Hey Sunshine

Murder Is Not the Way To Go

Pekka Rollins' class sucked.

Why Wylan, you might ask. Is it because he drolls on and on endlessly about topics nobody cares about? Is it because he paces around the freakin' lecture hall and his voice is either too soft when you're actually trying to pay attention, and too loud when all you want to do is sleep? Is it because Wylan dreams of punching his stupid face in with an iron hammer and then shoving his entire fat body into an easy bake oven where it will cook for three eterni-

"Okay," Inej (who he had recently discovered also attended the same torturous Rollins class as him) said slowly, pulling at Wylan's arm. "I understand that we all hate Rollins but murder is not the way to go."

"But is it?" Wylan asked quietly, shooting the man in question a glare. "I'm telling you - he hates us because we ate his stock while we were stuck in his cafe."

Inej scoffed. "Of course he does," she said calmly. "Pekka Rollins is a businessman. The fact that we ate his food instead of starving to death like civilised people irritates him. But he's still your teacher, so you need to at least pretend to like him so you can get good grades in his class."

"But he woke me up," Wylan complained, rubbing the sides of his eyes. "You can say whatever you want about him, but the fact remains that he woke me up and it was for no reason other than to tell me my shoe was untied. Which, by the way, it wasn't."
Inej made a face. "I mean, you did fall asleep in his class."

"I did but," Wylan yawned, loud enough to make other students look at them curiously. Wylan blushed at the attention, but Inej simply raised an eyebrow until they all stopped. "Thanks," he said gratefully and she brushed it off. "Anyways, I was exhausted. Do you know how much sleep I got last night?"

Inej arched an eyebrow. "Well, I did see you in a bed with Jesper, but then again you were fully clothed and I didn't hear Kaz's disgusted yelling so there wasn't any sex. Yet Jesper seems to be extremely happy and giddy, like he's been unburdened from a secret, so I'm going to assume that he told you about the gambling and you took it in a good way, promising to help him out with it?"

Wylan's jaw dropped. He wanted to ask her how she did that, but on the other hand he wasn't sure he really wanted to know.

Inej stayed silent. Well, he thought to himself. That's that.

"Hey. you draw right?" Inej asked suddenly, and Wylan tilted his head swinging his bag to the front of his chest.

"Yeah, why?" he asked, riffling through to find his sketchpad.

"Well, the wedding is coming up soon and I kind of don't want to give the mafia a wedding gift they can use on crime, so I was thinking that if you gifted them a painting then that would be okay."

Wylan considered it nodding. "I think that'd be good," he said. "I mean, are you guys coming to the wedding? Are you even allowed to?"

"Yeah, Gretina's an old friend of mine," Inej said. "Nina's my 'plus one', and Kaz got invited because Bollinger has an age-old obsession with one-upping him, and for some reason he thinks that if Kaz sees him getting married he'll consider himself one-upped by the man."

Wylan considered this, hand still absentmindedly ruffling through his bag. "So Matthias' is going to be Kaz's 'plus one'? But really, it's going to be Matthias and Nina, and you and Kaz?"

"Yes," Inej confirmed. "What are you looking for?"

Frowning, Wylan purposely looked through his bag again. "I can't find my sketchbook," he murmured. "Crap, I think I left it in Pekka Rollins' class."