Saturday, August 28, Morning

Kotone Koizumi

Rap Club. Tape, drop, fire, mix spit. Wait, what? I rubbed my eyes. There was a dull pain compressing my head.

The words seemed to dance before my eyes and rearrange themselves. Now, it read: Rap Club. Drop your mixtape and learn to spit fire. That made more sense. Mondays at room C301. The advisor signature looked forged.

I hovered over their status column, then keyed, ‘r-e-j-e-c-t.’ Their application lacked a time, and didn’t list an advisor.

It was really hard to keep my eyes open. I rubbed them again.

Focus, Kotone!

Bartender Society. Friday after school in the cooking room. Advisor: Hawthorne. Signature provided. They’d also provided a list of activities as well as a list of (non-alcoholic) drinks. Not bad. Table. Were it up to me, I’d tentatively reject and ask them to rebrand to avoid unfortunate implications. But it’s not up to me. It’s up to the legislative council, when they get elected.

‘T-a-b-l-e.’

I typed with one hand and leaned my cheek against the other. Shoot. I could go for an energy drink, right about now. Maybe one of Erin’s ‘magic elixirs.’ I shuddered. Ha-ha, just kidding. Said elixir was coffee, brewed with cherry Monster. I’m pretty sure anything more than a small dose of that should kill a fully grown human, but I guess Erin isn’t human.

Fry Cook Club. Paperwork checks out… I think. I blinked, twice. I covered my mouth. Don’t yawn. Don’t give in to it. Fight through it. Take a deep breath.

In, out. In--

Wham.

My head hurt. It could be the lack of sleep, but I think, at the moment, that was an indirect cause. The direct cause, then, would be the fact that my hand slipped and my head had hit the table.

The door to the student council office opened. I heard footsteps approach from behind. Slowly, I lifted my aching head, and looked at the newcomer.

“Oh, Judy. Morning.”

Judy nodded. “You’re here early.”

I laughed. “Yup. No rest for the wicked.” Well, I’d told myself that I could sleep in today (so I could stay up later), but I ended up waking up early anyways. There has to be a word for that.

She sat down, adjusted her glasses, and began hammering away at her own laptop. Without realizing it, I’d reached up and adjusted my (nonexistent) glasses. Maybe it was the sleep deprivation. Or maybe, it was because I thought the gesture was kind of cool. Maybe that admission itself was a result of sleep deprivation.

Okay, back to work. Focus, Kotone. Focus.

Judy tilted her head. “Huh… That’s odd...”

“Something wrong?”

“No, it’s nothing. It’s just, something about this… this… application, isn’t working properly.”

I half-closed my laptop. “Anything I can help with?”

Without hesitating, Judy said, “No, don’t bother. You know, technical difficulties. I’m sure it’ll sort itself out.”

Well, given that it’s Judy, I’m sure she’ll make it work. After a couple minutes, she went back to typing at her computer. I followed suite.

At some point, Judy must’ve left the room. I looked up from my computer; her seat was empty, though her things were still on the table. My eyes looked down on the clock. It’d been over an hour since I last looked at it.

Oh, jeez. Where did the time even go? I swear I just looked at it a moment ago. I must’ve lost focus, or something.

Concentrate!

The door opened again, behind me. Judy stepped back in and placed a bottle of ice coffee on the table in front of me.

“For you.”

“How much was it?”

“Don’t worry about that.” She adjusted her glasses. “It’s not much, but I’ll do what I can. Don’t fall asleep again.”

‘Again.’ I guess I must’ve been sleeping just now. That would explain things. I uncapped the bottle and took a large swig. It was way sweeter (and way less strong) than what Jacob would brew at work. I guess that’s what you get from vending machine coffee.

“You’re working hard,” Judy said. She let a rare smile. “That’s our Committee Chair.”

I grinned back. “But of course. This is my job.”

Judy nodded. “I know, I know--”

The moment I set down the bottle, my phone started ringing. The caller ID listed it as a ‘private number.’

“Hello?”

The other end was silent, but I thought I could make out someone breathing.

“Um… hello? Is someone there?”

The line went dead.

“Who was it?” Judy asked.

“No one. I thought I heard something, though.” I put my phone back to sleep and set it on the table next. “Spooky.”

“Probably a junk call.” Judy sat back down at her computer and pulled open the screen. “Hey, my connection issues are gone.”

“Maybe they’re connected,’ I said. “The phone call is actually a mysterious hacker trying to get into my phone and caused connection problems in the process.”

Judy was looking at me like I was out of my mind. Maybe I was.

“Joking, joking.” Note to self. Spend less time with Leo and the Hero Club. Not that I had spent that much time with them since the semester started.

Her dubious look lingered for a moment longer, before she kicked back and sighed. “I should be happy that the site works properly now, but what it actually means is that I don’t have an excuse to slack off.” She laughed. “Hey, Kotone--”

Before she could continue talking, the door opened, and banged against the wall behind it. I leapt up in my seat and banged my knees against the table.

“Ow…”

“Do either of you have a red pen?” I turned around. It was Carla. She walked in, holding a stack of papers. Carla pulled out a black pen and extended her hand. “I’ll lay this down as collateral.”

“I’ve got one,” I said. I pushed my laptop half-closed and rummaged through my bag. It was a complete mess. When was the last time I’d cleaned this dump up? But I eventually found one. “Here.”

“Thanks.” Carla left the pen on the table. “Use it however you like. I’ll return for it later.” With that, she left.

After a brief pause, I turned back to Judy. “Sorry, what were you saying?”

“Discuss a moment in life where you overcame a challenge and helped someone else grow. Any ideas?”

“For me, or for you?”

“Anything goes. I just want to get accepted into college.”

I said, “I couldn’t imagine you having any problems with a prompt like that.” Despite the fact that I’m technically her superior, I’ve deferred to her plenty through the years, and I feel like that’s not going to change going forward. Her, and the previous Social Committee Chair.

I paused. Kind of makes you wonder what I’m doing here, huh? As much as I respect my predecessor, she was kind of an airhead enough of the time to make one at least wonder.

Wasn’t Judy a lot more qualified than I was?

“It’s not that simple,” Judy was saying. “What they’re looking for isn’t actually an answer to the question.”

“They’re not? Then why ask the question?”

She uncapped her own bottle of coffee and downed a gulp. “The question is just a way to see if you’re the kind of person they want. If you’re special.” She set it down. “If you’ll become someone that’ll bring fame to the school.”

Something didn’t sit right with the way she phrased it, but I let her continue.

“More famous alumni, more applicants. More applicants, more rejections. More rejections, more ‘selectiveness,’ and ergo, a better reputation. Better reputation, better funding. It all comes back to the money.” Wry smile from Judy.

That’s awfully cynical. “Well, whatever you say.”

“Nah, whatever you say. So, as one of these special few, have anything that might help us mere plebs?”

“Stop messing with me. I’m not special or anything.”

“Executive council as a junior. That’s gotta count for something.”

I mean, it just means that I’m the only one on the Executive Council who isn’t being crushed by the weight of college applications yet. I thought for a bit. “Well... I guess you could write about a time you helped a Social Committee youngin? You’ve done plenty of that in the past three years.”

She shook her head. “That’s not special.”

“Sure it is.”

“Being helpful won’t get you into college.”

That’s a depressing thought. “But you’re good at it. Aren’t they looking for special attributes? I think helping others like you do is pretty special.”

After a long pause, she leaned back in her chair and adjusted her glasses. “I guess I’ll give it some more thought. By the way, did you ever finish the flier designs? For the elections?”

“Oh. Shoot.” With all that’s been going on, it just slipped my mind. “Add that to the bucket list, I guess, huh?” Judy had told me earlier this week to ask Olivia for help with those. That seemed like so long ago.

Judy slumped back in her chair, but did not reply. I went back to typing.

“These past three years really flew by… what was I doing, even?” Judy pulled her glasses off her face, and closed her eyes.

I didn’t know what to say to that.

“Hey, Kotone,” she said. “Did I do it wrong?”

“What do you mean by that?”

There was no answer. After staring at the ceiling for a long time, she opened her eyes, threw her spectacles back on, and adjusted them. “No… never mind. Thanks for the essay ideas.”

“Yeah, sure. Anytime.”

It was very quiet.