Chapter 41 In the Classroom

In the Classroom

“Ughh! I can’t believe my homeroom teacher asked me to help….”

It’s been a while since school ended, so the number of students in the hallway has decreased drastically.

Walking down the hallway and muttering to himself, Sou goes to his own classroom.

He usually goes straight home after homeroom. But today, his homeroom teacher asked him to help carry the students’ math papers.

It was a lot for one person to carry.

Unable to refuse, Sou helped his homeroom teacher.

By the way, right after homeroom, Haruki appeared in Sou’s class and invited him to go home with her.

Haruki obviously wanted to go home with him.

However, he did not feel comfortable making her wait, so he declined.

Haruki said that she would wait as many minutes as it took for Amane, but he didn’t give in to her words and made a deal with her to go shopping with him at the supermarket around 7 p.m. today and asked her to go home first.

At that time, Haruki’s face was clearly unhappy.

After dividing the papers in half, Sou and the homeroom teacher carried them to the teachers’ room.

They walked down the hallway with the noises of the students, carrying a rather heavy pile of papers.

Sou’s classroom and the teachers’ room were on the same floor. Therefore, there was no need to go down the stairs.

They entered the teachers’ room, put the papers on the homeroom teacher’s desk, and his work was done. After that, he had a casual chat with the homeroom teacher and left the teachers’ room. And that’s the way it is now.

“Ah, my body is a little sore. Maybe I’ll go home early and read some light novels, yeah.”

He mumbles about his plans when he gets home. Then he walks down the hallway at his casual pace.

“Eh?”

Just as he reaches his own class, Sou’s eyes are drawn to the class 2–5 next door.

The door to the classroom was only open at the front, and inside, Mizuki was rummaging through the trash can. Expressionless and silently, she dug deep into the trash can with her bare hands, searching for something.

“Eh, what happened?”

With a questioning tilt of his head, Sou enters class 2–5.

“I finally found it. It’s really troublesome….”

With a disgusted look on her face, Mizuki picks up her loafers that are buried deep in the trash can. Dirt is stuck to the loafers, making them very dirty.

She brushes the dirt off her loafers and cleans them on top of the trash can.

“I think they’re pretty clean; I don’t want to wear them, but I think I’ll just put them on and go home soon. Ah….”

When she takes her eyes off the loafers and the trash can and turns her attention to the classroom door, Mizuki recognizes Sou standing there.

“Nakatani-san… Could it be….”

It’s easy to guess why Mizuki was looking for the loafers in the trash can. There’s only one possible reason. Any normal person would know, even if they didn’t want to.

“Aha-ha… So you found out… I didn’t want you to know….”

With a bitter smile on her face, Mizuki lets out a dry laugh and looks down.

A heavy silence falls between them.

Mizuki keeps her head down.

Meanwhile, Sou can’t say anything clever and can only stare at Mizuki, who doesn’t meet his gaze.

“If we continue like this, only time will pass. Why don’t we talk on the way home?”