Chapter 328.<h4><b>Chapter 328. Troubling Developments: </b><b>Giving my Co-worker a Ride. (1/3)</b></h4>


    <span style="font-weight:400">We continued with our shift as usual until it was nine. The two of us coincidentally exited the store at the same time and turned in opposite directions. I took a few steps in the direction of the parking lot where I’d parked my bike while she went her own way. However, only a few steps after exiting the door, she abruptly called out to me.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Hey, Ran…”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“What is it?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“About your question earlier today…”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“What question?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“The one where if I had to pick who I’d want as a boyfriend out of the three options avable.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Huh? That was still on your mind?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I’d have picked you.” She said that coolly like it wasn’t a big deal.


    <span style="font-weight:400">When I nced back over my shoulder, she was walking away without looking back.


    <span style="font-weight:400">I could have said nothing in return, but something in me made me want to tease her. “Hahaha. You know,” I pointed at her and continued, “you look like a girl who missed her chance at love right now.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Shut up. I didn’t miss anything.” She turned around and snapped back at me.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“By the way, don’t go quitting your job because you’re heartbroken or something.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">She rolled her eyes and scoffed, “I’m not some weak little girl from a shoujo manga who’d go crying if some guy has a girlfriend already.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">The two of us were just joking around as usual.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“You’re right. I totally couldn’t see that happening at all. But can you cry this one time so I can take a picture and send it to Rosa to prove I turned down your undying love?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">She walked up to me then pinched the corner of my eyes and stretched them out. “Why don’t you cry so I can take a picture and send it to that girlfriend you’re so head over heels in love with? Hmph! Turned down my undying love? You have some nerve saying that when I don’t even like you. I only like one person, and that person definitely isn’t you.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">I raised my brows in surprise. It was the first I’d ever heard that there was someone she liked.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“You like someone? That’s quite a surprise.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Yes, I like someone. Is there something so strange about that?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I can hardly believe it. Is it someone who works here?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“No.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Someone from your university?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“No.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Huh? Neither from work or school? Then where?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Oh? Are you curious?” She smiled.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Just a little. For someone to win you over, it’s pretty surprising. What sort of weirdo must they be?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“They’re not weird.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Really though, who is it?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Hmm… well, even if I wanted to tell you, I couldn’t.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“You couldn’t? What do you mean?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I don’t really know them.” Her eyes made it clear she wasn’t kidding.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“You… don’t know them?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“You like someone you don’t know?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I really don’t get it.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“They don’t know me either.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“That’s even more baffling. Are you suggesting you don’t know who they are and they don’t know you either, but you like them?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah, is there something wrong with that?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Unbelievable. How does that even happen? You must have a few loose screws. If they don’t know you, you’ve never talked to each other, right?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Not even once.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Have you tried to talk to them before?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I don’t know how to talk to them.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I’m even more confused than ever.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Ah! My bus!”


    <span style="font-weight:400">I looked over to the side where she was looking and a bus was already driving past the bus stop. It was toote to catch it.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“No waaaay… haaaaaah. Why’d you have to say something stupid and distract me? The next one won’t be here for another hour.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Ouch. Sucks to be you.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“It does. Student loans suck. You can only afford public transit and can’t get approved for financing a car without a guarantor.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Your parents won’t act as a guarantor for you?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“They don’t like that I’m doing an arts degree in literature and refuse to support my decision in any way. They wanted me to do a science degree, but I outright refused. Get a real job with a proper degree. Haaaaaah… I can’t even remember how many times they’ve told me that.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Hey… you really n to wait for the next bus instead of calling a taxi?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah, I don’t want to waste money on a taxi.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">Honestly, I felt a bit sympathetic toward her when I recalled my own experiences with missing the bus and sometimes having to wait or walk for hours because funds were tight.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“You want a ride?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“A ride? You mean on your bicycle? No way, I’ll pass. You’d tire yourself out for no reason.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">She still wasn’t aware I’d upgraded.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Haha, don’t worry about that, I’ve got my license now.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“What? You mean… you… got a car? How! I can’t even get approved for financing but you’re telling me you did? What’s with this injustice? You’re even younger than me, what’s this extreme sense of defeat and inferiority I’m feeling right now?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Well, it was sort of a birthday present. Plus, it was used and really cheap. I could have still afforded it. It would have been privately financed between me and the seller, but somehow things worked out and it was paid in full all in one go.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I don’t think I’ve ever felt this envious before in my life.” Yuna shook her head in dismay.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Well? You want the ride or not?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Uh… if it wouldn’t be too much trouble…”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Then follow me.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Sure…”


    <span style="font-weight:400">I led the way and Yuna followed directly behind me. I came to a stop between my motorcycle and the driver’s side of a car. Yuna was… on the passenger side. Haha, it was only natural she’d misunderstand.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Yuna, what are you doing over there?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Huh? What do you mean? This isn’t your car?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“It’s over here.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Over… there?” She hesitantly walked around the car, skeptical as she continued, “But-”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Oh, I forgot to mention I got a motorcycle, not a car.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Huh? A... motorcycle? Doesn’t that mean-”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah, you have to ride on the back. Is there a problem?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“On second thought- wha-” Cut off mid-sentence she let out a small yelp as I grabbed her by the wrist l, pulled her forward, and leaned her up against the back seat. I picked up my passenger helmet, pulled it down over her head then strapped it on.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Huh? Uh?” She seemed a bit flustered.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“What’s wrong?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“N-Nothing.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Where’d the cool beauty act go?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“... shut up… if you’re going to drive me home… just do it.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">I mounted my motorcycle before she meekly sat down behind me and lightly clutched onto the back of my jacket.


    <span style="font-weight:400">I turned the key in the ignition and shifted out of neutral into first gear. As soon as the wheels rolled forward a bit, Yuna, startled, removed her hand from my jacket and sped onto both sides of my waist from behind.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Haha, what’s wrong? Scared?” I taunted.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I’m n-not scared at all. It’s just a motorcycle, no big deal. There’s nothing to be scared about.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Alright, then I’ll pick up speed.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">I cranked the handle toward me and quickly elerated up to the speed limit.


    <span style="font-weight:400">Yuna’s arms wrapped around the front of my waist as if afraid she’d fly off if she didn’t.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“If you’re scared just say so, I can drive slower.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I’m not scared.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Then you don’t mind if I get onto the highway?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I mind. I absolutely mind. That wouldn’t even be the right way to get to my ce.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Right, right. Just tell me the way to go.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Keep going straight. I’ll tell you when to turn. Uh… but it’d be nice if you went a bit slower… if you go too fast you might miss the turn.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Haha, right, right. Because I might miss the turn. Sure.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I’m being serious…”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Whatever you say.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">I slowed down to about two-thirds the speed limit.


    <span style="font-weight:400">Yuna’s vice-like grip around my waist ckened and I felt her body gradually rx as she grew ustomed to the slower speed as we drove.


    <span style="font-weight:400">A few minutes of silence passed before she opened her mouth and said, “Make a left at the next light.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Alright.”


    <span style="font-weight:400">I changed into the left turningne and slowed to a stop before the intersection as the light was red.


    <span style="font-weight:400">When we came to a full stop, the side of the helmet Yuna had on tapped against my back. She didn’t move it away and rested it there.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“A drive on a motorcycle at night is strangely calming. How unexpected,” Yuna quietly mumbled to herself.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“It is, isn’t it?” Ipletely agreed with her sentiment.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“I might be able to write something good tonight when I get home.” Her voice was soft and at ease.


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Oh? A bout of inspiration?”


    <span style="font-weight:400">“Yeah, a little I guess...”