"Miyuki!"

The screech of my name halted me in my tracks. I briefly contemplated ignoring it but the anger in their tone didn't sound as if it'd end well for me if I did. And here I thought I was doing a pretty good job of not getting on people's bad-sides lately...

With a sigh, I spun around and wasn't even the slightest bit surprised to find the cause of all my nightmares—the devil herself, Suzuki-sensei—thrusting a sheet of paper all up in my face.

"Miyuki!" she shrieked yet again, practically shattering my eardrums. "What is the meaning of this?"

My body stiffened, and I tried my best to avoid her eyes as well as the other students' that were loitering around in the hall.

"Miyuki Hoshino, I am talking to you! Don't you dare ignore me!" I winced as she continued to yell. I reluctantly met her eyes, the back of my neck burning in embarrassment. Suzuki-sensei raised an eyebrow. "Are you going to answer me or not?"

"Uh..." I feebly began, swallowing hard. "Miyuki Hoshino is not available at the moment. Please leave a message after the beep—"

"No, I will leave a message right now!" she bellowed. "And she better be available if she knows what's good for her!"

I jolted, not really expecting her ballistic anger. Was she that mad? "Um, uh—" I spoke again.

"Hasn't being in a club taught you anything yet?" she cut me off with a snap. "You've obviously cheered up since you joined so make it evident in the essays I assign. Instead of how wishing on these... Dragon Balls can somehow bring the dead back to life!"

I let out a small snort in remembrance to that reference I had made in my essay. Then, I frowned. "I didn't change at all, sensei," I informed her easily. "I'm still the same old but young Miyuki Hoshino you know. That just goes to show that my involvement with that club is pointless. So does that mean I can leave that club today—"

"No," she enunciated, hands at her hips.

I puffed my cheeks. "Aww."

"—Anyway!" she said and yanked me by the ear. "You're coming with me! It seems I need to give you yet another lecture about your horrible grades!"

"No!" I whined, flailing my arms. "Somebody, save me!"

"Nobody's coming to save you," she hissed, dragging my sorry self down the hall. "Your goddamn nerve all the time... You'll need a hearing aid after I'm done with you!"

——————————————————

"She's been lying there like that ever since she came in here..."

"Do you think she's okay?" Wannabe asked.

"I heard Suzuki-sensei yelling at her in the halls," said Hiro. "'Got cornered because of her grades."

"What, really?" asked Yuji in surprise. "I overheard a bit, but... Suzuki-sensei was that mad because of her marks?"

From where I was laying, I traced the lines of the ceiling, making imaginary pictures in my head. My ears were still ringing and whenever I closed my eyelids, her evil face appeared. Man... that was absolutely horrible. How could such an old person be filled with so much rage? It was like she was a ticking time bomb, and I was the idiot who always managed to cut the red wire that made her explode times and times again.

But compared to a bomb, she was one hundred times more destructive...

"Are Mi-chan's grades that bad?" I heard Saki ask the others. "She always slacks in class, but..."

"Looks to me she should try harder," Yuji insisted.

"She should," agreed Wannabe. "Why doesn't she?"

"Her brain's full of nothing but anime so that's probably why," Hiro said in reply, narrowing his eyes. "But if that's the case, I don't think she deserves—"

Deserves? My ears perked. Immediately, my eyes darted right and left to spot what Hiro was referring to. When met with nothing, I lurched upwards from the couch, hastening towards him with brightened eyes. "You got something for me?" I thrusted out my hands, grinning from ear to ear. "Then what are you waiting for? Gimme, gimme—"

"Never gets," Hiro snapped, instantly downgrading my mood. "Get your hands away from me. I don't have anything for you."

Pursing my lips, I retreated my hands back. "Then why the heck did you say you did?"

"I didn't." He rolled his eyes, scoffing as he continued, "But even if I did, you obviously don't deserve it if you're failing all your classes."

"I'm not failing all of my classes." As the words left my mouth, I cringed. "Most, a bit, but—"

"Even if you like this anime stuff so much, you shouldn't fail your classes, Mi-chan!" Saki scolded, joining Hiro. "Midterm exams are coming up soon too!"

I breathed loudly, sagging my shoulders. "What does it matter? My poor excuses of my grades shouldn't even concern you people."

"What are you saying, Hoshino? Just like the saying 'if one body part hurts, the entire body will suffer;' if one of us fails, we all automatically fail!" Tamaki-Wannabe strolled up to me, clenching his fists in determination. "We have to strive to be the best we can together! You can do it!"

My expression fell. Similar to if I were being blinded by the sun, I had to shade my eyes for a bit. "Is this what people call an optimist?" I murmured. "So those actually exist...?"

"Miyuki," Yuji piped in. "Although you say you're fine, didn't Suzuki-sensei say you have to get a tutor?"

Shifting my attention away from Mr Sunshine in front of me, I raised an eyebrow at him. "Tutor...? Did she say that?" I asked. "And how do you know?"

"I was passing by her office and heard lots of screaming and colourful—and I mean, extremely colourful—words coming from her mouth," he answered, teetering on his chair and grimacing at the memory. "I thought you did something worse than horrible but I'm surprised it was only because of your grades."

"See," I said, puffing my cheeks. "Feel for me a little guys. She overreacts over every little thing."

Shutting my eyes, I tried to recall that very topic of a tutor but nothing came to mind. To be completely honest, I blanked out the moment she started yelling, which wasn't uncommon considering I tuned out all of her lectures.

My shoulders sagged even more. But, a tutor? I'm pretty sure my averages were a solid D+ so it didn't exactly need much improvement. Besides, getting tutored by an instructor did not sound like a good idea at all. It was way too time-consuming.

"I'm fine," I mumbled for the umpteenth time.

"Not you're not," Yuji said. "Hiro, you're good at math aren't you?"

Hiro shrugged. "It's an easy class."

At his reply, Yuji clasped onto my shoulders. "Great! Tutor Miyuki then. If she doesn't pass the math midterm there's a chance she'll have to repeat the grade!"

The moment I glanced up at Hiro, we both flinched. Disgust consumed both of our faces. I wiggled out from Yuji's hold to glare at him.

"Yuji, what the heck?" I demanded.

"Yeah! Me, help her?" Hiro agreed. "That's impossible!"

"Yeah, that's—" I stopped myself to look at him. "Wait, what do you mean impossible? Are you implying that I'm incapable of being taught?"

"Huh? No I'm not," Hiro refuted. "I just meant—"

"That you think it's impossible for me to absorb any kind of information," I finished for him, folding my arms over my chest. "Just because I have a low grade you're looking down on my math abilities is that it?"

"I was trying to make a point," Hiro seethed after a pause. "Why're you taking this so seriously?"

"Because your point is offensive," I retorted back. "I think the reason you're saying this is 'impossible' is because you don't believe you're good enough at math to tutor me, not the other way around."

"Yes I am. Helping you would be easy!"

"Why don't you prove it then?"

He squared his shoulders. "Maybe I will."

"Wait, wait," Saki whispered in the background, "so Hiro is helping Mi-chan with math?"

"I guess so..." Yuji murmured, in awe as both Hiro and I scowled at each other.

"Their friendship is really refreshing." Beamed Wannabe as he watched this unfold with stars in his eyes.

Both Yuji and Saki sweatdropped.

"They look ready to kill each other, Kazuya," Saki murmured with a forced smile.

"Learn to read a mood," sighed Yuji.

"H-huh...?"