Betting On Your Love
Tomoe had to keep Nanami occupied, fast, before she spoke to the inspectors and showed up the university. She had only been accepted onto the programme because of Tomoe, who vouched for her. In retrospect it probably wasn’t the best idea, but Tomoe was drinking and wanted Nanami to leave him alone in the Oxbridge brothel.
It took him a moment to locate her. She was sitting on a bench near the campus lake; the air was cold enough for Tomoe to feel it under his robes.
Nanami leant her head back and looked towards the sky. A few moments passed with her seated, her familiar stood beside her, before she opened her mouth to talk.
“The stars…the sky is so clear tonight. Don’t you think it’s pretty, Tomoe?”
He watched his mistress before looking up at the sky. After seeing the same sky every night it’s merged into one boring plane of shifting colour. But he had to keep Nanami occupied and away from the inspectors, and he quickly came up with an idea that would engage the simpleton’s attention.
“Do you want to see it closer?”
-
Tomoe held Nanami up, his arm around her waist. It was colder on the roof. Tomoe realised how easy it would be to push her off the edge but forced himself to relent - at least until the inspectors had left the grounds.
Tomoe walked along the edge of the cement roof, the wind rippling through his robes and silver hair. He tipped his head over a little. “Shanks told me a young woman such as yourself is likely to have romantic feelings towards someone available…like me. But I would hope that isn’t true.”
Nanami stopped Tomoe with a fist in his robes. “And if it were true?” They were close enough for Tomoe’s hair to brush against her nose and the ridges of her cheekbones. “If I…liked you?”
Tomoe threw his head back into the night air, laughing. “Ah Nanami. Your imagination never fails to amuse me. I’m sure this fresh air will be enough to return you to your sanity!” Tomoe grabbed her shoulders and shook her wildly.
“Tomoe! Tomoe, stop!” Nanami grabbed Tomoe’s hands to try and pry them off her, though as a spirit he was stronger…
“No! You stop with this lunacy! You are my student and I am your teacher. A yokai and a human – stop this!”
Nanami stopped struggling, as did Tomoe. His hands were still on her shoulders – she was leaning over the end of the roof – they stilled.
“What – so, so – you’ve never-“ a tear dripped off Nanami’s cheek. “You’ve never found me attractive?”
Her heel clipped off the end of the roof and Nanami fell backwards, almost in slow motion – she dropped right out of Tomoe’s hands –
“Nanami!”
Tomoe’s eyes widened. “Nanami!” He jumped off the roof after his student–
“Take my hand, Nanami – take my hand and let me save you!” Tomoe held his hand out towards Nanami, though he was inches too far to catch her – and with every second that passed the ground got closer, though it was practically in slow-motion, like dribbling through a slushie – her clothes wrapped around her and were practically pulled off her, the wind pulled her apart –
“Nanami please, give me your hand and let me save you!”
Tears dripped out Nanami’s eyes and were torn by the wind. “So – so you never liked me? So you never felt anything for me?”
The speech was distorted by the drop though the words were understandable and Tomoe’s eyes widened and desperation welled in his tone, “Nanami, please-“
Nanami looked at his pale hand, slender fingers –
The impact with the ground made her eyes roll to the back of her head.
Tomoe landed steadily on his feet beside her deceased body.
Not two metres from where she landed stood both inspectors. The Fuhrer’s expression was painted in disbelief.
Tomoe took a step in front of Nanami’s corpse, drawing their attention towards him. “Just ignore that, gentlemen. Nothing to see here. Really. I’m not sure if there is anyone on this earth who would feel her loss. Actually I’m sure she consented to organ donation. I always knew she’d be worth more dead than alive.”
Kaname fainted.
-
The inspectors were made aware of the circumstaces surrounding Nanami’s death and they ascertained a suicide could not be blamed on the institution.
However, they remained at the university for the rest of the week to see what measures they would put in place to deal with bereavement and help with student wellbeing. It was hard to ignore the rotting body for the entirety of the week by the main entrance. No one had bothered to clean it up, flies surrounded the corpse which smelled worse than anything they’d ever smelt before, including Gluttony’s breath. Even the students seemed to be largely apathetic towards the presence of the rotting body, merely stepping over or around the corpse. One morning someone had even taken the time to fit a wig over the deceased’s head and paint her face like the infamous Ronald McDonald.
As each day passed it dawned on the Fuhrer that there was clearly no intention by any of the staff to dispose of the deceased. There had been no sign of a memorial plaque, no therapist invited to talk to mourning students. But the body.
PArt of her arm was missing, and there was rumours of a drunk student biting it off.
-
Fukazawa picked up the envelope emblazoned with the Ofsted seal.
“That’s it?” Kakashi drawled, turning the page of his erotica novel.
Fukazawa nodded. “This - this is it. This is the feedback for the observation the Ofsted employees gave us.”
Fukazawa decided he had to be the first to read it, before any of his loyal subordinates.
Dear Fukazawa of Oxbridge,
It is the intention of the Ofsted committee to ensure a safe and healthy standard is maintained nationwide through education institutions. Due to Oxbridge’s notorious global standing our expectations were, of course, proportionate.
We would firstly like to thank you for being so hospitable. We found your school grounds charming and your students appeared to be satisfied by their teaching, though unfortunately for the entirety of our ten-day visit we were unable to witness any classes being held. There were some cases of indiscretion and student-teacher relationships, though we found no supporting evidence of this. We also found satisfactory evidence that Oxbridge followed health and safety guidelines in their recent interuniversity event, the Triwizard Tournament.
Our main cause for concern, however, is the reception of the death of your student Nanami Momozomo. Though we identify that neither Oxbridge or its affiliates can be blamed for student suicide, there seemed to be a complete disregard for the wellbeing and safety of the other students on-campus.
Though Principal Fukazawa has suggested that the death of their late janitor, Shu, is the reason for the corpse to be left on campus for an unsafe and unsanitary period of time, Ofsted have reason to believe that there were other methods of disposing of the toxic waste present on campus.
We would also like to note that such inaction would most definitely be the cause of mental trauma and anguish among the student body, and we feel that the university as a whole has more responsibility in this incident than they are willing to admit.
Therefore with the health of Oxbridge students in mind, we regret to inform you that Oxbridge university must close indefinitely.
Students must be rehoused and transferred to safer higher education institutions. The school must produce a public apology and Principal Fukazawa must sign the enclosed document, which will bar him from teaching for the rest of his career.
Kind Regards,
Ophsted xox