The Book of Firsts

Sixty-Seven

My skin is good, and for many years I’d been impatient with the time and expense involved in makeup, doing not much more than using a moisturising sunscreen. Millie had taught me to see makeup as an artform, and for the last day of formal lessons I took the time to do a nude makeup, refining my features while trying to retain a touch of the natural. My hair was twisted into a loose ball on top of my head, leaving my long bangs as a frame for my face, and a few spare tendrils to emphasise the length of my neck. Short shorts and the thigh-skimming tunic completely highlighted my legs, and I’d found a pair of low platform sandals to add to the effect.

I wouldn’t say my usual look made me ugly, but the bulky, overlong school uniform had a muting effect, while the double-takes at my bus stop today left me in no doubt that I’d highlighted my best features. I can’t claim to hate this kind of attention, as long as people keep their hands to themselves, and so I strolled onto school grounds with a sense of anticipation, while pondering what kind of look I’d go for at university, when uniforms were no longer a factor.

Given my own laziness about non-essential things, and Helios’s weather, it would mostly be jeans and t-shirts. My wardrobe didn’t run to a lot of options anyway.

Since the idea was a grand entrance, I’d taken the latest possible bus, and the school paths were relatively deserted. My phone miaowed, and I found a message from Kyou telling me not to eat lunch, and one from Bran, asking me to warn him when I was about to arrive. Since I was nearly at the auditorium, I paused to tell him which door I’d enter through, and then texted Lania to check if we were still sitting where we’d planned.

Getting confirmation, I headed in, spotting Bran, Rin and Kyou on the stage. Bran had his phone out, apparently filming the massed audience, and after a glance I ignored him, trying to spot Lania in the distance as I made my way past all the front seats. The way the volume of chatter dropped briefly was quite gratifying.

"Mika!" Sean, at Lania’s side, made expressive gestures. "Too, too hot! Steam is rising."

"I think you’ve broken our Executive," Lania said. "They stared at you the whole time you walked over."

"Probably trying to decide whether I’ve pushed the dress code too far," I said, laughing. "Let’s sit down before there’s no seats left."

As student representatives, the Three Kings were all wearing their uniforms and, after their initial lapse, managed to keep themselves to a matching level of decorum as they ceremonially handed over duties to the incoming Student Council. I paid more attention than I had the first day of school, appreciating how well they looked together, and the fact that Kyou had managed to grow his hair long enough to pull some of it back. The look was simply excellent on him.

Rin played his violin, Kyou gave a speech, and Bran stood in the background displaying his resting broody face. The new Student Council cleverly kept their own speech to a minimum, and then various faculty trod a careful line between extolling the importance of the coming exams and reassuring us that exams are not the end of the world. A girl I didn’t know sang the school song. Then we were released for classes.

Last days are never destined to be focused on study, so the next half hour involved a lot of chat, occasional photographs, and three invitations to the Seniors' Dance. None of them from people I knew, but at least one who appeared enormously confident that I’d accept, and who left looking puzzled.

"Should I know that guy?" I asked Lania, as we headed back to the classrooms for a token lesson.

"Kade Arnassan. He’s in our year, but only comes to school for exams and the occasional special event. Obscenely rich, unnecessarily good looking, and way too aware of it. But also rather smart, and inclined to anonymously help people out."

"And a leg man, I guess," I said, shrugging. "Lucky I’m pre-booked."

"I wish we’d found the dresses already," Lania said. "I wanted to paint my mask today to match."

"Do it next week. They’re saying we can come in any day of the week for study sessions, so I’m sure a little artistic interlude is permitted. In fact, didn’t Carr talk about that?"

"Yeah, he’s considering lunchtime sessions for the inevitable many who don’t get their act together until the last minute. But there’ll be plenty there this afternoon."

Art Club was holding a mask-making event, for those who wanted a personal touch to their masks. Matching masks to clothes was a big deal, it seemed. I spent the lesson before lunch thinking about dresses, not willing to blow my budget buying something I’d only wear once. Lania and I were going to the largest store in the city on the weekend, and there’d surely be something there that fit without being foolishly pricy.

Amusing as it had been, I was already regretting my transformation scene because being eye-catching made it difficult to wander off unnoticed for a lunchtime get-together. I took a circuitous route, not heading to the dovecote until I was sure no-one was paying attention. The app showed no change since the messages this morning, so I sat texting my parents for a while, then was distracted by an exciting development on one of the professional forums I followed. When the pop-up from the Cheshire app notified me that it was safe to head up, I was surprised to see that nearly half the lunch hour had gone by.

Even more unexpectedly, I found Bran waiting for me at the fence.

"Minor drama," he said, once we were safely inside. "Kyou’ll probably be another ten minutes, given the mess he was in."

"Mess? Literal or figurative?"

"He exceeded you and managed to nosedive down a flight of stairs."

"Another attack?" My heart thumped. Foolish. Even Bran wouldn’t be nearly so calm if Kyou was seriously injured.

"Two juniors with more guts than sense decided to ambush hug him. Unfortunately, Kyou wasn’t paying attention, but was holding a picnic basket at the top of a flight of stairs. Only a short flight, or his neck would probably be broken. As it is, everything in sight was decorated with strawberries, brie, and chocolate cake, along with a lot of sparkling apple juice and glass. Kyou got more cake than glass, but still needs a couple of stitches. And probably something for bruises, since those idiots landed on top of him."

I stared, then quickly found the school forums on my phone, currently featuring an excellent picture of a very dishevelled Kyou, lying at the foot the main building’s entry stair, chocolate frosting smeared across his uniform, and crying girls sitting on his stomach and legs. Blood dripped from the hand he’d raised to cover his face.

"I can never truly get my head around how your fandom behaves. Do they leap on you often?"

"Relatively rare, fortunately. More inclined to try to get us drunk, which is one of the reasons we don’t socialise much." Bran leaned over to look at my phone, then shook his head. "Kyou hides his face when he’s lost it."

"It’s a miracle he didn’t deck them."

"We’ll have a week of posts on the school site about inappropriate touching, now," Bran said. "Lucky we gave up on the bondage part of this challenge."

He pointed to an innocuous black patch in the photograph, smirked at my reaction, then pulled a strip of cloth out of his pocket.

"I don’t think I could have smuggled a lot of rope and leather away nearly so neatly." His phone beeped, and he checked it, then said: "Back in a minute."

Scrolling through the post comments, I couldn’t see any discussion of blindfolds, but plenty about the other contents of the picnic basket, which had led speculation down a path of possible romance. This had produced some fiery debate until Rin and Bran, emerging from the medical office, briefly discussed buying a replacement lunch.

This hadn’t entirely quelled the romance speculation, just sent it on imaginative tangents. I was laughing at one of Sean’s posts when Bran returned with two pizza boxes, and a bottle of soda.

"Were we all going to have a picnic?"

"Rin and I were meant to sneak off out of school, but that’s fallen apart." He put the pizzas down, and took out some glasses. "Unless they decide to send Kyou to hospital just to be safe, we’re having a replacement lunch and then I’m driving Kyou home, while Rin hangs around to take care of the things we were supposed to do this afternoon."

Both our phones chirped a warning, and he checked his screen, then began pouring soda. "Looks like they managed to ditch the faculty."

Kyou and Rin paused at the gate to lock it, then headed to the summer house. Kyou was wearing his sports uniform, had one hand bandaged, and brought an almost tangible black cloud with him.

"It’s my fault," I announced, as they came in. "I shouldn’t have asked you to grow your hair out. That style looks way too good on you."

Kyou stopped short, then smiled. "And I didn’t think anything could cheer me up."

I took his hand after he sat down, and examined the bandage. "Any tendons involved?"

"No, thankfully," he said. "It’s going to irritate the hell out of me for a week or two, but then can be displayed as a war wound."

"And you’ll tell all the girls tales of your glomping injury?" Rin asked, opening a pizza box.

"As if that news needed any help spreading," Kyou snorted, reaching for a slice. But then he frowned, and fished his phone from his pocket instead. "Speaking of which, better nip the backlash in the bud as best I can."

He found the school forums, but then handed the phone to me. "Type for me?"

"Sure."

"No major damage. Always gain consent before hugging! But also remember that everyone makes mistakes. I can forgive enthusiasm causing a minor accident, but I have no patience with bullies exercising outrage on my behalf."

"They timed their idiocy well," Bran commented, offering me pizza as soon as I finished posting. "They’ll have study break to hide at home, exams to distract everyone, and by the time school starts up again we’ll be old news."

"It might work that way," I said. "So long as they don’t read the forums, and no-one knows their social media accounts, and how likely is that?"

"Faculty will work with their parents," Rin said, on a dismissive note, then turned to more immediate subjects. "Above and beyond on the outfit, Cheshire."

I swung a foot, admiring my tall sandals. "Not good for wall climbing, great for getting invites to dances."

"Who do we need to kill?" Kyou asked.

"Still Lania," I said. "Do you have any dress preferences? We’re going hunting this weekend."

"Green," Kyou said, immediately.

"Backless," said Rin.

"Something that doesn’t get in the way," Bran finished.

I laughed. "Well, I’ll try for at least one of those. How’s the studio progressing?"

"Coming up to our first major hiring phase," Kyou said.

"The new office will only be ready for use about two weeks before we start at Helios U," Rin added. "We’ll advertise now, interview while we’re on an internship we’ve arranged, and set the new hire starting date for a week before classes start. That way we can fully focus on training and sorting out issues before we’re hit with too many distractions. We’re aiming for a second quarter release date next year, and good hires will have a big impact on whether we succeed."

"So soon?"

Kyou shrugged. "We’ve been working on One Step More for three years."

"Bones are in place, game functions on a mechanical level, still at least six months of work to go," Bran said.

"What we’ll focus on for the next few months is our management and coordination skills, since the bulk of the scripting, core programming, concept art and music are all done. Now we just need the manpower to finish it off. Practicing people wrangling is also one of the reasons we went in for the Student Council." Kyou rubbed his face. "Hopefully we can successfully encourage our employees to not throw themselves on us."

"Put it in your company code of conduct," I said. "You’ve been working on Echoes for even longer, right? When do you expect to transition to it?"

"We’re never not doing something in relation to it, but the next major stage is around Christmas," Rin said. "We want to see how we go with the upcoming phase of One Step before deciding how ambitious we’re going to be with Echoes."

"Whether to be Triple A or mid-level?"

"No, definitely Triple A," Kyou said. "More the extent we commit to major branching paths in the story."

"And how much of the development engine we build from scratch," Bran said. "We’re using existing tools for parts of One Step, but there are long term costs involved in those."

"Bran’s been fiddling around with his own engine for years," Rin added.

"What’s involved in a game engine?" I asked.

This led to a mini crash course about physics engines, rendering software and a great deal more, which I enjoyed at least in part because it was Rin, Bran and Kyou not hiding their enthusiasm for their pet project. Perhaps next year we would be able to continue this way, but if not, I was glad to have this day. The greatest compliment these three boys could give me was making me feel like a fourth in their friendship.

"About to pass out?" Rin asked, pausing in describing how sound is managed in games.

I looked at Kyou, who had his eyes closed.

"More that everything’s throbbing. And not in the good way."

"Give me your keys, and I’ll bring your car around," Bran said, standing up. "Take you to the pharmacy to fill that prescription."

"I’ll play distraction for the faculty," Rin said, and followed Bran out after Kyou handed over his keys.

"Sorry, Cheshire," Kyou said, rubbing his face with his uninjured hand. "This is far from what I had planned."

"Not your fault. Were we going to play a game of guess what’s in your mouth now?"

Kyou choked. "That’s not quite how I’d have phrased it. But you’ve captured the essence."

"It looked delicious. Though the pizza was also nice. I’ve never had a chance to just sit chatting with you three before."

"That will change. This place is convenient, but it increased the need to pretend not to know you. Our comings and goings will be less obvious at Helios U."

I was less than certain about that. It seemed to me that they’d just gain a larger audience. But now was not the time.

"I’d crawl into your lap, but it looked like they broke you."

"My mouth still works," he said.

A brief stint of kissing barely touched on the things I’d wanted to do with Kyou today, but I didn’t prolong the encounter, and had him let me out before Bran returned. The school was too stirred up, and I was too eye-catching. Being particularly cautious, I emerged at full alert from the twists of the wall, and only went so far as the dovecote to play some Tyranny before heading to Art Club. That was crowded and enjoyable, since I was far from the only one caught by the mood of final day of school proper. I let myself enjoy it, a small bit of indulgence before it was time to start seriously reviewing.

All I needed to do was stop thinking about three boys. And last times.