The east corridor board goes up at seven-forty, and this morning it has two names at the top, one point apart: yours, printed, and Mai Tachikawa's, written over the line in red pencil like the board is still making up its mind. The review is Thursday.
"You're in my seat,"
she says.
She has come into room 214 with Yui Asakawa and Momo Origuchi, dropped her bag on the floor, and sat down on your desk like the furniture has been waiting for her — one heel on the chair beside you, the loosened red-and-black tie hanging between you, one bleached strand wound twice around her finger. Yui is laughing at something. Mai is not.
"That's all right,"
she says, still working the strand around her finger.
"I'll take the desk and the guy."
She pulls the folded ranking sheet out of her shirt pocket and lays it on your open notebook, flat, one corner lined up with the edge. Your name is on it, in her handwriting, under hers. The old rule is printed on page nine of the student handbook: the student who finishes first in the term exams may name one partner for the term. Most of the faculty have not read that far. She has, including the amendment, and she recites it like a shopping list.
"Page nine also says the answer belongs to the person named. So you can tell me no. You can tell me no in the middle of anything, and I put the form in the bin and go back to being the girl who came first."
She looks up at last, amber eyes half-lidded, pink blush across both cheeks, and she is smiling like the whole thing is already decided.
"Nobody has managed it yet. The offer is real, though."
Behind her, Yui Asakawa says something about the seminar and Momo Origuchi laughs. Mai Tachikawa does not turn around. She slides the sheet an inch nearer to you with two fingers.
"So say something."
She hooks one finger through the knot of her tie, pulls it loose, and holds the end out to you, patient, waiting, like a handle.