Maria-sama ga Miteru Volume 25 Chapter 6 Part1
The new week brought annoying rumors.
"&h.e.l.lip; student council elections."
"I knew Touko-san would &h.e.l.lip; "
"Shes so reckless."
Each individual whisper was quiet, but when they were all added up it made them easy to hear. The excited chatter about last nights TV shows, so loud it could be heard out in the hallway, was far less irritating.
That said, if she were asked if shed rather be insulted directly, then shed probably say no, since that came with its own set of problems. If she got fed up with pretending to ignore them, she could always confront them directly.
(So moronic.)
If only recess would end soon. Touko turned a page of her book. And with that, she felt depressed that her own time was going to waste.
If the words on the page had made their way into her brain then she wouldnt have called it a waste of time, but she couldnt just shut out everything and concentrate on her book when her name was being whispered around.
So, regardless of whether she took in the words or not, when her eyes reached the last row of text she turned the page. By keeping up her, "I dont care at all about the rumors," act, Touko was at least able to retain some of her pride.
(Ah.)
Noriko returned to the cla.s.sroom and walked past Toukos desk. After the election, she would look at Touko as though she had something she wanted to say, but she hadnt yet said anything.
Has she finally given up?
That was to be expected. Touko was just paying for her own mistakes.
She was frankly amazed that Noriko was still willing to be seen with her.
She still felt an empty hole in her chest.
Touko understood that this was her reward for picking apart the threads that bound them together, one by one.
Why was it that she always did this sort of thing?
If she was just a bit more honest, she probably wouldnt hurt herself and others as much.
"Hey, is that any way to be talking about one of your cla.s.smates?"
The loud voice coming from behind her brought Touko back from the hole in her heart to the first-year camellia group cla.s.sroom.
"Arent you ashamed about getting together to spread malicious rumors?"
The moment she realized that the conversation was about their behavior towards her, Touko instinctively turned around. Expecting Noriko to be the speaker.
But she was wrong. Noriko was sitting at her desk, a short distance away, also staring in amazement at the center of the commotion.
"Dont you think its a bit late to be the good little girl? Last week, you were saying you wanted Touko to lose the election too."
The maligned students. .h.i.t back, not backing down. The two arguing parties had, indeed, been in agreement last week. Attacking Touko, ignoring Touko, they were both the same thing.
"What was it that you said again?"
Pressed by her former comrades, the cla.s.smate who came to Toukos aid acknowledged her own crimes as she responded:
"While I may have called her reckless, Touko-san gave it her all in the election. You must have seen the effort she put in too? All on her own? It was incredible. It made me feel ashamed of myself. I asked myself, as her cla.s.smate, why didnt I help her? Why didnt our whole cla.s.s unite behind her?"
Then, from within the group of gossipers, a couple of voices piped up, endorsing this opinion with, "Me too." There was internal discord.
"Look, I like Touko-san as a person. But if she wanted our support, shouldnt she have discussed it with the cla.s.s before running off and nominating herself?"
"Isnt that a problem with our cla.s.s not providing the right environment for such a discussion?"
"Oh, so now youre saying that were the problem?"
The argument between the two factions gradually started to heat up. Even though Touko herself had never wanted this to happen.
If shed wanted them to argue, it would have been over some other topic - having the fight be about her made it more of a nuisance.
Fed up with this, Touko turned to face the front and found someone standing in front of her desk.
"Unforeseen repercussions are a pain, arent they?"
Kanako-san smiled, gently shifting her long hair so it didnt spill onto the desk. She was tall at the best of times, and Touko was seated, so she was quite the imposing sight.
"What do you know?"
Touko responded. Kanako-sans know-it-all air was a bit annoying, but it was ten, no a hundred times less annoying than the people arguing behind her.
"Nothing. But youre making that face. You were annoyed that someone would speak out like that. And now youre fed up with it."
"Thats quite observant of you. Im impressed."
Touko said with just a touch of sarcasm. Implying that Kanako-san must have a lot of free time, to be able to study each and every persons face.
But Kanako-san completely missed the sarcasm. Or maybe she got it, but chose to ignore it.
"Well, since youre complimenting me, Ill let you in on something. When youre reading a book, it looks more realistic if you subtly vary your pace every so often."
"Huh?"
"Normally, youd stop when you got a kanji character mixed up, or youd have to re-read some difficult pa.s.sages, right?"
Indeed. Basically, she was telling Touko that shed seen through her "reading a book" act. Kanako-san grinned and walked back to her own seat.
"That was informative."
With a nod, Touko closed her book. In truth, she didnt have to put a bookmark in there, but she thought that it made it look more realistic.
The argument behind her continued until the bell rang and their teacher entered the cla.s.sroom.