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Prologue: The Fate of Hauling Files

Saeki was summoned to haul files because the student council elevator was broken, and he happened to be passing by before he had learned how to refuse.

President Shirayuki Rin set a stack of documents into his hands and glanced at his face. "You shake. People who shake make good control groups."

"Control for what?"

"For how sharp my tongue is." She turned and walked off. Her heels struck the corridor like a seal being stamped.

Chapter One: The Sharp-Tongued President's Annotations

Shirayuki liked a red pen for marking papers, and she marked people the same way.

"Your handwriting looks like ants that failed at moving house." She tossed back the minutes Saeki had written. "Rewrite them. No crying. If you cry, I add a line: secretary's assistant, emotional management unsatisfactory."

Saeki rewrote them three times. On the fourth she nodded, and the red pen drew a very small circle in the corner. That was the only praise of the day.

As he left the office he heard her say to the vice president, "This one will do. Don't let the broadcasting club steal him."

Chapter Two: Office Battlefield

The office battlefield began with a box of sweets. The secretary, the vice president, and a junior from the broadcasting club set sweets on Saeki's desk at the same time, the boxes stacked into a tower.

Shirayuki walked in, looked for two seconds, and toppled the tower. "The student council forbids bribery. Saeki, distribute the sweets to every student on duty."

"And me?" the junior asked.

"You stay and haul files." Shirayuki set a fresh stack into Saeki's already empty hands. "The control experiment isn't over."

Chapter Three: Romance Forbidden

Article One of the charter: members of this council are forbidden to fall in love.

Saeki read the line aloud. Shirayuki did not look up. "Reading it a second time will not lift it."

"Then who wrote Article One?"

"I did." She spun the red pen once. "A rule written for other people to see is called a charter. One written for yourself is called a diary. Diaries are not made public."

Saeki put the charter back in its folder. The gilt on the cover gleamed under the lamp like a sentence that refused to be spoken.

Chapter One: Noted: I Like You

"Noted: I like you."

Those words appeared on Saeki's leave slip, in red pen, in the president's hand. The reason for leave had been "family matters." She had changed it to "come to the office."

He went. Shirayuki spread the charter open. Article One was still there.

"Noted is not approved," she said. "Noted means I saw it. Once I've seen it, it has to be dealt with. Dealing with it takes time."

Chapter Two: Article One, Struck Through

The day Article One was struck through in red pen, the office went suddenly quiet.

The vice president asked, "Should we post a notice?" Shirayuki said, "Post it. Title: Charter revised. Details will not be disclosed."

Saeki looked at the crossed-out words and felt that single stroke weighed more than any praise. Shirayuki capped the pen. "The control experiment is over. You passed."

"Passed as what?"

"Passed as the exception."

Final Chapter: The Student Council Does Fall in Love

The student council does fall in love, but that sentence will never be written into the charter.

It is written only on the back of the duty roster, beside "elevator still not fixed." When Saeki carried the files away, Shirayuki straightened her nameplate, the motion uncommonly gentle.

"Come again tomorrow," she said. "Not to haul files. For a meeting. It's fine if you shake. Shaking can go in the minutes."

Her heels in the corridor still sounded like a seal being stamped. This time, the seal fell between their two names.