The next day, Zhen Shu's route sheet was blown onto Che's desk by the wind.
It wasn't intentional. The window hadn't been shut properly, and a gust slipped in before morning class, sending several sheets of paper flying everywhere. Kiyo reached out to grab his own, only to catch Morita Yu's blank practice sheet instead. He even said righteously, "Paper is paper, anyway." Morita Yu took it back with an expression like he wanted to shove him into a sink.
Zhen Shu's sheet flipped twice before landing on Che's desk. One corner was pressed beneath his workbook, exposing four words at the end of the rear corridor: Encountered, unanswered.
Che did not immediately pick it up and look elsewhere. He held down the corner with two fingers and waited for Zhen Shu to come over.
Zhen Shu did not look pleased. "Give it back."
"I didn't look at anything else."
"I know."
Those words, I know, caught Che off guard. Zhen Shu pulled the sheet away without first suspecting him of sneaking a look, as he would have before. Maybe after all the recent practice with water basins, paper corners, original records, and route recitations, everyone had finally built a little usable trust in the words "I didn't look."
Kiyo muttered from the side, "The wind was peeking."
Morita Yu said, "Go interrogate the wind."
"The wind doesn't answer according to the rules."
Takuya entered just in time to hear that last line. He shut the door, though the window paper was still trembling. Today, he had brought no new props, only a paperweight. It was an ordinary gray-white stone with a chip along one edge.
"Today, we'll practice answers that get blown back," Takuya said.
Kiyo immediately grew wary. "Answers can come back on their own?"
"They can." Takuya