18. Let’s do this

Ah, so the second male lead wanted to catch up with the first. He was apparently not the only one searching for a shortcut.

Meanwhile, the pigtail girl caught up with them. 

"Right! I heard that too, what's up with that? Did he just want to talk badly behind your back?" There was an awkward pause because she had burst into a conversation with unknown people.

Natasha asked herself how the girl could eavesdrop on a conversation in some closed classroom. After lunch, Jance had her follow him there and warned her. There was absolutely no one near them.

"Then if he had said that, why are you talking to me?" He smiled a strange smile, looking first at Natasha and then at the pigtail girl. 

Natasha was disgruntled, having to share Lance's attention with a random girl who popped up from nowhere.

"Right... it's because you are cool!" the girl said.

Natascha was exasperated, and the girl hastily followed up.

"I mean, he is cool, right? And you are so pretty; you would be a perfect couple, right?" she asked, looking between them.

Natasha went beet red and looked shyly at the ground. 

"I'm gay," Lance said blankly. 

Both of the girls froze in horror; their reaction was really a bit over the top. 

"I'm joking..." Lance glanced depressedly into the distance. He got a strong feeling that something was wrong with Pigtail. Maybe someone who was reborn too and knew them, but he felt she was more like a fan, like a reader.

'Urgh, please no more readers.' Did it have to be that one more person had to know everything about his darkest moments?

Both hastily laughed, not finding this funny, but Natasha had now understood that, sadly, it was too early for a shy and romantic atmosphere. She would have to work hard in the future, since she fell in love with him at first sight. Natasha somehow knew that he was the father of her future children. 

She looked around and continued with her topic.

"You don't look like a person who would do such a thing; do you have enmity with the class rep?" 

"You could say so." He probably had a lifetime of grievances together, while Lance himself had about a day of it, since he had just learned about his existence yesterday.

"Then... then will you have problems?" she asked, shaken.

Lance really didn't like her over-familiar behavior, feeling it was fake the more he talked to her.

"No, we did a drug test and will get the results tomorrow." Both girls nodded, believing in him wholeheartedly. 

Suddenly, Natasha furrowed her eyebrows.

"We?"

Dang, he slipped. But it was not really a secret, so, "Paige was accused too."

Natasha looked at him, feeling wronged and with a bit of an accusation.

His lips crept up again. 'What right does she have to look like a disappointed wife?'

He scoffed, turned around, and left on the spot. He was hungry and didn't like them, so let's go home. 

'Home,' his smile turned genuine.

He was home first and made more for dinner. This time it was spaghetti with tomatoes and eggs. After cooking the spaghetti, he put sliced tomatoes on top and two fried eggs. It was, again, not really tasty but super filling.

He found tons of hazelnut ice cream in the fridge and tried it. It was really good. Lance sat on the couch and waited.

When Paige was finally home, it was already dark, and Lance had destroyed two cups of ice cream.

She was sporting an oversized black T-shirt that read "I don't wanna" with a sad smiley face in the middle. 

He cracked up with laughter.

"Why are you wearing this? Aren't you too old for something like this?" In combination with her unwilling look, this shirt was really priceless.

"Don't tell women that they are too old." She put her bags down and slumped on the sofa.

"We adults can only communicate honestly with the outside world through our T-shirts."

"Isn't that a desirable world?" Laughing, he asked.

"Don't know." Suddenly, she stood up and bent her knees a little. She clapped her hands and breathed deeply a few times, jumping up and down.

"Okay, let's do this."