Two days after Moretti-san's evaluation, I called for a meeting to decide the 30 lucky students who will be a part of the Spring elections.
"Good morning." I sighed feeling the draught from these past few busy weeks for the preparation of the Spring and Autumn elections.
"Good morning, Tsukasa-senpai," Erina, Isshiki, and Kinokuni chorused.
While the rest of them stayed silent as they stare at me. Well, with the exception of Rindou of course. She's currently eating fried grasshoppers so she just ignored me.
"May I have the list of the students who applied for the Spring elections, Nakiri-kun?" I lended my hand towards the blonde girl who in turn handed me a brown envelope that I immediately opened.
I read each document of each student before placing them all in the table in the middle of the meeting room.
"Did you manage to have your secretary write every single reaction and word you responded to each dish?" I asked Erina.
She nodded and handed me a clipboard that I assumed had the information I needed.
"What are your thoughts of each student and their dish?" I continued asking the youngest of us.
She stated all her thoughts on each of them and their dishes until she finally arrrived on the last student, Moretti-san.
I jumped a bit over my chair, anticipating her comment. My fellow elite ten members looked at me in confusion as I smile sheepishly at them.
"The next student is Moretti Caterina. She's a transferee. She transferred here just this school year and came from one of the top art schools in Florence, Italy before going here to Tōtsuki. She specializes in Italian cuisine." Hmm? Didn't she tell me she specializes in fusion cuisine and baking too? Also, an art school?
"Her skills are impeccable. She's fast and graceful while she cooks and does not make you wait at all. But despite her quick actions, you can still clearly see all her movements. Her skills and abilities in the kitchen does justice to the amount of time she probably worked in their family business," Erina said, calmly.
"What about her food?" Kinokuni-san quired with her hands on the table, interested in the girl.
"And her dish is as magnificent as the vast starry sky. Each part of it complimented each other, never overpowering the other," Erina paused before looking at me and her tone of voice changed. "But..."
"But what?" Isshiki-kun questioned, curious as to what could possibly be wrong with his best friend's dish.
"I think she only managed to cook like that because of Tsukasa-senpai's help." The heads of the members each turned to me as they eyed me in disbelief.
"Seriously? I didn't think you're biased enough to help a single student, Tsukasa-senpai," Eizan-kun bluntly responded to which Kinokuni-san nodded to.
"Heh, I knew there was something suspicious about you two," Kuga-kun remarked and smirked.
I stared at him in disbelief that led for him to shut up.
"Ehh? I thought we already cleared this up last time, Erina-chan," Rindou said, scratching her hair.
"What do you mean, Nakiri-kun?" Isshiki spoke, amused and calm yet worried all at the same time.
I let out a breath deciding to explain myself before Erina spoke more. "Nakiri-kun, please stop giving our fellow members such atrocious ideas. While Moretti-san and I are friends and I did help her by making vague comments about her dish before her evaluation-"
Erina cut me off before I can continue. "So you admit that you helped her, Tsukasa-senpai?"
I sighed, holding my irritation inside of me. "The help I gave her is not something you could say is help enough to pass her evaluation. You can check the CCTV cameras in my kitchen if you wish for an evidence to my claims VS yours, Nakiri-kun."
"Well, then why don't we check them, Tsukasa-senpai?" Erina replied, firmly. She called her secretary to bring the footages to us and had the security guards set them up here so we can watch them.
When we finally watched the entire footage, Kinokuni-san concluded, "Tsukasa-senpai is right, Erina. There's no need to fight over this." She gestured for the computers and footage to be removed in the table. "Please take these away."
Meanwhile, Erina looks embarrassed, though she is doing her best to hide it. She's too uptight.
"Let’s continue," Saitō-san stated. "Place the document of the student you wish to be a part of the Spring elections and we can talk about whether they should be in or out."
All of us proceeded to do so and before I could place Moretti-san's document up front, Isshiki shook his to me head and did it instead.
Right...They'll become suspicious again if I do it myself.
"All in favor of Moretti Caterina, please raise your hand," Megishima-san prompted.
The vote began with Megishima-san then followed by Rindou, Isshiki, Kuga, Kinokuni, myself, Akanegakubo, Saito-san, and Eizan-kun. In total, that made nine votes with only Erina not voting due to her stubbornness.
She should really stop that. If anyone's biased, it is her.
When the 30 students were completed, three passes were to be given to three luckier students. One of us have to support one and the others have to agree to enable the first round free pass.
I wanted to give Moretti-san a free pass but I know that if I give her that, our group will condemn her and I so I decided to gesture to Rindou to do it instead.
Her eyes twinkled in amusement and gave me a tap on my hand that was under the table with a tiny mischievous grin that I just decided to let pass.
Rindou was about to give her free pass to Moretti-san when Saito-san raised his hand. "I'll give my free pass to Moretti-kun."
What? He smiled a little as he scanned everyone. All of them agreed, only waiting for my response to enable the pass.
While they were waiting for my response, I couldn't help but feel uneasy. It was the same feeling I felt whenever Moretti-san laughs and jokes with Isshiki, the same feeling when she would talk to Kuga about their same interests, and even when I saw her with the boy she said is called Hayama-kun.
It's a sickly feeling I didn't like nor did I want to feel. It's spreading to my brain and making me think of such things I shouldn't be bothered with. Alas, I couldn't stop the feeling no matter how much I dislike it.
"Tsukasa? Hey? We're waiting for you, you know?" It was that when Rindou's voice shook me awake of the feeling that was overpowering my senses.
I nodded my head, agreeing to giving Moretti-san a free pass through Saito-san's support.
It's okay. He believes in her skills. Just like I do. What am I so worried about?
Although we have transferred to another topic and Rindou has began to talk about who she wanted to give her free pass to, I still couldn't shake away the sickly feeling that stayed in my heart, my body, and my soul.
I transferred my blue eyes' attention to Saito-san who is listening intently to our meeting while I couldn't focus myself and continued to watch his actions.
I can't help but feel guilty that I'm feeling something like to this to a good friend like him. It's not good that I'm thinking of doing bad things or gettiing mad at Saito-san just because I didn't get to do what I wanted...
But I just couldn't help it. I couldn't help the sickly feeling that stresses me right now and is making me think more about Moretti-san.
What is this sickly feeling?
...
Umm, I'm sorry if you don't like the way Erina is here. She's just kind of doing her job? After all, cheating isn't allowed in this program and in school so she has to make sure of it.
Anyways, thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter! <3
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Kitchen Encounter (Tsukasa Eishi x OC)
FanfictionCaterina Moretti was forced to attend Tōtsuki Tea Ceremony and Cooking Academy. As she go through her cooking journey she met Tsukasa Eishi, a chef who was baffled with her because she found his cooking to be missing something. What will Tsukasa Ei...
