a sun that never sets

CHAPTER EIGHT | I HOPE YOU'RE HAPPY BUT DON'T BE HAPPIER

I LET THAT matter rest for two weeks. And then it was midway through November, though this time around I had no tests. Instead, mocks were after Christmas, which meant my Christmas was going to be hell. If Adelina or Yunji were affected by what had happened, nothing changed. Adelina was still drifting away, I could feel it, but at the same time...

So was Yunji. Yunji befriended this day girl called Qinguan, who was a first generation immigrant living here with her parents. And they'd hit it right off. But Qinguan and I had a total lack of topic, and the few times I'd tried to join them, it hadn't gone very well.

We get along, of course. There was no bad blood between me and Qinguan, and I did not envision there to be in the future. It was simply that we had nothing to talk about as long as Yunji wasn't there. It was almost reminiscent of Yunji and Adelina's relationship last year.

Which wasn't good.

Because if both Adelina and Yunji were making new friends, having new priorities, I was getting pushed down that list. Which meant I was all alone.

I hinted at this to James Taylor one particular day as we strolled leisurely back to our houses after class. He looked pensive.

"I mean, it is somewhat to be expected. Your relationship was almost always due to proximity rather than anything else anyways."

"We live together."

"Precisely," James pointed out. "Proximity. Like, do you and them have anything in common besides the obvious? Like, well, like think about it. You and Adelina. You're both in Lok. You're both good at duelling. With you and Yunji, well... It really just boils down to the fact that you're both Chinese."

"Thanks," I deadpanned. "I love it when you dispense sage and wise advice."

"I know, I know," James flashed a grin, "it's part of my persona. You see, I'm the gay friend. The one who's always there offering suggestions to everyone else's relationships, but mines always fails. Or are nonexistent in the first place. That's me."

"You're such a stereotype."

"I am. But also I'm not. The same could be said for you, really. You're a major stereotype for a classic Chinese girl."

"But I'm also not."

"Precisely."

He looked extremely pleased with himself for having carried this unuseful and strange point across. I did not share his sentiment. I was rather perplexed, if I must be honest, on the entire point of this conversation in the first place.

James Taylor and I had a strange friendship. We were good friends by all sense of the word, but at the same time, we almost never interacted outside of these small chats between lessons or when we randomly ran into each other in the queue for a meal. And just like what he said about me and the girls, the two of us had practically nothing in common except for the fact that we both used to study in the library during first prep. Something neither of us did anymore, since first prep was no longer conducted in classrooms

If I really thought about it, I couldn't list a single reason why we were still such good friends.

But somehow we were. And that meant that I was never alone. Besides, I still had Louisa, Audrey and Gwen. But with them, it was still obvious that they were a unit, and I was the other person. They never excluded me by any chance, but it did feel a bit intrusive when I hung out with them sometimes.

Which was why often times, I simply tagged along with someone and said nothing, trailing behind them like a wraith, offering a sentence or two but then falling quiet, because it felt like no one had anything to say to me, and I had nothing to say to any of them.