The John Bosco Culinary College was alive with color and sound.
Morning sunlight fell across a busy campus. Students hurried between stalls, professors called out instructions, and families streamed through the gates carrying cameras and balloons.
It was the practical exam, but no one would have known it from looking. The grounds had been transformed into a festival, with colorful banners strung between the trees, music playing from speakers hidden in the bushes, and the smell of cooking food drifting through the air like an invitation.
Parents had come from across the city to watch their children cook and taste their creations. Students moved between the stalls with trays of food, their excitement barely concealing their nerves.
Yuuta stood at the edge of the crowd, his equipment bag slung over his shoulder, his heart pounding in his chest.
He had known about the exam for weeks, but it was only since yesterday that the day had taken on a different meaning. Sister Mary was coming to watch him.
Erza and Elena had come with him, waiting to see what he could do.
His bag was heavy. He had packed it carefully the night before, checking and rechecking every item: his chef's knife, sharpened to a razor edge; his cloth duster, soft and clean; a small bottle of whiskey, for the sauce he had been practicing; measuring cups and spoons, arranged by size; a spatula, worn smooth from years of use; a lighter, for the crème brûlée; a peeler, small and sharp, for the delicate work of carving fruits.
He had everything he needed, yet his nerves refused to settle.
Behind him, Erza walked with her arms crossed, her face set in its usual cold mask, her eyes scanning the crowd with the particular intensity of someone who was used to being in control and was not sure she liked being surrounded by so many people.
Beside her, Elena bounced with excitement, her silver hair shining in the sunlight. Her wings fluttered as she pointed at one stall after another.
"Papa! Look! Food!"
"Papa! Look! Pink cloud!"
"Papa! Look! Meat!"
She darted between the nearby stalls, laughing as Yuuta hurried to keep her close. Watching her enjoy herself eased his nerves for a moment.
Yuuta laughed, despite his nerves. "I see, little one. I see everything."
Erza was not laughing. Her face was cold, her voice sharp, her eyes moving across the festival with an expression that might have been confusion or might have been disdain.
"Why does your college hold something so meaningless?" she asked.
Yuuta blinked. "What do you mean, meaningless?"
"Look at this." She gestured at the crowd, at the music, at the stalls and the banners and the parents taking pictures of their children. "It is just a test. But they celebrate it like a victory. It is useless. Wasteful. There is no purpose to any of this."
Yuuta sighed. He should have expected that response.
Erza saw the world through the eyes of a queen, through the eyes of someone who had spent centuries measuring everything by its usefulness, its efficiency, its contribution to the greater good. She did not understand joy. She did not understand celebration.
She did not understand the simple, foolish, wonderful act of being happy for no reason at all.
"You are right, my queen," he said. "It is useless. It is wasteful. There is no purpose to any of this."
Erza nodded, pleased that he had finally agreed with her. "I am glad you see it my way."
"But," Yuuta said, "do not see anything unusual here?"
Erza looked around.
She looked at the stalls, the music, the parents taking pictures. She looked at the students laughing, the children running, the old man playing the violin in the corner, his eyes closed, his body swaying with the music. She looked at all of it, and she saw nothing unusual. Nothing except waste. Nothing except noise.
"No," she said. "I do not find anything unusual."
Yuuta sighed again. He pointed at Elena. "Look at Elena's face. Look at the faces of the other humans. And see."
Erza looked at Elena.
Her daughter was standing in front of a cotton candy stall, her face lifted toward the spinning sugar, her eyes wide, her mouth open, her smile so bright that it seemed to light up the space around her.
Elena had not won a prize or accomplished anything. She was simply delighted by the spinning pink sugar, the music, and the chance to spend the morning with her parents.
Erza looked at the other faces in the crowd.
A mother, laughing at something her son had said, her hand on his shoulder, her eyes bright with pride.
A father, lifting his daughter onto his shoulders so she could see the stage, his face red with effort and joy.
A grandmother, her hands clasped in front of her, her eyes wet with tears, watching her granddaughter arrange plates on a table.
Even those who looked tired or anxious smiled as they watched their children. Erza began to understand why the gathering mattered to them.
Yuuta's voice was soft, gentle, the voice of someone who had learned this lesson the hard way.
"It may look like a waste of money or time to a queen," he said, watching a child run past with a balloon. "But look how happy everyone is. You can have endless wealth, but what good is it if you cannot bring a smile to your own people?"
Erza was silent.
Her arms, which had been crossed, fell to her sides.
Her face, which had been cold, softened. She looked at Elena, at her daughter's smile, at the joy that was radiating from her small body like heat from a fire.
She looked at the other faces in the crowd, at the mothers and fathers and grandmothers who had come to watch their children cook.
She looked at the students, nervous and excited, their futures hanging in the balance, their hands steady on their knives.
She felt something she had not felt in centuries.
Warmth.
It was not the warmth of magic. It was not the warmth of battle. It was something else, something softer, something that spread through her chest and made her heart beat faster and made her throat tight and made her want to smile even though she did not know how.
Erza quickly folded her arms again and looked away, unwilling to let Yuuta notice.
"Ridiculous," she said. "Absolute nonsense. I have never heard such foolishness in my entire life."
She turned and walked toward Elena, her steps quick, her back straight, her face turned away from Yuuta so he would not see the color rising in her cheeks.
Yuuta caught the brief change in her expression and smiled to himself before following her into the crowd.
The exam had begun.
Students were being called to their stations one by one, their names echoing across the courtyard, their faces a mixture of excitement and terror. Each one had one hundred and twenty minutes to prepare their dish, to present it to the judges, to prove that they had learned something in the years they had spent at this college. Some had already finished and received their results. The judges sat at a long table near the front, their faces serious, their pens moving across their papers, their eyes never leaving the students who worked at their stations.
Yuuta's roll number was forty-nine. He was second to last. He had been watching the exam for hours, sitting in the seating area near the judges' table, his equipment bag at his feet, his hands clasped in his lap. Erza sat beside him, her arms crossed, her face cold, her eyes fixed on the students who were cooking. Elena sat on his other side, eating cotton candy, her face sticky with sugar, her legs swinging, her attention drifting from the exam to the stalls to the birds that were gathering in the trees.
Yuuta was nervous. He had taken practical exams before, had stood at cooking stations while judges watched and waited and judged. He had never been nervous. He had always been alone, with no one to impress, no one to disappoint, no one to watch him fail. Now Erza was beside him. Now Elena was watching. Now Sister Mary was somewhere in the city, on her way to see him, and he had to pass this exam, had to prove that he was not a failure, had to show them that he was worth something.
He looked at Erza. She was watching a student at the far end of the row, her expression unreadable, her hands still. He thought about the past weeks, about the dances and the meals and the hands they had held. He thought about the ring on his finger, the ring that had changed, the ring that would not come off. He thought about the promise she had made, the promise to kill him, the promise that he was not sure she would keep.
I have to do my best, he thought. For them. And for myself.
He looked at the judges' table, at the students who were being called, at the names that were being announced. He was not watching the exam. He was looking for someone.
Roll number thirty-six.
Fiona.
He had not spoken to Fiona since their conversation on the rooftop, when she warned him about Erza. He had avoided contacting her afterward.
Yuuta sighed. He had been thinking about her all week, about the years they had spent together, about the friendship that had meant something to him and nothing to her. He had thought he loved her, once. He had thought she was the only person who saw him as something other than cursed. He had been wrong.
Maybe I never loved her the way I thought I did. I just wanted someone to look at me without fear.
His mind drifted, pulled back by the weight of memory, to the day he first walked into that classroom, the day everything changed, the day he met Fiona.
The classroom had been loud when he arrived, full of the particular chaos that came from children who had been told to sit still and be quiet and had failed miserably.
They whispered, passed notes, and kicked at their desks, barely noticing the new boy waiting outside.
"Students," the teacher said, her voice rising above the noise. "We have a new student today."
The whispers stopped. Heads turned. Eyes fixed on the door.
"New student?" someone said from the back of the room. "Is it like an anime protagonist? Is he going to show up and dominate the class?"
A girl laughed. "No way. Imagine if a hot guy appeared right now. That would be crazy."
Their expectations grew with each joke. None imagined the shy boy waiting beyond the door.
The teacher smiled. "Okay, you can come in, Yuuta."
The door slid open.
He was small, smaller than the other children his age. His hair was long, falling over his face, hiding his eyes. His uniform was old, the fabric faded, the cuffs frayed. He kept his head down, his chin tucked, his shoulders hunched, as if he was trying to make himself smaller, to disappear, to be anywhere but here.
"Who is he?" someone whispered.
"Why is he hiding his face?"
"Did you see his uniform? It looks so old. Like, really old."
The whispers were not cruel. Not yet. They were curious, confused, trying to understand the boy who would not look at them.
Yuuta stood at the front with his hands clasped, his head still bowed. He seemed afraid to draw any more attention to himself.
The teacher's voice was soft, gentle. "Yuuta, can you introduce yourself?"
He nodded. His voice, when it came, was barely audible, trembling with nerves.
"My name is Yuuta Konuari. It is nice to meet you."
The classroom quieted as the children listened to his timid introduction.
"Did you hear his voice?" someone whispered. "It is so good."
"So cute. I bet he is handsome under all that hair."
The teacher smiled. "Yuuta, you can look at your classmates. They are friendly. Do not worry."
He shook his head. His voice was small, broken, the voice of someone who had learned to expect the worst.
"No. They will hate Yuuta. Everyone does."
The teacher's smile faded. She looked at him, at the boy who had been told so many times that he was cursed, that he was poison, that he was something that should not exist. She had seen children like him before, children who had been hurt so many times that they had stopped hoping for anything else.
"Yuuta," she said, "no one will judge you. You can look at your classmates. How else will they see your cute face?"
He hesitated, wanting to believe her.
"Really? They will not hate Yuuta?"
"Really," the teacher said. She looked at the class. "Will you?"
The children shook their heads. "No," they said. "We promise."
Yuuta was ten years old. He still believed that promises were sacred, that words spoken in good faith could not be broken, that the world was kinder than he had learned to expect. He looked up.
His hair fell away from his face. His eyes were red.
The classroom, which had been loud with whispers and laughter, went silent.
The smiles around the room vanished as the children stared at his unusual eyes.
Most had never seen red eyes before, and their surprise quickly turned to unease.
The children in the front rows trembled. They did not speak. They were good children, raised to be polite, raised to be kind. They did not know what to say. They only knew that the boy standing at the front of the room was not like them, and that frightened them.
The children in the back were not good children. They were not kind. They had been waiting for someone to mock, someone to hurt, someone to make them feel powerful. They found him.
"Monster," one of them said. "Look at his eyes."
"Demon."
"Devil. He is a devil."
Yuuta's eyes began to glow. He did not know why. He did not know how. It happened when he was sad, when he was scared, when the world reminded him that he was not wanted. The light pulsed from his red eyes, faint and flickering, and the children in the back saw it and laughed.
"His eyes are glowing! He really is a demon!"
"Cast him out! How dare he betray Jesus!"
"The devil will be crushed beneath God's feet!"
Paper balls flew through the air. They hit his face, his chest, his hands. He did not move. He stood at the front of the room, his hands at his sides, his eyes glowing, his tears falling.
"But you promised," he whispered. "You promised you would not hate me."
The teacher tried to stop them. She slammed her duster on the desk, shouted at the backbenchers to sit down and be quiet. They did not listen.
They threw more paper, laughed louder, called him worse names. She could not control them. She could not control any of it.
And then a girl stood up.
She was small, like him, with dark hair and sharp eyes and a voice that carried authority that should not have belonged to a ten-year-old.
She marched to the front and stood between Yuuta and the children throwing paper.
"Enough," she said.
The classroom went silent.
The backbenchers stopped laughing.
They looked at the girl. They remembered the last time they had made her angry.
They remembered the washroom they had been forced to clean, the detention they had served, the parents who had been called. They sat down. They clicked their tongues. They were quiet.
The girl turned to the teacher. "Ma'am, please continue from here."
The teacher nodded, relief flooding her face. "Thank you, Fiona. I am glad you are here."
Fiona turned toward Yuuta and met his glowing red eyes without flinching.
"Woah," she said. "Your eyes are different from the rest."
Yuuta hid his face, turned away, tried to make himself small. "Please do not look at them. Yuuta does not want to scare you."
Fiona sighed. "Do you think I will be scared?"
He shook his head. "Everyone says the same thing. But when they see my eyes, they treat me like a demon." His voice cracked. "But I am Yuuta. I am just Yuuta."
Fiona looked at him.
At his trembling hands, his wet cheeks, his eyes that glowed when he was sad.
She reached out and took his hand. Her grip was firm, steady, sure.
"From now on," she said, "you will sit beside me."
She led him to the empty desk beside hers and pulled out the chair for him.
"Tell me," she said, "if anyone bothers you. I will handle it."
Yuuta looked at her. At her dark hair, her sharp eyes, her voice that carried authority that should not have belonged to a ten-year-old. He did not understand why she was helping him.
He did not understand why she was kind. He only knew that she had held his hand when no one else would.
"Yes," he said. "I will, Fiona."
The memory faded.
To be continued...