Rising Shards

"Roux's trying to climb over the order table again," Amara said. "I'll laser them down."

Amara marched off as Kalei, Maia, and I finished the last few orders.

Our fake job day was winding down, and I was beat. The teachers and staff were either super chill about what they ordered, or complete monsters, being hyper specific and picky in spite of there being two options they could pick from. Which I guess fit what I knew about my teachers, they seemed to either be really cool or be pretty awful. Stella stopped in and nearly forgot to order entirely, rushing straight for me to take pictures of my work outfit.

"It's just an apron, do you really need more than one picture of this?" I asked.

"No, it's precious!" Stella laughed. "I won't do this when you get a real job, let me enjoy this."

"I'm really sweaty, I look gross." I said.

"You look fine." Stella said.

"Why is librarian teacher talking to Zeta?" Roux asked. I didn't see any laser flashes go off, so I figured Amara must have gotten them down peacefully. I saw the fox Kanibari girl leaving to go see Rain and KJ, so she must've hit her limit being away from her companions and couldn't take any more of us.

"I'm just a librarian," Stella said.

"Deflecting from the topic, I see." Roux said.

"Come on, it's so obvious," Iris said, who had been hanging around waiting for Maia to be done. "Zeta's mom is here!"

"I'm her older sister," Stella said.

"You're basically her mom, though," Kalei said.

"I mean, guardian-ing wise, yeah," Stella said. "Why is everyone crowding around me?"

"This is revenge for all the pictures!" I said.

Stella managed to get about thirty seven more pictures of me before the students wanting to ask her librarian questions got to be too much. The remaining students were clumping together into a few big groups, and I caught Oka looking between them, unsure of which one to join. When she spotted me, we silently agreed to avoid them altogether. Oka got us each a root beer float, and we stood back-to-back, shoulder to shoulder, and I felt myself recharging just from that little touch. The sweet drink helped, too, obviously.

"Some of these teachers do not understand how root beer floats are made." Oka said. "I got asked to make one with just ice cream. That's not a root beer float, that's just ice cream!"

"I thought you were just on server duty," I said.

"They had me running around, Rain's root beer floats were terrible," Oka said. "And Corinani liked how we handled the big root beer keg once we found that thing."

"That sounds stressful," I said.

"It was kinda fun, actually," Oka said. "I think I like being a little busy. How was yours?"

"I'd say it was...busy, too. I think I dislike a bunch of our teachers now." I said.

"For real! Junea asked me to put my tail in a hair net. Like, what?" Oka said. "Speaking of, my tail kept undoing the back of my apron. I totally get what you meant every time you said your tail has a mind of its own."

"I'm glad you get it," I smiled. We both noticed that our tails had wrapped themselves around each other, which was very cozy and looked super cute. I didn't want to interrupt the cute vibes, but I didn't want to keep this locked up, either.

"Something's up, too." I said. I explained everything that went down on our break, and my slim findings on Kalei's mood situation.

"I already added P.D. to my revenge list after the thing with Kalei last time, but now she was rude to you?" Oka said. "She's double-y on the list, now."

"Good," I said. "She's on my list now, too. I'm ready for this recreant thing to be done so her and Chickadee and Ovie and all of them just go away."

"I get you," Oka said.

"What do you think about the rest of it?" I asked. "Is there anything we can do for her?"

"I think Kalei has a lot on her plate," Oka said, staring into her float. "Or, mug. Oh, wait I can do a visual!"

She gestured to the contents of her drink. "Think of everything we have going on as this float. Sometimes, it's pretty well managed, but sometimes someone drops an extra scoop of ice cream in there and the whole thing starts overflowing. But I think Kalei is the type who is very good at keeping this mug very well sipped, a skill we all unfortunately share with her. Though the ice cream keeps piling up, we all have just enough to not spill. As we're both aware, this method does not work long term, and things do eventually blow up."

"That's very true," I said. "So what should we do? I know we probably shouldn't keep asking if she needs help, but..."

"I watched the first episode of that horrible show you and Kalei were talking about," Oka said.

"Huh? What'd you...think?" I asked, not sure about the sudden topic change.

"I hated just about every second," Oka said. "But. I do think there's something to the bit about the captain or whatever his rank was about asking for help."

"Oh yeah?" I said. "I did kinda like that part."

"We can't force her to talk about whatever she's feeling about everything going on," Oka said. "Knowing Kalei, it might make things worse if we make an attempt. As you're well aware, she famously keeps her emotions fairly locked up, and doesn't like when we pry."

"Good point," I said. "And I'm incredibly impressed you got to that from that void marine show."

"Thank you, my dear." Oka said.

"Still though, do we just wait it out then?" I asked.

"I think we should be there for Kalei the best we can," Oka said. "And if her root beer float overflows, we can be ready and waiting with paper towels? Which are metaphorical to, um, being there for our friend!"

I mulled that over as I sipped my drink.

"You would be a good teacher," I said. "Or like, a great therapist maybe."

"Heh," Oka grinned.

There was still a lot I didn't understand about what Kalei was going through, but the parts I did get had me concerned.

"About her asking about trans stuff though, I dunno!" Oka said. "Maybe she just wants to get to know her roommates better."

"Next time she asks, I'll do my best to give her any info she needs," I said. "And hopefully we won't get interrupted."

"We do get interrupted a lot, don't we?" Oka said.

"We do! It's like half this school is super rude!" I said.

"Honestly! And if they're not being rude, they have the worst timing." Oka said. "But not us. We are kind folk, full of fluff and love. Especially for each other."

"Yeah!" I nuzzled against her, and we clinked our mugs together in a show of girlfriend-ly solidarity.

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!