How Interesting

One week. Seven days. Sixty eight hours. No sixty seven school ended an hour ago. Ten thousand and twenty minutes, and 601,200 seconds left. Time is slipping quickly, and here I am relying on Midari.

This is rather concerning, and even more concerning is that something appears to be wrong with the President. When I returned from getting Runa’s paperwork, she seemed quite off. The possibility of it being related to the election are rather low. She is incapable of seeing the consequences that will come with losing or simplyshe doesn’t care. Keeping this in mind the only logical conclusion is that her troubles are from the conversation in the morning or the one in student council room. Perhaps even a combination of the two.

Looking at it objectively the election is more important than the President’s current emotional state. Comparing the two even in my head is foolish. My priority should be on both securing victory for the President while also ensuring she is safe from Terano. Her emotions and mine are both useless under these circumstances, and to be distracted by then even for a moment is a serious lapse in my judgement. I mean how could a frowning face compare to empty dead eyes.

I’m walking faster now. There’s a yell from the classroom next to me. Most likely some students are still gambling. I don’t stop. Maybe I’ll walk home today. More time to think.

I wonder if can I trust the President to win the election on her own. Her skills in gambling cannot be denied, but there are other factors to consider. And what draws her ability to win in question the most is her motive? I suppose using the wording ability to win would be wrong maybe potential or willingness would be better because I cannot help but wonder if victory is what she is after. Was this election only for entertainment or perhaps are there some other hidden motives? Does she even want to win? And if she doesn’t want it am I still in a position to help her reach victory. I must consider a circumstance where she loses, but remains safe. Perhaps if the Vice-president wins and I’m still able deal with the threat Terano is. I think as though I have a complete plan to deal with Terano, but I don’t. Too much is unplanned, and this uncertainty makes me ill. How can I keep allowing myself to procrastinate? How could I make Midari a pivotal part of my plan? Using Yumi as leverage is key, and I left Midari in charge of speaking with her. It would be too suspicious if I did it myself outsourcing this job was the only choice. And how you will I use her as leverage? A gamble? Why would she agree? Just direct threatening...something else? My heart is racing now. My palms are sweating.

I must stop. I don’t have all the information at the moment. Without all of the information, any plan created would be unreliable. Useless. It is ill-advised to think of this even, but my heart is still pounding. Counting. I’ll count it.

One hundred twenty seven beats per minute. Not a particularly reliable count as they was a clear increase between each beat as time passed. The exit is approximately seven meters away. It’ll take approximately 10.59 strides, so 21 steps. The length of a person stride based on their heights is often cited as height multiplied by .413 for women and .415 for men. I wonder how was this data collected? How accurate is it? Perhaps I should do a study myself it would be easy. A simple procedure of looking at my phones distance counter and counting my strides for certain distances. It would be easy to calculate the average stride length for each of these distances then I would calculate the average of these values. Naturally to find this so called ratio between strides and height, I would divide the average stride length by my height.

This would be quite an interesting experiment, not enough to prove this number that has been found is truly accurate, but still it would nice to know. I wonder would the Preside—I must not waste her time on such topics. She’d mostly likely find it to be rather boring, and if she found it to be interesting, such topics would be dangerous. Discussing one’s individual interests has been shown to result in a drop of one’s guard. That is something that must be avoided at all costs at least for the time being.

————

An average stride length of 64.92 centimeters making the ratio of stride length to height approximately .4058. With thirty seven different stride lengths, an averaged out the answer should be an accurate representation of my own stride length, but this doesn’t hold true for someone else’s.

“Hello Igarashi. How are you today?” A voice from my left calls out. I turn my head. My neighbor. A rather polite man who has lived next to us for over ten years.

“I’m well, and how are you?” I bow to him.

“No need to be so formal. I’m good was just worried about why you were standing out here.” I suppose it makes sense standing outside the gates to your home is rather odd, but I wanted to complete my calculations before entering my house. My mother has off today, and she would most certainly distract me. “Well have a good night.”

“You too.” Informal enough, I would guess. I open the gates to my house then walk towards my front door.
It’s unlocked and lights are on, so my mother is indeed home.

As I open the door, my mother peeks her head out of the kitchen doorway. “Oh Sayaka dear how was school?” She’s smiling. Having a break from work improves her mood, I don’t understand it, but it always seems to hold true.

“Good. How was your day off?”

“Great and are you sure you’re okay?” A mother’s instinct truly denies all logic. I wonder is this a reason for this question besides a ‘feeling.’ Did I give something away?

“Yes, and I have work tonight, so I won’t be here for dinner.” My parents are usually good at remembering dates, but it is always better confirm information with people.

“I know. When does your shift end?” My jaw tightens. She will not like the answer, but the truth is the only option.

“Eleven thirty.” She frowns as expected.

“That’s quite late. Be careful on your way home.”

“Of course.” I should try to get some of my school work done before I have to prepare to go to work.

“And you’re running tomorrow again?” She’s sounds resigned perhaps irritated. While it is important to consider the research that shows people need 8 hours of sleep with teens needing even more, it’s an unrealistic number. Work comes first. Life comes first. A change in schedule could result in the complete and utter collapse of my work ethic a butterfly affect if you will. The few extra hours of sleep are not worth what could be lost. She doesn’t understand that fact.

“Yes and I will be out longer than usual.” It won’t be much time at all...no extra time if Midari bails which wouldn’t be a complete shock. A six o’clock meeting time might have been a bit too early. Only time will tell I suppose still it makes me a bit nervous.

—————

She’s not here. The time is now 6:03 three minutes pass our scheduled meeting time. To contact her through our phones would reckless. I suppose I will wait till 6:10. If she doesn’t come by then, the chances of her coming at all ar—-

“Chill out you freak.” She’s wearing some sort of strange netting with a black shirk and black t-shirt. Her walk is casual amused even; not the walk of someone who is late to their meeting.

“You’re three minutes late.” She laughs. The girl is an annoyance, but I cannot bring myself to be too annoyed when my relief is so strong. “Well what happened with Yumi?”

“Oh some great shit.” She’s smirking. There’s an awkward pause as I wait for her to expand. Is she really not going to expand? ‘Great shit’ with Midari could mean anything. A image of Midari licking Yumi’s throat with her gun pressed against the girl’s head flashes in my mind. I shiver. It wouldn’t be completely out of character, but if this were to be an accurate representation of the events, the chance of success would certainly plummet to near zero percent. She has still yet to expand.

“And what is ‘great shit.’” At the world shit, she chuckles. A child.

“I got her to agree to come to an arcade with us today.” An arcade? What is wrong with her?

“You were suppose to try to gain more information on her not plan for us to play games.” Could I use this perhaps? She would certainly tell Terano. Now she’ll be most certainly be suspicious. My options are running low, but if Yumi truly is a fool I could use this.

“Yeah but now you can just make friends with her. Just don’t be a fucking weirdo. Learn how to properly talk with another person.” To hear that from Midari must be truly the greatest insult of all my life. My social skills are quite adequate in my eyes. I have mastered the two main pillars of every social interaction, politeness and professionalism. “So we’re meeting at 3 at Jerry’s Arcade.” Her tone is suddenly nervous. A sign that could only point to danger. She’s backing away. “Also Kirari knows about your meeting with Terano. Got to go.”

She knows. She knows. What could this mean? Under normal circumstances I would be inclined to believe that the President would not interfere. She’d simply observe, but I cannot know for certain. They are too many factors to properly predict how she will react. If she decided to interfere... A flash of red hair stained with blood appears. No certainly there must be a way around such event.

I should run after Midari. It would easy her form is awful, but my knees are unstable, and I feel sick. I have much to consider. These variables are adding up, and the possibility of reaching a solution decreases with each day.

Failure is not an option. My heart is beating too fast perhaps I should count my stride length while running home.