Starry Days & Sunlit Nights: Volume 1 - Reluctant Blaze

Chapter 1.7 - Usual Invitation

Once classes came to a close, students flooded out of Marie Florence High School. It had only been five years since the once all-female institute opened its gates to the male populace in welcome of a co-ed system. Thus, a good majority of the pupils walking across the grounds were girls. Among them were one Yumiko Manaka and her best friend, Kaira Lynette MacHallen, the latter of which was now sporting a brown beanie on her head since there was no regulation or dress code preventing it outside of class.

"...but before I could get even a little peek, these two big guys came out of nowhere and dragged me off by the collar!" Kylie protested in the middle of her own narration. "Well, I think they were both guys anyway, but I think one of them was a lady. I couldn't really tell for sure. They looked a lot like bouncers rather than security guards now that I think about it. Suppose that's why they dragged me out. It really hurt though, even if I wasn't really choking, but they didn't have to be so rough. All I wanted was a peek at the little sundial they uncovered. They'd be showing it off to the public at the city hall anyway. It's not like I was going to touch it. Actually I really, really wanted to touch it, even taste it! You know you can learn a lot about an artifact's properties by how it tastes, and maybe even what it was used for with the right context? There's not a lot of articles about that object in particular, but man wouldn't it be great if we could manage to figure it out soon? I can't wait for them to put it up at city hall!"

Yumi, patiently waiting for her turn to speak, replied to her friend. "You'll have to let me know when they do. If it's that interesting, I'd like to see it myself."

Kylie smiled at her. Truth be told, she was aware of how her machine-gun-like mouth caused her to have little friends; but if one of those friends was Yumi, who was the kind of person who accepted things easily, then she was content. The half-Japanese girl was far from perfect, in more than just mannerisms and clumsiness, but her cheerful nature and energy to match her own made her a fine companion.

In the brief lull of vocal activity from Kylie, on account of her mentally reflecting on her blessings, Yumi's ears picked up on the conversation of a male and female student they were passing by.

"It's been three weeks since Juniper Mendoza's disappearance, hasn't it?"

"You'd think there'd be some clues turning up about now. Or maybe the police are trying to hide something."

"No way. With a family background like hers, that's kind of impossible. Know what I think? Maybe all that stress from being student council president got to her real bad."

"A suicide? Ugh, but as bad as that sounds, it's not like it isn't possible."

Poor girl, Yumi thought to herself. She's disappeared to who knows where and all these rumors keep spreading about her. Just the other day, people were talking about her eloping with someone, or something like that.

"Yumi? You hear what I said?"

"Hueh?" the amber-eyed girl let out a cute sound in surprise and turned her attention back to her friend.

"I was saying I just remembered I picked up a bunch of neat stuff last week, before that place became a sort of dig site," Kylie told her, referring to the same place she had been recently booted out of. "Sorry I didn't tell you until now."

"No, that's alright," Yumi said, not that it was really something that affected her much. "I suppose it slipped your mind?"

"Well, there's that, and I still don't have much information on what I found anyway," Kylie admitted. "Wanna come over to my place and check them out yourself?"

"I'd love to," Yumi answered, smiling brightly.