On the way home I managed to shake off the delinquent and Mr. Bare-Legs, who tried to see me to my door like they had the previous day.
Trying to run away before our meeting was one thing, but I don’t think even those two expected me to do it afterwards─I got myself alone by telling them I needed to use the ladies’ room, then gracefully slipped out the third-floor window.
I’d hit on the idea that adding in the dimension of height might give me an advantage against Mr. Bare-Legs’ legs─I think the only reason they didn’t come after me was that they foolishly figured they could just lie in wait at the school gate. but even I’m acrobatic enough to jump a wall.
I did it!
This time I’m free!
I gave those snooty pretty boys the slip!
…I was so pleased with myself that I almost forgot my original goal─my escape may have appeared pointlessly stubborn at first glance, but I did actually have a proper reason for it.
I had to stop somewhere before I went home, somewhere I couldn’t bring any other members of the Pretty Boy Detective Club, and so I had to duck out on my two-man escort.
My previous two failed attempts to run away had lacked any real justification─but now that I’d succeeded the third time around, I felt kind of pumped up by my own little Great Escape.
I wondered if the people who escaped their canvases had felt the same way─though I know that’s a bit of a crazy thing to say. At the very least, I could hardly imagine the kidnapped students felt as pleased as I did.
Anyway, I headed away from the train station near Yubiwa Academy─and toward a certain bus stop.
This bus stop marked the midpoint between Yubiwa Academy and our traditional rival, Kamikazari Middle School.
But the two schools had butted heads so many times in the past that the midpoint had become more of a middle ground, a sort of demilitarized zone─I guess you could say that like the schools, the bus stop had a history.
Well, even conflicts need rules.
I’ll give it more of a grown-up spin and say wars have rules, too─although that statement may be unworthy of a “boy”─but anyway, if a Yubiwa Academy student and a Kamikazari Middle student are going to meet up, the bench at that bus stop is one of the places to do it.
A place that’s fair for both parties.
That said, he and I had definitely not arranged to meet up─far from it.
He actually had the nerve to say, “I’ll be there, but it’s fine if you don’t come.”
It’s fine if you don’t come.
The guy is a genius.
How the heck did he know that was the surefire way to get me─the girl who comes when she’s not invited and runs the other way when she is─to show up?
As soon as he said I didn’t need to come, I wanted to.
I had to.
Anyway, when I arrived at the bus stop after shaking off my escort, he─Fudatsuki─was sitting there as promised.
Lai Fudatsuki.
The student council president of Kamikazari Middle School and recent adversary of the Pretty Boy Detective Club.