Sour Love

Chapters

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9

Chapter 1 Author's Note

Just a heads up for Sour Sweet's dialogue
Normal font="sweet" persona
Bold font="sour persona
I hope you enjoy the fic, and again I would very much like to see any constructive criticism you have for me, Thanks.

Chapter 1

‘Okay, let’s see here. The Crystal Prep’s reddish-purple blazer worn neatly and proudly, shirt tucked in properly, dark-blue tie is presentable, dark-blue slacks are clean pressed, and hair is combed to perfection. *sigh* Sure, let’s just wait until after you get on the bus to worry about my appearance, right, White Foam.’

I was sitting there thinking to myself, wondering why I was riding the bus to get to the school known as Crystal Prep. Oh wait, that’s right, my parents took it upon themselves to send me to a school that I wasn’t really fond of going to, under the excuse of, “we just want to give you a promising future.” I mean, sure they’re not wrong, I’ve heard how successful Crystal Prep students are once they graduate and the fact that I met the prerequisites and barely passed the entrance exams needed to transfer my grades over to Crystal Prep once we moved to Canterlot, considering the grades I usually made in my previous high school, was more than an accomplishment for me as far as I was concerned. But at the same time, I’ve heard some pretty negative things about Crystal Preps student body and faculty, mostly about them being snooty, show no sportsmanship towards the schools they compete against, and are mostly out for themselves. Not to mention Crystal Prep’s high standards when it comes to their curriculum and the grades their students are expected to make. Why couldn’t my parents send me to Canterlot High instead?

I suddenly felt the bus crawl to a halt, causing me to look out the window. There it is, Crystal Prep. I see that it lives true to its name, since several aspects of the building look like it was made entirely out of crystal. Seriously, someone give the architect an award, he or she fucking deserves it.

As I got off the bus and entered the school grounds, I started going through my mental checklist. ‘Alright, go to the principal’s office, get my locker assignment and schedule, store my stuff in my locker, and survive the school day. What could possibly go wro…..nope, not going to finish that sentence.’

I spent the next ten minutes trying to find the office that I was supposed to go to, until I found a door labeled, “Principal Abacus Cinch.” ‘Okay, just go in and introduce yourself. She can’t be as bad as everyone says she is,’ I think to myself before opening the door to the office, only to find the room to be eerily dark, with only one lightbulb lighting up the entire room. The only objects that are clearly visible are a desk and an oversized leather office chair, which made it impossible to determine if there was somebody sitting there or not.

‘Okay then, ten bucks says that this person looks and acts like a stereotypical villain’

“Um, hello? Is anyone here?” I called out.

Suddenly the chair slowly rotates revealing a middle-aged woman with her elbows on the armrests and her fingers interlocked. Upon seeing me, the woman, who I can safely assume at this point is Principal Cinch, looks at me with an uninterested expression before speaking, “Hmph, so you’re the new student who just transferred into my school. I’ve been expecting you.”

‘Nailed it.’

“Y-yes ma’am, my name is White Foam. I-it’s an honor to be accepted into your academy,” I say, trying to get on her good side.

“As it should be, this school has a reputation of absolute perfection to uphold. After all, I would hate for something to tarnish my school’s reputation again,” she said as she gave me a look that let me knew that by something, she meant someone.

“Yes ma’am, I understand.”

“Good,” she said as she reached for the phone on her desk. She pressed a button, and raised the phone to her ear, “Dean Cadance, would you please come to my office with White Foam’s locker assignment and schedule? Thank you.” She then put down her phone before turning back to me. “Now I hope that you perform well in my school, but remember,” she leaned in closer, “it’s even easier to get kicked out of my school then it is to get accepted.”

I gulped, “Yes ma’am.”

The door behind me suddenly opened, causing me to quickly turn around, expecting someone similar to Principal Cinch. Instead, I found a young woman, possibly in her mid-twenties, who radiated kindness as opposed to Cinch’s cruelty. She seemed like someone that I could look up to as an older sister figure.

She gave me a kind smile before extending her hand to introduce herself, “Hello, you must be White Foam. My name is Dean Mi Amore Cadenza, but you can call me Cadance. It’s nice to meet you.”

“It’s nice to meet you too, Dean Cadance,” I say, as I reach my hand out and accept her handshake.

She gave me another warm smile before ending the handshake, pulling out a folder. “Now then, I’m sure you would like to know your locker assignment and your schedule for this semester, correct?”

“Yes, ma’am”

“Alright then,” she says as she pulls out a couple of forms from the folder, “this form shows you which locker you are assigned to and to locker combination. Your locker is number 130. You’ll find it straight down the hall after turning right once you leave the office.” I nod in understanding. “And this form shows you your schedule for this semester. Will you need any help finding where your classes are?”

“No ma’am. I think I can find my way around just fine.”

“Okay. Well if you have any questions about our curriculum or about any of our extra-curricular activities just let me know. Enjoy your stay at Crystal Prep!”

“Thanks, I’ll try,” I say as I leave the office and make a right towards my locker.

‘Alright, let’s see where my classes,’ I think to myself as I pull out my schedule, ‘Let’s see, first period is Physics in room 158. Great. My worst subject as my first period class. This will end well. Next is History in room 243, then Pre-Cal in room 215, followed by-‘

My train of thought was interrupted when I felt myself run into something, knocking me down on my ass. ‘Okay, what did I run into?’ But when I looked up, I saw that the something was actually someone, a girl to be more specific.

She had pale, light grayish gold skin, indigo eyes, some freckles on her cheeks, and moderate rose colored hair with a lighter moderate rose and aquamarine steaks tied in a ponytail with a berry styled hair tie. She was wearing the standard Crystal Prep vest and skirt, with a white shirt underneath the vest, a dark blue bow tie, dark blue socks that went up to her knees, and the standard shoes that female students were required to wear. She was in the same position I was in, clearly still slightly disoriented from the collision. Looking in the direction that her back was pointing to, I could see the hallway that she came from. She probably didn’t see me coming around the corner, and me not paying attention didn’t exactly help either.

I managed to get up first and went over to her to give her a helping hand up. It seemed like the most sensible thing to do. “I’m so sorry about this miss. Guess I wasn’t watching where I was going,” I say giving her a friendly smile.

She looked suspiciously for a moment before returning the smile and accepting the help up. “Oh it’s no problem at all. I’m sure you didn’t mean it,” She said in an almost obnoxiously sweet voice.

‘I guess the students at Crystal Prep aren’t as bad as I’ve heard.’

But as soon as she got on her feet, her sweet smile turned to an angry frown as she yanked her hand out of mine before exclaiming, “If you were watching where you were going.”

‘Okay, where did that come from?’

“Look, I said I was sorry. I’ll admit that this is partially my fault and that I should have watched where I was going. Can we just leave it at that?”

She seemed to think about it before responding, “Fine, but so long as you keep your distance from me. Understood?” I nodded in understanding, which caused her to change her attitude again. “Great! Now, I’ll be on my way,” She says, turning and walking away, right in the direction I’m headed.

‘*sigh* Oh well, might as well continue on to my destination. She’ll probably just assume that I’m just walking in the same direction as she is.’

However, a few moments after I started walking, she turned her head around and noticed me walking behind her. She then frowned before turning around even further and exclaiming, “Didn’t I tell you to keep your distance? Why are you following me?”

“I’m not following you, I’m just headed to my locker, which just so happens to be down the hall.”

She then gave a slight smile. “Oh, well if that’s the case,” she said as she stopped at one of the lockers, entering in a combination to open the locker, “ this is where we part ways.”

“Okay then, that’s fine by...you’ve got to be kidding me.” I had taken the time to look at the other lockers and noticed the locker to the right of hers...130. “You’ve got to me kidding me!”

“What is it?” My only response was to enter the combination and open the locker. “ARE YOU SERIOUS?!?”

“Apparently.”

She sighed heavily. “Okay, we can deal with this. Let’s just go to class and ignore each other when we’re at our lockers. Deal?”

“That’s fine by me.”

She nodded at me with a sneer before heading off to her class. ‘Okay, so my first class is in room 158 which is...that way....right in the direction she started walking in.’

So, needlessly, I had to walk in her direction in order to get to class, which she unfortunately noticed. “Didn’t I tell you not to follow me?!?”

“I’m not following you. I’m just headed to class, which just so happens to be in the same direction that you’re going to.”

Her only response to that was turning to a door, which I could only assume was the class that she was going to, while exclaiming, “Whatever you say, creep.” She then turned toward the door and walked in the room.

I didn’t say anything; I just continued to walk down the hall thinking to myself. ‘Yeah, well, whatever helps you sleep at...Did she just walk into room 158?’ I looked back at the door. ‘Yes. Yes she did. Well, time for the shit storm.’

With no other option, I walked into to classroom and sure enough, the girl was there in one of the seats, just staring at me with an angry and shocked expression. It didn’t take long for the teacher to notice me walk in before speaking to me. “Ah, you must the new student. White Foam, correct?”

“Yes sir.”

“Alright then. Well, class is about to begin. Why don’t you take the empty seat right next to Miss Sour Sweet?” He said as he pointed towards an empty desk, next to the girl from before, who just sat there even more shocked than before ‘So, her name’s Sour Sweet, fitting name actually.’ I took the seat right next to her, which caused her to scowl at me. ‘Can things get any worse?’

“Alright class, today we’re going to start our lesson on electric currents.”

‘Oh wait...this is physics class……yay.’

Once class was over, I decided to get out of the class room without any further incident with Sour Sweet. The last thing I need right now is her yelling at me again just for going about my day. Seeing as how my locker is right next to hers, I might as well just go to history class to avoid seeing her again.

When I did find the room, I walked in and decided just to sit in an empty desk in order to give myself a breather. ‘Hopefully I don’t have to run into her again anytime soon,” But it was at that moment that I heard a familiar, obnoxiously sweet voice coming from the hall.

“And then he just follows me down the hall! Can you believe it?!?”

“And was he actually following you?”

“…Okay, no, he actually wasn’t. But that’s beside the point.”

“So don’t you think that you’re overeating?”

“Absolutely not, Sugarcoat! Look, so long as I don’t have to deal with him for the rest of the day, than I’m sure that I can-” It was at that moment that she and another girl with white pigtails walked in the classroom and froze in place as soon as she laid eyes on me. ‘We share the same history class, don’t we?’

“ARE YOU KIDDING ME RIGHT NOW?!?”

'Yes, yes we do. Great.'

I was so exhausted by the time I got to the bus to go home that I decided that I didn’t really care about where I sat. I decided to just take a seat next to a girl with mostly green hair jamming out on her headphones, figuring she’d leave me alone as I sat there thinking about the day I just had. Specifically my run ins with Sour Sweet. Turns out, history wasn’t the last class that we shared together. We shared 4 out of 7 classes together, and each time I ran into her, she met me with just as much hostility, if not more, than our previous encounter. At this rate, I think my time at Crystal Prep is actually going to be worse than I originally thought.

‘Can this day possibly get any worse?’

It was at that moment that I heard a voice suddenly blurt out, “Dude, you’ve got to hear this!”

As I felt a set of headphones blaring loud music, the only thing going through my mind was, ‘Oh why did I have to jinx this now? Now I have someone forcing me to listen to whatever crappy song she was listening t-...wait. Is this Pat Benatar’s “Hell is for Children”? Never mind...I might actually enjoy this,’ But just as I was enjoying the music, I felt the headphones lift off my head, forcing me to turn my head towards the girl next to me in confusion.

“Dude, you actually enjoyed that?” She asked with an eyebrow raised.

“Yeah, why? Is that a bad thing?”

“Are you kidding me? That’s one of first times someone didn’t cringe in pain or try to throw off my headphones, other than the first time I had Indigo Zap listen to my tunes. My name’s Lemon Zest by the way,” she said as she gave me a warm smile.

“My name’s White Foam, nice to meet you.”

“You too! I take it you had a rough day?”

“Yeah, not exactly how I wanted my first day here to go.”

“Wait, today was your first day?” I nodded. “Shoot, sorry to hear that man. Hey, why don’t we become friends?”

I couldn’t believe it, she wanted to be my friends. Just like that. “Why do you want to become my all of a sudden?”

She just shrugged and said, “Well, you seem like a cool guy, we share the same taste in music, and I could use someone else to talk to. Besides, you look like you needed one good thing to happen today.”

I smiled in return and said, “In that case, I’d me more than happy to be your friend.” On second thought, maybe my stay in Crystal Prep won’t be as bad.

Chapter 2

Something has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.

Chapter 3

“What do you mean I can’t join the swim team?!?”

Apparently there are things that can keep me from joining the swim team. Since Indigo Zap and I still had some extra time before classes started once we had our uniforms on, we went straight to Dean Cadance’s office to make me an official member of the swim team.That’s where we hit a little snag.

“I didn’t say you were not able to join the team.” Dean Cadance said, trying to calm me down. “I’m saying that at the present moment, you can’t compete at meets with the rest of the team.”

“But what could possibly stop him from competing? He already has my approval and I’m sure the coach wouldn’t be opposed to having an extra person on the team.” Indigo Zap said, just as surprised at what Dean Cadance was saying as I was.

“It’s his grades that are stopping him from competing. He is still able to join the team, but the only thing that he will be allowed to do is attend practice.” Cadance answered simply.

“But that’s impossible! My grades from my previous school transferred over, right? And in my previous school, my grades were high enough to compete with the swim team. So what’s stopping me from competing here?

“You may have been able to compete with your previous school’s team, but this isn’t your previous school. Here, our students need to make at least a C or higher in all of their classes in order to compete in athletic competitions.

Of course, Principal Cinch would make higher standards for the academic performance needed to participate in athletics. In my previous school, just simply passing courses with a D was enough to be considered allowed in there athletics programs. But here, I needed a C. “So, what courses do I need to pull up?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

“Fortunately, you only need to pull up one class, physics.” She said trying to cheer me up. It only filled me with dread. Last time I checked, my physics grade was currently a D+.

Indigo Zap just stood there with a frown on her face, arms crossed, and sighed in frustration. She made it very well known that she was not pleased with what Cadance was telling us.

“So, what do you recommend that I do in order to raise my grade up?” I asked.

“Well, our school does have a tutoring program. Basically, we have various students that are doing well in their courses help students that are having trouble by becoming their personal tutors. In return, we give them a little bit of extra credit to their final grade.”

‘So, you give students that are having trouble tutors to improve their grades and give the extra credit to students that are already doing well. Both result in students possibly getting higher GPAs when they graduate. Very clever, Principal Cinch.’ I thought to myself.

“So for you, I would recommend you take advantage of the program.” Cadance continued.

“Yes he would!” Indigo Zap answered before I could. I just smiled and nodded to Dean Cadance to confirm that that’s what I would like to do.

She just smiled before browsing through the computer on her desk. “I only have one student that’s available, and she’s available at any time after school. Would you like to set that as your time for tutoring?”

So, my personal tutor is going to be a girl. “Yes please.” I said, not really having any other option.

“Okay.” She said as she looked at the clock. “I think that she’s actually on the school grounds right now, I can call her in if you want to meet her right now.”

“That would be nice actually.” I replied.

“Alright.” She said as she turned on the school’s PA system. “Miss Sour Sweet, could you please come to my office if you’re available?”

I was suddenly filled with dread. Sour Sweet’s going to become my tutor. If I had any other options, I would have said no right on the spot. But Cadance said it herself, Sour Sweet was the only student avaliable that had signed up to tutor physics. ) So I stood there, kept my objections to myself, and mentally prepared for the shit storm that was going to come.

Around five minutes later, Sour Sweet walked in with a sweet smile on her face as she called out to Cadance. “Hello Dean Cadance, was there-.” She stopped talking as soon as she noticed me, and her happy expression turned to a slight look of rage. She started to make everybody in the room feel uncomfortable, but thankfully she didn’t blow up in a fit of rage. Instead, she turned to Dean Cadance again, giving her another smile. Only this smile was more forced than her previous one as she continued her greeting to Cadance. “Was there something you needed to speak with me about?” She said with a forced sweetness.

However, this did little to ease Cadance’s comfort level as she responded to Sour Sweet’s question. “Um, yes, I have a student here who would like to sign up for tutoring sessions for physics. Have you met White Foam?

Sour Sweet continued with her forced sweetness. “Oh yes, our lockers are right next to each other and we share four classes together.” Then she suddenly changed to the sour tone that I had been expecting. “Which is four too many classes than I would care to have with him.”

“Okay then, so I was wondering if you would be able to tutor him. I understand if you aren’t able to, but keep in mind that you are the only available tutor right now.” Cadance hesitantly said, still feeling uneasy about the situation at hand. “It is possible for me to make you a temporary tutor for him until another tutor opens up, if that's what you'd prefer."

Sour Sweet seemed to consider that for a moment. Then she turned to Indigo Zap and asked, [b“]I take it you have a hand in this, Indigo?”

‘So asking Indigo why I need to raise my grade instead of asking me. Real classy Sour.’ I thought to myself as opposed to saying in to Sour Sweet.

Apparently Indigo wasn’t expecting Sour to include her in the conversation either, since it took her a few moments to give Sour a shaky answer. “…Oh, um, yeah. I actually want him to compete with our swim team, but his grades aren’t where they need to be, so...”

Sour Sweet raised an eyebrow at Indigo’s response before asking, “He actually impressed you enough to make you want him to join?”

Indigo, clearly nervous by how Sour Sweet would react to her answer, shakily responded, "Um....yes actually. He actually beat me in the 500 meter freestyle."

Sour Sweet just stared at her with a deadpanned look, and gave a sigh in frustration. “Only because you want him on the team.” She said with disdain. Wait, she wasn’t actually going through with this, right?

She then turned Dean Cadance, returning to the forced sweet persona she had earlier. “Dean Cadance, I will be his physics tutor. At least until he finds someone else to tutor him.” She said, switching personas to let everybody know that she intends to make this a temporary arrangement if she can help it.

Cadance gave a sigh of slight relief before responding. “Okay, I’ll put you in the system with a mark for temporary tutor. As for scheduling, I'll let you and him take care of that.”She kindly stated as she typed a few things on her computer.

Sour’s smile wavered a little bit before responding. “Of course.” She then turned to me. “I’ll meet you in room 158 where we have our physics lectures around 2:45. It’s usually empty around that time. Don’t be late.” She then walked out of the room, not giving me enough time to react to her arrangements.

Cadance then turned to Indigo and me. “Well, you two better be off as well if you don’t want to miss your first class. You two have a good rest of the day. Let me know if Sour Sweet becomes too much of a handful for you, okay White Foam?” She said sweetly.

“Will do, you have a good rest of the day as well.” I said to her as Indigo and I left her office. I then turned to Indigo and said, “So, I guess I’ll see ya at practice tomorrow then.”

“Yeah, sure. See you then.” She said without much emotion. She seemed to have been thinking about what happened with Sour Sweet a few seconds ago. She then turned to me and worriedly asked, “Are you sure that you’re going to be okay with her as your tutor?”

“I should be fine. So long it gets my grade up, I should be able to struggle through Sour Sweet, right?”

She then turned away and muttered, “Yeah, if she actually helps you learn the material.”

I pretended that I didn’t listen, but I knew that she had a good point. Dealing with Sour Sweet everyday would mean nothing if I couldn’t learn the material in the process. But at this point, I didn’t have any other options. All I could do is hope that another tutor becomes available. “Don’t worry about, I’ll be fine. Trust me.” I tried to reassure Indigo. But at this point, even I didn’t believe what I was saying.

Apparently, Indigo didn’t believe me either, because she gave me a skeptical look before responding, “Sure, whatever you say. Well, I need to start heading off, see ya later.” She said, before walking. As she walked out, she pulled her phone out of her bag. She flicked her fingers around it's screen, then put the device to her ear. “Hey Sunny, are you doing anything after school?” She was still audible from where I was standing. “….Great, I have something that you need to do, it involves-” Before I could hear the rest of her conversation, she turned the corner, causing me to lose sound from her conversation. Even so, I imagine that it involved Sour Sweet, since what occurred in Dean Cadance’s office was still fresh in her mind.

Seeing as there was nothing else for me to do, I decided to head off to my own class, getting ready for the impending doom that was and extended day with Sour Sweet.

My school day was pretty average. I go to my classes, ignore Sour Sweet as much as possible, and get into little arguments with her whenever ignoring her didn’t work. The only thing that was different was that Lemon Zest and Sugarcoat decided to talk with me during lunch. Apparently they heard from Indigo Zap that Sour Sweet was going to be my physics tutor. I tried to reassure them the same way I tried to reassure Indigo, but they believed it just as much as she did. Sugarcoat at least offered me a ride home after school, which I accepted.

It was currently 2:40, and I was walking to room 158, getting ready for the hell that would be tutoring with Sour Sweet. I don’t even know why I was even going there any way, knowing her she was probably not going to show up and force me to waste my time going to a tutoring session she wasn’t even going to have. But as I walked through the door, I was surprised to see her sitting in one of the desks, waiting patiently for me to show up.

She must have noticed the surprised look on my face, because she just raised an eyebrow at me and sweetly asked. “What’s wrong?” Before sourly stating. “You actually seemed surprised to see me.”

“I was actually expecting you to not to show.” I said, putting emphasis on the “you”.

“Please, I actually take my agreements seriously. So, take a seat, because standing there is just going to waste my time.”

I rolled my eyes as I went to a desk right next to her, then pulled my physics notes and assignment for us to go over. “So, what are we going to go over first?”

She decided just to get straight to the point, probably thinking that the less time it takes to learn something, the sooner we get this done. “Well we’re going over circuits, so I think the first we should discuss about is adding up capacitors. So, without looking at your notes, how do you get the total capacitance of a circuit if all of the capacitors are in a series?” She asked nicely.

And straight into a pop quiz on the first day of tutoring, isn’t that great. Not to mention the question she asked involved some sort of memorization, which I wasn’t really good with, and this is material we just learned yesterday. Well, guess that just leaves me with one option, go with my gut feeling. “Um……add the capacitance of all the capacitors together and you get the total capacitance.” I answer hesitantly.

She sat there silently before responding, “Yes, adding the capacitance of all the capacitors together is definitely how you get the total capacitance of a circuit.” She said sarcastically in her sweet tone before suddenly yelling out in her sour tone. “If the capacitors were in parallel!"

‘Okay, so I got the question. Did that really warrant an attempt to make me go deaf?’ I thought to myself as I tried to recover from her sudden outburst. “So, how is it found then?”

“You’re telling me you don’t know material we learned today.” She yelled, keeping her voice at the volume as her outburst.

“Hey, memorization isn’t really my strong suit. Besides, we get a formula sheet during the exams. So why do I need to know to have the formula’s memorized?”

Thankfully, she decided lower her volume when she responded. “Because the more you know the formulas and how to use them, the more likely you’ll actually use the formulas correctly in the test. You’d think that anybody would know that.” She sarcastically pointed out.

This got me to stop and think. 'Okay she actually has a good point, but-'

“And, they’re not going to put the names of the formulas next to them. So what do you think is going to happen if you keep thinking that you find the total capacitance of a circuit just by adding of the capacitors that are in a series together?" She suddenly asked, interrupting my thought process.

I didn’t say anything. I just tilted my head down slightly as she sat there with a smug smile on her face. Even I had to admit, she made a really good point and I had no way of arguing against her logic. She knew that I didn’t have a counter-argument before she even asked that question, and I could tell that she loved every second of it.

I felt that she enjoyed her victory long enough, and decided to just hurry up and make this tutoring session as short as possible. “You still didn’t answer my question, Sour. How do you find the total capacitance then?” I asked harshly.

“Hmph, rude.” She simply remarked as she pulled a piece a paper out of her folder. She then began drawing a line to represent a circuit with three marked segments to represent three different capacitors in the circuit, each marked C1, C2, and C3. “It’s simple, all you have to do when you add capacitors that are in a series together is to take each value of the different capacitors and put them in a fraction of one over that value.” She said as she started writing down 1/C1, 1/C2, and 1/C3 on the paper.

“You then take all of those values and add them all together to equal one over the total capacitance.” As she said this she had all of the values added up to equal 1/CT. She then added another line after that to have 1/CT=C1+C2+C3/C1*C2*C3 in order to show that the next step was basic adding with fractions. She then turned to me and said, “Now tell me what the next step is. It should be easy. Key word being should.”

I looked over the solution that she had written so far, which thankfully made it really obvious what the next step. With confidence, I answered her. “You flip the values. That way you have the total capacitance equal to C1 times C2 times C3 all over C1+C2+C3.”

“Oh my god, you can learn.” She sarcastically exclaimed. I decided to keep silent. The last thing I needed was rile her up when we only just now started the session. “Now,” she said as she pulled out another piece of paper and started writing on it, “to start figuring out problems for you to work on."

“Wait, you’re telling me that you didn’t have a plan?” I asked bewildered.

“Oh no, I definitely had a plan, I was just expecting us to be further along in the lesson by now. But I didn’t account for you being as much of a dumb ass as you are a creep.” She stated coldly.

Okay, it’s starting to be really hard not to argue with her. I get that she’s still pissed off about the incident from yesterday, but did she really need to make it into such a grudge? It’s almost like she wanted me to respond to her insults, just so she could get me to do something stupid.

The rest of the session went by like this, her giving me a problem to work on, me working on the problem, and her belittling me at any possible moment. It was around 3:15 when the two of us decided to call it quits and pick up from where we were tomorrow.

“So, same time tomorrow?” I ask.

“Sure, if you don’t find somebody else to deal with your dumb ass.” She said bitterly.

It was at that point that I had enough with her abuse and decided you yell back. “You know what, that’s perfectly fine with me. I’d be more than happy to have somebody else tutor me on this subject. God, with how much of a bitch you are, I’m starting to question why the hell you even signed up to be a tutor in the first place!”

She immediately stopped putting her notes away and slowly started to look down. I was expecting her to turn to me just to continue our shouting match. She never did, all she did was sit there in silence and her frown to more of a saddened look. It was almost as if she was thinking about that last sentence I yelled. After a few moments, she just put the rest of her notes away, got up from her seat, and quickly walked out of the room without saying a word.

I just looked on with confusion, this was the first time she was ever rendered speechless. I wanted to be happy about actually winning an argument against her, but I didn’t. Instead I just felt empty inside, making it feel more like a hollow victory. Deciding that the least I could do was to see if she was okay, I quickly put my note in my bag, got up, and ran out of the room to see if I could see where she was going. But when I reached the hallway, she was gone. The only other person in the hall was a girl with short mulberry hair with light raspberry streaks wearing a sun hair clip along with her school uniform standing close by the room Sour Sweet and I were in. Turning to her, I asked, “Have you seen a girl with long rose colored hair walk out of room recently.”

She just simply turned to me and answered, “Sorry dearie, but she’s probably long gone now.”

“Okay, thanks anyway” I responded, in disappointment. Since it was too late to go looking for her, I decided that the best thing to do was to go find Sugarcoat and head home. After all, it’s probably best to let the situation calm down before talking to Sour Sweet again anyway.

When I did walk outside, I found Sugarcoat’s car at the front of the school, with Sugarcoat sitting in the car. I quickly ran over to the other side of the car and opened the door to get in the passenger seat. When I sat down and started closing the car door, Sugarcoat plainly asked me, “Did things go well with Sour Sweet?” I just sat there in silence. Thankfully, the silence seemed to have told Sugarcoat about everything that went on between Sour Sweet and me because she put a reassuring hand on my shoulder before saying, “It’s okay, we’ll think of something.”

I nodded, but then I stopped and thought about what she said. ‘Wait, what does she mean by we’ll think of something?

Chapter 4

It was now the day after my first tutoring session with Sour Sweet, and I really didn’t know what to expect from her today. It wasn’t because I didn’t know what material we were going to cover, since the homework assignment involved whatever we were doing in physics. But it was because Sour Sweet really wasn’t being herself today, or at least she wasn’t when I was around.

In the hallways and during class, she would remain silent and give me side glances every so often with a sad look on her face. It was somewhat relieving for me, since this meant that I wouldn’t have to deal with Sour Sweet’s usual attitude. But at the same time, I was actually somewhat worried about her. Like earlier today, during lunch when she was talking and laughing with that girl with the sun shaped hair clip that was hanging around the halls yesterday, until she saw me. Then her smile slowly faded and she walked out of the cafeteria as fast as she could, ignoring her friend who was calling after her.

My other friends noticed this as well and practically demanded me to tell them what happened between Sour Sweet and me during the tutoring session yesterday. Even Sugarcoat, who let me get away with not telling her anything yesterday, wanted me to tell her what happened. I didn’t see any other way out of this, so I decided to tell them everything that happened yesterday, including the moment that I called Sour Sweet out on her insults. My friends looked more worried than they were yesterday, and started to whisper amongst themselves. I couldn’t really hear what they were discussing about, although I had a good idea what the discussion was about. But before I could ask them what they were talking about, the bell rang to go to the next class, and the three of them immediately ran off to their respective classes.

Well, looks like I’m asking Sugarcoat about what they talked about when she drives me home. I thought to myself as I started to head off to my next class.

When the last bell rang to let the students out of school, I started to make way to the classroom that we were using for our tutoring session at a moderately fast pace. Sure I didn’t really want to be there, but I didn’t exactly want my grade to get any lower either. Worst case scenario, Sour Sweet decides to be even more of a bitch than she was yesterday.

It was around 2:40 when I walked into the room, but unlike yesterday, Sour Sweet wasn’t there waiting for me. “Okay, she’s not here right now.” I thought to myself as I sat down and started putting my notes and homework assignment out. “She’s probably just caught up with something, I’m sure she’ll come in within the next five minutes.”

Five minutes went by, and she still didn’t show up. “Okay then.” I thought with confusion. “I’ll give her another ten minutes to show up.”

It was about eight minutes after that when I finally lost patience with her. “Well, if she hasn’t shown up now, she’s probably not going to show up two minutes from now either!” I yelled out in frustration and started to put my notes and homework into my bag.

As if she could hear me, it was when I started to get up to leave that Sour Sweet decided to walk in. She was walking rather slowly and she was looking toward the ground with a sad expression on her face. I sat back down and started to pull me notes and homework back out of my bag. “So, what caused you to be so late?” I asked, making my frustration with her clear.

She looked up in surprise, apparently not expecting any form of question when she walked. “I….um,” she shakily said as her eyes started darting around the room, “Had to help somebody out! Yeah, I had to help somebody out with a...thing. It just took longer than I thought it would.” She said sheepishly.

I could tell that she was lying, but decided not to question her further about it. I didn’t exactly want to get into a shouting match with her before the session started. She took a seat at a desk to the right of me, but didn’t pull out any notes or blank pieces. Confused as to why she wasn’t doing anything, I asked, “So, what do you have for me to do today?”

She just sat there for a moment before answering. “How about you just do the problems that are in today’s homework? I’ll check your work from time to time and let you know what you get wrong. If you have any questions about anything, just… let me know.” She said in a monotone voice.

I raised an eyebrow at her response, but decided that it was better to not question her. This was probably just her way of getting through the whole tutoring session without speaking as much as possible. Instead, I just started working on the homework. The assignment wasn’t too hard, mostly about finding the capacitance, charge, or the voltage of a capacitor. It wasn’t anything too complicated yet.

As I worked on the assignment, I kept making side glances at Sour Sweet to see what she was doing. Every time I did, she would be fidgeting in her seat and muttering to herself. I couldn’t really hear what she was saying, except for the one time she spoke in her sour tone. “Come on you fool, you’re going to have to talk to him at some point.”

That caused me to pause. Talk to me about what? I thought to myself. What could she possibly want to talk to me about, why she’s been giving me the silent treatment? After thinking about it for a few minutes, I decided that it would be a good idea to be the one to break the silence. Turning to her, I said, “Hey, I need your help with this problem.” I figured that pretending to have a problem with a question would be a good way to get her to start talking.

She looked up at me with a surprised look on her face and just stared at me. She definitely wasn’t expecting me to suddenly speak to her at that moment. After a few moments of staring, she finally decided to speak. “Um, I…uh…*sigh*, I can’t do this.” She said as she grabbed her backpack and started to get out of her seat.

“Wait, where do you think you’re going?” I yelled. It was at this point that I was really pissed at her.

She stopped walking and turned to me. “Look, I’m sorry that I’m just walking out on our tutoring session early.” She said, clearly distressed. “I’ve just been out of it today and need some time to myself, okay?” She then continued walking towards the door.

Not wanting her to just abandon our tutoring session, I started to get out of my seat as well and said, “Hey, you mind telling me what’s going on? I can tell that something’s been on your mind today, so why don’t you-”

Before I could finish, she just suddenly turned around and yelled in her sour tone, “I said leave me alone!” She then turned back around and ran out of the room.

I just stood there dumbfounded and frustrated. I knew that going after her would only make things worse, regardless of how angry I was. After staring at the door for a few moments, I muttered “Fine, have it your way.” I then turned back to my desk and began to haphazardly put my notes and homework back into my bag. Too infuriated to care how they would look tomorrow, I threw my bag over my shoulder and headed out of the room. When I made it to the hallway, I saw that same girl from yesterday standing to the side of the hallway, only with her back turned to me so that I couldn’t see her face.

I tempted the thought of speaking to this girl, but decided that today just wasn’t the day. All I wanted to do at this point was get home as quickly as possible. So, instead, I made my way to the front entrance as quickly as possible and thankfully saw Sugarcoat waiting out in front by her car.

When Sugarcoat saw me walk out of the school, she seemed surprised that I was coming out this early. When I reached her, she stopped from getter in her car. “What happened in there? You shouldn’t be out this early.” She asked with concern.

“Nothing. She just sat there mumbling to herself while I was working on the homework assignment, and when I asked for her help, she just sort of freaked out and left.” I said, frustration clear in my voice.

“Are you sure that’s all that happened?” She asked.

I sighed before continuing, “We had a small argument when she started to leave the room, but that’s pretty much all that happened.”

She just stared at me for a few moments before saying, “Come on, let’s get you home. You look like you need some time to yourself.” She then got into the driver’s seat of her car.

When I got in the passenger seat, I turned to her and asked, “So, what did you and the others talk about at the end of lunch?”

Sugarcoat sat there for a moment before turning the car on and said, “We've decided we’re going to see how you and Sour Sweet interact for a little while. If things don’t get better from here, well,” She paused as she started to accelerate, “we’ll figure something out.”

In other words, they don’t have a plan right now. I thought with disappointment as I stared out the window. I was beginning to think that my best option is to hope and pray that Dean Cadance would find me a new tutor, sooner rather than later.

Chapter 5 Author's Note

Not going to lie guys, I had a little bit of a difficult time trying to write this. Thankfully, I still managed to get this chapter done faster than what I had expected and I hope you guys enjoy it.

Chapter 5

A week has gone by since the second tutoring session with Sour Sweet, and things have not progressed well with her. She still looked like she was being distracted by something, almost as though she constantly has something on her mind, but didn’t know how to tell anybody what’s wrong. I wouldn’t mind it so much except it’s actually made our tutoring sessions less productive. She still came to the tutoring sessions late, stared off into space whenever I worked on a problem, which would force me to spend some time to get her attention whenever I had a question or when she needed to look over what I did, and sometimes ended the sessions early. I don’t know what’s going on in that head of hers, but what I did know was that the sooner Dean Cadance found a replacement, the better.

Aside from tutoring sessions with Sour Sweet, everything else was going pretty well for me. I was getting good grades in all of my courses, except physics. Lemon Zest always tried to find a way to make me laugh and have a good time, which very rarely failed. Indigo Zap forced me to start going to swim practice during my third day at Crystal Prep, even though I wasn’t on the team yet. With Indigo practically running the practice, she made sure that practice was exhausting, but at the same time made sure that nobody was wearing themselves out too much and gave us pointers as to how we can improve our technique. Sugarcoat always offered me a ride to and from school, and gave me her honest opinion about something, in her own special (allows one to really feel the sarcasm.) way. The only thing that she’d never give an honest answer about was anything involving Sour Sweet.

It was weird, I walked into this school thinking that most of the people I would be interacting with would be a whole bunch of stuck up rich kids. Instead, most of the people I’ve met have actually been really nice to me and actually seemed to be looking out for me. In all honesty, the only people who’ve left bad impressions on me were Principal Cinch and Sour Sweet. The only person I really couldn’t get a read on was that one girl with the sun shaped hair clip in her short mulberry hair that was always hanging around after school near my tutoring sessions with Sour Sweet. Maybe I should introduce myself and see what her deal is.

It was currently around 2:35, and I was making my way to the classroom that Sour Sweet had our tutoring sessions in. I don’t even know why I was actually trying to get there on time, since she’s most likely going to come in late again. Take her appointments seriously, my ass. But, when I walked into the class room, I found something I wasn’t expecting to see. There sitting in the classroom was Lemon Zest, Indigo Zap, and Sugarcoat, looking as though they were waiting for me to arrive.

“Wait are you three doing here?” I asked in a surprised tone.

“We’re going to settle things between you and Sour Sweet, today!” Lemon said with determination. “Or, more accurately, you and Sour are going to settle things between the two of you.”

I just raised an eyebrow in confusion and asked, “If that’s the case then why are the three of you here?”

“Because we know what Sour Sweet might be going through and we’re here to give her the push she needs to actually start talking to you about it.” Indigo said.

“You do?” I asked curiously.

“Well,” Sugarcoat bluntly said, “based on how she acts when she’s around you during the day, all of us knowing Sour Sweet longer than you have, what you’ve told us, and what Sunny Flare has observed. Yes, we might have an idea on what’s going on in Sour Sweet’s head.”

Okay, so what she told me made sense to me. They definitely would know Sour Sweet longer than I have. Sour starts mopping around whenever she sees me, and I have told them that our tutoring sessions haven’t been progressing well. But there was one thing that didn’t make sense to me that I needed to be clarified now. “Who’s Sunny Flare?” I asked curiously.

“That would be me, dearie.” A girl’s voice elegantly said from behind me. When I turned around, I found the same girl with the sun shaped hair clip in her short mulberry hair. She then walked in to the room and elegantly said, “I’m terribly sorry I’m late, girls, but I had to take care of something real quickly.” She then turned to me, offered me a hand, and politely said, “Hello, I don’t think we’ve been properly introduced. My name is Sunny Flare. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

“My name’s White Foam. It’s nice to meet you too.” I said returning the politeness and gently shook her hand in return.

“Yes, it’s a shame we couldn’t meet under better circumstances.” She sincerely said. “And I’m sorry for listening in on your tutoring sessions with Sour Sweet without your permission. I still don’t know why those three decided to have me commit such a rude act.”

“Because I’m busy with the tutoring sessions I give after school, Indigo’s always has after school practice with the various sports she’s a part of, and Lemon Zest would probably get bored after five minutes and start listening to music instead.” Sugarcoat immediately chimed in.

“She’s not wrong.” Lemon Zest said as she started to put her head phones over her ears and started jamming out to whatever song was playing. Everybody else just gave her a deadpanned look in response.

After a few minutes of waiting, we started to hear footsteps approaching the classroom from the hall. “That’s probably her.” Sunny Flare quietly said matter-of-factly. “It’s time to settle this. And would someone please get Lemon Zest to turn off her music.” She said pointing a finger at Lemon Zest, who was still jamming out to her music. Indigo Zap, who sat closest to her, tapped Lemon Zest on the shoulder to get her attention and pointed at her ear when she did have her attention to let her know that she needed to turn off her music. Lemon Zest nodded in response and paused the song she was listening to.

After a few seconds of waiting, we saw Sour Sweet start to enter to room. She was looking down towards the ground with a solemn look on her face, like she was dreading stepping into the room. She took three steps into the room before finally looking up. She immediately stopped walking when she saw her friends and me, and almost immediately showed signs of panic. “What are you doing here?” She defensively asked in her sour tone as she tried to back away from us.

“Sour, dear.” Sunny calmly said as she reached a hand out to Sour Sweet to try to calm her down. When she made contact with Sour Sweet’s shoulder, Sour Sweet started to tense up, but soon started to relax when she realized that Sunny Flare didn’t want to hurt her. “I know that what you’re going through is really hard to talk about. But, this can’t go on anymore.”

Sour Sweet sighed before sadly saying, “I know it can’t, but-“

“’But nothing, Sour Sweet!” Indigo Zap loudly interrupted. “All you have to do is talk to White Foam. Just tell him what you’ve been going through.”

“That’s just it, Indigo.” Sour Sweet quickly replied. “I don’t know how I should tell him.”

Sugarcoat walked up to Sour Sweet and bluntly said, “Here’s what you need to do. You need to tell him the actual reason you signed up to be a tutor, what happened afterwards, and why that’s been affecting you’re interactions with White Foam.” She then gave her a comforting smile before saying, “I know talking to him is going to be hard for you, but keeping it to yourself is going to be harder on you. You understand?”

Sour Sweet stood their silently for a few moments, most likely in deep thought, before looking to Sugarcoat and saying, “Okay, I think I understand.”

While the girls were talking, I sat their thinking about what they were talking about. Apparently this situation stems from a problem she’s been having for a while, and what do they mean by ‘the real reason she signed up to become a tutor?’ Are they saying that she didn’t sign up just for the extra credit?

“Do you want us with you, or do you want to talk to talk him by yourself?” Lemon Zest asked with concern, pulling me away from my thoughts in the process.

After a few moments of silence, Sour Sweet finally responded, “I think I’m alright by myself.”

The other girls nodded in understanding and made their way out of the room. Sunny Flare was the last to exit, but before exiting turned to us and said, “If you need anything, just let us know.” She then closed the door behind her as she left to give us some privacy.

The two of us just stood there awkwardly for a moment, with me not really knowing what to do at the moment and Sour Sweet looked nervous and uncomfortable. Eventually, I decided that if we were going to get anywhere, then the first thing Sour Sweet needed to do was relax. “Do you want to take a seat, Sour Sweet?” I asked pointing to a couple of the desks.

She seemed surprised by the sudden question, probably not expecting me to say anything, but soon settled down before she responded. “Sure, I’d like that actually.” She said sincerely. I nodded in acknowledgement and the both of us took seats in the two desks closest to us. After a few moments of sitting, she looked like she was actually starting to relax, which also caused me to relax to. Eventually, she gave a sigh and asked, “Where do I start?”

“Well, Sugarcoat did recommend starting with why you decided to sign up to be a tutor.” I pointed out.

“Okay,” she said reluctantly before taking a deep breath. “Well, this might not come as a surprise to you, but I’ve always kind of been a mood swinging bitch, especially to people that pissed me off.” She’s right, that didn’t come as a surprise. “But then, something happened that made want to change all of that.”

“What happened?” I asked curiously.

She hesitated for a moment before responding. “There was this girl that used to go here that I was just awful to. Actually…we were all awful to her, but I was the worst to her.” She said with a hint of regret. “No matter what she did, I always had something to criticize her about. Accidentally cuts in front of the line to the buses while she was trying to figure out where she was going? Made a mean comment about that. Accidentally gets in my way, but almost immediately stepped aside to let me continue walking? I told her that I’d be watching her before walking off. Have her as a team mate during the Friendship Games and have her cost us an event by losing the lead I put us in to give the other team a lead we almost didn’t recover from? You better believe I was frustrated with her. I hated her and I let her know it on a daily basis. But by the time I realized how my almost daily habit of yelling at her, criticizing her, and just overall making her life a living hell was affecting her, was the day that she became a she-demon at the end of the Friendship Games.”

“What a moment,” I interrupted with slight alarm. “You mean that figuratively, right?” I asked hopefully.

“I wish I was.” She said not missing a beat. “That was probably the scariest thing to happen to me in my life.” I looked at her to see if there was any indication that she was lying. I couldn’t find any.

“Okay, I’ll just take your word for it and let you continue.” I said nervously. “Sorry I interrupted you.”

“Don’t worry about it, I figured that you were probably not going to believe me as soon as I told you about that as soon as I said it.” She said jokingly before returning to a sadder tone. “As I was saying, after the whole she-demon incident, many of us realized that it was our mistreatment towards her that caused her to go berserk on everyone, so we wanted change how we treated others to keep something like that from happening again. We decided that we were going to be more helpful around the school. It worked out well for the others, Sunny Flare was giving helpful advice to the fashion students and asked for nothing in return, Indigo Zap started paying more attention to her teammates instead of herself, Sugarcoat signed up as a tutor for various courses, and Lemon Zest did whatever she could to raise student moral.”

“But as for me,” She continued as a tear started to roll down her face, “I was the lost cause. I did the exact same thing Sugarcoat did by tutoring certain courses, but there were a couple of differences between us. One was the reputations we had beforehand. We were both considered two of the schools best students, but she was only known for being too blunt for her own good and I was the girl with the mood swings and a bad temper. What happened as a result was that Sugarcoat ended up getting fully booked to tutor people and nobody even dared to have me as a tutor. To be honest with you, I figured that something like that would happen” She paused for a moment to wipe away some of the other tears that started to develop. “I probably wouldn’t even be that upset by it if it wasn’t for the other thing that was different between Sugarcoat and I in this situation.”

“And what was that?” I asked, beginning to feel sorry for the girl in front of me.

“Our reason for signing up to be tutors.” She immediately answered. “Sugarcoat did it solely for the purpose of helping other students. I wanted to do it not only to help others, but also to… help myself.” She sadly admitted as she started to drop her head down towards her desk.

“What do you mean by that?”

Her composure started to become less relaxed as she began to speak. “Because the main issue I’ve always had is how I interact with other people. I interact with the four outside just fine, but it’s trying to interact people I don’t know that I start having problems. Hell, it was so bad that I actually promised myself that I’d actually start treating others better. So I thought, if I put myself in a situation where I have to help others by teaching them about the subjects they’re having problems with and be patient with them, then maybe I’d actually start understanding how to interact with other people. But how could I when nobody was willing to sign up for my tutoring sessions? You don’t know how frustrating that was.”

She then turned her head towards me and I saw that she had tears streaming from her eyes. “And when I first ran into you, that built up frustration combined with the collision just caused me to take it all out on you. And when I did that, I started to revert back to my old ways. And I just stayed with my old ways up until the end of our first tutoring session when you called in out on me. When you did that, I realized what I had been doing and knew that there was no going back. All I wanted to do after that was apologize to you about the way I had been acting, but how could I? How could I when you’ve already seen me at my worst? Hell, I don’t blame you for hating me, because I would definitely hate myself too. I just…I’m just so sorry!” She finally blurted as she threw her head down into her hands and began to cry.

I sat there trying to comprehend everything she just said to me. To say that I was surprised by everything that Sour Sweet told would be an understatement. I wasn’t exactly ready to forgive her for everything she’s done, but at the same time I understood where she was coming from. All she wanted to do was make an improvement in her life, but had no one willing to help her do so. I couldn’t blame her for being frustrated; anybody would be frustrated by that. When I first started these tutoring sessions, all I wanted was to have someone help me out with physics. But I never imagined that I’d be paired with someone who needed more help than I did.

I was pulled away from my thoughts when Sour Sweet lifted her head up to try to wipe away her tears and sadly said, “When someone else gets an open slot for tutoring, you can go ahead and switch to that person. I won’t be angry at you or blame you. You’re probably not ready to forgive me yet. Not after all I’ve put you through.”

I couldn’t see her like this. I don’t know why with the way she’d been treating me, but I just couldn’t. It was at that moment that I knew exactly what I needed to do. I started scouting the desk closer to the desk she was sitting at. And when I brought the desk right next to hers, I turned towards her and pulled her in for a comforting hug. I felt her tense up for a moment before she began to relax and buried her face into my shoulder as she returned the hug. After a few seconds of comforting her, I began to speak, “I’ve been thinking, and you’re right. I’m not ready to forgive you.” I felt her hug me tighter, probably preparing herself for the worst. “But, I’m willing to give you another chance.” I said sincerely.

Sour Sweet immediately raised her head off of my shoulder so that she could look at me with a look of disbelief. “Why?” She shakily asked. “Why would you give me a second chance? You don’t have a reason to...”

“You might be right, I probably don’t.” I agreed. “But it’s like you said, how can you improve your interactions with others if don’t have someone willing to help you out? I just think you went about it the wrong way.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well,” I explained carefully, “you put yourself in a situation where your way of interacting with people you don’t know completely relied on people coming to you. If anything, you needed to seek out others to help you with your social problems.”

“I think you have a point there.” She reluctantly agreed. “But, what do you mean seek out others?”

“I meant going out to make friends.”

“But I already have friends!” She defensively replied.

“Then make new friends. Someone who you’re not already on friendly terms with. That way you can learn from experience how to treat others you don’t know and keep your mood swings under control.” I pointed out.

“So, someone like you?” She asked, looking up at me hopefully.

I sat their silent for a moment. Would I really consider her my friend? Sure she’s treated me like crap for the most part, but at the same time she regrets the way she treated me, apologized for her actions, and accepted my attempts to show her comfort during the situation. I chuckled a little bit when I realized that the answer was obvious. “Yes, Sour Sweet, I’d be willing to be that friend.” I answered truthfully.

Sour Sweet just continued to stare up at me with disbelief as more tears started to appear. Eventually, she quickly threw her arms around me for a tighter hug than before and buried her head in my shoulder again to cry into it. The difference this time was that these tears were out of happiness rather than sadness as she continuously mumbled 'thank you' into my shoulder. I returned the hug and gave her light pats on the back let her know that everything’s alright. After about a minute, we separated from the hug and I asked, “So, what should we do know?”

“Well, thanks to me being emotional, we’re really behind on tutoring,” She said jokingly. “So, why don’t we spend the rest of the time catching up?”

“You sure you’re up for that today?” I asked with concern.

“I’m, like, a hundred times better than I was the past couple of days. Besides, this talk really made my day.” She said sweetly as she started to get her notes from her bag. “Would it be alright if we started with the material from our second tutoring session? Seeing as I was kinda out of it.”

“That’d actually be nice.” I happily replied as I pulled out my physics book and notes out of my bag as well.

So that’s what we did, only this tutoring session ended up actually being more productive than our first tutoring session. She actually did a quick overview of the notes with various questions asked in the middle of it to make sure I was paying attention. We also worked problems from the physics book, only we did it one at a time so that she could check my work after each problem, told me what I doing wrong, and worked me through the steps to solving the problem correctly. It was by the fifth problem that I was starting to get the questions correctly, as well as some small praises from Sour Sweet. Overall, it was a much better experience than any of the other tutoring sessions we’ve had so far. Sure, she went into her sour tone from time to time, but she wasn’t near as condescending as she originally was.

We were on question ten when we were suddenly interrupted by someone quickly swinging the door open. We turned to see who it was, only to find Lemon Zest in the doorway frantically saying, “Dudes, you’ve been in there for, like, an hour and a half! Are you guys doing okay in here?” Then she saw the notes and books on our desks, as well how close our desks were together, and began to calm down before asking, “Are you guys…studying.”

“We’re catching up on the tutoring sessions.” Sour Sweet explained “And as it really been an hour and a half?”

“Uh, yeah! Have you guys been reading the clock?” She said pointing at the clock that hung on the classroom wall, which sure enough read that it was just past four.

“Shoot, we should probably start getting out of here.” I said as I started gathering up my belongings and putting them in my backpack.

“I agree.” Sour Sweet said as she did the same. She then turned to me and asked, “Hey, since we have a lot we need to catch up on, do you mind meeting up during the weekend?”

I was surprised by this sudden question. We just know started becoming friends and she’s already offering to meet up on the weekends. Then again, this probably just her way of apologizing for being the reason we were behind on our tutoring sessions. “Sure, I don’t mind. Where do you want to meet up?”

“I was thinking that we should probably meet up at your house, since it’ll give us a nice quiet place to work. I would offer to meet up at my house, but I don’t want my parents checking up on us every fifteen minutes. I haven’t exactly brought any boys home for them to pester.” She said jokingly.

“Alright, my house works fine. My parents should leave us alone once they realize we're working on physics.”

“Okay then, do you mind giving me your address? That way I at least know where I’m going.” She stated bluntly.

“Actually, I need a ride home.” I admitted, “So if you can drive me home, I can show you where it is so that you know where to go.”

“Alright, that sounds like a good idea.” She happily said as she started to walk out of the classroom with me following close behind her. After a few moments of walking, I couldn’t help but think back to what just happened during the past hour and a half. I walked into that classroom expecting another disappointing tutoring session with Sour Sweet. Now I’m walking out of it, with the most unlikely person I’d ever imagine myself calling my friend. I wouldn’t haven’t any other way.

Chapter 6

Something has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.

Chapter 7 Author's Note

Hey, I fnally did a thing...Yay!

Chapter 7

Today was Thursday, the day of the physics test. Ever since the tutoring session Sour Sweet and I had this past weekend, I studied as hard as I could to prepare for this exam. But that still didn't stop me from being extremely nervous about it as I stood at my open locker. Repeatedly, I just kept thinking about how I wasn't ready for this test and that I needed more time to prepare for it. Right as I was about to close my locker, I heard the locker to my left suddenly open.

I turned my head to see that Sour Sweet had opened her locker and was putting her belongings into it. "Hey, White Foam, ready for the physics test today?" She asked without looking at me.

"Uh...yeah. As ready as I'll ever be, I guess." I reluctantly answered, turning back to the locker.

Sour Sweet stopped what she was doing before she looked at me with a concerned look on her face. "That didn't sound very convincing. Don't tell me you didn't study for it." She said.

"Of course I did." I said defensively.

"Good, now come on, we're going to be late." She said as she pulled her calculator out of her locker and closed it. Otherwise, you really would've studied for nothing." She added as she began to walk away.

I sighed as I closed my locker and followed her to our physics class. On the way there, I tried to think of anything that would get me to avoid taking the test today. Maybe the teacher will forget about the test? Yeah, when has that ever happened. Maybe someone will pull the fire alarm today? Oh please, who would be crazy enough to do that. Especially when the best outcome is Cinch immediately suspending them. Maybe I can pretend to be sick? Yeah, and trick the nurse how? Besides, even if I could trick the nurse, my mom would find out when she got home and scalp me for it. It was at that moment that I looked up to see that I was right in front of the classroom and just froze. And as I stood there, all I could think of was four words. I can't do this.

Sour Sweet, who had already walked into the classroom, was just about to sit at her desk until she looked back at me and saw me just staring into the classroom. She looked at me with a concerned look before she put her stuff on her desk and walked up to me. When she was in front of me, she asked, "Hey, White Foam, are you doing okay? And don't say that you're fine, because I can tell that you're not.

"...Sour Sweet, I can't do this. I'm not ready for this test." I sadly admitted.

"I knew it. You didn't study!" Sour Sweet responded with a slight scowl on her face.

"No, Sour, I studied. I tried to study at least three hours a day for it this past week. It's just that...what if the teacher put a trick question on the test just to spite with us?" I began to frantically ask. "What if he puts material on the test we barely went over in class? What if there was something that I forgot to look over? What if-"

My series of 'what if' questions was interrupted when I felt a pair of hands grasp my shoulders. Sour Sweet was practically staring into my soul with a slight frown on her face. "Alright, I need you to answer every single answer I ask you, got it?" She asked with determination.

"O-okay" I managed to reply.

"How do you find the current of a circuit?" She asked.

"Take the charge of the circuit and divide it by the time." I answered immediately before flinching back. Where the hell did that come from.

"Good, now if the charge and time are given along with two different voltages, how do you find the power?" Sour asked as a smile began to form.

"Um, find the difference between the two voltages and multiply that difference by the current, which again can be found by dividing the charge by the time." I replied.

"Alright, and how do you find the resistance?" She asked as her smile grew.

"Add the resistances that are in parallel by taking each of the resistors under one before adding them together. Then take all of the resistors in the series and add them together." I said.

She then let go of my shoulders and said, "See, you remembered all of that without having to use the formula sheet. As far as I'm concerned, you're more than ready for it."

Once she was done with her little prep talk, I felt some of the anxiety beginning to slip away. I still felt nervous, but I didn't feel like taking this test was going to be a lost cause either. Sour Sweet's small pop quiz helped, but it was during that last bit of encouragement that I started to really calm down. There was something about her trying to help me that just felt...calming. I took a deep breath before replying. "Alright...I think I can do this."

She nodded before saying, "Good, I'm glad to hear that." She then developed a small frown before she quickly moved behind me and exclaimed, "Now, get in there before the bell rings or you're guaranteed to fail it! She then proceeded to push me into the classroom.

I stumbled forward for a few seconds before I caught my balance and turned around to give Sour an unamused look. She responded by giving me a smug grin as she walked up beside me. I rolled my eyes at her before I walked up to my desk as she giggled and walked to her desk. When I reached my desk, I placed my pencil and calculator on it, took my seat, and faced forward to see the teacher at his desk.

The teacher was reading through some papers on his desk as students continued to enter the classroom. By the time the bell rang, all of the desks were occupied and the teacher had stopped reading through his papers and pulled another rather large stack of papers out of his bag. He then got up and said, "Put all of your books and notes away. The only things allowed on your desks are pencils and your calculator. Several students began to quickly put away their books and notes as the teacher said, "When I place a test paper on your desk, you may begin."

As he passed out the tests, I began to think to myself to keep myself from panicking again. Okay, don't overthink this. You can ace this test. Even Sour Sweet believes you can pass this. When the teacher reached my desk, he placed a test paper on my desk. I took a deep breath and thought to myself, Okay, let's do this, and looked at the first question.

The first question had a circuit that had five different points of resistance in a series. Two of the points consisted of a single resistor and the three other points had resistors in parallel, two of them had three resistors and one had two resistors. The question asked for the total resistance of the circuit.

I continued to take steady breathes as I thought, Okay, remember what Sour Sweet taught you. Add all of the resistors in parallel together before you add all the resistors in the main series together. With that in mind, I added all of the individual parallel resistors by adding all of the resistors in that parallel together the way that Sour Sweet taught me to. When I had the three parallel resistors added up so that each of them was the equivalent of one resistor, I thought, Okay, now I need to add these five resistors together and I get- I entered the numbers into my calculator and added them together. Twenty-six ohms as the answer. I sat up a little straighter as I wrote down my answer and thought to myself, Huh, that felt easier than I thought it was going to be. Maybe this test won't be as bad as I thought it was going to be.

And it actually wasn't. I ended up being able to get through it with little difficulty. The only problem I had trouble with was one where I had to find the voltage of a capacitor, but even with that problem I was still able to finish the test with about seven minutes left to spare. I looked through the test one last time to check my work before I decided that I was finished. So, I got up and walked to the teacher's desk to turn it in. He took the test from me and placed it face down on a stack of other tests that had been completed and continued to watch over the class.

As I walked back to my desk, I glanced around the room to see how the other students were doing. Some of them were racing to finish their test, while everybody else had already finished it. Sour Sweet was one of the students who finished the test and was currently reading a book. When I got back to my desk, I sat there and waited out the rest of the class time.

The bell rang soon after and everybody began to file out of the classroom, with a small handful who didn't finish it quickly writing down their work before turning in the test. I grabbed my things as I got up and walked out of the classroom to get my locker. Along the way, Sour Sweet walked up beside me and asked, "Hey, so how did it go?"

"Honestly... I think I did alright on it." I answered. "I had some problems with one of the questions involving a capacitor, but other than that I didn't have too much difficulty with it."

Sour Sweet gave me a small smile as she said, "That's good to hear. Guess we'll see how you did tomorrow."

"...Wait, what?" I asked after a small pause to process what she just said.

"Yeah, this teacher has a habit of grading our tests the day we take them and then gives them back to us the day after." She casually explained.

I raised an eyebrow at her as I asked, "So, does he sleep at all on test days."

"I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't." She said as she shrugged her shoulders. "Well, on the plus side, we won't be spending the weekend worrying about what we got on the test, right?"

"Yeah, that's a fact." I said as we reached our lockers.

The next day had arrived, and just like Sour Sweet had predicted, the teacher started the class by saying, "Class, your tests have been graded. When I call your name, come up and get your test." He then looked down at the stack of papers and called out, "Suri Polomare."

As he called out names of students to get their tests, I saw movement at the bottom of my eye. I looked down and saw that there was a folded piece of paper on my desk. With a confused look on my face, I picked it up and unfolded it. Inside was a note that read out.

Let me know what you got.

-Sour

I glanced over to my right to see that Sour Sweet was pretending to give the teacher her full attention as she glanced over to me to make sure that I read the note. I smirked at her and gave her a thumbs up to let her know that I got her message. "White Foam." I heard the teacher suddenly call out, catching me by surprise as I looked up at the teacher.

I gave a soft sigh as I stood up and walked up to the teacher. Even though I was walking at a normal pace, it felt like it was taking me hours to walk up to him. Anxiety was starting to hit me again at full force. How could it not? This test could make or break my grade. When I finally reached the teacher, he handed me my test. I took it and reluctantly looked down at my grade as I walked back to my desk. I got a ninety-three.

Time felt like it was going back to normal as relief began to spread throughout my body. I can't believe it. I thought as I sat down at my desk. I got a ninety-three! I actually got an A on a physics test. I looked up at Sour Sweet to see her looking at me curiously. So, I turned my paper a little to let her see what my grade was. She gave me a small, sincere smile and a thumbs up before turning back towards the teacher.

"Sour Sweet." The teacher called out. Sour Sweet stood up and confidently walked up to get her test back. When she got it, she walked back as she looked through her test to see what she got on it and smirked at her results. She turned the paper towards me so that I could see what her grade was as she sat down. She got a ninety-five. I nodded my head and silently told her, "Good job."

The rest of the class went on as normal. The teacher started a new subject and gave us a new homework assignment at the end of class. When the bell rang, everybody got up from their seats and started to head to their next class. When I got to the hallway, Sour Sweet came up beside me and gave me a hug. "See, I told you that you could do it!" She happily said.

I smiled as I returned the hug and said, "Yeah, you did. Although, I don't think I would have been able to pass it without your help."

"You're damn right you wouldn't have." She exclaimed as she released me from the hug.
She then paused for a few moments before suddenly asking, "Hey, why don't we go celebrate?"

I turned with her with a surprised look. "Really!? Don't we have a tutoring session today?" I asked.

"Pttf, we can do that tomorrow morning. So, why don't I take you to this really awesome bakery in town this afternoon?" She asked with a hopeful smile.

"Alright, and I guess we can have the tutoring session at my house tomorrow." I offered "We could even watch a couple of movies when we're done, if you want to?"

"Only if you invite our friends over as well. They all seemed interested when we told them about the movie we watched last weekend." She replied.

"I guess there's no harm in that. Though I think that Indigo Zap and Lemon Zest were the ones interested. Sunny Flare and Sugarcoat just seemed mildly curious." I replied.

"Even so, I'm sure they'll at least appreciate being invited." She reassured.

"Alright, I guess I'll ask them whenever I have the opportunity to do so." I replied. "Where should I meet you for our celebration."

"Just meet me by the front entrance. I'll drive us to the bakery." She replied.

"Alright, I'll look forward to it." I told her as we continued on to our next class.

Chapter 8

Something has gone wrong. We don't seem to have an archived copy of that chapter.

Chapter 9

Students were filling in the halls after the last bell rang. They were either rushing out of the school so they could get home or standing around in the halls talking about their plans for the weekend. In my case, I was at my locker getting all of my stuff together before heading off to swim practice. Since my grade in physics was a C thanks to the last physics test, I was able to be apart of the swim team, much to Indigo Zap’s excitement. Just as I was about to close my locker, I suddenly felt a pair of arms wrap around me.

I smiled before turning my head and saying, “Hey Sour Sweet, how was your day?”

“It was fine.” She said as she let me go and looked up at me with a smile. “How was your day?”

“Pretty good. School’s as boring as always, but at least there’s swim practice to look forward to.” I replied as I closed my locker.

“That’s good.” She simply replied. Then she suddenly asked. “So, are you looking forward to tomorrow?”

My eyes widened in fear when she asked that bombshell of a question. Of course she’d ask something about our date tomorrow, since I was the one planning the date. The problem with that was that I still haven’t finished planning it yet. I had some ideas for the date, but the problem I was running into was that I didn’t know what Sour Sweet would like to do. Right now, I was leaning more towards going to this one steak house that was in town. I figured that Sour would appreciate the gesture, but the prices stopped me from making that decision final. After a few seconds of silence, I snakingly replied, “Uh…yeah, I am.”

“Good, me too.” Sour Sweet replied. “So, what do you have planned?”

“Oh, well…um…it’s a surprise.” I hesitantly answered with a nervous smile.

Sour Sweet raised an eyebrow at me and, for a moment, looked like she was about to retort in her “sour” tone. Then she just shrugged her shoulders and said, “Alright, if you say so.” She then looked down at her phone. “Hey, I have to get going. I’ll see you tomorrow, okay.” She said as she pulled me in for a hug.

“Yeah, see you tomorrow.” I said as I returned the hug. She then pulled away from me and proceeded to walk to the exit as I watched her leave.

“You don’t have anything planned, do you?” I suddenly heard a monotone voice said behind me.

I jumped and turned around to see Sugarcoat standing right behind me. “Sugarcoat, don’t sneak up on me like that!”

“I didn’t sneak up on you. I was standing here the entire time.” Sugarcoat simply responded.

“Oh…so you saw all that?” She nodded her head. “And you figured out that I don’t have anything planned for tomorrow yet?”

“It wasn’t hard to figure out. Most people don’t stutter that much when their telling someone they have a date planned unless they’re trying to make stuff up to save face.” She explained matter-of-factly.

“…Does anything get past you?” I asked after staring at her for a few moments.

“Not really.” She simply replied.

“Figures.” I muttered. “So, do you think that Sour Sweet knows that I don’t have anything planned?”

“Of course she does. She’s just waiting until tomorrow to chastise you for it.”

“Great, what am I supposed to do then?” I groaned as I leaned back against the lockers.

“Have you even thought about what you’re going to do tomorrow?” Sugarcoat asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Of course I have.” I answered. “I’ve been primarily thinking of that steak house that’s on Mistmane Avenue and-”

“No.” Sugarcoat suddenly interrupted.

I flinched back and starred at her with confusion. “Um…why not?”

“First off, do you really want to spend that much money on dinner?”

“I mean…not really.” I admitted. “But I was going to ask my parents for money.”

“Okay, but even your parents did help you afford going there, it would still be a bad idea since Sour Sweet hates the food there.” Sugarcoat immediately responded.

“What?!” I exclaimed. “Why?”

“Because the chief there is thoroughly convinced that everything needs to be cooked with a large amount of black pepper, and Sour Sweet hates that. If that wasn’t bad enough, she thinks the salads are bland, the deserts are too milky, and all of their fish dishes are terrible.” She explained.

“…Welp, there goes that idea.” I frustratingly exclaimed as I tilted my head back.

“Do you want my advice?” Sugarcoat suddenly asked.

“Yes please!” I immediately replied, almost pleading.

“Do something simple like going to watch a movie or going to the mall.”

“…Really?” I asked in disbelief. There’s no way that taking a girl out would be that simple.

“The whole point of the first few dates are to get to know each other better and to see if the two of you can like each other romantically. You can do that doing something simple. You don’t need to go all out on something when you’re not sure if Sour Sweet will like it or not.”

“…Huh, it makes sense when you put it like that.” I said as I got off the locker. “Thanks Sugarcoat. I think I’ve got a good idea on what to do.”

“You’re welcome.” She replied. “Although, you do know that you could have avoided this you had just talked to Sour Sweet about the date?”

I gave her a deadpanned look before asking, “Has anybody ever told you that you’re too honest sometimes?”

“Yes.” She simply answered.

“Do you really care?”

“No.”

The next morning, I had woken up and got ready for the date. Once I had gotten myself dressed in a pair of pants and polo shirt, I looked down at my phone to look over the text messages I had with Sour Sweet last night.

Hey Sour, what do you think about going to the mall tomorrow?

Sure, sounds like fun. How long did it take you to come up with that? And before you ask, yes I knew that you didn’t have a plan when I asked you about it yesterday.

Not long…once somebody talked me to the right direction?

Sugarcoat?

Sugarcoat.

Of course. So, what time do you want me to pick you up?

How does 10 sound?

Sure, see you tomorrow! ♥

I smirked a little at the last message she sent. I then glanced up on the top of my phone’s screen to see what time it was. 9:55. She should be here soon. I thought as I waited patiently in the living room.

“You know son,” my dad suddenly said as he worked on his laptop. “Most guys are the ones who pick up their dates.”

I knew he was just teasing, but I couldn’t help but retort, “Yeah, but most guys usually have a car to drive?”

“You could have asked us to borrow one of the cars.”

“You mean the car mom’s using to run errands. Unless you’re saying that you’ll let me drive the Firebird.” I sarcastically replied.

“Not on your life.” He immediately answered. It was at that moment that the door bell suddenly rang, catching both his and my attention. “That must be for you. Have fun and go get her, son.” My dad said as he turned his attention back to his laptop.

I couldn’t help but roll my eyes at his last comment. “Alright, thanks dad. I’ll see you later.” I said as I got up and adjusted the collar of my polo shirt before walking towards the door and opening it.

Sour Sweet was standing on the other side with her usual makeup applied and her hair done in her usual ponytail. She was wearing a black blouse along with a pair of blue jeans. She also had a pair of black slip on shoes on as well. “Hey, White Foam. Are you ready to go?” She greeted.

“Yep.” I replied as I walked out of my house and closed the door behind me.

As we walked to Sour Sweet’s car, she suddenly asked, “So, did you have a plan before Sugarcoat suggested taking me to the mall?”

“I did but Sugarcoat was fast to tell me that it was a bad idea.” I replied as we reached the car.

“Oh really, what was it then?”

“The steak house on Mistmane Avenue.”

“Ugh, I hate that place!” Sour exclaimed as she got into the car.

“That’s pretty much what Sugarcoat said.” I replied as I got in as well.

“Well, then it’s a good thing she ran into to you yesterday and got you to take me to the mall.”

“You’re telling me.” I jokingly replied. “Although she did also suggest going to the movies, but-“

“There wasn’t anything currently showing that you wanted to go see.” Sour chimed in.

“Pretty much.” I admitted.

“That’s fine. I feel the same way.” She said as she started the car.

“Yeah, but it still would have been better than bringing you to that restaurant, right?”

“Fair enough.” She said as she started to drive. “Although, I’ll probably have to make you a list of places never to take me.”

“Why, what’ll happen if I do?”

“I’ll break up with you on the spot.” She replied with a smirk on her face.

“Well, in that case, please give me that list as soon as you can.” I sheepishly said, making her giggle.

About five to ten minutes later, we made it to the mall. Once we got out of the car, Sour Sweet immediately ran over to my side and took a hold of my handg. “Looks like somebody’s excited.” I jokingly stated.

“Oh, shut up.” She jovially replied as she bumped me with her hip.

I laughed before asking, “So, where are we going to first?”

“Well,” She dragged out, “there is a clothing store or two that I’d like to go to. If you don’t mind of course?”

Of course, I should have seen this coming. I thought before replying, “Sure, I guess we can go to some clothing stores if that’s what you want to do.”

Fifteen clothing stores. For the past two hours, we went into fifteen clothing stores. Two hours of Sour Sweet looking through clothes, trying them on, and asking me what I thought about them. I mostly just stood nearby and told her that whatever she was wearing looked great on her, although some of the clothing she tried on that looked absolutely stunning on her. In the end, I’m just glad that she decided not to buy anything, otherwise she’d make me carry her stuff like a pack mule.

Next, we moved on to the food where we ordered some burgers and fries to eat for lunch. I was about halfway done with my burger when I asked her, “So, what is it that you do during your free time?”

She just shrugged her before replying, “Mostly just shopping, reading, and browsing through the internet. Although, I do occasionally go to the archery range after school.”

“Huh… really?” I asked with a raised eyebrow even though that’s a something that Principal Cinch makes as a standard requirement for students. Which was something that I still didn’t understand.

“Hey, just because it’s something the principal forces us to do doesn’t mean that I can’t enjoy it.” Sour Sweet replied in between bites. “Besides, it allows me to relieve some stress and clear my head.”

“Hmm, good point. Mind if I join you from time to time?” I asked.

“Of course! So long as you don’t skip swim practice to do it.”

“Hey, Indigo said that swim season’s almost over. We just have two more meets before districts. After that, then we really won’t have a need to go to afternoon practice other that to keep ourselves in shape.”

“Good to know.” She said before taking one final sip of her soda. She then stood up and said, “Ready to go?”

“Yeah, sure.” I said after eating my last fry. Once our trash was thrown away, we continued to walk through the mall. “So, are there any other stores you want to go to?” I asked.

“How about we go to one you want to go to? I’m pretty much done looking at clothes anyway.” She replied with a sweet smile.

“Alright.” I replied as I tried to think of where I wanted to go. I really didn’t know what this mall had to offer, other than the usual stores you would expect to see, and I wanted to avoid some places that would have been obvious, just to make things more interesting for her. Eventually, I gave up on the latter and asked Sour, “Are there any movie stores here?”

“Why am I not surprised.” She muttered as she began to lead me through the mall again.

It took us about a minute to reach the store she was leading me to. It was a relatively small store that had music on one side of the store and movies on the other side. The two of us decided to browse through the movie section. I was picking up various movies and reading the back cover of them while Sour Sweet was just mostly glancing at the titles. “Is there anything in particular that you’re looking for?” She asked.

“Not really,” I answered back. “I’m mostly just looking around to see if there’s anything of interest.”

“So, what’re you’re saying is that you’ll buy a movie you’ve never seen before?” She asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Maybe. Maybe not. It all depends on what I find. It’s not like I can go to a movie rental place anymore.”

“…Can’t you just stream stuff online or something?”

“It’s just not the same.” I replied. “Although, if it makes you feel any better, the really bad movies tend to also be really cheap.” After browsing around for a while, I finally found something that caught my eye. “Hey, Sour. I found something.” I said as I pulled the DVD off the shelf.

She came over and looked over the title of the movie I was holding. “Kelly’s Heroes?” She asked.

“Yep. I saw this movie on T.V. awhile back and absolutely loved it.”

“What’s it about?”

“This soldier named Kelly finds out that there’s a stash of millions of dollars’ worth of gold behind enemy lines. So, he, the rest of his squad, a quartermaster, and a tank unit decide to go AWOL in order to get the gold for themselves. Basically, it’s a bank heist film that’s set in the middle of a war.”

“Sounds interesting.” Sour simply said.

“Yeah it is, and it’s pretty funny too.” I replied. After a small pause, I asked, “Should I buy it?”

“Why are you asking me?! Who do you think I am, your mother?!” She jovially berated.

“Fair enough” I said as I walked to the cashier. After making my purchase, we continued to walk around the mall for a while. We went into a couple of stores here and there, but, just like with most shopping malls, there really wasn’t much that I was interested in. By the time it turned three o’clock, the both of us decided that we were done at the mall. As we walked back to the car, I asked Sour, “So, anything else you want to do?”

She was silent for a moment, probably thinking on what to do next, until her eyes landed on the bag I was carrying. She then shrugged her shoulders and asked, “Movie at your place?”

“Do you know how much gold is in that bank? The oddball tank commander named…well…Oddball asked the enemy tank commander. When he was met with a curious stare, Oddball says. “Sixteen million dollars.” The other tank commanders widened in surprise and realization.

“So,” Kelly began, “Why don’t you turn the turret of that tank around and blow the doors of that bank down for us?”

The scene then cuts to the front doors of the bank in question, only for them to suddenly be blown to pieces as the tank shoots them.

Sour Sweet and I burst out laughing as we watched the scene play out. We were both laying on my bed as we watched the film. I had my arm around her as she was snuggled up beside me and rested her head on my shoulder. We made a snide comment occasionally, but we mostly stayed silent as we enjoyed the movie and each other’s company. Once she calmed down, Sour said, “You know that this probably wouldn’t happen.”

“There’s a good number of things that happen in this movie that probably wouldn’t happen.” I replied. “But that’s why I like it so much.”

“Hmm…true.” Sour agreed as she returned her attention to the film just in time to see the soldiers celebrate as they open one of the many crates that held the gold that they were looking for.

As the credits rolled, I stretched out a bit and asked, “So, is there anything else you want to do, or do you need to get going?”

She looked over to the clock and said, “I think I probably should get going. Although, there is one thing I want to do before I go.”

“And what would that be?” I asked only to suddenly get that answer as Sour Sweet’s lips smashed into mine. My eyes shot open at first, but as the kiss continued my eyes gradually closed and I begun to kiss back. We stayed like that for what felt like hours. Just the two of us enjoying the moment with a simple kiss.

But, as soon as she initiated it, she ended the kiss by leaning back and staring at me with half lidded eyes. I stared back at her while rubbing her shoulder with my thumb. “I really should get going.” Sour said with a hint of disappointment as she started to get up.

“I know.” I said as I got up along with her. The walk to the front door was silent, neither of us really knowing what to say to each other at the moment. When, we did reach the door, I awkwardly said to her, “So, I’ll see you on Monday then?”

“Of course. We have classes together, remember?” I replied.

“I-I know, I just-” I tried to stammer out before she stopped me by giving me a small peck on the lips.

“I’m just messing with you.” She jovially said. “I’ll see you at school.”

“Yeah…see ya then.” I replied. She then gives me one more peck on the lips before opening the front door and walking out. As I watched her walk back to her car, I couldn’t help but think to myself. It feels like yesterday that I would have welcomed the thought of not talking to Sour Sweet for the rest of the day. Now, I there’s nothing I want more than having her around.