162 Chapter three, 2016, school festival, madness and glory: 1 (1/2)

'I'm heading for a mental breakdown.' Ulf glared at the festival committee room. Then he gave the student council room a glare as well for good measure. 'Bloody hell, I need them to get their act together.'

He buttoned up his shirt and pulled his neck-tie all the way to his throat. Wearing his school uniform the casual way had become a habit since he dropped the geek act late spring, but he had a role to play today. One he hadn't planned for.

Wearing a blazer over the belted walkie talkie looked like crap, but he appreciated how it made him look more important as well. Looks were important in Japan, more so than in Sweden, where no one gave their CEO a second thought when he arrived in chinos and an unbuttoned hiking shirt covering a T-shirt.

Sure, there were days when he wore one of his business suits as well. Chinos or suit, it mattered little to him, but right now he wanted the added authority a suit would have granted him.

'Can't be helped. I'm a student here.'

He belted his walkie talkie after a last confirmation and fished up his cell.

”Ulf here, how long until you're back with the canned drinks?”

He looked at his watch when he got the answer. An old habit. He'd worn watches for far more years than cellphones.

”Fine, dump it at the back gates. I need another four hundred cans after that.”

'Crap, we really need trucks, but I'll make do with the cars we've scrounged up.' He groaned. 'Poor sods. They're damned heroes keeping us supplied.'

There were heroes and heroes. The next set of victims of his phone calls were on their way back with Ramune, a soft drink especially popular during events like these, and always sold in small glass bottles. The weight was a killer.

'Time to beef up the trash patrols as well, and I need sanitary basics as well, or we'll never make it through tomorrow.' He didn't want to fund toilet paper and soap.

In the end he called the old goat and forced a promise to have a full week's worth of sanitary supplies delivered late that evening. After that he sent Noriko a mail with the estimated costs in case the school wanted the festival to pay. He wasn't sure the old goat would pay for the hundreds of extra trash bags and trash transport Ulf had ordered. The alternative would be toilets looking like something from a horror flick.

When he finally called the Ramune patrol he had them shop for a mountain of trash compactors as well. Less disgusting to fill the trash bags that way.

'And Christina thinks I'm sexy like this? Just proves she has poor taste in men.' But he admitted how her comment built a warm knot of cosiness in his stomach. 'All your fault Yukio, or Kyoko. But for that roof top adventure of yours she'd never talk about sexy this way.'

He shook his head. No time for thoughts like those, especially not with Amaya slamming down an unheard of curfew over his head. 'What the hell? I'm not a bloody kid!'

He'd obey, even if it stole even more precious hours from him and Christina. 'Don't understand what you're thinking Amaya. We're starved for time together as it is already.'

Even the old goat nagged about how he should go home and get a night's full sleep. That met with a flat refusal. Their second day would go up in flames unless he kept the human machine he built running during the coming evening.

When he arrived at the plaza the alluring smell of grilled meat played with his nose, and he realised how hungry he was. For a moment he nursed the idea of forcing his way to the barbecue stalls, but the plaza was crammed and he didn't have the time to stand in queue.

'Haven't had as much as a bite since morning. I'll fall apart like this.' Reluctantly he unclipped his radio. Pulling rank wasn't his idea of good leadership, but there was no other way.

”Jirou?”

”Jirou here.”

”Ulf here. I'm swamped. Think you could arrange some food for me? Over.”

”No problem Uru… Hamarugen-san. You should have asked earlier. Over.”

”I'm really grateful. I'll be at the front gates. Over and out.”

While he walked between the stalls on the main school yard he looked at his radio. The voice behind the polite words had been genuine. 'Guess I did pretty well today after all. You guys really made it easy. I owe you all big time.'