I was wearing my shoe near the locker when someone patted me on my shoulder quite roughly so that I almost lost my balance. I leaned against the locker with my right hand and quickly slipped my foot in the shoe and turned around to look at the person.

Of course it was none other than my friend. Tsūmen was standing behind me with a huge grin on his face. I could tell by that grin that something good happened with him today and he was dying to tell me about it. I decided not to make him wait and started heading out the building with him walking beside me.

"Why are you smiling like that? It's creepy."

"Hey! Well… so, you know what happened?" He said in a cheerful voice.

"No," I said blatantly.

"..." He looked at me like he was so done with my antiques. He closed his eyes and sighed.

"Tell me, how else am I going to know about it?"

"Are you trying to piss me off?" He said, narrowing his eyes at me.

"I was just kidding. Tell me about it. Did Hiromi-san ask you out or something?" As I mentioned her name, he slightly blushed and looked at me. Even though he was trying to play it off cool from outside, I know he was nervous and probably embarrassed at the mention of her name.

"Wha… nothing like that." He said, shaking his head from left to right and moving the index finger of his right hand as a gesture to oppose my comment.

"I see." I said, while nodding. We were out of the school campus and were walking towards the downtown intersection where we separated our own way.

"Actually, I managed to impress my sensei after a long time. Well, not only him but the others too." He smiled.

"What did you do?"

"So… I don't even know how that… maybe it was a coincidence." He said while clenching his left fist frequently.

"What?" I asked, as I had no idea what he was talking about. All I could understand was that he impressed everyone in his club and was having trouble believing that he did it.

But what did he do?

He looked at me with a cheeky smile and said, "Ahh… so I shot this arrow at the gold… which wasn't impressive since I could do it easily." He took a small pause and raised the index finger of both of his hands and continued, "I shot another arrow right after that and I don't know how, it pierced that previous one right in the centre." He showed the scene by touching the tips of both of his index fingers.

(A/N: Gold is a term used to describe the centre of the target which is often coloured yellow.)

"The gold… hmmm… that's quite impressive." I was indeed impressed by his skills. I knew he was good at archery but the event he told me was quite a difficult feat to achieve.

"Ah, it's not that… I think it was a coincidence." He said while laughing awkwardly. He was also not good at handling compliments.

"Well, coincidence or not, it's still cool. Like those shonen protagonists you know."

"Ayy, you're trying to make me cringe. Bruh!" He said, wrapping his arm around my shoulders and shaking me aggressively.

"Ahhh… my bad, my bad" I said. He may not know it but this guy had one hell of an upper body strength. Mainly his forearm muscles were developed. He was a person I wouldn't want to arm wrestle against, but if we're talking about hand to hand fighting, then the outcomes can differ.

"Ooof, anyways… I wish Hiromi-san was there to see that." He sighed and let go of me.

"You wish!" I said jokingly while straightening my collar and adjusting my tie.

"I'll surely get a girlfriend before you. You're going to remain a virgin." He said.

Oh, how wrong is he? Well he is not wrong, I did get a girlfriend but then she forgot everything about it so can't really consider that. But if he gets a girlfriend then I'll be happy for him. I know many girls are dying for him but he has his eyes only on one person, Hiromi-san. Despite his carefree attitude, he knew how to stick around with anything. May it be archery or a girl who he loves one sidedly.

"Oya, talking about a girlfriend reminded me… are you trying for Yasurouka-san?" He said while giving me side glances and a smirk.

Ah shit, he noticed it. As I expected this morning, he did have an idea of my exchanges with her. Well, looks like I'll have to prepare myself for his endless teasing.

"Um, trying as in?" I decided to play dumb.

"Oh please, I know you, don't I play dumb with me." He nudged me with his elbows.

"What?"

"See, you have been talking with them for sometime now. Since Kizhashi already has a boyfriend, she's out of the question. Remaining person is who? Yasurouka." He looked at me and wiggled his eyebrows.

"Are you interested in her? Romantically?" He emphasised in the last part.

"I'm not."

"Ah, then you are interested in her because of her big chest?" He looked at me with shock in his eyes.

"Saishi, I know you haven't felt a woman's touch in a long time, but you have to control your libido, man!" He patted my back while laughing.

"Bruh… how did you even…." I narrowed my eyes.

"It's my talent. Don't ask how." He showed his index finger at me and I decided not to ask him anymore, since he will probably give some weird answer that will give me brain damage.

"See if you want to be sneaky about your love life then don't worry. You can always tell me about it." He put his hand on my shoulder and nodded.

"Well, if I ever feel like I'm falling in love with someone, you're the first person I'll talk to."

"Oh, such high thoughts of me." He nodded with a proud smile.

"No…" I said in plain tone and laughed it off.

"Well, she is a nice girl so you can go for her." He said that and I looked at suspiciously since he rarely talks like that.

"What? I'm genuinely saying this." He sighed. "Anyways, see you tomorrow." He added.

We reached the intersection and he went his separate way. I was standing at the zebra crossing waiting for the light to turn red. My eyes were still on his figure walking into the crowd and disappearing moments later. The light turned red and the crowd around me started walking.

I crossed the road and headed towards my home. There were many thoughts in my mind at that time, but the major one was that I can't let him be too involved in this matter, and for that if I have to lie to him for the rest of my life, then I'm fine with it.

I've been called a liar by someone I held my dearest at some point of time, so I couldn't care less about someone calling me a liar again.

What a waste of time.