Unlike before their midterms Yukio got together with Kyoko to study for the final exams a good two weeks in advance.

Sitting in the club room they had just finished an English session, which in line with Urufu's suggestion they held entirely in English, and now the room was eerily silent. First Yukio couldn't put his finger to it, but then he recalled how the club had been given written permission to run their activities at the Stockholm Haven café. Their club room was slated for being converted into a classroom come April.

At the moment fewer than half a dozen members lazed in the lounge area. Another five or so had left for a walking talking session, which only proved how far Urufu's stance on self-organisation had penetrated the club.

Yukio turned his head and looked outside. Grey skies and rivulets of water on the window pane told their story of yet another rainy day. If the clothes worn by the students he saw crossing the gravel beneath him were an honest indicator, it was a cold rainy day to boot.

“Yukio, what about this part,” Kyoko said in English and showed him a math problem.

He grinned at first but toned it down to a smile. “You're cute,” he responded in Japanese.

“Huh? Oh, sorry.”

“I think we can do the math in Japanese. I don't even know half the terms in English.”

She gave him a sheepish smile and nodded. “Yeah, and I love you too.”

It was easier these days. Yukio preferred it this way when expressions of affection and love came natural to them both. Somehow the world changing feelings from August had calmed down, but instead Kyoko had become his most important friend apart from being the girl he loved.

“They're not here as often as before,” Kyoko said after he pointed out the mistake that prevented her from solving the problem.

They. We don't even need names now, do we? “I guess so,” he said. “Urufu said he's helping her prepare the finals, but he's also doing a lot of work through those strange contacts of his.”

Kyoko's expression darkened, but Yukio knew her displeasure wasn't directed at him. “Same with Kuri-chan. She's spending almost all her free time modelling.” A tentative hand reached out across the table and Yukio took it in his. “I worry, you know.”

He did as well. Since he became an item with Kyoko the two of them gradually saw their responsibility towards their friends as a shared one. Especially after what happened during the cultural festival. Now they more or less agreed that the two old teenagers were children that needed taking care of.

“Is it just me, or does Kuri smile less often now?”

“She's unhappy,” Kyoko said. She turned her attention to the next problem and the two of them fell silent while they solved it, each on their own. “She doesn't tell me, but I can see. I got to learn that expression during our year at middle school.”

Yukio looked up from his booklet and met Kyoko's gaze. “Kuri was unhappy during middle school?”

“Yeah, and no. In the beginning I think she was scared more than unhappy, but that was before I learned who she really was.”

Caressing Kyoko's fingers Yukio waited for her to continue. Sometimes she needed to say something in preparation of what she really wanted to say.

“I was… was…,” Kyoko started. “I was fat.”

Yukio looked at her. She was still a bit chubby, but he liked that part of her. It made her adorably soft to hug, and he couldn't get enough of it. He was aware, however, that not everyone saw her in the same light as he did. Their loss. I get to keep her all for myself.

“When I lost weight some of the boys started looking at me, and there were a few girls who didn't like that.”

Were you bullied? You never told me.

The smile Yukio got was disarming, and he could feel how Kyoko had guessed what he was thinking. “It never got as far as bullying. Kuri-chan didn't like it anyway though. That's how I got to learn what she looked like when she was unhappy.” All of a sudden Kyoko's face lit up in a wide grin. “She's a funny girl that way. It was like she didn't care when people said bad things about her, but no one was allowed to do the same to me. That was when I decided she was my best friend.”

I can see how she won your heart. Urufu's just the same. He has absolutely no concerns for himself. “I understand,” Yukio said and met her grin with one of his own.

“Urufu?”

Yukio nodded and laughed. Their two Swedish best friends who tried but always failed to become Japanese. Sometimes he wondered how hard they really tried. “And he's not proper.”

“Same with Kuri-chan. She's not a proper girl at all.”

And I believe they made us both better persons because of that. What was it Urufu called it? Ah, integrity. That's how he tried to explain the Swedish version of honour. Doing what was right even if it meant betraying your friends, because if you didn't stay true to yourself you didn't deserve to be called a friend in the first place.

“You know,” Yukio began, “I think they're trying to learn how to be teenagers again,” he said as realisation struck him. “It's like they're caught in between if you get what I mean.”

Kyoko closed her eyes the way she usually did when she was deep in thought. Then she opened them, tilted her head backwards and stared at the ceiling. “I think I understand. Does that mean they're fighting like adults now but are treated like kids?”

He hadn't thought about it that way. Could it be that Kuri and Urufu had stepped onto the turf of adults where everyone saw them as unruly teenagers? If that was so, could they ever hope to win?

***

Ryu carried another cardboard box into the inner room. With the help of his mother moving things from their club room at school had gone a lot faster.

The last time he fetched some books and white board markers he saw Yukio and Kyoko study for the coming finals, and as they were in more need to prepare themselves than he was he decided against asking for their help.

He put the box on the table and went for a toolbox that hid in a corner. Principal Nakagawa had made good on his promise to reimburse them for the whiteboards they had to abandon at school, but any assembly had to be done by the club members.

With the help of Kichirou-kun and Jirou-sempai he quickly fastened two large whiteboards to the walls where Urufu wanted them. Setting up the beamer took a little longer, but the audio system got installed a lot quicker than he had hoped. During the work James entered from time to time with coffee or help. He seemed to have a surprisingly extensive experience from this type of equipment.

Ryu gobbled down the last of his coffee and turned to Jirou-sempai before he rushed away to his girlfriend.

“Know when Urufu's expected?”

“Sorry. I'll check with Sango,” Jirou-sempai said and referred to the first year club member he dated. “I think he was here earlier.”

The backside of a blazer left the room and Ryu grimaced before he shot Kichirou-kun a glance. A repeat of the question didn't yield an answer that was any more useful.

Guess I'll have to call you then. Mail first though, if you answer it. You suck at that. Because Urufu did. He positively hated email on the phone and went on about how he didn't really like the Swedish messaging system all that much neither. All in all it was the feelings of an old person. They even had to force him to activate Line. Antique, calling you old is too nice.

Now, however, getting in touch with him was a necessity. One of his old customers had been in contact with Ryu. With his father initially, but a phone call later Ryu took ownership of the contact. It seemed there was a need for some kind of validation and what the contact referred to as process re-factoring. Ryu wasn't entirely clear about what that meant, but then neither was the contact.

From the café proper Ryu suddenly heard a roar, and he left the inner room in a hurry to find out what the commotion was all about. When he squeezed himself out between counter and narrow door he saw a group of club members wielding smart-phones like weapons, and by another table three Irishima high students had turned to better listen in on those waving their phones.

“He did it?”

Who did what?

“Look, it says here he left in the morning, and there's even a photo.”

Ryu threw a cursory glance at the boy. Imai Seiichi, one of the last to join the club before Himekaizen got an entire new freshman class. He should have joined them at about the same time as Nao-sempai did.

“Who left in the morning?” Ryu asked.

“Look Ryu-kun! Says Urufu-kun spent the night with Kuritina-chan.”

Crap! Ryu forced a smile to his lips. Well that explains why those two have behaved so strangely the last days. A part of him cursed Urufu and another wished him good luck. Both groaned at the knowledge that Urufu and Kuri had made the news in the worst way possible.

“They've been a couple since May. Why the newsflash now?” Ryu said in what he suspected was a doomed attempt at downplaying the news value of the incident. You should have been more careful. This is going to be bad!

“But Kuritina-chan is like super famous now.” Sho-kun said and waved his own phone around over his head.

“Who's Kuritina-chan?” one of the Irishima high students asked.

Aw, shit!

“Kuritina-chan? Ah, the model Ageruman Kuritina,” Sho-kun helpfully explained.

“You know Ageruman-san?”

“Yeah, she's the club president.”

“Ageruman Kuritina is your club president?” a voice from across the room asked.

Hell no! Ryu groaned when a red blazer over green trousers rose from his seat.

“Yes, isn't it cool?”

“And she's in an improper relationship with the boy on this photo?”

“What the hell? They've been going out since before summer. Nothing improper about them.”

Thank you Sango-chan!

With the mood rapidly deteriorating James made a very visible show of taking orders at the tables together with the college student who worked part time here.

With final exams looming closer both Kyoko and Noriko had dropped out from their working schedule. Ryu suspected his sister would take up her work again during winter break.

“Guys, could you please keep your voices down about this?” Ryu said to the group who had started the uproar. “You wouldn't want to make more problems for Kuri-chan, would you?”

Seiichi-kun glared at the Red Rose student and nodded. “Sorry about that.”

Ryu smirked. Seiichi-kun was about as sorry as Sho-kun was, which was to say not sorry at all, but none of the boys really wanted Kuri-chan to get into trouble. Ryu wasn't so sure about what they thought about Urufu though. Urufu didn't have the halo of stardom, so his reputation depended more on what he had done recently, and spending time at a hospital garnered pity rather than glory. The cultural festival was already a long time in the past.

But if you knew what kind of job he does you'd be awestruck. Ryu shook his head. That wasn't true. Most of the club members simply wouldn't be able to grasp what Urufu was doing for a living. There were manga stories with a high school corporate magnate as the main lead. None of those stories said anything about the hard work and time needed to coach a stubborn company to change its way of doing things.

Reminds me I really need to call him. Two reasons why I have to now.