"We shouldn't be here."

"Too late." Igarashi chucked the menu at my chest. He slid into the seat across from me. "We're eating 'til we're stuffed."

"At nine in the morning?"

"That a problem?"

I couldn't suppress a snort.

A huge grin poked into his cheeks, bringing a twinkle to his awe-inspiring green eyes.

"It's on me so order whatever you want. Desserts are fair game too."

"Is eating the solution to all your problems?"

"There's never been a single situation it hasn't helped. Now order before I change my mind."

I gnawed on my lower lip.

We'd ditched school twenty minutes ago. He led me through inconspicuous pathways and alleyways, slipping through the tiniest crevices, until finally arriving at a cafe reasonably far-off from campus. He hadn't asked what had gotten me down, though I'd argue he already knew.

He knew yet here he was cheering me up.

One moment he could be the most aggravating cockroach to walk the face of the planet and the next, shockingly considerate. Like two people crammed into a single—and very much tiny—body, I had no idea how to go about digesting it.

Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined I'd publicly break down into tears, let alone in front of the jerk I was sure would torment me to my last breath for it. Him dragging me to a cafe of all places to treat me was a bizarre spectacle as well.

By and by I sifted through the various breakfast and lunch commodities; even skipped ahead to the sweets section. Occasionally, I peered up to find Igarashi grinning widely to himself as he scanned his own menu. Wherever he went, whatever he did, he was blatantly obvious. He wore his emotions on his sleeve—something I wished to emulate.

I released the menu with an exaggerated breath. "I hate you."

He jolted. Whipped his head upward, jaw-slacked. "Hate me? Do you know how much I'm doing for you, woman?"

"Yep. And I hate it." My focus drifted out the open window, spilling warm beams of light against my face and neck. "You should've left me alone."

"I would've if I could. But you were begging for help. Sobbing on the floor like that."

I couldn't tell if I was blushing or if the heat of the sun was scalding my skin.

"I wouldn't have been on the floor if you hadn't blocked my way. Let me make myself clear: I neither asked for your help nor your sympathy."

"Don't you think it's a little late for scorn?" He pulled a face. "I don't offer to feed just anyone, you know."

I knew. The way he scarfed our meals the last time we went out to eat spoke volumes.

"Besides," he said, "it's common courtesy to accept people's kindness. So accept it."

Flatlining my mouth, I raked him over one last. He beckoned I raise the menu a second time.

I didn't.

My mind was swirling. Bound by countless thoughts. Heart heavy like lead in my chest.

"You hate being indebted to me that much?"

"It's not that."

"Then what is it?"

I chewed the inside of my cheek.

Why are you comforting me when it's obvious you couldn't care less about my well-being?

The question was so, so clear amidst my swarming sanity, but I couldn't muster the confidence to utter it. Whatever the reason, we were here. He was consoling me.

None of it made sense.

I wasn't sure how to make sense of it.

Therefore, doing what any girl in my situation would, I scooped that board into my palms and requested everything on the dessert menu.

"I hope you go broke," I muffled between bites of the strawberry shortcake I was shovelling onto my tongue.

I inhaled my pint of cookies 'n cream ice cream. Part of me hoped doing so would cave this illusion I found myself trapped in, or piss him off to his senses, but it was halfway through my apple pie did I realize my vision had blurred.

"And b-bald."

Igarashi gazed at me with utter indifference in his eyes. He didn't make any move for the chocolate chip pancakes he ordered.

I rubbed the tears strolling down my cheeks with one arm while shoving more sweets into my mouth with my other. Unfortunately, eating didn't cease my trembling jaw. "Midget. Cockroach."

"Are you crying or picking a fight? Choose one."

"I'm not c-crying."

"You look pretty teary-eyed to me."

"Fix your eyesight, then," I snivelled. "Because I'm n-not."

"Yeah, yeah." He cracked a grin. "I never would've guessed you'd be so sensitive, Kisaragi. Or piggish. I'm glad I worked those extra shifts."

I smacked his arm.

Wincing, he retreated, then sent me a frosty glare.

"Extra shifts?"

He took his first bite of his pancakes. "I work part-time at a ramen shop," he replied. "I'm saving up money. Or, at least, I was saving up until I offered a giant an all-you-can-eat buffet. Now I'll be lucky if I come out of this with any clothes on my back."

He earned himself a malicious scowl with that one.

Reclining in my seat, I suppressed my waterworks the best I could. The prospect of Igarashi working was enough to warrant shock, but my curiosity had been piqued for an alternative reason.

"Saving up for what?"

He momentarily hummed.

"Forget it. If I tell you, you'll laugh."

"I won't."

"Yeah, right."

I forced his eyes to mine. "I won't."

He stalled, as if searching for falsehood behind my statement. But, I meant what I said. Igarashi could've ridiculed me from the moment I bawled like an idiot in the school courtyard. He could've snapped pictures to hold against me as blackmail. Yet, instead, he'd taken me to wallow my sorrows in desserts—going so far as to ditch alongside me—to ultimately improve my mood.

He warned me about Kamakiri. I chose not to listen. I reaped what I sowed. He had no obligation to go so far for me after that. In fact, if the roles were reversed, and he'd suffered heartbreak for something I previously cautioned him about, I'd have called him a moron and put the case at rest like that.

So, then, why. . .

"Still not telling."

My mouth plummeted.

He chuckled under his breath. "Whether you laugh or not, I have no intention to. Add it to the list of 'mysterious charms' that constitute Toru Igarashi. Now, eat. We have somewhere to be after this."

I admit, I was wonderstruck. For a lot of reasons.

Toru Igarashi was. . .

"Why are we at a karaoke bar?"

It might've been pointless to ask considering we'd already entered one of the soundproof rooms and Igarashi was tapping the machine for a song to belch.

He beckoned the microphone.

"You have a lot of pent-up steam. Your mind is all over the place; that's why you're an emotional wreck."

"And?"

"Scream your heart out. It'll make you feel better."

I eyeballed the mic. The music blaring from the speakers pursed my mouth. "Mortal Mania? Really?"

"There's nothing better than rock and roll."

The idea was bizarre. Shrieking your frustrations and anger through song? What was this, the anime Aggretsuko?

As the piercing music thumped in my ears, memories of Kamakiri flooded my mind. and I found myself gritting my teeth and balling my fists before long.

I'd begun insulting him before I realized. His misleading handsome face and asshole personality. The audacity for him to play me like a fiddle and insult me thereafter. For tricking me into heading into the haunted house and abandoning me. I'd even slandered myself for being such a gullible idiot, and my classmates for insulting me for being tall. Somehow I'd brought up Mao, too, and my frustration for her forgetting to shut my bedroom door when she'd paid a late night visit.

Through it all, amidst multiple songs of me teeming it all out, Igarashi spurned me on. Clapping, laughing, and agreeing with every snub (even about myself). He offhandedly validated each and every single one of my frustrations and rage with an annoying grin taking up three quarters of his face.

When I finally finished, huffing with unintentional tears staining my cheeks for the umpteenth time today, Igarashi was a sniggering mess.

"Crying again?" he teased as I flopped into the seat next to him. "You're such a mess, Kisaragi."

"Shut up," I sniffled, rubbing at my face.

Because I was so focused on concealing my mortifying state, I hardly noticed he'd leaped to his feet.

Him setting his palm onto my headtop, and giving it a gentle ruffle, was the least of my expectations also.

But when I peered up, he'd already clasped the second microphone in his hand, and chosen a song.

"After such a wonderful performance, I've gotta keep up." He spun around to face me. Cheeks red from his broad smile, he flashed me a peace sign. The room brightened another notch—parting the gloomy clouds of my heart. It was like I was staring into the sun itself. "I guarantee at least a smile by the end of the performance. Until then, I ask you please withhold any and all waterworks."

He hadn't needed to "ask." At that moment, I'd long forgotten the reason I was crying. And when he started singing, it grated on my ears. He was horrible—tone-deaf in its purest definition. But he was enjoying himself to the fullest. Even professional comedians had nothing on his level of goofiness. I wasn't sure when it'd happened, but before I knew it, I was laughing. Singing alongside him just as wretchedly. It didn't matter how bad I sounded. Or our bad blood that'd left us at each other's throats for months. Even our height differences. Right then and there, we were just two hopeless dorks who happened to be obsessed with the same band.

"That's how it should be."

He'd stopped without warning, leaving me in a heap of confusion.

The blaring Mortal Mania album had become white noise.

He beamed up at me.

"That smile suits you better than those needless tears," he said. "Don't be stupid and cry over idiots who only care about height or getting a laugh. There's way more to you than that and Kamakiri's an asshole for not realizing it."

"Igarashi..."

"Do ya' understand?" He stuck out his tongue. "I better not see such an ugly crying face again."

"U-ugly?" I sputtered.

Soon, he was laughing his butt off. Albeit peeved, I could only glare at his antics.

Igarashi was a lot more than I gave him credit for.

Maybe I was too fixated on looking up. It'd become my obsession—my distaste for having looked down my entire life. I'd somehow convinced myself that looking up would grant me something. A miracle. A tall boy. Something that'd reassure my height's all right. And yet it wasn't a tall boy, but this midget who was consoling me—conveying that maybe I wasn't meant to be alone after all. That maybe I needed to start focusing on those around me—what I had, opposed to what I didn't.

That was possibly the answer I was searching for all along.