(6) Saudade

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I was riding on the high of the festival excitement all of the next day

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I was riding on the high of the festival excitement all of the next day. Even the looming presence of finals wasn't enough to break my stride. I had agreed to join my new Support Course friends for lunch that day, so as we entered the cafeteria, I bid my classmates goodbye.

Because I brought my lunch, I headed straight to the table instead of waiting in line. Glancing back over my shoulder, my eyes immediately found Akiba. The seat next to him was empty. Sakura raised her eyebrows at me, silently asking if I was losing my mind for passing up this opportunity. A pang of longing struck my heart, and I seriously debated turning around and pushing off my lunch with the support crew.

As if sensing my eyes on him, the boy turned to look at me. His eyes were the color of the fabled silver lining of hope that all clouds carried. My ears burned and in my distraction, I tripped over the leg of a chair.

A cold hand reached out to steady me. I looked up to see Rose giving me a confused look. "You alright?"

I nodded and followed her to the table, illusing, "Yeah, sorry. I guess I just got distracted."

She glanced over her shoulder, trying to see what I had been looking at, but I silently prayed that she didn't notice. I mean, she was always hanging out with our class. Of course, Sakura knew about my crush on Akiba, but I didn't need that information getting out to Rose too. She was in charge of Kita's hero costume and Kita was really close with Akiba. Basically, I saw how this could easily spiral out of control, and I certainly didn't want that to happen.

I laid my paper bag down between Snake and Double and took a seat.

"If I have to look at another Pro's outfit and discuss the so-called 'practicality,' I'm going to walk out of class," Dani said, pulling down his face wraps so Rocket could read his lips.

"Classes are ramping up before finals?" I asked.

"Definitely," Snake replied. "We finished our final projects, but Professor Q keeps-s-s talking about how difficult the written exam will be."

"I heard the word 'essay' and my brain tapped out," my pink-headed friend added.

"I want to get back into the lab and make something," the scaly girl lamented, picking at her food. "But we won't get designated time until next semes-ster."

I looked across the table at their solemn faces and considered a possibility that hadn't occurred to me before. As I took a bite of my sandwich, I illused while signing, "I may have a proposition for you guys."

Their interests were immediately piqued. I searched their hungry gazes and wondered if this was too soon to start inviting them to places. But then again, they did just invite me to a festival, so it must be alright.

"My friend has this sorta garage/lab that her brothers work in. They have a big robot battling arena set up and everything. Maybe one of these nights, we could go over there." I shrugged, hoping that Reina wouldn't see me as rude for wanting to bring over five Support students. But like she always said, "the more the merrier."

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