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Chapter 86 – Editing and Photoshooting
Seeing the girl in front of me, a certain question came to my mind. It was early January, how the hell did you manage to go bare legged during this time period? Did the fat that was stored in her thighs kept her legs warm?
I held the urge to ask her those questions and instead asked a harmless one.
“You just finished practicing?”
“Yes, well, today is the last day
”
The last day. The atmosphere turned strangely heavy when she said that.
“Anyway, I’m about to go home. Do you wanna go together?”
“Huh? Arina-san isn’t with you?”
“She left me behind. Just reminding you that we aren’t always together.”
“Eh? But everyone is used by the sight of you two together. The Big Mac combo!”
“What the hell was that name?”
“You both are tall, so
”
How did you get Big Mac from that reasoning? We were tall, not heavyweight!
We both were from the same middle school and we used to walk together all the time, so there wasn’t any awkwardness between us. We naturally walked side by side, relying on the streetlights and the occasional car lights to light our paths.
“You want to be a hairdresser, right, Shirona?”
“Huh, have I ever told you about that?”
“Yeah, back when I helped the journalism club, I interviewed you, remember?”
“Ah, right
”
“So, do you still want to be one now?”
“Of course. Why are you asking me this though?”
“No reason
 I’m just wondering how nice it is to have a dream like you
”
Shirona looked at me with a puzzled look on her face.
“You don’t have a dream?”
“Nope.”
“What about the thing you want to do? You don’t have them?”
“None
”
“Then, what are you planning to do in college?”
“Uh
 I have no plan whatsoever
”
“I see
 Well, no need to fret about it much! Just find out about it in college!”
Well, I guess she was right. I just got impatient seeing my other friends were doing their best to achieve their dreams.
If only I could live the rest of my life as a tomato juice connoisseur, my life would be easier.
“Are you planning to go to the same college as Arina-san?”
“I don’t even know which college she’s going to.”
“Huh, I thought you guys would be together after graduating
”
“We’re sane enough to not do that, Shirona-san.”
“Ehh
”
Besides, Arina was way smarter than me, there was simply no way that I would get into the same college as her. Not to mention that our majors were different.
Why was I thinking about this anyway? Who cared about which college Arina would get into. Even if by some miracle I entered the same college as her, she would treat me like a parasite anyway.
*   *   *
After that, I worked with the journalism club for the next two weeks.
During the time period, Arina and Toma discussed their writings in the journalism club room every day after school. I was supposed to do the same as them, but Arina called my writing ‘filthy’, so I was relieved from the position. I tried to fight back of course, but after seeing her concise and neat writing, I had no choice but to accept my fate. As expected of an aspiring writer, her writing was something else.
“What are you and Hiwa up to?”
Perhaps worrying about me staying up late at school everyday, Makoto asked me that. Ever since I met Arina, I’ve been doing things that a member of the going-home club like me shouldn’t be doing and the frequency of that happening has increased lately. If my fellow clubmates were to see me, they would surely be disgusted by my actions and would immediately kick me out of the club.
“I’ll look forward to the photoshoots.”
Then on another day, Tsuru approached me with a wicked smile. She was the mastermind behind all this. The one who assigned this arduous task to the journalism club and the one who roped us into this.
She said those words to me casually during the recess in a casual manner while I was working on an article.
I threatened her with tomato juice, but she didn’t budge and took my note away from me instead. I had no choice but to beg her to give my note back to me like an NTR protagonist begging for his lover to come back. This girl was so cruel, I’ll make sure that the dinner tonight would be a roasted chicken.
“Modern literature?”
On another day, Miyazaki Shinji, the president of the art club approached me and peeked into my notebook. How the hell did he get into that conclusion? I told him that I was writing p*rn and that drove him away.
During this period, a certain question popped out in my mind. ‘Why do we hesitate to show our creations to others?”
The answer I found to that question was, ‘because a work of art is the creator’s alter ego.’
In other words, it was the embodiment of my soul. I couldn’t stand the thought of leaving my feelings bare for someone to read it. It was the equivalent of running around the city naked. If you enjoyed that kind of feeling, please get some help.
Anyway, there were many problems that came up during the writing process, but we managed to finish everything in time. I started to appreciate the journalist more. Publishing news every single day was hard work, I had to chug four cans of tomato juice every day because of the mental exhaustion it caused. I could hear my blood and liver screaming, but lmao who was I kidding, they didn’t have mouths, dummy.
*   *   *
“Alright! Only the pictures are left!”
Finally, we were moving on to the thing that I had been avoiding this whole time, the photoshoot.
“Does it really have to be Arina and me?”
They could just hire some models for it, the results would be better than forcing it on us.
“It’s the student council’s request!”
“I really should roast that girl alive
”
“By the way, we found a perfect place for the shoots! The camera is ready too!”
Toma took out his SLR before standing up.
“Let’s go!”
“Right now?! Arina hasn’t worn her makeup yet!”
“I’ve never worn any to begin with, you crackhead.”
“Stand up! Stand up! Time’s of the essence! Let’s go!”
There was no convincing the guy, Arina and I reluctantly stood up and left the clubroom. A few other members accompanied us as Toma’s assistants.
“Move your a*s quickly.”
I tried to resist by walking at a significantly slower pace, but Arina berated me for it.
“I don’t want to do this
”
“Don’t think about it, just stand there, think that you’re a rock or something. It shouldn’t be hard.”
“That won’t make my nervousness go away! You have the perfect attitude to be a model, do you have any tips for me?”
“Are you implying that I’m a narcissist?”
“No, not at all.”
“Well, just think of yourself as garbage, garbage doesn’t need to worry about anything.”
“You just want to insult me, don’t you?”
We changed our shoes and left the school building. Arina’s expression became grimmer by the second. She probably didn’t expect that we would take the shoot out in the open. To be exact, we were going to take it in front of the school gate.
“Alright, let’s start!”
“What’s the plan?”
“We’ll be taking some nice shots of both the school building and you two.”
That was quite the abstract plan.
His plan made me worried but, thankfully, a girl from the club had done her research and managed to give us precise instructions. While she was looking for the best spot to take the shots, Arina and I got our uniforms ready. They asked us to wear our uniform properly, in other words, no crooked ties or ribbons. They gave no comments with the way I dressed, but when it came to Arina

“Hmm
.”
Toma crossed his arms and let out a groan. Arina also did the same, she got her hands crossed and showed her frustration clearly as she confronted him.
“Arina-san, can you do something about your tights?”
“What? You got a problem with it?”
“No, it’s just, don’t you think it’s a little bit
”
“What? Say it clearly.”
The tension was building up. Arina was taller than Toma, so she exuded a bigger pressure than him. I felt bad for him.
“Tights aren’t part of the official–”
“So you want me to take them off? Is that it?”
I decided to give him a helping hand.
“Sister, calm down.”
“You too? Fine, I’ll strip for you. F*ck it, I’ll get naked.”
“You don’t need to go that far
”
Arina left the place, then Toma clung to me and expressed his gratitude.
“Next time, explain everything to her properly in advance.”
“I’m sorry! I will strive to do better!”
After five minutes, Arina came out with a glare. Her breath was accompanied with a growl, reminding me of a starving wolf. Her legs that were previously covered in a jet-black tights were now bare.
The female club member quickly explained the pose we needed to take before Arina could burst out in anger. I, too, tried my best to distract her by occasionally throwing some jokes in. She tilted her head in my direction, probably wondering why I suddenly acted this way even though I had been averse to the idea of photoshoots until recently. The answer was, defusing the bomb in front of me was more important.
Anyway, we were talking about the pose. With the school building as the background, Arina and I had to stand in front of it while facing 45 degrees in the opposite directions. Since I was taller than they expected, they would take a lower angle so that they could take a better shot of the school building.
“Alright, let’s start!”
The girl signaled us to get ready.
“Arina-san, can you soften your expression a little?”
I could imagine her current expression. She was most likely frowning because of the cold.
She took five pictures in total. I asked her to show me the pictures and I gotta admit, they looked great. They would edit it later, so no doubt that it would look even better.
Arina disappeared immediately after we were done taking pictures. She didn’t tell us anything, so we decided to head back to the clubroom first.
As we were enjoying ourselves, basked in the warmth of the heater, Arina entered the room.
“My tights are gone.”
She suddenly said that to me.
“It’s not me, I haven’t stood that low yet.”
“Stop resisting.”
“No, it’s really not me! I’ve been with these guys the whole time!”
“I’m going to kill you
”
“Seriously, it’s not me! I’m going to sue you for defamation!”
“Who is it, then? I swear, if I catch them, the first thing I’ll do is to stick his fingers in the shredders
”
Please turn yourself in quickly, dear thief. If you don’t, I would be the one who’ll suffer in your place. I didn’t want to die before seeing Ugin wearing her high school uniform.
Suddenly, someone knocked on the door. Was it the culprit? Please be the culprit. Please give the tights back to her. I’m literally shaking right now.
“Excuse me.”
It was the chicken! No, go away, why were you here?!
“Ah, please go away.”
“So mean, I just got here
”
“We just finished taking the pictures, look forward to it.”
“I definitely will! By the way, is this yours, Arina?”
She was holding a folded black object. It was a pair of tights, one of the most popular attire for winter.
The first one to react was Arina.
The girl stood up and immediately approached Tsuru. Their noses were almost touching.
“Where did you find this?”
“Eh? 
In the toilet?”
So she left them in the toilet! Seriously, this girl!
“So you left them in the toilet? There’s no way that I’m the culprit then! I didn’t even know that the girls’ toilet existed until recently! I always thought that you girls don’t normally pee!”
“Excuses.”
Oh c’mon.
Well, anyway, the case of the stolen tights was solved by Tsuru.