And the rest, is Johann

Chapter 5. In vino veritas (IV)

"Of course!" She was still choking him. "Cappuccino, as usual?"

"Yes." He tried to distract his painful head with the images of the delicious pastries that were waiting for them in the cafeteria, the hot beverages. She finally let him free.

A few minutes later they were sitting on one of the canteen tables, the twins with their coffees and Friedrich with an apple juice instead. All of them wearing the same gloomy expression, the favorite style of any student with incoming exams. The lack of sleep didn't help either.

"How's the Tax presentation going? You have it on Friday, no?" He asked after drinking half of his glass.

"Yes." Anna answered, suddenly standing. "We finished more or less the slides yesterday, now we only have to practice..." She smiled at both stares. "I'm hungry... I'll get a snack." She headed then towards the vending machines.

Then Friedrich's green eyes were back at him, along with an exaggerated smile.

"You are so lucky, you can work on any project together and you don't have to meet anywhere..." His eyes, which had been following her, came back To Johann with the most hopeful expression. "Be my brother for a week, please, I'll return you after the exams... please... it's not fair, why is she the only one who has you at her disposal all the time..." There was some sincere desperation in his words, but they all needed the drama and more importantly, the laughs.

Johann chuckled, carefully leaving the cup on the table before looking at him. The coffee was simply perfect ad he already felt like a brand new person.

"I can be really annoying sometimes too, ask Anna... yesterday she was probably feeling like kicking me out of the house..."

"I don't care! I accept you Johann, and your obsessive perfectionism, I'll do whatever you tell me, just make me pass...!" His eyes suddenly opened wide, like he had seen a ghost. "Wait, don't you have also exams in the conservatory soon? You mentioned it a couple of weeks ago, I forgot, sorry..."

Johann's smile slowly disappeared, to end up in a sigh.

"Yes, of piano and also music theory." He nodded, grimacing, painfully aware of the stressful couple of weeks ahead. In moments like that he was tempted of giving up his musical inspirations and focus on the most practical path. The piano was going to become a hobby eventually, and he had made that choice the moment he had decided to follow the conventional study and enroll in a law degree.

"Oh... what a mess.. how can you handle everything?"

"I don't know... but maybe I'll drop music next year and focus on school." He dramatized, his grades should go way worse for him to consider giving up music, though. "For the moment I'll do my best and try to survive it all." He shrugged, smiling at him again, who was looking at him like he was a lunatic. Ok, he wasn't making his own life one bit easier with his own decision, maybe he deserved that look a little bit.

Suddenly Anna sat back next to him, opening a bag of chocolate chips to rapidly make one disappear in her mouth. With a swift movement, he stole one, not flinching at her deadly stare, after placing the bag between them.

"Twiinssss...! Here you are!" As all of them turned to the voice on their back Klara and Bea appeared after a group of -possibly Business- students, heading towards them, and the miraculous two free sits in front of them.

"Hey!!" Anna waved effusively, despite having seen them that same morning, before the classes, in that same canteen. "Please, tell us Professor Müller didn't start with whole new material for the exam because, well, 'we just have the time'..."

Friedrich started laughing, desperately, which brought the worst news.

The rest of the recession time was dedicated to complain and vent, which they very much needed before heading to another class. The rest of the classes were uneventful.