Oh Mr General!

104: Sports Day

For dinner, the housemaids had prepared an extravagant array of oriental dishes for the couple. They sat down to have a nice meal together. Sato, looking rather distracted, ate a stalk of vegetable slowly.

"What's the matter?" Gray asked immediately when noticing Sato's strange behaviour.

"Ah?" Sato didn't realised Gray had asked him something for a second. He wasn't the type of person that would hide his problems and so, he answered back.

"Well, recently for the past week or so, Ming has been acting differently from before. He seemed more distant from me? It was like he was trying hide something from me. Did something happen during our outing to Grand Theme Park that I didn't know about?"

Gray listened in to Sato's problem, in search of a solution to it. He too was clueless about this issue. There wasn't much to go on with what Sato had told him.

"What does he do nowadays that made you think like this?" Gray followed up.

Sato gave it some thought before coming out with a list of questionable actions from Ming.

"So, as you know, we would normally meet up somewhere before going to class together. However, for the past few days, he had been using excuses like, 'he was rushing up some report' or that 'he had to go to the toilet'. As a result, even when he came to class, he would sit at some other seating arrangement, away from me. Not only that, we would normally have our lunch together as much as we could. Yet, once again, Ming surprises me that he was going to have lunch with his other friends. This did not happen just once. In fact, for the past week, I have been having lunch either by myself or with my club mates. What's worse is that, on regular occasions, Ming would reply to my messages late with crappy excuses. He never does that! He usually replies within five minutes of my sending. "

Hearing this, Gray scrunched his eyebrows together. Thinking about everything that Sato said, Gray replied with his opinion.

"Personally, I think Ming is going through something on his own and what he wants is time to himself. Since he is your best friend, if he wanted help, he would approach you first. So, I think what you can do at this point is just give Ming some space. When the time comes, he will naturally tell you. "

"But... That is the part I'm worried about. Ming has a long history of keeping things to himself. Rarely, would he express himself. He is the type of person that would follow along with people's opinions, especially when he cares for the person."

"Mmm.. That is just what I think, Sato. There is another thing you could actually do."

"Oh? What is it?"

"Pick an appropriate time and occasion where you can directly ask Ming if he was facing any problems in his life."

"That's not a bad idea I guess," Sato agreed with Gray, "If things do not get better tommorow, I'll just ask him on sports day. There's no way he can avoid me then!"

"Alright, well now, can you eat your food before it gets cold?" Gray said to Sato lovingly.

"Yep!" Sato smiled back as he started to consume as per normal.

...

The next day flew by in the blink of an eye and the sports day was finally tommorow. Today, Sato had been given the event roster on his phone. He was assigned to the 2500m race which he didn't particularly mind. It was good training for his stamina. The engineering students didn't have high expectations for Sato, for not many people in engineering was part of the school's track and field team.

The seniors in his Taekwondo club had also asked for the new juniors to come to the training hall to spectate the sparring fights. Sato had to go watch for a short while before leaving for the performance by The Sirens.

In the morning of the event, Gray drove Sato to the University.

"Have fun at the sports meet." Gray wished Sato through the car window.

"Thanks!" Sato waved goodbye. The students wowwing at the sight of Gray's car had become a norm for the student.

"I'll see you around." With a cryptic smile, Gray drove off.

"See me around?" Sato looked confused by his boyfriend's statement. Regardless, he placed Gray's words behind him and walked into school.

For the first time in a long time, Sato had not feel this comfortable in the school grounds. The once cocky Tyron had stopped bullying Sato, ever since that incident. Now, only Motori from his engineering class teased him, but he was simply an eye sore.

Everyone was required to gather at the school soccer field ground in the morning. There were very few moments in the year where there would be such a huge gathering. Only big events like the school's founder's day and Sport's day would everyone gather up for a speech by the university president.

Fifteen minutes before the speech, most of the students had gathered together into their respective departments. Today, everyone arrived earlier than late, for there was a warning notice that was issued the other day by the University staff.

"All students are to report at the Soccer field before the beginning of the speech by the University President. If any student fail to do so without an official reason, they will be issued a demerit point for their truancy."

This was by no means a lax situation. With five demerit points, a student would be expelled from University Z. In consequence, everyone came to school earlier than usual, for fear of a traffic jam that would affect their school track record.

At 10am sharp, the president of University Z stood up on the stage set up yesterday. He began his speech as prepared.