"Last night, I prepared it in case, and it sure is coming in handy," Rois mumbles to himself. I look at him, dumbfounded, and Xion and Leon both chuckle in sync. He wrote a whole page to defend himself and prevent ME from snapping!

"What the..." I whisper as the whole scene is about to unravel.

"We’re all waiting, you know," Xion urges Rois before he can respond to her.

"Yeah. Hurry up with your talk," Leon adds.

"Quiet down, you pricks, I’ll tell you blind brats myself!" she says when she’s clearly the loudest and the only brat present here “he fought idiots!”

Leon replies "I already knew that much."

"I guess you dumb ones can get the idea at least," she mocks running a hand through her hair and retying the bun.

"GET DOWN, PUNKS, THIS INSTANT!" a teacher shouts from below, hoping that she wouldn’t have to climb all the stairs "I SAID RIGHT NOW!".

Crap. It’s the vice principal! "Shit, we’re doomed," Xion lets us know beforehand, and Rois looked utterly devastated. He’s the class rep. He’ll get in trouble the most.

The vice principal struts towards us scowling in anguish for she had to climb stairs to yell at us.

"Thank god you’re here, ma'am. We had no idea what to do," Leon quickly rushes to the ma'am, really worried, and wiping his forehead, he adds, "She never came back."

"And worried sick, we looked for her and found her lying over here," Xion quickly adds.

"She has... I think low blood pressure," he sighs and nervously smiles "Could you please help my friend? Over there is the one. She just collapsed."

When he is done knitting the falsehood to save our necks, he starts panting out of worry. 

"Huh? She what?" Quickly, the principal unable to comprehend anything else darts forward to where the new girl is standing. Perturbed I look her way.

With her head held low, she stood leaning against the wall, holding Rois for support "Ah, no need, ma'am. I am okay," in a feeble voice, she says "I'm fine," breathing hard, she said, and put more weight on Rois’ arm. What the...I think I am in the wrong circle of beings. These are pure menaces and delinquents.

"Sh... lie down and don't say a word," ma'am tells her. "Go and fetch the nurse, boy," she tells Rois.

Nervously, Rois looks at Leon, but he nods confidently.

"But, miss, I am okay now. I just feel weak," she mumbled lying down, deliberately sliding the cigarette that she threw earlier under her shoe.

" you kids should eat more and be healthy. Are you a foreigner?" ma’am asks her about it.

"Ah, ever since my only guardian, my mom, left, I am having trouble, and yes, ma'am, I am a foreigner," she replies calmly.

“Oh, I'm sorry. Be in your uniform next time kid,” ma’am puts an end to the long conversation. The new girl vented to her a little bit about the problems that she deals with living alone, and Leon added some stuff too, and then they both sighed mid-sentence like old men in their forties. Two sentences of her issues slipped her mouth too but upon realizing it ma’am didn’t add anything else. Among all this me and the other knucklehead stood frozen in the background until the nurse arrived.

"Your blood pressure's good now, although you should take care of yourself, girl," the nurse says after checking her. "Eat more, you're all skin and bones."

In response, she simply nods and gives an apologetic smile. All of us sigh with relief together.

"See, I told you guys I was okay now," she says to all of us as she stands up. Rois looks so pale now.  

The nurse left as soon as she was done, and unfortunately, the vice principal felt the need to escort us to the class. 

"Anyone else feeling good?" Xion whispers as we all enter the classroom, huddled together me and Rois perturbed but I am not sure about these three.

"Feeling good, like I should," Leon whispers back.

"Quit yapping, you too," new girl didn’t whisper but said it out loud and the teacher stared at all of us blankly. I look at the clock and realize that in just five minutes, the class would have been over!

Xion whispers something and suddenly she needs support to stand, she puts her hand on Xion and starts looking all sick and tired.

“Oh hi there teach,” Leon says, smiling at the teacher as he walks around the class and sighing drops in his seat.

“That’s who they went to fetch, teacher,” Eva says, pointing at her. “As I said, they were worried that she seemed too careless and must have got lost, so they went to check and well.. are late because of that.”

Poor Eva is trying to cover for us, but this new girl is gritting her teeth and trying to refrain from saying something. I feel like there should be a leash for her.

"Tell you what, teach, she was lying unconscious on the roof just like Snow White, like totally unconscious," Leon flaps his hand rolling his eyes in a manner that suggests everyone else lacks sympathy for his falsehood but him.

"She had low blood pressure," Xion adds casually and drops in his seat. 

“Agh… you guys, I am okay!” delicately she walks over to the last seat and decently sits, crossing her legs. “Stop looking already. I said I am okay!” she manages to say calmly, and neither the teacher nor anyone else pried any further, although I am sure I heard her whisper ‘sh*theads’ at the end.

"What are you two doing standing there?" she asks me and Rois, and we both look at each other all mute. The bell rings, and everyone darts to the cafeteria leaving us stranded in the door frame.