A Flower in Death's Embrace

Chapter 4

Vincent couldn't believe what he heard that he stayed speechless for some time. Gloxinia tilted her head when he wouldn't say anything.

"Come again?" Vincent finally blurted out.

"Be my friend?" Gloxinia said again.

Vincent studied her expression. She was looking straight at his eyes with stable and clear pupils indicating that she wasn't lying or forcing herself. She sincerely just wanted to be friends.

"Why?" Vincent asked. He glanced at her hand which was grabbing onto his shirt. He wanted to push her hand away, but he thought it would be rude. It wasn't as if she were a germ.

Gloxinia blinked as her mind started to think of a reason.

Why?

"Because you're the only one who would talk to me?" Gloxinia said, strangely with a little questioning tone at the end.

"..."

"..."

Both of them fell silent. Vincent was being confused at Gloxinia and Gloxinia was being confused at herself.

"I don't really need friends." Vincent was the one who broke the silence first.

Gloxinia frowned at his words.

"But friends are important for a school life," Gloxinia said, looking up at him straight into his eyes as if she was challenging him. She couldn't fathom why Vincent wouldn't want friends in school.

"Who even told you that?" Vincent said with a frown. Gloxinia noticed a change in his expression for the first time - an expression that she didn't know the meaning. One thing for sure was that it was not a happy expression.

For Vincent, what she said made even less sense. Vincent didn't need such a vain thing called friends. Not after what he'd been through.

He stepped backwards in a sudden to yank off Gloxinia's hand without touching her before he walked back into the building.

"If you really want friends," Vincent said as he passed by Gloxinia. "Just look around."

Gloxinia watched as he went inside the school building. She wondered what he meant by 'look around'. Were there other people that could be her friend?

Gloxinia followed Vincent back into the school building, but once again she already lost sight of him even though he was just gone a moment ago. She decided to just shrug it off and make her way to the classroom.

She was about to walk down when she noticed someone passing by carrying a bunch of things in his arms.

Somehow, those things looked like her missing things.

"Oh!" Gloxinia exclaimed. Her loud voice startled the guy and he stopped moving.

Gloxinia hurried down the stairs and approached the guy with her eyes stuck on the stuff he was carrying.

"Are those mine? Are you the one who found them?" Gloxinia asked with sparkling eyes.

"N-no, I mean, yes..." the guy stuttered.

Gloxinia looked up to look at the guy's face and raised an eyebrow. She felt like she'd seen the guy before. His face didn't have any feature that stood out--black hair, two round eyes, average nose length, lips... But the way he averted his eyes from Gloxinia seemed familiar.

"Ah," Gloxinia said. "Didn't we meet yesterday?"

She was talking about the one she and Vincent met when they were going back to class.