Outsider Syndrome | ✓

Chapter 16 - "A Beautician Named Banri"

After defeating Upperclassman Hanai in the Music Festival and standing against her lackeys, I was convinced today couldn't get crazier.

Perhaps, I was wrong.

"A model?" I couldn't believe my ears. "Me?"

"Yes." A fiery passion swirled in his eyes. "I need you, Kisaragi."

This had to be a dream. I'd gotten my heart broken recently so this was pure wish fulfillment. It had to be.

Unless. . .

I reeled my foot into Igarashi's shin.

"Ow!" Yelping, he hopped, clutching the spot. "What the hell, Kisaragi?"

So I wasn't dreaming.

"Look," I eventually told the boy. "I think you're confusing me with someone. That, or you're delusional. Me? A model?"

It made no sense. No matter what he said, or how he said it, there was no way I was going to give in.

"Please!" he begged, his fingers curling tighter around mine. "I'll never find anyone as beautiful as you!"

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"You've lost your mind."

I tuned out that orange-haired nuisance to the best of my ability. It was free period, courtesy of our mathematics teacher ditching class on the notice that his wife was giving birth. With him gone, our class was left to do whatever we pleased until administration managed to round up a substitute teacher in the minimal time frame they had.

"You barely know the guy," Igarashi continued. He rocked back and forth on his chair, his expression dour. "Why're you going along with him?"

Heat blossomed against my cheeks. "For your information, his name is Banri Taniguchi. He's a year older than us and apart of the famous group, the Beautician Boyz."

"Your point?"

"I know enough."

"So if I call you pretty, you're gonna wag your tail doing whatever I ask, too?"

"I'm not wagging my tail!"

"You are! And it doesn't make sense! What about you does that guy see? Is it that? He's into animals—"

"Finish that sentence, I dare you!"

He decided to adhere to the warning, much to his distaste.

Puffing my cheeks, I fiddled with my shortened bangs. When I came home on Friday, Chie and Mao found me in the sorry state I was in and demanded who'd hurt me. Mao volunteered to obliterate them—had even collected a vast majority of her "dark vessels" to end their lives. Similarly, Chie was seconds from phoning the police. After assuring them I wasn't attacked on the way home and lied about cutting it myself for the betterment of the production, they calmed down. Part of me knew they held suspicions about the whole ordeal. Fortunately, though, they dropped it.

I'd worn my hoodie beneath my blazer to school today to conceal the choppy portions of my hair. Chie offered to even it herself and while I desperately wanted to duck into my usual salon, Upperclassman Taniguchi had made it clear to wait it out. Apparently there was a member in the Beautician Boyz who excelled at hairdos and that he'd do a way better job than other hairdressers at the cost of nothing.