Akemi dipped her nose deeper into the confines of her scarf and held herself back from laughing amongst the panicked ear-splitting screams emanating from below the bridge.

A pair of geese had left the edge of the riverbank for their usual afternoon snack once they spotted a group of students spending their lunchtime at the canal side, idly unwrapping their sandwiches without knowing that their aromas were flocking geese toward their picknick table, who were honking in demand for the food to be shared, happily thrusting their beaks to grab bite for themselves, if left ignored.

Their straightforwardness caused uproar among the students, who scampered onto their feet to run away, screaming once they noticed geese were chasing after them, demanding for the food to be left behind as they aggressively flapped their wings at them.

Akemi burst out laughing at the sight, and she pressed her scarf tighter against her mouth, stifling the sound despite the obvious crinkling on her eyes when she saw Kazuko approaching her, finally arriving from her class.

"What happened?" Kazuko asked, glancing at the canal side below the bridge, where the geese returned, their spoils of war captured between their beaks.

"Nothing," Akemi breathed, trying to regain her bearings. "I just thought of something funny."

Kazuko hummed, casting another suspicious glance at the canal side before she dived into the matters at hand. "Sorry for calling you out so suddenly. I know you're busy. But I've been meaning to ask you if anything has been happening lately?"

"No?" Akemi answered, a tad bit confused, wondering what gave her the reason to ask.

Rather than answering, Kazuko only wrought her lips, as though she wasn't quite sure how to approach the topic. She reached out a gentle hand, squeezing Akemi's shoulder as she said, "Well, if there's anything at all, please let me know. We're friends after all."

"Sure…?" Akemi blinked. "What brought this on?"

"Ah, don't worry about it. We don't need to sweat the small details—"

Small details? "What are you talking about?"

"Well, you know, I've promised not to tell. He specifically told me not to mention this, but you know how I am – I can't help but worry once I know things." Kazuko trailed off.

Akemi stayed patient, even as her brain heated up from being overrun with information as she thought who this person could be – this person who specifically insisted for Kazuko not to tell her despite knowing full well that her friend would turn around and tell her anyway.

The same person whose identity Kazuko was currently still insisting didn't matter, even though it very much did. Akemi had a hard time remembering a person whom they both knew, who had also the strange habit to run around sharing personal details of her life with others (regardless, whether those said details may or may not have been truthful), and so she insisted on who, knowing that sooner or later Kazuko would buckle under relentless insistence—

"Alright!" exasperated, her friend finally revealed that she had followed up with the Lawyer, whom Akemi was meant to meet a couple of days before (but never did).

"He said you mentioned that you were going through a rough time, trying your best to keep a roof over hour head, which is the exact reason why you don't have time to date anyone."

How scarily accurate.

For a moment, Akemi was impressed. That Lawyer's information base must have been highly reliable and efficient if he could have found this much about these intricate details of her life in such a short period of time. After all, she had only sent him a message, specifically telling him she couldn't meet him because of pretend stomach ache. . .

"Akemi," Kazuko called her, concerned. "I'm moving out from the place I share with Natsumi. She's looking for a new flatmate, and the rent is a lot cheaper with two paying for it—"

"Ah, no, no – it's not that bad." Akemi reassured her, appreciating the sentiment, but she knew she couldn't afford to live with anyone. Sooner or later, they would be getting worried about her late-night escapades, or grow suspicious about the random, sudden phone calls she would rush to take, and possibly even file a missing police report on her for disappearing several days at a time with a palatable excuse that didn't entirely held together once pitted against a substantial amount of concern and worry. . .

"The landlady knocked down the price for me at the beginning since the constructions nearby were turning off clients from moving in." Akemi said, trying her best re-assure her, although she knew that the task would be difficult to accomplish since Kazuko could be notably stubborn.

"And I like to be busy that's why I work so much. I only said that to him because I didn't know what else to say to turn him down." Akemi revealed, although she spoke nothing but lies. A part of her was still stumped about this turn of event, and she made a mental note to find out about this Lawyer who somehow knew she was struggling to pay her rent when no-one else knew.

"I see," Kazuko sighed, realising the actual cause that brought this entire conversation to its existence. "So, he was no good too?"

Akemi shook her head and stayed silent, leaving Kazuko to her thoughts as she most likely wondered to herself where she had gone wrong this time, having been so convinced before to have finally found the right one—

Another scream erupted from the riverbank. The geese were at it again. Chasing off another student who had wanted to spend some quiet time at the canal. Akemi let out a laugh she couldn't hold. It was strangely therapeutic to watch them scampering around the grassy field, in a state of heighten emotion, both alert and terrified at the geese's restless barrage of attacks.

"It must be mealtime, again," Akemi said when she noticed Kazuko's stare on her. "They've been preying on students for food ever since they learnt the taste for human food, even though most of it isn't good for them…"

"No, not that," Kazuko said, not even sparing another look at the geese as she focused on the woman in front of her. "Rather, tell me why you were laughing?"

"Why, is that strange?" Akemi said, glancing around, spotting plenty of other passer-by's chuckling at the situation.

"No, it's just strange for you."

Wait—what? Akemi was stumped, a state she found herself quite often lately as she cocked her head to the side, quite sure it was socially acceptable to laugh at situation like this, right?

"Whilst it's common for people to laugh, it isn't something I expected to see you doing," Kazuko explained, and Akemi realised she spoke out loud again. "Wouldn't you be normally concerned for the affected party, rather than spend your time laughing at them?"

"I wasn't laughing at them—"

"Yes, you were."

"No, I—"

"I saw you. You stared at them and laughed." Kazuko interrupted, sounding bewildered and perplexed as much as Akemi felt deep inside, still unable to fathom when the lines blurred between the semblance of her life at the public eye and her private inner thoughts that she kept to herself – and why exactly it had to be someone like Kazuko noticing it. Kazuko, who easily remembered nuances and needlessly thought about them too much. Unnecessarily, too much.

"I'm sorry," Akemi said, strangely finding her voice ebbing and reclining back in size in its entirety. "But I don't know what you're talking about. I watched the student to make sure they were alright. I wasn't laughing at them."

"Sure," Kazuko said, deciding to let the matter rest, even as her brows still twitched in thought.

Next to her, Akemi remained silent. On the riverbank the geese were happily munching on bread crumbs, swallowing toxicity into their system without realising that they was slowly killing themselves, and knowing this, Akemi couldn't quite help but loathe person who gave them such food in the first place. . .