Soul for a Girlfriend?

There was only a week left before the exam, so quite a lot of students in class were slowly starting to take things seriously. Even though Kizhashi, who was supposed to be next to me, was talking with her friends a few desks away.

"Yo!" I heard an energetic voice greet me. Turning around, I noticed the new student walking towards me with a smile on his face as I gave him a small nod, "Seryoku… what's up?"

"You know exams are next week?" He asked as I nodded and replied in a bland tone, "Yeah… who doesn't?"

He laughed awkwardly as his eyes wandered around and said in a prompt tone, "Ok, it was my bad attempt to start a conversation."

I found it rather weird that a guy like him felt the need to start up a conversation with me. The only time we had a conversation was in the toilet and I remember him as the 'toilet conversation starter dude.'

I glanced at him as he was smiling sheepishly. I was looking at his earring as it caught my attention from the first day he came. Now that I got a closer look at it, I could make out the figure of two metal strings intertwined with each other and a red orb at the end. It was quite fancy.

  "Love your honesty." I said, as he nodded and continued, "Anyways…"

"You want my notes?" I asked him as the expression on his changed into a baffled one. With narrowed eyes, he asked in confusion, "How… did you know?"

It was very clear from the start that he wanted something from me. Otherwise, a dude like him would never talk to me. I sighed and said, "I would rather not use the effort to explain it."

"Well… yeah. I want your biology notes." He said in a rather relaxed tone. It seemed like he was feeling awkward to start a conversation just because he needed something, but since I confronted it from my side, the awkward tension between us broke.

"Ah… why don't you ask any of the girls?" I asked, as most of the girls would be more than delighted to help him. He was startled by my tone as he said, "Damn… you're so cold."

"Oh… I just talk like that." I replied as I didn't mean that to sound rude, but it just came out like that. A smile formed in his face as he asked, "You talk rudely? And you know that but still do it?"

"Pretty much." I nodded, as he laughed, "You are a weird one."

"So…? Ask the girls? They're more than likely to help you." I again proposed as I didn't want to give my notes to a dude I barely knew. That too, a week before the exams. He sighed and said, "They'll help me, that's true but their notes are just a copy of the book with different colour pens and highlighters."

"You're rather keen compared to your appearance." I said, looking at him as he tilted his head with a confused smile and asked, "Eh…? Was that an insult?"

"No, I was just saying that you're smart." I shook my head from left to right as I said that, followed by him completing the thought, "But I don't look smart."

"Yes." I nodded as he laughed awkwardly and said with narrowed eyes, "I'm having mixed feelings about it."

"So can you please give me your notes? I heard that your biology is strong." He asked me in a rather polite way. It would've been quite rude to reject him, so I proposed, "Can I send you photos?"

"But that'll be a hassle for you." He said, considering there were probably more than 50 pages of notes. I nodded, and said, "But I gotta study…"

"Don't worry, I'll start writing them right now. And I'll try to finish most of it by home time."

"Then I'll do the rest at home and give you back tomorrow."

"If you can't wait for tomorrow, then tell me your address. I'll give you back by tonight." He added lastly, noticing the unconvinced look on my face as I took out my notes from the bag. He was being quite diligent about it and also it was better than giving a stranger my address just for the sake of returning a notebook.

"Ahh… don't worry. Here, I'm trusting..." I was handing him my notebook when suddenly I felt a jolt of pain in my left arm and lost my grip on the notes, causing it to fall from my hand. Seryoku caught it instantly, and asked me, "Dude, are you good?"

"Did you hit your funny bone or something?" He asked me again as I didn't reply to him because of the pain setting in my arm slowly. It was quite weird, as I said, "Nah… it just felt like something stung my arm really badly."

"Which arm?" He asked, as I narrowed my eyes and replied, showing him my left arm, "Left one…"

"Oh… which arm do you…" I knew exactly what he was about to ask as I pointed towards the notebook and said in an indifferent tone, "Here… take the notes. No further questions."

"Yes. That was a weird thing to ask." He nodded awkwardly and laughed while walking back towards his desk. That was quite the weird exchange I had with the new student.

The week was going pretty normally as I didn't have to interact much with Shiraishi because of exams. It was quite ironic that when everyone was stressed out this week about the upcoming exams, I was rather happy that I got a tiny break from this damn contract.

Everything was fine until one Wednesday night. I still remember that night as if it happened yesterday. The incident was pierced into my mind. Even though everything I felt was so surreal, it all felt rather lucid.

From that night onwards, quite a few things changed between Lilith and I. 

I wasn't expecting that sort of development between us, but I slowly started to look at her differently from that point. Even though everything appeared to be alright, there was an underlying tension between us.

And that was the night of 10th November.