A few minutes later, Lucia and I regrouped and got to work on our clandestine operation.
And for a while, things went pretty well.
That is until we got to the part where we needed to pour coffee onto the sheet of fake signatures.
As instead of pouring only a tiny bit of coffee onto the sheet of paper, Lucia somehow managed to spill out the entire bottle.
In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have entrusted a task that requires discretion to someone who was willing to blast their brother with fire over a minor slight.
“Lucia… how exactly did you manage to get the entire room drenched in coffee with just a bottle of the stuff?”
I said with an annoyed expression on my face, before grabbing a roll of paper towels from a nearby cupboard and tossing it over to Lucia.
“Hey, it’s not my fault that some people can’t fuckin seal their products properly.”
“When you were prying the bottle open, you looked like a deer in headlights. I highly doubt that the seal was the main problem in this situation.”
“Just be quiet and help me clean this shit up before Anne comes back. Also what the hell are headlights?”
Ah right, there aren’t any cars in this world.
“…Lights that are attached to heads, obviously.”
“What the fuck does that have to do with anything?”
Lucia replied while looking at me as if she were looking at a hairless cat.
“You wouldn’t understand even if I explained it to you.”
“Then why’d you say something like that in the first place, dumbass?”
“Has anyone ever told you that you ask way too many questions?”
I deflected before grabbing another roll of paper towels from the cupboard for myself and started to help Lucia wipe down the marble floor of the student council room.
“You can be really irritating sometimes you know?”
“Oh I’m well aware, you remind me just about every other day.”
About an hour later, Lucia and I finished cleaning up and began browsing through the council room’s bookshelves for good reading material since we didn’t have anything better to do.
And after a bit of searching and not finding anything interesting, we just settled on grabbing a random book off of the shelf.
The book we ended up grabbing was titled Vermillion Gardens and from a first glance seemed to just be another generic romcom novel.
So going into it, Lucia and I weren’t expecting much.
“Why are we even bothering to read this?”
Lucia said with a hint of irritation in her voice, after she finished skimming through the poorly worded synopsis on the back of the book.
“Because we don’t have any better options available to us right now.”
I said simply.
In turn Lucia just sighed, before scooching a bit closer to me so that I could get a better look at the text.
About 2 chapters in, the pessimistic outlook that we had going into the novel gradually started to fade away.
As by then we realized that the prose in Vermillion Gardens was better than most of the other novels we read in the past month.
Moreover, the protagonist wasn’t completely dense or insufferable either.
Frankly, if it weren’t for the fact that the cover for the novel was misleading, this thing probably wouldn’t be gathering dust in the student council room.
I guess the saying “don't judge a book by its cover” has some merit after all.
Which is pretty inconvenient for me, as a certain someone is currently making it really difficult for me to judge a book by its contents.
“Oi, could you maybe stop flipping through the pages so quickly? I can barely read the top part of each page.”
“Ah sorry, I forgot that you have the reading speed of a turtle that’s got shit eyesight.”
Lucia retorted sardonically before flipping through four more pages.
“...Did you just start reading faster?”
“What? No, of course not.”
Lucia said, sarcastically.
“Then could you go back just like two pages?”
I said while attempting to grab the left side of the novel.
“I could, but I don’t really want to.”
Lucia said, before pulling the book away from me and quickly skimming through the page that she was currently reading.
“Okay, now you’re just being petty.”
“You’re the one that’s acting like a kindergartner who’s gotten their toy confiscated.”
“And what would that make you? A greedy preschooler who can’t help but hog everything to themselves?”
I remarked, while grabbing at the right side of the novel.
In turn, Lucia just moved her arm upward slightly, making it so that the novel was just out of the range of my attack.
“Too slow, idiot.”
“Alright, the gloves are coming off.”
I retorted with a smidge of indignation in my voice before grabbing at both of Lucia’s wrists.
And for the first time during this entire exchange, one of my attacks finally connected.
Unfortunately, it did not create the results I was looking for… as instead of just causing Lucia to lose her grip on the novel, the maneuver caused her to lose her balance and fall on top of me.
“…Sorry about that.”
I apologized before helping Lucia get back up to her feet.
“Nah, it’s my fault… I shouldn’t have assumed that someone like you wouldn’t resort to using underhanded tactics.”
Lucia said while avoiding eye contact with me.
“So uh… you wanna get back to reading Vermillion Gardens and forget that this ever happened?”
“Dumbass, do you really think that I could forget something like this?”
“Fair enough… then could we just get back to reading Vermillion Gardens?”
“I’ve got no objections to that.”
Lucia said hurriedly before quickly grabbing ahold of the novel and looking for the spot where we stopped at.
Which in turn, gave me a few seconds to mentally go over the events that just transpired.
…There's no way that my heart started racing because of that right?
Yeah, it must’ve just been a trick of the mind… right?
A few minutes later, Lucia and I regrouped and got to work on our clandestine operation.
And for a while, things went pretty well.
That is until we got to the part where we needed to pour coffee onto the sheet of fake signatures.
As instead of pouring only a tiny bit of coffee onto the sheet of paper, Lucia somehow managed to spill out the entire bottle.
In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have entrusted a task that requires discretion to someone who was willing to blast their brother with fire over a minor slight.
“Lucia… how exactly did you manage to get the entire room drenched in coffee with just a bottle of the stuff?”
I said with an annoyed expression on my face, before grabbing a roll of paper towels from a nearby cupboard and tossing it over to Lucia.
“Hey, it’s not my fault that some people can’t fuckin seal their products properly.”
“When you were prying the bottle open, you looked like a deer in headlights. I highly doubt that the seal was the main problem in this situation.”
“Just be quiet and help me clean this shit up before Anne comes back. Also what the hell are headlights?”
Ah right, there aren’t any cars in this world.
“…Lights that are attached to heads, obviously.”
“What the fuck does that have to do with anything?”
Lucia replied while looking at me as if she were looking at a hairless cat.
“You wouldn’t understand even if I explained it to you.”
“Then why’d you say something like that in the first place, dumbass?”
“Has anyone ever told you that you ask way too many questions?”
I deflected before grabbing another roll of paper towels from the cupboard for myself and started to help Lucia wipe down the marble floor of the student council room.
“You can be really irritating sometimes you know?”
“Oh I’m well aware, you remind me just about every other day.”
About an hour later, Lucia and I finished cleaning up and began browsing through the council room’s bookshelves for good reading material since we didn’t have anything better to do.
And after a bit of searching and not finding anything interesting, we just settled on grabbing a random book off of the shelf.
The book we ended up grabbing was titled Vermillion Gardens and from a first glance seemed to just be another generic romcom novel.
So going into it, Lucia and I weren’t expecting much.
“Why are we even bothering to read this?”
Lucia said with a hint of irritation in her voice, after she finished skimming through the poorly worded synopsis on the back of the book.
“Because we don’t have any better options available to us right now.”
I said simply.
In turn Lucia just sighed, before scooching a bit closer to me so that I could get a better look at the text.
About 2 chapters in, the pessimistic outlook that we had going into the novel gradually started to fade away.
As by then we realized that the prose in Vermillion Gardens was better than most of the other novels we read in the past month.
Moreover, the protagonist wasn’t completely dense or insufferable either.
Frankly, if it weren’t for the fact that the cover for the novel was misleading, this thing probably wouldn’t be gathering dust in the student council room.
I guess the saying “don't judge a book by its cover” has some merit after all.
Which is pretty inconvenient for me, as a certain someone is currently making it really difficult for me to judge a book by its contents.
“Oi, could you maybe stop flipping through the pages so quickly? I can barely read the top part of each page.”
“Ah sorry, I forgot that you have the reading speed of a turtle that’s got shit eyesight.”
Lucia retorted sardonically before flipping through four more pages.
“...Did you just start reading faster?”
“What? No, of course not.”
Lucia said, sarcastically.
“Then could you go back just like two pages?”
I said while attempting to grab the left side of the novel.
“I could, but I don’t really want to.”
Lucia said, before pulling the book away from me and quickly skimming through the page that she was currently reading.
“Okay, now you’re just being petty.”
“You’re the one that’s acting like a kindergartner who’s gotten their toy confiscated.”
“And what would that make you? A greedy preschooler who can’t help but hog everything to themselves?”
I remarked, while grabbing at the right side of the novel.
In turn, Lucia just moved her arm upward slightly, making it so that the novel was just out of the range of my attack.
“Too slow, idiot.”
“Alright, the gloves are coming off.”
I retorted with a smidge of indignation in my voice before grabbing at both of Lucia’s wrists.
And for the first time during this entire exchange, one of my attacks finally connected.
Unfortunately, it did not create the results I was looking for… as instead of just causing Lucia to lose her grip on the novel, the maneuver caused her to lose her balance and fall on top of me.
“…Sorry about that.”
I apologized before helping Lucia get back up to her feet.
“Nah, it’s my fault… I shouldn’t have assumed that someone like you wouldn’t resort to using underhanded tactics.”
Lucia said while avoiding eye contact with me.
“So uh… you wanna get back to reading Vermillion Gardens and forget that this ever happened?”
“Dumbass, do you really think that I could forget something like this?”
“Fair enough… then could we just get back to reading Vermillion Gardens?”
“I’ve got no objections to that.”
Lucia said hurriedly before quickly grabbing ahold of the novel and looking for the spot where we stopped at.
Which in turn, gave me a few seconds to mentally go over the events that just transpired.
…There's no way that my heart started racing because of that right?
Yeah, it must’ve just been a trick of the mind… right?
