Bestest Friend

I was at my desk resting my right cheek on my palm. Some of the classroom's windows were open to let in the natural breeze that mid-May brought in the morning. I started working on a poem that I knew wasn't going to be satisfactory. Nevertheless, I was deep in thought while staring at the courtyard where I could hear and see the wind rustling and taking leaves.

A loud thud was heard behind me on the other side of the classroom. I heard faint gasps from startled classmates, but wasn't bothered by it enough to face the cause. I twirled my eraser between the fingers of my left hand.

A loud "You!" echoed in the room, but even that didn't make me look. I had assumed it was the usual rowdy classmates that were too energized for the morning. However, silence followed the bellowing call, which was unusual.

My right ear twitched before hearing a tapping sound on my desk. I jolted from my relaxed posture, looking towards my classmate. His heterochromatic orange and red hair glossed in the morning. I looked down to his finger that was pointed at the classroom's rear door. My head turned to see a girl in the doorway.

She made herself big, having her feet at shoulder-width and elbows bent so her fists were on her hips. She looked directly at me with narrowing eyes like I was her prey. I was a little intimidated by her, but didn't let it show on the outside.

She raised her right to the sky and brought it down to point a finger straight at me. Without a care for making a racket, she said aloud,
"Is yer name 'Poet-kun'?"

My entire expression changed in an instant. My moon-eyes directly answered her. Only one person called me by that name, but it wasn't this random girl standing right in front of me. The way she sounded and the energy she emitted were different.
Who's she?

The first bell rang, meaning homeroom was starting in four minutes, but I had a dilemma; I wasn't in class. I left my schoolbag on my desk, so the teacher should know I was present. This random girl had – not physically – dragged me to the flower garden on the other side of school.

The morning breeze on my right forearm was suddenly cold. The random girl stood in front of me as I stared down at the grass below our feet. Without having to look, I knew she was fiercely staring at me. Her arms were crossed and one foot was tapping on the ground.

I had a suspicion as we were walking to the garden and I noticed her hair: She was the mysterious girl who sometimes watered the plants here. I never saw the front of her because she entered and left from another area, not the narrow passage. I wouldn't speak first, which led to her breaking the frigid ice.

"Oi, what's yer relation to Yuri-chan?" she asked.
Her dialect was rather rural.

The fact she referred to the girl from the hedge with "-chan" led me to believe she was a friend – which wouldn't be a surprise at all. I didn't answer her, which prompted another question.

"Who are ya?"

I responded, "I'd rather not say my name to someone who looks like they're goin' to rip me apart."

She muttered a little "Ah..." followed by a shift in posture. I slightly looked up so my eyes were around the height of her chest, but I'd shift them to the right so I could look past and see her in my peripherals. She rubbed her face with her hands and lightly slapped her cheeks to refresh herself.

"Sorry," she sighed, surprising me. "I haven't got the whole 'friendly approach' stuff down yet; it's harder than it looks. I didn't mean to intimidate'cha like that, or put'cha on the spot in the classroom."
Her speech was moderately fast for me to understand immediately.

"D-Don't worry about that."
I looked up a bit further, and focused my fixation on her face.

She was looking slightly to her left.
"I must've been in overprotective mode again without even realizing."

She had a naturally sporty figure that appeared to be more boyish and taller than my own. Her gradient blue hair was around shoulder-length, and adding to that, her eyes were heterochromatic; pink and purple. This only made me ponder what kind of features another girl I had in mind must've had.

I said, "I-I know I didn't answer your question, but can I ask what you want from me?"

"Answers," she said coldly.
She put her right hand to her chest as she declared,
"I'm Yuri-chan's bestest friend, the girl who's known her since first grade. I know everything about her."

Or so you think.

"Or so I thought," the girl's friend continued. "She's been acting weird all week as we studied together. It was like something was missing, or she was missing something."
She had also confirmed my suspicions about watering the garden's plants.
"Ya made me curious about what a boy would do alone in the garden, and I have to say, it was quite a sad sight to see."

Alrighty then, quite unnecessary, I thought.

"That was until last Friday, when I saw Yuri head to the garden. I went over to talk to her, but then ya arrived and sat down on the other side of the hedge. I saw both'o ya talking but I couldn't hear about what."

So that made you question our "relationship"? Fair.

"I had to go for volleyball practice, but when it ended, I returned to the garden and saw ya leave. She stayed, but she seemed bummed out."

O-Oh, she must've really wanted me to join the club...
I shifted my eyes to the flower shrubs where I had left the girl the week before.

The girl's friend started pacing back and forth.
"On Monday, Yuri-chan helped us study at the library. This might just be my imagination, or some test anxiety, but I don't think she wanted to be there. But as the days went by, she began acting normal again. Yesterday, she told us she wouldn't be at the library today, and I asked what happened to make her excited all of a sudden."
The girl's friend stopped pacing and sharply turned her head to me.
"Yuri-chan told me she's 'going to meet with Poet-kun again!' with a smile that could cure diseases."

Awh shoot... I thought.

"I know she's talking about ya, and I want to know how someone she's never told me about changed her mood for an entire week."

The bell rang to begin homeroom. I was late.
That was exactly what I didn't want, to know about the girl and get roped into her stuff. Our interactions at the hedge weren't supposed to affect our lives outside of it, but here I stood. Saying that, knowing she was also looking forward to the end of the week made me grin ever so slightly.

*Stop that.*

In order to not reveal the girl's secret to her friend, I couldn't tell the truth about what we talked about in the garden, but I didn't necessarily have to lie either. From a certain point of view, anything could be true.

I looked at the girl's tomboyish friend and told her the truth...according to me.
"She's tutorin' me, sort of."
Apparently it wasn't irregular for her to tutor someone, so that excuse seemed believable. I only hoped that she didn't question why we sat with a hedge between us.

Believing the conversation had reached its end, I began walking away from the garden to my classroom. I expected a protest from her, seeing as she dubbed herself overprotective and appearing like she could take down a grizzly bear, but she stayed behind.

"Oi! She may be naturally friendly, but she's also a sensitive girl, ya know! Her words always tell her true feelings so don't just hear her out, listen carefully! If you hurt her, I'll kill you."

Noted.
I trembled. I could only assume that was best friend code for how serious she was.

I knew the girl was naturally friendly, which explained why I couldn't get away from her despite having plenty of reasons. I had been hearing her out, because that was what we agreed on. The girl didn't want me to listen to her carefully, and yet, I took her friend's word to heart.

After that, school went by without worry. I was at the garden after the final dismissal bell, and saw the same calendar at my spot. A part of me wondered if the tomboyish friend was watching, but nevertheless, what I had waited for all day–– all week, had come. I had to make sure this ended better than last time.