Side Story 4: A reminder that Those Three still exist.

Author's Note: This side story is a little weird. It's more like 3 short events rather than a story. I was thinking of something that would let Olivia, Lilian and Jessica interact with the others, but the clutter of characters was becoming too much for 2.5K words. Therefore, I decided to use this side story to show a little of what Those Three have been up to, how they've been changing and to set up some stuff for the (relatively near) future. As a result, I think the biggest weakness of this side story is that it feels like very little, but I still liked it. It makes me want to write more about them, and I hope it has the effect of making you look forward to see the things they've been up to, as well.

Story idea by Ultratalon on the Patreon:
Something involving Olivia, Lilian and Jessica and the reparations/improvements they've made and the harem interacting with them.

This is canon to the main story and takes place some days after David and Katherine got together.

Enjoy!

---

You received a random text to the group chat from Megan asking what you were doing. Nothing out of the ordinary. The girls usually text you for random things when you’re not together, and Megan often ask what you’re doing.

You replied saying you’re downtown since there are some things you need to get that they don’t sell at the supermarket near you. They don’t need to know you got cravings for a specific kind of snack, right? You don’t need to tell them that. Well, regardless of that, the moment the rest read that they bombarded you with errands.

Sophia: Can you get me that book we talked about? There should be a bookstore close carrying it.

Mia: Can you check the prices for acrylic paints, please? Just check. Don’t buy them.

Anzu: Since we’re asking, can you buy a couple of bottles of rubbing ? The school’s almost out and the next batch comes next week.

Emily: I just noticed my socks have a hole in them. Can you get me new ones?

You: …You don’t have another pair?

Emily: I do, but since we’re asking for things I figured I’d take the chance.

Emma: I want some makeup remover! I’ll send you a picture of the want I need.

You: …

Megan: Sorry David…

You: I’ll see what I can do.

Good thing you came here with a backpack to carry your things. And you’ve taken care of everything by now. You only need to get Emma’s makeup remover. You don’t know anything about this, but she sent you a picture, so you just go inside a random but fancy looking cosmetic store.

You get a few odd glances from women around, but you want to believe it’s just because of how lost you seem. You walk through every aisle looking for the bottle in the picture, but you can’t find it.

It’s not long after that a lady dressed in staff uniform approaches you with a friendly smile. She grimaces when you show her the picture of what you’re looking for, telling you they don’t carry it.

You’re about to turn and leave when you hear a surprisingly familiar voice approaching.

“Mandy, the manager is calling you.” With a bold walk and a presence that seems to demand attention, even in staff uniform, the new girl is none other than you classmate, Lilian Reed. “I’ll take over for you.”

“Thanks.” The previous lady leaves you in Lilian’s hands, though it’s not like it matters since they don’t have what you need.

…But it would be rude to just leave when there’s someone you know in front of you, right? Might as well be polite.

“I didn’t know you worked here.” Or worked at all, really. You keep that comment to yourself as you give Lilian a friendly smile.

“It’s my mother’s store.” is all she says. She has a hand on her hip and although her posture is straight and confident as always, she’s bashfully looking away. “So? What do you need? Make it quick.”

You let out a soft, quick breath with a wry smile. “I’m looking for this, but the lady said you didn’t have it here.” You tell her, showing her the picture on your phone.

Unblinking and unhesitatingly, Lilian nods. “We don’t, but we have the same product by another brand.” As she talks, she turns around and starts walking to another aisle, and you find yourself automatically following her. “I’ve tried it myself and they’re both extremely similar. Who is this for?”

Obviously not wanting to reveal anything unnecessary, you lie. “Megan.” You answer.

“Thought so. Send her a picture of this one. She’ll probably tell you it works, too.” Lilian says as she takes a bottle from a shelf and presents it to you.

You do as she suggests and soon get a reply from Emma.

Emma: Yes! That one works too!

Huh. Would you look at that?

“You were right.” You say with an amused tone.

“Of course I was.” It comes off as arrogant, but she has a satisfied and proud smile on her face. “I’ve tried nearly every product here at least once. I know what I’m doing.”

“I see.” You chuckle. “Well, thank you for your help. I’ll take this one, then.”

After you pay for the thing, you start leaving. But Lilian stops you right outside the store.

“Hey!” She calls out, making you turn to her. Once more, her eyes avoid yours as she scowls, yet she stands there firmly like she has nothing to be ashamed of. It’s a weird dissonance of facial expression and body language.

She clears her throat with a soft cough. “…Thanks for helping us study for finals last semester.”

Oh?

“Actually… thanks for helping me with math. I… got a decent score and my mother actually praised me for once.” Her cheeks start becoming a very soft shade of pink. “I would’ve given you a discount as thanks, but I can’t do that without getting in trouble.”

“It’s fine.” You laugh. “I really do appreciate the help. The girls sometimes ask me to buy them some stuff, but I know nothing about makeup. Could I ask for your help next time?”

“Sure.” She shrugs, but it’s more exaggerated than casual. “If it’s about makeup, I can spare the time.”

“Thanks.” You smile, but that’s mostly to yourself. It’s moments like this, when you can have a normal conversation with someone that used to hate your guts, that reassures you that you’ve made good decisions so far.

That seemed to take Lilian aback, because she grimaces for a single second before going “Yeah, yeah.” As she turns around and back into the store.

---

“I like Edgar Allan Poe better than Lovecraft or Stephen King as well.” Katherine says as she walks next to Sophia.

“Really? I thought you liked Stephen King more.” Sophia muses.

“I like the movie version of The Shining, but I’m not a huge fan of the books. Poe’s works just work better for me.”

The two girls enter the restroom in the second floor of the school as they have this conversation, sparked by Emma’s comment during class that she enjoyed most of Poe’s short stories while there were only a few she liked from Lovecraft.

“I have a hard time reading horror in general. Movies, too. I’d rather watch a sappy romance, but I always get outvoted when we have to pick one.” Sophia sighs.

“Don’t you get to pick the next movie uncontested though?”

“Yes, and I’m looking for the sappiest one just to get my .” Sophia nods with glee.

Before the two girls can do what they came to do, one of the doors to a stall opens. That alone wouldn’t be enough to stop their talk, but the person that comes out and how they look is.

Jessica comes out of the stall with tired, red eyes and a ruined makeup. She looks shocked to see Katherine and Sophia here, and even glances back at the stall for a moment, as if considering to go back and hide.

“Jessica? Are you okay?” Sophia asks. The girl has obviously been crying.

And apparently not having the will or the strength to look tough, she answers. “Not really…” She says with a humorless chuckle.

“What happened?” Katherine finds herself asking.

This is an odd situation. She always thought she would be happy to find one of her former bullies crying over, well, anything. But now her own chest is tightening seeing the Brazilian girl in such a state.

“It’s fine. You don’t need to worry.” She tries to smile, but that turns into a devastated frown quickly enough. Tears start forming around her eyes again as she remembers whatever it is that got her like this. “Sorry. Sorry. I’ll leave you two alone.”

As she starts to leave, trying to wipe the tears with the sleeves of her blazer, Sophia stops her with a hand on her shoulder. “We want to know. We might not be the best of friends, but we’re still on friendly terms now, right?”

With just a bit of hesitant, Katherine nods in agreement. She won’t go as far as calling Jessica her friend, but it couldn’t hurt to take a page out of David’s book, right? Well, it could, but she will anyway.

“It’s nothing, really. It’s just something stupid.” Jessica shakes her head. Even her hair seems messy, like she’s been running her hands around it. Her eyes glance between the two girls before she finally answers. “I just got a call. I… didn’t get the part in a play I auditioned for.”

…

Oh.

“You were auditioning for a play?” Katherine asks with surprise.

“Y-Yeah.” Jessica nods slowly. “Just a small, local rendition of Oedipus Rex to present in a local high school.” She chuckles self-deprecatingly. “It’s something so small, yet I’m crying here like I lost my chance at life. Pretty pathetic, right?”

“…Not at all.” Katherine says with a frown. “I think it’s okay to cry when you really care about something.”

“I agree. This obviously meant a lot to you, right? Are you trying to get into acting?” Sophia asks.

“Y-Yes, kind of.” Jessica nods, swallowing. “It’s kind of the only thing I’m really good at. Or so I thought.” She bites her lip.

“Did they tell you why they didn’t pick you?” Katherine asks.

“Just that they found someone else more suitable for the role.”

“Were they going to pay you for this?” Sophia asks.

“N-Not really. But… this was a well-established group looking for new talent.”

“Did you lose all your chances to try again?”

“…No.”

“Then try again next time.” Sophia nods firmly. “It’s okay to cry if you really cared, but it’s not like all your options are cut off, right? You’ll find other plays to audition for, and you’ll eventually get the role.”

“…I understand that.” Jessica smiles wryly. “It’s just… Olivia and Lilian are already making progress in the things they decided on. Meanwhile, I’m still stuck.” She says, biting her lip. “I still haven’t gotten a role in any plays or anything.”

“But it’s not like you want to give up, right?” Katherine asks suddenly, surprising even herself. The words are already out though, so she continues. “If it bothers you enough to cry, it means you really want to succeed, right? If so, then I think you’ll make it sooner than later.”

This is harder than she thought, but not impossible. At least Katherine can relate to the feeling of failing and being left behind when all your friends seem to be succeeding. At least to some extent. Sophia beat her to the captain seat in the team, and she has yet to beat David in any test scores. It’s not a pretty feeling, so even if she and Jessica are only now on… neutral terms, she can understand and sympathize with what she’s going through.

“…” They see Jessica smile. It’s a small curling of the lips, but it’s honest and even relieved. “Thanks. I know you’re right, but… I think I needed to hear it from someone else.”

She takes a deep breath and slowly lets it out. With a couple of soft slaps to her cheeks, her face goes back to normal. Or at least as much as it can with red eyes and ruined makeup.

“Alright. No more moping around. I need to put myself together.” She nods to herself, and her smile widens. “Sorry to throw this on you two all of a sudden.”

“We asked for it.” Sophia grins and shrugs while Katherine nods in agreement.

“Now, I need to find Lilian. I know she has some makeup I can borrow. See you around, okay?”

With that, the Brazilian girl leaves, and the two remaining girls can finally enter the stalls.

---

The knock on the door to her office doesn’t surprise her. Hayes Academy gives each teacher their own office so that they can attend to the students’ academic concerns more personally, after all. Mia answers immediately, allowing whoever it is that came to see her to come in. What does surprise her is seeing Ms. Olivia Hughes here, but she doesn’t let it show on her face.

“Ms. Hughes. How can I help you?” Mia asks, stopping the work on her computer to pay attention to the girl.

“I wanted to talk about my grade in our last assignment on mass media.” The girl says.

“Are you dissatisfied with it?” That’s the only reason she could be here for. She did score an average grade. Better than usual for her, but not something a student here should be proud of. She probably wants to argue it’s undeserved.

“I am, so I wanted to ask if there’s anything I can do to get it higher.” She says, surprising Mia again. “Is there an extra assignment I can do?”

Mia studies Olivia’s face. The girl is deadly serious, standing straight and looking directly at the teacher’s eyes. However, it’s not at all in the challenging way she used to look at everyone else. She’s simply trying to convey through eye contact alone just how serious she is about this.

Mia sighs mentally. This girl doesn’t even realize it, but she has an extremely firm and intuitive grasp on the importance of body language in social interactions. She’s able to effortlessly present herself as confident and unmovable, and in that regard she has her three best students beat.

Mmmm. That gives her an idea.

“I think there’s something we can do, Ms. Hughes.” Mia nods, mostly to herself. “The problem with your assignment was not it the content, but in the way it was presented. You need to develop a better understanding and usage of academic language. That’s why you’ll give me an oral presentation in three days.”

She pauses for a moment as she grabs the first assignment from a pile of papers on her desk. It just so happens to be His. She grimaces internally, wondering if it would be too obviously biased to use David’s as an example. She soon dismisses that thought, since she can easily let anyone who questions her decision read it and judge for themselves.

“Make a copy of this and study it. This is Mr. Walker’s assignment on the relevance of printed media in the modern day. It has a perfect score and it will serve as a good example of how these sort of texts should be written. What’s more, Mr. Walker is approachable. I’m sure he’ll give you some advice if you ask nicely.”

Olivia takes the paper from Mia as she answers with a small grimace. “I’m sure he will.”

“Is there a problem?”

“No.” Olivia sighs. “But… couldn’t you give me another paper to study?” Her voice loses its confidence for that moment alone. Her shoulders slump just the slightest and her lips purse as she reads the name on the assignment.

Mia perfectly understands that she should maintain the line between student and teacher. She knows she crossed it already with David and the other girls, but she still strives for objectivity when teaching them and grading their tests and assignments. They got into a small argument a couple of months ago when she had to give Emily and Megan bad grades, but thankfully Emma helped diffuse that quickly. It hasn’t happened again since.

However, she’s now extremely tempted to push this for David’s sake not as her student, but as her boyfriend. After all, this is the girl that tormented him. Mia doesn’t want to punish her, get or anything petty as that. She wants this girl to grow up, both because she’s her teacher…

…And because there’s a chance David might hook up with her in the future.

She knows her boyfriend well by now. He has a hard time resisting a pretty girl who has feelings for him, and Olivia fits both, if her scores with him haven’t changed since he told them. Yeah, if Ms. Olivia Hughes is in love with her boyfriend, she might as well become a woman worthy of him before they start anything.

Feeling satisfied with her thought process, Mia answers.

“Not if you want a good example to follow. Study it, by which I don’t mean memorize it. Think about what’s being written, why it was written and how it was written. You can come and ask me questions, you can ask Mr. Walker for advice, but what’s important is that you think about it.” Mia nods. “Your presentation is in three days. You’ll do it here in my office. If you do well, I’ll give you extra credit on the previous assignment.”

Olivia takes a deep breath and lets it out.

“Very well. Thank you, Ms. Owens.” She doesn’t smile, but her gratefulness sounds sincere, so she’ll take it.

Mia can only hope this helps in some way.