Detention was mind-numbingly boring. You weren't allowed to do anything, including talk, read, write, draw, or do homework. You just had to sit there.

Normally you would daydream, but you tended to focus on people when you did so and, with Kimiko in the same room, you weren't willing to risk bringing her ire down on them.

Halfway through detention, who else but Minoru came waltzing into the room. She'd obviously cleaned up to the best of her abilities, but her uniform was still soiled with soy sauce and ginger salad dressing.

She didn't look at any of the attendees, just walked up to the teacher supervising. "Hello, Ms Yume. I'm here on official Student Council business. I have need of Aina Sato."

"Is that so? Looks like it's your lucky day, Miss Sato. You're dismissed." Kimiko gave Minoru puppy-eyes from her desk but was ignored.

You grabbed your bookbag and left the classroom without acknowledging her either. Serves you right for causing a food fight and then saying I started it, you thought.

You continued to follow Minoru down the hall and upstairs.

"Are you mad at me?" You mustered up the courage to ask. She was usually so warm towards you. Now she was cold as the day you first met.

"No, I'm mad at Oshiro. This is all her fault. She was a bad influence on Kimiko and now Kimiko's..." Minoru let out a sigh as chilling as a winter wind. "Kimiko's a bad influence on you."

She suddenly spun around and grasped your shoulders like a drowning man grasping at straws. "Listen to me, Aina. You need to be careful around Kimiko. She's not someone to be admired. You're not safe around her. Do you understand me?"

Truly you didn't. Kimiko might be a threat to her rivals and the main character, but to her friends?

"Do you understand?" She repeated, shaking you once, hard. Her fingers were digging into your flesh, leaving bruises down to the bone. You grimaced and nodded just to make her stop.

She let go as abruptly as she grabbed you, brushed her fingers through your hair gently. "I'm sorry, baby. I just don't want to see you get hurt." You nodded again, wanting this conversation to end as soon as possible. She frowned but didn't push the topic any further.

"Hinata's waiting for you in the library. She'd love it if you read with her for a bit."

...

Reading with Hinata was nice. She'd lost some of her bashfulness and all but nestled into your side, a warm, reassuring weight after the cold, smothering load Minoru pressed onto you. The book was starting to get good, too. The male and female leads finally met and they had some good chemistry.

Of course, you didn't get to read with Hinata for more than thirty minutes when the girl of the hour interrupted.

"Get out of here, Hinata. The grown-ups need to talk," Kimiko said, shooing the smaller girl. Hinata scurried away without packing up any of her things. She was likely going to go tell Minoru. "Hey, Aina," Kimiko then said in a sultry voice, leaning on one of the bookcases with her ankles crossed in a way that looked effortless.

"Don't you hey me! I'm mad," you hissed at her, crossing your arms in front of your chest.

"Still?" She said incredulously, eyes wide like she couldn't believe it. Then she sighed and ran her fingers through her dreads. "Would it make you feel better if I said I was sorry?"

"I'm not the only one you should be apologizing to."

Kimiko got on your level, plopping down next to you on the floor, claiming Hinata's spot for her own. "I'm not apologizing to that bitch. She had it coming."

"Then we have nothing left to talk about."

"Don't be like that, dollface," she all but cooed, although there was a dejected undertone to her words. "You're so sweet to Minoru and Hinata. Where's that sweetness when you're around me?"

You genuinely felt a little bad. You had been playing favorites, doing whatever Minoru and Hinata wanted while refusing to play along with Kimiko. But that was just because you didn't want to perform pranks just to ruin someone's day. And too often Kimiko went too far. Today was a good example of that.

"I thought you didn't like me sweet. You like me spicy."

"A girl can't survive off spice alone. Here, I've got something that will sweeten you up!" From the confines of her bookbag, Kimiko procured a plastic-wrapped red lollipop. "Tada!"

"Oh no," you said, turning your head away, "I'm not falling for that again after the soy sauce incident."

"You're so distrustful. It hurts my poor little heart. Don't give me that look; it really does!" She said, holding her chest like she was having a heart attack. "Look, I'll take the first lick!"

She then proceeded to tear off the wrapper and swirl the candy around in her mouth with the stick. Once she had finished her demonstration, she released it with a pop and held it out to you. "See? Perfectly safe."

You took the lollipop and gave it a few licks to satisfy Kimiko. You never were the most patient type when it came to hard candy, though. Soon enough, you crunched down on the sugary treat... And immediately noticed something was wrong.

There was something flat in the middle of your lollipop. Biting down on it hurt your teeth. Running your tongue along its edge cut your tongue.

It couldn't be... You thought with growing dread. That's nothing more than an urban legend.

You quickly spat out the sugary shards to confirm your suspicions. There it was, laying so sinisterly in the middle of your palm. A double edge razor blade.

"How does it taste?" There was no hint of humor in Kimiko's voice, nor any tinge of guilt. She wasn't joking around. She understood the gravity of what she had done. She just didn't care.

What a fucking sociopath.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?!" You demanded before rubbing your tongue up against the roof of your mouth to assess the damage. There was a distinctive metallic undertone to the cherry filling your mouth, but nothing hurt too bad.

Still, what if you had kept licking? Or worse, swallowed it?

"You're not safe around her," Minoru had said.

"What's wrong with me? What's wrong with me?! What's wrong with me is you!" She yelled, quickly standing up just to glare down at you from an advantage point. "You keep looking at other people. Talking to other people. Touching other people!"

"What, I'm not allowed to have other friends?"

"I just don't understand why you need other friends when you have me."

"I don't know where you girls think you are, but this is a library. If you don't quiet down, I'm going to have to ask you to leave," the librarian interrupted, having made her way over to your area to investigate the yelling.

"That's fine. I was just leaving," you whispered darkly before grabbing your things and getting up off the floor.

"Don't you walk away from me! We're not done here," Kimiko shouted after you.

She went to grab you, but the librarian caught her first. "That's it, young lady. Come with me. I'm writing you up. I hope you like detention." With that, you made your escape.