Their booth was tucked away in a corner, a little partitioned room within the small grill shop. The place wasn't big, but it was reasonably clean.
You could still hear the clatter of chopsticks and the rise and fall of conversations from the other tables, but the thin wooden walls softened everything into a background murmur instead of a roar.
"Little Jayna,"
A woman in an apron, warm-faced and generously built, came over with a slight sway in her step. There was a hint of playful reproach in her voice.
"You come in and don't even say hello anymore?"
"Sorry, Ms May," Jaynara said, rubbing her nose, looking just a little sheepish—but her embarrassment didn't last long. She finished off the lamb skewer in her hand in three quick bites.
"You little glutton."
Ms May clicked her tongue fondly and set an order slip down on their table. She gave the girl sitting opposite—silent, straight-backed, obviously not used to this sort of place—a quick, curious look.
"Oh, brought a classmate along this time?"
"My friend, Ginevra Volkova. Summit's number-one top student," Jaynara declared, loud enough that the title rang in the small room.
Ginevra felt the tips of her ears heat.
Ms May's eyes lit up. "Top of Summit Ridge? That's amazing. I wonder if my boy will ever manage to get in there," she said, half to herself. "You girls order whatever you like, I'll go help in the kitchen."
Only after the woman bustled back toward the main area did Ginevra speak.
"Don't introduce me like that to people," she said quietly.
"But it's true," Jaynara replied, honestly baffled.
"It's too showy. There's no need," Ginevra insisted.
Then something else occurred to her, and she frowned. "And since when am I your friend?"
At that moment, Jaynara was bent over the order slip, ticking boxes with great seriousness.
At the question, she glanced up, puzzled. "Aren't you?" she said. "Can you handle spicy?"
Ginevra paused, considering.
"Not really," she admitted.
"Then we'll do just a tiny bit of heat," Jaynara decided, spinning the pen between her fingers. "If there's no spice at all it won't taste like anything. Anything you absolutely don't eat?"
"No."
"Perfect. You're easy."
She grinned. "Calista is a nightmare—no cilantro, no scallions, no garlic. High maintenance."
Her pen danced across the page: lamb skewers, crispy cartilage, grilled eggplant, duck blood in foil, a platter of their signature thirteen-spice crayfish. When she was satisfied, she slid the slip across the table.
Ginevra looked it over.
It was… a lot.
She pushed it back. "You ordered too much."
"We'll finish it," Jaynara said with the serene confidence of someone who had never lost a battle with a plate in her life. "You think this place is just about the barbecue? Their crayfish is the real treasure. They used to have a branch near my house—my cousin took me all the time. The meat is unreal, seriously, it's—"
She kept going, enthusiasm spilling over in an unbroken stream.
Ginevra found her rhythm impossible to interrupt.
She had meant to clarify a few things—starting with the definition of "friend," continuing with "I don't actually like crayfish"—but the words never found a gap.
By the time she thought of a way to steer the conversation, the food began to arrive.
Plate after plate landed between them, sending up clouds of steam and spice. The rich, smoky scent filled the small booth.
Jaynara practically vibrated with happiness.
Her philosophy in life was simple: of all the things the world offered, good food was the one she refused to waste.
She grabbed a crayfish and began peeling.
By the time a small mountain of empty shells had formed in front of her, she realized that the girl opposite her had barely touched anything.
"You eat in a very… élégante way," she said, trying out a newly-learned word. "Elegant."
Her pronunciation mangled the middle syllable beyond recognition.
Ginevra let a tiny, involuntary smile tug at the corner of her mouth.
"You don't like crayfish?" Jaynara asked.
Her gloved fingers were slick with red oil; passing the plate over would only spread the mess, so she simply nudged the entire platter a little closer to Ginevra and held out a fresh pair of gloves.
Ginevra shook her head. It wasn't a matter of cleanliness; she just found the peeling fiddly and tedious. She had rarely eaten shrimp of any kind as a child, and the habit had stuck.
"Some host I am," Jaynara muttered. "I invite you to dinner and end up stuffing my own face."
She picked up another crayfish and deftly stripped off the shell. Under her fingers, the pale meat came away perfectly, the dark vein carefully removed.
She set the cleaned piece gently into Ginevra's bowl.
Seeing the questioning look in her eyes, she explained, "My hands are already covered in oil. Might as well be the one peeling. And you look like the type who's never done it before. Try it—it really is good, I promise."
Under the warm overhead light, Ginevra's expression softened without her noticing.
She found herself watching the girl across from her, head bowed, entirely absorbed in the simple, repetitive task of peeling one crayfish after another, arranging the firm pink meat into a neat pile on a clean plate.
It was absurdly… careful.
"Ginevra, why aren't you eating?"
Jaynara's voice dragged her back. "The meat's going to get cold."
Still not convinced that the top student appreciated the miracle in front of her, she dipped a piece of crayfish in the sauce and held it up, right at the edge of Ginevra's personal space.
"Open," she said.
"I can feed myself," Ginevra began.
Before she could finish, the morsel was already in her mouth—pushed in by careless fingers that didn't quite know their own haste.
She paused, caught between indignation and… the flavor.
"See? Good, right?"
Ginevra chewed slowly, took a napkin, dabbed at the corner of her mouth.
"…It's acceptable," she said at last.
Picky, picky, picky.
Jaynara bit back a laugh and pushed the plate toward her.
"These are all for you. I'm full," she said. "Honestly, I've never peeled this much for anyone else."
"You eat a lot," Ginevra observed, still not reaching for the chopsticks. She couldn't quite understand why this girl had gone to the trouble for her. Maybe it was just gratitude for the English tutoring.
"How do you know that?"
A faint blush climbed into Jaynara's cheeks.
"The owner said so," Ginevra replied, nodding toward the front counter where Ms May was working the register. "When you went to wash your hands."
"What else did she say?"
Jaynara poked at a clam with her chopsticks, then grabbed a thin green chili and chomped down as if it had personally offended her.
"That you can finish a whole pot of spicy crayfish by yourself," Ginevra added, her tone perfectly neutral.
"I do not have that big an appetite," Jaynara protested. "Look at my waist!"
She pulled her shirt tight against her side to demonstrate the curve.
"Apparently you usually order extra spicy," Ginevra said. "She couldn't figure out why you went mild today."
"That's because you can't handle heat," Jaynara shot back.
At that, Ginevra looked up.
Those bright, crescent-moon eyes were smiling at her again, the corners of her lips shining with oil, glossy as if someone had brushed them with butter.
She reached for a napkin almost without thinking and held it out.
"Wipe," she said.
Jaynara took the tissue and gave her mouth a quick swipe.
The chili skin at the corner of her lips merely migrated to her cheek instead.
She had no idea.
"You eat too slowly," she sighed a moment later, pushing the plate of peeled shrimp again. "Hurry up and finish these. I suppose this makes you special; I've never peeled for anyone else…"
Ginevra's brows drew together.
The sliver of chili on Jaynara's face was a small, bright red flag she couldn't unsee. Ignoring it was becoming physically impossible.
So she did the only thing her brain offered up: she reached across the table, took another napkin, and clumsily wiped it away herself.
"You… what are you doing?"
Jaynara's eyes went wide, staring straight at the hand that was unexpectedly close to her face.
Then she realized what Ginevra was doing—removing the offending chili skin from her cheek—and heat flooded her ears, hot and fast.
"G-Ginevra, you could've just told me," she stammered. "You didn't have to… do it yourself. That's… kind of embarrassing."
She snatched up several more napkins and began scrubbing at her face with excessive force, determined to leave nothing behind that could be laughed at later.
"It's gone," Ginevra said.
Jaynara froze mid-scrub, then slowly lowered her hands, cheeks now redder than the chili had been.
Looking at the serious, slightly stiff face across from her, she couldn't even muster real annoyance.
She just tugged at the corner of her mouth, half a smile, half a grimace, and jabbed her chopsticks toward the plate in front of Ginevra.
"Finish that," her eyes said clearly. You owe me at least that much for peeling.
The top student, for once, did as she was told.
One piece at a time, she finished everything in the bowl, meticulously, as if it were a particularly difficult exam question.
By the time they left the restaurant, night had settled fully over the street. Neon signs buzzed softly. The air was cooler, food smells thinned by the breeze.
Jaynara walked in front, Ginevra a half-step behind. From the set of her shoulders and the faint looseness in her stride, Jaynara could tell that even if she hadn't eaten as much, Ginevra hadn't exactly suffered through the meal.
"I told you Mr. Max's place is good," she said, chewing on a piece of gum. "You can bring your friends next time too. Just drop my name and they'll give you twenty percent off."
She fished another piece of gum from the packet and handed it back. "Strawberry. My favorite."
Ginevra accepted it, turning the small foil-wrapped rectangle in her fingers.
After a moment, she said, almost casually, "I don't have friends."
The words hung in the air between them, sharper than she'd probably intended.
Walking ahead, Jaynara felt something in her chest click.
She shifted her bag higher on her shoulder, turned around, and clapped a hand lightly on Ginevra's shoulder.
"Sure you do," she said.
Ginevra gave her a questioning look.
"I mean me," Jaynara said, pointing at herself. "When I said 'bring your friends,' I meant 'bring me.' Obviously. You really didn't get that?"
She laughed, letting the sound spill out, bright and easy.
Ginevra didn't answer.
Jaynara couldn't tell what she was thinking.
She pulled out her phone suddenly. "Do you have a phone?"
"Yes."
A huff of laughter escaped before she could stop it.
Ginevra's brows lifted.
"I just thought, you know, Merit students don't play with their phones," Jaynara said.
"I don't play with it," Ginevra replied, in deadly earnest. "I use it to read news. And for study apps."
"Of course you do," Jaynara said solemnly, hiding her smile. "Anyway, I don't even have your number yet. Let's swap contacts. And add each other on Apptalk—it'll be easier to reach you that way."
Ginevra went still for a heartbeat.
No one, as far back as she could remember, had ever said that to her in quite that tone—light but warm, as if wanting to keep her within easy reach was the most natural thing in the world.
She reached into her backpack and took out her phone. The screen lit up. She swiped a bit awkwardly through the home screen, tapped the app.
A notification popped up immediately, reminding her there was a software update available.
It had been… a while.
"Seriously? You only have this many contacts?"
Jaynara had drifted closer without her noticing, tilting her head to peek at the screen. There were only a handful of names in the list, all clearly family.
"I'll scan you," she said.
Seeing that Ginevra had no idea where the QR code option was, she took the phone gently from her hands and found it herself, fingers moving with practiced ease.
"Honestly, you're like a grandma," she teased.
"I just don't use it much," Ginevra muttered, letting her hold the device but unable to keep from defending herself.
"I know, I know. Done."
They exchanged codes. A moment later, a new notification appeared on both screens.
Jaynara handed the phone back. Ginevra looked down.
Her new contact stared up at her: a little cartoon bunny, cheeks pink, ears too big. The display name read: "Daisyjay."
Cute. A little silly. Very her.
By contrast, her own avatar was a simple little drawing of a river, done in three shades of blue.
"You like daisies," Ginevra said suddenly.
Jaynara blinked.
Then she realized.
"Oh, you mean my username? Yeah," she said. "I changed it because I thought it sounded cool. I like them now, I guess. Hey, don't tell me you drew your own avatar?"
Ginevra nodded, honest as ever.
"Wow," Jaynara said. "Picasso would be proud."
She pressed a few more buttons, then thrust her own phone into Ginevra's hands.
"Here, look," she said. "I edited your contact for you."
On the screen, under Ginevra's number, her name was saved as:
Summit Top Genius – Little Ginny
With a tiny heart at the end.