There’s No Freaking Way I’ll be Your Lover! Unless… Vol 5
Table of Contents
Group Chat Name: 5déesses
(4) Part 1
Chapter 1: This Was
Doomed from the Start! There Was No Freaking Way I Could Do My Best!
Group Chat Name: 5déesses
(4) Part 2
Chapter 2: There’s No
Freaking Way I Can Do Steady Practice!
Group Chat Name: 5déesses
(4) Part 3
Chapter 3: Even If I Try
My Best, There’s Still No Freaking Way Things’ll Work Out
Group Chat Name:
5déesses (4) Part 4
Group Chat Name: Behind
The 5déesses (3)
Chapter 4: There’s No
Freaking Way I Can Ever Be a People Person!
Group Chat Name: 5déesses
(4) Part 5
The Sena Ajisaide of the
Story – Season 2
Prologue
YUP, THAT’S ME right there—your totally
average first-year high school girl, Amaori Renako—backed up against a wall. Directly in front of me
stood a girl who looked at me the way a snake stares down a frog. We were presently in an
empty classroom during lunch break, and she had me trapped in a truly
magnificent kabedon.
“I’d appreciate your
answer any day now,” she said. The way she said it, so
matter-of-fact, like it was just business, made me curl in on myself.
Her long, smooth,
perfectly split-end-free hair shut out the rest of the world like curtains. I was boxed in by the
smell of her perfume.
Koto Satsuki-san. Personality wise, she was cold and blunt, but she had her warm and
friendly side too. She was actually a really nice person. Well. Maybe. That might be a bit of a
stretch. At
any rate, she was a very dear friend I made in high school—or rather, that’s
what I assumed.
“Amaori,” she said, her
voice hard and crisp.
It was the beginning of
October, the bonus level known as Fall, aka the most pleasant of all the four
seasons in Japan, lying between its sweltering summers and chilly winters. And yet, in spite of
that, I started to drip sweat.
Outside in the
schoolyard, I could hear the boys having a grand old time playing some sports
game. The
interclass athletics competition was just around the corner, and they seemed to
be getting more hyped by the day. But in this empty
classroom, the only sound was my labored, frantic breathing. I was so dizzy, I almost
felt lightheaded.
“I-I keep telling you,
there’s no freaking way,” I squeaked, like one of those plastic toys you
squeeze. “There’s
no freaking way I can be your lover!”
Yup. This all started because
of that message Satsuki-san sent me. See, a whole bunch of
things went down that ultimately culminated in me having to make a decision the
other day. At
that point, I made the only choice I could. The idea that I might look
back on it later and want to take it all back didn’t even cross my mind. I just acted, and the
other two you-know-whos accepted me. And that was that!
Well, that’s how I had to
consider it, or else I’d be squashed flat. This late in the game,
it’d be way rude to be like, “Oh my god, I’m looking back on it and I’ve
changed my mind! I
take everything back!” I’d
straight-up die.
So,
yeah. Anyway,
let’s move on from that sudden mental health slump.
That was the context for
Satsuki-san’s decision to get in on this as well. You should
go out with me too, she’d
said. I
know it’s awful to crap all over someone’s serious feelings when they ask you
out, but her timing was so whack that I couldn’t help but think she was just
jumping on the bandwagon after Mai and Ajisai-san. I mean, it was literally
moments after I got two girlfriends. “Me too”? Really? Is that how
you ask a girl out?
So that’s why I’d been
giving Satsuki-san the slip until she finally caught me today on lunch break
and brought me to this empty classroom. And now we were here.
She put a hand to her chin
even as she kept me pressed up against the wall. “Why
not?” she asked.
“What do you mean ‘why not’?!”
Her question was as
innocent and naive as, “Hey, where do babies come from?”
Maybe she legit didn’t get
it. So I
looked away and told her, “Well, I, uh. I’m already dating someone
else.”
Saying it out loud shot a
bullet named reality straight into my heart. I took damage too.
There was a beat. And then she said, “Your point being?”
“So that means I can’t go
out with you. Right?” I said.
“Well, at this point,
what difference does another one or two people make?”
I looked back at her, and
our eyes met. Oh god. Satsuki-san was one of the prettiest
girls I’d ever laid eyes on—celebrities included—which meant that having her
face up close always struck me as more frightening than alluring. Long eyelashes framed her narrow,
almond-shaped eyes. Her aloof
beauty made her seem like a snow witch who’d freeze you in place if you got too
close. She had a great body too;
she was taller than me, but, for some reason, she had a smaller face. She was slender but not bony—basically,
her build was graceful. And
don’t tell anyone I said this, but I’d seen her boobs, and they were freaking
incredible. (This last part
delivered in a whisper.)
She was just so pretty
that the pressure she exerted was too strong. I felt like I was going
to succumb to it. But I somehow managed to hold out and rally my almost defeated spirits,
because there was one thing, no matter if we were talking about Satsuki-san or
anyone else, that I couldn’t back down on.
“I-it’s not just a matter
of numbers,” I said. “That’s not why I’m dating them… I thought about it for ages and ages
and then came to that decision. It’s kinda messed up to
go and start bringing numbers into it…”
I’d left her on read for
eons precisely because I hadn’t been able to tell her that straight-out. But now I’d finally made
it happen. Still,
there was no denying that I definitely ran out of steam toward the end there. Bluh.
Only silence followed my
rejection. It
unnerved me, so I snuck a look at Satsuki-san’s face to see what she was
thinking. She
looked back at me coolly, perfectly nonchalant.
Wait, was she even
listening to me? Now I was starting to have some doubts.
I was expecting she’d
just hit me with the same affectionless drivel she’d monotoned at me before,
like, “Wow. I adore you. I love you so much. Mwah, mwah, mwah.”
“Good question,” she
said, running her hand through her hair, and then she obnoxiously refused to
elaborate further. At this stage, she wasn’t even trying to hide her lack of feelings for
me!
“Gh! You’re just trying to use
me to piss off Mai again, aren’t you? Gee, what am I to you,
Satsuki-san? Chopped liver?”
She was practically
unfazed even when I shouted in her face. In fact, she leaned in
closer.
“Whoa, hold the phone,” I
said. This was
going nowhere good. Her pale skin and her lips, like tiny flowers blooming through a
blanket of snow, filled my vision. And then I…
…shrieked “N-no!” and pushed her away. I couldn’t control how
much oomph I put into it, so it turned out to be a real shove and a half. But even so, she only
moved back slightly and didn’t so much as wobble. This girl was strong. Phew. That was a slight relief. Wait, no, now wasn’t the
time for that. I wasn’t out of the woods yet.
“N-no, we can’t,” I said. “That’s not appropriate,
Satsuki-san.”
My heart pounded. If I hadn’t stopped her, that would have led to a kiss, right? I mean, on the one hand, I
felt like even Satsuki-san wouldn’t be so gauche as to make the moves on
someone who’d just got herself a brand-spanking-new girlfriend or two. But on the other
hand…that sounded exactly like something Satsuki-san might do. This was Schrödinger’s kiss.
“…Very well,” she said. She traced her lower lip
with her finger, her face blank. I still had no idea what
was going on in her mind. Was
she mad at me?
“Not particularly,” she said.
“I don’t feel
much of anything, really.”
“Did you read my mind again?” I asked.
“I did not. You’re simply far too straightforward.”
I never understood what
Satsuki-san meant by the things she did, but she had me all figured out. No fair.
“Okay, so what was all…that…about?” I asked. I wiped my sweaty brow
with my handkerchief. Mind you, I knew that there was no chance in hell she’d tell me even if
I asked her.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “For taking up your time,
that is.”
Then, with a flip of her
hair, she made to leave. Just as she did, I was struck with the feeling that she was abandoning
me.
A whack-ass request which
I then turned down—gee, that sure felt familiar. It was that same
uncomfortable sensation from the time in junior high when everyone had started
to shun me.
You can’t tell a person no
when they invite you to do something.
I felt like the ground
was about to give way under my feet as my past trauma resurfaced like an old
scar. My
mouth moved on autopilot, and I yelled after Satsuki-san.
“I-I’d like it if we
could still be friends!”
There was a slight
tremble in my voice. I mean, good friends like this didn’t just grow on trees.
“That was all just, uh. Another one of your usual
jokes, right?” I asked, almost like I was clinging to her. I gulped down a mouthful
of saliva.
I pictured the worst, but
I didn’t have the luxury of choosing my words carefully. I just asked her
straight-out, telling her only what I wanted and nothing more.
“Satsuki-san, don’t
actually go and catch feelings for me, okay?”
Satsuki-san slowly turned
around. There
was a hint of a smile on her face. “Why, but of course I
won’t,” she said. “You’re awfully full of yourself. Don’t get too big for
your britches, Amaori.”
I felt so relieved, my
knees just about buckled. “Right,
duh!” My face lit up. “I should have known. I mean, you have no
interest in stuff like love or crushes. Or like, you know,
girlfriends and dating and marriage and making a future together, right?”
“Okay, that one’s pushing
it a little, but whatever. You get the picture.”
I picked up my lunch box
and binder case from my desk and fell in step next to Satsuki-san on her way
out the classroom door. Perhaps out of relief, or maybe from a sense of guilt for rebuffing
her, I blabbered, “Anyway, that’s a mean joke to make, Satsuki-san! You legit had me going
for a minute there. I’ll let it slide this time, but some things are off limits, even to
your very best friend in the whole wide world who you care about so much. Got it?”
Satsuki-san sighed in a
way that made her sound like she was done with me. “Yes, yes,” she said. “I’m sorry.”
Good, it seemed like she
was finally back to her usual self. Phew!
Now, this was what I’d wanted.
And then, almost as if
she wanted to live up to my expectations, she spat vitriol at me. “Don’t worry. I promise that there are
only two people in the entire history of the universe who could ever develop
feelings for you. In the past and future both.”
Hey, wait a sec, this
vitriol was a little too strong!
“I wouldn’t mind a few more,” I
said. But
even so, I couldn’t deny that I was already way luckier than I had any right to
be with two certain someones having fallen for me.
After Satsuki-san and I
went our separate ways, I went up the stairs in a thump-thump, thump-thump
rhythm. When
I reached the metal door at the end of the hall and turned the knob, it opened
easily for me.
The sky was one sprawling
stretch of blue, the kind of clear autumn day that got my tummy rumbling like
in that old wives’ tale. Two girls and their open lunch boxes sat on a sheet spread out across
the rooftop concrete.
They both greeted me with
smiles.
“Oh, Rena-chan, there you
are!”
“Why hello, Renako. The breeze is lovely
today, so it’s quite pleasant up here on the roof.”
The first was Sena
Ajisai-san. Her hair fell in gentle waves, and something about her always seemed as
soft as cotton fluff. She had a sweet face and large, bright eyes. If you were to stand her
all neat and innocuous under a sign which read, “Everyone’s Best Girl,”
literally the entire human race would agree and begin chanting her name in
unison. Ajisai-san
was super kind, the sort of girl who everyone would adore if she were a love
interest in a story. But she also had the strength to be a protagonist in her own right, and
I admired her as a person. More than that, actually—I worshiped her at this point. Ajisai-san was an angel.
Then there was the other
girl sitting there next to Ajisai-san: Oduka Mai. As evidenced by her
clearly natural blonde hair, she was a quarter French. She gave off a radiant
inner light, a golden glimmer that could just about outshine the sun. I figured it was that
aura thing people talked about. She was a top-of-the-line
model and was as dignified and graceful in manner and deportment as a princess.
Without a
doubt, she was also the most popular girl in all of Ashigaya High. We nicknamed her the
Supadari. There
was no one else on her level, not when the mere chance to have a conversation
with her was enough to make anyone happy.
“S-sorry,” I said. “I guess I ran a little late.” I laughed awkwardly. Satsuki-san had held me
up, but I wasn’t about to tell them that.
I took a seat in between
the two in the space they’d left for me. I unsteadily unwrapped my
lunch, feeling oddly self-conscious and elated, just like the day I first put
on my junior high uniform.
“It’s kinda nice to have
lunch with you guys like this,” I said, reflexively.
Ajisai-san and Mai
exchanged glances and then both giggled a little spontaneously.
“Yeah, I guess because
Satsuki-chan and Kaho-chan went somewhere else today, huh?” said Ajisai-san.
“They did,” said Mai. “What a rare chance for
us three to have some alone time. I believe this is our
first time meeting in a group of three at school, but it is quite a lovely
thing to do, isn’t it?”
“For sure,” Ajisai-san
replied.
So I had—actually, we had—a
secret. The
kind of secret we couldn’t tell anyone, the kind of secret other people would
consider immoral. See, Mai had asked me out, and then Ajisai-san had followed suit. I couldn’t possibly
choose one over the other! So, uh. I didn’t. And now all three of us
were dating one another.
My
girlfriend Ajisai-san turned to Mai and said, “Oh yeah, Mai-chan, did everything
turn out okay for you? I know a bunch of people overheard us and started all those…you know. Those rumors about us and
stuff.”
Oh, good point! After I’d asked her out in such a conspicuous fashion, she probably
went trending on social media. Maybe Mai was going to be
hounded by talk show paparazzi until she suffered a mental and physical
breakdown from the invasion of privacy!
“More or less, I suppose,” my girlfriend Mai said as she picked up
her phone. “But
there’s little enough of the gossip that it can be ignored. Had the commentary been
solely on the fact that I am dating a woman, then perhaps the response would
have been a bit more sensational. But that isn’t the whole
story, no?”
“I guess, when you put it
that way.”
“Mm-hmm.
It simply
sounds too odd for Oduka Mai to be dating two girls at once, so the news hasn’t
gone far. I
suppose people think it was some sort of bizarre performance. In that sense, perhaps I
should be grateful for Renako’s decision to ask me out there…”
Then my girlfriend Mai looked at me, and
her eyes widened. “Is something the matter, Renako?”
“Ooh,”
my
girlfriend Ajisai-san
said. “Your face is
bright red.”
She put her hand to my
forehead. I
tensed up all over at the touch of her cool, soft palm.
“I-I’m okay,” I said. “I’m not running a temp
or anything. I’m fine. I’m so fine.”
“Y-yup!
I’m doing just
peachy!”
I waved away her look of
concern. Oh god. If I got too conscious of
the brutal reality, pretty soon I’d wind up unable to carry on a conversation
with them. Were these
two really my
girlfriends? Or was this all a dream? I felt like I was full to
bursting with helium gas, but I vowed to put in serious effort and be a proper
participant in the present conversation.
“Th-that’s good to hear,
Mai,” I said. “If you lost work or something because of rumors about me, I’d have no
choice but to grovel on the floor in apology in front of your mom.”
“You needn’t let it worry
you, Renako. My decisions are my responsibility. Even if I were to suffer
a setback if someone found out about our relationship, I promise I would never
regret my decision to ask you out.”
Ajisai-san nodded and smiled.
“Me neither,
Rena-chan. I
mean, I don’t have all the responsibilities that Mai does… But I still feel the
same way. I’ll
never regret my decision to be with you.”
These two were so sweet
that I almost teared up involuntarily. My sorry soul
instinctively tried to run away, screaming, “Come on, I’m not good enough to be
with them! Here,
one sec—let me call up a hypnotist to erase all my memories.” But I put a hand on my
chest and suppressed the feeling. No, no, no. I’d already made up my mind, hadn’t I? Now wasn’t the time to go
whining about my insecurities. I had to keep trying to
be positive for the sake of both these girls who’d fallen for me. And I had to use everything
in my power to keep their promises to never regret it. After all, I’d sworn to
try my best, right?
“Okay!”
I said and
snapped on a smile. Both Mai and Ajisai-san looked startled.
“What is the matter, Renako?” Mai asked.
“Just shooed away all the
bad thoughts!” I said. “I’m now the reborn
Neo-Renako. I’m
focused on what’s ahead and never looking back. The emissary of courage
and love!”
“You really don’t have to
go that far…” my fallen angel said, wasting no time before attempting to shake
Neo-Renako’s resolve. “Don’t push yourself too hard, okay, Rena-chan? You can try your best at
your own pace, you know.”
If Ajisai-san says so, why
not? I thought. Why not let Ajisai-san be
nice to me?
Yes, I was tempted to
immediately go back on my decision, but no. I had this.
“And with that said,” I
went on, “I’d like you to review the following documents.”
I took two bundles of
paper from my binder case and handed one each to Mai and Ajisai-san. Both took them and read
aloud in monotone, “The Girlfriend Project Business Proposal.”
Ajisai-san looked at me
like she’d just read some nonsense. “What is this…?”
I adjusted my nonexistent
glasses and straightened up. Believe me, I’d prepared
plenty for this moment. I’d watched tons of videos of presentations and stuff so I could
deliver my speech with ease.
In real business lady
tones, I said, “I’ve labored these past several days on producing this
document, as I would like for us all to come to an agreement on various matters
in order for me to date you both. Presently, I would like
to propose that we institute a quarterly girlfriend contract, viz. a contract to be renewed
in three months’ time.”
“A girlfriend contract,”
Mai repeated.
“Viz and…whadda what in
three months…?” Ajisai-san
asked.
I
nodded. “That’s
correct,” I said. “Please see page three for reference. The girlfriend contract
was agreed upon by mutual consensus of all parties at the recent Makuhari Messe
conference. Of course, either Mai (henceforth referred to as Party A) and
Ajisai-san (henceforth referred to as Party B) may terminate the contract at
any time and for any reason. However, barring those
circumstances, I would like to direct your attention back to the matter of the
contract renewal.”
Party A and Party B
exchanged glances.
“You don’t need to keep
calling me Party B…”
“I see,” said Party A. “Grading the project on a
scale from 0 to 100, no? So you are asking us to rate you, essentially. And in quite a few
categories, it seems.”
“Yes, there are twenty,”
said Party C.
There were five grades
possible, like on a report card. The categories ranged
from things to do with my personality, like sincerity and kindness, to things
involved with being a good girlfriend, like how much the other parties enjoyed
our dates. I
wanted to cover as many bases as I could think of.
“Earlier, I pledged to you
that I would try my best,” I went on, “but I failed to provide any specific and
measurable criteria for doing so. This sheet is therefore
designed to help us visualize the degree of my effort.”
Anyone could say they’d
do their best, but that didn’t mean anything. Well, I guess if you lived
your life on the straight and narrow, just saying that would still be pretty
credible. But
Party C lived on the twists and turns, so I knew better than anyone that you
couldn’t trust me as far as you could throw me. Still, now that Party C
had decided to do her best—or rather, given that if Party C failed to do so,
she’d utterly loathe herself—she had no choice but to actually follow through. The thing is, however,
you can work yourself to the bone, but so long as you’re doing it for yourself,
like, “See how hard Party C’s working? That means you should
think good things about her!” then it’s all just a
bunch of self-centered, self-indulgent nonsense.
I would do my best, not
skip on school, and on top of all that make Mai and Ajisai-san happy to be my
girlfriend. That’s what “actions speak louder than words” means, aka the correct
way to try your best.
“If, at the end of the
three-month period, Party C fails to score above a 90 on your evaluation, the
contract renewal will be shelved until further notice,” I (or Party C, rather)
said with grave seriousness. I awaited my audience’s
cheering and applause.
It didn’t come. If anything, the audience looked positively indifferent. Hello?
“R-Rena-chan,” Party B
began, but Party A lightly put a hand out to stop her.
“Y-yeah?
Oh, you can
call me Party C, actually…”
“All right,” she said. “I’d be happy to do your
evaluation.”
“Hey, Mai-chan,” Party B
protested.
For some reason, Party B
glared at both of us in annoyance. I’d hardly ever seen
Party Bjisai with a look like that on her face—it freaked me out so bad I
almost dropped my act altogether.
But Party A only smiled. “What’s the harm in it?” she asked. “Renako is asking us for feedback on the results of her hard work. As with grades on a test,
having an evaluation of her performance in a visible format is sure to be a
good motivator, no? I think it’s a fascinating idea.”
“Sure, I guess,”
Ajisai-san said. “But that’s not what I was going to bring up.”
“No, I understand, Ajisai.” Party A turned to Party C
and continued, “But I think it best if you do not set a pass or fail mark.”
“Huh?”
I said,
instinctively looking back at her. I panicked. “M-might
I ask why? It’s
to ensure client satisfaction! That’s why I poured my
blood, sweat, and tears into the Girlfriend Project Business Proposal!”
“Yes, we can tell just how
hard you’re working for us,” Mai said.
“So…” I rapidly lost all
confidence in the face of Mai’s smile. “What, are you saying
there’s no way I can hit a 90…?”
“I mean the opposite,
Renako.”
“Huh?”
I looked up. Hesitantly, I asked,
“What do you mean, the opposite? That I get a perfect score
just by being here…?”
Ah, right, ri—wait, what? Just then, I returned to
my senses.
“No,” I cried. “Look, I can’t just accept that right off the bat! You’re too quick to be
nice to me, after all, and my self-esteem isn’t high enough for this yet.”
“Do we need to give you
another push?” Mai said. “Ajisai, would you do the
honors?”
“Sure,” said Ajisai-san. “Hey, you know what,
Rena-chan?”
They were attacking me in
waves!
Ajisai-san folded her
hands across her chest and hit me with the puppy-dog eye treatment. Eep. It felt like she’d
wrapped me up in her soft, downy wings in the blink of an eye.
“Mai and I asked you out
because of who you are, Rena-chan. We both said that we
wanted to date you, remember?” she
said.
Oh
no. Just
that preface alone warned me that I was going to be an emotional wreck by the
time she was done talking. As far as predictions of the future went, this one was sure to come
true.
“So you see,” she went on,
“the most important thing of all is that you’re you. That fact alone gives you
full credit…actually, no. That’s not something that can be scored at all.”
“Ugh,” I whimpered. “I get full credit just
for being myself… Ajisai-san, you big softie…” I blubbered some more, clutching
my head in mental agony.
It was bizarre. My heart was just about to be purified and everything. I could have sworn I was
on the right path into the light, but was I really marching back into the
darkness once more? Like, in the first place, I didn’t want to base everything on what
other people thought of me, but now I was trying to rely solely on Mai and
Ajisai-san’s opinions again. That was the last thing
I’d wanted to do, and yet here I was trying to do it again!
“I don’t want to keep
being like this…” I said. “If I really am always allowed to try becoming a new me…then I want to
end up someone like Mai or Ajisai-san!”
I stretched my hands out
to the sun as if I were crawling up out of a bottomless swamp.
Mai and Ajisai-san gently
took my hands into theirs.
“It’s okay, Rena-chan,”
Ajisai-san said. “This made me happy, because I could tell how seriously you think about
us. How
could I not be happy about that?”
“She’s right, Renako,”
Mai added. “You
know, we have no desire to try and push you too hard. It’s perfectly all right
to go at your own pace. You don’t have to compare yourself to anyone. I want you to take care
of yourself before worrying about anyone else. Then, on top of that, we
would be pleased if you prioritized us too.”
These two were so kind in
every way.
“Ajisai-saaan, Maiii,” I
sobbed.
Their kindness soaked deep
into my heart, washing away the black ink that stained it.
“I’m amazed that you came
up with all of this on your own, Rena-chan,” Ajisai-san said. “You’re so cool. You really don’t let
anything stop you.”
“But you needn’t strain
yourself all alone,” Mai said. “These rules affect all
three of us, so let’s decide them together. After all, I am quite
excited about this too. The life I’ve dreamed of is waiting for me just around the corner.”
“Uh-huh,” Ajisai-san said. “No doing it alone, Renako. See, I’ve been thinking
too—about trying this or doing that. You can’t go and steal
all the fun.”
She grinned adorably, and
Mai beamed too. My heart wept as they held my hands.
“You’re so sweet…” I said. “You guys are both so sweet…”
Wow. Girlfriends. These two wonderful people
were my girlfriends. The responsibility involved seemed so heavy it would squash me flat,
but I didn’t want to get squished. Because I mean… I
mean…they thought I was special and were so nice to me! I was in heaven!
I’d been reduced to an
emotional wreck, but Mai and Ajisai-san comforted me profusely. (Even though all this
fuss was my fault in the first place for deciding to two-time them!)
And then lunch was over,
with my little episode of stirring up drama just to get brownie points having
resolved it. God. What was I doing with myself?
(Like, for real,
though.)
As I walked down the
hallway alone, a yellow hair ribbon popped up next to me.
“Y’know,” said the girl
attached to the hair ribbon, “if anyone could two-time Mai and Aa-chan without
batting an eye, I would, like, be giving the question of their sanity some
serious side-eye. Just sayin’.”
This girl with the
know-it-all grin who’d just appeared out of nowhere was Koyanagi Kaho-chan, a
pretty girl who was sort of the school’s friendly pet cat. Best known for the little
fangs peeping past her lips, she was petite and perky, and, due to her bubbly,
cutesy personality, we all recognized her as the resident little sister figure
of Ashigaya High. Everyone doted on her, no matter which friend group she popped into, so
maybe she was less of a pet cat and more of a popular stray cat. In her own words, she and
I were pals, but recently we’d discovered the shocking truth that we were also
close childhood buddies from way back in elementary school. That had led to a fight
and a few headbutts back and forth, but now we were thick as thieves.
“Hey, Kaho-chan, can I
say something awful?” I asked.
“Spill it,” she said. “But I might whack you
with a rock if it’s bad enough.”
She still smiled away,
but her fists were clenched. Yikes.
I smiled wearily. “I’d really rather you didn’t… If at all possible, I’d appreciate sympathy
or kind encouragement instead…”
“You already hit rock
bottom right outta the gate, but now you’re telling me it’s gonna get even
worse?” she asked
in astonishment.
I slumped so hard my
shoulder joints just about disconnected. “Okay, so as it turns
out, I’m hella nervous about this after all. I promised I’d try my
best, but no matter how hard I try, I just don’t feel like I can be the kind of
person they both deserve.”
Yup, no doubt about
it—this was how I felt deep down. I
hadn’t lied back when I said I’d try
my best, nor was I now attempting to sweep that decision under the rug. The desire to do my best
was a genuine emotion, but so was the fear. The thing is, while I
only had the first one equipped right now, the other, hidden emotion was
rapidly growing to the point where it was about to burst. And that’s why I wanted
to confide in Kaho-chan. Just venting to someone didn’t count as betrayal, right?
And so, in response to my
terrible confession, Kaho-chan said, “Huh. Yeah, I getcha.”
That sounded like
sympathy to me! Thank god. Kaho-chan, I love
you, I thought.
“But, like,” she said,
“that shoulda been obvious before y’all started dating, y’know?”
“I mean, yeah, but…” Okay,
so I got the sympathy but not the encouragement. That’s fine,
thanks anyway, I thought.
Just having
a listening ear was good enough for me.
I knew I’d even boasted
up on stage with that whole, “Go out with me. I’ll make you happy”
thing, but I had zero confidence in myself. It caused me no end of
anxiety to think that I’d screwed up even in the way I approached trying my
best. Whatever
happened to the invincible Neo-Renako? Boo-hoo-hoo! Believe me, I wanted her back more than anyone else. (Boo-hoo-hoo indeed.)
Our destination now came
into sight: our classroom, 1-A.
Kaho-chan tilted her head. “Huh? Whazzat?”
Standing in front of the
rear door was Hasegawa-san, the girl who always sang my praises like I was some
kind of god. Her expression looked uneasy, like the face of someone who had to
handle a difficult customer.
When our eyes met, she
exclaimed, “Ah! Amaori-san
and Koyanagi-san. Um. There’s someone here to
see you.”
“Us?”
I said. I almost involuntarily
made a “whoa” noise in surprise.
In front of Hasegawa-san
stood five girls, but they weren’t from our class—I figured they were from
Class B next door. When I saw that one of them was a girl I really didn’t like, I backed
away without thinking. I bet I was making the same face as Hasegawa: like I had to deal with a
customer who’d come in with a laundry list of outrageous complaints.
Kaho-chan was the only
one chill enough to raise a hand and go, “What’s poppin’? You guys need somethin’?”
Demonstrating their
perfect coordination, all five girls turned to glare at us in unison. Holy smokes.
The girl standing at the
front of the pack barked, in tones so ringing I bet you could hear her outside,
“Koyanagi-san and Amaori-san, it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance!”
“P-pleasure’s all mine…?” I
said.
This was Takada Himiko-san. She had long black hair
and was really tall—taller than Mai or Satsuki-san even, well over 170 cm. She was the boss of Class
B and, according to Kaho-chan, she thought we Quintet girls were her rivals. She even clicked her
tongue at me, of all people, every time we passed in the halls. Freaky, don’t you think?
Oh, I guess now’s a good
time to mention that the Quintet was the name for the friend group of the top
five girls in Class 1-A. It included Mai, Ajisai-san, Satsuki-san, Kaho-chan, and some weirdo
loser who tagged along at the back of the pack like a fifth wheel with a flat
tire.
Anyway, as I dithered on
the spot, Kaho-chan let Hasegawa off the hook with a grin. “Thanks! I’ve got this; you can
peace out now.”
Hasegawa-san looked at her
like a girl in love. “Thank you so much, Koyanagi-san!” Then she zoomed away.
Dang, Kaho-chan was such
a girlboss. And she acted like it was nothing.
“Uh, well. Uh,” I said. “Is there anything with
which we might be able to help you…?”
“I should certainly think
so, Amaori-san!”
Eep.
I felt like
a tiny dog getting barked at by a larger, threatening mutt. The pressure she put on
me was intense!
Takada-san placed a hand
on her chest and, sounding calmer than before (or perhaps just more full of
herself than ever), recited, “Today marks the six-month anniversary of the day
we began school in April. We have skirmished many times, and through our rivalry encouraged
mutual growth as we shared this high school experience.”
She said it like it was
totally true, but I’d never clashed with Takada-san before. And believe me, I’d done
more than my fair share of clashing.
Was Takada-san,
unbeknownst to me, good buddies with the Quintet? Were they gabbing around
the clock in a Line group chat I hadn’t been invited to? Oh no! There went a door to
darkness opening again!
As I fought for dear life
to construct a barricade in front of that ominous door, Takada-san continued
her speech with the inexorable pace of a tank. “And yet I have come to
the realization that it will not do to remain so gleeful and complacent. No more of this nonsense. We ought to settle this
matter once and for all! We must impress upon the students of Ashigaya which of us is the
superior. The
student body will fragment!”
Takada-san snapped her
arms open wide like a lizard spreading out its neck frills.
I suppressed my monumental
urge to go, “Oh, okay. In that case, lemme just…” and then skedaddle out of there like that
same lizard would. After all, if I ran away, I’d leave Kaho-chan here all on her own. And besides, I was the
one who Takada-san had addressed first anyway.
“Uh, you want us to
s-settle this once and for all…?” I repeated.
“Indeed!”
Takada-san’s
eyes glittered. Eeep. “You, the Quintet! We, the 5déesses! We shall compete to see
which of us is fit to reign supreme over Ashigaya High School’s first-year
class, and that is what I mean by
settling this once and for all!”
Ignoring the whole reign
supreme over yadda yadda yadda for a sec… “You are…the what now?” I asked.
I shot Kaho-chan, the
walking encyclopedia, a look begging for an explanation. But just then, the girl
behind Takada-san answered for me.
“Well, Amaori-chan,
5déesses is a combination of ‘déesse,’ the French word for goddess, and the
Japanese word for five, ‘go,’ to describe us as five actual goddesses. You see?”
I was really not sure
about a girl I’d never met before adding a “chan” to my name. For some reason, the way
she talked kind of reminded me of Ajisai-san, but the vibe was all different
because she sorta came on too strong.
The girl giggled. “So even just from our names, we goddesses outrank you queens. Right, Himi-chan?”
“Indeed,” Takada-san replied.
“Alas for
you, such is how this cruel world sees us. I suppose one could say
the competition is over and done with, but I shall still be kind enough to grant
you an opportunity to face us directly.”
“Wooow,” Kaho-chan jeered
with zero emotion whatsoever, resting her chin on her folded hands. “That is sooo nice of you. So, what’s this
opportunity, huh?”
“The most ideal
opportunity, truly. The perfect setting to determine the winning class, a festival of
sporting—” Here Takada-san threw an arm up diagonally, as if she were Romeo
addressing Juliet on the balcony, “—the inter-class athletics competition!”
Next to me, Kaho-chan
muttered, “Yup, figures.”
“Wait, you’re saying
we’ll decide which of us is better by seeing who wins the competition?” I asked.
“Indeed,” said Takada-san. “For it is perfectly fair,
will lead to no complications further down the line, and, above all, will let
the entire grade know which of us is the victor. Correct?”
Just then, I felt someone
come up next to me, a sparkling radiance in human form.
“Why, I see. That sounds entertaining,” the radiance said. It was Oduka Mai: the
queen of the Quintet!
Someone in Class B went,
“Oh my god.” Yeah, I couldn’t have said it better myself. I’d felt like we were the
away team up until a moment ago, but Mai’s mere presence was enough to banish
that feeling in a jiffy. I felt like a newbie shooter in an FPS being carried by my friend who
ranked top of the leaderboards.
Takada-san fixed Mai with
a serious expression. “Why hello, Oduka Mai-san,” she said. “Does this mean you
accept my challenge?”
“If I were only speaking
for myself, I would be happy to take you on as much as you like. However…” Mai smiled wryly.
There were two others
standing next to her. “I refuse. It sounds like far too
much bother.”
“I had a feeling you
would say that, Satsuki,” said Mai.
Now that Satsuki-san and
Ajisai-san were here, we had the whole Quintet assembled in front of Class A. With all five present,
the visual appeal, as you can imagine, was completely off the charts. I may not have known a
lot about Takada-san’s gang, but to my bystander’s eye, the 5déesses stood no
chance of beating the Quintet (even if you took me out of the equation and made
it five versus four).
“And there you have it,”
Mai said. “I
apologize, Takada-san, but as you can see, we are quite a pacifistic bunch and
much too kind to fight. Isn’t that so, Renako?”
“Oh, uh, yeah.” As the bystander suddenly brought into the spotlight, I nodded
fervently. “I-I’m
not really confident I’d do all that hot in a competition or anything. Sorry about that.”
The first girl to clap
back, just moments later, was the one who’d spoken up earlier and reminded me
of Ajisai-san. “Come
on, Sena Ajisai. I know you’re acting like the school popularity contest means nothing
to you, but you’re still reaping all the benefits of being in the Quintet, you
know.”
“Huh?
Is that
really how I come across, Suzuran-san?” Ajisai-san asked.
“How could I see it as
anything else? You’re always so full of yourself!” The girl called
Suzuran-san jabbed a finger at Ajisai-san in a way that set my alarm bells
ringing.
Then one girl from Class
B after another began to join in on the rain of taunting.
A girl with long bangs
sighed listlessly. “I understand how you feel,” she said, picking on Satsuki-san, “about
this being far too much of a bother. Why not surrender now, then? If you have no dog in
this fight, surely it doesn’t matter who wins or loses.”
“Because to begin with, I
don’t have any desire to spend a single second of my time on something
this trivial.”
“I
see. That’s
perfectly understandable too. No one wishes to compete
in something they already know they’ll lose.”
A petite girl hopped to
the front of the pack and smirked at Kaho-chan. “Hey, how’s it shakin’,
Kaho-rin? Don’tcha
wanna throw hands with us?”
“Like, I’m down for
whatever,” Kaho-chan said. “But Mai’s the leader of the Quintet, so whatever she says goes.”
“C’mooon, it’ll be fun! C’mon, c’mon, c’mon, c’mon!”
It was then that I
noticed something. I felt like these girls were all playing copycat, right? I mean those five copying
us five. Maybe
it was all a complete coincidence, or maybe they were doing it on purpose. But, like, Takada-san was
the confident queenly type squaring off against Mai. And the other girls were
also really similar to my pals: feminine Ajisai-san, stoic Satsuki-san,
childish Kaho-chan… Wait, so did that mean the last girl was like…me?!
Oh god, what was she
going to be like? What if she was super timid and so blatantly shy that she couldn’t
even make eye contact? Wouldn’t that mean that’s how people saw me? No. I was an
extrovert. No
matter what anyone said, I was an extrovert! I’d done a flawless job
of turning over a new leaf for high school! No one knew the truth! That’s why I was 100
percent positive that the last girl would turn out to be completely normal, a
total cookie-cutter model of a teenage girl.
And then. The person who came forward…was…an
adorable girl with stars in her eyes.
“Hiya, Renako-kun! Y’know, I’ve always wanted to have a chat with you,” she said, then
giggled. “I
know this is maybe not the best way to meet, but I feel like it’s still gotta
mean something. Nice to
meet you! Call me
Terusawa Youko.”
“What the heck?!” I cried involuntarily.
Why the heck had they
sent out a sweet, kindly, can’t-keep-a-good-girl-down,
oldies-shojo-manga-protag-looking girl? She was the exact
opposite of me! For crying out loud, people, take a better look at me!
“Oh, Renako-kun, are you
not a big believer in fate or fortune telling or that kind of stuff?” she asked. “Okay, that’s good to know. I guess I was being a
little bit of a try-hard for a minute there. Yikes, this is embarrassing. But you’re so cute that
maybe it’s better this way, you know?” She giggled again.
“Cut it out!” I roared, not giving a damn what anyone else would think.
Miss me with that tugging
on people’s heartstrings BS! Would it have killed her
to at least try and act like me? I mean, heck, this girl
was the cutest out of everyone in Takada-san’s group, to boot. Sure, we all have our own
preferences, but she and I were about the same height, and her bobbed haircut
was so well styled it shone.
“Anyway,” she went on, “I
was really hoping we could work up a good sweat together and be buddies. Hope it works out! And good luck to us both
at the competition.”
“G-go easy on me please…”
I said.
Nope. Having a peppy extrovert
come at me with that level of intensity was freaky. Some real freaky stuff,
I’m telling you. I mean, I was an extrovert too, but it’s a matter of degree! Like all living beings,
staring at someone so much more overwhelmingly brilliant than me was blinding.
I was in such distress
that Mai seemed to notice. “Unless it’s unanimously agreed upon, I’m afraid we won’t be competing
with you as a group,” she said.
Oh, shoot, sorry. I’d made her turn someone down again! I could feel my inner
darkness swallowing me up once more!
Takada-san glared at
Satsuki-san and me in particular and then made a prideful “hmmph” noise. “Very well,” she said. “Lunch is just about
over, so we will be on our way. But this is not a surrender. We will find you a reason
to fight, I promise.”
“See you later, Renako-kun!” called Terusawa-san.
“R-right, see you…” I
called back with a wave. I really would have preferred to not see her later, but…I
guess that was out of the question.
I went back to class along
with the rest of the Quintet and sighed quietly. No doubt about it, this
was all because hanging around Mai gave my high school experience more perks
than I could count. People thought I was better than they were and paid me their respects. Girls loitering together
in front of the bathrooms would immediately smile and step aside with an,
“Oops, sorry, Amaori-san!” the moment they saw me. People no longer hogged
all the seats and refused to make space for me, and both boys and girls alike
were on the whole friendly when they talked to me. Given my dark past in
junior high, it couldn’t be overstated how grateful I was for that. It was like having a
cheat-level blessing. Sometimes guys would ask me to go hang out or girls would get jealous
of my social status and click their tongues at me, but even then, the only
reason I took critical damage was because I was an ex-introverted loser with
subpar people skills. In theory, the upsides outweighed the few downsides. And considering how many
upsides there were, it just made sense that I paid the tax for all these
blessings.
That was how I
rationalized this incident too. However…
Like a small typhoon growing in strength, this small controversy would eventually balloon into a huge stinking event that ate up all my emotions. For me, who’d just barely dipped my toes into the dating pool (and with pretty girls who were far out of my league!—and two of them at once!), it took everything I had just to get through the day. Worrying about these other concerns of my high school experience was totally out of the picture.
Queen: And thus we’ve finally declared war.
Star Lily: Great job, Himi-chan!
Queen: There is no going back now…
Mwa ha ha ha…
miki: Miki miki!
Queen: What is the matter,
Miki-san?
Queen: Has an evil witch laid
a spell on your tongue, rendering you incapable of speech?
Star Lily: Idk. It’s just this thing she’s been doing lately.
Queen: Ugh, whatever! Anyway, in order to reign supreme over Ashigaya High,
Queen: we must do whatever it
takes to make them agree to this showdown! Even if we must resort to
drastic measures!
Queen: I will come up with
that later!
Star
Lily: Coolio.
Star Lily: Sounds to me like she’s
got a great idea up her sleeve.
Queen: I do hope you aren’t
just saying that.
Queen: I shudder to think what
she might come up with. Please don’t tell me it’s something like digging a pit for them to fall
into.
miki: So, like, we could call
one of ’em to meet us out back behind the school building, trap her there, and
start a fight. Or we could like keep picking on ’em over and over in little ways until
they get hella mad at us. Or how about we take something they care about and break it?
Star
Lily: Huh?
Chapter
1:
This Was Doomed from the Start! There Was No Freaking Way I Could Do
My Best!
SOCIAL INTERACTIONS are like a game where
you have to pick the so-called “right answer” over and over. For instance, let’s say
your friend makes a joke. The right answer might be to laugh, to hit them with a follow-up joke
of your own, let it fall flat if the joke’s corny, etc. It depends on what’s
happening at the time, the whole vibe of the situation, and the kind of dynamic
you guys have. It’s possible that if you laugh your head off at a really stupid joke,
everyone around you will just look at you like, “What’s that person’s problem?”
and your
public opinion will groundrocket (you know, like the opposite of skyrocket). Frankly, it’s tough as hell.
At school, you’re
constantly having those choices thrust in front of you. When your friend starts
complaining about something, how do you respond? Do you sympathize? Commiserate? Try to cheer them up? Console them? What are the pros and
cons of choosing each?
The vast majority of
people persons are like, “Can’t you just tell?” What is that? Mind reading? Some kind of magic? Nah, it’s all just kinda
picking up on vibes. You know, reading the room—that whole thing. It’s like how weather
forecasters can figure out what the weather’ll be tomorrow based on the cloud
movements and the humidity fluctuations and whatnot. Someone who’s a people
person can use the slightest changes in others’ facial expressions, vocal
tones, and reactions to always (and instantaneously!) lead them to the right
answer. If
that’s not magic, what is? It’s totally out of the question for me. Even if I work my butt
off and get to one correct answer, I could never keep up with the speed of
questions barreling in like on a buzz-in game show. Like, guys. I just can’t. It’d fry my brain’s CPU. That’s what made me
escape to the roof back on that fateful day.
Okay, this is already
raising the difficulty level way too high, but let’s move on from talking about
ordinary interactions. If there are ordinary interactions, does that imply that there are some
that aren’t so ordinary? Yup,
sure thing.
Those would be the extraordinary interactions.
There were
no clear right answers for dating as a group of three the way I’d decided on. We had to pause every
step of the way and consult together like, “Okay, so do you guys wanna call
this the right answer?” “Sure, sounds good to me.” It was an adventure to
fill in the blank spots on the map. And I was basically going
in blindfolded, fumbling and groping my way through everything without any of
this room-reading business to serve as a clue. Any time I decided that
something was a sure thing, I ran the risk of stepping on a land mine. No two ways about it,
this was hard mode. And there was no freaking way I could pull it off!
And yet, and yet! Since I’d made my decision, I gathered up all my dreams and set off in
search of my holy grail: the One Piece! Mind you, I did get kinda
burnt out and overwhelmed for a hot sec, but…this was how I rolled for the most
part.
Now would begin my first
trial as a girlfriend. Just because I couldn’t read a room to save my life didn’t necessarily
mean I couldn’t cut it in an extraordinary interaction. No one knows what the
future holds and all. And I wasn’t the kind of gal who read the walkthrough—I just charged
right into the game!
“Wait a minute,” I said. “Relationships aren’t
games, though!”
I lay in bed at the crack
of dawn, face-planted into my pillow, still in my PJs, and my phone gripped in
one hand. The
light streaming in through my curtains was refreshingly bright, proving that it
was most definitely morning.
“I mean, in games, all you
have to do is pick your choice,” I said. “In real life, I don’t
have the ability to make this choice… Not anymore…”
I was currently up
against one of the rules of having a girlfriend. Earlier, I had surveyed
Mai and Ajisai on what sort of things they wanted me to do. Of course, being as this
was my first deed as their girlfriend, I asked them to make the request as easy
to fulfill as possible… Anyway, they both told me what they wanted in no
uncertain terms.
At the moment, it was
fulfilling Ajisai-san’s request that had me agonizing in bed. Well, no—the agonizing
bit wasn’t part of her request. That was something I’d
chosen to do myself.
Oh hell, it was already
the time we’d agreed on. If I dawdled any longer, Ajisai-san would be disappointed in me. Then she’d be like,
“Y’know, I don’t…think this whole dating thing’s going to work out after all. But let’s be friends
again in our next life, okay?”
Feeling like I was about
to use my one and only elixir in a game, I pressed the call button on my phone.
Hyah!
Ugh, my chest ached. Since I’d started high
school, the only times I’d pressed this button (well, except to speak to my
family, that is) had been a handful of calls to Mai and Kaho-chan. Texting was
anxiety-inducing enough, so for me to call Ajisai-san… Man, dating was hard!
My brain started spewing
out shrieking noises in an attempt to distract me from reality. The phone rang for a
while and then…connected.
The other end was silent
for a moment. Wait, uh. She did…actually pick up,
right?
“Uh,
hi…?” I
said in the same tone of voice as a student who needs to fess up that they
didn’t do their homework.
I heard a rustling of
clothing on the other end of the line. Then, after another
period of silence, she mumbled, “Hello…?”
She was mumbling! Mumbling Ajisai-san!
My mouth opened and closed
like a fish. I ransacked my mental closet of appropriate things to say from top to
bottom several times over and then decided to give her an exceedingly standard
greeting. “H-hi.”
I heard what sounded like
an amused little girl giggling. Wait, was that Ajisai-san
just now?
Oh
god! Oh no. Ajisai-san’s sleepy voice
performed a direct assault on my eardrums, and it was about to do me in. Heck, it was doing me in
already. I’d
never be able to handle this, not once for as long as I lived.
“Um,” I said. “Uh. I’m calling, um, just
like you requested.”
“Uh-huh…” she said, then
giggled. “This
is kinda nerve-racking.”
“Y-yeah, you’re telling me. It’s crazy nerve-racking.”
Ajisai-san had requested
that I give her a wake-up call on the weekends. Weekday mornings were a
war zone for Ajisai-san, since she had to help her brothers get ready for
school, so the recoil from that made her pretty lazy on the weekends. Thus, she was having me
place a wake-up call at 8 a.m. That sounded like
something even I could do, or so I’d thought at the time. But it turned out to be a
close thing. I’d yet to conquer the introvert’s kryptonite: the telephone.
But all the same, I did it! I achieved my goal of
waking up Ajisai-san!
“So, I guess that’s that,
Ajisai-san,” I said. “Have a great day today!”
Wait, was Ajisai-san
starting to say something after I disconnected? The realization hit me
with a shiver. Hold the
phone. Calling
her in the morning was basically just me being her alarm clock…right?
I directed the question
into thin air, but my answer came in the form of my phone ringing.
“Whoa!”
I cried. That startled me. It was, of course, from
Ajisai-san.
“Hey, it’s me… Sorry,
Rena-chan. Are you busy?”
“Oh, no, not at all. Not in the slightest,” I
answered quickly. Maybe I’d come across sounding too easygoing.
“Well, in that case,” she
said. “Um…I
was just kinda…hoping I could hear the sound of your voice a little more… Do
you mind?”
“I-I don’t mind a bit!” It felt like she was a
little kid tugging on my sleeve, pleading with me. I shook my head fervently. “S-sorry. Did I do something wrong,
or…?”
“Oh, no, it’s not you. I’m sorry for asking you
such a selfish request.”
“No, not at all,” I said. “Besides…your voice is
really cute right after you wake up and all.”
Once again, we lapsed
into silence. But it was
funny. I
didn’t feel as scared of the silence as I had on my last call with her, even
though I sucked at carrying on conversations that had no particular purpose.
“Back then, I wasn’t
really sure if I like liked you or not… I’m
pretty sure I thought of you as a friend.”
“But even then, having
you right next to me when I woke up felt, well, super nice. That’s why I was so glad
to hear you right after I woke up this morning too.”
My ears burned. This was the kind of conversation I absolutely could not have over speakerphone,
on the off chance that my family would hear it.
I pulled my blanket up
over my head, which made me feel like I was in my own little world with
Ajisai-san here in bed. Her undeniable affection for me made my head go blank. But even with my head in a
fog, I still searched for the right words to say. After all, I was
Ajisai-san’s.
“Me too,” I said. “I’m really lucky to get to talk to you first thing in the morning.”
“Are you sure?” she
asked. “It’s not
a bother for you?”
“No, I like it. It makes me feel like I’m your oneechan again.”
Whoops.
The tone of
her voice would have been yikes-worthy enough in person, but having it
whispered into my ears like this made it a whole other kind of yikes. It was a deep swamp of
yikesness.
“But you aren’t my
oneechan at the moment, now are you?” she asked. She sounded almost like she was pouting, which made my pulse race.
Eep.
I mean, I knew
that of course. But…
“Y-yeah, that’s true,” I
said.
“Uh-huh.
So what are you, hmm?”
She was trying to make me
say it!
God, she was really
trying to make me say it no matter what!
“Come ooon,” she said. “What are youuu?”
Little by little, she
sounded like she was getting more ticked off by the moment.
Ajisai-san was silent for
a moment and then went, “Mm-hmm.” I’d never heard her sound
so happy before.
Ugh! I was beyond mortified,
but if it made her happy, then it was fine! Wait, that wasn’t the
point I wanted to make. Ajisai-san and I were dating, after all. Didn’t that mean we had
equal power? So that meant it wouldn’t hurt for me to say selfish things too, right?
Mwa ha ha. Now it was my turn to
embarrass Ajisai-san to death.
“Hey, Ajisai-san, I want
to hear you say it too,” I said. “Ajisai-san, you’re my
whaaat?”
“Sure thing,” she replied. “I’m your girlfriend.”
I couldn’t respond. I felt like I’d been
parried and lay wide open for a counterattack.
“I’m your girlfriend,
Rena-chan,” she said before giggling to herself.
“That’s me! Sena Ajisai, Amaori Renako’s girlfriend.”
She didn’t need to keep
repeating it! At this rate, she was going to do me in, which would be a good way to
die. (Right?)
“How can you say that so
calmly?” I demanded.
She giggled again. “That’s
’cause I am calm.”
Even if Ajisai-san was
actually hiding her face in her pillow from embarrassment and kicking her legs
in the air, I would have had no way of knowing. Now that I thought about
it, I had the feeling Ajisai-san could lie to me for ages, and I’d never be
able to tell.
I forcibly switched the
topic. “Oh
hey, that hot spring trip sure was a blast, huh?” I said. If nothing else, I couldn’t let this end without making Ajisai-san’s
bashfulness show itself. “I never imagined Mai would walk in and catch us pretending to be sisters,
huh? What a mess that
was! Boy,
that sure was embarrassing, huh?”
“Uh-huh,” she said. “I was super startled.”
How could she respond so
casually?! Was
it because she knew all my weaknesses?
“I-I’d always be happy to
be your oneechan again if the opportunity ever arises. Just say the word. Okay? Okay?”
“Hmm,” she said. “But I
dunno. I
mean, now you can dote on me plenty as my girlfriend.”
No! It wasn’t an either/or thing!
Without thinking, I
screamed at the top of my lungs, “Look,
you can still be girlfriends even when you’re sisters!” I’d cranked the volume
of my voice up so ridiculously loud that my voice accidentally came out as a
shout.
“N-no, it’s okay,” she said. “It’s just, um…” This
sounded like the lead up to her saying something awful. “Rena-chan, are you,
like…into that kind of thing…?”
“I most certainly am not!” I insisted.
It was just that—oh, how
do I say it?—out of all the many cute sides of Ajisai-san, that side of her was
particularly adorable. Look, for the socially awkward, when you have a single good experience,
you keep ruminating on it for ages until it’s sucked dry. Like, you think, “Oh boy,
it sure was fun to play that game with my friend. Yeah, sure was a blast
playing together. Wow, I’d sure love to play that again, because that was great,” over
and over again, and then when the remake comes out years later and you try
again and you don’t find it’s as engaging as you remembered, you’re like, “Oh,
I guess it wasn’t the game that was so good. It was spending time with
my friend,” and you weep thinking that those happy days will never return. That’s how things work
when you’re socially awkward. Not that I fit that
description, mind you!
“I mean, if you really want to, we can do that again sometime,”
Ajisai-san said. “I guess.”
“Yay!”
I
fist-pumped out of reflex—not just because of the sister thing, but because I’d
finally gotten her sounding embarrassed. I mean, being wide awake
and talking about something you did half-asleep is no doubt mortifying. But I guess you had to
play fair when you were dating.
As I rejoiced, Ajisai-san
whispered, “Rena-chan, do you have a thing for little girls?”
I refuted the accusation
with every fiber of my being. I needed to clear up this
misunderstanding! If I didn’t, I had a feeling it’d get entirely blown out of proportion
to the point where there’d be no coming back from it.
I laid it out in clear terms.
“I’m not
into little girls,” I said. “I just love situations
where 158 cm, 15-year-old Ajisai-san sometimes goes back to her true self, acts
all shy, pretends to be a little girl, and asks me to dote on her as her
oneechan!”
After I got off the phone
with Ajisai-san, I somehow managed to lethargically crawl out of bed. I did it. I completed my duties as
a girlfriend. That was a perfect ten out of ten right there! Trial one, complete!
I still had something I’d
promised I’d do with Mai on Monday, two days from now, but that had sounded
easier, relatively speaking, when she’d told me what she wanted. That’s because I knew
what the right answer for it was. Well, I say that, but I
still ended up turning it into a huge kerfuffle anyway…
I
sighed. I
still wasn’t sure if I could fulfill all of my duties as a girlfriend, but I
just had to try exactly as hard as I felt unsure. That’s
how life works, Amaori Renako, I reminded myself.
You know, I’d been feeling
warm all morning. I decided to take a quick shower.
And just as I left my
bedroom, I bumped into my sister.
My sister—Amaori
Haruna—was two years my junior. She was in her second
year of junior high, and yet she was already a teensy bit taller than me. Haruna spent her youth
devoting herself to her club (badminton), and I guess she’d made a name for
herself as a local athlete. It went without saying that she was athletic, but she was also
attractive and, above all else, had the ability and the guts to say what she
meant with zero fear whatsoever. She was a people person,
hands down. Come on, don’t leave poor ol’ sis here in the dust, I thought. If we
start dividing up our family into who’s got what it takes and who doesn’t,
it’ll make me ditch school again.
We fought sometimes, and
she drove me bananas other times, but I’ve heard that’s how it is with all
families. I
thought we got along all right, considering we had completely different
interests.
But what was she doing
outside my room? Was
she just passing by? Or was she coming to me with a grievance?
“Oh, sorry,” I said. “Was I being too loud?”
“Nah, not really,” she said. “You’re way louder when
you’re up all night gaming and talking to yourself.”
I thought she’d given up
on saying stuff like that these days…
As I apologized, my
sister turned her face away but otherwise didn’t move from the spot.
“Hmm?”
I said. “What is it?” What was this all about?
Well, she clearly had
something she wanted to say.
“Who were you talking to
on the phone?” she asked.
There was a weird sort of
tension. It
was like the moment before a race when you’re crouching and waiting for the
signal, but you don’t know when it’ll go off.
“By the way,” my sister
said, “what ever happened with you and Mai-senpai?”
I pressed both hands to
my chest. What
did she mean, what ever happened? Was she talking about…the
you-know-what? The time when Mai tried to come on to me and my sister chewed me out? Was she…asking what
happened afterward? Why was she bringing it up now?!
“Wh-wh-wh-why do you ask?” I
said.
“’Cause.”
My sister
wasted no time laying it all out. “I never heard about
anything after that, and it’d be kind of weird for me to ask Mai-senpai for the
deets. You
got really depressed all of a sudden, so I thought maybe you guys had broken
up. Then
you randomly perked back up again.”
True enough, I supposed
my recent behavior really did look hella sus from my sister’s perspective. Not to mention all the
selfie training or the voice exercises I’d been doing to prep for my
performance in the cosplay event…
“‘Reasonable enough’?” I
repeated. But I got
what she meant.
I folded my arms
automatically. It’d be easy enough to tell her, “Mai and I started going out,” but my
sister was in contact with Ajisai-san. So if she let slip to
Ajisai-san something like, “Hey, did you know that my sister is going out with
Mai-senpai?” it’d be totally possible that Ajisai-san would then grin and go, “Yeah,
and she’s dating me too. Me and Mai-chan are both getting two-timed.” And then I’d end up with
my sister chewing me out over my relationships. I could see it now. She’d be like, “Oneechan,
as you are the disgrace of the Amaori household, it is my duty as your family
member to execute you.” And then she’d drive a butcher knife through my heart.
Yeah, that wasn’t my idea
of a good time. Never mind a good time—that’d straight-up be the end of my life. Even if she didn’t kill
me, she’d at least give me the death glare every time she saw me, right up
until I eventually grew up and moved out. Yeeeeah, I wasn’t a fan of
that idea.
If that were to happen,
I’d have no choice but to grovel before her with Mai and Ajisai-san in tow,
like the samurai guy on Mito Koumon with his retainers Suke-san and Kaku-san, and plead, “If you hurt me
or make me miserable, these two will suffer for it! So please, be nice to me!” And I did not want that!
Choosing my words with
extreme care and precision, I addressed my sister and said, “Um. Mai and I had. Uh. It’s a long
story!”
“What’s that supposed to
mean?” she asked. I was trying to obscure
the truth, but it was like she had my heart caught in her grip and refused to
let go. “You
guys are dating, right? You went to her fashion show and met her mom, didn’t you? So let me guess. You haven’t made any more
progress past that, have you?”
Oh
no. With my
conversational skills, there was no freaking way I could sneak this past my
sis. I
decided to play my last card.
“Wh-whatever, who cares?” I
said. “Why
should I have to tell my kid sister? It’s embarrassing, so I’m
not gonna talk about it!”
The card I’d just played,
An Older Sister’s Iron Fist, could force any conversation to an end! And thus, with the
playing field destroyed, my sister had no choice but to retreat in dejectio—
“Um, excuse me?” she
said. “After
all the help I’ve given you, where do you get off telling me that? It’s not like this is
none of my business.”
Oh
no! Given
that I’d used my sister’s help to turn over a new leaf for high school, all the
perks of my new high school experience only lent her power. What
are you, my biggest shareholder?
Was my only choice to do
her in before she could end me? Would I be forced to rip
out my sister’s heart? If I was going to die either way, then I had no choice but to take her
down first… Mwa ha ha, yes, I had to!
Just before that
dangerous thought took over my mind, my sister finally released my heart from
her clutches. She sighed. “Oh, whatever, I get it. If you really don’t wanna
talk, I’m not going to pry.”
As I cheered, she gave me
the stink eye. “I can totally tell you’re hiding some funny business, though.”
“Cut it out,” I said. “That’s a totally
unfounded accusation. Where’s your proof, huh? I demand to see proof!”
“Who died and made you a
lawyer…?”
“Whatever, I’m leaving! This court is adjourned!”
I dashed away, and she
didn’t follow. Thank god.
I went back to my room,
grabbed a change of clothes, and set off for the bathroom. I was in the middle of a
shower—aka stark naked and completely vulnerable—when my sister chose to launch
her next attack.
“So, Oneechan,” she said
from across the frosted glass.
That scared the living
daylights out of me. What on earth was it going to be this time?
“What is this,” I
snapped, “some back alley?”
“You have a thing
for
little sisters, don’t you?”
Aha! So that’s why she was in
front of my room earlier!
“What, were you
eavesdropping on my phone call with Ajisai-san?” I demanded.
“No, that’s the first
I’ve heard of this.”
Wait. Did she also know about
the time when Ajisai-san and I had roleplayed as siblings…? Who had told her? These were top
confidential state secrets, people!
“Okay, but who wouldn’t?” I
said. “To
big sisters, little sisters are so cute you can’t help it.”
I lobbed the same ball
I’d bowled at Ajisai-san in order to get a spare. “I mean, big sisters would
hear out any selfish request from their little sister. Because it’s cute, you know? I don’t have a thing for sisters, but it’s
only a matter of course since I’m a big sister myself!”
I emphasized Ajisai-san’s
cuteness with everything in my power. “If you had a little
sister, you’d understand too. You feel this sort of
illogical love, like you want to protect them from every misfortune. That’s what having a
little sister is all about!”
My shout echoed around
the bathroom.
My sister was silent for
several moments and then muttered to herself, “…Freak.”
Look, you can only say
that because you’ve never seen five-year-old Ajisai-san, okay? You just don’t have any
love in your heart, but I’ll have you know, you bleepity-bleep…!
Man. I was exhausted, and it
was still barely morning.
Once I was done with my
shower, I decided to go on honeymoon with my PS4 in order to recharge my MP. Time to spend the day in
Four-kun’s tender, loving embrace, heh heh heh.
After I’d spent a while
mooching around, I heard the doorbell ring. My sister had gone off to
her club activities today like the workaholic she was, so there was no one but
me home at the moment. Welp. It was a major pain in the
ass, but I got up.
I picked up the intercom. I hoped it wasn’t someone
selling something…
“Is this Amaori Renako’s
residence?” I heard.
I scrambled to the front
door and yanked it open. “Satsuki-san?!”
I cried.
There, dressed in her very
best, stood an extraordinarily gorgeous raven-haired beauty.
I sat stiffly across from
her at my table. What
was she doing here? Our FPS competition with Mai was over and done with ages ago. The rare event of having
a pretty girl in my room was making me wig out. No matter how many times
it happened, I didn’t think I’d ever get accustomed to it.
She was silent. I was
silent. Oh,
the silence, the horrible silence! Props to Satsuki-san for
that. Neither
Ajisai-san nor my sister’s silent treatment powers could hold a candle to hers.
(Silent
treatment power is a measurement of how much pressure one exudes by virtue of
being silent. As a matter of fact, Kaho-chan’s silent treatment power was pretty
high.)
I couldn’t take it any
longer. With
the same sort of feeling as when you pull your head out of the water when
washing your face, I spoke up. “Uh, Satsuki-san… What
brings you here today?”
“Nothing much,” she said. “I simply had some free
time before my shift.”
“What, and did plate
tectonics suddenly put my house in between yours and the donut shop?”
“Of course not,” she said. “Nevertheless, I am here.”
Satsuki-san was being
kind of evasive, even though normally she went in swinging with all the
military might of the mystic sword Muramasa. Was this, like…the fluffy
uwu Satsuki-san here today or something? Had she ended up at my
house in an “Oopsy-doopsy, looks like I caught the wrong train!” maneuver? And if that was true, did
that mean I didn’t have to be quite as formal with her all the time?
Then uwu Satsuki-san’s
lips gently parted and said… “Well, have you kissed Sena yet?”
She was just as sharp as
ever! And
she was coming at me quick from point-blank range. What was she, a master
swordsman?
“Why’re you asking?!” I
demanded.
“It just occurred to me
that we once kissed in this room too, that’s all.”
“Seriously? You bring this up like it’s casual small talk?”
Urgh. I wriggled bashfully and
laced my fingers together across my chest. “Not…yet…”
“What, were you just
asking out of curiosity?”
“Why not? There isn’t anything particularly interesting about kissing,”
Satsuki-san said. “It makes no difference to me whether you’ve kissed anyone or not.”
“You say that, but you
totally flipped out when we had our first kiss.”
“I no longer recall that.” She smiled, looking
horribly composed. “That’s
all in the past.”
If you only listened to
what she said, she sounded like a mature older girl with lots of experience,
but…that had only been her first kiss…
However, she soon
retracted her smile. There was a bit of gloom in the look she leveled at me. “I came by today to offer
you an apology.”
In spite of myself, I
felt uneasy. Had she done something nasty to me that I didn’t even know about?
“Y-you didn’t tell
Ajisai-san that we’ve kissed before, right?!”
“No,” she said. “That would be awful, don’t you think?”
“Hm?”
I said. “Yeah, I mean, I guess…?”
I think it’d be pretty
shocking to find out that your two friends kissed, right? But what do I know?
“Let’s suppose you heard
that Mai and Kaho kissed,” Satsuki-san went on. “What would you think?”
What would I think? “Uh…not much…?” I ventured.
I mean, even if they
kissed, I would imagine it’d just been them fooling around or something. Kaho-chan treated Mai
pretty casually, after all.
“So I actually think it’d
be kind of okay, I guess…?” I
said. In
the first place, Mai knew Satsuki-san and I had kissed too.
“Yes.
Hence why I
am also keeping the fact that I am your ex-girlfriend to myself.”
Who was
my ex-girlfriend?! We only dated for two weeks and then broke up and went right back to
being friends like it was nothing! There were no lingering
feelings at this point either!
W-wait a second… I put a
hand to my chin. Humbly, I asked, “Satsuki-san, are we exes?”
This was about as
shocking as if I’d just found out that the planet I’d been born and raised on
wasn’t actually Earth. This distinguished and gorgeous girl was my ex…? No way!
“Wait, no, but!” I said. “We were just pretending
to date!”
“Isn’t it a bit late to
say that now?”
Okay, yeah, we kissed and
bathed together and stayed the night together and stuff—but still! It was only so we could
make the big reveal to Mai that we were totally dating!
“You’re.
My ex? And I’m…your ex?” I asked. “And what would happen if
Ajisai-san were to learn all that…?”
I gave Satsuki-san an
imploring look, and she averted her eyes. “It would likely trouble
her a great deal.”
I could imagine. “Rena-chan, you dated Satsuki-chan?” she would say. “Why on earth would Satsuki-chan date someone like you? What kind of nasty hidden
trick did you use? Do you…know her weakness or something?”
No! That was way too inaccurate. After all, Ajisai-san was
my girlfriend right now, and there was no way she’d ever say so many insulting
things to me.
So it’d be more like:
“Rena-chan, you dated Satsuki-chan? Wow, I had no idea. Hey, do you still,
um…have feelings for her? Yeah, that makes sense. Satsuki-chan’s really
great… Well, but you still dated me in spite of all that, huh? Thanks.”
“That would be awful,
Satsuki-san!”
Fundamentally speaking, I
never had a darn clue what Satsuki-san was thinking, but I knew her rivalry
with Mai and her simple sweetness toward Ajisai-san were both legit. I could trust her as a
fellow worshiper of Sena Ajisai.
“Right,” I said. “I
understand. Let’s keep what happened between us strictly off the record.”
“I agree,” Satsuki-san said. “I’ll tell that to Mai
later as well. At any rate, let’s return to the topic of conversation at hand.”
Now that she mentioned it,
what was this thing she wanted to apologize for?
“It is about the
inappropriate message I sent you,” Satsuki-san said.
What message? Oh, the one where she asked me out?
“Didn’t we get that all
squared away in that one empty classroom?” I asked.
“So you may think, but I
have a different opinion. Are you not curious as to why I asked such a thing of you in the first
place?” she said.
True enough, Satsuki-san
wasn’t the type to play mean pranks like that just for the heck of it…
Right?
Actually, I
suddenly didn’t feel too confident about that. At any rate, it seemed to
me like she often jumped the gun about things only to regret it later. Maybe this was simply
another example of that. Satsuki-san was a lot rasher than you’d think to look at her.
“As I’d done you that
disservice, I felt I owed you a proper explanation,” she said.
“You’re pretty hard on
yourself, huh?” I said. “That’s really impressive.”
“Don’t worry. I’m just as hard on everyone else.”
Satsuki-san demanded a
mentality of strict self-control from everyone else too. Anyone who couldn’t, she
considered scum. Truly, she was something else.
“Uh…so, why’d you send me
that message?” I asked.
Bluntly, she said, “I
don’t want to tell you.”
“Um, hello?” I spluttered back on reflex.
But Satsuki-san remained
perfectly grave. “My answer is that I do not want to tell you why I sent you that
message. And
that is all I will say on the matter.”
“But you just said you
owed me a proper explanation.”
“Yes, and didn’t I just
give you one?” she asked.
“Huh?!
You call
that a proper explanation?”
Satsuki-san smiled and
shrugged in relief. “That was because I had accidentally lied to you. Now I’ve finally gotten
this off my chest.”
I hadn’t even noticed her
lying to me either. God, I really had no idea where Satsuki-san drew the line on what was
okay and what wasn’t.
“Okay…” I said. “All
right. Fine.”
If Satsuki-san had decided
that she wasn’t talking, there was no point in me trying to ask her. Besides, she already
looked relieved enough at the moment, so maybe it was better to leave things as
they were. She’d
probably only done that to try and steal me away from Mai or something anyway. Then she had probably
realized that doing so would upset Ajisai-san too and hurriedly took it back,
or some other ineffable reason like that. Satsuki-san had this
issue where she got tunnel vision whenever it came to Mai.
Satsuki-san glanced at
her watch.
“Well, we’re done talking
now,” she said. “What next?”
“Oh, do you still have
time before you need to get going?” I asked.
“Some.
What, would you
like a kiss?”
“Could you please stop
messing with me like that?” I
protested. “I
have girlfriends now, so we can’t do that anymore! We’re just exes, remember?”
“When you call us exes,
it suddenly makes kissing sound all the more probable.”
“God, I know, right? Wait, no it doesn’t!”
I’d totally agreed with
her and then immediately changed my mind. I was flip-flopping so
hard it almost made me dizzy.
“Take your messed-up
ideas about love and get them under control already,” I said. “Here, since you don’t
come over all that often, let’s play a game. Yeah.”
“A
game?” Satsuki-san
repeated.
I smiled at her like I
was opening my jacket to sell her a pirated DVD. “You gave Mai her console
back after our match, so you must be starving for some good game time, aren’t
you?” I snickered. “You missed Four-kun,
didn’t you?”
“How on earth?! You don’t get the shakes when you can’t play games all day long?”
“Not at all. I only played in order to win our competition,” she said. “But very well. We can play now.”
Satsuki-san sat down next
to me, just like that day way back when. She accepted a PS4
controller from me and flashed me a smile that made my heart skip a beat.
That smile of hers, like
every one of her smiles, was the sort that could capture your heart if you
weren’t careful enough. Satsuki-san smelled so good whenever she came near… (And I knew what
that scent was too!) She was just too beautiful. I wouldn’t say it out
loud, but I would always gladly welcome her whenever she deigned to keep me
company!
“What game do you want to
play?” I asked.
“Will any game work? Let
me see. How about this
one?”
The game she chose was a
zombie shooter that you could play two-player.
That was the game I’d
played with Mai and Ajisai-san. For some reason, I felt a
bizarre sense of guilt over lowly me playing it with girl after girl.
Eh, but who cared? Playing games with a pal never got old.
“Yeah, let’s do it!” I
said. “On
the bright side, the controls are pretty much the same as in that one FPS you
played.”
Yeah, there really was a
perk to playing games together, something almost ritualistic about it—a ritual
to show that we were back on good terms as friends again. After all, I didn’t want
things to be so awkward between us anymore!
However, the moment we
started playing, there was a shocking revelation.
“Satsuki-san,” I said,
“do you not remember any
of the controls?”
“I forget everything that
doesn’t hold any interest for me,” she replied.
I thought she’d really
enjoyed herself, but nope. Turned out it was all just to have a chance at facing off against Mai
all along. This girl had used my beloved Four-kun! Done him dirty!
I gunned down one
spawning zombie after another, nursing an odd feeling of rage.
Lord only knew how, but I
managed to get enough MP back to go to school by the Monday in question. Yup. The first trial of having
a girlfriend, but part two. It just sounded bad.
I fidgeted as I sat at
the dining table.
“Oh, you’re up early,
Renako,” my mom said.
“Y-yeah, I guess.” Normally I’d only just be rolling out of bed right around now, but here
I was, up and all ready to go. Not to mention that I’d
also clearly put more effort into my appearance today, with my makeup and hair
and all.
My mom gave me some
buttered toast. “Are you meeting up with someone?” she asked.
I really had no idea what
sort of face I was supposed to be making, sitting here like this. I just stared at the
corner as I munched my way through my toast. My mom probably thought I
was going to meet a boyfriend or something. Fortunately, she didn’t
pry, but as that didn’t give me the opportunity to plead my case, the best
defense inevitably came to be silence. If nothing else, I wanted
to be out of the house before my sister came in to the dining room.
My phone buzzed just as I
finished gulping the last of the toast down.
“Oh, uh,” I said. “I’d better get going.”
“Mm-hmm. Have a good day,” said my mom.
I put my plate in the
sink and grabbed my bag. My mom gave me a patronizing smile like she understood everything
completely, which, honestly, was super embarrassing.
As I changed my shoes in
the entranceway, I heard my sister’s voice calling “Good morning!” from the living room. That was a close one. I got out of there right
in the nick of time. If she’d asked me, “What, did you have your sexual awakening?” right then, even if she
didn’t mean it in a bad way, I’d straight-up run away on the first train
tomorrow to a hot spring inn.
I opened the door. It was clear this morning, but it was supposed to rain later. There in front of my
house, a limousine was idling, and waiting for me beside it was a girl with a
charming grin. Her blonde hair swayed in the autumn breeze like a field of golden
pampas grass.
“Why, hello, Renako,” she
said.
“Thank you for humoring
me and coming with me today,” Mai said.
“Oh no, not at all. Honestly, my thought was
that asking me to join you on the way to school was so modest that I wasn’t
sure if it was really you I was talking to.”
“Do you really think so?” she asked. “Then perhaps I should have been a bit braver.”
To match with
Ajisai-san’s request for a wake-up call, Mai had asked me to let her pick me up
in the morning so we could go to school together. That felt pretty doable
to me too, which was how I wound up sitting next to her in the back seat of the
limo.
The car glided through
the streets on the twenty-minutes-ish trip to school. It was so calm and
pleasant that I found it unusual to look out the window and watch the scenery
stream by.
“I feel like it’s been
ages since we’ve done this,” I said.
“Indeed,” said Mai. “The last time you rode with me in the limousine was when we went to
the ryoutei, no?”
“Oh, no, that’s not what
I meant. I
was talking about us just relaxing together.”
“Ah… I see.” Mai looked down with a slightly shy expression. “Yes, you make a good point. I’m afraid I was keeping
my distance from you slightly for a while…”
“Of course. I’m quite happy about that.”
I glanced over at Mai as
she sat next to me. She always looked show-stopping, reigning supreme as a top model. She didn’t have the level
of eagerness some girls our age did, the kind who go, “I’m going to look fab
today!” but
she had the sort of beauty built up from talent, a good background, and
assiduous daily effort. Mind you, I didn’t really know what kind of stuff Mai did on a daily
basis, but I knew she gave her work a hundred percent, so I figured it must be
pretty tough.
“Hey, Mai,” I said. “If you ever feel like you want to talk to me or take a breather, you
can always reach out. Even if it’s just for a few moments.”
Mai paused for a moment. “I beg your pardon?”
“Oh, never mind. I was just thinking that I’ve never actually put that into words, you
know? And,
um, I figured it’d be kinda nice if it could give your happiness meter a little
boost, right?”
Mai giggled. “You say that even though I am always calling you with no consideration
as to whether it’s a good time for you to take a call.”
“Y-yeah, but still. Look, I’m saying it’s
okay to call me. You can call even if you don’t have anything to say, if it’ll make you
happy.”
“I am beyond grateful for
your careful consideration.”
Just then, something hit me. “Hey, Mai. How come you’re avoiding
looking at me today?”
“Am
I?” she said. “I don’t believe I look
at you so much on a normal basis.”
“Come
on!” I insisted. “We’ve made like zero eye
contact all day! I mean, we don’t usually do that either—but that’s because I’m the one
looking away.”
Now I wanted us to look at
each other, no matter what that took, so I tapped her knee. I was usually awful at
giving or receiving casual touches, but for some reason, I was A-okay with
doing that to Mai. Maybe it was the same general principle as to why the three of spades
beats the joker in Tycoon.
“Hey, Mai,” I said. “Mai. Mai, Mai,
Maimaimaiamaimaimai.”
I pestered her like a
little kid talking to a relative who’d come over to play with them.
“All right, Renako,” Mai
sighed and, resigned to her fate, looked at me.
Oh god, those enormous
blue eyes of hers filled my vision. I felt so bashful! I hurried to turn away. Nope, I couldn’t handle
this one bit! We probably hadn’t made eye contact for even a full second, but all the
same, the image of Mai’s eyes was permanently burned into my retinas. That one second was so
striking it could have lasted for a full twenty-four hours.
Mai sighed in wonder. “We really and truly are
girlfriends now, aren’t we?”
“It’s challenging to
express how I feel, as I once gave up on any of this ever happening.” Mai beamed. “My heart feels so full
right now.”
I didn’t respond. I was still nervous about doing a good job of returning Mai’s feelings.
After all,
both she and Ajisai-san loved me with all their might, but our relationship
would fall apart if I only gave each of them half my love. I needed to ensure I
showed them double the affection.
“Hey, Mai!” I
announced, animated. I didn’t hesitate before scooting closer to her.
“I know I still may not
be the slightest bit reliable, but I’m going to try my best, okay?”
“O-oh?
Well, I’m glad
to hear that. Just do be sure not to push yourself too hard.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” I said.
But I needed to do some pushing myself—and a fair
deal, mind you, not just a little bit. Still, I nodded
obediently in front of Mai. “Let’s both do the things
we want to do and be happy together!”
“Oh?”
she said. “What sort of things do we
each want to do?”
“Um.”
I averted
my eyes as far as humanly possible. “There’s still. Uh. Some stuff you’d like. On your…piece of. Um. Paper that you wrote a
while ago. You know. That thingy.”
“Oh.”
Mai put her
hand to her mouth again and looked away, legs crossed. “But I promised not to do
anything that would hurt you anymore.”
“Well, do you want to do
those things or not?!”
“I don’t think it’s such
a great idea to divide the world into two categories like that,” Mai said. “I value the wide variety
of options in the spectrum between yes and no.”
Now she was suddenly
making arguments for argument’s sake the way I always did.
“Mai, Mai, Oduka Mai!” I
cried. I
rapped at her knee again like I was trying to open a huge, heavy door.
Mai made a pained expression.
“Please, I’m
embarrassed… You see, I would still like to do all those things… My desires
have not changed…nor have my feelings for you.”
She looked almost too
mortified. The
fact that she could show her embarrassment, I thought, was growth in and of
itself. Come
to think of it, I think Ajisai-san had also mentioned once that the difference
between friends and girlfriends were the steamy feelings involved. Or had I only dreamed that? Well, I’d never had any
sort of dirty feelings toward girls, not once in my entire life, so Mai was
alone here. Still,
I got what she meant. I’d read about that sort of thing in manga and stuff before.
“I came up with this for
your benefit,” I told her.
I pulled my sketchbook
out of my bag and flipped through the pages to the words The
Touchy Time System: An Introduction.
Mai jolted. “Touchy
Time, you say…?”
Lifting my mental
glasses, I endeavored to explain it to her in a professional manner. It would have been too
embarrassing without getting into character, you see.
“To prevent you from
going overboard, I propose we allocate certain times for this activity. Thus, both parties can
engage in consensual fooling aro—I mean, touching.”
I clamped my mouth shut. I’d almost said “fooling
around.” Fooling
around implied a certain, well, two-way street nature of it all.
“I see,” said Mai. “You’re
a genius. How
long will the first session be? Around six hours, I suppose?”
“This isn’t a karaoke free
time on a day when you have no other plans!”
Seeing Mai immediately get
back into the swing of things made me nervous deep down, but I also felt kind
of happy. It reminded
me of old times.
I thrust my palm forward
and said, “But!” I turned the page in my sketchbook, highlighting the next section. “Whenever you get Touchy
Time, you also get an equal amount of Touched Time!”
Yup, this was my secret
plan to prevent Mai from going overboard, a means to teach her, “Don’t do unto
others what you don’t want done unto you.” Yes, it was a bit like
obedience training a dog…for another first-year high schooler…but who cares?
To be honest, it also had
to do with how embarrassed Mai had been when she put her head on my lap that
one time. She
was like an assassin character, outstripping me by far in offense while having
weak defense. So I figured she’d probably get as embarrassed as anyone else if I
touched her and stuff, and this would probably help stave her off. And…I also felt like,
since we’d gone to some trouble to actually be girlfriends and everything, it’d
be nice if I could do some of the courting for a change… It was a bad idea to
say, “Um, I think I’d like to touch you…” Yet, if we set a rule in place first,
then I could manage it by sheer force of going, “Welp, guess I have to touch
you now! Can’t get
around it! Rules are rules!”
I mean, not that I
particularly wanted to touch her or anything. It was just that rules
are rules, you know? Can’t
get around ’em! Those’re
the rules!
Anyway, I suggested,
“Want to give it a shot while we’re here?”
“D-do you mean right now? Not in the car.”
“Well, don’t do anything
that can’t be done in a car, then! Here, we’ll each get
about three minutes before we get to school. Come on.”
After I pestered her, Mai
finally steeled herself. “All right,” she said. “Let’s do this.”
“Okay.
Touchy Time starts
now.”
I faced Mai and spread my
arms slightly. Mai gingerly reached for me in my utterly defenseless state, and she
stroked my cheek.
“Mm…” I said. God,
this was awkward.
She caressed it with the
back of her palm.
Her hand trailed down to
the back of my neck. Uh, I was ready to be fondled, but hearing her whispering sweet
nothings to me was completely unexpected…
She pulled me into a hug
and buried her face in my chest. I kept my arms
outstretched and let her do as she pleased. I mean, that’s what the
rules said, after all!
“You’re so soft,” she said. “And you smell so good.”
C-come on, man, this was
mortifying! It
was likewise mortifying that I was embarrassed by this PDA even though I’d been
the one to suggest it, so I bit my lip and bore with it. It’s just that I could
feel the overwhelming affection Mai was sending me through her fingertips, and
a light sweat began to break out all over my body.
She rubbed my back. She fondled my head. She stroked my cheek. She loved on me like I
was a stuffed animal she’d just bought until the three minutes were finally up
and she let me go.
I had to catch my breath. “Y-yeah, that’s how it
works…”
Thank god I’d suggested
three minutes to start. If I’d tried to act tough here in Mai’s touchy-feely rehab and given
her ten minutes, I would’ve needed to pop back on home for a shower afterward.
I hurriedly fixed my hair
and then glanced up at Mai. “S-so, how was that?”
“Ah, yes… I’m glad I was
able to feel your touch for the first time in so long. It was a true joy,” she said.
The sheer intensity of
emotion on her face made my chest feel hot. Uggghhh. But at the same time, I couldn’t deny that I was glad. You know, honestly, it
felt really good to get affection. It made me realize how fun
it’d been, what a luxury it was, to have gotten that time when we argued about
whether we’d make better girlfriends or regular friends. I mean, girlfriends
weren’t a step up from regular friends, mind you. It’s just that it’s kind
of nice to have these physical interactions. Right? Right.
“Yes, of course,” said Mai. “I would love to return
the favor, after all the happiness you granted me.”
I set the timer for three
minutes. Now
as for what to do first, uh…
I reached out for Mai’s
cheek. I
figured something that tame wouldn’t be beyond me. But then she caught my hand.
“Uh, what’re you doing? Could you let me go?!”
She let my hand go. What was that all about? Wait a minute. Mai looked nervous, like a little kid bracing for an injection.
This couldn’t be what I
thought it was, right?
I stroked Mai’s cheek
with the back of my hand, and she shivered and made a little noise. Ah… For an instant, I had
a flashback to the time I’d touched Kaho-chan’s soft skin in the bath. There was that same level
of shame and covert excitement.
Careful not to mess up her
hair, I gently petted the back of Mai’s head. She pressed her lips
together firmly, doing her best not to make a sound, and remained silent. Mai normally seemed as
put-together as a work of fine art, but when she blushed like this, there was a
totally human element about her. Eeep.
That made
me embarrassed in turn for some reason. God, there was no way I
could last three whole minutes of this!
But I’d clearly leveled
up thanks to the time I spent in the bath with Kaho-chan. With that EXP under my
belt, I’d become a stronger person! That’s because (excluding
Mai from the list of bathing partners) being naked together in the bath with
someone was a horribly oh-god-worthy
experience. That meant that now I was as cool as a cucumber… Right, as cool as a
cucumber… Okay, not really. But I could handle this somehow!
I hugged her tight,
wrapping her head in my arms.
The invincible Neo-Renako
whispered in her ear, “You’re so cute, Mai.”
“N-nonsense,” she protested. She looked like she might
start wriggling and making a fuss at any moment.
I grinned at her. “You’re
cute, Mai. You’re so cute.”
“No, you’re far more
adorable than I…”
“Nah.
Right now,
you’re super cute.”
And I meant that, right
from the heart.
She wrapped her arms
around me too and let me sink into her. “You are quite the femme
fatale,” she murmured. “Oh, how you toy with my heart.”
I giggled. I figured it’d be fine to get a little carried away, at least for now. No one could see us here
in the car. Here in Mai’s
arms. It
made me feel bashful to have her hugging me, but when I say “her,” I’m not
referring to the beautiful, powerful Oduka Mai. Right now, she was just a
cute teenage girl like me. It was thrilling to feel like we were connecting even further on an
emotional level.
“You really do like me, huh?” I said.
I casually poked Mai’s
cheek to remind her that her three minutes of Touched Time were up.
Mai pouted. “Who taught you lines like that?”
“Well,
you really like me too, don’t
you?” she demanded.
“I-I mean, yeah, duh! I mean!
I do, but
like, why do you even have to ask? It’d be horrible of me to
suggest Touchy Time if I didn’t even like you!”
“Understood,” Mai said. “That indicates that,
instead of being touched in turn, I should pay you in cash to compensate you
for the time in which I get to touch you. That would not be a bad
deal for other of us.”
“Do you really hate me
touching you that much?!”
“How could I hate it? It’s only…that I’m shy…”
“Join the club, buddy!” I
retorted. “Now you
know how I feel.”
It felt like ages since
we’d bickered like this. A grin slid its way onto my cheeks without any input from my brain. I’d liked this girl as a
friend, and as it turns out, now that we were dating, I still liked her just the same. I mean, well. That meant I didn’t have a good emotional reason to have turned
Satsuki-san down, which didn’t quite sit right with me. But people typically
don’t go around picking up girlfriends left and right anyway! I know I’d said to hell
with being typical, but still! Not happening on my watch.
The car pulled up in
front of the school gates. We decided to excuse our joint arrival by saying that Mai had bumped
into me on the way and decided to give me a lift. It seemed natural enough.
“Thank you,
Hanatori-san,” Mai said to the woman in the driver seat.
Hanatori-san gave Mai a
silent bow, and I instinctively flinched.
Wait a sec… We weren’t
alone in the car. There was also a driver…and she just so happened to be the one who
loathed me: Hanatori-san!
Well, maybe things
weren’t as bad as I feared. Hanatori-san seemed to
adore Mai, so if she found out that we were dating, maybe she would decide to
support our love.
Mai smiled at me. “You know, Hanatori-san usually works from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.”
“You needn’t be
concerned,” Hanatori added, puzzlingly. “I am also given a
two-hour break.”
“Uh, okay,” I said with a
nod.
“However,” Mai went on,
“when I mentioned that I would be going to school with you today, Hanatori-san
offered to drive us. I think she’s taken quite a shine to you.”
“Thank you for accepting
my request,” Hanatori-san said.
We locked eyes in the
rearview mirror. Her gaze was icy, staring at me like I was a pest coming to defile her
flowers. Nope,
she didn’t seem to support our love in the slightest.
I laughed awkwardly. “R-really?
Wow, I’m…flattered…”
“Have a nice day,
Pest-sam—Amaori-sama,” said Hanatori-san.
Wait, she was totally
calling me a pest right there.
Sheesh.
Would it
kill the universe to give me one regular, rewarding day in what’s supposed to
be the best years of my life?
“Why, if it isn’t
Amaori-san,” she said. “You’re wandering around with quite the gloomy expression on your face,
aren’t you?”
“Say, I heard that you
and Oduka-san came to school together today,” she went on. “Making your dramatic
entrance in a limousine in front of the entire student body is a rather
show-stopping choice, wouldn’t you agree?”
“I-I didn’t mean it like
that, though,” I protested.
She was just commenting
on it, but I felt like I was being majorly attacked. Why’d she always have to
come upon me when I was alone?
True, Mai and I getting
out of her limo together had caused quite a stir among the other students also
getting to school at the same time. They looked at us in
envy, and if Ashigaya were some kind of rich girl academy, we probably would
have heard cries of “Oh my, Oduka-sama and Amaori-sama have arrived together!” “Why, those two are quite close, wouldn’t you
say?” “Indeed,
the Quintet are all such marvelous friends. One cannot help but admire
them.” I
was only a koala clinging to Mai’s coattails, mind you, but I still enjoyed
being bathed in their admiring gazes along with her. It gave me the drive to
fight on for another six months to avoid letting slip that I’d once been a shy
loner. But now this! Did I really have to deal
with this the moment I got a
little something good for myself? The tax one had to pay
for popularity was far too high.
“Kindly don’t let it go to
your head,” Takada-san said.
Little Miss High Horse
pressed in close as I trembled. “Your Quintet is only
temporarily tied with us for the top spot. Furthermore, you’re a
posse of lily-livered wimps running away from a fight.”
“Oh?
And might
you have any evidence to support your rebuttal, Amaori-san?”
She came even closer. This girl was freaking me out!
My mind went totally blank. If you had given me half
an hour, I might have been able to come up with something sensible to say, but
alas, reality was not so kind. There was no Hyperbolic
Time Chamber handy.
Little Miss High Horse
made a face like she was bored with my failure to produce any actual words. “Ha,” she said. “Waiting for your
comeuppance, I see. Soon we shall discover who truly reigns supreme over Ashigaya High.”
She laughed at me in
contempt and then departed. Thank
god. I was
too pitiful a foe, so she let me go. If she had dragged me off
to some secluded corner of the school and assailed me with insults, my heart
would have collapsed in on itself.
God, what was all this about?
Takada-san
was right up there with Satsuki-san in terms of nastiness, but the two were
totally different. Essentially, I think it had to do with the hostility or the lack
thereof. I
don’t think I was very good at handling that sort of thing.
I staggered back to class. Now that I was out of the
hot seat, I was starting to feel sad. God, I really was a
wretched piece of work. And here I’d thought that joining the Quintet had made me able to talk
normally with scary people. But nope, a direct attack
plunged me right back into Loserville. I wish I’d been able to
at least let it go or sidestep the issue better or something. Like, you know, I could
have been all, “I don’t give a fig who’s the best in our grade” or whatever.
I rewound that moment
over and over in my head, searching for things I should have said instead. I knew this kind of thing
was pointless, but I just couldn’t bring myself to stop.
I spotted Kaho-chan off
on her own when I wobbled into class.
“Hm?
What’s up, buttercup?” she asked.
I slouched over to her
and hugged her around the middle.
“Aww, what’s wrong?” she
said. “C’mon, there,
there. Tell me
what’s happenin’.”
“I wanna be with you for
the rest of my life… I’ll never leave you…”
“What the…? Why does this sound like a proposal? Wait, is this legit a
proposal? Like, for
realsies?”
“Uhh, if you want it to
be, sure…”
She karate chopped my
forehead. Ow.
“Here you go again,
already chasing after other girls. You’re the literal worst.”
This was just how girls
interacted, and even though no one had ever said anything to me about me
hugging her, I started to feel embarrassed nevertheless. So I straightened up.
Kaho-chan put her hands
on her hips and closed one eye. “Hmmph, fine,” she said. “You look like you’re in a
real bad way, so I guess I’ll let you spill the beans.”
“You’re my best friend
forever, Kaho-chan,” I said.
Kaho-chan ended up
agreeing to hear me out over lunch. That maybe meant I
wouldn’t have to repeat today’s misery over and over in bed that night. Thanks a million, Kaho-chan.
“Oh bee tee dubs,
Rena-chin,” she said, “I heard you hitched a ride with Mai-Mai in her limo this
morning. I’m super
jelly.”
“Wait, if even you’re mad at me now, I’ll straight-up die!”
The minute your
relationship gets better with one person, it get worse with someone else. Talk about a difficult
balance.
Oh, I should also mention
that Ajisai-san grilled me about coming to school with Mai too. But she just giggled and
said, “Gotcha. I see how it
is.” The
way she laughed made me think she’d figured something out, but she wouldn’t say
anything else.
Basically, neither
Ajisai-san nor Mai told each other what favors they’d asked of me. Naturally, they were
probably curious, but we’d decided to do it like this to prevent any one-upping
or arguing about fairness. Mind you, I couldn’t imagine Mai and Ajisai-san arguing with one
another to begin with, but that’s a moot point.
“Y-yeah, we happened to
bump into each other, and she offered me a ride,” I explained.
“Cool,” she said. “Makes sense to me.”
She beamed, and I forced
myself to smile awkwardly and insincerely back. Ugh, this was mortifying!
Kaho-chan laughed. “So you tangled with Little Miss High Horse, huh?”
After we’d finished eating
with the whole friend group at lunch, Kaho-chan and I stood around talking on a
convenient staircase landing. I was a little concerned
about leaving the classroom, but I felt okay since Kaho-chan was there with me.
As long as
I had Kaho-chan around, I could go anywhere. She was my owner, and I
was content to nip at her heels.
“That really sucks,” she
said. “If I
were there, I coulda made you guys get along. Sorry I wasn’t there to
protect you.”
I made a whining noise as
she scratched me under the chin. I could feel all my
mental scars fading away. At the same time, I could also feel every last scrap of my human
dignity being flushed down the drain, but you can’t make an omelet without
breaking a few eggs. You win some, you lose some. Talk about a difficult
balance indeed.
“Why does she hate the
Quintet so much?” I asked.
“You get aggressive,
ambitious girls like her wherever you go,” Kaho-chan told me. “The way I see it, you
gotta have hella self-confidence to legit think you can dethrone Mai.”
Since Kaho-chan poked her
head in with friend groups all around the school, she was the Quintet’s
informant. If
this were a game, she’d probably be the NPC who told you how all the love
interests felt about you.
“Sucks for her, though,”
she said, “’cause she’s got like a one-in-100,000,000 chance of winning.”
Forget a one-in-a-million
chance, yeesh!
“I don’t know anything
about the kids in Class B,” I said. “Are any of them popular?”
“I guess there’s some
pretty popular girls, yeah,” she said. “Good-looking. Loud. Strong-willed.”
Bluh.
Those were
the type of girls I was weak against.
“You don’t even like hearing me
talk shit, do ya?” she asked.
Yeah… That was fair. Hearing bad things about
someone I knew like Mai or Satsuki-san dealt double damage, but even hearing
bad stuff about total strangers made me upset. I mean, I’m not saying
this because I’m some saint or something, obviously. It’s more that whenever I
heard someone shit-talking other people, it always made me reflect on myself. Whenever someone was like,
“Man, so-and-so can’t read the room to save their life,” it inevitably made me
focus on my own ability (or lack thereof) to read a room. Whenever I happened to
hear someone say, “Look at that bozo thinking they’re a hotshot,” I remembered
that my test scores weren’t all that great either and vowed to not get too big
for my britches. You
know, stuff like that. I’d
chastise myself.
So I wasn’t cool with it. Even if they were talking
about someone who wasn’t actually there, I still felt like I was being
criticized. That wasn’t the same thing as being a good person, I’m sure. If anything, it was more
like being ridiculously self-centered.
“’Kay, ’kay,” Kaho-chan said.
“I’ll try my
hardest to make it sound like I’m not talking shit. But god, the 5déesses
don’t make that easy.”
While being considerate
to me, she then introduced me to each of the members. Takada Himiko-san was
their leader. She was tall, gorgeous, athletic, and to top it all off, had rich
parents.
“Plus, she’s super-duper
smart,” Kaho-chan said. “Believe it or not, ever since she got here, she’s never dropped below
the top three in the class ranking!”
“Whoa!”
I said automatically. “That’s, wow… That’s
pretty impressive.”
Top three, she said. Top
three!
Kaho-chan nodded. “And our girls in the top two are always competing with each other and
paying, like, zero attention to anyone else. Which is why she’s like that.
And I mean, I get it. But, like, that’s no
excuse to go bothering people, y’know? That’s a whole other
story, Rena-chin!”
I was about to sink into
the swamp of sympathy for Takada-san when Kaho-chan jerked me right back out of
it again by the arm. Yeah, she made a good point. Just because you were
frustrated didn’t mean you could go and take your anger out on other people.
“So about the other guys,”
Kaho-chan went on. “There’s Kamesaki Chiduru-chan, the one who’s totally copycatting
Saa-chan. Then
Haga Suzuran-chan’s the one copycatting Aa-chan, and the one who’s copycatting
me is Nemoto Miki-chan.”
“Can you really explain it
with such a rough summary?” I
asked.
I was super shocked. I mean, I thought they
were copycatting us too, but for this to be something that everyone knew?
Kaho-chan went on to talk
more about those three. Kamesaki-san was on the library committee and Haga-san was a part of
the student council. Nemoto-san was some kind of mystery peppy girl. A woman of intrigue, if
you will.
“And that’s that!” Kaho-chan
said. She
made a face like she was all done. But that latter half of
her explanation was pretty slapdash…
“Uh, what about
Terusawa-san?” I asked. You know, the girl
copycatting me…actually, not at all, but you know what I mean! The cute, peppy girl who
wasn’t copycatting me in the slightest, Terusawa-san.
“Hmm?”
Kaho-chan said. “Oh, her?”
She was just about to talk
when someone leaped out at us.
“Oh, there you are!” this person cried. “Amaori-san, Koyanagi-san, there’s huge trouble!”
It was Hirano-san, our
fangirl.
“Ooh, what’s goin’ on?” Kaho-chan asked.
“Oh my god, Koyanagi-san
from the Quintet is so close to me!” Hirano-san gushed. “You’re so terrifyingly, awesomely adorable! Wait, no, that’s not what
I meant.”
Hirano-san told us that
she’d been on her way to the bathroom where she saw Satsuki-san tangling with
the Class B girls in the hallway. Sensing that something
was up, Hirano-san hid and watched as the three girls took Satsuki-san back
behind the school building. Considering the recent
declaration of war, she’d decided to let the Quintet know and thus set out to
find us.
“I hope Satsuki-san’s
okay,” I said.
“This is Saa-chan we’re
talking about,” said Kaho-chan. “She’s prolly fine.”
But I was still worried
in spite of Kaho-chan’s reassurance. No matter how mature
Satsuki-san acted, she really was just a teenage girl in her first year of high
school like the rest of us. I didn’t think she could
get ganged up on by three kids her age without batting an eyelid. I mean, I couldn’t even
handle one kid my age without ending up on the verge of tears. Even Satsuki-san had to
be feeling pretty hopeless right about now.
To be honest with you, I
was really freaking scared of standing up to those girls…but! Even if my hands were
trembling! Even
if I really wanted to nope it out of here all the way home, forget everything
that ever happened, and go straight to bed! I couldn’t just leave her
there. Lord
only knew what Satsuki-san thought about me, but I at least considered
Satsuki-san to be a very precious friend!
Just like they said on
the weather report, the sky this afternoon was filled with thick, heavy clouds.
It looked
like it was about to rain at any minute, and we ran down the covered outside
hallway back to the area behind the school buildings. We turned the corner and
there…we saw…a sobbing girl.
I instinctively began to
call Satsuki-san’s name, but then it hit me…
“Oh, hello, Amaori and
Kaho,” said Satsuki-san. “What’s
the matter? Can it not
wait?”
Let me try to set the scene. Satsuki-san was backed up
against the wall of the building as if the others had trapped her there, while
three other girls—the 5déesses minus Takada-san and Terusawa-san—stood in front
of her. One
of them was blubbering, while the other two on either side of her looked at
Satsuki-san like she was a bear they’d run into on a snowy mountain. What the heck was going on?
“Saa-chan mopped the floor
with ’em…” Kaho-chan said.
One of the girls trying
to comfort her friend shouted, teary-eyed too, “H-how could you say such
terrible things? I don’t
believe you!”
“Terrible, you say?” Satsuki-san leveled her
gloomy gaze at them, making all the girls immediately stiffen. Eep. I got caught in the
crossfire, and it made me shiver too. “You dare stand there and
call me ‘terrible’ after you dragged me all the way back here and subjected me
to your monotonous blithering? Your shamelessness knows
no bounds.”
“Y-you’re so full of
yourself, using such big words!”
“Oh?
I was
attempting to use the most cretin-friendly language at my disposal, but it
appears that my efforts were in vain. You must be far more
sophomoric than I could have ever fathomed. It begs the question how
you ever managed to score high enough to enroll at Ashigaya; considering your
distinct lack of intellect, it must have taken quite the effort.”
“C-come on, compete with
us…to see who’s better!” Haga-san
whined.
Satsuki-san looked her way. Haga-san blatantly
flipped out as Satsuki-san locked on to her.
“Very well,” she said. “Shall we compete, then?”
“Let us compete here and
now, and once this is over, you are to never bother me again for as long as we
both shall live. I care little about what we compete with. Well, you suggested this
yourself. So what’s
it going to be?”
“W-wait, hold on,”
Haga-san said.
Satsuki-san immediately
moved in closer. Haga-san squeaked and stepped back just as much as Satsuki-san moved
forward.
“Why, I seem to recall
your bunch saying that running away makes one a coward,” Satsuki-san said. “Or am I wrong?”
I felt like I was
watching a witch torment some poor village girl. Honestly, what on earth
had I been worried about? There was no way Satsuki-san would lose a 3v1. Who’d these girls think
they were going up against? The
Koto Satsuki, that’s who.
“We’ll get you…next time!” the girls said, and then
having delivered that old-school parting line, they stampeded away.
I watched them go for a
few moments before snapping back to my senses and dashing up to Satsuki-san. Right. Satsuki-san was a real
show-off, so even if she acted like she was totally unaffected, she could
actually be really hurt deep down.
“Are you okay, Satsuki-san?” I asked. “You’re not, like, hurt
or anything anywhere, are you?”
“I’m fine.” Satsuki-san flicked her hair with all the nonchalance of someone out
for her early afternoon coffee break. She really was acting
like nothing had even happened, huh? “I suppose I would have
felt a bit threatened had they pulled a gun on me, but they didn’t. These are only three
teenage girls, you know. They’re nothing to write home about.”
“Uh, you’re a teenage girl
too?!”
“One must ignore one’s
own shortcomings if one wishes to seize the mental advantage over their
opponents. Then
one is obliged to target each of their weaker rivals and obliterate them one by
one. That’s all
there is to it.”
Well, easy for her to say. But she had a point. In FPS games, the first
thing you wanted to do when you were at a numerical disadvantage was to put
every effort into thinning the ranks of your enemies. In theory, at any rate. Whether or not you could
actually pull that off was another matter.
Satsuki-san turned around
to face us. “Were you
worried? Did
you both come to help me?”
“Huh?”
I said. “I mean, yeah. Kinda…”
Kaho-chan grinned casually. “Yup, but looks like you
didn’t need the help, huh?”
“I think not,” Satsuki-san
said, bluntly. “But thank
you.”
“S-sure thing.” I was kinda happy we could talk so naturally like this. In a sense, I was glad
we’d come running to her rescue.
Kaho-chan lifted her
pointer finger and grinned. “Welp, guess the Class B
kids’ve learned their lesson, huh? Now that they’ve been
split in half by the long blade of the Quintet’s shock corps, they’ll think
twice before messing with us for a while!”
Even I, a pessimist at
heart, felt the same.
But things were only
getting started.
“Sounds like you guys had
it pretty rough yesterday,” Ajisai-san said to me over lunch. Her soothing voice was
like the water of a hot spring seeping into my soul.
Today had been pretty
peaceful, and I figured it’d stay that way for a while. No more of life’s
hardships or sadness for me, just smooth sailing for the rest of high school. All one needs in life,
really.
And as a part of that, I
was presently sitting in the classroom chatting with Ajisai-san.
“Yeah,” I said, “but I’m
kinda glad they chose to target Satsuki-san out of all of us.”
If they’d gone after me
instead, I’d probably have burst into tears within a few seconds. But then would Kaho-chan
and Satsuki-san have come to my rescue? I’d feel like I would owe
them for life if that had happened. I’d become their gofer.
Kaho-chan said the other
girls had gone after Satsuki-san because she tended to go off and do her own
thing a lot of the time. That was certainly true, but I also felt like Satsuki-san was the
number one worst person in the Quintet to go picking a fight with. You know what I mean?
“Hey, what would you have
done if they’d gone after you?” I
asked.
“Me?”
Ajisai-san
stared off into space, like she was following a cloud with her eyes, and then
cocked her head to one side. “I guess I’d want to try
talking it out with them first. I’d have the time for it
if it was during lunch, so I’d ask them why they were doing this and stuff.”
“What if they weren’t
willing to talk…?”
“Hmm.
I think I’d
still be patient and try to hear them out. I mean, we’re not talking
about total strangers here. These are our classmates.”
I imagined a ring of
girls surrounding Ajisai-san with hostility. It was kind of a
depressing thought.
“B-but I feel like that’s
sorta dangerous…” I pointed out.
“Don’t worry, it’s fine,”
she said. “I
ran into this kind of thing all the time back in junior high.”
That took me aback. “You
did?!”
“Yeah.
I mediated
in a number of fights back then.”
Okay, I couldn’t imagine
that at all. Ajisai-san,
a mediator? What
on earth did she mean?
“Hey, in junior high…were
you, like…you know?”
Did Ajisai-san used to
be…a wild child?! For a split second, I imagined Ajisai-san with her hair dyed blonde,
her natural hair color already creeping in at the roots. Ajisai-san in a crop-top
uniform, miniskirt, big cell phone strap on her bag, leering at the camera:
delinquent Ajisai-san. Did that mean she’d sort of turned over a new leaf for high school too?
Damn, Ajisai-san…
“Wh-what’d you used to be
like back in junior high, Ajisai-san?” I asked.
Taking no notice of my
ludicrous vision of her, Ajisai-san giggled. “That’s top secret.”
So she really was a
delinquent?! Ajisai-san! Well, everything made so
much sense now… Even how close to her family she was—everyone knows delinquents
are big on family. And that also explained how she was so optimistic and ready to roll
with the punches! And why she was so honest and
upfront with everyone. It was all because she used to be a bad girl!
“Ah, I think you’re
picturing something kind of weird,” she said.
Ajisai-san giggled. “I was the student
council president back in junior high, you see.”
“Oh, huh, okay… Wait, you
were the president of the student council?!”
That was cream of the
junior high crop! Come to think of it, I’d always figured student council presidents were
born into their role. And then once a student council president, always a student council
president. I’d
never considered someone resetting upon entering high school and becoming a
regular student.
“Does that startle you?” Ajisai-san asked.
“Y-yeah… But in the sense
of, like, now that you say that, it makes total sense.”
Ex-student council president-sama… You were once part of a
class of people that were far beyond the likes of me, Ajisai-san…
At Ashigaya High, uniform
customization was permitted to a certain extent—provided it followed common
sense—and so Ajisai-san, too, wore a thin ribbon that wasn’t part of the
standard uniform. It looked great on her and was really cute, but it also wasn’t the kind
of thing I’d expect a student council president to wear, not when they took the
initiative to follow school rules. That sort of laid-back
style was pretty Ajisai-san-ish. Wow. Student council president,
huh?
They’d even form a fan
club for her and stuff. I mean, I’d probably do it myself. And then pretty soon,
fights would break out to determine the club’s pecking order, and I’d be
threatened by some really popular girl who came along after me, whereupon I’d
sadly hand over the seat of fan club president to her… It wouldn’t take long
for me to be driven out of the fan club and end up shutting myself away at
home…
Even in my wildest
daydreams, there was no hope for me. Enough of that!
Ajisai-san made a teensy
heart with her fingers. Aww, cute.
“Would you be my fan too,
Rena-chan?” she asked.
“In a heartbeat,” I said. “I’d probably match your
style and try to make my hair look like yours.”
“Aww, really? That’s so cute,” she said. “You should totally do that.”
She put her hands
together across her chest and beamed at me. You’re
the cute one, Ajisai-san,
I thought. But
me cosplaying Ajisai-san… I felt like I’d just see myself in the mirror, return
to my senses, and immediately want to die. It was a crime for Amaori
Renako to try and convince herself that she was Sena Ajisai.
Just then, Mai came over to
us.
“You look like you’re
having quite the fun conversation,” she said.
“You know it, Mai-chan,”
said Ajisai-san. “Since we’re on the subject, were you a part of any clubs when you were
in junior high?”
“I would have liked to
have done something, but my familial circumstances didn’t permit it,” Mai
explained. “But
as I was required to have a club membership of some kind, I was allowed to join
the same literature club as Satsuki.”
“Aww.
You guys used
to be clubmates.”
“I wouldn’t word it like
that, per se,” Satsuki-san said, joining in the conversation. Ah yes, the kaiju who’d
gone on a rampage yesterday: Satsukizilla. “She only showed up when
it suited her, and she didn’t use her time there well either. She didn’t even read any
of the books I recommended to her.”
“That’s because you
devour books at your pace,” Mai said. “I couldn’t keep up with
you.”
Ajisai-san turned the
conversation back to me. “How about you, Rena-chan? Were you in any clubs in
junior high?”
Oh
no. I’d
been afraid that was where this conversation was headed. Oh god, what was I
supposed to do? Okay. Time to employ my
truth-fudging technique: hide the truth, never tell them the important bit, and
make them get the wrong idea.
“I was sorta in the
basketball club,” I said.
“Ooh, wow. I would never have expected that,” said Ajisai-san.
“I mean, I wasn’t that
serious about it. You
know how it is.”
Yeah, I’d shown up on the
first day of club and struggled through the weight training for a month or so,
but then I didn’t want to go anymore and put in an application to change clubs.
That’s what
you call communication skills right there.
I nodded, my brain filling
with question marks. What the heck was she talking about? PE, maybe?
“Oh yes, absolutely,” Mai
chimed in. Satsuki-san,
meanwhile, looked bored and went back to her seat.
Seriously, what was this
all about? But
I soon found out during our next home room.
There was an event
written up on the blackboard, featuring both softball and basketball. All the girls in the
class had to pick one or the other. Naturally, I wanted to go
for softball, because it required a lot less individual responsibility than
basketball.
And yet, and yet—my name
was already up there on the board under the basketball heading. How the heck had this
happened to me?!
Home room went on as I
sat there trembling. Our two class committee members, Shimizu-kun and Kaho-chan, stood in
front of the blackboard and cheerfully filled in all the names.
Kaho-chan chuckled. “We’re gonna go out there
and win this thing!”
Damn
it! If I’d
laughed and been like, “Aw, man, basketball’s too much effort. I’m cool with softball,”
then maybe they’d have let that slide. After all, I was the
Quintet’s Amaori Renako. One
of the top! Girls! In! The! Class! But…
The top girls in the
class all got there from being, like, cute, carrying on funny conversations,
getting good grades, being fashionable, and so on. That’s what made other
people respect them and gave them an aristocratic status. If I acted noncommittal
or did contemptible things, I wouldn’t be cut out to be a top kid in the class.
Then
everyone would hate me, and I’d be kicked from the Quintet! And besides, everyone in
class was counting on me, since I said I used to play basketball.
How far could I exercise
my Quintet authority? I really needed to find the exact boundary line. Was this it?
As I watched, the members
of the basketball team were decided. I felt like I was
watching a little too closely, but under my intense supervision, things
surprisingly turned out for the better. Three out of the team’s
five members came from the Quintet: me, Kaho-chan, and Satsuki-san.
“That’s ’cause nobody can
beat Mai-Mai in softball!” Kaho-chan declared.
“I will do my best,” Mai
pledged, and all the other girls picked for softball looked relieved.
Ajisai-san clapped. “I wouldn’t expect any
less of you, Mai-chan.”
Mai chuckled. “Thank you for saying so. I’m sure that’ll help me
go above and beyond what I normally do. All right. Let me promise to lead Class A to victory.”
All the girls who’d
picked softball stared at Mai like they’d already fallen in love with her. Truly, she was Ashigaya’s
super darling.
“And!”
Kaho-chan
went on, whacking the blackboard, “Our class’s second ace is here on the
basketball team. Putting Saa-chan here makes this the strongest arrangement for Class
A.”
Personally speaking, I
wanted to see Mai and Satsuki-san bring on a double assault, but Satsuki-san
seemed opposed to that. And I mean, I wanted to have Satsuki-san on my team too!
“Dang, the girls in our
class are freaking tough,” Shimizu-kun muttered seriously, arms folded. The rest of the boys agreed. (By the way, the boys
were apparently playing futsal and volleyball.)
“All righty,” Kaho-chan
said, “let’s rock this thing!” She cheered and pumped her
fist in the air. Apparently unsatisfied by my lack of reaction, she then pointed
straight at me. Huh? “Let’s rock this thing,
Rena-chin!” she repeated.
All attention turned toward
me. Wait, wait, wait! Frantically, I copied
Kaho-chan and raised my fist too. “Hip, hip…hooray?” I
offered.
Kaho-chan grinned and gave
me a thumbs-up, and the class seemed happy too. Thank god. I guess that was the right answer.
Now with our teams squared
away, the interclass athletics competition was two weeks off. I had until then to work
my butt off to make sure I dragged down Kaho-chan and Satsuki-san as little as
possible!
I’d never expected the
competition to turn into such an unwinnable battle. I thought things were
smooth sailing. I was perfectly fine with a chill high school experience dating Mai and
Ajisai-san! Nooo!
Group
Chat Name: 5déesses (4)
Part 2
Queen: …
Queen: This feels almost like a
wake.
Crane-chan: Boo-hoo…
Crane-chan: She’s so horrid… How
could she say such cruel things to us?
Crane-chan: It was just a torrent
of abuse pouring out of her like a fountain… Curse you, Koto Satsuki.
Queen: Did she really get the
better of you that easily?
Star Lily: It was awful! She’s a demon, I tell you!
Queen: So she isn’t a mere
Oduka Mai flunky, I take it.
Crane-chan: Maybe…
Star
Lily: ?
Crane-chan: Maybe… She’s Oduka
Mai’s hired bodyguard…
Crane-chan: No, or perhaps a hired
assassin…?
Star
Lily: ?!
Crane-chan: Did you see the look in
her eyes? The
only way to explain that is if she’s killed a man.
Star
Lily: True!!!
Star Lily: But then what are we
supposed to do?
Star Lily: If we take down Oduka
Mai, will we get an assassin after us?!
Crane-chan: No, Haga, it’s the
other way around.
Star Lily: Wdym?
Crane-chan: If we depose Oduka Mai
from her throne, we’ll weaken the glue that binds them together.
Star Lily: So if Koto Satsuki is a
woman for hire, could we pay her money to switch sides?
Crane-chan: It’s certainly possible. I think it’s a realistic
idea
Star Lily: So…you’re saying we have
no other choice but to try.
Crane-chan: Correct. First things first, we need to sap the Quintet’s fighting strength
Crane-chan: And in order to do
that, our next target is…
Chapter
2:
There’s No Freaking Way I Can Do
Steady Practice!
I STOPPED IN at a sporting equipment
shop on the way home from school and bought a basketball for my own personal
use. It
stirred up memories of when I was a little kid in PE in elementary school. We were all playing ball
games in the gym, everyone playing with whatever ball they wanted. I thought the big
basketballs were super cool, and I wanted to go off and play on my own. But since we didn’t have
very many balls, they told me I couldn’t play alone and forced me into a group
game. There
were about four or five of us passing the thing around, so I didn’t get as many
chances to touch the ball. I remember pondering sadly that something about it just wasn’t quite
what I’d imagined.
That’s probably what
prompted me to join the basketball club in junior high. But they wouldn’t let me
touch the ball there either, and since I sucked at social interactions, I
ended up quitting again real quick.
But now, on the way home,
as I held my very own basketball, it suddenly occurred to me that buying a
basketball would have let me play alone whenever I wanted to, an idea that had
never even crossed my mind before. I’d figured basketballs were school items, so of course you
used them at school.
There were so many times
I remembered feeling like, “Wait, I can do that?” The day I posted a
message on social media by myself. The day I played my first
computer game. The day I styled my bangs on my own.
As I went home, I felt
like a whole new person, broadening my horizons bit by bit. I decided that, after
school tomorrow, I’d take my ball to the nearby park.
The deserted sports area
in the public park was just a few minutes’ walk from my house. It had two basketball
courts, and I stood alone in one of them, wearing my PE uniform.
Thump, thump, thump. The sound of the ball
smacking the ground reverberated around the court. God, this was kinda
mortifying. You
know, the whole idea of the athlete playing outside alone, the people who are
fundamentally good at what they do, the whole lone, hardworking wolf schtick. It felt kinda like that. But all I was doing was
just dribbling by myself, my hands a flustered, waving mess. Whenever an older person
walking their dog or a kid on the way home from school passed by, I broke out
into a weird sweat. I kept imagining them being like, “She’s not very good, but she’s
certainly trying her best,” and snickering. Like an “Oh, good for her”
kind of thing.
Nooooo… If people were
going to be watching, I wanted to be way better before I hit the courts
publicly for the first time… Like spending a year practicing dribbling in my
own room first, that kind of thing! The competition would be
long finished by then, but you know what I mean!
At the very least, if I
had someone here to keep me company, then I probably wouldn’t be so sensitive
to all these eyes on me. Being alone was difficult. I’d take anyone. Come on, give me someone!
And just as I had that
thought, I heard the chime of a bike bell. I jumped and spun around.
“K-Kaho-chan!” I cried. My face lit up. “This is like when you
need a weapon but don’t care what, and the game drops the strongest assault
rifle right next to you!”
Kaho-chan parked her bike
and trotted over. She was wearing exercise clothes too, but she had a pleated sports
skirt that was both good for moving in and fashionable. Quintalicious! (That’s the sound of
admiration.)
“Wh-what brings you here?” I asked.
She showed me her phone. “And, like, what else was
I supposed to do? You were blowing up my phone with stuff like, ‘I’m going to start
training in basketball today! (wink wink) Starting at
4:30 in the park! (nudge nudge) All by myself! (wink wink nudge nudge)’
The hint dropping is disgusting!”
Eep.
Well, I
never expected her to actually show up…
I must note that I also
tried this maneuver on Satsuki-san, but she totally left me on read.
“Thank you, thank you,” I
said. “Kaho-chan,
you are indeed my best friend for forever.”
“Aw, jeez,” she said. “You sure know how to lay
it on thick. Whatever,
it’s no biggie. I wanted to get some practice in anyway. Now you still have twenty
bestie points left.”
“What’re bestie points?!” Here came a whole new
mechanic out of nowhere.
“And how many did I use up
with this…?”
Kaho-chan lifted a finger. “’Bout a hundred.”
“And I only have twenty
left?! Go home,
Kaho-chan, now! Delete
all the messages! I’ll
practice on my own.”
“Nah, I’m just yankin’
your chain.” She grinned at me with her fang sticking out, evidently amused. Grr… She was screwing with
me again!
“Hey, c’mon, pass the
ball,” she said.
From what I remembered,
you had to hold it in front of your chest like you were about to thrust it out.
I tossed it
to her, and she caught it and started to dribble. I didn’t have the
know-how to comment on anyone’s dribbling technique, but she seemed to be doing
pretty good. Although maybe that was only because Kaho-chan was so darn cute she
looked good doing anything.
I hunkered down and ran at
Kaho-chan. I
was confident (in as much as I could be) of my defense skills. I mean, I had good
reflexes from playing FPS games.
I reached out as far as I
could and nimbly whisked the ball out of her hands! (Jk, I missed.)
I didn’t say anything, but
Kaho-chan giggled.
Okay,
now I whisked the ball out
of her hands! (Jk, I
missed again.)
Whisk, whisk, whisk! (Jk,
Jk, Jk.)
Kaho-chan nimbly moved the
ball left and right and slipped past me before I could so much as blink. Argh. Unchecked by me, she made
her way to the hoop and launched a jump shot. The ball traced a
parabola in the air and swished through the net beautifully.
“Oh hey, I made it in,”
Kaho-chan said.
“Say whaaa?” I followed the path of the ball with my eyes, dumbfounded. I couldn’t believe it. “Kaho-chan, are you that
good…?”
“I call BS!” I
retorted. “If
that’s how it worked, you’d be literally unstoppable in everything. What’re you, an innate
copycat?”
“You’re a riot,” Kaho-chan
said. “You
always have ginormous reactions.”
Believe me, I wasn’t doing
this for her entertainment!
“Anyway, forget cosplay,”
she said. “I’m
really not all that good. I’m just kinda average, y’know? That means that you’re the
problem here.”
Kaho-chan put a hand to
her mouth and snickered, fangs peeping out past her lips. “That’s. ’Cause. You. Suuuck,” she singsonged.
I challenged Kaho-chan
once again. No more
playing Mr. Nice Guy, oh no!
I’d show her! But…
“Oooh, you’ll never beat meeee. Loooser, loooser,
looooooooseeeeeeer.”
“Oooooh, guess who lost
again? You
sure do love losing, don’t you, Rena-chin?”
I fell to the ground and
yelled, “Goddamnit!”
I couldn’t win at all. I’d already racked up
maybe twenty losses in a row. Heck, I hadn’t even
touched the ball once. I felt buried up to my waist in the snowdrifts of disgrace.
Kaho-chan stuck her
tongue out and laughed. “Sorry, I was having so much fun, I got a li’l carried away. I didn’t mean to beat you that badly. C’mon, cheer up.”
She patted me on the head
with her tiny hand. This was too blatantly an attempt at the carrot and stick method, and
yet I was still glad that she was being nice to me. Kaho-chan had full control
over my nervous system, like she knew exactly what provocation would cause
which reaction. Damn. Damn! That only made things
more frustrating.
“I’m not gonna play with
you anymore,” I whined.
“Aw, why not? Are
you sulking? Sulky
sulky Rena-chin-chan?”
“Hmmph!”
I puffed up
my cheeks and looked the other way. Yeah! This is what you get!
“C’mon, Rena-chin,
Rena-chin, Reeena-chin. Look at
me. Lookie, lookie.”
I resolved to not react
as she poked at my pouting cheeks. I-it did tickle, though.
She then laid a hand on
my cheek. Huh? Slowly, she forced me to
turn in her direction.
Kaho-chan’s face was
startlingly close. The heat of her stare was so intense my cheeks were on fire within
moments. Eeep.
As she hit me with those
pretty girl puppy-dog eyes at point-blank, she whispered to me, “Rena-chin… I’m
sorry. I feel
really bad, I prommy. Could
you forgive me?”
The direct attack messed
with my brain. “Ughhhhhhh,”
I groaned. “Yeah, I
forgive you…”
“Yay!
Love ya lots,
Rena-chin!”
Kaho-chan patted me on the
head. She
sure had a lot of variation in her apology repertoire, between all this and the
groveling she’d done the other day. But to top it all off,
each of them had the power to deal a knockout blow. With apologies like
these, I’d forgive her even if she dumped muddy water over my head for no
reason. This spelled
disaster. Nothing
went my way when Kaho-chan was in perky girl mode. I felt like a maid at the
complete mercy of her super powerful mistress.
“Kaho-chan, why don’t you
put your glasses on for a bit…?” I suggested.
“Why?
We’re in
the middle of exercising.”
Yeah, but I had the
advantage against that Kaho-chan!
Unable to think up
anything productive to suggest, I hung my head. Kaho-chan was too strong. I couldn’t beat her…
“Hey, just so y’know,
you’ve been really hanging back this whole time,” Kaho-chan told me. “You being shy, Rena-chin?”
“Being shy?” I
repeated. Was I?
“Like, I didn’t feel any
kind of pressure from your defense, y’know? Like you were being
really timid. There was this big ol’ gap between us. You gotta get close or
else you’re never gonna reach me. You feel me?”
My heart skipped a beat. I knew what she was
talking about, of course. But at the same time…
“If I do that,” I said,
“I might accidentally touch you.”
“Nah, nah, nah.” She waved her hand no, her expression serious. “That’s a gimme in sports.”
“No, it’s not!” I
insisted. “I
can’t possibly touch you by accident in the middle of all the confusion. That’d be hella rude!”
“Weren’t you literally
just hugging me, like, two minutes ago?!”
“Yeah, well that was
different. That’s
because I was in a crisis. This is another thing entirely!”
How come she didn’t get it? When Kaho-chan was
dribbling and looking straight at me, I felt like she could predict every one
of my actions. It
was super embarrassing. Besides, Kaho-chan was so skinny that I felt like I’d knock her over
(and then with her lying there under me…well, we all know where that goes) if I touched her.
In other words, that
meant: “Kaho-chan, it’s all your fault for being so darn cute!”
My shout echoed across
the basketball court.
Kaho-chan’s eyes lit up
with an alluring gleam. “Oooh~”
“Gah!”
I felt like
I’d gone and dug my own grave again.
Kaho-chan got a flirty
little smile on her face and opened both arms. “All right. C’mere,
then.”
“We’re gonna have a
special training to get you used to touching women’s bodies,” she said.
“I have one of those too,
you know!”
I stuck my hands all over
myself to show her, but Kaho-chan didn’t let that count.
“If we don’t do
anything,” she said, “you’re gonna make for a rotten teammate, y’know?”
“Gah!”
I said again. “T-true, but still! Look, the girls on the
other team can’t be as cute as you, right?”
“They won’t be! You’re the cutest person in the whole world, Kaho-chan.”
“Maybe so,” she said,
easily accepting that title, “but no matter who we’re facing off against,
you’re still not gonna be able to touch ’em, y’know? If you don’t practice,
then there’s no way you can do it when it comes to the real deal. See, before a shoot, I
always practice with a camera in front of my mirror and figure out what makes
me look best.”
The additional argument of
Kaho-chan’s hard work as a cosplayer sunk my opposition.
“Fine, fine!” I said. “I get it. I’ll do it, I’ll do it. Happy?” But
don’t say I didn’t warn you!
I’d already touched
glasses!Kaho-chan once when I’d washed her, and above all else, I’d gotten my
hands all over Mai during Touched Time. Right? Well,
let’s say that I did! So a little thing like peppy!Kaho-chan wasn’t going to stop me. I was going to have her
making weird noises again, just you wait and see.
“You little friggen-fraggen…”
I mumbled as I squeezed her upper arms.
They were really soft and
almost too slender. Oh no. I was already getting
mortified.
“C’mon, do more!” she
encouraged.
Now I touched the side of
her torso. It
was soft, but I could tell she had real muscle there. Regardless of whether I
wanted to see it or not, the memory of her naked as I washed her back flashed
through my mind’s eye.
“That’s not gonna cut it!” Kaho-chan insisted. “The offense’ll blow
right through you. C’mon, put your whole body into it and slam into me! Like boom!”
Kaho-chan launched
herself at me and slammed into me hard, but I caught myself with my back leg. We ended up so close we
were basically hugging. She was all warm from exercising, and it felt as nice as if I were
cuddling a small animal.
But also, she was pushing
really hard! Hey now, Kaho-chan!
Now wasn’t the time to be
shy. If I
didn’t push back with all my might, she was going to topple me to the ground. So I hugged her petite
frame and gritted my teeth as hard as I could, almost sumo wrestler-esque. However, I couldn’t hold
out any longer, and she pushed me over.
Ack! I hit my back a little. Ow.
When I slowly looked up,
I saw Kaho-chan sitting up astride my waist. But even though she was
right on top of me, I didn’t feel her at all. She was just too light for
that. She
placed her hands on my chest as she straddled me. Hey,
don’t you think that was a little too much? For, you know, a lot of
reasons! Gh… I looked
away.
Her palms pressed down on
my chest. She
was crushing my lungs, making it harder to breathe. If she was going to touch
my boobs, she could at least be a little gentler about it… Wait, no, that was a
problem in and of itself too!
With a vague sort of
expression, Kaho-chan said, “Wow, I’m riding on you while your face is all red.
This is
kinda steamy, don’t’cha think?”
“I don’t know what you’re
talking about!”
I lurched up and Kaho-chan
fell back with a little shriek.
At any rate…Kaho-chan’s
drastic measures had made me somewhat more acclimated to women’s bodies…I
think. Granted,
that was due to the resultant “You bastard!” feeling, but whatever.
“Phew,” Kaho-chan said. “I’m
pooped.”
“Before we start working
on your skills,” she said, “we gotta get you some stamina, girl.”
“The video games have
rotted your brain,” Kaho-chan muttered.
It was starting to get dark. As Kaho-chan sat there
under the light of the street lamp, she seemed a little different from how
she’d been before, kinda mellower. She opened her mouth and
said, “So, how’re things going with Mai-Mai and Aa-chan?”
When I looked at her,
Kaho-chan tilted her head slightly so I couldn’t see her face. “C’mon, you were the one
who was talking ’bout how nervous you were. But you just act like
everything’s A-okay at school.”
“Well… I appreciate you
asking. I
guess…we’re making it work.”
I rubbed my forehead,
feeling a lingering throbbing pain where she’d headbutted me.
“Huh, cool.” Then, after a beat, she added, “I’ve been cosplaying since junior high,
and I’ve heard a ton of gossip over how messy guy and girl stuff can get. That made me think there
was no way three people dating would ever work out.”
“Urgh… Yeah, I get that,”
I said.
“But you’ve always done
stuff that I could never even dream of. So maybe, y’know, you
guys might have a chance.”
That probably meant that
she was rooting for me.
Kaho-chan pointed a
finger straight at me that came to rest just before the tip of my nose. Eep.
“Don’t get the wrong
idea, ’mkay? This is just my opinion as your pal. As an ordinary teen and
as a huge Mai-Mai fan, I am noooot on board.”
Kaho-chan stood up and
chucked the ball at the hoop. It fell short and rolled away.
“Kaho-chan, have you ever
thought you’d want to date someone?” I asked.
“Sure, like, if Mai-Mai
was up for it. Or just that I should, ’cause I’m cosplaying as a people person. But never anything too deep.”
“But you said you get
crushes and stuff—”
“Crushes are crushes!” she
said. “They don’t mean I like like people. I mean, I don’t know how
anything works with love or the kind of like liking you do!”
Kaho-chan ran off to go
pick up the ball. In the fading light, I thought I saw her embarrassed face turning red.
“A-anyway, what I’m tryna
say is that you can complain to me if you want, ’mkay? Mai and Aa-chan are my
real good buddies too, so you’d better make ’em happy. If you don’t, you’re
gonna get it, missy!”
Her words made me realize
something. Yeah,
I guess there was that aspect to it as well. I always thought that
whatever went on between couples didn’t affect any third parties. But to people who cared
for Mai and Ajisai-san and wished them happiness, I was an uncertain and
dangerous element. It would’ve been better if we were a conventional couple, but I’d
chosen to pursue an atypical path and had tons of reproach-worthy traits to
boot. So
that meant…I needed to be better than an average girlfriend, or else no one
would accept us. People were absolutely going to tell them, “You should stop seeing
her!” or
“There’s better people out there.” And Mai and Ajisai-san
would feel hurt if one of their loved ones told them that. Was not hearing those
things all dependent on how hard I worked? God, I didn’t know. Now I felt even more
pressure coming in from this unexpected angle.
But now wasn’t the time
to go whining about it.
“Yeah… I really do want
to make them happy… Or so I’ve been thinking.” I nodded slightly.
“That was awfully quiet…”
Kaho-chan said, looking disgusted. She fooled around with the
ball as she went on. “But I guess back when I started from nothing as a cosplayer, I wasn’t
gonna let anyone stop me, no matter if they criticized me or objected to it… So
I guess I can’t help but support you with the stance you’re taking… Or, y’know,
something like that!”
I got what she was trying
to say. I
got that she was encouraging me, that is.
Even though I might not
have been up to the task at hand, I lifted my head and grinned. “Thanks, Kaho-chan.”
“You betcha!” She gave me a huge nod back. “But you better not only
pay attention to Mai-Mai or Aa-chan and forget about me again! You gotta keep hanging out
with me too.”
“Y-yeah, of course.” I stood up and clenched
my fists. I
could say this with conviction. “After all, I’m really
glad we got to reconnect. I want to get even closer to you now too! I still think that my
girlfriends and my friends are two separate things, but Kaho-chan, there’s
nothing out there that could replace the time I spend with you.”
“O-oh, that’s…good,
then…’n stuff.” Kaho-chan held the ball to her face to hide her mouth and mumbled, “So,
like…uh, I’m not doin’ anything tomorrow. You wanna come to the park
and, like…shoot hoops with me or something?”
The way she asked made it
almost sound like she was begging, with the charm of a cat sidling up to me
going, “Pet me, pet me.” I averted my eyes as hard as I could. I really wasn’t good with
people asking me for stuff like this.
“Sorry…” I said. “I have plans with Ajisai-san tomorrow.”
Kaho-chan lobbed the ball
at me. “You
frickin’ player, Rena-chin!”
“For the last time, I’m
really not!”
When I ran over to the
girl standing in front of the shop, her face lit up. “Rena-chan,” she said.
“S-sorry for being kinda
late.”
“No, don’t worry about it. I’ve just been trying to
figure out what to order anyway.”
The day after basketball
practice with Kaho-chan, I met up with Ajisai-san at a café after school. A new one had opened up
nearby, and we’d been talking about wanting to check it out together.
I peered inside. Since it’d just opened, the place was jam-packed with kids from
Ashigaya. Like,
it was pretty crowded in there.
When we went in, we were
taken to a seat in the back. I sat down opposite
Ajisai-san and relaxed.
“Oh, really? Did it
go okay?” Ajisai-san
asked.
“Yeah, there were too
many people watching for her to do anything. But I guess she’s still
hung up on this competition thing… Even though the members for the inter-class
athletics competition are already set in stone.”
“Mai-chan and I are doing
softball, and the rest of you guys are on basketball, right?”
That meant that, by
virtue of the Quintet being split up, we couldn’t have a direct showdown with
the 5déesses. And we couldn’t swap out members this late in the game even if they
tried. I
wished they would just give me a break already. Oh, but if I started
looking glum, Ajisai-san would get worried. Smile, smile, I reminded myself.
“A-anyway, let’s eat some
sweet treats and forget about all that,” I suggested. I flipped over the menu
and showed it to Ajisai-san.
“R-right, sure,” she said. “I mean, this is a date, after all…isn’t it?” She grinned, her cheeks
turning red.
“Date” was such a tiny
word, but oh, how it could evoke anxiety in me! That’s right, this was a
date… It was a date… It WAS a date… Being aware of
it made me overly conscious of it, even though I’d tried to prevent that by
using a euphemism and telling Kaho-chan I just had “plans.”
“Is this, uh, our first
date as a couple…?” I asked.
“Huh?
Oh, y-yeah…
I-I guess it is.” Ajisai-san nodded woodenly.
Given the way she looked,
it was possible that she’d already been hit by that realization. Oh my god.
“I can’t believe,” I
said, “that our first date is just at a
café on the way home from school.”
I trembled. “We should have done something more dramatic. We should have gone to a
restaurant in a high rise and gotten a window seat so we could look out over
the city at night time. I should have actually dressed up for it. We should have toasted
with champagne and crap…”
“Oh!”
Ajisai-san
tapped the top of my hand, and I came back to reality. “S-sorry about that.”
“Jeez,” she said. “Your brain took a page out of Mai-chan’s book there, huh?”
It astonished me. If I kept using Mai as the standard for dates, I’d never be able to
have a romance on a reasonable scale again. If I kept showing off
despite not swimming in cash, I’d end up as the kind of girl who racked up
debts but kept up appearances in front of her partner. And it was all Mai’s fault! I was doomed!
Ajisai-san wrapped her
hand around mine. “You know, I like dates that are big, grand events like that. I mean, who doesn’t? But what’s way more
important to me is getting to spend lots of time with you. Don’t put me on hold for
two weeks just to prep for something big or anything, okay?”
“That’s not at all what
I’m saying!”
Uh-oh, the Girlfriend
Project Business Proposal me was back.
Ajisai-san sighed. “Oh,
whatever. It’s fine. I know you’re trying your
best for me.”
Did I really just make
Ajisai-san sigh?! You mean to tell me that Ajisai-san sighs at people? Oh, I was done for. I was doomer than doomed. She was going to ask me
to break up right here at this very café. “I thought I had feelings
for you, but I guess I was wrong,” she would say, staring down at me with cold
eyes. “We
really should have just stayed friends, I think. See you around.” Then she’d dump water
over my head and leave me sitting in the café all alone. Ajisai-san,
don’t leave me…
“So you see, I’m going to
be patient and talk things through with you until I make sure you really
understand, you know? It’s like when I tell off the kiddos. I have to make sure they
really get it.” Then, as Ajisai-san looked at me like an oneechan, her mouth formed a
round “o.” “Rena-chan,
why’re you crying?!”
“I-I thought you were
going to leave me here or something…”
Ajisai-san let out a
little sigh once more. Again with the sighing!
God, I wished I was just a little more emotionally stable!
But for the time being,
she’d accepted my “please don’t leave me” plea, and so with that paper-thin
layer of salvation between me and utter doom, Ajisai-san and I looked down at
the menu. You
know, I just had this feeling like—I was the one who’d promised to make her and
Mai happy, you know? But wasn’t I kind of a basket case? Or was that only my
imagination?
“Ooh, look at this,
Rena-chan,” Ajisai-san said.
“A new menu item, huh? A couple’s set?”
It was a campaign where
two people could get cake combos for a slight discount. I figured they’d made it
for the fun of it, what with a school being so close by and all.
“I-I’m kinda embarrassed
to order that…” I said.
“Y-yeah, same…”
Ajisai-san agreed.
A pair of penny-pinching
high school girls being like “We’re a couple uwu!!” was cute and all, but
Ajisai-san and I were a legit couple. So, like…we’d totally
turn bright red.
As I picked out what to
drink, Ajisai-san went back to the conversation at hand. “Hey, Rena-chan, um. Have you said that sort
of thing to Mai before too?”
That sort of thing being
“don’t leave me,” already this month’s nominee for thing I most wanted to leave
behind in my dark past. Hmm.
“Huh, really?” She
looked surprised.
Why
not? Well,
she had a point—Mai was so super rich and a famous model and all that, so she
had plenty of chances to meet attractive girls. If you were going to list
it out, then Mai seemed way more liable to ditch me by the roadside than
Ajisai-san. (How cruel.)
But at the same time, how
come I doubted she ever would? When I tried putting it
into words, the answer came out all too easily.
“I guess because I know
she likes me and all…” I admitted.
Ajisai-san pinned down
that vague sentence of mine and pressed for more details. “How do you know that?”
I could give a lot of
concrete examples. Like there was the time we fell off the roof together. Or the fact that she’d go
after me for my body at the drop of a hat. All the kisses, all the
faces that she wouldn’t let anyone else see but me. The way she blew up my
phone with messages and photos. But those were all things
I couldn’t tell Ajisai-san! It was the way all that
stuff worked together that drove home the point for me that Mai actually had
feelings for me.
As I ummed and uhhed,
Ajisai-san quietly closed her eyes. “I get it now,” she said. For some reason, she
sounded as filled with fortitude as the forty-seven ronin before their big
raid. Wh-what was this all about?
Then Ajisai-san’s hand
shot upward, and she called for the waitress. She then proceeded to
place the order, “W-we’d like to order the couple’s set, please!”
“Um, I’d like the milk
tea and the Basque cheesecake please. R-Rena-chan, what’re you
having?”
After we finished our
flustered ordering and the waitress left, we both sat there in silence. Ajisai-san hung her head,
her face bright red.
“I-I mean, we’re a couple
and all,” she said.
She pouted like she was
complaining. “You know. It’s because we’re a real
couple and everything…”
I really wasn’t sure what
had caused Ajisai-san to flip her switch like that, but…well, it was really
embarrassing, that was for sure. Of course, if anyone
around us saw that, I’m sure they just assumed that we were two teenage girls
doing it for the bit. I mean, even the waitress had smiled a little. But…we were a real couple,
so we were really conscious of how people looked at us. It wasn’t that people
were shooting us daggers so much as it felt like they were going “Awww,” as if
we were a kindergarten art exhibit.
“I’m just really, really
trying to make it clear how I feel,” Ajisai-san said in a tiny voice.
Just then, the waitress
brought us our cake. Ajisai-san broke off a piece of her cheesecake with her fork and then
pointed it in my direction. She
grinned. “Here, Rena-chan. Say ‘ahh.’”
“Wait, no, uh!” I said. “We don’t have to go that
far, right?!”
“Where’d the ‘san’ come from all of a sudden?! You’re freaking me out!”
Ajisai-san half-smiled,
clearly holding back an explosion of embarrassment. I’d never seen her like
this before.
Oh
god. We
were slowly but surely catching the attention of people around us. Ajisai-san seemed
oblivious to the watching eyes, and it felt like she was backing me up along
the edge of a cliff with every passing moment.
“You’d eat it if Mai-chan
offered, wouldn’t you? Come on, Rena-chan, don’t be a butt!” Ajisai-san insisted.
“Then I’ll be just as
incessant! Come on, say
‘ahh’! Here. ‘Ahh’!”
Ajisai-san kept pushing
the fork, a wild look forming in her eyes. If I kept turning her
down, I felt like she was going to stab the fork right into my mouth.
Gripped with the feeling
that I was flinging myself off the cliff, I opened my mouth. “A-ahh…!” I said.
I gulped down a gaping
bite of the cake she’d offered me. As I watched the fork
retreat, I put a hand to my mouth and lifelessly said, “Fyeah, ish…ghood…”
“Good…good! Great,
thank you!” Ajisai-san
put her hands to her cheeks and beamed.
I mean, I couldn’t begin
to tell you what it tasted like, but whatever. Ajisai-san sure looked
cute when she smiled. I mean, she looked cute when she was mad too. And when she wasn’t
making any sort of facial expression at all. And when she sneered down at me like I was something vulgar (not that I’d
ever seen this before).
Still, a smile looked
especially good on her. This really was what people meant when they said a smile bloomed across
someone’s face. Well, if I got a smile like this, that made up for my shame. Boy, handling your
girlfriend’s coaxing is a real ordeal, don’t you think? Tough stuff for sure.
“Okay, now it’s your turn,
Rena-chan,” she said.
Wait.
Did she
mean, she wanted me to do the same to her? To her, with her
mouth open like a baby bird?
What I had next to me was
a tiramisu. I
wished I had something that’d be way harder to feed her instead, just to resist
this pressuring “Ahh”…like shingen mochi with all its messy kinako powder. Alas, that wasn’t on the
menu.
“Aren’t we a couple, after
all?” She
pouted ever so slightly and stared at me. She seemed hellbent on
using that word today to slaughter me repeatedly.
“Uh.
You know. There’s, like…tons of people
here,” I said.
“Won’t you please feed
me, Renako-san?”
And for crying out loud,
enough with the san! It
was freaking me out.
Oh, that’s right. I was an android that existed to bring Ajisai-san happiness. I came to the Sena
household when she was born and ever since then I’d stayed with her and kept a
protective eye on her as she grew up.
Gh! What was a little thing
like this, if it was for my mistress? Yes, it was mortifying as
hell, but it wasn’t going to kill me. I’d do it. It
was just an ‘ahh’! Heck,
I could do that. And I’d already resolved to try my best, so it was time to show that by
putting it into action!
Rallying my morale with
everything I had, I looked up and saw…Ajisai-san trembling and hiding her face.
Oh, not this again.
“Oh gosh, I’m sorry,
Rena-chan,” she said. “I’ve been saying selfish things nonstop today. It’s okay, we can stop here.”
Oh god, don’t get
depressed on me out of nowhere! I thought.
“Wh-what’s the matter?” I
asked. “Hey, Ajisai-san! You want to say ‘ahh’, right?
‘Ahh’!”
“No, it’s…it’s okay. Now that I think about
it, having my mouth gaping like that and all looks, well, kind of
inappropriate…”
“No, it doesn’t,” I said. “You looked cute, Ajisai-san.
You were
the cutest in the whole world!”
“Mmm, I don’t know…”
Ajisai-san looked as distressed as if her head were being squeezed in a ring.
“You wanna say ‘ahh,’ right? You totally do,” I insisted. “We’re not leaving this
restaurant until you say ‘ahh’! I mean, we’re a couple,
after all. Right?”
I really had no choice at
this point but to force her into it. As I strained myself to
put a smile on my face, I thrust a spoonful of tiramisu at her.
“Here, c’mon. Here comes the airplane. Can you open wide for me,
Ajisai-chan? Can you say
‘ahh’?”
Ajisai-san leaned forward
and tucked her hair behind her ear. “Ahh…” she said. Her lips parted before closing over my spoon. Oh. Oh god. For some reason, my heart
skipped a beat. This was a scene that could stir the heart of even an android. I mean, like, this was
kinda…you know, kinda…!
Her little tongue flicked
out and licked the spoon. She smiled modestly. “I love it,” she said.
Like, this was kinda
sensual, you know?!
Hey, I’m not the only one
thinking this, right? I thought. You guys upstairs, you
get what I mean? Right?
Satsuki-san was disgusted. “You really have no
shame… Despicable.”
Ajisai-san scoffed, “Gosh,
Rena-chan, that’s all you ever think about. Sexually frustrated much?”
And then Kaho-chan
brought up the rear, whispering to me, “You’re a mondo perv, Rena-chin!”
What the heck? How come all four of them ganged up on me? Not one tried to help me
out here! Come
on, they were people who lived in my brain—you’d think they’d try to be a bit
nicer to me!
Ajisai-san—the angel, not
the one who lived in my head—laughed. “S-sorry, I just said the
weirdest thing. Here,
let’s dig in.”
Phew.
That was a
panic and a half right there. Still, that was big of
Ajisai-san for bailing me out when it got all weird. Granted, she was the one
who made it really freaking weird in the first place, but still.
Ajisai-san carried her
fork to her lips. I couldn’t take my eyes off of them…
Wait,
no! The
brain gang would just start clowning on me again!
I stabbed my spoon into
my tiramisu and was just about to dig in when. It. Hit. Me.
This was the spoon…that’d
been in Ajisai-san’s mouth… Could I eat dessert with the spoon that’d come into contact with that sacred
mouth? Oh heck no.
I called out to the
waitress passing by, “Excuse me, could I get a new spoon?”
Kaho-chan lost her mind
laughing when I recounted all this to her. “You suck!” she said.
“Ugh…” I hid my face in
my hands.
We were practicing
basketball again today after school. She’d actually wanted to
invite a couple of other people, but Hasegawa-san and Hirano-san—the other
people on the inter-class athletics competition basketball team—couldn’t make
it because of club stuff. Or so they said, but I had a feeling they’d ducked out because they
couldn’t bear to be in the same space as two members of the Quintet. It was a relief that my
teammates were all girls I knew, but I was concerned that with those two, we
might never be able to practice together until the day of the game itself.
Anyway, since neither
Kaho-chan or I were all that great at basketball, we were just kinda practicing
dribbling, passing, and half-assed shooting. I didn’t feel like I was
making all that much improvement…
Kaho-chan finally stopped
laughing, wiping the tears from her eyes. “Oh my god, you are the
literal worst,” she told me. “Rena-chin, don’tcha
think you’re gonna get dumped?”
“Huh?!”
My eyes
bugged out of their sockets. Ajisai-san, dump me? “No, I’d hate for that to
happen…”
“If it does, I’ll be
around to cheer you up,” Kaho-chan said. “God, you’re so hopeless!”
She slapped me on the back. Ugh. Now I was getting
depressed pretty quickly. “This romance stuff is hard…” I said.
As I drooped, a
realization struck me. Frightened, I took a step back. “Uh… S-sorry, Kaho-chan. Was that a humblebrag again?”
If even Kaho-chan decided
to desert me now, I really would give up all hope. I peeked at her to see
how she might feel, giving her my most fawning eyes in the process.
“Nah.”
She shook her
head, relaxed. “I dunno, I don’t really think so. You’re just kinda weird is
all. You’re
doing your best, y’know?”
“Oh, Kaho-chan…” God,
having her around was so soothing. “We should live together…
And you should take care of me every night… Be my teddy Kaho-chan and listen to
all my sorrows…”
“Are you tryna hit on me?” she asked.
My limit was two
girlfriends, so my capacity was maxed out already. And, like, even if I had
space for more, that didn’t mean it was okay for me to go making the moves on
Kaho-chan either! T-to be honest, though, I kinda had a feeling I could somehow pull off
casually going out with Kaho-chan… You know, like a
taking-friends-to-the-next-level kind of thing… Like, hey, we used to just be
friends, and I don’t bother about keeping up appearances…and now we’re living
together. But
I couldn’t find a good job, so I’m trying to make a living off of gambling at
pachinko parlors, which causes endless trouble for Kaho-chan. As I leech off her for
money, I’m constantly abusing her and… Wait a minute. This was just the emotionally
unstable, abusive boyfriend Rena-chin and the girl who will never, ever stop
loving her no matter how much Rena-chin beats her, so please, please don’t
leave her ASMR series! I guess I’d never be free
of Kaho-chan’s hypnosis… Before long, I might even start calling Kaho-chan my
dog mommy or something. Or had I done that already? No, no way…
As I trembled on the spot,
Kaho-chan made a face like she knew what I was thinking and clapped me on the
shoulder. “Got it,” she
said. “I’ll
make a new ASMR track and send it to you.”
“N-no, you don’t need to
do that! I
mean, I might listen to it if you send it, but still!”
“Well, maybe one to raise
my self-esteem where I’ve got multiple girlfriends all fighting over me…”
Wait, no. I was not into that whatsoever. Noooo, no, no. My only thought was that I wanted to get acclimated to this current
situation as soon as possible, so I’d asked for something along the same lines.
But believe
me, it wasn’t because I had any desire for that sort of thing at all! You know that, right?
Just after I mysteriously
lashed out, I saw two people appear at the edge of the basketball court—teenage
boys. I
thought no one came to this park, but they looked like they were here to play
basketball too.
“Oh, there they are,”
Kaho-chan said.
She gave them a big wave. Wait, what?
“Like, we’re not gonna
get better practicing on our own, y’know?” she said. “So I figured we’d have ’em around for a day or two to show us the
ropes.”
“Uh, I don’t know about
that…”
All the blood drained
from my face with a whoosh.
Both boys were students
from Class A.
“Yo, wassup, Koyanagi?” said
one.
Hey, I knew one of these
guy’s names! That was
Shimizu-kun. (I had no clue what his first name was, though.) And the other guy
standing behind him, the tall guy, was uhhhhh Yamaguchi-kun from my class, I
think.
I tugged on Kaho-chan’s arm. “K-Kaho-chan!” I said.
“Huh, what?” She looked back at me, puzzled.
Gah! Right. Kaho-chan had no idea
that I wasn’t good with guys, since I’d claimed back in elementary that I was a
class fave with guys and girls alike. This was a textbook
example of being hoisted by my own petard.
“They’re both in the
basketball club,” she said, “so let’s let ’em teach us and level up together!”
True, this would be the
simplest and fastest route to getting better. But it was a double-edged
sword, because that meant the truth would come out: I was completely unathletic
despite once having been in the basketball club. I had to do something
that would prevent me from losing my status as a member of the Quintet while
also seriously putting in effort to get better at basketball. Oh, right, and I also
couldn’t let Kaho-chan catch on to the fact that I wasn’t any good with guys! God, I had my work cut out
for me. I
decided to give up on everything and, for the time being, put all my skill
points into communication.
“Th-thanks for coming out
today, guys,” I said. I made myself smile and lean forward in a very peppy-girl type of pose.
I bet I
looked very upbeat and extroverted…right? I mean, I was an extrovert. Come on now.
Shimizu-kun twirled his
basketball on his index finger (how cool!) and said, “Aight, so what’re we
starting with? Is there any kinda stuff you guys wanna focus on?”
“Shooting!” Kaho-chan’s hand shot up in the air. “I wanna learn shooting!”
“Yeah, I guess you can’t
win if you don’t score points, huh?” he said. “Dope. Let’s give that a shot.”
“Woo-hoo!”
Kaho-chan jumped
for joy. I
guess she was so emotive and easy to read that she could communicate regardless
of how girls talk vs how guys talk.
Yamaguchi-kun said to me,
“I feel like we haven’t really talked before, huh, Amaori-san.”
“R-right, I guess not,” I
said.
This dude was freaking
huge and had gnarly muscles, but his face looked kindly enough. Given that, I wasn’t
nervous…okay, never mind. Not
happening. His
size alone was enough to rule that out. Big things are freaky, you
know?
“I heard you used to be
in the basketball club,” he said.
“Uh, yeah, but I’m really
bad at it…”
He laughed. “And so that’s why you’re training? That’s tight.”
What the heck was I
supposed to do? I
could barely breathe! Was I pulling off the extrovert act? I doubted it!
“How about we practice
shooting for a bit?” he offered. “We’ll use that hoop over
there.”
I shouldn’t have been so
nervous, considering I’d talked to Shimizu-kun before. (A few times. In total.) I had no idea
what was a no-go to say with guys, so I ended up only being able to say the
most totally inoffensive, milquetoast things possible.
As I trembled at the
thought of this, Shimizu-kun jogged over. “Sorry, Yama, you mind
helping Koyanagi? I’ll take care of Amaori-san. You guys’re acting like
you’ve never met.”
“Nah, dude, we’re in the
same class and stuff. But it was nice to meet you, Amaori-san.”
With a clap on the
shoulder, Yamaguchi-kun and Shimizu-kun switched positions. Thank god!
“Aight, you ready to start?” Shimizu-kun asked.
I trailed after him like a
baby duckling until we stood under the hoop.
“Let’s do some layups,” he
said. “By
the way, do you wanna practice shooting two-handed or one-handed? If you wanna hit high
spots, one-handed’s the way to go, but two-handed gets you more distance. More girls these days are
shooting one-handed like guys do.”
“Um,” I said. “I think we could give one-handed a shot… It, like, seems cooler than
two-handed and all.”
“Sick,” he said. “That’s easier for me to show you too.” Shimizu-kun grinned. His boyish smile had a
mix of both rugged masculinity and cuteness.
For a while after that,
Shimizu-kun walked me through my form. I was still nervous, but
since he was teaching me, it was a lot easier to figure out where we both
stood. I
felt better once I figured out I could repurpose the same attitude I showed my
teachers. And! As we practiced, I stopped making shots
that never so much as grazed the net and started getting more near misses.
“W-wow,” I said. “This is kind of fun!”
“Glad to hear it.” Shimizu-kun stood under the hoop and caught the rebound before passing
it back to me.
I tossed it from where I
stood and…it went in. I-it went
in!
“Yup.
Makes
sense, if you used to be in the basketball club.”
“I only showed up to
practice, like, twice,” I said. “Oh, but don’t tell
anyone, okay?!”
As I started to get the
hang of it, it got way more fun. At this rate, I figured I
might even go beast mode in the final competition.
“Heck, I might be pretty
good!” I said.
“Hell yeah,” Shimizu-kun
agreed. “The
kind of genius born every one hundred years.”
“Oh yeah, by the way,”
Shimizu-kun said, “sorry to hear about all that crap you guys have going on.”
“Huh?”
I tilted my
head as I held the ball in front of my chest. Boys weren’t as emotive
in their voices or facial expressions as girls, so I couldn’t really tell what
he was feeling right now.
“You know. Seems to me like the girls’re having a fight,” he said.
“Ohhh.
It’s less
that and more like they’re targeting us.”
“Yeah, but either way, it
seems like a real pain in the ass.” Shimizu-kun picked up the
ball after I dropped it and shot a goal. It soared high up into
the air and swished through the net beautifully. “And, like, guys can’t
really get in the middle of fights between girls, y’know? So I’m sorry all we can
do is watch and stuff.”
“O-oh, yeah, I see what
you mean… Well, thanks anyway.”
“That’s why I figured
helping indirectly would make me feel a little better,” he went on. “I’m glad Koyanagi asked us.”
He passed me the ball. He was probably holding
back some so that I didn’t get hurt. Damn, Shimizu-kun… He was
one good dude!
“Shimizu-kun, you have a
girlfriend, right?” I asked.
“Huh?
Oh, yeah, I guess.” He looked startled for a
second there before he went back to normal. “We’ve been dating since
junior high, so I guess it’s been around two years now.”
“Uh-huh. I can really tell why you’re so popular.”
“Nah, I wouldn’t say I’m
popular or anything.”
I dribbled the ball a
couple of times. “You see, I’m not very good at talking to guys,” I explained. “But you’ve been really
considerate, which is a big help.”
“Nah, you’re cool,” he said. “Sena and Koyanagi are
exceptions, not the norm.”
“How about Oduka-san?” I
asked.
Seeing his expression
darken made me involuntarily giggle. “Hey, Shimizu-kun, does
your girlfriend ever get mad at you?”
“Bro, she is literally
always chewing me out for something or other. I keep forgetting to call
her and stuff.”
I felt a little more at
ease now. It
was like, if even tactful Shimizu-kun messed up, then it was simply a matter of
course that I’d slip up too.
“How ’bout you, Amaori?” he
asked.
“Are you seeing anyone
right now?”
I looked away for dear life. Saying yes would be
embarrassing, but saying no would be a lie. “Sort of. Um, yeah.”
“Cool,” he said. “I
kinda figured.”
Shimizu-kun didn’t grill
me for more details, thank god.
“You seem like the popular
type,” he added.
I was about to tell him
that this was because I was the most eligible bachelorette among the Quintet,
but then I decided this wasn’t something I should tell a guy. Heck, I really was the kind of genius that
came around once every hundred years.
“What’s the matter?” Shimizu-kun asked.
“What time is it?! Oh,
shoot!”
I galloped to my backpack
and dug out my phone. Oh god, it was already this late.
Besides Shimizu-kun,
Yamaguchi-kun and Kaho-chan came over too. “What’s wrong, Rena-chin?” Kaho-chan asked.
“Ooh.
Well look
at you, little miss popular,” she said with a glare. Don’t do
that in front of other people!
Just then, my phone rang,
and the caller ID showed it was from Mai. I immediately picked up. “H-hello!”
“Why, hello, Renako,” Mai
said. “I’m
sorry, do you have a moment to talk about our plans?”
“I’m afraid my work
schedule is a bit compacted, so I might run late today. I’d prefer if you didn’t
wait for me and instead went straight to my apartment.”
Honestly, it was already
past the point when I needed to leave, but if Mai was working late, I guess I’d
be on time somehow. Today
was my lucky day.
“Where are you now?” Mai
asked.
“Uh, I’m just practicing
basketball at the park near my house.”
“Oh?
Then let me
send someone to pick you up.”
After I hung up, I sent
Mai the address. There,
all taken care of. Actually,
not at all. I hadn’t told our helpers an ending time today even after they’d gone
out of their way for us.
I whirled around and bowed
deep.
“Sorry, Shimizu-kun and
Yamaguchi-kun!” I said. “You guys were kind
enough to teach me, but I have plans after this I need to get to.”
“Nah, it’s all good,”
Shimizu-kun said. “I was actually just thinking I need to get going pretty soon too. Same with you, Yama?”
“Yeah, it’s getting
dark,” Yamaguchi-kun agreed. “So, how was it, Amaori-san? Do you feel like you got
any better?”
“Y-yeah, I did. I think. Thanks, guys!”
I smiled awkwardly and
bowed once more.
As we were still saying
our goodbyes, Kaho-chan stretched as far as she could go. “Mmm!” she said. “Boy, I sure worked up a sweat practicing today. Can’t wait to get home
and pop in the shower!”
I laughed. “I feel you there, Kaho-chan.”
Just then, it hit me. Someone was coming to
pick me up…which meant…
“I don’t have the time
for a shower!” I yelled.
My ride showed up not
long after. A huge limousine pulled up alongside the park, and both Shimizu-kun and
Yamaguchi-kun, who were still hanging around for some reason, made twin “ooh”
noises of admiration.
“Sorry—bye—sorry—see you
later!” I said.
Last, Kaho-chan gave me a
big wave of farewell. “’Kay
’kay, good luck!” she called.
I had no idea what she
was telling me good luck for, but also? Mood.
Thus, I set off for the
princess’s castle clad in my workout clothes and with a basketball under one
arm. You
gotta wonder: what was the point of a glamorous carriage when I looked like a
mess?
I sighed. If nothing else, I wished I had at least brought a change of clothes.
Inside the limo, I
sniffed my shirt. Bluh. I smelled like sweat! Now that I’d decided to
try my best at one thing, I was slipping on everything else.
Today, I had dinner plans
with Mai. My
thought was that since I’d gone to that café with Ajisai-san, Mai should be
next. So
I’d asked her if there was anything she’d like to do. I think she was really
looking forward to this. But if I didn’t take it seriously, it would seem like I didn’t
prioritize her. Well, Mai was nice, so she probably wouldn’t think that…but I’d
definitely give myself a failing grade and beat myself up for not trying my
best. A
zero on the project assessment sheet! No contract renewal for me! Ugh, I really wasn’t a
people person at all…
“Is something the matter?” asked a female voice from
the driver’s seat.
“Oh,
um. No,” I said. I must have looked like a
total mess. Ugh,
what a disaster I was… I folded in on myself. “I was just out
exercising, so I think I smell…and, you know, I look like this, and…”
“I see,” the driver said. “You’re quite correct in
both assumptions.”
My head jerked up out of
reflex. The
woman in the driver’s seat was—
“Agh!”
I screamed. “Hanatori-san!”
She said nothing. I retreated to the far corner of the limousine, cowering and trembling.
I was
one-on-one with Hanatori-san in a locked space! In the end, I’d chosen both Mai and Ajisai-san. And to make matters
worse, I’d talked about Touchy Time and Touched Time right in front of her! Oh my god. She was going to kill me.
“Where are you taking me?!” I demanded.
“To my mistress’s
residence,” she said.
“Liar!
I’m going to
end up alone in an abandoned building in the mountains being chased by a
murderer dressed as a clown.”
“Well, if that’s what you
would prefer.”
I wept silent tears of
extreme fear. “Things have just started to get better for me, but I don’t want to die
here. Not
now, not like this…not when there are so many good games coming out in the next
two months…”
Ah, I’d never before
realized how much I wanted to live. But recently, my grades
had started picking up bit by bit, and all my friends weren’t being mean to me
either. I
wished I could be given just a little longer to live…an additional eighty years
or so… By that point in time, the PS20 would be out and they’d have full dive
VR, so even lame ol’ me could have the time of my life being the brave hero who
saved the village.
“We’re here,” Hanatori-san
said.
I yelped, and the car
stopped. Timidly,
I looked out the window and saw a familiar parking garage. O-oh…
“This is Mai’s
apartment…” I said.
I looked up at
Hanatori-san with twinkling eyes. “Hanatori-san, could this
mean…I have your seal of approval…?!”
She threw me a cold look. “What do you take me for? The manager of a death game?”
She left the car, opened
the door, and escorted me inside with a “Right this way.”
I quailed as she looked
me up and down, her indifferent expression growing even more dour.
“Indeed, I cannot let you
see my mistress in such a state. I will see to it that you
have a change of clothes. Please come inside.”
“Hanatori-san!” I
exclaimed. I knew it! She really was doing a
nice thing for me.
“I will expend every
effort to ensure that my mistress does not one day look back on having
fraternized with you and hurt herself with the thought. Now, please, do conduct
yourself around her as best you can.”
She was on my side… Or
was she? How
would you even classify that? Well, she was on Mai’s
side, so that meant she was on mine as well, right? Hmm. Yeah,
I wasn’t sure about that.
I got on the elevator she
led me to. The
silence was prominent in that enclosed space. There was something
weightier about elevator silences compared to ordinary silences. Maybe it had to do with
gravity.
She didn’t so much as stir
from where she stood in front of the control panel.
Was she planning on
staying quiet forever?
“Oh, um. Well. Uh, you sure are fond of
Mai, aren’t you?” I
laughed awkwardly. That was for sure a one-way ticket to getting her mad at me. She might even punch me
in the stomach and yell, “Shut up, you imbecile!”
But all she did was dip
her head in a nod. “That I am.”
Umm… Was this a sign that
it was okay to carry on the conversation? I mean, I was fine with
staying quiet until the universe ended, don’t get me wrong… But it was just,
like, you know. It took so much effort for me to start dating Mai, so to have someone
who spent so much time around her, like Hanatori-san, harbor bad feelings about
me… Well, it wouldn’t feel great. And it’d make Mai unhappy
to boot. If
we could get along well (and even if we couldn’t!), I hoped to be on civil
enough terms that we could chitchat, at the very least. If she had some kind of
wrong idea about me, I wanted to clear it up. I wanted her to understand
that I was serious about Mai.
Now, what was something
the two of us could talk about? Maybe the thing about her
being a rabid Mai × Satsu shipper, like I’d heard at the hot spring inn?
“C-can I ask if you like
Satsuki-san too?” I asked.
“I
do.” Hanatori-san
nodded firmly.
“You’re saying that it’d
be wonderful if Mai and Satsuki-san dated, huh…?”
“That it would. I
won’t give up yet.”
The elevator door opened. I looked up at
Hanatori-san, still flabbergasted. “Wh-what do you mean?”
“It should be self-evident. My mistress is a wise girl. I trust that before long
she will realize what a mistake she has made in carrying on with you.”
She glared at me. Well, no, not really. She just looked at me
like normal, but a chill still ran down my spine. Maybe she had the evil eye.
“She will before long,”
Hanatori-san insisted. She opened the door with a clack and set off for the living room. I trailed along behind.
She’d nodded with such
conviction that now I was anxious. Looking down at the ground
as I went, I muttered, “I-I really don’t think you know anything about me,
though.”
How could she just
flat-out say these kinds of things to me? I wanted to ask her, but
Hanatori-san had disappeared off somewhere. We were in the middle of
a conversation here!
She eventually reappeared
carrying some sort of box. Were those the clothes for me to change into? Nah, that wouldn’t have
made any sense.
“What a perfect
opportunity, venomous pest-san,” she said. “Let me give you a dose
of reality.”
Hanatori-san opened the
box with a dreamy, far-away look in her eyes. Inside were lots of photo
albums, Blu-rays, and other stuff like that. W-wow…
Was Hanatori-san, of all
people, really trying to compete with me like a child?!
Hanatori Hitoe was born
in the remote countryside of Saga prefecture.
She grew up in a village
in the middle of nowhere with only three other children in her generation. Her idea of playtime
amounted to scampering through the nearby fields and hills. To Hitoe, entertainment
was something to be found on TV and the internet—a glamorous world, a glitzy
career. As
she spent her girlhood in tank tops and shorts year round, Hitoe’s longing for
the city life grew stronger by the minute.
When she began college,
she clinched her chance to study in the big city and dove headfirst into her
dream of working in the entertainment industry. She began working part
time as an assistant in a small modeling agency.
Hitoe bent down to
introduce herself to her charge, a nine-year-old model. “It’s a pleasure to meet
you,” Hitoe said. “My
name is Hanatori.”
She wasn’t used to her heels.
Or the suit. Or the big city lingo. Armed with nothing but a
hastily assembled repertoire of tidbits and tricks, she took on the challenge
of this new world with trepidation, whereupon she met a blonde princess.
“Hello,” said the princess. “My name is Oduka Mai, and
it’s a pleasure to meet you too.”
Hitoe squealed. This girl was the embodiment of everything Hitoe admired—long, silky
locks, blue eyes like gemstones, skin as fair as snow. Unlike the rest of
humanity and their ape ancestors, this girl seemed to have formed from the
tears of a goddess, and the sight of her made Hitoe feel like she was struck by
lightning.
At the very same moment,
her ministerial soul awakened. The heavens had created a
person above all people, and this person now stood directly in front of Hitoe. She knew this girl would
go on to captivate multitudes, and thus it was only natural and fair that
someone should serve her. It went without saying that this girl’s worth far outshone any of the
masses.
In some sense, perhaps
that moment was love at first sight.
“Hanatori-san, will you
stay with me?” she asked.
Presently, Queen Rose was
still in dire financial straits, with terrible turnover of personnel. This led to a college
student like Hitoe being responsible for Mai, if only in a sub-managerial role.
These words from Princess
Mai had the effect of making Hitoe kneel on the floor, look straight into Mai’s
eyes, and declare, “Yes. I will serve you for as long as I live.”
She responded, Hitoe thought. Her heart kindled with
warmth at the prospect of her new role. None could be more sublime.
Ever after, she labored
at her job with passion. In recognition of her steadfast work, she was welcomed as Mai’s
exclusive manager after graduating college. Now her duties extended
beyond professional support roles to include taking care of Mai’s daily needs. This, she felt, was what
made hers a meaningful life.
“And thus,” Hanatori
finished, “I am convinced that this is my mission.”
I watched a Blu-ray of Mai
when she was in elementary school as Hanatori-san talked. This wasn’t just a matter
of having a lot of love for Mai. Her tastes—heck, this
woman’s entire life—revolved around Mai. She cared for Mai as if
she were her sister or her own daughter. Well, now I got why a
total nobody like me winning Mai’s affection could give Hanatori-san cause to
complain. Wait
a minute, now she was winning me over!
Hanatori-san turned to me
in surprise.
“Oh, sorry,” I mumbled. “That’s really
impertinent for a first year in high school to say.”
“No, but you’re quite
right,” she said.
Was she agreeing with me,
kinda?
Opposite Hanatori-san, who
held her hand to her chest, the screen showed itty-bitty Mai wearing a pretty
dress as photographers snapped picture after picture of her. It was on a way different
scale than the photo shoot I’d had with Kaho-chan, but that went without
saying. Her
studio was gargantuan and thronged with piles of photography equipment and
herds of staff members. In the video, which I’m guessing Hanatori-san recorded on a portable
camera as part of her job, there’d occasionally be emotional whispers of her
going like, “Oh, mistress… How lovely…” or like “Oh, mistress, you’re just like
a princess who’s flown down to be in the Oduka family…” What was Hanatori, a
Mai otaku?!
As I got hung up on the
massive discrepancy between Hanatori-san’s appearance and behavior, she said,
“I wish that my mistress and Koto-sama could have lived together in a blissful
honeymoon for all eternity. But I fear that may only
be my own selfish desire.”
Nah, no need for the “I
fear” bit; in my book, it was 500 percent her selfish desire. But I was scared to say
that out loud, so I smiled and racked my brains trying to come up with how to
make things less awkward.
“Uh, I’m sorry, I guess,”
I said. “That
she ended up with someone like me…”
“As you should be,
venomous pest-san.”
“Ah. I see you’re still
calling me that, huh…”
“I must admit that you
are the one my mistress has chosen,” Hanatori-san said. “Thus, even if you are a
venomous pest who used your wiles to seduce my mistress…that does not change
the fact that there was never anything I could do about this. If I were to physically
eradicate you, then I would only cause her unhappiness.”
Hanatori-san lowered her
eyes. Seeing
a grown woman look this downcast made me feel like I was on unsteady ground. Also, wait—did that mean
she had planned to do away with me…?
“Hanatori-san, you really
like Mai, huh…?” I
muttered, terrified.
Hanatori-san nodded quietly. “Indeed, I do.”
I didn’t know a ton about
Mai’s family situation or anything, but I thought it was nice that she had an
adult around who cared about her this much. So…
Just then, the image on
TV changed completely. It was still a video of Mai, but she looked a little older than she had
before. I
was guessing she was in one of her later years of elementary school. She didn’t look all that
much younger than I did right now, really… She was already about as tall as I
was, and her face looked grown-up as well.
The black-haired girl
standing next to her was probably some famous model too, I figured. Something about her, like
her vibe or her style or whatever, had an amazing power to draw the eye.
Hanatori-san sighed in
admiration like a lady standing in front of a famous Rubens painting. “Oh, Koto-sama, how
beautiful…”
“Wait, what?” I
exclaimed. “You’re
telling me that’s Satsuki-san?!”
She was totally right. It was Mai and Satsuki-san. They whispered to one
another and giggled together in between the snaps of the shutter. Satsuki-san was still a
little kid and lacked the cutting edge in her eyes she had now, the one as
sharp as a legendary sword. I felt like I’d never
seen Satsuki-san smiling in such a carefree manner before… At any rate, it was
stinkin’ cute.
“Oh wow, she’s adorable,”
I said. “Oh my god. That’s so cute.”
I didn’t know what
Hanatori-san was smirking about, but Satsuki-san was so pretty I had no choice
but to agree with her. Like, the difference between this Satsuki-san and the Satsuki-san I
knew was wild. Not only did she and Mai seem thick as thieves, but these two little
girls giggling together, ignorant of the depravity of the world… It was like
this scene was a sacred artifact that adults were absolutely forbidden to
encroach on. I almost expected the words “once upon a time” to flash across the
screen…
“This was a period of
time in which Koto-sama assisted my mistress with her work,” Hanatori-san said.
“It was to
help her when she was in low spirits, you see.”
“Oh!” I said. “That’s the thing they told me about when we had the FPS competition.”
“Yes, that is correct. Naturally, ordinary
friends could not be allowed to attend a photo shoot, but they allowed her
because she was Koto-sama. They immediately attempted to talent scout her, as you can see.”
“Yeah, that’s Satsuki-san
all right…” I remembered the dignified figure she’d cut back at the cosplay
show. Of
course she turned out to be the kind of person doing stuff like that right from
the start.
“I see…” I said. “It would have been nice if they’d gotten married, huh?”
“Indeed, it would have…
Ah, but I haven’t given up hope yet.”
This must have been the
thing that broke Hanatori-san’s brain and turned her into a rabid Mai × Satsu
shipper. But yeah,
I could get why. If I’d met Mai-san, Satsuki-san, or Ajisai-san when we were little
kids, I would 100 percent have fallen head over heels for them. As for Kaho-chan? Well, Kaho-chan…was a pal,
so…
Now that I looked more
carefully, I noticed that there were other child models there too apart from
Mai × Satsu. But there was a shocking difference in how little they stood out. It was like me compared
to the rest of the Quintet. Man, that must have sucked.
“Now, no more of that,”
Hanatori-san said. She ejected the Blu-ray and carefully returned it to its box. I guess it was her treasure
chest. “I
assume the bath is ready, venomous pest-san.”
My mood took a hit every
time she called me venomous pest-san. Like, yup, that’s me. Just a venomous pest
coming in between Mai and Satsuki-san. Sorry for being born.
“I’ll hop in, then,” I said. “Sorry for all the trouble.”
Hanatori-san brought a
full change of clothes, which she must have put together when I wasn’t paying
attention. I
tried to take them from her, but she just walked right on past me. Well, I guess I could let
her show me the way to the bathroom.
“Oh,” I said when I
opened the door. “Wow, this is surprisingly…normal?”
There was a toilet and
sink, plus a bathing area sectioned off by a thick glass door. It kinda reminded me of
the bathroom in the hotel Mai and I had stayed at. Given how atypical Mai’s
apartment was, I’d figured she’d have a freaking huge tub like the one in that
love hotel.
But Hanatori-san still
didn’t give me the clothes. Um?
“For the sake of my
mistress,” she said, “I cannot allow you to remain unsupervised.”
“Uh, what is that
supposed to mean?”
And then, right before my
very eyes, Hanatori-san stripped out of her suit. Hello?!
“What’re you doing?!” I
cried.
“Wha?”
I screamed. “Whaaaaat?!”
I gingerly tiptoed into
the steamy bathroom. I had a bath towel covering my front, but I was completely exposed from
behind. When
Hanatori-san stood behind me, I felt, for some inexplicable reason, like my
life was in danger.
“What does bathing and
cleansing me, uh, entail exactly?” I asked.
Hanatori-san’s hair had
gotten caught in her shirt when she removed it, so now she had it released from
its tight bun. Her black hair was slightly wavy and cloaked her like a shadow, which
emphasized how pale she was.
Hanatori-san took the
shower nozzle and adjusted the water temperature. As I listened to the
fwisssh of the water, I thought about the game I was super into at the moment. Whenever I played on a
city map, the inter-fighting in the early stages of the game was ferocious. I wondered if holing up
in the outskirts would increase my chances of survival. But in the end, defensive
plays wouldn’t get you to the top of the leaderboards, even if it did improve
your ranking. You got better results in terms of growth from practicing shooting in
normal play, which meant that having this black-haired beauty wash me would
also eventually pan out in my favo—okay, nope! So much for an escape
from reality.
“I mean, I can wash
myself, you know!” I said.
I looked over my shoulder
and caught a full look at Hanatori-san. Boy, she was a Grown
Woman all right. Her thighs were nicely filled out, and while she was pretty thin
overall, there was a curviness to her. She wasn’t like my mom or
any of my teachers, but neither was she anything like the girls my age. It was like…the nakedness
of an oneesan, you know? Pretty
vivid! Seeing
my friends naked was oh-god-worthy, but an older stranger I’d barely even
talked to before was plenty oh-god-worthy too. An “oh god” on the oh-god
scale. Plus,
I felt extra guilty from the fact that I was seeing Hanatori-san naked, when up to this
point she’d never shown any emotion and acted like a helper robot. Just think, underneath
that suit of hers was this sleek nakedness… Nope, my mind was way too deep in
the gutter!
“Now, if you’ll excuse
me,” Hanatori-san said.
She covered a body sponge
with a gorgeous-smelling soap. Oh
thank god. She
wasn’t going to use her hands like some pervert.
Yeah, you know what? If it was like getting
your hair washed at a salon, then it wouldn’t be so bad. I figured Hanatori-san
was treating it all like a job, so I had to do my best to be just as
professional about it. Right. Professional.
I slowly opened my bath
towel and stood stock-still in front of the wall. I could feel
Hanatori-san’s hands coming up from behind and reaching for me.
The sponge touched my
skin, and I squeaked.
“Oh,
no. It just tickled
a little.”
The sensation of
scrubbing on my skin was waaaaaaaaaaay different than how it felt at home.
“Th-that sponge feels
kind of odd,” I said.
“It’s silk,” Hanatori-san
told me. “Its
small fibers allow it to strip off the smallest bits of dirt, but scrubbing too
hard can damage the skin.”
That explained why she
was being so gentle. That feather-like touch was so light I could barely tell if she was
making contact or not. As her sponge barely tickled the tips of the fine down on my arm, I
could feel some gauge in me rising little by little. This…actually felt good…
In order to alleviate the
rising heat in me, I opened my mouth and let out a little moan. It relieved the throbbing
that had nowhere else to go. Still, Hanatori-san
continued to scrub away at me, keeping up the endless stream of that uneasy
feeling.
“U-um… It still really
tickles, so that’s why I… Mmm…”
“You’re quite ticklish,”
she said.
With no hesitance
whatsoever, Hanatori-san moved the sponge down from my back toward my butt. Eep?!
“Could you please be a
little quieter?”
“How come I’m the one
getting the blame?” I whined.
I bit my lip to hold it in. Wait, hold what in?! Listen, this really
tickled, okay?
“Would you mind sitting
down for a moment?” she asked.
I sat down, feeling
exhausted. The
moment I parked my butt on this thing—it wasn’t a bath mat, more like a bath
legless chair (is that a thing?)—I felt a little bit better.
Hanatori-san offered me a
bottle of water.
I put the straw in my
mouth and took a sip. This was deadass some princess-level treatment. For some reason, I was
sweating all over, which had to be good for my health.
Hanatori-san lifted my
leg, and I lost my balance.
“Couldn’t you have said that before you picked up my leg?!”
She rubbed a mysterious
scent all over my leg and then began to work away again with the sponge. I felt like a log being
sanded with a plane. Wait, are you calling my legs logs? Look, I’m not that fat, okay?!
“How does this feel?” Hanatori-san asked.
“It’s really
embarrassing…” I said.
“You have no cause for
concern. I
am a certified esthetician, so I have faith in my skin care abilities.”
She lifted one leg, and
my position kinda…you know! I tried to turn my thighs
inward and bear with it to the best of my ability, but I felt like at any
second she’d totally see the parts of me best not shown in polite company. Had I ever suffered such
a disgrace before in my life? Not to the best of my
knowledge, no!
My abdominal muscles
began to quake, and I squeaked.
“Is something wrong?” Hanatori-san asked.
“Y-you scrubbed me down
to my toes! I couldn’t
help it!”
She might have been a
robot bent on finishing her task—she didn’t so much as lift an eyebrow. She just took my other foot. Eep. Once again, she started
scrubbing away at the log. It felt really good…
“Wait a sec, why’re you
making me this squeaky clean anyway?” I asked. “You’re not going to put me on a plate and serve me up before Mai, are
you?”
“What depraved nonsense
are you talking now…?”
“Then there’s no need to
go this far, right?”
“It isn’t a matter of
degree,” she said. “I am only doing this because it would be an insult to my mistress for
you to meet her in such filth.”
Guh. I mean, I did want to be
nice and clean all the time too, so there was that going for her.
Hanatori-san finally
finished washing both legs.
I had to catch my breath. “I-I survived…”
“Now lay back slowly,
please.”
I guess there was more to
Hanatori-san’s beauty salon treatment. I reclined back on the
chair and stretched my legs out. I had the feeling that,
rather than fighting with her, it was wisest to cooperate and get it over with
as soon as possible.
She rubbed me down from
my biceps to the backs of my hands with the same gentle motions. I think my arms were even
more sensitive than my legs or my back. My breathing was starting
to quicken again. I really did feel like she was preparing me for cooking. Once I was all done, was
she going to serve me up with salt and cream for Mai as an afterschool snack? Freaking Oduka Hannibal
over here…
Hanatori-san finished both
arms, and I was finally free.
“Now I will lower the back
rest,” she said.
Well, it was a legless
bath chair after all. I could recline it and lie down completely. I’d never laid back and
stared at the ceiling of a bathroom before, so that made for a new experience.
She placed a bath towel
over my eyes, once again just like at a beauty salon.
And then there was a
squish… Hm? I felt some kind of sensation on my chest. Oh, no way… Was she
washing my front now?!
“They don’t do this at
salons!” I said.
“Yes, for I shouldn’t
think one is naked at a salon.”
“Well, duh, but that’s
not the point!”
While naked, blindfolded,
and flat on my back, I was completely vulnerable. If Hanatori-san wanted to
kill me, she could have done so at any moment.
When her sponge touched
my boobs, I just barely caught myself seconds before I screamed. Then the sponge glided
from my cleavage down to my stomach. Eep.
It made my
fingers curl and my legs fidget. This felt way, waaay
better than when she first washed my back, and that made it all the harder to
keep quiet. Ohhh god.
“U-um, Hanatori-san…are
you done yet?” I asked.
“It will be just a little
longer,” she said. “Please
be patient.”
Oh god, no, this was too
much. I was worn out. Nooo freaking way.
“Ahh,” I moaned. “Ahh.” I breathed heavily. I couldn’t take it any
longer, and that moaning accidentally slipped out.
I felt so hot. I wasn’t even in the bath yet, but my whole body felt hot and steamy. And now I was almost
getting some massage kind of thing.
“Th-this feels so good…”
I said. “N-no,
Hanatori-san. No, not there…”
My mind had gone blank. My voice sounded far away
even to my own ears.
In my head, I repeated for
dear life, “This isn’t sexy, this isn’t sexy,” like it was the Buddhist nenbutsu prayer. But for all my efforts,
you couldn’t deny that my voice sounded pretty sensual.
Ohhh god. It felt like there was something tingling under my skin. I was miserable. I couldn’t tell anything
since my eyes were covered, but I had the fear that something awful was
happening all over me.
I hadn’t meant to, but
now it sounded like I was begging for it. Some part of my brain
swore that I could never let anyone at school see
me like this.
Suddenly, light shone
into my eyes.
“All done, venomous
pest-san.” Hanatori-san
peered down at me.
Shocked, I hurried to
wipe my mouth. Sure
enough, I was drooling.
“I-it’s not what it looks
like!” I said. “It’s not that it made me
feel good or anything!”
“Oh?
It has been
quite some time since I’ve exercised these skills, so I’m pleased to see you
enjoyed the experience so much.”
“No, that’s not what
happened!”
Hanatori-san ran hot water
from the shower head. She raised my head slightly and washed me down as I lay there. It was my first time
getting scrubbed and having hot water run all over me while lying down, and
both were odd experiences. Not to mention it pissed me off how darn good it all felt.
“W-well, if that’s as bad
as it gets,” I said, “I could handle this sort of thing any day! It tickled, sure, but
that was only right at the start. I was just acting like
you got the better of me. You’re not so bad as all that, Hanatori-san!”
Hanatori-san looked down
on me as I lay there naked and gave me a vague, “Hmm,” in reply.
Then she almost
apologetically covered me with a little towel that went from my boobs to my
lower body. Hm? She squeezed some
oil-looking thing into her hands and rubbed them together.
“Very well,” she said. “Then I shall continue
with an oil massage.”
Hanatori-san made no
acknowledgment and loomed over me.
I heard a door open and
then running footsteps.
“Why, hello. I’m sorry for being late. You must have been
waiting for quite some ti—” Mai began as she came into the living room, but
then the smile froze on her face.
I forced myself to smile
at her as I sat innocuously on a dining room chair. “W-welcome home, Mai.”
“Welcome home, mistress,”
Hanatori-san said with a polite nod of her head. “I have dinner ready. Would you like to eat now?”
“A-ah, yes, thank you,
Hanatori-san.”
Mai took off her coat,
and Hanatori-san accepted it from her like it was second nature. She bowed and then left
the room in order to serve dinner.
Mai sat down across from
me in her own dining room chair with a rosy, beaming smile. “You surprised me,” she said.
“Yes.
You look
absolutely adorable.”
She reached out and took
my hand. I
was wearing the clothes Hanatori-san had picked out for me following my bath,
which, of course, were certainly no exercise clothes or anything of the sort. It was a dress that Mai
hadn’t ever worn and that had been carefully stored in the closet for years. I was a bit worried about
how it’d fit, but I guess it looked good no matter who wore it. Hanatori-san went and
coordinated a whole outfit for me, down to the nines, and even did my hair. That’s not to mention the
full body massage too. My entire body felt relaxed and springy. Was I, by any chance, cute now…? Nope, nope, nope, I couldn’t be conceited. Because Mai would call me
cute within moments anyway!
“You’re so cute, Renako,”
she said.
“Yeah, comparatively
speaking, I’m a lot cuter than I’ve ever been,” I said, “but you must see tons
of cuties and hotties all the time. So objectively speaking,
I’m not that cute.”
“You’re lovely,” she said. “You are indeed very
cute, Renako.”
“Look, you wouldn’t have
dated me if you were just in this for my body!” I said.
I glared back at her in
embarrassment, and Mai just nodded and said, “That’s true.” Don’t agree with me!
“You see, all the girls
I’m referring to are models,” Mai explained. “Each and every one has a
BMI between 14 and 16. They scrutinize every morsel of food they consume and take painstaking
care to maintain their bodies.”
“Gotcha,” I said. “Well, then there’s no freaking way I can compete!”
I had no qualms about
admitting my defeat. I mean, I ate fried chicken and pastries and stuff all the time.
Mai smiled. “Yet that does not guarantee that all those girls are so lovely. I much prefer you over
all the others. Thank you for dressing up for me.”
“S-sure thing… I mean, it
was pretty much all Hanatori-san’s doing, but yeah…”
Smiling all the while,
Mai stroked my hand. Urgh. Well, if it made her this
happy, then I guess I could put up with the embarrassment it took to get here…
Was I being brainwashed? No, wait—when was I going to stop being so weird about her? I needed to! Actually! Tell
her that I loved her!
“Is something the matter?” she asked. “You suddenly clutched
your head in great pain.”
“I’m trying to smoke out
my inner demons right now,” I explained. “But the demons have by
and large become one with me, so I’m taking damage at the same time too.”
“I-I
see. I’m
not sure I understand, but that sounds dreadful.”
While Mai looked put off,
Hanatori-san brought in dinner. I thought she’d come in
pushing a trolley like in a hamburger restaurant, but instead she used a normal
tray. She
set the table for Mai and I and then served generous helpings of beef stew onto
our deep dishes.
“Wow, that looks good,” I
said.
But it was a heck of a lot
less glitzy than I’d imagined meal time in the Oduka household to be. I was positive they’d
wheel out a whole roast pig or something. Well, no. Mai was a model, after all. She wouldn’t eat that much.
“Bon appetit,” said
Hanatori-san.
I was famished after all
that exercise earlier. I figured I’d better dig in before the delicious smells made my stomach
growl.
“This looks good, huh, Mai?” I said.
“Yes, I’m sure it’ll be
scrumptious. I guarantee.”
I dipped my spoon in the
stew. It
had lots of broccoli and potatoes, and the carrots made for a pretty touch of
orange. This
was probably beef shank, I figured. It seemed nice and soft,
as if it’d been stewed for a long time.
I lifted a spoonful. It was very hot, so I
blew on it a good deal before bringing the spoon to my lips.
It was way different than
the stew we had at my place! Like, the flavors were so rich! Or strong? Flavorful? There was…depth to it! Yeah, it tasted like it’d
perk you right up.
“Hey, Mai, this is awesome!” I said. “Hanatori-san’s cooking
is the bomb.”
Hey, wait a sec. If I married Mai, did that mean I could get food like this every day? Mai had already asked me to marry her, but maybe she was going to sway
my heart from a different angle by showing me in no uncertain terms what my
life could be like after marriage. Plus, I could get
massages courtesy of Hanatori-san too, right? And rides in the limo. I could live the life of
a princess of a wealthy nation. This was the kind of
thing everyone dreamed of.
Mai put a hand to her
mouth and giggled. What
was that for?
“I was just reminded of
when Hanatori-san first came to live with us,” Mai explained.
Hanatori-san protested, a
little flustered, “Mistress!”
“At the time, her cooking
repertoire was still quite limited, and as this was the only thing she could
make, she made beef stew in a slow cooker every single day. Do you remember that,
Hanatori-san?”
“I apologize for such an
inconvenience,” Hanatori-san said as she hung her head. She bowed to try to hide
her face, but I could see her cheeks reddening anyway.
“So even Hanatori-san had
a phase like that, huh?” I said.
“She did,” Mai said. “Now that I think about
it, there was her driving too. She used to go white as a
sheet whenever she drove through narrow suburban roads. She grew so upset over it
that she contemplated going back to driving school to relearn.”
“I beg your pardon,
mistress.”
“Oh no, you misunderstand
me,” said Mai. “I
mean it as a compliment. I’m grateful for how much effort you’ve always put in for me.”
“You are too kind,” said
Hanatori-san.
You know, this was
really…nice. Especially given the stories about Hanatori-san’s devotion that I’d
heard earlier. The stew tasted great, and Mai and Hanatori-san were both having a good
time. So yeah. It felt super pleasant.
Mai smiled dreamily. “You know,” she said, “I
have the most curious feeling right now.”
“Uh…how so?” I asked as I continued to shovel down stew. (I was being a total mood
killer.)
That was kinda… I mean, I
ate at home like this all the time. Mom and Dad were there,
and my sister and I always recounted the stuff that happened at school that
day. It was
something I always took for granted, something that’d been like this for ages.
I stopped spooning up
stew and looked at Mai. I couldn’t really tell what she was thinking, but she wore a peaceful
look on her face… Was she tired from work, maybe?
“U-uh, yeah,” I said. And then, just to be on
the safe side, I added, “But you know, um. I’m still not thinking
about marrying you, okay?”
Mai grinned. “Yes,
I understand. Nevertheless,
thank you.”
She was the one who was
giving me yummy food and letting me wear her pretty clothes, and yet she was thanking me.
Mai rested her elbows on
the table, laced her hands together, and smiled. “That reminds me. What if we try living
together first? Oh, but of course I’ll introduce myself to your parents when we go to
ask for permission. Why,
I’m so nervous.”
“It’s quite all right. They may reject us at
first on the grounds that it’s too sudden, but I’m sure I’ll bring them around.
I’ll make
both of our dreams come true, you see.”
“Uh, but my dream is just
to have a chill life, thank you very much!”
The sudden tempo change in
this conversation really threw me for a loop. Besides, I had a feeling
that, even if Mai didn’t try all that hard, my parents would give her the OK
right off the bat. It was less that my parents were particularly easy to wheedle and more
that the figure Mai cut was just that impressive. At the very least, I knew
my sister would be all over the idea. Maybe I had too few
people on my side here… Well, I had a feeling Hanatori-san would be on my side
on this particular issue, but I also couldn’t imagine her having the heart to
oppose Mai. So in the end, it was up to me to protect myself!
“Look, I’m not the kinda
girl who’s so easy you can win her over with a single meal,” I said.
“Then perhaps my next
effort should be to set up a game room for you.”
“Could you legit not? That’s my weakness! I don’t want to go over to your house and spend all the time I want
playing games on top-of-the-line machines with high refresh rate monitors. I’d end up practically
living at your place!”
Mai smiled as she watched
me rage.
I only came over to her
place to hang out, eat dinner, and go home. That’s all it was, but
Mai seemed happier than ever. Maybe, I thought, it
wouldn’t be such a bad idea to do this kind of thing again sometime.
Wait, was this in some
sense the first date at her house since we’d started going out? Nah, nah, nah, no way. I was just going to play
a quick fighting game with her after dinner and then go home, that’s all. It really wasn’t that big
of a deal, right? Right?
It turned out that
Hanatori-san took me home too.
“Thanks for everything
today,” I said. “The food, and, um, the clothes and all.”
“Not at all,” she said. “I will come collect them
later when the opportunity presents itself.”
On the way home,
Hanatori-san drove me in a small black car as opposed to the limo. I figured it was the one
she commuted to work in. It seemed like a car a person actually used, and so I felt a little
awkward sitting in the back seat.
She pulled up in front of
my house. I
bowed, holding a paper bag containing my workout clothes and my basketball. Then, as if she thought I
was about to run away just like that, Hanatori-san rolled down the car window.
“Do please continue to
stay good friends with my mistress,” she said. She…was smiling, ever so
slightly.
“Are you sure?” I said. “That we should stay
friends, I mean.”
“What, is this a joke? The flower is fond of the
venomous pest and thus my hands are tied. No?”
Anyway, I thought I’d
gotten clear of her “Do whatever it takes to stamp them out!” attitude. Thank god. But I didn’t know if I’d done anything to prompt such a change in
opinion. I
mean, she’d looked like a super cute big sister when she was talking about Mai.
If only she
always looked like that, then she sure would have been a heck of a lot easier
to talk to.
“At dinner tonight,”
Hanatori-san began, “my mistress was almost…”
She snapped her
professional face back on, but I still had a question for her. It had been stuck in my
throat for ages like a tiny bone. Or heck, not even that
tiny—more like the skull of a giant man-eating shark.
Nervously, I said,
“Hanatori-san, can I ask what you think?”
“The,
um. The two-timing
thing.”
“Oh, that.” Then, completely opposite of what I expected her to do, she giggled. “I don’t mind a whit.”
What the… Her answer was
so unexpected that, for a moment, I was at a loss for words. It was like steeling your
courage to walk into class on the day you’re supposed to get a test back that
you didn’t think you did so hot on, only to find that the teacher was out. It felt like a letdown. Hanatori-san cared for
Mai so greatly, she should have considered me a no-good piece of work. I thought it’d be a huge
challenge to win Hanatori-san’s approval, but it was one I had to undertake. It’d have been a hard
thing for me to declare that I’d make Hanatori-san happy too, but I had to do
it at some point. But for her to acknowledge me as good enough for Mai right off the bat
was, well, a good thing…I guess?
“Why, there surely can’t
be anyone who would dare two-time my mistress. So all those rumors
circulating the internet are simply too preposterous. You shouldn’t let that
ridiculous gossip get to you. You must simply continue
to improve yourself day after day for my mistress.”
“Um…” I laced my fingers
together and asked, “About that… Hypothetically, um. If I was two-timing her…what would
you do?”
Hanatori-san chuckled
elegantly. And
then, as if that were as impossible as trillion yen coins suddenly falling from
the sky, she said, “Penal code article 199.”
And then, saying no more,
she drove away.
I went back to my room
and burrowed myself under my blanket. I didn’t think I’d
committed a dire enough crime to deserve death! Right? Right?!
Surprise surprise, I had
nightmares.
It started off with a
scene where Ajisai-san dumped me, with no prior warning at all. “Sorry, Rena-chan,” she
said, “but I just don’t like you anymore.”
Gotcha, I
thought. Well,
there was no fighting it if she didn’t have feelings for me any longer. Friends can connect just
by having common interests or stuff to talk about, but dating someone’s a
matter of romantic feelings. If you didn’t like them
that way anymore, then so long, dating. It really sucked.
But that meant that Mai
and I were just a couple, then. Mai told me, “We’ll still
be together.” And because she liked me, we dated. QED.
I went over to her house
as usual, and then after some quality time (???) in bed, Hanatori-san called
out to me just as I was about to go home. She pointed straight at me.
“You were two-timing my
mistress, were you not?” she
demanded.
I denied it with every
fiber of my being. I wasn’t being insincere, but I still had no choice—I didn’t want to
die. My
desire to live trumped everything.
Realizing that the jig
was up and Hanatori-san knew everything anyway, I groveled before her and
surrendered my pride à la Kaho-chan. I also busted out every
excuse in the book. It
wasn’t my fault! It
was them who seduced me! I did nothing wrong, I tell you!
Hanatori-san looked down
on me like I was an unsalvageable piece of trash. At some point, she’d
gotten ahold of a chainsaw and now brandished it aloft. Why a chainsaw? It must have come from the
game I was playing before I went to bed. I kept screaming: I did
nothing wrong!
As if to drown out my
voice, the chainsaw slashed me in two. Game Over.
You can’t just wake up
from a dream like that and be all chipper, going, “Heya, everybody!” Instead, I oozed my way
into the classroom.
“Hi, Rena-chan,”
Ajisai-san said.
“H-hi!”
My voice
came out louder than it needed to be.
I decided to grin to
dispel my anxiety. I couldn’t look uneasy in front of Ajisai-san, after all.
Ajisai-san stared at me
as I put down my backpack and took a seat.
God, she was so cute
today… Wait, I was getting sidetracked.
How would Ajisai-san’s
little brothers look at me if they found out I was two-timing their big sister?
Do you
think Kouki-san and Kippei-san, after I’d played video games with them and
everything, would call me “Loser!” and “Butthead!”? Maybe
even her mom, who’d seemed so kind when she’d come to pick Ajisai-san up that
one time, would come after me with a chainsaw too.
“I want to work harder for
you,” I said.
I wanted to discover what
it meant to live a meaningful life like Hanatori-san…
“Did you bring your
textbook today?” I asked. “What about your
homework; did you do that? Are you missing anything?”
“Uh, not really,” she said. “I think I’m okay.”
I wanted to give her more
advantages to dating me… I liked seeing Ajisai-san living happy and healthy,
but I didn’t want to be cut in half by a chainsaw. If Ajisai-san had been the
sort to never be happy without me, then I would have done anything and
everything for her. But Ajisai-san was perfectly capable of being happy on her own, which
ultimately meant she didn’t need my help. Which meant I couldn’t
give her more advantages. In order to make things better for her, I had to make things worse for
her first! This
making people happy thing was some tough business! Wait, no. I couldn’t imagine making
her unhappy. That’d
make dating me less advantageous. I decided to try thinking
up some other method.
“What about if I gave you
a compliment a day?” I
suggested.
“Um, that’d be nice, but…?” Ajisai-san tilted her
head, still not getting why I was doing this at all.
In the face of such
cuteness, I realized how foolish I’d just been. “No!” I cried. “It’s so obvious that
you’re adorable that calling you cute would just be stating a fact. That won’t make you happy!”
“Ajisai-san, your pencil
case is so cute!”
I pointed to her pencil
case, one of those ones with fictional characters on it. I wanted to branch out on
my complimenting game as much as possible.
Ajisai-san smiled and nodded.
“Yeah! Actually, the kiddos gave
me this as thanks for all the help I give them. Talk about unexpected, huh?”
Perfect.
Now this was
a Perfect Teatime. I could hear the sound of her affection meter rising. Also, it was kinda nice to
hear that things were good between her and her brothers.
Mai came over and greeted us.
“Good morning.”
Before I could say hi
back, I noticed someone behind her and went “Urk.”
“Enough is enough,” the
other girl snapped. “Have you given the matter any thought yet, Oduka-san?”
“You may ask me all you
want,” Mai said, “but it won’t make a difference. To begin with, I’m hardly
what you would call the leader of the group.”
“Lies!
You are
clearly the leader of the Quintet, any way you slice it!”
Ajisai-san and I
exchanged looks as Mai shrugged.
“Another quarrel with
Takada-san…” Ajisai-san whispered to me.
Would Takada-san lay off
it already? I mean, we already had the teams picked for the inter-class athletics
competition and everything. Just give it a rest, girl.
Takada-san’s eyes
swiveled in our direction. Eeep.
“And a good morning to
you, Amaori-san and Sena-san! Say, did I hear correctly
that Amaori-san was picked for the basketball team?”
She charged over like an
invader. Eeep!
“Why, then let us have a
showdown!” she said. “For you see, we all
chose to play basketball too. Surely that will make it a
fair fight, no?”
Not really, because Mai
and Ajisai-san were both on the softball team. If Class B won under
those conditions, would that be enough to placate Takada-san?
“You know, Takada-san,”
Ajisai-san said, gently trying to pacify her, “could we maybe save this for
later? I
feel like getting the whole class involved will make a lot of trouble for
everyone else.”
That was dangerous,
Ajisai-san! If getting targeted made her unhappy, didn’t this give me a chance to
offer her more perks to dating?
But, of course, Takada-san
didn’t listen. “That will keep you on the run from me forever, will it not? It is best to compete in
a class event and thus broadcast to the entire school which of us is superior. My word…”
Takada-san looked around
the room and put her hands on her hips. “With every one of my
suggestions, you take every opportunity to duck out. Class A is nothing but a
bunch of cowards!”
The class fell completely
silent. A
silence like that would have sunk emotionally vulnerable me in one hit, but
Takada-san just put her hand to her mouth and smirked. “No response, really? Very well, I’ll take my
leave. There’s
no point in wasting my precious time in the morning on your sort.”
She brandished her hands
as she made to leave, and just then, someone spoke up.
“Hey now,” that someone said.
“I’m not
cool with the way you talked to us.”
The objector was a girl. And that girl’s name? Amaori
Renako. I
mean, I couldn’t just let a little upstart like this trounce the Quintet! Everyone here was so nice,
just doing their own thing as they lived out their daily lives chasing their
dreams, so it was just that they didn’t go fighting people. The Quintet couldn’t lose! And it pissed me off to
let her get the last word!
“The Quintet will win
when it comes to a real fight,” I told her.
“Oh?
Words are
cheap without the actions to back them up,” she challenged.
Then two other voices piped
up, agreeing with me.
“Sh-she’s right!” said
one. “The
Quintet will win for sure!”
“Uh-huh,” said the other. “They’d never lose to the likes
of Class B.”
Still, Takada-san frowned
in displeasure and waved a hand as if repelling their watching eyes. “If you wish to fight
fair and square, then come to Class B. I don’t care a wit about
your yapping at me.”
Takada-san knocked
something off a desk and onto the floor where it struck the ground hard. It was…Ajisai-san’s
pencil case.
And then, to make matters
worse, Takada-san stepped on it as hard as she could, producing a SNAP!
Mai rounded on Takada-san. “What the hell do you
think you’re doing?”
And then. And THEN. She put her hand to her
mouth and roared with laughter like a villainess. “That shabby thing is your
pencil case? Why, I mistook it for a piece of trash lying on top of your desk, so
it’s hardly any wonder that I failed to notice it and then stepped upon it. After all, it was only
garbage!”
The class fell dead quiet,
with Takada-san’s laughter the only sound in the room. Oh, that little…
Then Ajisai-san said in a
heartbroken voice, “Oh… That was the pencil case they gave me…” She gently
kneeled to the ground and picked up the pencil case with the shoe print on it. “It’s not a piece of
garbage.”
Everyone heard her whimper. Then, from all across the
classroom, people said, “Ajisai-san…”
“How could they do this to
her…?”
All of Class A was of one
mind on this issue, and I felt their strong determination urging me on. So I said, “We accept.”
I pointed at her with all
my might. “Fine! We accept your challenge! We’re going to see who’s
better fair and square with basketball. And if we win, you’re all
going to apologize to Ajisai-san a ton for what you did!”
For a moment there,
Takada-san looked daunted. Then she said, “A-all right, very well. Why, this is exactly what
I was hoping for!”
“Takada-san,” Mai said. She came up to stand next
to me. “I
care not if you loathe me or bear enmity against me, for I’m quite used to
that, you see. But I cannot condone you using that hatred as an excuse to hurt my
friends.”
Mai’s voice sounded
angrier than I’d ever heard it, and Takada-san was at a loss for words. “V-very well. Very well! Good, it seems I’ve manipulated your weaknesses well. All according to plan! Well now, I shall be
looking forward to the day of our competition. You’ll get what’s coming
to you, just you wait!”
Takada-san hurried out,
all but speedwalking.
Still cradling her
trodden-on pencil case, Ajisai-san looked up at us in worry. “Um, guys.”
“Yes, I know, Ajisai.” Mai took Ajisai’s hand. “Let us teach those girls
a lesson so that nothing like this will ever happen again. They will learn where
they stand in relation to us, and I promise we will make you feel better.”
And then Ajisai-san
looked at me. I said nothing.
I slowly
came back to my senses as the heat of my anger dissipated. Hiding my trembling hands
behind my back, I nodded as hard as I could even though I was as white as a
sheet.
“Sure thing,” I said. “Just leave it to us!”
However, our class
undeniably came together in that moment. It didn’t matter if you
were a guy or a girl—one look at Ajisai-san’s sad face, and you seethed with
hatred toward Class B. The inter-class athletics competition may have started out as just an
ordinary school event, but now it was a battle we could not afford to lose.
Group
Chat Name: 5déesses (4)
Part 3
Queen: …
Queen: …
Star Lily: Great job, Himi-chan!
Crane-chan: You show your foes no
mercy. Even
if you are on my side, I must say, you terrify me.
Star Lily: And that was an
especially good choice to go after Sena Ajisai!
Crane-chan: Yes, just as I said before.
Star Lily: She’s always like “Ooh,
I’m on eeeeveryone’s side,” and plays nice with everybody.
Star Lily: She’s won over all the
boys AND girls in Class A, and now she pushes them around like they’re her
servants.
Crane-chan: Just as I suspected…
Star Lily: And you wanna know what
I think? Or
like, I just have a hunch about it.
Star Lily: I think she’s
the ringleader.
Crane-chan: ?!
Star Lily: There’s far more to her
than meets the eye.
Crane-chan: Nonsense. She looks like she couldn’t hurt a fly.
Star Lily: That’s all a front.
Star Lily: In her heart of hearts,
she’s evil as can be.
Star Lily: I bet her favorite
pastime is to steal another girl’s man and then ditch ’im.
Star Lily: In that same way, she
destroys the relationships of those around her, approaches those who are alone
under the guise of being a supporter, and worms her way past their defenses
straight into their hearts. She does this enough, and
that’s what’s gotten her the popularity she has today.
Crane-chan: Is she the shadow
leader of the Quintet?
Star Lily: But we’re in luck,
’cause we got someone who’d go after anyone relentlessly.
Queen: …
Chapter 3:
Even If I Try My Best, There’s Still
No Freaking Way Things’ll Work Out
I SAT UP STRAIGHT and held out a
thousand-yen bill. In wheedling tones, I tried to coax my actual sister, “Oh,
Haruna-chan… Would you be willing to teach me how to play basketball?”
Thanks to the hubbub from
the other day, Class A was now all of one mind. (By the way, Ajisai-san’s
pencil case wasn’t noticeably damaged apart from the footprint on it, thank
god. Probably
something to do with divine protection.) Now, all that was left was to win and
avenge Ajisai-san…and therein lay the problem. According to what
Kaho-chan had heard from kids in Class B, their basketball team was made up of
all five members of Takada-san’s posse. And all of them seemed
pretty athletic.
On our side, we had
Satsuki-san and Kaho-chan, but then there was also Hirano-san, Hasegawa-san,
and me. To
be blunt, at our current skill level, this would be one tough fight. I’d brought up the idea
of calling Mai and Ajisai-san back and going in with the full Quintet crew, but
a sudden roster change would be detrimental to the softball team. I’m sure that wasn’t what
Ajisai-san wanted.
That meant that the
basketball team had to train extra hard ASAP, but I was the only member who
didn’t have a club or a part-time job to keep them busy. Thus, I had no choice but
to take the initiative and practice—which was why I was bowing to my sister.
“A class athletics
competition, huh?” she said. “And you’re doing all
this for Ajisai-senpai? Okay, I get the picture, but I dunno.”
She looked away from me. Come to think of it, ever
since our recent argument, she’d basically been treating me like normal. But sometimes she got
noticeably quiet, like this. Had she found out about
the two-timing thing? I trembled in fear every time the thought crossed my mind.
“Y-you don’t know?” I
prompted.
“Oh, I mean, like, I play
badminton, right? I’m
no good at basketball.”
“Okay, but still! All I’m asking is for you to practice with me a little.”
“Why can’t you ask one of
your school buddies?” my sister began to ask, but then she hurried to cover her mouth. “I’m sorry. I know you don’t have any
friends.”
“Um, I totally do! I’m actually pretty popular in class, thank you very much!”
My sister returned my
desperate assertion with an unfeeling look. The thing is, if I had
any friends I felt comfortable asking, I wouldn’t have needed to cough up money
to beg my sister for training, so my argument was dead in the water from the
outset. Alas, poor
argument-chan. She
wasn’t breathing…
“Well, I can’t do it every
day,” my sister said. “Only if club gets out early and I don’t have anything else going on.”
“Thank you, Haruna-chan! I’m so glad you grew up
such a good kid. I love you!”
In an attempt to appeal
to her sisterly love, I made to take back the thousand-yen bill, but she
snatched it out of my hands. Darn
it! I
watched helplessly as my bill disappeared into her wallet.
Like a character in an
RPG prompting, “Are you sure?” right before an important
decision, my sister asked once again, “But you know I’m really not any good at
it at all, right?”
Gobsmacked, I watched the
basketball swish through the hoop. My sister and I had come
to my usual park.
“Huh?
No, not really,”
she said.
Dressed in workout clothes
with her hair tied back in a high ponytail, my sister picked up the ball from
where it had fallen and showed off some complex, two-handed dribbling like it
was nothing. “Hup,” she said and launched into a jump shot. Once again, the ball got
sucked into the hoop.
“No, you’re freaking
incredible!” I insisted.
“Nah, nah, nah. I just play with my friends before practice and stuff, that’s all.”
Her voice didn’t have any
of that usual “Oh, me? Nah, I totally suck (but I’m fishing for compliments)” obnoxiousness,
so she must have really meant it. Could she just do anything
when it came to sports? Why, oh why, had I ended up with such sucky genes?
“Wait a sec,” I said. “Do you think my talent
for sports is sealed away by magic or something?”
My illustrious little
sister suddenly passed the ball to me. I panicked and caught it.
“Honestly,” she said,
“how you use your body mostly just comes down to training. Pretty much anyone can do
okay at a sport if they really work hard at it.”
“Gotcha,” I muttered to
myself. “So
it’s like if someone plays a ton of one FPS, and they’re at the point where
their aim is perfect and they have a good ability to read a situation and judge
their opponents’ mindsets. And then even if they go try another game, they’ll already have a lot
of experience going into it and they’ll be able to fly up the ranking ladder in
no time.”
“You sound like a weirdo,
motormouth,” my sister pointed out.
Ugh.
Sorry. Anyway, that meant…
“If the other team are
all sporty girls, that means they’ll be as good as you, Haruna!”
I couldn’t help it. I screamed, “So there’s
no freaking way I can win! (No
‘unless…’!)”
“Does that mean your
team’s at an overwhelming disadvantage?” she asked.
“Uh…I’m not sure, but
probably.”
“Hmm.”
My sister
crossed her arms, looking serious.
I was fascinated by how
gallant she was being. Haruna rarely let her guard down around me at home, but I figured this
serious expression she wore now was the same sort she used when guiding her
kouhais at school. Don’t tell
me. Was she popular? Hey now.
“Basketball’s a
five-on-five team game, right?” she
said. “If
the other guys are all newbies too, then I think you guys could just barely
pull it off even if they’re all better on an individual basis. Give me just one sec.”
“By all means,” I said,
accidentally slipping into formality.
My sister sure was
someone you could depend on in a pinch, huh? It felt kind of pathetic
to admit it as her older sister, but I really felt grateful to have her as an
ally.
My sister made a phone
call to someone; maybe she was calling a buddy in the basketball club or
something. She
had a lot of friends, right?
With nothing better to
do, I had just started to practice shooting when I heard someone shout “Oh!” from the edge of the
sports area. A girl marched up to me, her shoulders stiff with rage. W-wait a sec. Was this who I thought it
was?
“Oneesan-senpai!” she
demanded.
The famous tween
cosplayer Serara-chan scowled even further. “It’s Seira, okay? Get it right!”
“S-sorry,” I said. “Anyway, what’re you doing here?”
Seira-san was wearing a
set of workout clothes with shorts that showed off her legs. She looked really cute.
“Haruna-chan sent me a
message telling me to come play basketball with her all of a sudden. I haven’t been all that
active recently, so I figured why not? And here I am.”
“Gotcha. Well, you sure are cute even in exercise clothes. I guess that’s because
you’re a cosplayer.”
“Duh!”
Seira-san
grinned and flashed me a quick pose.
At the Makuhari summit,
I’d been dolled up in cosplay too, so I hadn’t paid a ton of attention to her. But now, seeing her in
her usual clothes, I realized that Seira-chan was a real cutie pie. She was working with some
good source material.
“Also, could you cut it out?” she said, puffing her
cheeks in a pout. “Haruna doesn’t know about my hobby, ’member?”
She let me off the hook. “Yeah, no worries. It’s
nbd.” That was nice of
her. “We’ll
just let bygones be bygones, even if you did backstab me. I’m the cutest right now,
after all, so there’s no need to be hung up on it.”
“Ah, gotcha… But you
know, I’m still sorry. I wasn’t trying to trick you. It was just a matter of
first-come, first-serve. If you’d asked me first, I probably would have helped you out too.”
“It’s whatever,” she said. “I don’t care anymore.”
“Moon-san told me you
cried after they announced the judging results, right? I’m sorry to hear that.”
“Look, are you trying to
start a fight or what?!” Seira-san lashed out at me for being too inept at bringing up
conversational topics, her face bright red. She grabbed me by the collar.
Eeep. She was gorgeous.
“I-I’m not!” I said. “I was trying to cheer you
up! And I
thought you said it was whatever.”
“Don’t tick me off and
then nitpick what I say!”
“I-I-I’m sorry… I’m just
not that good at carrying on conversations, that’s all…”
Her shoulders heaving
with her heavy breathing, Seira-san let me go. “I’m not upset about how
it turned out,” she declared. “But that’s because I’m
gonna win next time, just you wait and see. I’m still on the road to
victory, and this is just a checkpoint. So you’d better get an
autograph from me before it’s too late, Oneesan-senpai! ’Cause they’ll be going
for one billion yen before long!”
She pointed right at me. I knew she was just
bluffing, but the fact that she felt good enough to show this kind of tenacity
was a relief. It was nice to see kids chasing their dreams and working hard with such
strong feelings.
“In return,” she said,
“I’m gonna beat you to a pulp today in b-ball. Hope you’re ready to get
dunked on.”
My sister came back over to
us, her phone call finished.
The two tweens exchanged
their girly (I guess?) greetings. I could really feel the
extroversion on a different level from how it manifested in the Quintet. This place was getting so
full of extroversion it was suffocating.
“Anyway, I’ll start off
by coming up with a strategy, Oneechan,” my sister said. “And then I’ll show it to
you later.”
“Thank you so much.” I pressed my hands
together in worship. Truly, I was getting my money’s worth here. It paid off to have a
little sister who could outshine me.
“And did you say a friend
of yours is coming?” my
sister asked.
“Yeah, she’ll probably be
here soon,” I said. “What
about you? Is it
just Seira-san today?”
“Oh, nothing. It’s just that there were three of you when you had friends over during
summer break.”
There was Haruna,
Seira-san, and that other girl. Bobbed Hair, the one whose
eyes lit up when we talked about Queen Rose. If I remembered
correctly, her name was Minato.
“Oh, nah, nah, nah.” Seira-san thrust herself
into the conversation almost frantically. Hmm? “Nah, we don’t really talk about her. C’mon, let’s go play some
b-ball.”
“We’re kinda having a
fight right now,” my sister muttered in a low voice.
She and I were always
fighting, so this sparked a bit of a trauma reaction in me. My heart skipped a beat.
There was an awkward
silence for a few moments. Um… I wondered if maybe I should laugh it off awkwardly, like, “Damn,
Haruna, you seem like you get along with everyone. You, fighting? That’s wack.” But it sounded like this
was a topic best left alone.
To dispel the awkward
tension, Seira-chan chirped, “Whatever, who cares? C’mon, you don’t get a
chance like this every day! Let’s play and have fun. We’re all buddies here,
right? Love and
peace, y’know?”
And then another girl
joined in, late to the party, with a natural grin and a peace sign. “Uh-huh, you know it! What’s poppin’, besties?”
Seira-chan’s eyes bugged
out of their sockets. “Huh?! What’re you doing here?”
Welp, I figured that was
going to happen.
We ended up practicing by
playing a two-on-two game, my sister and Seira-san versus me and Kaho-chan. In terms of ability, my
sister and Seira-san were neck and neck, with Kaho-chan not far behind. Which meant that I was
way below all the rest. Sure enough, it was no time at all before my feet were dragging and I
ran out of stamina. I flopped onto a bench and tried to catch my breath.
“B-basket…ball…sure…wears…me…out,”
I panted.
As I spluttered there
like a beached fish, I heard a cutesy, girly voice squealing, “Huh? Wait, Seira and
Kaho-senpai, you guys know each other?!” It had to be my sister. When she was on her best
behavior like this, she transformed into a completely ordinary pretty young
girl, no traces of the brutish jock left behind. Actually, maybe it wasn’t
so much that she was acting as it was that she was too unfriendly around me.
“Mm-hmm,” Kaho-chan said. “We know each other
’cause of extra currics ’n stuff. Right, Seira-chan?”
Seira-san forced herself
to smile while Kaho-chan beamed. They had their arms around
each other’s shoulders in an attempt to pass themselves off as the best of
friends. I
guess they were putting up a united front here.
“But, like, I had no idea
Rena-chin had such a cute li’l sis,” Kaho-chan said. “You’re in your second
year of junior high, right? I never woulda guessed.”
My sister laughed. “Yeah, I get that a lot. Thanks for always looking
out for my sis, by the way. You don’t mind, right? She’s not bothering you,
is she?”
Still gasping for air, I
called, “Mind your own business,” but it had no effect on reality. Maybe my throat mic was
muted.
“Nah, she’s never a
bother,” Kaho-chan said. “In fact, Rena-chin’s always bailing me out of stuff.”
“Wait, really?!” my
sister said.
“Yup, yup! And
I’m not the only one. Rena-chin’s super-duper popular in class, and it feels like everyone in
our friend group’s fighting for her attention.”
“Wait, in your friend group?! You mean like, Mai-senpai
and Ajisai-senpai?”
“Yeah, yeah! They’re aalll head over heels for her.”
Kaho-chan met my eye, and she winked. Don’t give me that “I’m
just raising your stock value!” nonsense!
I thought. Now my sister’s looking
at me weird.
“Wh-what’s there to like
about her, though…?” my
sister asked.
“Oh, you know. You know,”
I hurried to say. “Like. Um. You know what I’m talking
about. The
whatchamacallit.”
Kaho-chan folded her arms
and gave me a look which said that amateurs should shut up and stay out of it. Then she closed her eyes
and said, “Like how quick she is to put out…work.”
“O-kay,” I said, lurching
upright and interjecting between my sister and Kaho-chan. “Let’s get back to
playing, shall we? Hm? Were you saying something
a moment ago? I
didn’t hear anything!”
I’d be in hot water if
someone spilled the beans to my sister about the whole two-timing thing. Time to keep the lid on
that forever. What if
she found out? Then it’d be Hanatori-san and her chainsaw and my sister with a butcher
knife coming after me. What
the heck, man? I wasn’t even doing anything that bad! Come on, guys, can’t we
just all be happy? I promised I was trying my best, right?
“I’d really just like to
apologize, Rena-chan,” Ajisai-san said during lunch at school.
The two of us were on our
way to the vending machine in the courtyard to get drinks when she apologized
to me right out of the blue. My heart skipped a beat. I had as many things to
say sorry for as there were clouds in the sky, but I didn’t have the slightest
idea what she was apologizing for. Maybe she was about to
say, “If I tell my parents that you’re two-timing me, they’ll be super angry
and want you to pay damages. You can handle that, right? It’ll be about 1.2 million
yen. Good luck.” Now I was worried about
whether or not I had 1.2 million yen in my wallet, of all things.
“Not just to you,”
Ajisai-san said. “To
everybody. I
mean, it’s all my fault you guys’re working so hard at the interclass athletics
competition.”
Phew.
I almost
had to bust out 1.2 million yen there.
“You don’t need to
apologize,” I said. “I mean, Class B started it. That’s what everyone’s
saying, right?”
“Yeah, I guess…”
Ajisai-san clutched her strawberry milk with both hands.
For some reason, it didn’t
feel like the right moment to head back to class, so we stayed in the courtyard
talking for a bit. Most of my time outside recently had me sweating on the basketball
court, so I hadn’t noticed how chilly the wind was getting.
“But you nodded off in
class today, right? Don’t you think you’re working too hard?” Ajisai-san asked.
“Huh?
Oh, that’s
just because I never get any regular exercise. I have, like, zero
stamina compared to most people.”
Ajisai-san looked gloomy,
which in turn made me panic. How dare Class B make her
look like this? I wasn’t the type to hold grudges for a long time, but this was
different. If
I didn’t win, Ajisai-san would be in a funk forever.
“I mean, they didn’t even
break my pencil case, exactly,” she pointed out.
“Yeah, so? They broke out, so sue ’em! I mean, like, that’s not
the issue so much as how rude they were to you. They still haven’t
apologized to you, right?”
I took a sip from my soda
and then made a fist. “It’ll be okay, Ajisai-san. Our whole class loves
you, and that’s why we want to do this for you. O-of course, I feel the
same way, so…I’m going to go out and win this, just you wait and see!”
Funnily enough, I felt
like the weight of my responsibilities had grown even heavier… But no, this was
a team sport. And that meant the responsibility was distributed across five people. But what if I dragged
everyone else down and made us lose? Then it’d be my responsibility again!
Oh god, what was I
supposed to do? I was starting to feel kind of not so great. Maybe I
should skip class and go practice basketball instead, I wondered.
I all but did a spit take
with my Sprite.
Ajisai-san lifted her
hair to hide her mouth. Avoiding eye contact with me all the while, she mumbled, “Oh, um, I was
just…you know, I was just trying to think if there was anything I could do to
help, and that’s all I could come up with.”
“Wait, but like, um. That’s
like. Um.”
“Y-yeah, not a good idea,
huh? That’d
just be rewarding me, not you.”
Ajisai-san’s face
immediately flushed even further scarlet. A kiss? A
kiss from Ajisai-san?
After my girlfriend’s
proposal, I…I…
“I-it’s not a bad idea!” I protested. “But, like!”
I grabbed both of her
shoulders hard. “R-Rena-chan!”
she squeaked.
God, how the heck could I
word this? I
took the gargantuan ball of emotions in me, tore them to shreds, pounded them
to a pulp, kneaded them, stretched ’em out, and little by little made words out
of them.
Ajisai-san staggered like
I’d hit her. No,
I didn’t mean it like that!
“No, no, I’m super happy
you suggested it. It’s just, like, it wouldn’t be any good for me if I pulled Excalibur
out of a treasure chest in the very first dungeon, you know?”
“U-uh, no, I don’t. What does that mean…?”
“I need to get it after
overcoming more challenges or else I’ll get too greedy for more!”
Whenever I was with Mai,
I always let her do all the steering. That made the immense
happiness she’d given me a frightening thing which I reflexively tried to run
away from. I
couldn’t let that happen again here. It was a warning.
“So what I’m trying to
say… I-if, say, I won the basketball game, you could kiss me then…or something.
Um, that would be
okay. It’d
be a real reward then, better than, uh, New Year’s money or whatnot…”
Happiness wasn’t
something someone else could give you. You had to go out and
make happiness for yourself.
“That’s how much a kiss
from you would mean to me, you see…”
“I really don’t think it’s
that big of a deal…” she said. I don’t think she got my
point. “I
mean…if I want to kiss you, is that…really such a bad thing?”
For a moment there, an
infinity of options popped up in the galaxy of my mind. But pop up was all they
did, and I had no ability to process any of them.
I froze and, practically
gasping for air, mumbled, “Nah, it’s not…so bad… Actually…never mind, yeah. It is.”
Seeing Ajisai-san look so
shocked made me feel guiltier than ever. But come on.
“I’m sorry,” I said, “but
I just think that if I get a kiss from you now without having to work at it,
whenever I run into issues later on down the line I’ll be all like, ‘Well,
Ajisai-san’ll kiss me anyway.’ Then I won’t ever take
anything seriously and I’ll become a lazybones.”
“I-I really don’t think
that’ll happen.”
“It will,” I insisted. “Or more like, it did. I’m actually from the
future, and I came back in time to stop that from happening.”
“I think that’s more
shocking than anything else, frankly…”
I placed my hand on my
heart and declared to her, deadly serious, “That’s why I need to ask you to not
do it now. My life is at
stake.”
“If your whole life hangs in the balance, I can’t exactly say no,” said Ajisai-san. She shook her head sadly
but then immediately grinned. “But I guess this is
something you really care about, huh? Okay, sounds good to me.”
“I appreciate your
understanding and cooperation,” I said with a solemn bow. Ajisai-san pulled a face. Oh great. Here was business!Renako
again.
I waved both hands in a
“no” gesture. “I mean, it’s supposed to be a reward, so it’s not at all like I’m
opposed to it, you know? I
really mean it. I really, really like you a lot, Ajisai-san.”
Ajisai-san looked a bit
happier now, thank god. But at the exact same time, an enormous wave of regret washed over me. Why on earth had I let a
chance to get a kiss escape me? What if, because of this,
I never got another kiss from Ajisai-san in my entire life? Amaori Renako, I told myself, you are an utter
fool.
After Ajisai-san finished
her strawberry milk, she whispered to me, “So, like…good luck at the
competition, okay? I, uh, can’t wait for…your good performance.”
That meant. If we won the interclass competition, then my reward would be. A kiss from Ajisai-san.
I immediately locked up. “I-I’ll try my best!” I said robotically.
“Kaho-chan,” I said,
“from now on, we’re going to practice basketball 24/7!”
“Uh, no, that’s literally
impossible.”
I was fired up that
afternoon after school. I mean, not that I had any particular reason to be or anything. It was just that this was
a school event, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to take it more seriously than I
typically did. That, uh, that whatchamacallit… That “hard work” thing? Yeah, that’s pretty rad,
you know? You
put in enough hard work day after day, and you can make radical growth between
who you are now and who you were yesterday. Even if the results don’t
pan out, the fact that you worked hard is impressive enough. See, I was learning that
there were more important things in life besides winning and losing. Never heard of hard work? Don’t worry, you boomers
wouldn’t get it.
“Did Aa-chan say
something to you or what?” Kaho-chan asked.
“Uh, not really! And what, why Ajisai-san of all people?” I responded, far too
sensitively.
“No reason,” said Kaho-chan. “It’s just ’cause she’s
been kinda fidgety today, yanno? And, like, I know you
guys are dating, so I’m like, ‘Ooh, someone’s been bitten by the love bug.’”
“Ah,” I said. “Well, that’s nothing but a figment of your imagination, so I refuse to
comment!”
Kaho-chan gave me a look
like that was some BS and grinned at my reddening, retorting face. “Oooh, are you giving this
your all ’cause of Aa-chan? Are you in luuuuurv?”
“N-n-n-not really!” As shaken as I was, I did
my best to deny it. “But, like, given the way they picked a fight with us, it’s a
no-brainer that I have to do my best, right? And not necessarily for
Ajisai-san! Right? Right, Kaho-chan?”
“Uh,
duh.” Kaho-chan
nodded with great confidence. Huh? “Like, I’m not a ‘Let’s
all hold hands; happy, happy, happy’ kinda optimist, y’know? I’m the kinda gal who
fights when it’s time to fight. I’m gonna make each and
every one of ’em grovel before Aa-chan.”
Dang. Outgoing!Kaho-chan sure
was cool.
“So I don’t think there’s
a problem in trying your best for Aa-chan, right? Oh, excuse me—your girlfriend. Gotta do it for your loving girlfriend. Gotta
look cool in front of your girlfriend.”
“You mess with me an
awful lot when you’re in outgoing mode.”
Kaho-chan’s fangs peeked
out past her lips mischievously. I could almost see her
imp’s tail wagging.
“Oh, forget about it,” I
said. “Let’s
just go shoot some hoops.”
Even when I raised both
arms threateningly, Kaho-chan wasn’t perturbed. It didn’t even debuff her
attack stats. Darn it!
“By the way,” I asked,
“where are we going?”
I’d left my backpack back
in the classroom to follow Kaho-chan somewhere. I was pretty sure there
wasn’t anything but the gym over here.
“Do you even have to ask?” she said. “If we really wanna win, then of course we gotta do this—and by ‘this,’
I mean spy on the enemy.”
She’d really dragged me
along on such a dangerous mission with zero explanation?
“Oh, on Class B’s
basketball team?” I asked.
“Yup, yup. I hear they’re all staying after and practicing today. Like, our copycats. Let’s steal all their
info and leave ’em with nothing!” Kaho-chan grinned and
gave me a thumbs-up.
Uhh, but they’d get
really mad if they spotted us, right? But she had a point. I, too, wanted to know
what the other team was bringing to the table beforehand. It’d help us form a more
concrete strategy, and if someone should go, then I should absolutely take the
opportunity to go along too.
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s go spy on them.”
“Hold on one sec. We gotta talk about something important first.”
Kaho-chan gave me a
mysterious grin and held her index finger aloft. “Let’s give ourselves
code names.”
“Uh, okay. But is that really important?”
“Um, hello?! If we call each other by our real names, then the jig is up, moron!”
“Jeez, there’s no call to
be that mad.” Her fury
scared me.
Kaho-chan cleared her throat.
“’Kay ’kay, so
I’m gonna be…”
As Kaho-chan stood there
frozen in place, a boy and a girl from another class passed by.
“Could you really not
come up with anything better?!”
“And I’ll call you Wifey
too!” she said.
“We can’t both
use the same
code name! At
least call me Hubby or something.”
Kaho-chan marched off,
fist in the air. “Let’s get this show on the road, Wifey!”
“People are so going to
get the wrong idea if they hear you,” I told her.
“Rena-chin.” Kaho-chan patted me on the shoulder. “Look, no one’s gonna
hear a couple of teenage girls calling each other ‘wifey’ and think they’re,
like, actually a couple. They’re gonna just think they’re doing it for the bit. We’re not all totally
into girls, like you.”
“I keep telling you, I’m
not!” God,
I kept having to argue with her on this over and over and over and OVER! “For the last time, I don’t like like girls! Didn’t we used to talk
about guys we liked in manga way back when and everything? Can’t you just trust me,
if no one else?”
Kaho-chan snorted in
derision. “Says
the chick dating two girls at once.”
Well, now that she’d
played that card on me, pack it up, folks! We were done here! I was forced to admit defeat.
I bet I’d never clear up
that misunderstanding for as long as I lived. Not that it meant I’d
date girls for the rest of my life or anything, mind you.
Kaho-chan and I squabbled
the whole way over to the gym. Then we opened the door
surreptitiously and peeked inside. Ah
ha. There they were. They were kinda far off,
but we could see them more or less.
“Whatcha think, Wifey?” Kaho-chan asked.
“Uh, I think I see three
people over there,” I reported.
It was the three girls
who’d tangled with Satsuki-san. It didn’t look like
Takada-san or Terusawa-san were with them.
“They’re not doing
anything ’sides passing the ball around, are they?” Kaho-chan asked.
“Nope.
But I’m
still getting a totally athletic vibe from them.”
All outgoing guys can be
athletic if they put their minds to it, but outgoing girls fall into one of two
categories. Some girls (such as my sister) are like guys and grow up with high
self-esteem due to their ability to play sports—the warrior type. Others can get away
without doing a lot of exercise—the magic-user type. There were many
subcategories among this latter group of outgoing girls, such as exceptionally
pretty girls, rich girls, super chatty girls, or girls with tough boyfriends. Or, say, girls who talked
to Oduka Mai on the first day of high school and thus ended up in the same
friend group!
At any rate, it wasn’t a
shock to see all of them being athletic, even if some folks around me couldn’t
play sports to save their lives. It was technically
possible for pretty much everyone in Takada-san’s group to be warrior types.
“Hmm,” Kaho-chan muttered. “Do you think they’re tough?”
“Who knows?” I said. “I’ve never seen them
play an actual game, so I can’t say for certain. By the way,
Kaho-cha—Wifey, I didn’t know your eyes were so bad.”
“Tbh, my contacts fell
out,” she said.
Kaho-chan typically
cosplayed as an upbeat, outgoing sort, but she showed her true colors when she
didn’t have her contacts in. I liked seeing her cute,
more introverted side, but she wasn’t exactly the kind of person you could rely
on in a pinch. So
that made me freak out.
“N-now’s not the time for
you to be shy! Wifey!” I told her. “Do it somewhere when
we’re alone!”
“Huh, why? You’re
kinda spooking me.”
“Anyway, don’t worry ’bout
it,” she said. “It’s just a little blurry is all. Oh hey, it looks like
they’re practicing shooting.”
Dang.
They were
pretty good at it too…or at least better than me.
“I guess I’d better put in
more practice,” I said.
“You’re in this thing to
win it, huh, Wifey?”
“Well, duh.” There was an Ajisai-san kiss on the line, after all.
I bit my lip hard. That was a close one. I was not about to tell Kaho-chan
that! And
besides, the kiss had nothing to do with it. I just wanted to try as
hard as I could for Ajisai-san with the rest of the class, that’s all. It would have been awfully
rude if I only put my back into it because there was a kiss at stake. No one else had the
chance to play for a kiss.
“H-hey, Wifey…” I said. “Just, uh, hypothetically
speaking… If Mai offered to kiss you if we won, would that help you feel more
motivated?”
Kaho-chan took a moment to
gulp down both spit and words before tentatively asking back, “Um, what do you
mean? Are
you offering to give away your girlfriend?”
“No, that’s not at all
what I meant!”
“You scared the crap outta
me,” she said. “For a sec there, I thought I irrevocably messed up your sexual
preferences with my hypnotism.”
“No, that’s really not at
all what I meant.” I
had worded it poorly. Already regretting bringing this up, I amended myself. “I was just wondering how
much of a motivating factor it’d be if the person you l-like offers you a kiss
as a reward. Sorry.”
“Eh, no worries,” she said. “I’m used to you saying
stuff with zero tact all the time.”
“But if that’s the deal,
then I’d rather go for a kiss from you,” Kaho-chan said.
I looked back at
Kaho-chan after she straight-up said something so ridiculous. She gave me a cheeky,
flirtatious grin, holding a peace sign up to her chin.
“I mean, you’re the
hottest item on the market, Wifey-chan. Mai-Mai and Aa-chan are
scrambling to get their mitts on you, y’know?”
“It’s supposed to be less
scrambling and more a peaceful relationship,” I protested.
“Well, my point is that a
kiss from Wifey’s worth the most. I may not look it, but I
wanna get a leg up in the world, y’know?”
Weirdly embarrassed, I
fiddled with my hair. “It makes me feel kind of bashful to hear you say stuff like that,” I
admitted.
“I mean, we’ve been
friends for ages and all. That makes you, like, different from all the others, you know? Sort of…special, in a
sense.”
For a moment, Kaho-chan
stared intently at me, and then she heaved a huge sigh, her shoulders slumping.
“Bluh. I hate how you have zero
self-awareness.”
“Wh-what’s that supposed
to mean?”
“Nothin’, nothin’. I’m just talking to myself. So, is that the plan? Are you gonna kiss me?”
“No!”
I said. “It was only a thought
experiment!”
I didn’t go around
kissing people willy-nilly! I wasn’t Satsuki-san, for
crying out loud.
“Oh hey, there’s Little
Miss High Horse,” Kaho-chan said.
Oh yeah, she was right. Takada-san was there too
now, practicing basketball with the others.
I shuddered in fear. “Sh-she’s incredible.”
“Yeah, she’s way outta
our league,” Kaho-chan agreed. “It’s like comparing the
clothes I sewed myself back in junior high to the costumes some pro designer’s
made.”
At the very least, it
wasn’t just a matter of her being athletic. I bet she had some real
basketball experience too, because this girl was just too good.
“Guess we gotta get our
veteran b-ball player to work her butt off, huh, Wifey?” Kaho-chan teased.
“That’s total BS!” I
insisted. “You
haven’t forgotten how bad I’ve been at all our recent practices, have you?”
Just then, Takada-san
stopped on the spot and looked right in our direction. “Is someone watching us?”
“That’s ’cause you yelled
just now,” Kaho-chan told me.
“Well, then maybe you
shouldn’t have said anything stupid enough to be worth yelling at!”
“Yikes central!” Kaho-chan
said. “Let’s split up. I’ll go this way, ’kay?”
“Huh?
Oh, okay! See you later, Wifey!”
But I ended up running
right smack into…
The only thing down here
was the gym’s storage room. Could I scramble up over
the fence and escape into the schoolyard? Nah, I was sure I’d be
caught while I was still clambering over it. Oh god, they were chasing
me too!
Just as I faced my
impending doom, I heard a voice call, “Renako-kun!”
A girl beckoned to me
from the storeroom door. I had no time to hesitate, so I dashed inside.
The girls following me
were almost here.
“I’m sure she ran this way!” Takada-san said. “We’ll catch her and mete
out punishment.”
I held my breath. Presently, I was hiding inside a locker in the gym’s storeroom with the
other girl. The storeroom door suddenly opened with a huge rattle, and light
flooded in.
The girl pressed up
against me put a hand over my mouth and whispered, “Don’t worry, you’ll be
okay. Just
be patient for a few more minutes.”
“T-Terusawa-san?” I
whispered back. This was Terusawa Youko—a girl I’d only barely said hi to once. And that was back when
she was with Takada-san and the other girls. “Why’re you helping me?”
The voices were just
outside our locker. “Where are you hiii-diiiing?” they singsonged.
Eeep.
Why was
this a horror film all of a sudden? And it wasn’t even a one
Killer versus four Survivors kind of deal—now there was one Survivor and four
Killers!
Takada-san and her
friends roamed the storeroom searching for me. It wasn’t all that big of
a storeroom either, so I knew they’d find us in no time. Then, once they found me,
they’d gang up and chew me to pieces! I wasn’t as thick-skinned
as Satsuki-san, so I’d immediately burst into tears. And then they’d film that
and put it all over social media. Class A would lose before
we even got to put up a fight.
“It’s okay,” Terusawa-san
whispered. “It’ll be okay.” She squeezed me tight and
patted me on the head as I trembled.
“Don’t worry. They’ll
be gone soon. Relax, relax. Here, try counting back
from ten in your head. Ten…nine…eight…”
Her voice was oddly soothing.
I wasn’t
sure if it was a coincidence, but by the time I finished counting, Takada-san’s
gang was gone. I sagged.
I was a boneless Renako. I couldn’t even stand up
without her support. Terusawa-san held me for a while longer. God, she smelled really nice.
She was
wearing some kind of perfume.
“Oh, sorry,” she said. “I was just working out a
few minutes ago, so I must smell super sweaty.”
“N-no, not at all,” I said. “In fact, you smell great.”
Terusawa-san went red
enough that I could tell even inside the locker. Oh.
“S-sorry, I didn’t mean it
like that!” I said.
She laughed awkwardly. “I smell good, huh? No one’s ever told me
that before, so I got kinda embarrassed. Plus, I never expected to
hear that from you of all people.”
After giving her a look
to confirm the coast was clear, I opened the door. Cool, fresh air blew in,
and I took a deep breath.
“Phew.
Thanks a lot for
the help.”
“But, like…how come you
helped me?”
Terusawa-san was in Class
B and all.
“Hmm.”
She propped
her chin up on her index finger and looked off diagonally upward. “I guess just ’cause I
wanted to help you out, Renako-kun.”
“Just ’cause.” Terusawa-san
laughed.
Feeling that she meant
well in her outgoing, don’t-sweat-the-small-stuff way, I couldn’t question her
further. Urgh. Even though she’d bailed
me out and all, I wasn’t sure if she had the chops to carry on a good
conversation. I figured I’d better beat a hasty retreat.
“Oh, Renako-kun,” she said. “It’s still risky to go
out there.”
She pulled me by the hand. Wh-whoa! I’d gradually started
warming up to the Quintet girls touching me, but touch from a complete stranger
still freaked me out. When I pulled back exaggeratedly, I startled Terusawa-san.
“Oh, no, not at all. You know, you’re a lot
more humble and quiet than I was imagining.”
“Huh?!”
I replied,
keeping my guard up. “No, I’m a cookie cutter model of an average teenage girl!”
Wasn’t she basically
insinuating I was an introverted loser?
Terusawa-san tapped
herself on the head. “Oopsies. Sorry to make you
self-conscious about it. I say any old thing the minute it pops into my head, huh? I just thought you’d be a
lot more outgoing, that’s all. That wasn’t very nice of me. I’m sorry.”
Terusawa-san heaved
herself up onto a mat in the storeroom and stretched out her legs. I squatted a step away
from her in a position where you couldn’t see me if you were coming in through
the door.
“I have, like, no tact,”
she went on. “Or maybe I’m just a little weird or something. That’s why I didn’t have
all that many friends in junior high. You know, it was only
when I got to high school that I started fitting in with the girls. I guess you could say I
turned over a new leaf or something, huh?”
“Huh?
Oh… G-good for you.” My heart skipped a beat
when she mentioned the “new leaf” part.
“Thanks. Anyway, Himi-chan became my friend, and that saved me. I know she might look
like the tyrannical empress type to the other classes, but she has her sweet
side too. I promise.”
“Good for you.” I had no idea what to say, hence why I kept repeating the same thing
over and over. But that wasn’t cutting it, so I shook my head. “Uh, why’re you telling
me all this, though…?”
“Oh, you’re right!” she
said. “Shoot, why am I telling you this?”
“Well, I guess maybe it’s
’cause you seem like such a nice person,” she said. “I thought maybe you
wouldn’t make fun of me even if I told you about how I used to be, but I guess
maybe that’s just wishful thinking!”
“I would never make fun of
you,” I said. I couldn’t stop myself from speaking up. “You see, I…”
“Oh, nothing,” I backpedaled.
“I just mean. Um. What I was going to say
is… I really look up to people who work hard like that to reinvent themselves. So, uh. I think that’s a good thing. Yeah!”
Terusawa-san’s eyes widened. Hey, wait a sec.
She giggled. “You’re
so honest.”
She smiled winningly at
my apology. “See,
I knew you were nice. Knowing that there’s bubbly, outgoing people like you out there makes
me think I can make friends with loads of girls.”
Urgh.
I felt
guilty for my earlier thoughts about her conversational skills. What a haughty person I
was, passing unilateral judgments on people doing their very best! Was I conceited now that
I’d made a few friends for myself? Believe me, I should have
been fully aware that everyone had their own struggles! I felt deep, heartfelt
regret. Once
again, I strongly resolved myself to view everyone exactly as they were, not
with pre-conceived biases.
Terusawa-san grinned. “Thanks, Renako-kun. Oh hey, you can call me
Youko if you want.”
“Huh?!
O-okay then…
Youko…chan?”
Terusawa-san beamed. “I
love it!” Then she laughed.
“Gosh, it
feels like we got set up by a matchmaker. You’re definitely way out
of my league, but I’m happy we still became buddies!”
“I really don’t think I’m
out of your league,” I said.
“I just wish you won’t
think too badly of Himi-chan,” Terusawa-san said. “But that’s probably a
wash, huh? My
only hope’s that after this competition wraps up we can at least end this on
good terms.”
Mind you, that sounded
pretty tricky to me, knowing Takada-san…particularly after she’d upset
Ajisai-san, of all people. Still, there was something kinda nice about the idea that I could maybe
make a friend with someone from another class, even if we were enemies now. These kinds of things did
come about sometimes, after a conflict.
“See you at the game,
Teru…Y-Youko-chan,” I said.
“Same.
Y’know, I’m
glad we got to talk today!”
And then, like it was
totally natural, we both shook hands. That made Youko-chan
blush again for some reason.
“O-oh, Renako-kun, your
hand is really soft,” she said.
“Uh-huh… Oh, sorry, I
didn’t mean it in that way! Wait,
what’s that way supposed to mean? Whatever—anyway, we’re
not losing to Class A, so watch out.”
But just as I was about
to leave, she said, “Oh yeah, one last thing. Hey, um…”
Youko-chan covered her
mouth with her hand and fidgeted. “I, uh, just happened to
overhear. Y-you
know, I won’t tell anyone that you call Koyanagi-san ‘Wifey,’ I promise. So don’t worry! Anyway, that’s all I
wanted to say. Later!”
But she ran away and paid
me no notice.
Freaking Kaho-chan! Now Youko-chan totally
had the wrong idea. Hey! Kaho-chan!
“It
is not a laughing matter,” I told
her, my face red. “Jeez!”
I brandished my finger at
Mai as she sat on the side of the pool. We were at that hotel in
Akasaka, the one with the big, members-only fitness pool. Why were we there, you ask? Well, it was raining
today, so basketball was off the table. But I still wanted to
keep exercising, so I’d asked Mai if she had any plans and then came with her
to the pool. I
was in no way a good swimmer, but I splashed my way back and forth across the
pool for quite a while. To be honest, it was a little embarrassing, since I was the only one to
be putting her whole heart into puttering around a high-end pool like this.
“What a cute
misunderstanding, no?” Mai said. “You and Kaho, hmm? Now you’re up to three
girlfriends.”
“Believe me, I’m not trying to take infidelity to the extremes here!”
At the moment, I was
bitching to Mai about what went down the other day when Kaho-chan and I went to
spy on Takada-san’s group. Plus the whole using Wifey as a code-name thing, and how someone
overheard that and got the wrong idea. I skirted around the fact
that said person happened to be Youko-chan.
Mai grinned at me from her
seat on the edge of the pool. “Popularity such as yours
must be a challenge indeed, Renako.”
“There’s zero reason that
should ever be a thing,” I groaned.
It went without saying,
but Mai and I were both in swimsuits since we were in the water. I wore a one-piece that
didn’t show a lot of skin; I wasn’t about to wear a bikini that flashed my
tummy in front of Mai again. Mai, on the other hand,
wore a black bikini so overlaid with ornamentation that I doubted she was going
to swim in it. But
it looked super cute. I knew she had long legs, but whenever she took her clothes off, it
emphasized their length all the more. It hit me all over again
that she was a model who competed on the world stage. People are amazing, huh? The diversity in particular.
And speaking of
diversity, it was even more amazing that people like Kaho-chan or Youko-chan,
both girls who fell into the more cutesy than elegant camp, had moments when
they outshone Mai. But maybe I was just an amateur connoisseur of girls. Girls really were hard to
wrap your head around, huh? No, I
reminded myself, people who work hard are beautiful in their own way
too. Get it together, Renako.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have
told you about the Wifey thing at all,” I said, only coming to this realization
once the words were already out of my mouth. My judgment was too slow. (Please don’t slap me,
Sakonji Urokodaki.)
“Because…you might not
like it…”
“I
see.” Mai
crossed her legs and smiled at me. “Might I ask why you think
that would be the case?”
“Huh?
Is this a
sudden Mai quiz bowl?”
She smiled. As far as I could tell, she didn’t seem upset in the slightest. Well, but I did want to
become someone who saw people for who they were and could pick up on other
people’s emotions. I leaned on the edge of the pool and thought the matter over carefully.
“Let me see,” I said. “Uh, well, I was trying
to be serious when I asked you and Ajisai-san out. So to lump you in with
the likes of Kaho-chan, who’s only a friend, might make you think my feelings
for you aren’t all that serious after all. Or something. Did I get
it?”
“Mmm.”
That didn’t
tell me if I got it or not!
I kept thinking. “Okay, maybe you’re nervous I’m going to go and cheat with someone else
besides you guys.”
“Mmm,” Mai said again. What was that supposed to
mean, seriously? “Well, it’s just that…I thought it’d be fun to make this into a little
quiz, but it’s rather embarrassing to say when you get it right, thus pushing
my own insecurities onto you.”
“You saying something this
rash reminds me of Satsuki-san,” I told her.
“Maybe so. At any rate…” Mai looked down and laced her fingers together. “Of your two guesses, I
suppose the latter came closer to the truth. I’ve never once doubted
your sincerity. It’s just that you’re so very charming and sweet that I fear that if
someone else were to court you, you couldn’t help but want to respond.”
Satsuki-san came to mind
again, so I shooed her away with a mental wave of the hand.
I climbed up out of the
pool and sat next to Mai. I felt
bad. Feeling
bad on top of feeling bad. Like:
I sighed. “Sorry for being such a loser.”
“No, not at all. I love that you try to do good every single day,” Mai said.
“Mai, you’re always so
quick to be sweet to me,” I whined.
Mai’s thigh brushed mine,
and I felt a slight flush of heat.
“You always make me sound
like a super good person whenever I talk to you,” I said.
“Alas, I think that you
are mistaken.”
The fact that she didn’t
even hesitate before shooting me down made me snap at her, but she just
laughed. God! I kicked my legs in
frustration, sending up sprays of water. Ripples spread across the
surface to the far edges of the pool.
“Hey, you know what, Mai?” I asked.
I wondered how much
sharing my feelings was just based on my own insecurities. I wanted to reassure her,
right. But
I wasn’t sure where you drew the line. Nor did I know where to
draw the lines between what I wanted to say, what I couldn’t say, what I shouldn’t say, and what I should. If only there was some
way to get it all nice and organized and tell Mai the thing that would make her
happy.
“I’ve been so out of my
depth recently that I haven’t really had the mental energy to sit down and
reflect on my actions. Oh, here I go making excuses again. Anyway, I just feel like
all I’m doing is causing you trouble nonstop.”
We were alone together,
just she and I. She placed a hand on my thigh, and I placed my own on top of it. I knew her hands well.
“You asked me out first,”
I went on. “You
asked me out first, and you waited for me for ages, but I feel like I just kept
procrastinating on answering you. I really want to
apologize for all that.”
Mai would certainly never
say it out loud, but I had the sinking feeling that she agreed with me. But Mai had been lonely
and sad about this far longer than I had been, so I needed to keep going.
“Um, you don’t need to
believe me, but…I really do like you. Like, a lot. For instance, I know we went to Odaiba together ages ago, but it was
such a ton of fun. You know, I’ve really fallen for you.”
“I
know.” Mai
squeezed our clasped hands. “Why did you say that I
don’t have to believe you?”
Good question, really. I thought it over and
then strung a couple of sentences together. “I guess I just thought
that it’s okay if you don’t believe me right now. Because I’m going to try
my best to prove it to you, so that one day you’ll believe me for sure.”
Mai giggled and leaned on me.
“I adore you, Renako.
More than I even
did before.”
“W-well, I’m very glad to
hear that… Hey, you’ve been asking me a lot of why questions today. You’re making an effort
to really understand me, aren’t you?”
“I am,” she said. “Does it bother you?”
“Nah, not at all! I just thought, wow, you’re trying your best too.” I looked out over the
water and said, “I guess, like, I’m kinda happy. It’s nice when the person
you like tries their best for you. You know?”
Yet Mai tilted her head
in confusion. “But I thought that’s what I was doing before. How odd. I’ve tried all sorts of
things to make you happy.”
“You mean like the time
you dragged me to that party or invited me for dinner at the ryoutei?! Those were way too
large-scale for me, so I couldn’t just straight-up accept them!”
“Oh, so what about small
scale?” Mai asked. “Let me see. Would you like any candy?”
“How on earth does giving
me candy translate to you doing your best?!” I snapped. “I thought you said you got it!”
Mai let out a cultured
giggle. This
freaking girl, I’m telling you.
“Oh yeah,” I said, “what
exactly did you do to Takada-san, anyway?”
“I’m afraid I don’t have
the faintest idea,” Mai said. She put a hand to her chin. Hmm.
“You’ve been involved
with so many people,” I said, “so maybe you did something and then just forgot.
Or maybe
she has a grudge for no good reason. It’s tough to tell.”
“Agreed,” Mai said. “But I’m used to it, in as much as one can be.” She looked off far into
the distance. “It’s a situation in which my hands are tied. This is my lot as Oduka Mai.”
“Come on.” I shoved Mai in the lower back and sent her toppling into the pool with
a splash.
“Wh-what was that for?” she demanded, turning to
me in shock.
Deep down, I was nervous
that she’d be super pissed, but I feigned nonchalance and said, “Look, you can
just say if you’re sad or upset or ticked off or whatever. It’s fine. Because you’re here with
m—because you’re here with your girlfriend.”
Okay, that last line was
a little embarrassing, so I got tripped up there. No clinching that full
one hundred points for me. But
whatever. I
pretended not to notice and went on, “You say that a partner’s someone you
share both happiness and sadness with, right? So come on, share away. Lay it on me.”
“Oh…” For a few moments,
Mai stood there in the pool looking out of place. I wasn’t sure if she was
giving in or if she’d been wanting to open up to me for ages, but she
eventually started talking in little dribs and drabs.
“It’s not uncommon for me
to be met with open hostility,” Mai said, “and to receive unilateral insults
from someone I’ve never met before. When so many people know
you, it’s inevitable that a certain number of them will have negative opinions
about you, you know.”
Yeah.
The haters,
as we know them colloquially.
“I’m better about it now
than I used to be,” Mai went on. “I don’t let it get to me
as much. The
cruel things they said hurt me most during a period when I was in elementary
school. Back
then, the harsh comments felt louder to me than the words of my supporters.”
That must have been
around the time she brought Satsuki-san with her to the photography studio, I
guessed. Back when
Mai was little.
“At the time, you see,
Queen Rose wasn’t as famous as it is now. This was right around when
they started receiving more media appearances, thanks to my mother. I’m sure she must have
used some rather heavy-handed measures. It’s hardly any wonder
people resented me, not when I was the face of the company.”
“But you were just a kid,
and they were taking out their frustrations on you,” I said. “That’s awful!”
Mai smiled in
self-mockery as my voice rose. “You’re right. Now I’ve given up, and I treat it as something inevitable, but at the
time…it depressed me.”
Mai looked down, and I
could almost see the reflection of a small child in the water. I slipped into the pool
and grabbed her hand.
“I never felt like I
belonged anywhere, not even with my classmates, although they were all quite
nice to me. I
would have been happy if only I could have lived in peace with my family, my
friends, and all my loved ones… But I suppose saying that doesn’t change
anything.”
There was a horrible
sense of ephemerality in her smile. I guessed Mai was always
putting on the bravest face she could muster, but deep down she wanted more
than anybody to live an ordinary, quiet life. She spent her whole life
trying to live up to expectations and try her best for other people, but it
would have been nice if she could have used a little more of that energy for
herself… Wait, but instead she used that energy for me, right? The truth came as a shock. So that meant that when I
refused Mai when she tried to make a move on me in my bedroom, I was doing
something awful? Nah, it was still Mai’s fault for trying that when I wasn’t on board
with it.
Ugghhh.
After
agonizing over that, I pulled Mai into a tight hug.
“And when I’m done, we can
have Touched Time, I guess…”
“I-I see… Yes, that is
how the rules work, I suppose.”
I wasn’t sure if me
getting all handsy on Mai in an attempt to make her feel better was a good
thing. I
wondered if she’d think that using my body like this was pretty crude, but I
wanted her to be happy. I wanted her to forget all that unpleasantness. And if it was for that
purpose, then maybe I wouldn’t mind her touching me so much after all. You know what I mean. Whether as friends or
girlfriends, Mai was a special someone to me. So if there was something
I could do for her, I wanted to follow through, you know? That wasn’t me being too
naive, right? If clinging to Mai could make her feel better, then heck—I’d use
whatever I had, body and all! Well, within the scope of
things I felt brave enough to do!
As I hugged her tight, I
felt Mai’s supple frame against mine. In the water, our body
heat stood out in stark contrast. The places where we
touched felt extremely warm.
“F-five minutes are just
about up,” I said.
“Which means it’s my turn,
no?” Mai asked.
It was just hugging, not
touching Mai in any weird places (whatever that means!), but… If, you
know, I’d tried touching her there…she wouldn’t really have minded, right? I stared into her pupils. Mai flushed and looked
away, and then she enfolded me in her arms.
I let her kiss me. It was kinda, like, you know. A throwback. Our lips brushed against one another a handful of times. Hers felt so, so
soft—those girlish lips. I prepared myself for the possibility of her trying to slip me some
tongue again, but despite me being on guard for it, she didn’t. She peppered me with
sweet little kisses like someone raining pecks on a baby’s cheek.
No one could see us here
in the pool as I clung to her, the two of us sharing our body heat. The warmth cycling
between us seemed so strong it could melt our feelings and let them
intermingle.
To be perfectly honest, I
loved the way it felt. I’d never savored it like this before. I never knew kissing
could be so good—a kiss from your partner, at that. Me, kissing my partner. I couldn’t help but
internally laugh at the thought. No one was more shocked
than me at the dramatic turn of events in my life since the start of high
school.
“Oh, you see…time’s up,”
she said.
My heart rate skyrocketed. “Oh, okay. Sure, makes sense. Yup, can’t argue with the
clock! Okay! So, how would you rate
your experience, Mai-san? On a scale from one to five, how likely are you to recommend my body to
a friend?”
She gave me a look that
asked what on earth was I going on about. Mai, of all people! Ugh, how embarrassing. To be fair, though, what
on earth was I going on about?
“Right, anyway! Anyway, I really like you!”
Mai looked off into the
distance. “I
heard from Ajisai-san that she’ll kiss you if we win the upcoming interclass
athletics competition.”
I fell silent and, oddly
enough, despite being in the pool, started dripping sweat. “Uh.” Struck with the mighty
need to say something, my jaw creaked open and I mumbled, “It’s not what it
looks like.”
“Look, I wasn’t trying to
keep it a secret from you or anything,” I said. “It’s just, you know, kind
of a delicate topic. Besides, I haven’t told Ajisai-san about us kissing either.”
“I told her when she asked. That we’ve kissed, I mean.”
“God, you two talk about
everything under the sun, don’t you?”
Seriously, why? I’d planned on playing innocent until the end, but now Mai and
Ajisai-san’s buddy-buddyness was making me feel a sense of danger. I mean, I’m sure it was
more fun for them to talk things over without me. They always had plenty to
talk about and were great at chatting. But then one day the
realization would hit them, like the fallen apple that sparked Newton’s
discovery of gravity. One second, they’d be giggling up a storm together, and then the next
they’d be like, “Wait a sec. Do we really need Renako
after all?” Yup. I’d known all along that
this would happen. That’s why I needed to work, to strive, to do my very best so they
wouldn’t leave me.
Completely unaware that I
was going through it, Mai beamed. “It’s similar to how you
are thoughtful to us in so many ways. We talk from time to time
to see how we can keep things moving smoothly for all of us. This is one example of that.”
“We’ve decided that if
one of us even starts to feel guilty, we can always come talk to the other. And then when the other
opens their heart to us, it’s on us to properly accept how they feel.”
Wow, they’d really talked
this out, huh?
“You see, Ajisai is
considerate to me in everything she does,” Mai went on. “Thus, if my discussing
things with her helps the relationship between you two stay positive, it’s my
pleasure to assist.”
True, Ajisai-san was
plenty considerate of my feelings, so she was probably even more considerate of
Mai’s. She
wasn’t just trying to make Mai feel better or anything. She really was just that
kind. I
guess there had to be lots of things she felt like she couldn’t tell me… So
yeah, okay. If anything, this was a good place for me to say thanks.
“Thanks, Mai,” I said
after a moment of pondering what to say. “I had no idea you guys
were doing that.”
Mai smiled with aplomb. “Why, it’s quite all right. It all came about because
Ajisai is almost too nice, you see. Of course, I too wished
for her to have this sort of relationship with you. Thus, it only stands to
reason that I should take pains to preserve it, no?”
“In that case,” I said. “Uh. I have a question for you.”
Mai tilted her head. “What
did?”
“Oh, I mean, you know. When you heard that
Ajisai-san and I, um, kissed…you weren’t upset?”
“Hm…” Mai put a hand to
her chin and fell silent. There was a pause where I think she was trying to figure out how to
answer in a way that wouldn’t hurt me.
“Well, all three of us
are dating, of course,” she said. “Thus I assumed it would
happen at some point, and therefore I was ready for it. I think it’s lovely that
you two are happy together.”
I looked up at Mai. She’d flipped a whole
bunch earlier, and that was all pretty much due to jealousy. So I had a feeling that
would still hold true here.
I didn’t believe her, so
I asked again to double check. “A-are you sure?”
“‘Duh?’”
I goggled. “Hold the phone, Mai. When’d you get all OOC on
me?”
“It’s true,” she said. “I’m absolutely not jealous. Duh.”
God, that was really cute. I mean, I guess? It got me feeling some kind of way.
Anyway, she was 100
percent jealous, hands down. She needed to let the
feeling out somehow or else it’d spell trouble for me later, and that would, by
extension, put our three-way relationship in jeopardy.
“O-okay, then I’ll let
you in on it too!” I said. “There’s gotta be
something you want me to do, right? It’s no fair if I only
get a reward from Ajisai-san for winning the competition, right? Right?”
Mind you, the whole point
of getting a kiss from Ajisai-san had started off as a reward because she felt
bad about me choosing to work so hard in the fight against Class B. It didn’t make any
logical sense why Mai had to get a reward too, but relationships weren’t
exactly logical.
My words turned out to
have enough of an effect on Mai as is. Her eyes swam. “Something I want you to do, you say?”
I could only wonder what
in the world she was about to come up with. If she said some crap
like us taking a roll in the hay, I could tell her no, right? Actually, wait—did I
have a reason to tell her no…?
“Bwuh?”
I
spluttered, my whole body flushing as Mai beamed at me.
I roared as I dribbled
ferociously and then chucked the ball at the hoop. I threw it way too hard,
though, so it didn’t even come close to going in.
Kaho-chan and I were once
again at the park practicing basketball, like usual.
“You’re really into it
today,” Kaho-chan said.
I had to catch my breath
before I could pant, “Yeah, I guess.” I wiped at the sweat
pouring off my forehead.
The thing Mai had told me
was pinned in place in my mind. “Well, since you
offered…” And there I kinda stopped breathing as Mai continued bashfully. “After your kiss with
Ajisai-san…I think I’d really enjoy it if you told me in no uncertain terms
that you have feelings for me.”
She sounded like she was
sharing an insecurity, and I felt like I’d just been punched in the head. I mean, in the end, yeah. She wasn’t any different
than me. Jealousy
was a concern even for Mai. Just as I got antsy over
the way she and Ajisai-san were so close, my intimacy with Ajisai-san caused
her anxiety too. That’s why she basically asked me to reassure her.
I roared again. “Okay, let me give that one more shot!”
You see, this all
meant—well, it meant I wasn’t trying hard enough. Right? If I’d made it clear enough to them that I could make them happy,
there’d be no need for them to feel anxious. Yeah. I wasn’t
wrong, right? I wasn’t able to make it clear enough, which meant that I’d messed up. I wanted to do a way, way
better job of making sure Ajisai-san knew how I felt and reassuring Mai. I wanted to make them
understand just how much I cared about them. I wanted them to
understand the sincerity of my feelings for them.
And to do that, it all
circled back to winning the competition. They wouldn’t get how I
felt from words alone, not unless I showed them through my actions. I needed to show results,
to show how hard I’d worked for Ajisai-san. And this wasn’t just a
one and done thing either. I had to keep following up with more and more later on, you know? This was just the first step.
I had to kiss Ajisai-san
and then tell Mai exactly how much I cared for her. And to do that, I had to win.
If I didn’t
win, I’d be in serious trouble!
“Hyah!”
I yelled
and threw the ball again. It swished through the air, rolled away, and came to a stop at someone
else’s feet.
The person—a girl—picked
it up and said quickly, “Um, e-excuse me? Um. Excuse me.”
Her modest, self-effacing
voice sounded suspiciously like me from long ago. When I looked up and saw
who it was, I was shocked. Wait a
sec. What
the heck was she doing here?
“O-oh, yes, hello! I didn’t have club practice today, you see.”
“And I’m here too!” added Hasegawa-san.
Well, well. Hirano-san and Hasegawa-san.
“Uh…do you guys, like,
need something?” I asked.
“Urp.”
Hirano-san
staggered like I’d just stabbed her somewhere.
Oh crap, I thought. It hit me that the way I’d phrased that wasn’t the best. I recalled a puzzling memory.
Back when I
was ditching class nonstop, on one of the rare occasions when I actually went
to class as opposed to the infirmary, one of the kids had laughed at me and
been like, “Wait, what’re you doing here?” Like what the hell, man! Junior high is
compulsory, and everyone’s got the right to an education, don’t they? I fall apart easier than a
card castle, you know? You gotta handle me with more care! Ah, yes—the soul of an
introvert is an innocent and sensitive one. So I got it. Believe
me, I got it, Hirano-san and
Hasegawa-san. The likes of us were always hiding our timid spirits behind bulky suits
of armor, weren’t we?
I amended myself, this
time trying to be as friendly as possible. “I see you guys’re
wearing exercise clothes. Are you going home for the day?”
Hirano-san fidgeted, not
meeting my eyes. I
waited for her to speak. Man, the tempo of this conversation kinda reminded me of old times. It put me at ease, but
then an extrovert came up and broke the tranquility.
Kaho-chan galloped up,
waving like a windmill. “Hey,
there you are! Glad
you could make it.”
“Oh no, not a sudden
burst of sunny optimism!” Hirano-san
wailed.
“Oh god,” said Hasegawa-san. “She’s so cute! My heart! My mind! They’re being overwhelmed with cuteness!”
A sudden Kaho-chan was
just too blinding. The
three of us froze. Kaho-chan, like a T-rex that had barreled into a valley where only
rabbits lived, looked at us with her head tilted to the side. After a long pause, she
asked us, “What’s the matter?” Yeah, I say “us,” because
I was still a timid introvert deep down!
But in spite of her
brilliance, Hirano-san indomitably took a step forward. She was so strong! Panting, she gasped, “H-hey! Um, well…! I-I apologize. I know we’re…taking up the precious time of you exalted
extrovert-samas.”
“So if we drag our feet
any longer,” Hasegawa-san chimed in, “we’ll just increase the amount of time
you spend on us… So, we’re going to work up our courage and say it. We’re gonna say it, we
swear!”
The two held each other
up so they didn’t succumb under the pressure of optimistic extroversion and
hightail it out of there. It was pretty moving, to be honest.
“W-we’ve come!” Hirano-san
cried. She
fished her phone out of her pocket and held the screen aloft. “You called us,
Koyanagi-san, and we’ve come!”
What in the world…? On her phone was a message that read, “Hey, wanna practice basketball
with us? (insert
some cute emoji here).” Kaho-chan had their contact info? Now that’s what I call
being a people person. Wait, I was getting distracted.
Anyway, even if they had
been invited, it couldn’t have been easy for them to actually show up. I mean, Kaho-chan and I
were both a part of the Quintet. From where Hirano-san and
Hasegawa-san were standing, that was basically like having two Mais. Back when I was in junior
high, would I have shown up to a basketball practice had my classmates invited
me? Oh heck no. I knew that if I showed my
face, they’d all make fun of me like, “Omg, you really showed up? LMAO.” That meant there was no
way I could go. And yet, in spite of all that, these two were here!
“Huh?”
My heart
skipped a beat, even though I knew she didn’t mean it in a like like sense.
“You’re all such sights
for sore eyes, and you’re always really nice to us too.”
“Nah, no way,” I protested. If anything, I felt more
like they were nice to me.
Hirano-san nodded along
with herself and continued. “Compared to the girls at
the top of the school social pyramid, us asocial dweebs are nothing but
pathetic wastes of space. Our communication ability score is, like, five or something… We just
suck, right? And yet…”
Everything she said cut me
real deep too!
“And yet all the kids in
Class A are really friendly. I know we don’t make for
particularly good conversationalists, but you guys are always kind to us
anyway. I’m
just really, really glad I’m in your class.”
Hasegawa-san gave that a
big nod too.
Yeah.
They were totally
right. In my
case, my decision to talk to Mai first meant that by now I fit right in with
the rest of the class. Every class has its own style, which changes depending on how the most
popular kids act, like how the perception of a country changes with every new
head of state. When you have popular kids who only think about themselves, the whole
class gets kinda mean too. When you have someone who’s a kind ruler at the head of the pack, the
class ends up a lot nicer. In some sense, that made Mai a queen adored by her subjects. It was impossible to
imagine that Mai or Ajisai-san treated other people kindly out of a calculated
self-interest, but all the same, I was glad that kindness bounced around and
ended up coming back to help them out.
As Hasegawa-san helped
support her, Hirano-san said straight-out, “I saw what Class B did, and I think
it was despicable. That’s why we want to do our best for Sena-san and the rest of the
Quintet too!”
Suddenly, that thing
Youko-chan said flashed through my head: that she had once been a shy loser,
but it was Little Miss High Horse becoming her friend that saved her. My heart ached, ever so
slightly.
But I shook off that ache
and smiled at Hirano-san and Hasegawa-san. “Thanks a million, you guys.”
“Oh god, she’s so cute!” Hirano-san squealed.
“Oh my god,” Hasegawa-san
breathed. “Amaori-san’s
smiling!”
I grabbed them both by the
hand, perhaps a bit excessively. “Let’s work together and
show ’em exactly what Class A is made of!”
“My
hand!!!” Hirano-san
squeaked.
“P-please stop, Amaori-san!” Hasegawa-san cried. “Or I’ll fall in love with
you!”
As more and more happy
things occurred, they drowned out my anxiety. I felt like I was
standing in the light after all. Class A would win. It
was only fair.
“I’m no good at all, but
if we all work together, we can make it work as a team, right?” I said. “Time to show some Class
A solidarity!”
“Oh, it’s too late! I’m
in love!”
I even had my sister’s
tactics. So this had to
work. We’d
make it work somehow, I knew it.
As I paid no notice at
all to Hirano-san and Hasegawa-san, now both bright red, Kaho-chan muttered
next to me, “Talk about being a vixen.” I didn’t have a clue what
she meant.
Well, as it turned out,
once we started practicing together, those two weren’t any better than I was. But hey, that’s what
teamwork’s for!
And we’d gone spying. Plus now I had more
people to practice with. My motivation was at its peak, and I had lavish rewards awaiting me. I mean, rewards weren’t
the motivating factor here, so let’s just forget about that. At any rate, there was
just one piece of the puzzle left for us to achieve victory.
We only had one person on
our team with the ability to match Little Miss High Horse’s ridiculous
athleticism. Yup, we needed to make Shimizu-kun dress as a girl and add him to the
team. Wait. No.
I looked down at my phone. I’d sent a sticker of a
cute little koala peeking out from behind a wall to see if you were looking,
but I’d gotten totally left on read for my efforts. I’d set a new record:
left on read for twelve days running.
Well, if that’s how she
wanted to play it, fine. There was only one option left to me. Ugggghh. I guess I had to go showing up uninvited at her house.
I dragged my feet all the
way up to her apartment door. God, you really needed
manly courage to go up to someone’s house and push the intercom button. That’s not how this
normally goes, right? You get ahold of someone on their phone beforehand or text them or
something to open the door for you instead of buzzing them on the intercom. I mean, I never dropped
by my friends’ places without making plans first, so I had no idea how it
“normally went.” It hit me then that I could never cut it as a door-to-door salesperson.
Man, people
who worked for a living were truly something else.
For some reason, I had the
idea to stand in the shadow of a telephone pole, from where I could see her
front door, as I thought this over. I wondered if she would
come out. I
kept peeking out to look, even though I must have looked like a total creep to
any outsider. But I swear I was actually her friend—that excuse would definitely get
me off the hook…right? Or maybe I
was a creep, actually… Nah,
no way. I
was just waiting to catch a glimpse of a beautiful black-haired girl, you know?
“Hey there!” said a voice next to me. “This is the police.”
“Huh?!
No, it’s not
what it looks like!” I
whipped around. “Um, I’m just, I’m here to see a friend! So, um! I
know it looks creepy. And I might be a creep. Wait,
no! I have
a good reason for creeping!”
There stood a pretty
lady, her eyes wide. “Oh?” she said. “Aren’t you Amaori-chan?”
“Wait, you’re
Satsuki-san’s siste—mother!”
“Yup, that’s me. The oneesan,” she said. “Peace
out!” She
took my slip of the tongue in stride and threw me double peace signs. But she had two
concerning objects in her grip.
“Um.
What’re those…?” I asked.
“This thing in my right
hand is tear gas,” she said. “And in my left’s a taser.”
“Good question, Amaori-chan. You’re about to ask me how
come I’m holding my taser in my non-dominant hand, right? But you see, tear gas has
to be sprayed right in the face. For a taser, all you need
is to land a good hit somewhere on their body to stop them moving. That’s why it’s better to
have the tear gas in your dominant hand.”
“That’s not at all what I
was going to ask!”
Having finished her
explanation with a self-satisfied grin, Satsuki’s mom tilted her head. “Oh? Then what is it?”
“Oh, I saw some creepo at
the door, so I came out the back window and circled around behind you.”
“Wow.”
I felt like
this was something she had a lot of practice with. “Do you do that kind of
thing a lot?”
“Eh, now and then,” she said.
“We don’t
have a man around the house, so we have to protect ourselves. I’m always reminding
Satsuki-chan too: the key’s not to go overboard, but when you get in a fight,
you better beat them so hard they never come back!”
I’d always taken
Satsuki’s mom for more of the laid-back type, but I guess the whole family was
a regular tribe of Amazons. Well, it made sense. This
was Satsuki-san’s mom, after all.
She’d freaked me out so
hard I hadn’t even noticed her appearance. Today, Satsuki’s mom was
all nicely made up, giving her more of a mature look compared to the last time
I saw her. Like
this, she looked a lot more like a mom than a big sister…well, kind of? Her dress had a real
tight skirt, but she was also just wearing house slippers.
“You look really pretty
today,” I told her.
“Aww, you’re so sweet,”
she said. “That’s
because I’m heading out for work soon. Amaori-chan, want to walk
with me to the station?”
Her offer made me recoil. However…
“Oh, I needed to see
Satsuki-san about something,” I said.
“Oh, right! Well, Satsuki-chan’s not home at the moment, but I know where she went.
Here, I’ll take you. Let’s go!”
She took me by the hand
and pulled me along, but I frantically tried to make her stop.
“Hold on, please. That’s a big help, but you’re still in your slippers!” I pointed out.
“Oh, you’re right,” she said.
“Come to
think of it, the keys are inside, so we’ll have to get back through the
window.”
“I-I’m sorry… You only
ended up like this because I was being a creep.”
Satsuki’s mom winked and
gave me a charming grin. “Hey, mind giving me a little shove on the butt so I can get through
the window?” Then she
laughed. “Sorry! As if I could ever ask
that of one of Satsuki-chan’s friends.”
“So, you ready to go?” she
asked.
Kitted out in a pair of
tall stilettos and a tiny purse, Satsuki-san’s mom walked next to me with a
click-clack of heels. If it had been me in those shoes, I’d have been stumbling all over like
a baby deer. But she was a
pro. God was she cool.
“So you and Satsuki-chan
had plans to hang out today?” she
asked.
She was so incredibly
beautiful whenever I happened to glance over that I almost dropped my guard
around her. But
she was, after all, Satsuki-san’s mom. If I went blabbing to
someone’s relatives about all the various things going down at school, I bet
even Satsuki-san would feel mortified. Well, but I was already being a bother
to her with my whole creepo schtick. I felt bad about not
saying anything.
Satsuki-san’s mom’s face
lit up. “Ooh, really?!” she squealed. Urk. “You guys’re having a competition?! Aww, Satsuki-chan didn’t
even mention it! Oh, that
girl. She
never tells me anything that’s happening at school. Ooh, does this mean I can
go watch?!”
“Um.
I don’t
think that’d be a very good idea…”
“Really?
Aww, bummer. Hey, so what’re you guys
playing?”
“Ooh, that sounds great. B-ball, huh? How cool! I just love seeing people
dribbling and shooting and all that stuff. You know, back when I was
in school, basketball was my favorite unit in PE too. I may not look like it,
but I was pretty good.”
“W-were you now? Well, you are pretty tall, after all.”
Picking out the most
important keywords from her machine-gun like barrage of chatter in order to
craft a response was an exercise that took quite a lot of concentration. I felt like my
communication skills were getting a good workout.
“Yup, sure am,” she said. “So how’s Satsuki-chan? Huh? Is she good at it? Or is she not so hot? I bet not; she’s not a
very good team player.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,”
I said and then, at the end of some careful consideration, added “She’s…well. She can kind of be a team player.”
Satsuki-san’s mom
exploded in laughter. “Uh-huh. Thanks, Amaori-chan. You’re right, she’s an
okay team player. You know, I really do think she wants to be friends with all of you,
but she’s no good with words. That must make it really
hard for her. She’s so pretty, though, that I bet everyone would be super sweet to
her if she just played nice, don’tcha think?”
A wild set of daydreams
spread their wings: a Satsuki-san who greeted me in the morning with shining
eyes and a chirpy “Heya!” And then “Hey, hey, guess what, Amaori? Ooh, ’kay, so…” and here
she’d giggle “so I found the BEST book yesterday. Oh my god, it was so good. I’ll let you borrow it soon. You totally HAVE to let me
know what you think when you’re done.”
Okay, wasn’t that just
Satsuki-san’s mom in a nutshell?
I caught her eye, and she
smiled at me. “Hm?”
Come to think of it, I
really didn’t know why Satsuki-san took such pains to keep other people at
arm’s length. If she was all smiley like her mom, I figured she could be super
popular without lifting a finger. But…knowing Satsuki-san,
I guess she didn’t want that.
“Do you mind if I say
something?” I said.
Her almond-shaped eyes
were so much like Satsuki-san’s, but hers looked so much gentler.
Unable to meet the eye of
someone older than me, I mumbled, “When someone can do a certain thing, it’s
easy for them to be like, ‘How come other people don’t do it?’ But for the people who
can’t do that thing, it’s way hard. So I guess I’m asking for
you to please not say that to Satsuki-san so casually.”
I felt like a little kid
making an audacious request.
Satsuki-san’s mom said,
“Amaori-chan?”
“Eep!
S-sorry.” I inadvertently jumped
when she said my name.
“You’re a good kid,
Amaori-chan. You know that?”
I squeaked as she wrapped
me into a tight hug. Her! Satsuki-san’s mom! She was hugging me! A full-grown woman! Her open-mindedness was
off the charts!
“Uh!”
I said. “Um, uh, excuse me!”
“Hey, would you keep
watching out for Satsuki-chan? I know I run my mouth all
the time, but Satsuki-chan really is something. Team sports may not be
her thing, but she always tries her hardest for anything she can do on her
own.”
“R-right…” And she could
be fickle, or troublesome, or way more reckless than you’d expect from her. Yeah, she was something
else all right.
“Huh?
Did she fall
over or something?” I asked.
“Nope, not exactly. She said she got trounced
in dodgeball.”
“Wow.
Someone
could trounce Satsuki-san?”
And in dodgeball, huh? I felt like nowadays,
Satsuki-san could repel a ball with the strength of her glare alone.
“She seemed really upset
about it,” Satsuki-san’s mom went on. “She spent ages after
that practicing dodgeball by throwing a ball against the wall at the park. I don’t know how she
ended up being such a sore loser, but I guess that inspired her to work her
hardest.”
“Yeah, that sure sounds
like Satsuki-san all right.”
“She’s even worse
whenever it involves Mai-chan. Amaori-chan, do you think
Satsuki-chan likes her?”
To be real with you, I
wasn’t sure myself. Satsuki-san’s mom wasn’t wrong—there were moments when I wondered if
there was some kind of chemistry brewing…but I was way too scared to ask
Satsuki-san outright. I mean, there was no denying she liked Mai, but the question was more
whether it was liking in a romantic sense. What if she did? Well, then that would have made her asking me out pretty weird, right?
“I-I think Satsuki-san’s
sense of affection’s a little messed up…” I said. “Or like, I don’t think
she’s the type to say straight out that she’s into someone, so I wouldn’t
know.”
“Hmm.
Well, she has been reading nothing but
romance novels recently. It’s strange, because she normally never touches them.”
“Huh.”
Did that
mean she legit wanted to date someone? Satsuki-san? That didn’t seem
remotely like her. Besides, hadn’t she straight-up said she didn’t think much of romance? Had she just been
bluffing or something? Man,
I didn’t know. To begin with, I couldn’t even imagine her having a crush on someone. But I could pretty
naturally picture her dating a girl! Why on earth couldn’t I
entertain the possibility of her going out with a guy? Satsuki-san going out
with a guy was just like… You know! It was just kinda…you know! I had a lot of feelings I
couldn’t put into words. I mean, she’d kissed me and all. Thrice, even!
As she and I talked, we
came to a shrine. It was that same one from that other day.
“Ah ha, there she is,”
said Satsuki-san’s mom.
And there indeed she was:
Satsuki-san, dressed in exercise clothes, with her hair up in a ponytail. She was practicing
dribbling the basketball in her hand.
“See?”
her mom
said, watching over her daughter with a huge grin. “She’s not the most
socially adept, but she tries hard. She’s a good kid.”
I gave Satsuki-san a big
wave. “Hey,
Satsuki-san!”
For a brief moment,
Satsuki-san’s serious expression faltered. “Bah. Amaori.”
I ran over to her. “C’mon, what’re you doing practicing here all by yourself? Talk about stand-offish! You should come practice
with us. See,
it’ll be just like the time we played that FPS.”
“What are you doing here
with my mother?” Satsuki-san
asked.
“I-I just happened to bump
into her at your house! Don’t worry about it. Hey, come on, Satsuki-san,
come join us.”
Satsuki-san clicked her
tongue. Yikes.
“It’s not about it being good. Isn’t it more fun to play
as a group? Right?”
“I’m not looking to find
fun in this process,” she said, “so that matters little to me. I believe it’s perfectly
fine if the only joy I experience is in the moment of victory.” She dribbled the ball. “And it’s my fault.”
“It’s my fault they
picked on Sena.”
“No way,” I said. “You didn’t do anything.”
As I started speaking, I
realized that Satsuki-san was staring off into space. Err…whoops?
“Had I landed the
finishing blow in my encounter with that group, then none of this would have
happened,” she said. “This time, I will crush them so thoroughly they will never desire to
challenge us again.”
Parroting the teachings
of her mom! Satsuki-san being so sweet on Ajisai-san made her pretty gung-ho,
or…maybe murder-ho… Maybe during that dodgeball episode, she hadn’t been upset
that she’d lost. Maybe she’d just been pissed off!
Once again, she slapped
the ball against the ground with a loud thump. Eep.
“I wouldn’t mind too much
on days when I don’t have work,” she said.
Okay, but now I had
second thoughts. If Satsuki-san were there, I was pretty sure we could kiss our
fun-loving mood goodbye. I needed to protect Hirano-san and Hasegawa-san!
I watched Satsuki-san as
she trained so diligently with terrified eyes. Meanwhile, Satsuki-san’s
mom stood a small distance away and beamed at us. No, believe me, this
wasn’t the kind of heartwarming scene she was imagining!
And with that,
Satsuki-san joined the party. She showed up at practice
the next day and was transcendentally good. We couldn’t beat her, not
even four against one. She
trounced us all. Good god, talk about fighting power. With the deva of
basketball, Koto “Genocider” Satsuki, on our side, we were sure to win. We could trounce Class B! This battle was set to go
down in our favor!
But with that being said,
I couldn’t just leave it all up to Satsuki-san to handle on her own. So I gave basketball my
every effort. I read books on it, watched videos, and had my sister watch me from
time to time. Starting with Shimizu-kun, I got people in the basketball club at
school to give me tons of advice.
There was a feeling in
the air that Class A would come together and beat Class B. I’d never gone out of my
way to participate in school events before. I was always left on the
sidelines, even during Sports Day. They had to force me to
participate in choral competitions, and even during Cultural Festivals, I just
did whatever they told me to and worked on odds and ends off in the corner.
But this year was
entirely different. Turning over a new leaf in high school and joining the Quintet had been
all I needed to do to receive such an outpouring of support. Everyone in class was
behind me. Mind you, it
wasn’t my popularity—it was just on
loan from my friend group—but still. If anything, that came as
a relief and made me resolved to work even harder.
As the interclass
athletics competition drew closer, my motives solidified: I didn’t want anyone
to find out that I was so cruddy at basketball, even though I was once in the
basketball club. Or maybe it was just to safeguard my position in class. Or perhaps I wanted to
punish Takada-san, like Satsuki-san did. But actually, my real
motive was kinda different. Like Hirano-san had said,
it was because I loved the Quintet. I wanted to make good on
the feelings of Class A as they cheered me on. I wanted to return the
favor by doing what I could. Actually, scratch that. By doing what I couldn’t. I wanted to do whatever it
took to win, no matter what. I wanted to contribute to
the group, because I was a member of the Quintet too.
So I threw myself into
practice, heart and soul.
Even when it rained and
Kaho-chan said, “Nah, I’m ducking out,” I still ran to the park instead of
mooching around at home. I wanted to get better, even if a slight improvement was all I could
manage. Being
satisfied with where I was at was unthinkable. I needed to
practice—every little bit helped—so that I wouldn’t drag my team down.
I focused all my
sincerity toward Mai, all my feelings for Ajisai-san, into each and every ball
that I shot. It was because I’d made this decision, the decision to try my best. So I had to follow
through, because I never wanted to go back to the person I’d been in junior
high.
An autumn rain may be
light, but it rains for hours.
Now it was Saturday
afternoon, and the competition was just around the corner. I was about to head out
for basketball practice when my mom stopped me in the living room.
“Renako, you should take
it easy today.”
“No way,” I said. “No
way, no way.” I
shook my head emphatically. “I mean, I need to practice. And Kaho-chan’ll be there
in the evening.”
My mom brought the
thermometer and held it out to me with a look of concern. “Well, humor me and take
your temperature.”
“Okay, fine…but I feel
perfectly normal.”
Just as she ordered, I
stuck the thermometer in my armpit. When it beeped, I lifted
it up and got a surprise.
I had a temp of 38.2 degrees.
“It can’t be
that high,” I said, and I tried taking it again. This time it came out as
38.3. It went up. “Huh?”
I flopped down on the
living room sofa, and at that exact moment, it felt like gravity had suddenly
increased across my entire body. My head ached. Come to think of it, I’d been planning on getting up bright and early
for practice, but for some reason I’d slept in until almost noon. I hadn’t even stayed up
that late last night either.
“But that’s okay,” I said. “It’s not that high.”
“What’re you even saying?” my mother snapped. “You obviously need to get some rest.”
“Here, I’ll get you some
medicine. You
need to tell her you aren’t coming.”
Still slouched on the
sofa, I hung my head. My vision was blurry and none of my thoughts made any sense. But…I was doing such a
disservice to everyone…in spite of all their support…
I tried to fish my phone
out of my bag, but it slipped through my fingers. “H-huh?” I mumbled. Now it was hard to even sit
up, and I fell over without meaning to. I felt hella sluggish. The muscles I used to
move my body were only working at half-capacity.
“But this isn’t so bad,” I
said. “And I
still suck big time. I
need to try harder.”
I rose and was just about
to go to the front door when my mother once again thwarted me. She gave me a cup of
water and some meds, both of which I swallowed quietly.
“No,” she said. “You
need to sleep!”
Told off with such force,
I reluctantly went back to my bedroom. I mean, now wasn’t the
time for snoozing.
Under the watchful eye of
my mom, I changed into my PJs and got into bed. They say being sick’s a
mental thing and all, so I figured that a little sleep would make me right as
rain and closed my eyes. I’d be fine by evening, and then I could meet up with Kaho-chan. The competition was early
next week, so I didn’t have the time to be loafing about. As unathletic as I was, I
needed to practice my butt off if I wanted to get good in time. So I had to go. I had to go. As these thoughts ran
through my head, I closed my eyes and fell asleep in an instant.
The next time I opened my
eyes, it was already past sunset.
The phone next to my
pillow vibrated obnoxiously. Now awake and
disconcerted by the fact that it was dark in my room, I grabbed my phone.
“What the?” I said. “Five notifications?”
They were all from Kaho-chan.
Oh shoot. I turned pale and called her.
It only
rang for a moment before she picked up.
“Um, hello?!” she said. “Rena-chin, you totally
stood me up!”
“I-I’m sorry!” I said. “I was asleep…”
“Yeah.
I was running
a bit of a fever. But I think I’m okay now, so I’ll be right over.”
I heard some girlish
voices on the other end of the line. Hasegawa-san and
Hirano-san must have been with her. I needed to hurry up and
meet with all of them.
“Rena-chin, what kinda
temp’re you running?” Kaho-chan
asked.
“Um.”
I waffled. “Nothing too bad. I’m totally fine.”
“How high was it? You measured it, right?”
“Uh, yeah, before I had a
nap…but I rested a bit, so I’m okay now.”
Moments after I said
that, I launched into a violent coughing fit. Oh, the timing!
“S-sorry,” I said. “I just woke up is all. Plus my room’s kind of dry.”
“Go take your temp,”
Kaho-chan ordered. “Now.” Her tone brooked no argument.
I said, “O-okay,” and then
went down to the living room to get the thermometer.
“Um…” It was 38.6. It’d
gone up again. I really didn’t want to tell her…
“Y-you see,” I said, “I
usually run pretty high, like around 36. I’ve even seen it jump up
to 37 before.”
For a brief moment, I
contemplated lying, but I felt like that’d be crossing a line. “Sorry,” I said. “Um. It’s…”
When I gave it to her
straight, Kaho-chan exploded. “What the frick?!” she
said. “You
shoulda told me sooner!”
“B-but I mean, it’s not
that high. I
figured it’d go down in no time…”
“Like heck it would! Do you know nothing about
anatomy? What,
have you never caught a cold before? How dumb are you?”
I coughed some more. “Sorry, Kaho-chan.”
“Man, it’s hard to be mad
at you,” she said. “But
I’m PO’ed anyway. You gotta speak up if you start feeling sick! You’d better devote all
your energy tomorrow into recovery.”
“Maybe I’ll be better by
tomorrow,” I said.
“Even if you are, I’m
gonna hit you with mankind’s oldest weapon!”
I shrank back as if the
rock she’d alluded to had just fallen on my head. “O-okay, got it.”
How come that hadn’t
occurred to me? What Kaho-chan had said was a total no-brainer. I couldn’t help everyone
out if I showed up to the competition this sick. I’d just be dead weight.
To hide how much that
shook me up, I nodded. “Right… Yeah, I know.”
For once, I was grateful
that this discussion was just a phone call. If this were face to face,
then I might’ve upset her with how depressed I looked.
After we talked some
more, I hung up and went back to my bedroom. I think my temp had gone
up again too.
No sooner had I crawled
under the covers than my mom opened my door to check up on me. “Renako, dinner’s ready,”
she said.
“Come on, have just a
little bit. You want to get better soon, don’t you? I’ve brought you some
water, medicine, and an electrolyte drink, so make sure you take them.”
I did want to hurry up
and get better, but I wasn’t sure if that was possible. As I slurped down the
udon my mom made for me, I prayed that my fever would go down by tomorrow.
I think this was the first
time in my life that I finally wanted to put full effort into participating in a school event. Please, I thought, just let
me do my best somehow.
And with that thought
running through my head, I closed my eyes to rest. But I knew that the
fatigue in my body, continuously overworked and unused to such training, wasn’t
the kind that could clear up in a single day.
I lay in bed on Sunday
evening. I
couldn’t sleep, but as I felt too tired to get up, I didn’t know how to pass
the time. I
had gone to a doctor’s clinic that was open even on a Sunday, and it turned out
that I’d collapsed due to overwork. They told me that I’d
recover with rest, but…I probably wouldn’t make it in time for the competition.
Once I got back from the
doctor’s with my mom, Haruna tried to make me feel better. “It’s too bad, Oneechan,
after all that practice you did.” Uncharacteristically, she
sounded sincere, neither teasing nor sarcastic. She probably had moments
too when she had been unable to play as well as she wanted due to sickness,
thus causing her to lose. Still, I felt too upset to give her anything but the most perfunctory
of responses. I was being a bad older sister. Or maybe I was just always a
bad older sister.
I thought back to a
moment in junior high.
“Hey, Amaori, are you
free today?” a pretty girl in class with light-colored hair had asked.
She was boisterous,
dramatic, and friendly with everyone in class. She looked at me like a
monitor lizard with her pretty almond-shaped eyed. At the time, I belonged
to a friend group made up of quiet, mousy girls, so the fact that a popular
girl was talking to me came as quite a shock.
“Come on,” she said. “Come hang out with me.”
Sure, I guess we’d
chatted before and stuff, but we weren’t particularly close friends or
anything. I
figured hanging out together would just be awkward and all.
While I deliberated, the
girl swooped in closer. “C’mon, don’t worry about it,” she said. “I hear there’s gonna be
guys too. What’s
the harm in hanging out once in a while?”
“R-right,” I said. “But
like, I’m…”
She was practically
invading my personal space. “I mean, you don’t have
anything else going on, do you? Come hang out with us for
a bit.”
“Um,
but.” I
raised both hands in front of my chest like I was guarding myself, because I
knew I wasn’t going to be comfortable sitting around and chatting with a bunch
of people I didn’t know.
Looking away and exuding
waves of discomfort and embarrassment, I shook my head slightly. “Sorry, Nashiji-san, I
don’t know…”
“I just, uh…don’t really
want to spend time with you.”
Nashiji-san’s friends
laughed at her. “You just got turned DOWN,” one crowed. “That’s hella lame.”
You know, they told her
stuff like that. But back then I didn’t have the peace of mind to realize that me
replying like that would destroy her honor.
Her eyes immediately
turned to ice.
“What the…?” she said. “You’re just Amaori. Where do you get off being
that rude?”
And I never got a chance
like that again. If I could go back in time, I might have found a better way to turn her
down. Or
maybe I could have sucked it up and gone with her.
I was always this way,
though. I
never knew I messed up until I had a bad experience. I didn’t have the
slightest awareness about things that other people treated like “Duh, everyone
knows that lmao.” You know, stuff like how defying the popular kids in class leaves you
friendless throughout all of junior high. Or that working too hard
at practice backfires and lands you with a fever. Every time I did
something different from everyone else, I felt another pang of regret.
I should never have done
anything that went against the grain. But then did this mean
that I’d someday wish to turn back the clock and choose not to go out with both
Mai and Ajisai-san? God. I hoped not.
Someone stroked my cheek. I had dozed off, and my
eyelids felt like heavy shutters when I opened them. “Mm,” I mumbled.
In the familiar view from
my bed was a very unfamiliar person: a drop-dead gorgeous blonde girl. But she wasn’t alone. Just a little behind her
stood a very kind-looking girl, and both of them looked at me with worry in
their eyes.
“My apologies,” said the
blonde girl. “Did we wake
you?”
“How are you feeling,
Rena-chan?” asked the other.
As my brain booted up my
memories, I finally realized what was going on. “Huh?” I said. “Mai and Ajisai-san? What’re you guys doing here?”
They both sat down and
leaned up against my bed.
“Kaho told us you were
running a fever,” Mai explained.
“Uh-huh. So we came to visit and see how you’re doing,” Ajisai-san added.
“Oh…” I said, like an idiot.
“Okay.” If I thought about it
logically, there really was no other reason for them to be here.
Also, by the way—I was
braless in my PJs, so it’d be kinda embarrassing to sit up. Deliberately being rude,
I pulled the blanket up to my chin and looked up at both of them. “Sorry for worrying you
guys,” I said.
The curtain was fully
closed, making my bedroom dim. A ray of late afternoon
light peeped in through a crack.
“I guess I’ve been going
about trying my best all wrong,” I admitted.
Oh, shoot. My vision was starting to blur. I pulled the blanket up
even higher. I had taken it upon myself to try my best, and getting the fever was my
own fault, so then to cry on top of that when they’d both come to visit me was
absolutely pathetic.
I forced myself to turn
away and then coughed. “S-sorry. I don’t think I’m
contagious, but you probably shouldn’t get too close anyway.”
I didn’t want them to see
me looking this much of a mess, especially not after I’d vowed to work my
hardest as their girlfriend. Now here I was, already a
liar after one month, and I couldn’t stand to face them.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m really, really sorry.”
And then, as pitiful as I
was, I felt their hands touch me on my head and back.
I stiffened. “S-sorry. God, I’m just saying stuff
that makes an even bigger inconvenience for you.” I hunched over and
whimpered like I was trying to push away their kindness. “I really did think I was
trying my best, I swear. I thought that if I worked as hard as I could for you guys, maybe it’d
make you both a little happier…”
These were all just excuses. I knew that, and yet I
kept going anyway.
“I mean, we’re dating and
all. If I’m
going to date both of you, then I’ve got to do right by you guys. I thought that if I
worked really hard, maybe someday you guys would think well of me…but in spite
of all that, here I am. I’m…”
I was so ashamed of myself. God, what a
disappointment I was.
“No matter what I do,” I
said, “I always suck. I can’t do anything right. Even though everyone in
class is rooting for me, I can’t live up to their expectations. I’m letting down
Kaho-chan, Hasegawa-san, Hirano-san, and Satsuki-san. I’m letting down all of you.”
I couldn’t hide my tears
any longer. God,
I must have been upsetting both Mai and Ajisai-san. I hated the fact that I
upset them. There was no way I could learn to like myself like this. I’d wanted to, but it was
impossible. I’d
wanted to, but it was never to be.
“Rena-chan,” Ajisai-san said.
She reached
out and stroked my hair. They were both so kind that of course they’d be concerned about
anything I said.
“S-sorry,” I said. “I’m really sorry.”
I sat up without
thinking, propelled by an intense feeling of self-loathing.
Ajisai-san looked up at me
with clear eyes from where she kneeled next to the bed. Then, in a voice that
sounded like she was taking me away someplace else, she said, “You know, if you
don’t feel better by tomorrow, I think I might skip school too.”
“Wait, what?” I said. I stared at her in amazement.
For just a moment, her
eyes flicked downward. “I’ve been doing a little softball practice myself, but…I think I just
might skip anyway.”
The lashes of her lowered
eyes sparkled like rainbows.
“Hmm.”
She met my eye and
beamed. “Well,
if we lose, then you and I can go halfsies on the blame, right?”
She said it like she was
offering to split the last piece of cake.
I didn’t even think. I just yelled, “No way!”
Ajisai-san started. “Why
not?”
“I mean, I can’t let you
go that far… There’s no need for people to get mad at you too.”
“Sure.
But maybe
it’s not about whether there’s a need for it,
exactly.” She smiled.
Still dripping tears, I
shook my head slightly. “You
can’t. It’ll
inconvenience everyone else. I can’t let you go that
far, Ajisai-san.”
I mean, Ajisai-san was
the nicest person I’d ever met. And skipping school when
everyone was doing their absolute best for her would only hurt Ajisai-san
herself. If
I were in her shoes, could I have done the same thing? Nuh-uh, no freaking way.
“I’m biased,” she said. “But that’s something I
chose to be when I started dating you.” She took my limp, dangling
hand and held it lovingly. “I think that’s what choosing someone’s all about.”
“I still feel the same way
as I did when we talked about this before. I don’t want you to have
to feel sad and in pain. I’d love to take on all those bad feelings for you if I could.” She giggled. “That’s ’cause I’m selfish
like that.”
If that’s what she called
selfish, then I guess we both were. The fact that I wanted to
recompense both her and Mai and not let down the class was just me being selfish too.
But I insisted, “I would
hate for you to be the villain and have everyone upset with you.”
Ajisai-san laughed. “Don’t
worry. I’m
pretty popular, after all. A little thing like this will be a-okay.”
That sounded like
something the messed-up version of Ajisai-san in my head would say, but the
connotation was totally different. She instead sounded like
a mischievous witch teaching me a hidden trick that would prevent anyone from
getting hurt.
I gulped back tears and snot.
“But like,
I’m still really sorry. I made you guys worry and have to look out for me.”
“I mean, I did it to you
first,” Ajisai-san said. “I dragged you around all summer.”
I mopped at my face with
a tissue and then sighed. Ajisai-san patted my head again. “Rena-chan, you’ve been
working really, really hard. I think that’s amazing. I’m positive you’ll get
another chance, you know. It’s all going to be okay. Because I really, really
like you, understand?”
“Yeah, I get it…” It felt
like Ajisai-san, who said she was even willing to skip school for me, had
stopped up all the cracks in my heart. “Thanks, Ajisai-san.”
After expelling such
intense emotion, my heart was all shriveled up and dry. But I could feel it
filling up with a warm, fuzzy feeling from deep inside. I bet it was the warmth
of Ajisai-san’s affection.
Mai had been kindly
watching over us for that whole conversation. “In that case,” she said,
sitting down on the bed too with a grin, “I’ll simply have to pull off such an
overwhelming win in the competition that neither of you two shall have to worry
about it afterward.”
Ajisai-san giggled at
that proclamation. “Ooh, what’s that all about? Aren’t you cool, Mai-chan?”
I rubbed my eyes and
looked back at Mai. “But you’re supposed to be playing softball, right? You’re the pitcher and
everything.”
“If you’re sick with a
fever, then surely they’ll allow me to sub in for you. There’s no harm in
pitching in for a game. It’ll
be a warm-up.”
Well, if Mai was going to
play basketball too and pull off a flawless win, then Ajisai-san and I could
both go to school, no problem! But this was all kinda… Man.
“I feel like this all
works out too nicely for me,” I said.
“And is there a problem
with that?” Mai leaned in.
“Ajisai-san will protect
you, and through my efforts, Class A will win. Then everyone will be
happy, no?”
“It all sounds great to
me, Mai-chan,” Ajisai-san said.
Mai and Ajisai-san teamed
up with me caught between them. My two girlfriends’ words
were making me flip out.
“But I didn’t even do
anything,” I said. “It’s no fair for me to feel happy when I haven’t done anything for
it.”
Up until this point,
every bit of happiness that I had came from wishing for it, working for it,
taking action toward it, and finally winning it for myself. So it made just getting
happiness dropped on me feel really, really weird.
Ajisai-san hugged me from
the side. “But you have done something, Rena-chan. That’s why I want to do
something for you too.”
Mai also came up from the
opposite side and hugged my arm. “She’s right. You were the first one to act, and that means you have a right to be
happy too. I
would even say that it’s my obligation to make you happy.”
The way we were sitting
was like a weird, deformed triangle. I felt their warmth
around me, and I… I…
I said, “Thanks, you guys. Thank you both so much.”
When they were being this
nice to me, I couldn’t continue to sulk and give up on myself. The tears kept coming,
like it was washing the self-hatred away. As they hugged me, I thought,
They’re being so nice to me because we’re dating. But even so…
If this is what it means
to date them, I’m glad I am. For the first time ever, I
thought, You know, this girlfriend thing is pretty nice.
“Poor Rena-chan,” Ajisai
murmured, in a voice like a small child pressing close. “She’s practiced so hard
and everything.”
“Indeed.” Once again, Mai thought back to the sight of Renako crying. “I’ve seen many cases
where one is too sick to perform as well as they’d like. Still, whenever it
happens, my heart aches for them.”
Mai struggled with it, as
she never allowed herself to cry in front of other people. She felt helpless
whenever she saw a girl cry. Additionally… Mai’s
mother momentarily flashed through her mind, but she shook the thought away. “At any rate, I must
simply give it my all tomorrow. I have your share of our
class’s expectations to think about, after all.”
“Sorry that we dumped all that responsibility on you, Mai-chan,” said
Ajisai.
“Oh no, it’s quite all right.
On the
contrary, having this challenge before me brings out my fighting spirit. Besides, we still don’t
know if Renako will be too unwell to go to school yet, do we?”
“Yeah, that’s true. Oh hey, what do you think about stopping by at a shrine on the way
home?”
“To pray for her?” Mai
asked. “That’s
not a bad idea at all.”
Mai said nothing but
listened in silence.
It was a natural enough
thing to think. Sharing a girlfriend meant they each had to share Renako’s time and
affection. However,
if Ajisai was honest enough to admit that she felt that way, then Mai couldn’t
consider her sneaky at all.
“See, I was also
thinking,” Ajisai-san went on, “that I might just get in your way, and maybe I
should hold back and let you two have alone time. I was really hung up on
this, even though you messaged me and suggested we go together.”
Ajisai-san looked down at
the tips of her toes as she walked. What if Mai had
surrendered that opportunity to her?
“Nevertheless, I’m sure I
would have continued to invite you until you agreed,” Mai said.
“…You really aren’t
bothered by this anymore, are you?”
“Well, because I care so
much for both of you.”
Naturally, these were not
emotions that could be dispelled with simple lip service, but Mai had already
shown her true self to Renako and Ajisai alike. She’d shown them her bad
sides from every angle, so it seemed a bit late now to try and cover that all
up. All she
could do, she thought, was try her hardest for both Renako and Ajisai’s
happiness in this interval where they could all live in harmony.
“You’re so cool, Mai,”
Ajisai told her.
“Please don’t give me
that nonsense.”
Ajisai giggled a little
in apology and then turned back around to face forward. “But you know, I think I
sort of get it now. I think I would have said the same thing if I’d come to visit her
alone. I
mean, that she and I both skip school.”
“Oh?”
said Mai. “I would have never been
able to say that. I’m rather jealous you think such things that let you get so close to
her.”
No matter how much
progress she made, Mai couldn’t abandon the role she played for everyone else. Not even now that she had
a girlfriend. Ajisai could easily cross the boundary line between her public and
private personas, and that made Mai consider her well and truly to be an
amiable, charming girl.
“Nuh-uh, I don’t think
it’s like that.” Ajisai-san slowly shook her head. “That’s as far as I could
go for her.”
“What do you mean by that?” Mai asked.
“I’m pretty sure Renako
would get stressed about it if she and I both…well, ran away together.”
Deliberately using such
strong words, Ajisai rejected her own self-presented image of the future. Instead, she lightly took
Mai’s hand.
“It’s because you showed
up too that Rena-chan was able to get over that. You saying that you’ll win
is a guarantee that no one will have to be unhappy.”
Mai smiled bitterly. “I’m not so sure about that.”
“W-well, I am,” said
Ajisai-san, putting on a childish voice like a demanding girlfriend. Then she looked away,
embarrassed. “That’s why I just wanted to say… Well, I’m glad you were there with
me. I’m not
just saying that either. I
really mean it.”
She swung their clasped
hands lightly.
“See, back when we agreed
to date, I thought that you and I would have to split Rena-chan and we’d each
end up with half. But that’s not really how it’s turned out. We can pick up
Rena-chan’s heart together, you know?” She spoke like she’d made
a marvelous discovery. “Even if I’m struggling and can’t really lend a hand, you can be there
for her, and I can rest easy knowing you’ve got her. In some sense, it feels
kind of frustrating…but I’m more glad about it than anything else.”
Mai knew Ajisai could say
this because she could care about other’s happiness like it was her own. Thus, Mai shook her head.
“My apologies,” she said,
“but I disagree, Ajisai. For you see, if you are struggling, then that is the time when Renako
and I should come to you, no?”
She smiled at the girl
standing next to her.
Mai’s smile dazzled
Ajisai for several moments. Then Ajisai said, “If that ever happens…I might be so happy I start
sobbing.”
Ajisai felt very
conscious of their linked hands. “Um, hey, Mai-chan…” she
said.
Startled, Ajisai looked at
Mai. Then
she blushed and waved her hands frantically. “Th-that’s not what I
meant,” she said. “I just, um, I mean that Rena-chan and I haven’t kissed yet, so, um. I guess maybe it’s too
soon to bring this up, so maybe. Wait, but if I say that,
that makes it sound like it’ll happen sooner or later, and that’s not what I
mean either. I just.”
Ajisai-san gasped for air. “W-well, all three of us
dating isn’t like a love triangle, you know? So I just thought, maybe…
Maybe someday we’ll do that, you know… So I figured I’d just ask what you think
about it… You know.”
Ajisai-san turned the
other way to hide her reddened face.
Mai considered the idea
with great care. When this topic had come up in the past, she had been unsure about
kissing Ajisai since she liked Renako and Ajisai in different ways. But things were different
now that all three were dating, so she gave it more thought.
“I’m quite positive it
would make me happy to do so,” she said.
Ajisai’s hand felt
slightly hot in Mai’s.
“I had just been about to
give up on my crush when Renako returned my feelings, and I have you to thank
for that,” Mai said. “So of course I like you more than I used to. It’s only reasonable, no? It isn’t the same as how I
feel about Renako, but I have no objection to kissing as a show of my deep
affection for you.”
“A-ah, so that’s how
you’re looking at it…”
“No, not really,” Ajisai
said. “Y-yeah,
you’ve kissed a whole bunch before too, right? I guess I’m just a little
too self-conscious about kissing or something…”
Mai jokingly laughed at
Ajisai and her blush, which had crept up all the way to her ears.
“Then would you like to
try it now? It’s quite pleasant, as it turns out.”
Mai gave Ajisai’s hand a
gentle squeeze, making Ajisai amusingly flustered. “B-but that would mean my
first kiss would be with you!” she protested.
Mai giggled, which made
Ajisai pout. “I feel like you always tease me whenever we talk, Mai!” she complained.
“Do
I? I
suppose you’re so cute I simply can’t help myself.”
“From what I’ve seen,”
said Mai, “you’re more like the little sister.”
“Aw, jeez!” Ajisai groaned, but then she immediately laughed. Mai, too, laughed with joy.
This pair had both fallen
for the same girl. If there was a phrase to correctly describe the strange bond these two
shared, then perhaps they were more than friends but still not quite lovers
themselves. It filled Mai with pleasure to spend this rather bittersweet moment
with Ajisai.
Ajisai finally calmed
down and exhaled. “But you know,” she said, “I really hope Rena-chan feels better
tomorrow.”
Naturally.
“I’m
certain she will,” Mai said.
“Mai-chan?” Ajisai-san tilted her head, inquisitive.
“Did my fever go down?” I muttered, feeling like
I was dreaming.
I took my temp the minute
I woke up on Monday morning and stared at the numbers on the screen. I learned later that
fevers can come on as a psychological thing, so that meant that after Mai and
Ajisai-san’s words gave me some relief, a full recovery was just around the
corner. One of
those things, you know? It was all thanks to them visiting me.
“This means I can play in
the competition, right?” I said. “Right?”
I brandished the
thermometer at my mom like a dog bringing back a Frisbee. Well, what about it?
Huh? Huh?
But my mom waffled for a
moment. What for, I ask
you? My fever
went down, didn’t it?
“But I don’t know…” she
said. “They
say the convalescent period is pretty risky…”
“But Moooom!” I begged as I pulled on her sleeve. Pretty, pretty
please?
“It’s too early for you
to be this loud,” my sister grumbled as she came into the living room. Unlike me, still in my
pajamas, she was all ready to head out the door.
“Please, please let me go
to school!” I said. I was even willing to get
on the floor and beg as I clung to my mom.
My sister butted in as
she munched on a piece of toast. “Where’s the harm in it? Her fever went down, didn’t
it?”
“Haruna-chan!” I cried. My angelically adorable,
wise, brilliant, exalted little sister had sent me help in my time of need!
“Come on, Mom,” she said. “You used to do
volleyball, right? You have to know how she feels.”
“Well, I suppose,” my mom
said.
“And like, it’ll be super
awkward if she no-shows when she’s supposed to be on the competition team. She might stop going to
school again.”
Oh, my dastardly little
sister, threatening my mother with my dark past! But you know how girls are
into bad boys, and even if she wasn’t a boy, per se, I now felt I could kinda
see the appeal. Hey, Haruna, did you want any pocket money? You want some
allowance? There you go, kiddo. I’ll
get you a Choco Baby sometime soon.
“I guess there’s no point
in arguing,” my mom sighed. “But make sure to take it easy, you hear?”
I needed to text
Ajisai-san ASAP too. I had to tell her she could come to school today!
With that, it was finally
time for the big game: the interclass athletics competition. All I had left to do was
show off the fruits of my labor, deliver Class B a crushing defeat, and take
home the victory! Well, not
really. But if only.
I still felt like I had a
huge bit of relationship troubles waiting in the wings for me. Whenever you had a
special someone, you both wanted each other to be happy—which was common sense,
but I was only realizing it clearly now. And sometimes you did the
wrong thing in the pursuit of your loved ones’ happiness, just like when
Ajisai-san offered to ditch school for me.
Group
Chat Name: 5déesses (4)
Part 4
Star Lily: So you guys all caught
that, right?
Star Lily: Yeah, like we got to
see the basketball teams from the other classes. They didn’t show their
faces, but that’s totally Koto Satsuki, right?
Queen: …
Star Lily: Like, I hear she even
beat a college basketball player like it was nothing.
Crane-chan: I was told she was the
secret sixth member on a team that won the junior high championships three
years in a row.
miki: Wait, hollup. Who’s spilling this tea to you guys?
Star Lily: Huh? Someone in
Class C.
Crane-chan: I heard from a person
in Class D.
miki: That’s all the doing
of…none other than Koyanagi Kaho.
Star Lily: Fr?!
Crane-chan: What do you mean, Miki?
miki: She’s doing psyops. She made videos and
started rumors all just to throw us off our game. There’s no knowing what
Koyanagi Kaho might do.
Star Lily: But I chat with her all
the time…
Crane-chan: Yes, as do I. She isn’t the type to do something so horrid.
Star Lily: Yeep.
miki: She butters up to
everyone and then uses that against them when it serves her needs! She’s a greedy harlot!
Crane-chan: Do you mean to say that
all those videos of Koto Satsuki were fabricated?
miki: Knowing Koyanagi Kaho,
she prolly thought we’d be able to clock it if she faked ’em, so she mighta got
the real thing somehow to throw us off guard.
Queen: Oh, enough of this
nonsense!
Queen: No matter what, the
match is tomorrow, and we shall win it. Won’t we, girls?
Queen: We simply cannot allow
ourselves to lose or exhibit any other such shameless behavior. Not this late in the game.
All: …
Group
Chat Name:
Behind The 5déesses (3)
Star Lily: So like
Star Lily: do you guys think
Himi-chan’s doing okay?
Crane-chan: I feel that she was a
bit at the end of her rope back there.
Star Lily: What do you think’ll
happen if we lose?
Crane-chan: Well…she was the one
who started it. So, like she says, it’ll be horribly shameful. I suppose her social
standing in class would suffer a dreadful loss.
miki: Yeah, there’s a lotta
kids in our class who don’t really like her pushy behavior. If she loses, they’re all
gonna gang up on her…
Star Lily: I guess the Quintet is
plenty popular even outside of Class A.
Crane-chan: …
miki: …
Crane-chan: Hm?
Star Lily: Oh, never mind! It’s
nothing.
Star Lily: Just, like, good luck
tomorrow, gang!
Crane-chan: R-right! Let’s do our best for Himiko!
miki: Y-yeah! We’re gonna win this thing!
Star Lily: You know it! No matter what it takes.
Chapter 4:
There’s No Freaking Way I Can Ever
Be a People Person!
THE DAY OF THE MATCH brought clear weather,
and I was fit as a fiddle too!
As an aside, we still had
class like normal in the morning, but afternoon classes were canceled so we
could have the competition. I could have chilled and
slept in until noon, but my fever had already gone down and everything.
I yelped as she tackled
me and grabbed my shoulders. I lost my balance and
pitched forward, and she wasted no time in putting her hand on my forehead.
“Your fever’s a goner!” she
said.
“Uh, yeah. I mean, I told you I got better already.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t
really trust you.”
Come on. There was no one in the world who wanted to skip school on the daily
more badly than I did. So would it have killed her to have a little faith in me when I came to
school while I was still in recovery? Well, I guess you could
make the argument that this was something stupid I was doing for the sake of my
class. I
wasn’t really the type to think about the consequences, after all. Okay, I got her point. Kaho-chan was right.
“Sorry for making you
worry about me,” I said.
“God, you can say that
again,” she said. “Eh, but I’ll letcha off the hook ’cause you’re here now. But you gotta take it
easy until the competition. C’mon,
sit down!”
Kaho-chan forced me into
a chair. The
fact that such a thing was necessary made me, to be totally real with you, kind
of happy. Heh heh.
“Fine, fine,” I said. “I’ll save my strength.”
“Yup.
If there’s
anything you gotta do, I’ll take care of it for you. So sit tight.”
“Oh, but before that,” I
said, “I need to run to the bathroom.”
“Sit!”
she barked. “I’ll go for you!”
“How is that supposed to
work?!”
Because, as it turns out,
one can’t go to the bathroom for someone else, I set off for the restroom. I bumped into Hirano-san
and Haseagawa-san on the way and gave them both a heartfelt apology.
“Sorry,” I said, “for
getting a fever and making everyone worried. I’m completely good to go
today, I promise! Now let’s go give this basketball game our all!”
Thus, even as they were
concerned for me, they also felt intensely motivated for the competition later
today. Heh heh! Morale ran high with Class A!
“Oh,” I said. She
didn’t reply. “Satsuki-san.”
“I see you’re better
now,” she told me.
She stared down at me. Wh-what was this all about?
“Do your absolute best
today,” she said.
“For the sake of your
beloved Sena, no doubt,” she added.
I gritted my teeth. “W-well, yes, as it turns out… But that’s rich of you to say when
you’re all fired up because of Ajisai-san too!”
Standoffishly, she showed
no emotion on her face whatsoever. What was up with that? But I couldn’t say
anything else in the face of her judgmental disrespect. She was pretty much our
best weapon, so I guess I had to put up with this for the time being…right?
But just as I was about
to leave the bathroom, she said, “Say, Amaori,” making me stop in my tracks.
Satsuki-san stood in the
center of the room. After checking to see that no one else was around, she asked, “Are you
happy dating both Mai and Sena?”
“Please, you needn’t
assume I have any hidden intentions. Take the question at face
value.”
She said that, but she was
also grinning like a man coming up to your house in the middle of a night with
a hatchet saying, “Me? Oh no, I’m no shady customer.”
“Satsuki-san, you have
intentions hidden behind intentions hidden behind intentions,” I told her.
“Goodness, you’re
obnoxious,” she said.
“Hey, Satsuki-san, you see
that thing right there? That’s called a mirror.”
As I kindly pointed out
the bathroom mirror, Satsuki-san gave me a murderous glare. Ah, now that was more like
it.
“Yeah, well,” I said. “I’m
happy. It’s just…yeah.”
“Really now?” For some reason, Satsuki-san didn’t sound very pleased with me. But I answered her and
everything! “You were certainly reluctant when I asked you.”
“That’s got nothing to do
with the present!”
I was pretty sure it was a
mark of growth for me to have moved beyond the way I thought in the past. Maybe, I considered, I
should turn the tables and tell Satsuki-san how great my girlfriends were in
order to get the better of her. Mind you, I doubted she’d
understand. But it might be fun to give it a try. I’d pay for my curiosity
with my life, granted, but still.
“Y-yeah?!” I cried, my voice cracking.
Oops. Satsuki-san was a phantom
who could read minds! Okay,
no she wasn’t. But I just couldn’t help but think that. It wasn’t a crime to think that, right? People should be free to
think whatever they want, right?
She stared me down and
then looked away like a cat who’d lost interest. “Well, I’m glad to hear
it,” she said.
Was she sincerely wishing
me happiness…? Nah, no way.
I felt a little chilled. “I-it’s okay, Satsuki-san. We’re still friends, even
if I have girlfriends now!”
Satsuki-san didn’t answer
but instead walked into a stall.
Man, this was all kind
of… Like, you know. I wasn’t sure how to say it. Like a hangnail. I normally wouldn’t be concerned about this, but there were moments
when Satsuki-san just sort of seemed off. It all started back when
she’d sent me that message. Or maybe it all began
when I started going out with Mai and Ajisai-san. What was the deal with
this…whatever…Satsuki-san didn’t want to talk about? What would I do if the
hangnail never healed? It
made me worried. I had plenty on my plate to keep me busy until the competition was
over, but when it was all said and done, I hoped I could talk things out with
Satsuki-san.
“Satsuki-san, are you
lonely because I have less time to hang out with you now that I’ve started
dating Mai?” I asked,
stupidly.
“Amaori-san,” Satsuki-san
said through the stall door. “Would you like to find
out if imbeciles can recover from death?”
My answer whizzed back as
fast as the wind: “I’ll pass!”
Once again, there was a
crowd of people in the hall in front of my classroom. Uh-oh. I’d seen
this before. I had a bad feeling about it as I sneakily peeked into the middle of
the group. There
stood Godzilla and King Ghidorah, aka Mai standing off against Takada-san. Oh god. The top of the pack for
both Class A and Class B.
“My sincerest apologies,”
Takada-san said. “Here I thought we’d settle things later. But you leave me no choice. I shall simply have to
crush your friends and show the world which of us is the superior!”
Takada-san steamrollered
on with her usual scream of laughter, as would befit the top student of
Ashigaya High. Mai, I assumed, would simply brush it off like normal.
But Mai said, “Goodness,
how I tire of your yammering.”
Tension filled the air at
that dangerous statement.
“I beg your pardon?” Takada-san said. All her mirth had vanished.
Mai smirked, a clever
look in her eyes. “I meant,” she said, “that I am not the sort to sit idly by and let my
friends get hurt.”
There was a storm brewing
between them!
“H-hmmph,” Takada-san
scoffed. “Say
what you like, but nothing can shake the foundations of the 5déesses’ victory! I cannot wait to see your
vexation later.”
“We’ll see about that,”
Mai said.
You normally never saw Mai
lose that gentle smile of hers, but this was the one exception. She put herself right in
Takada-san’s personal space with uncharacteristic boldness. Oh god, what a classic
pretty girl move… Boys and girls from both our classes shrieked. Even Takada-san took a
step back.
I thought she would
whisper, but Mai spoke as loud as if she was making an announcement. “Those who stand in the
right are the ones who claim victory. You should have employed
unflagging effort and sincerity. Instead, your methods
will never measure up against those of my friends and I. Would you like me to
demonstrate that to you?”
Takada-san hissed and
reeled back like she’d been repelled. She blushed, probably
from the sheer humiliation.
“Well, you’re the one
who—” Takada-san began hysterically, but then she broke off and glowered at
Mai. “Fine, by all
means! Either
way, we shall soon know the results! Be ready to taste defeat,
Oduka Mai.”
As Takada-san raised a
hand, as if to shower rose petals, Mai gave her a ferocious grin. “Likewise, what a shame it
will be for you to get your long, pretty hair filthy.”
“What are you talking about?” Takada-san asked,
half-angry and half-puzzled.
Takada-san’s mouth fell
open in a wordless scream. Everyone who saw her would go on to talk about it later like, “Yeah,
uh-huh. She
exploded like an oil rig.”
Just as she started to
scream in fury, the bell rang for class. We watched her sprint away
with wrath written on her face, and then Kaho-chan popped out of the pack and
exclaimed, “That was awesome, Mai-Mai! You sure told her! I’ve never seen you like this before.”
At her cue, all the Class
A kids followed suit. “What a relief that’s over,” one said.
“Oduka-san, you’re so cool!” said another.
“Now all we’ve gotta do
is win this thing!” said a
third.
“Yeah, but we’ve as good
as won in terms of class!”
They all spoke over one
another, getting more and more hyped. One of the boys fist
pumped and called, “Let’s win this thing! Justice for Sena!”
Ajisai-san, standing near
the edge of the circle, yelled, “I’m still alive, you know!” which made us all burst
into laughter.
I caught her eye and gave
her a big nod. She was telling me she chose me over the rest of the class; she didn’t
want revenge more than she wanted me to be okay. I was thrilled about
that, but at the same time…that was really because the role of being a
universally loved figure suited her so well.
Ajisai-san smiled charmingly.
She cupped
her hands around her mouth and mouthed “Good luck,” at me. God, she was so cute! I thanked my lucky stars
I’d come to school today.
Just then, Mai noticed me
and pulled me into the center of the circle. “Renako.”
“This means we’re
counting on you,” she said. She took my hand almost
as if we were ballroom dancing and beamed at me. I could feel all of our
classmates’ eyes boring into me. I didn’t want to stand out! I really didn’t want to
stand out—however! I gotta say, this was worlds better than being ogled by a crowd while I
stood on stage and made hopping noises.
I turned to look at the
group. “L-leave it to me!”
I said. I raised my fist in the air. I couldn’t think of
anything that great to say, but I decided that I might as well say something
loud and assertive anyway! “I, Amaori Renako, will lead Class 1-A straight to victory!”
Everyone cheered. Before this, I’d been a member of Mai’s friend group and the top of the
school social pyramid, which had been pretty thrilling. But at the same time, it
was also kinda just starting to sink in. Everyone listened to me,
and I could rally a group with a couple of sentences. With one fist pump, I
could make my mark on the class. This was it! This was being an extroverted people person, the most powerful force in
school! Now
it was time to do my damnedest to not damage the borrowed reputation of the
queen who’d brought me here.
So yeah, I got that
worked up over lunch break. Even I could acknowledge that I was having so much emotional turbulence
I was scared of an overflow.
But now I waited alone,
trembling, in a deserted area behind the school building. I’d noticed someone had
left a slanderous note on my desk which I clutched in my hand. What had I done to deserve
this? I was
a nobody, just someone allowed to lap up the sweet nectar that came from being
around the queen of the school!
The person who showed up
before me and my too-long rap sheet was the last one I’d ever expected.
“Sorry to keep you
waiting,” she chirped.
She was one of
Takada-san’s friends, the one who kind of copied Ajisai-san: Haga Suzuran-san.
“I’m glad you could make
it,” she said.
“Well, no duh!” I said. “I had no choice but to
make it after you sent me this!”
I brandished the paper at
her. Its
contents were as follows:
I know your big secret. If you don’t want it to
get out, you’d better meet me behind the school buildings during lunch. Come alone.
“What do you know, Haga-san?” I asked. I was totally stiff. I wish I’d borrowed
Satsuki-san’s mom’s taser before coming here.
And then, in the very
next instant, Haga-san bowed deeply to me. “I’m so sorry!” she
said.
“Um, well, you know that
whole letter thingy? Yeah, none of that’s real.”
“But you said you knew my
big secret, so like, what’s up with that…?”
“Oh, that’s just ’cause
you stand out as such a big people person,” she explained. “I figure you gotta have
one or two big secrets, y’know?”
“Uh, biased much?” I shouted instinctually. “Besides, I’m sure
there’s a people person or two out there who doesn’t have secrets.” Mind you, I couldn’t
think of any off the top of my head, but whatever.
“So that means you have
one, right?” she asked.
“I have the right to
remain silent,” I insisted.
No shit I had secrets; in
fact, I might well have had more secrets than any other girl at Ashigaya. There was the matter of
me being a loser in junior high. And then kisses with
Satsuki-san. And my appearance in a cosplay competition the other day. Plus dating Mai. Not to mention Ajisai-san. Any one of those getting
out would be more than fatal.
“Oh, don’t worry,”
Haga-san said. “We’ve all hid a bad test score from our parents or blown too much cash
on a phone game or, like, eaten too much chocolate in the middle of the night.”
“Right, true! I feel
better.” She’d
just made it even worse.
At any rate, I asked, “So,
what’d you need me fo—wait a sec.”
I looked around us. Was this going to be like
that thing the other day with Satsuki-san, but this time I was the one they’d
lured in and ganged up on? Oh,
heck no! The
only reason Satsuki-san had survived that was because she was Satsuki-san! Sure, I may have been the
first born in my family, but I was no Satsuki-san. I couldn’t handle this.
“N-no, it’s not like
that,” she said. “Please
don’t be so wary.”
She could say that, but
like hell could I just go, “Oh, sure, if you say so.”
“You know, I was actually
hoping to talk about Himi-chan,” she said.
“Himi-chan… You mean
Takada Himiko-san, right?”
“Yes, but it’s not what
you think,” she insisted. “Amaori-san, I’d like to ask you for a favor.” Once again, she gave me a
huge bow. “I’m sorry. Um, I know this is asking
way too much, but all the same…I really don’t have any other options, sorry.”
“Wh-what’s the favor…?” I
asked.
She sounded like she was
at her wits’ end. It sounded real, not like the letter she’d written earlier, and so
pathetic I felt like I simply had to hear her out.
When she looked up, she
couldn’t meet my eye. She whispered—and I would never have expected this in a million
years—“Amaori-san, would you please…give Himi-chan a handicap?”
I knew almost nothing of
this group of Class B girls, never really interacted with them, and yet still
got bothered by them all the same. And now they were asking
me this ridiculous thing.
“Um, what?” I said. Did that mean… “You want
me to throw the match?”
After a moment, Haga-san
nodded slightly.
I didn’t bother to beat
about the bush. “Nah,” I
groaned. “No freaking way.”
Obviously, there was no
freaking way I could do that for her. I felt a stronger sense
of refusal than when Satsuki-san had asked me out. Did she want an easy win
that badly? So she’d try to go after me, the weakest-looking member of my whole
friend group?
As I recoiled from her
request, Haga-san shook her head. “I mean, I just…I just
can’t have Himi-chan lose.”
“Wh-what’s that
supposed to mean?”
She’d die if she lost? What the heck, when did
this turn into a freaking death game? This was terrifying!
Haga-san stammered out
her explanation. “See, Himi-chan’s always been hostile toward Oduka Mai even before the
interclass athletics competition came up. I remember Himi-chan used
to complain about how annoyed she was because Oduka Mai’s literally all anyone
talks about here.”
Takada-san just talked
shit nonstop, huh.
“I thought that her
obsession with Oduka Mai was kinda weird, you know?” Haga-san continued. “And like it just got
stranger as time went on. So I asked her about it, and it turns out Himi-chan used to be a
model.”
“Oh, you can’t breathe a
word of this to anyone else, I’m serious! I think she’d be super
embarrassed if anyone dragged up her old articles or something.”
Come to think of it,
Takada-san did have the height for modeling… Dang, how many models were there in this one school? Tokyo, man. Incredible.
“But one day, the magazine
that Himi-chan was in did a special on Oduka Mai,” Haga-san went on. “It sold so well,
that…they dropped Himi-chan from the magazine… And Oduka-san stole some of her
other jobs too. Himi-chan’s got a lot of pride, so she quit the modeling career as a
whole.”
“But in spite of all
that, she refuses to let anyone outshine her at school. Like, she wants to win at
school if nothing else, you know? She’s really sincere about
that. But
at this rate, Oduka-san’s gonna take away every place where Himi-chan can be
herself.”
Ah, so that’s what
Haga-san meant by it being a matter of life or death. It seemed like quite a
few models around my age were impacted by Mai. There were probably tons
of girls out there like Takada-san. I randomly happened to
think back to the video Hanatori-san had shown me with Mai, Satsuki-san, and
the crowd of little girl models behind them.
But with that being said…
“That kinda feels like an unreasonable grudge,” I said.
“Totally,” Haga-san agreed. “But I still think that
if she can beat Oduka-san, Himi-chan will be able to move on. Please, Amaori-san.” She looked at me with
everything she had. “Please. We’ll apologize to
Sena-san for what we did and everything… So would you, pretty please? Help us out, Amaori-san.”
“You can ask all you
want,” I said, “but I just can’t. Sorry.”
I couldn’t bear to be
there any longer, so I dashed away to outrun her stare.
Even if she was doing
this for her friend, this was no fair. If she had the time to go
preying on people’s goodwill, then she could have used that to get more
practice in! I
mean, maybe she did practice. But you get what I’m
trying to say. She could ask until she was blue in the face, but there was no freaking
way I’d help her enough to throw the whole game.
But then, after I’d freed
myself from Haga-san…
I got caught by the next
person. “Please,
Amaori-san,” she begged, executing a perfect ninety-degree bow. This was Kamesaki
Chiduru-san, she of the long bangs and the somewhat inexpressive face. It was exactly like that
time with Haga-san.
“Wh-what do you want?” I
asked. “You’re
not going to ask me to lose the competition on purpose, are you?”
It was a one-on-one with
Kamesaki-san and me in the deserted outdoor walkway. Kamesaki-san jolted in
shock and then nodded earnestly. “Yes, indeed,” she said. “I’ve never seen Himiko
look so nervous before.”
I didn’t want to hear it,
but Kamesaki-san started to explain the details of her own accord. “She always has
confidence in spades, no matter what. It’s rare for her to
express any insecurities. Now that there is no going back, she has no choice but to win. And if she loses, she’ll
lose everything. She says that the rest of her high school experience will be ruined.”
The no-going-back part, I
assumed, referred to how she knocked Ajisai-san’s pencil case off the desk. Yeah, to be fair, that
was the moment when the rivalry between Class A and Class B ceased to be just a
joke. Class
A came together with Takada-san as our bad guy. But, I mean…she started it.
“You see,” Kamesaki-san
went on, “Himiko has always been the type to get carried away or run with her
incorrect impressions of things. And then she gets herself
hurt. I
just can’t bear to watch; it’s so risky. She’s a fool, you know. But this current episode
is completely unlike all the rest.”
No
way. I felt
like she was telling me the backstory of some character I didn’t know. The only Takada-san I
knew was the one who threw down with Mai. But now they kept on
telling me that there was so much more to her story than met the eye. Please,
I’d really rather stay out of it. Or was this what Haga-san
meant by me standing out?
“Please, Amaori-san,”
Kamesaki-san said. “I know it’s wretched of me to ask, but I simply don’t have any other
alternatives. I know Himiko would be furious with me if she knew what I was doing,
but all the same… Would you please?”
I stiffened as
Kamesaki-san bowed before me. How come Haga-san and
Kamesaki-san were begging me, of all people? Suddenly, the answer hit me.
There’s always a story to the lives of extroverts. Let’s take Oduka Mai for
instance, as she’s a good example. Mai cooked up her own
story and pulled everyone in school, Takada-san included, into it—saving me
when I became her friend, dominating over Satsuki-san as her rival, and more. That was just how Mai rolled.
Now, if I
had remained an asocial loser even in high school, and had I met Mai by chance
for a moment—say she’d smiled at me in the library after school or kindly
swapped two or three words with me—that would have become a treasured memory
even after I’d graduated. That was the power of Mai’s story. She was a popular,
extroverted person, which gave her a kind of glowing presence. And Mai wasn’t the only
one with that. Satsuki-san, Ajisai-san, and Kaho-chan all influenced other people to
this day.
And so maybe… Maybe from
the moment Takada-san had knocked over Ajisai-san’s pencil case and I’d gotten
fired up and declared war, I’d accidentally crossed the threshold into such an
existence. The
thought frightened me.
“Sorry,” I said, “but I
just can’t. That’s
not an option for me!”
I refused her plea. Making an impact on someone isn’t always a good thing. If someone makes an
unreasonable demand of you and you refuse it, they can hold a grudge for no
good reason. Which is
absurd. But
Mai had been hurt by such absurdity many times over, I knew. People talk about the
price of fame, but I hadn’t really considered it before. Standing out in the
public eye meant that someone will come along and cast you as a character in
their story without any of your input.
Miss me with that. Being a popular girl wasn’t a privilege. It was a responsibility. But I couldn’t be a part
of so many people’s lives. My communication juice ran out way too quickly, and my mental points
recovered too slowly. Now that I was out of my league, status-wise, there was nothing I could
do. Even
when Haga-san and Kamesaki-san bombarded me with their feelings, saying it was
for Takada-san’s own good, I couldn’t criticize them or try to persuade them
that what they were doing was unreasonable. All I could do was build a
wall and run away.
My breathing was ragged. While I took a short
rest, someone behind me called, “Oh hey, Amaori-san! You got a sec?”
I turned to look. There stood the mysterious girl who aped Kaho-chan, both hands pressed
together and an apologetic look on her face. Oh, for the love of god. Spare me.
“Huh?”
I said. I looked up to see
Kaho-chan standing there, frowning at me.
“You okay?” she said. “You’re spacing out like
crazy. You’re
not running another temp, are you?”
The other girls and I had
changed into our PE clothes before coming into the gym. Kaho-chan shoved a
basketball jersey at me and pursed her lips. “Get it together, girl. It’s almost time for the
big game!”
“Yeah, sorry. I guess I’m getting a little nervous.”
I pulled the jersey on
over my PE clothes. My number was four—a pretty good one, I felt.
“Good luck to us,
Amaori-san!” Hirano-san
called.
“I-I’ll do my best to make
this my greatest memory of high school,” Hasegawa-san promised.
I hurried to force a grin
and nodded.
Satsuki-san, her hair tied
back in a ponytail, tilted her head. “What’s the matter?” she
asked.
“Huh?”
I said. “Uh, nothing, really.”
Out on the sports field,
the boys were playing futsal and the girls were doing softball. The boys’ volleyball and
the girls’ basketball would be in the gym. On the next court over,
the Class A boys huddled together, totally amped.
I heard cheers from the
field outside. I couldn’t tell which, but I guessed one of the games had started. Finally, I snapped out of
my tunnel vision.
There were four classes
in the first year, A to D, but we didn’t do round robins or tournament style
games here. It was just a simple A vs B, C vs D matchup. That meant we had only
the one basketball game too.
“We gotta do our best,
just like Mai-Mai and Aa-chan!” Kaho-chan said.
Oh yeah, we’d cheered for
the softball match that started a bit ago. Class B had a lot of
girls on the softball team, so their batting lineup was pretty impressive. But in spite of that,
with Mai as pitcher, we struck them out one after another. Whenever Mai showed off
her power as the star player, both guys and girls alike squealed in joy.
I lost track of how many
matches we watched, but once class C and D’s basketball game was done, we were
called up to play. I could still feel the enthusiasm thick in the air in the gym.
And then there they were
in front of me: the five members of the Class B gang, Takada-san included.
“It is finally time for
the showdown, Quintet,” Takada-san said.
Kaho-chan, standing in
the center of our group, chuckled with pride and pointed straight at them. “We’re gonna crush you
flatter’n a pancake!”
Seeing the sparks
beginning to fly, the onlooking boys oohed and aahed.
Our opponents were Takada
Himiko-san, Haga Suzuran-san, Kamesaki Chiduru-san, Nemoto Miki-san, and…
“Huh?”
I said. “Not Youko-chan?”
Youko-chan stood on the
narrow walkway on the second floor of the gym and gave us a big wave. “Good luck out there, guys!” she called.
“What the heck?!” I
yelled. “How
come you aren’t on the 5déesses’ team?”
Youko-chan laughed. “I’m not that good at sports!”
“That’s no fair! That’s no fair at all!”
Now even Kaho-chan joined
in on the yelling. “Geh! You guys brought along
the first-year ace of the basketball team, didn’t you?”
“She’s an honorary
5déesse for the day,” Takada-san said like it was nothing, not the bombshell it
was. (Ace-san
made a face like that was the last thing she wanted.)
“That’s fine,” Hirano-san
said. “We’ve
got a superstar who used to be on the basketball team too! Don’t we, Amaori-san?”
“Huh?”
Her words
upset me mightily, but I couldn’t say anything to lower the team’s morale just
before the match. “Y-yeah,
true. Yup, just
leave it all to me! And then let’s get the ball to Satsuki-san whenever possible.”
“Fine, if you insist,”
said Satsuki-san.
And thus we lined up with
questionable team unity. Ugh… Haga-san, Kamesaki-san, and Nemoto-san kept sneaking me pleading
looks. I
tried my best to drive those earlier conversations from my brain.
After her classmates
talked, Takada-san tried to rally her troops too, saying things like, “We’ll
win for certain!” and “No matter how many points they score, we’ll pay them back double!”
and “Don’t
be nervous now, girls.” You know, maybe she wasn’t such a bad person after all… Wait, but
that’s what they wanted me to think! Was this all some
strategy to throw me off mentally? Well, even if it wasn’t,
it had the same effect.
Nope, nope, nope. Right now, the only thing on my mind had to be the game. I couldn’t let all those
days of training with Kaho-chan and the other girls go to waste.
The teacher who was
acting as the ref stood in the middle of the court with the ball. We’d start off with a jump
ball. On the
other side of the center circle stood, of course, Takada-san. And on our side, we had…
“Get ’em, Rena-chin!” Kaho-chan cheered.
Kaho-chan pushed me out
there.
“But Takada-san’s got a
good twenty centimeters on me!” I protested.
“Yeah, but you’re the
leader, aren’tcha?”
“Am
I?” Since when? Well, then as the leader,
I decided to delegate. “Please, Satsuki-san, take over!”
Phew.
Satisfied,
I wiped the sweat from my brow. I’d completed my
responsibilities as a leader. Kaho-chan stood next to
me and gave me a Look that said, “Are you sure you can do that?” but, as our leader, I
elected to ignore her.
The match was finally
starting. I’d be okay. I’d be okay. I had Kaho-chan and
Satsuki-san with me. Sure, our opponents may have been pretty tough, but I had good,
reliable people on my side. Plus, I’d also try my best…to support Satsuki-san, that is!
Satsuki-san managed to
get possession of the ball, and Takada-san harrumphed in anger. Kaho-chan grabbed the ball
from where it fell.
“Time to go, go, go!” she
said.
Nemoto-san tried to cut
in, but Kaho-chan nimbly sidestepped her. She tried to pass to me
to get it closer to the hoop, but—guess who was guarding me. The basketball ace. Uh, why?
“Uh, ’scuse me,” I said,
“um…”
The pressure was too great. I didn’t think I could get
past her! While
I was stuck, Kaho-chan passed it to Hirano-san, who sent it along to
Satsuki-san, and…she leaped and launched a jump shot.
A Class B kid screamed,
“Whoa!” The
ball traced a stable parabola and swished through the hoop. It was a perfect throw,
the kind of two-handed shot that was the go-to of female basketball players.
“You’re rocking it,
Saa-chan!” Kaho-chan
crowed. “Now
there’s a girl who can get the job done!” She slapped Satsuki-san
on the back.
“Oh my god…” Hirano-san
gushed. “I
passed a ball to Koto-san…and she scored with it!”
“Is that what they call
teamwork?” Hasegawa-san
said, overcome with emotion.
Heh heh heh. Now this was the true power of the Quintet… Keep it up,
Satsuki-san! I thought.
The other team seemed
pretty peeved. “They are indeed formidable foes,” Takada-san said. “But we already knew that. We’ll make up those
points, girls!”
Her command meant it was
time for us to go on defense. “All right,” I told the
others. “Let’s
bust out that strategy we talked about!”
While the other team
frowned, we banded together in solid defense, a tactic bequeathed to me from my
sister: put all members on defense! Any thrown-together team
in an interclass athletics competition would be largely made up of amateurs,
and their lack of team practices would make coordinated teamwork downright
impossible. So,
what was a girl to do?
“Lower their chances of
making successful goals,” my sister said, imparting to me some advice from a
friend of hers as we sat in her room, “and then boost your chances at making
good shots. It’s going to be pretty much impossible for an amateur to throw a
three-pointer when they’ve got someone guarding them, see. So completely ignore
anything outside the three-point line. If it goes in, switch it up. Have your guys go after
the rebounds on any shots you don’t make. That gives you guys more
chances to score, and they should go down naturally.”
It was a perfect,
surefire way to win in a match of amateurs vs amateurs.
“Well, but I guess it
only works if you can actually score goals,” my sister added.
That’s why I’d been
focusing exclusively on practicing my shooting—well, that and because it was
hard to learn intercepting passes, defense, dribbling, and all those other
things! So
when we were on defense, we’d all work together to pass the ball down court. Then we’d make sure not to
miss when on offense and keep stealing their offensive opportunities. And that was Class A’s
strategy!
In fact, Suzuran-san
tried to run up our side of the court with the ball, where she had her hands
full with Kaho-chan and Hirano-san on defense. Since they blocked her
from passing the ball forward, she passed the ball to the open Kamesaki-san. I made sure not to move
forward any more than was needed but got in between her and Takada-san, who was
closer to the hoop. Kamesaki-san looked stumped, so she tried shooting from where she
stood, and…she missed!
Satsuki-san, already in
the perfect position, snatched up the ball. Boy, that was a girl who
was made for jumping high! Now it was our turn to take the offense. She passed the ball to
Kaho-chan, who was already running.
“Hyah!”
Kaho-chan yelled. She looked like she was
about to shoot, but then she passed the ball to me.
Eeep.
I almost
fell for that feint of hers. Just stay calm, I told myself. And shoot. Shoot.
“4–0,” Kaho-chan said. She high-fived me.
Woo-hoo!
My sister’s
strategy worked like a charm. We’d win so long as we
kept this up. This
game was in the bag.
“The way you shoot
one-handed is so cool, Amaori-san!” Hirano-san gushed.
“Oh, how the Quintet
brings together the bonds of the ball…oh, god! I’m witnessing history in
the making!” said
Hasegawa-san.
I gave them both a
thumbs-up and grinned. I couldn’t believe it. I was actually pulling
off something athletic. Well, all I’d done was get in position and make a successful shot, but
still!
My sister’s warning
flashed through my mind. “The one flaw of this strategy is that you need to participate in both
offense and defense, so it really eats up your stamina. You gotta keep a close
eye on your base strength, okay?”
If this was a forty-minute
game, there’d be no freaking way this strategy would work. But the interclass
competition was ten minutes for the first half, an interval, and then ten
minutes for the second half, so it was only half the length of a regular game.
“Let’s keep it up until
the end!” I said.
We were off to a great start.
My sister
had told me, “If everyone’s motivated, not doing anything stupid to show off,
following the strategy, and keeping teamwork as the number one priority, then
your game’s good as won.” I wondered if that might actually be true. Or maybe it only worked
out that way since everyone just kinda half-assed school events like this. But Class B was in it to
win it too—maybe even more than we were.
At this point, the score
was 12–15.
They somehow managed to
flip the score by the end of the first quarter. Our all-hands on defense
strat had worked great for a while. But then…
My only miscalculation was
that girl from the basketball club. Once Takada-san figured
out our strategy and started directing the others, they made it their goal to
have the basketball girl throw three-pointers from outside the line. And since she was on the
basketball team, after all, she threw them as well as a hotshot sniper. She didn’t make a basket
every time, but she was good enough that we couldn’t ignore her. We tried having
Kaho-chan, the second-best person on our team, guard her, but then that left no
one to stop Takada-san. Those two were top players, but we only had the one star player in
Satsuki-san. They kept up a fierce guard on her too, meaning she wasn’t able to get
as many points as we’d hoped. Since we’d all practiced a
ton, we weren’t making any big errors or anything; but at the same time, that
practice hadn’t made us stellar overnight either.
She passed to Ace-san,
and I had no idea which one was going to come at me. Plus, Satsuki-san had to
stay near the hoop to catch the rebound. At this point, my only
choice was to stop Takada-san myself!
“Why hello there,
Amaori-san,” Takada-san said.
“C-Class A’s not about to
lose on my watch,” I told her.
Ace-san passed her the
ball, and she glared at me. I cowered under the
intensity of her eyes. This was a matter of life and death to her, according to Haga-san. I could feel something
like stubborn obsession in her stare. The rhythm of her
dribbling changed. Here she
came.
“It’s a pity that you just
aren’t up for the task,” she said.
“Wai—” I protested, but I
couldn’t stop her. Takada-san slipped past me like it was nothing and made a jump shot. The ball rocked the net. She’d earned two points
with that last goal, so the first half ended with the score at 14–17.
We had a two-minute
interval, and then it would be time to settle the score in the second half.
I bowed before all the
others and said, “I’m sorry.”
It wasn’t just that I’d
failed to stop Takada-san at the end there. It was the missing shots,
the dropped passes…the whole shameful performance.
Suddenly, Satsuki-san
placed her hand on my forehead.
“You aren’t running a
fever again. I see.”
That startled me. “Why’d you think I would be…?”
“Because it appeared to me
that you couldn’t focus when we were on the court.”
Well, I mean… I looked
away from her, but then Kaho-chan folded her arms. “Even if she was
super-duper focused, this is Rena-chin we’re talking about, y’know?”
“That is true,”
Satsuki-san acknowledged.
Was that her idea of
backing me up? Well, thanks anyway, Kaho-chan…
“Anyway,” she said,
“what’re we gonna do in the second half? I guess, like, stick to
the strat but put more oomph in it and somehow turn this game around?”
“I think we’re too
incompetent to manage that,” Satsuki-san said.
“What, you got any better
ideas, huh, Saa-chan?”
“Isn’t this the time to
discuss that?”
“True!”
Kaho-chan
recoiled like she’d been struck. Their slapstick antics
made things feel a little less tense. “So, like, what’s the plan?”
Time was slipping away,
and we hadn’t nailed down our core game plan yet. I noticed that Hirano-san
kept glancing over at us. Ah ha! That was the
characteristic behavior of an introvert trying to figure out when it’d be best
to jump into a conversation.
“Hirano-san, do you have
an idea?” I asked her.
When the conversation
swung her way, all eyes turned to her. Oh shoot. Maybe that wasn’t a good thing!
Then she squeezed her eyes
shut, like she was amazed that she’d actually said it. I got it. There’s nothing scarier
than the moment after you offer an opinion. That’s why I always had
to follow it up with, “Oh, no, never mind. That wouldn’t work, sorry!”
Hirano-san flapped her hands.
“Oh, um, never mind. Sorry, that wouldn’t work!”
Hasegawa-san nodded as
Hirano-san said almost the exact same thing I was saying mentally. “I don’t know, I think it
could work… What do you guys think?”
“It’s possible.” Satsuki-san looked contemplative. “The problem at hand is
that we cannot stop our opponents’ offense, no?”
“Y-yes, exactly,” said
Hirano-san. “So if we can’t stop their offensive even when we all work together,
they’ll only get a bigger lead on us… Oh, but that’s pretty nervy of me to say
when I’m no help at all. I’m
sorry.”
Kaho-chan stepped in
after Hirano-san earnestly apologized. “So you’re saying to
stuff defense and make this a contest to see who can score the most points,
huh? That’s bold,
Hiranon!”
Hirano-san blinked in
shock and turned to look at me as I’d been silent up to this point.
“Yeah,” I said. I looked back at her and forced myself to sound optimistic. “I think that’s a great
idea!”
“I mean, if we keep going
the way we’re going, we might lose anyway. So why not give this a shot? I’d hate to go down
without a fight.”
Kaho-chan pumped her fist
and cheered. Satsuki-san
said, “I agree.” For a moment, Hirano-san looked like she didn’t know what to do, but
then Hasegawa-san met her eye and nodded in encouragement.
“So now we need to nail
down the details,” I said.
If I’d been in
Hirano-san’s shoes, I absolutely never would’ve been able to share my idea with
the Quintet like that. Hirano-san was so brave, especially considering how much she venerated
Satsuki-san.
But she’d said it
herself, right? She
loved the Quintet. That’s why I wanted to win with her strategy and make good memories. I needed to get my head
in the game too!
Yet when I looked at Class
B, I saw them rallying each other and working their hardest to protect their
lead. Both
Class A—my crew—and Class B—Takada-san’s people—were good friends, well
practiced for this competition, and strongly motivated to win. So what was the
difference between us? I had
no idea.
Come to think of it,
Ajisai-san had once told me that I was nice to everyone. And I think Satsuki-san
had once said that, like, being a shy introvert made me considerate and let me
relate to everyone on the basis of their insecurities. At the time, I hadn’t
really understood what they meant, but now, as we played this match, I got it. Only five students
standing on the court right now could come away from this happy. The other five would feel
the sadness of defeat. It was undeniably idiotic to let your sympathy for the losers influence
your game, and I doubt that anything like that would have occurred to me if I’d
been playing an online match against faceless opponents like I usually did. It really was better to
not know anything about the person you were playing against.
I
wasn’t nice. I was just stupid.
As the second half of the
match began, the nearby gallery of onlookers grew. Thanks to Takada-san
constantly trying to start shit, this match had become a must-see for the
first-years at Ashigaya High. Loads of people came to
watch, including those from other classes. Well, even without
Takada-san’s shit stirring, Kaho-chan and Satsuki-san playing basketball was a
sight for sore eyes. So I got
it. If I
still had literally zero tolerance for public attention, like I used to, I
wouldn’t have even been able to dribble right with so many eyes on me. Thanks a bunch,
Rina Bun.
Our strategy required
Hirano-san and Hasegawa-san to hang around the hoops and defend it to the last
while the other three of us wasted as little attention on defense as possible. Instead, we poured all
our energy into offense. Naturally, we made little headway in stopping them from scoring, but
we’d expected that to happen. Instead, we effectively
countered them, and this was reflected in the scores. 16–17. 16–19. 18–19. 18–21.
20–21. We weren’t exactly
catching up completely, but neither were they expanding their lead. We were making it work
somehow.
“They’re persistent,”
Takada-san said.
“Uh-huh…” said Haga-san. “Not even our helper’s
stopping them.”
“I expected nothing less
from the Quintet,” said Takada-san. “Where would the fun be if
they weren’t this strong?”
Regardless of how she felt
deep down, Takada-san was still the picture of bravado. That’s just what you had
to do when you were at the head of the pack.
But we were also just as
exhausted as our opponents.
“E-excuse me,
Koyanagi-san,” said Hirano-san.
“Yeah, what’s poppin’?” panted Kaho-chan.
“Oh, it’s nothing. It’s just…are you all right?”
“Eh, yeah, I’ll make it work.
I trained a bunch,
y’know?”
Kaho-chan used every bit
of her nonexistent strength to flash a worried Hirano-san a peace sign. Actually, though,
Kaho-chan was the most fatigued of us all. She’d been guarding and
been guarded by Takada-san, the keystone of offense and defense, for ages now,
and that was way too big a responsibility. Even though it was only a
twenty-minute game, she’d basically been running full tilt the entire time. But with that being said,
we’d lose our rebounds if she and Satsuki-san switched places.
So I suggested, “Hey,
Kaho-chan, want to swap places with me?”
“Nuh-uh,” she said. “Not when we’re finally
doing well.”
“Look, I may not be
athletic, but I’ve got a heck of a lot more enthusiasm in me than meets the
eye.” She
wrinkled her brow at me. Urgh. “Even if I crash and burn
later, I still think it’s worth it to make good memories. I’ve never had a whole
class come together like this, all hyped, y’know? So even if it’s tough,
it’s fun. And I’m a-okay.”
I paused to think for a
moment. “Okay, fine.”
Kaho-chan threw me a
thumbs-up. And I got
how she felt. I mean, I’d been so set on working my butt off that I contracted a
fever.
“Just tell us if it gets
to be too much, okay?” I said.
As we quibbled,
Satsuki-san’s calm voice cut in. “They’re coming.”
Satsuki-san was the only
one whose performance hadn’t suffered since the beginning of the match. It was baffling, since
I’d never seen her exercise all that much prior to this. Did she have unlimited
stamina or what?
Our scores were neck and
neck, but it was so close I felt like I was balancing on a tightrope of spider
silk. Yet
that delicate balance had to snap sooner or later. If that happened while
Class B was as tired as we were, then maybe we’d get our second wind. If we could turn the
tides, maybe things would go in Class A’s favor.
However, the Goddess of
Victory undeniably smiled on Class B.
Two of the players
smacked together in midair and hit the ground with a dull thud. The spectators lost their
minds, and I dashed over to the collision, just as flustered.
Ace-san had been getting
our rebounds for ages now, probably because we’d hurt the basketball club’s
pride, and for the latter half of this game, she’d been ticked off and
challenging Satsuki-san to a fierce dogfight. Nevertheless, Satsuki-san
moved like a butterfly, won the ball, and kept up the offensive onslaught. It had been one of those
kinds of things.
“I-I’m sorry!” Ace-san
said. She
hurried to offer Satsuki-san a hand up.
Satsuki-san seemed
totally unfazed and made to accept her hand when her face warped. “Ow…”
Satsuki-san frowned. “Quiet
down. There’s
no need to make such a fuss.”
“Where’d she hit you?” I
asked.
“Nowhere.”
She held her ankle. “I just twisted my ankle
a little.”
We stopped the match for
a moment, and both classes gathered around her. I looked at the crowd of
people.
“I-is anyone here on the
nursing committee?” I asked.
“I tell you, I’m fine,”
Satsuki-san insisted.
“No way, you’re not. Your poor ankle! You look like you’re in a ton of pain.”
“Not especially,” she said. “It’s fine. I’m just not very good at
handling pain. I even cry when I get my vaccine shots.”
Oh, for heaven’s sake—now
wasn’t the time to be joking around!
But Satsuki-san said
peevishly, “If I duck out now, will you still be able to beat Class B?”
We didn’t have any
players to swap in, so the rules said we could find someone else—or, failing
that, someone on Class B could drop out as well, and we’d continue with four
versus four. There wasn’t even a full four minutes left on the clock. But they were still three
points ahead, as ever, and with Satsuki-san out of the running, we stood zero
chance of pulling ahead. But at the same time, there was no freaking way she could play like
this. Yet…
Kaho-chan said what we
were all thinking. “Not like things’ll go any better if you try and ignore the pain,
Saa-chan.”
I was a little surprised. Kaho-chan was plenty
outspoken, but I hadn’t expected her to be so straightforward even with
Satsuki-san.
Satsuki-san looked away,
like Kaho-chan had hit a nerve.
Takada-san came up to us. “Well, I suppose this is
as far as you can go.”
“Not exactly,” Satsuki-san
said. “I can keep
playing.”
“Kindly don’t lie to me. Your ankle will only
swell up worse.”
The basketball ace girl,
the one who’d hurt Satsuki-san, blanched.
Satsuki-san addressed
her, trying her hardest not to let emotion cloud her words. “Don’t worry. It wasn’t your fault. I have no plans to take
revenge on you later.”
As everyone looked on,
Satsuki-san wobbled to her feet. “Honestly…” she sighed. “What an undignified exit.”
I offered her a hand, and
she looked at me. “And with this, we’ve now set the stage.”
Wait a sec. She wasn’t looking at me. Satsuki-san was staring
past me at something else.
“I see you’re in quite
the bad situation,” a voice behind me said. I turned to see a
beautiful girl standing in the open doorway to the gym. “Perhaps I should lend my
assistance.”
Golden hair aflutter, it
was Oduka Mai.
Takada-san spat the name
with vitriol. “Oduka Mai!”
“I was hoping to finish
up in time to cheer you on, but are you by any chance in need of a substitute
player?” Mai
asked as she walked over from the gallery.
Haga-san shouted above
the hubbub, “H-hold on a sec! You can’t switch in a new
person over fifteen minutes into the match. It’s not fair to bring in
someone who’s all fresh and ready to go!”
“I agree, this is a task
that requires the ability to stay on one’s feet for hours, and I do still have
the energy for it. But with that being said, I have only just finished
pitching an entire game of softball. Will that satisfy you?”
“Geh.”
When
Haga-san faltered, Mai’s attention turned to Takada-san.
“Takada Himiko-san,” she
said. “I
find it difficult to believe that you could boast about your victory over my
class without vanquishing me as well. So, how about it?”
In front of so many
people, and faced with such a provocation, Takada-san’s answer was obvious. “Why not?” she said. “In fact, this is excellent. All I want is complete
and total victory over you. Now, let us be off to the
courts, Oduka Mai!”
Satsuki-san, now being
supported by a girl on the nursing committee, sighed in exasperation. “Mai,” she said. “You know what I’m going
to say, right?”
“But of course. I’ll win for you too. It would never sit right
with you if I didn’t, would it?”
“It wouldn’t make much
difference to me either way,” she said. “I’m not that invested,
personally. But
make sure you win for her.”
Satsuki-san raised a hand
nonchalantly.
Mai smiled. “Yes,
but of course. Which is another way of saying that I’ll win for you as well, no?”
“You don’t listen, do you?” Then Satsuki-san suddenly
turned in my direction. “Amaori.”
I stepped closer, and she
grabbed my chin. “Bwuh!” I spluttered.
“I don’t know what it is
that’s on your mind, and I really couldn’t care less about whatever’s stopping
you from focusing,” she said in a stern voice. “However, I need you to
understand that making a choice wipes out all other options. Make sure that gets
through your thick skull.”
Her eyes seemed to be
staring deep into my very soul. “Swatshuki-shan…” I mumbled.
Satsuki-san snorted. “You look so ugly like this.”
“Um, rude?!” I screamed as I shook her off.
“Well, I say that. But I still haven’t given up.”
And then she staggered
away, leaving me with that final mysterious comment. My heart was pounding. Wh-what on earth was that
all about?
But, yeah, okay. As Satsuki-san left, Ajisai-san called out to her cheerfully before
joining the crowd of spectators once again. I looked at her worried
expression, and then took a big gulp of air. I was biased, yeah. But I’d promised, hadn’t I? And Ajisai-san had chosen
me—me, in all my indecisive, incompetent, half-assed glory—just like
Satsuki-san had said. I’d made up my mind that this was important to me. And when it was this late
in the game, that made my priorities undeniable.
“Mai!”
I called,
startling everyone around me. I’d never called her
anything but Oduka-san at school before.
But Mai merely looked
back at me with a smile. “Yes?”
The scales were finally
lifted from my eyes. It was all about doing things for the ones I loved. It was all about doing
things with the ones I loved.
“Mai,” I said, “let’s win
this thing.”
Mai chuckled and placed
her hand on my head. “I
have it covered. I’m your Goddess of Victory, after all.”
That was just so cool
that I found myself at a loss for words.
The game resumed with
Class A’s ball. I gave Mai a simple rundown of our strategy so that she could fill in
the spot left by Satsuki-san. But then when Kaho-chan
dribbled past the line of our opponents, Takada-san stole the ball from her all
too easily. Kaho-chan
squawked.
“Oduka Mai!” Takada-san
called.
“My goodness,” Mai said. “Eager to bring on the
finale, are we?”
It was a one-on-one contest. Mai crouched low before
Takada-san. It looked almost like a shoot-out that no one could intrude upon. Even the bystanders were
fully silent, watching with bated breath.
“I’ll defeat you and
reign supreme over the school!” Takada-san declared.
“To be frank,” Mai said,
“I have no interest in this supremacy contest of yours at all.”
“But if I lose, you see,
my friends will be upset,” said Mai. “That’s why I have no
choice but to play like I mean it.”
Takada-san changed up the
rhythm of her dribbling. Here
it came again. I couldn’t so much as react, because by the time I even noticed what
was going on, she took off in the opposite direction. I assumed the worst and
ran in to cover for Mai.
“Watch and learn,” Mai said. And suddenly, the ball
was in her hand.
“Wha—?!”
Takada-san’s eyes
bulged.
Mai dribbled her way down
to the other side of the court.
“We won’t let you get away
with this!” Haga-san cried.
“No matter how good you may
be, we have numbers on our side!” said Kamesaki-san.
“Uh-huh. We’re gonna stop you for sure,” added Nemoto-san.
All three girls ran up to
surround Mai. There was no way she could break out of that tight circle—but then,
like a light shining through a copse of trees, Mai slipped past them all.
Last, Ace-san made to
block Mai from the goal by jumping into the path of her ball, but Mai leaped,
transferred the ball from one hand to another in midair, and…well, of course it
went in. That
move’s called a double clutch.
“All right,” she said. “Three minutes left now, is
it?” Her
blonde ponytail swayed like the tail of Pegasus. “A lead of three points
is nothing, wouldn’t you say? Ah, and now they’re only
ahead by one.”
God,
Mai! Oh heck, what
was I to do? I don’t think I’d ever seen her look this cool before. This freaking girl, I’m
telling you. This freaking girl!
Takada-san had the ball. She shouted to Ace-san,
the girl who’d accidentally hurt Satsuki-san. “She only got past us
because we had our guard down! Even Koto Satsuki could
have stopped that. Now, don’t just stand there all shocked. Get it together!”
The fire returned to
Ace-san’s eyes. Oh great, I
thought. Now it’ll be harder to get past her. But Mai didn’t seem
concerned in the slightest. Quite the opposite, in fact.
“Why, that’s because
Satsuki is hardly athletic,” she said. “She’s quite the
bookworm, after all.”
Kaho-chan waved her hand
in a forceful “no” gesture. “Uh, if Saa-chan’s not athletic, what does that make us? Invertebrates?”
“Wow,” I said. “This is what happens when Mai gets serious!”
Kaho-chan and I were, at
this point, 100 percent viewing her like we were part of the crowd. Hirano-san and
Hasegawa-san, meanwhile, were so gaga over her that they had hearts in their
eyes.
“Ooh, the queen of the
Quintet,” Hirano-san squealed. “Oduka Mai-sama!”
“She’s just too
beautiful,” Hasegawa-san said. “I wish I could take
everything my eyes are seeing right now and save it on a hard drive.”
And then, before I even
realized what was going on, Haga-san moved in to the center of Class B and
instructed the others. “Even Oduka Mai can’t stop all of us. Let’s give an all-out
offense our best shot!”
She was right. Takada-san switched up to guard Mai, so I took over watching Ace-san
while Kaho-chan got to take a little breather. But they did whatever it
took to score whenever someone passed the ball to them, so their lead didn’t
shrink. Maybe
because Class B was so focused—or so tenacious—they didn’t miss any more shots,
thus robbing us of our chance to get rebounds. Now Class B was in
perfect unity. Oh, the irony—Her Royal Majesty was just so strong that her very
presence lit a fire under Class B.
“We gotta make sure
Himi-chan wins!” Haga-san
said.
“Uh-huh! And we only have a little more to go!” Nemoto-san responded.
Mai scored us a point,
but Class B’s teamwork wrested the shot away. In a complete reversal
from the first half of the game, it was now, oddly enough, a scramble for
points just as Hirano-san’s strategy dictated. The match went first in
our favor and then in theirs as we took turns attacking and defending, but the
only major development was that time was running out.
36–37.
And there
was precious little time left, only enough for one more play.
The ball went to Takada-san. Once again, the person
who faced her head-on was none other than Mai.
“Why is it always you?” Takada-san snarled.
“Don’t they say that
people who already have it all wind up with everything? Is that the way things work? Listen—someone like you
will never be able to understand how I feel.”
“You are right,” Mai said. “I have been blessed with
many privileges.”
“Exactly! Which is why I need to win! If I don’t, then I’ll
have nothin—”
“And yet,” Mai said. She narrowed her eyes
quietly and said in a low voice, “I must ask you to engage in self-reflection. Don’t you have something
wonderful too? Don’t you have something that no one else can beat?”
I could hear the
following unspoken words: That’s the thing that Renako taught me.
Then Mai stole
Takada-san’s ball and dashed away. Takada-san’s eyes opened
wide in surprise, and she whipped her head around.
And then there were
Takada-san’s dear friends from Class B. “We’re going to stop you
this time, I swear!” one
of them cried. They blocked her path, looking almost as if they wanted to jump down
her throat.
Mai danced past one and
then the other. But before she could slip past the third, the other two stubbornly
followed hot on her tail. Mai
stopped. There was no
more time. For
a single moment, her eyes darted in both directions.
There I was, before the hoop.
I knew. I knew she couldn’t force
her way through the girls and make it to the hoop. That’s because this was a
victory that all of us in Class A had to make together.
Mai threw the ball to me. Someone—a girl from Class
B—screamed. “No,
Amaori-san!” The voice of that girl who thought of Takada-san as a dear friend wound
around my wrist like a thorny vine.
I got down into the right
stance to make a shot, in the one-handed style I’d practiced. It felt hard to breathe.
Every single person out
there wanted happiness. If not their own happiness, then someone else’s. Someone they loved. It was one of those
things you put your heart and soul into.
“Please!” she called. “Please miss!”
“Don’t let it go in!” she
yelled.
It wasn’t about which of
us was right or wrong.
I wanted my loved ones to
be happy. And you know why?
Because I’d
already made my decision. I—me, not anyone else—had decided to try my best.
“Rena-chan!” Ajisai-san yelled. “You can do it!”
My body felt light as I
tossed the ball. It soared through the air tracing the path of a rainbow after a storm. And then…it went in.
The whistle blew. The ref called, “The match is over!” Those words shook the
stifling, sauna-like atmosphere in the gym. Class A had won.
“I…” I muttered. Right at the end there, I hadn’t even been aware that I’d thrown the
ball. My body
just moved on instinct, like when I shot targets while staring down at them
through the crosshairs of my gun. It didn’t even feel real.
Mai came up to me. “I knew you could do it, Renako.”
“I…did it?” I asked. “I won us the game?”
“You did. You
scored the final shot.”
I looked down at my fingers. “I did it…”
I never once imagined
that I’d be putting a ton of effort into a sport like this. Not only had the idea of
me going all-out in an inter-class athletics competition been ridiculous to me,
I would never in my wildest dreams have imagined the whole class cheering for
me, let alone having friends and romantic partners in high school.
My fingers trembled. “I did it… I won.”
There was a sense of
elation inside me unlike any I’d ever felt before. This was what it felt
like to accomplish something.
“Rena-chin!” Kaho-chan yelled, pulling me into a hug.
“Careful there.” Mai caught me as Kaho-chan bowled me over.
“You were incredible!” Hirano-san said as she
and Hasegawa-san rushed up. Both were moved to the point of tears. “I was completely blown
away.”
“I’m going to remember
this for the rest of high school,” said Hasegawa-san. “No, scratch that. My whole life, my time
spent reincarnating, and the life after that too!”
Ajisai-san and
Satsuki-san, back after getting her ankle looked at, stood to the side of the
court. Satsuki-san
looked self-satisfied, like it was only a matter of course that we’d won, and
Ajisai-san was weeping.
Thanks, Ajisai-san, I thought. She was the one who’d
given me that final push of support to make the ball go in. Or that’s how it felt, at
any rate. Oh, shoot. Now that I was thinking
about how it was all over, I started to tear up. I tried to hold the
waterworks at bay. I should keep a smile on my face! I mean, we’d won and
everything!
“I knew you had it in you!” Kaho-chan said. “You did it! And frick you for
stealing the moment of glory right at the end!”
“Whoa, Kaho-chan. What’re you tickling me for? Hey, stop!” I
burst out laughing.
But just then, I happened
to look at Class B. The basketball star girl once again bowed to Satsuki-san. Satsuki-san sighed before
extending her hand, and the two shook. I wondered if the girl had
just invited her to join the basketball club. Basketball club
Satsuki-san sounded pretty darn cool to me.
Yet, meanwhile…Takada-san
crumpled to the ground on the spot as her other teammates crowded around her. It wasn’t enough to make
me feel bad, but I still wondered if I should say something to her.
After we all stood in a
row and bowed to one another, Youko-chan came over. “Congrats, Renako-kun,”
she said.
She stood in front of
Takada-san and the others like she was guarding them and smiled ruefully. “I guess, like, you
should maybe leave us alone for a while. Sorry. I know it’s a selfish thing to ask.”
No one in the Quintet was
the type to go kicking Takada-san when she was already down. So long as she apologized
to Ajisai-san later, once she was all calmed down, we were chill.
“To be real with you,”
Youko-chan said, “I’m kind of surprised. I didn’t think you guys
would beat Himiko-chan. You’re something else, you know that, Renako-kun? I guess it’s ’cause
you’ve got that special something.”
“No one’s ever said that
to me before,” I said.
I think she thought I was
trying to be modest, and she laughed. “Or maybe,” she said,
“it’s ’cause of the power of love.”
Youko-chan giggled right
into my ear and whispered, “You and your wifey have fun now, ’kay?”
“Wait, no, stop—you have
the wrong idea!”
That misunderstanding was still coming back to haunt me!
But while Youko-chan was
still deluded, my (fake) wifey lifted both her hands in the air and shouted,
“All righty! Let’s
go out and paaaaar-tay!”
I guess the class had
plans to hold a party to celebrate our victory, although I’d heard nothing
about it beforehand. Wait,
was I invited? If, after all this, I wasn’t allowed to go, I’d seriously break down
and cry. They
say there are only three moments in a girl’s life where she can cry: when she’s
born, when she dies, and when she gets left out of a party.
“Uh, duh,” said Kaho-chan. “Of course you’re invited.”
Oh, thank god she
confirmed that for me. Thank
god indeed.
But then she immediately
broke out into a grin and teased me. “You ’n me can have our own happy ending at a love
hotel party later.”
If Youko-chan heard her
say that, the misunderstanding was only going to be compounded! Kaho-chan,
could you cut it out? And besides, I already
had two girlfriends, thank you very much!
That’s how I said goodbye
to the interclass athletics competition. It was a whole hullabaloo
from start to finish, an event that left me exhausted mentally and physically. But when it was all done,
I thought, Yeah, you know what? That was pretty fun. And I don’t mean just the
competition either. All the practice I did in the park was included too. It was all about that
feeling of accomplishment: not just doing the stuff you already knew you could
do but learning how to do new things too. I think I might have
overdone it just a tad…but hey, even I could acknowledge that I’d really tried
my best here.
It was still difficult
for me to walk alongside these four very special people I admired, but you
know… When everyone sang my praises at the diner where we held our party, I
felt maybe, ever so slightly, like I was getting cool with it. It wasn’t so bad to give
folks compliments.
Group Chat Name:5déesses (4)
Part 5
Crane-chan: Well, they got us good,
didn’t they?
Star Lily: So that Amaori
Renako-chan, huh? She beat us right at the last second.
Crane-chan: I always thought she was
such a meek, cute, girly-girl too.
miki: I wouldn’t have guessed
it, but she’s got some backbone to her.
Crane-chan: And she must have put
quite a bit of practice into making baskets.
Star Lily: She’s not a member of
the Quintet for nothing, that’s for sure.
Star Lily: Do you think she’s
maybe the real leader of the Quintet but just pretends to be harmless?
Crane-chan: Now that you mention it…
miki: And didn’t she call
Oduka Mai by her first name?
Crane-chan: Could there be a shred
of truth to this?
Star Lily: I’m just pissed that she
didn’t let Himi-chan win, even after we pulled that stunt!
Queen: Whatever are you
talking about?
Star Lily: Oh. Um. Ah ha. Nothing.
Star Lily: Wait, are you calling me?!
Crane-chan: S-speaking of
Amaori-san, I see she and Terusawa-san are quite close.
Crane-chan: Terusawa-san doesn’t
have any friends, but she talks to everyone. It makes for rather an
odd relationship.
miki: And you know like when
we first went to go challenge Class A? She kinda tagged along
there too all of a sudden.
Crane-chan: …You know, come to think
of it, why do we call ourselves the 5déesses when there are only four of us?
miki: ’Cause there’s five in
the Quintet. We’d be outnumbered with the 4déesses, y’know?
miki: I was all for us being
the 500,000,000déesses, but Suzuran-chan put her foot down.
Crane-chan: If you named this group
the 500,000,000déesses, I would leave.
Epilogue
AFTER EVERYTHING, I THINK the rewards I got for
trying my best might have been going a little overboard.
I stood in front of the
girls’ bathroom mirror, my face as stiff with anxiety as if I’d used glue in
place of lotion. Once the competition was over, my muscles were sore as hell and my poor
health came back, but I managed to get past all of that somehow. Now it was after school a
few days later. The weather was great, a late burst of warmth, even though we were
creeping into fall.
I left the bathroom and
set off. When
I’d gotten the message last night that said, “I’ll wait for you on the roof
after school tomorrow,” I didn’t know what to respond with apart from an OK
stamp, but I’d been worried sick ever since. My heart was beating so
fast I felt like it was about to explode. If I met Ajisai-san in
this condition, I figured I’d straight up die on the spot.
We all knew what this
“reward” entailed: a kiss from Ajisai-san.
I groaned and clutched my
chest. To
be real with you, I was still torn over whether or not I was down for this. By “still,” I mean “now
and forever,” mind you. I’m pretty sure a good twenty thousand years could pass, mankind would
have settled in outer space, and I’d still be on the fence about it.
But I’d already made my
decision. I’d
tried my best, and now here was a kiss as my reward. Yeah, maybe I would be
confused as heck to pick up Excalibur in the first dungeon, but getting the
holy sword in the final dungeon came with a real sense of accomplishment, a
feeling like “Wow, I’ve really come this far?” And that’s what this was. Well…I mean, it’d all
felt super difficult while I was doing it, but now that it was over, could I
really say that the practice and the match were a big enough deal to warrant a
kiss from Ajisai-san? Wouldn’t you need to, like, defeat an NBA-level team to deserve a kiss?
Oh god, I
was getting scared as heck. See, with Mai and
Satsuki-san, there’d been that element of surprise. Now that I had plenty of
time to put myself in the right mindset, I couldn’t remotely get in the zone at
all!
I looked up at the stairs
leading to the roof and balled my hands into fists. Okay. You know what? Time to skedaddle. With the positive light
of egress shining in my eyes, I made an about-face. Just to be on the safe
side, I figured I should fall down the stairs and break a bone or two by way of
an excuse.
There stood Takada-san,
with three other girls flanking her.
Well, that solved the
bone issue. Think they’ll stop after just one?
They took me out behind
the school building. I backed away for dear life until I bumped up into a wall.
“Wh-what’s all this about?” I stammered. “Is this payback because
you lost? What,
are you going to take turns beating us all up? Am I your first target?”
Or was this divine
punishment for trying to run away mere moments before I met Ajisai-san? Please, God! That was only my
imagination running wild! You know I could never defy one of your angels, right? This is going too
far!
I was on the verge of
begging for my life in tears when, completely without warning, Takada-san bowed
to me. “I
most sincerely apologize,” she said.
Ajisai-san was the one to
apologize to, not me. But she’d already done that to make up for all the trouble the four of
them had caused. So, to my mind, there shouldn’t have been anything else for us to talk
about.
“My friends told me what
they did to you,” Takada-san said.
“Right, and what was that
again?”
Wait, was I legit going to
come away from this without getting thrashed? Are you sure?
“Honestly!” Takada-san
yelled. The
other three behind her flinched. “Of all the horrid things! My blood just about boiled
when I heard about it afterward. You can’t seriously
believe I’d be happy if that’s what made us win. I am well and truly
disgusted with all of you.”
“I-I’m sorry,
Amaori-san,” Kamesaki-san sniffled through tears. “I’m so sorry.”
Oh, thank god. So they weren’t about to put me in a concrete overcoat.
Relieved, I reassessed
the situation. So, Takada-san had brought the other three with her to apologize to me
over the whole interclass athletics competition debacle, huh? Okay, that made sense. And now that I thought
about it, that request of theirs had been
pretty infuriating…
“Uh, Takada-san,” I said. “I’m not bothered about
it anymore. So you don’t need to be so upset at them.”
Takada-san lifted her
eyebrows, evidently surprised. “What do you mean?” she
asked.
“I mean, they were just
trying their best, right? To make Class B—or, well, you—win. Sure, they might not have
gone about it in the best way, but it was all to help you out, right?”
Surprised, the other
three girls looked to me as one. Takada-san frowned. “I am extremely reluctant
to have it thought that this was done on my behalf.”
“However!”
Takada-san
took a deep breath, like she was a flamethrower. “Given that you are the
party who was affected by their actions, I’m afraid I don’t have a leg to stand
on.”
Without turning around
and her head still hung low, she addressed the other three. “Girls, please don’t ever
do this again… That is, if you really are doing it for my sake.”
Each of her friends
looked disheartened as they responded to her.
Yeah, when we do things
based on our own good intentions, we never know how the other person will take
it. I’ve
had situations like that too. For instance, I thought
it was nice to offer to pay when I went on my trip with Ajisai-san, but she
thought it’d be a good thing to pay for the whole trip herself. We had a conflict of
values, which turned into a whole thing—but in the end, we managed to figure it
out without shit hitting the fan. I guess it all boils down
to talking it out, you know? What can you both do for
each other? And
how will it make them feel? I mean, it’s still bad to
go bothering other people like these three did. Also, wait—Ajisai-san was
waiting for me!
“If we’re done here,” I
said, “I have to bounce.”
“Oh, yes,” Takada-san said. “I suppose I’ve never
told you why I’m so fixated on Oduka Mai, have I?”
I mean, I already knew. But if I were to tell her
that I’d heard from Haga-san, that’d be breaking my promise to her.
I hemmed and hawed before
going, “Y-yeah, I guess not.”
“Well, we’ve caused you
quite a lot of trouble this time around. So very well, I shall
divulge my hidden shame to you and you alone. You see, it all began back
when I was in fifth grade…”
She got a faraway look in
her eyes as she put her hand on her chest. W-well, so long as she
kept this short, I guess it would be fine… I’d just have to book it to the roof
once she was done… Uh-huh…
However, Takada-san’s
solo performance did not seem to be hurrying toward a conclusion.
“And then it was as if a
bolt of lightning ran through my body,” she said. “Ah, how gorgeous she
was, I thought. I had no idea a person so beloved by Venus could truly exist.”
And later: “It was
complete defeat. I
was utterly dejected. But that left me with two future options: to accept my fate or reject
it. In
order to protect myself, I turned against Oduka Mai.”
And: “Yet I never
expected to see her again. In Ashigaya High, no less! Oduka Mai had already
become a figure in my mind that I could never accept. Now, I had no choice but
to treat her with hostility. That is why I decided to
reign over Class B as its queen.”
And: “This curse of mine has
endured so long… Though I may be but a young maiden of sixteen, it truly was a
long, long curse to bear. But I now recognize my defeat, and so perhaps I can finally move on.”
You know what was long? Her
story!
I wanted so darn badly to
yell that, but this seemed so important to her that I couldn’t bring myself to
rain on her parade. This was what it meant to be popular, and I guessed this was also what
it meant to get dragged into someone else’s business. Huh. Being a popular girl’s not all fun and games, was it?
Takada-san detoxed
herself as she talked and then extended a hand to me with a clear smile. “And that is all thanks to
you,” she said. “Amaori-san, you are really such a lovely person, albeit a rather odd
one. Still. Thank you very much. I am glad we had the
opportunity to meet.”
I quickly took
Takada-san’s hand. It was a perfectly girlish hand. She, too, was another
person whose life had been turned upside down by Oduka Mai. A wave of sympathy washed
over me. First
Satsuki-san, then Hanatori-san, and now a third victim had been added to the
list. Wait,
shouldn’t I count too? Eh, best not to think about it too deeply. Ajisai-san was waiting.
“O-okay,” I said, “I
think I’d better get going now.”
“And yet we cannot relive
the same dreams we once had when we were young,” Takada-san went on. “The little girl who
yearned for such a glamorous career is no more. But instead, I now have
wonderful friends who cherish me dearly. Ironically, I would never
have discovered that if not for Oduka Mai.” She giggled.
“Suzuran-san, I must have
caused you no end of trouble. But you’ve saved me
repeatedly with your simple kindness.”
“Oh, Himi-chan… It means
so much to me to hear you say that,” Haga-san gushed.
Oh god, was this the
start of the Takada Himiko Story: Season 2 or something?!
“Now that I think about
it, meeting you—”
And hold the phone. Was it absolutely necessary for them to
have this conversation right in front of me? I legit had things to do,
people! No
more depositing your feelings in the bank of Amaori Renako. I didn’t offer that
service any longer!
I stuck my hand out to
interrupt. “Hold
on, please,” I said desperately. “Hey, uh, hold on please! Listen, I’ll call in
someone to stand in for me. You can tell all this to her.”
And then I placed a call. Please, please let her be
somewhere on campus still!
My life fundamentally
refused to go the way I wanted it to at times like this, but today was
different, because I was keeping Ajisai-san waiting. My action had
Ajisai-san’s blessing!
“Heya!”
said the
girl who picked up the phone. “What’s poppin’, Rena-chin?”
“Kaho-chan, please do me
a favor! Come rescue me!”
And thus I (by offering
Kaho-chan as a replacement me) broke out of Takada-san and co.’s siege. Kaho-chan was going to be
furious at me for this, I figured. But oh well! I’d apologize to her a ton later once it was all over.
I dashed up the stairs to the roof. God, at this point, I
didn’t even feel the urge to run away any longer. I’m sorry! That really was just my
imagination running wild! Please, God, quit giving me your divine punishment.
Maybe Ajisai-san was a
real stickler for time, and she’d been like “If someone doesn’t value every
second of their time, then I don’t want to spend a second around them,” and
already gone home. Maybe this was the end of our relationship. Please, Ajisai-san! I begged. Please still be
here!
Almost on the verge of
tears, I grabbed the knob and threw the door open. Was Ajisai-san there?! She was! She stood behind the
railing, her hair waving in the wind.
“Oh, Rena-chan,” she said,
with a small wave and a smile lacking so much as an iota of unhappiness. She was just practically
bursting with cuteness.
When I saw her, for some
reason I couldn’t fathom, I felt oddly moved. “Ajisai-san!”
My shadow lengthened as I
staggered out onto the roof. It wasn’t just that she
was adorable bathed in the afternoon light. She looked really,
incredibly beautiful.
“Oh no, don’t worry about
it.” She
smiled as if it really was no big deal at all. “Honestly, I’m really fine
with having to wait a little, because I live with the kiddos. And then when I’m late, I
call and let them know to come meet me, so it’s nothing to worry about.”
“Ugh, I’m sorry. And here I was trying to do my best so that I’d never make you feel
lonely like this again…”
“I wasn’t lonely, though.” She put her hand on her
chest and grinned. “Because I was thinking about you the whole time.”
I stopped in front of
her, so close that we could touch if we each reached out.
Ajisai-san giggled. “To be honest, I was just
thinking about going to wait for you in the classroom. But I thought other
people might see me, so I decided to stay up here.”
“Mm-hmm. You know, this brings me back. Remember the time you
told me you liked me over and over again? I can’t believe that was
already half a year ago.”
That must have been the
time I tracked Mai down to the hotel in Akasaka. Back then, I was
terrified of turning down people’s invitations, so I’d frantically tried to
ensure Ajisai-san wouldn’t get the wrong idea. Hey, wait a minute. That was one of those
things best kept buried in the past.
“Hey, you know what?” Ajisai-san said timidly. Her cheeks were red, the
same color as the setting sun. “I think that was when I
started to…see you in a certain light.”
“It’s funny, don’t you think?
Girls tell
each other they like one another all the time. But I guess, like, there
was something so real about the way you said it.” She placed both hands
across her chest as if that was where she stored all the important things she
had to say. “It
made me realize you really, really actually liked me. And so that’s why the
reverse happened. That’s when I started catching feelings for you.”
This was such an
embarrassing memory for me that I wanted to completely forget about it, but
man. She saw me
like that, huh? Looking back on it, I really had cared for Ajisai-san at the time, but
I didn’t think of her in a girlfriend kind of way. Still, remember what
Ajisai-san said to me? Maybe my definition of a best friend was what some other people would
define as a girlfriend. So, if it made everyone happy…what’s the harm in dating, you know? I’d chilled out about that. The way I cared for her
now wasn’t any different than it used to be. And besides…we now got to
do things we couldn’t unless we were dating. That was nerve-racking, sure.
But I
didn’t entirely dislike it.
“Rena-chan, you’re bright
red.”
Well, that’s because
Ajisai-san was smiling all too cutely. Hiding my embarrassment, I
half-heartedly shot back, “P-pot, meet kettle.”
She put her hands to her
cheeks, her eyes wide. That, too, was ridiculously adorable. For a moment, we grinned
at each other before she said, almost wheedlingly, “Can we hold hands?”
I put my hand out, and
she covered it with both of hers. Her hands trembled. Maybe it was the nerves.
“I mean, we’re
girlfriends, after all,” she said.
Ajisai-san and I were the
same height, so she looked into my eyes. There was so much
affection in them, all aimed at me, but I didn’t turn away this time.
I squeezed her hand back. “Yeah.
We’re dating.”
“Mm-hmm.” Ajisai-san closed her eyes, those eyes that were more beautiful than
any sunset, and giggled. “I really like you, Rena-chan.”
She took a step forward
to close the distance between us. She tilted her head up
slightly and slowly moved in, just like the time on the Ferris wheel. But, unlike that time on
the Ferris wheel, I closed my eyes.
Sure, maybe we’d run into
big problems later on down the line. That wouldn’t change my
desire to do right by her—this girl more precious than any other person in the
world, my girlfriend. Ajisai-san.
A soft sensation grazed my
lips. My eyes snapped
open.
“Ajisai-san!” I cried. She squeaked as I pulled
her petite frame into a tight hug. “I like you too, Ajiisai-san.
I really, really
like you! I care
for you so, so much!”
As I spoke to her,
enfolded in her scent and hair, Ajisai-san flushed a bright red. But she met my eye and
laughed. “I like
you too, Rena-chan. I love everything about you.”
Now it was her turn to
hug me, and for a few moments we stood there in each other’s arms. The setting sun, as we
watched it from our vantage point on the rooftop, shone like a jewel. With all the love in my
heart for her, I felt like now I could soar up, up and away through the sky…but
that’s probably just me exaggerating, don’t you think?
The Sena Ajisaide of the Story
Season 2
AS AJISAI WAS MAKING DINNER, Kouki asked her, “Hey,
Oneechan, what’re you smiling about?”
Ajisai was at a bit of a
loss. She
wondered if she was as much of an open book as they made her out to be. Admittedly, yes, she was
pretty elated—but it was only to be expected. After all, she’d been
kept on hold for so long, and now she finally had her long-awaited reward.
“Good for you, Ajisai,”
Mai told her later over a phone call as Ajisai curled up in bed. Mai’s voice sounded as
lovely and clear, like golden light, as it ever was.
“Thanks. I’m
really happy too. But Mai-chan are…are you okay with all this?”
There was no pretense in
her voice as Mai said, “After your rendezvous with Renako, I, too, had her tell
me how much she cared for me. So I’m perfectly all right.”
Maybe Mai was just trying
to act tougher than she felt. Or maybe she really meant it. Ajisai still couldn’t
tell the difference, and possibly Mai herself didn’t even know, given how hard
she tried to be strong.
But in spite of that—or
rather, because of that—Ajisai-san said, “You know what, Mai-chan? Since we talked, I have a
question for you too.”
“Yeah.
What was
your first kiss with Rena-chan like?”
“Ah.
Well.” Mai sounded flustered,
which Ajisai found so amusing she couldn’t help but laugh. Naturally, she figured it
was less from embarrassment and more Mai’s concern that hearing it would cause
Ajisai discomfort.
Hence, Ajisai pressed,
“C’mon, tell me. It’s fine, we can talk about anything at this point. So long as I don’t know,
I’m just gonna be curious, you know.”
“Hmmph,” Mai said. “Fine,
fine. If you insist.”
Ajisai’s deliberately
selfish demand put Mai on the spot. Presently, Ajisai had two
goals. The
first was to understand just what liking someone meant to Renako. No matter what, Renako
persisted in thinking her feelings for Ajisai were one-sided, no matter how
much Ajisai tried to explain otherwise. Therefore, she figured it
was time for her actions to get the point across, although it’d certainly be an
uphill battle.
Which brought her to the
second goal.
“We were caught in a
sudden rainstorm,” Mai said, “so I took her to a hotel.”
Ajisai wanted Mai to be
straight with her. Even if some things weren’t great to hear, or ended up hurting her, she
wanted Mai to tell her them. Mai was by far a stronger
person than Ajisai herself, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t be hurt too. If both she and Ajisai
were equal before Renako, then Ajisai wanted to shoulder part of the burden of
Mai’s sadness and anxieties. Perhaps Mai had stronger
feelings than ordinary girls. That thought worried
Ajisai a little, but so be it, she decided. She had to nag the kiddos
right and left if she wanted them to grow up to be model citizens. She cared about them more
than anyone else in the world, and she knew there was no way she could worry
about formalities when she was dealing with them.
Three-way relationships
were complex, uncertain, puzzling things. They required hard work
from every party in order to maintain a balance. That was why—
“But you know,” Mai said,
“Renako claims that one didn’t count as it was only a kiss between friends. I took that rather harder
than I should have.”
“Huh?”
Ajisai said. “Isn’t a kiss just, like,
a regular kiss?”
She used her hand to fan
herself as, red-faced, she mumbled, “I-I’m amazed. I can’t believe you and
Rena-chan, like, went that far already…”
“Huh?!
What’s that
supposed to mean?”
“Well, there’s so much
more to it; it’s a long story… You know what, I’ll tell you another time. For now, I wish you the
best of luck in your own endeavors, Ajisai!”
“Wait, what long story? Hey, Mai-chan! Now I’m super curious! Hey. Hey! What long story?”
Now that all three were
dating, things were sure to be a lot of fun, Ajisai thought. She wasn’t trying to act
tougher than she felt or convince herself that was true. She was sincerely excited
for what the future might hold.
“THAT SUCKED MAJOR BUTT,” Kaho said, heaving a
weary sigh as she sat alone in her bedroom. She’d happened to be
hanging around after school when Renako had called her. That had led to, for some
bizarre reason, a squadron headed by Takada Himiko lying in wait to trap Kaho
in a maelstrom of violent apologies. They meant well with the
apologies, she knew, but being on the receiving end of them demanded a lot of
patience. If
you asked her, it was friggin’ exhausting.
“Who woulda guessed
Takada Himiko and Nemoto Miki had such a fraught backstory?” she said to herself.
She’d gotten home around
dusk and then sat down at her desk wondering what to do next. She could read manga or
watch anime, or maybe start getting ready for her next big event. Ever since the last
cosplay show, her follower count had been really picking up. There’d been some haters
making fun of her placement in the competition, but that was nothing compared
to the benefits of making a stage appearance. That meant her cosplay
motivation was once again sky high. If she put a lot of
effort in this year, then maybe she could even make her own photo book at the
end of the year or next summer! As a girl raised on manga,
Kaho was super into the prospect of making her own book. But above all else, the
question begged: would it be a solo photo book or not? If they didn’t end up
flying off the shelves, she’d be disheartened…
“Eh, I’m not gonna get
ahead of myself!” she said. “All righty, let’s go make
some clothes.”
Just as she stood up, the
doorbell rang.
“Oh
ho.” Come
to think of it, she had made plans today.
Kaho stampeded toward the
door. Her
visitor was a beautiful black-haired girl in an Ashigaya High School uniform:
Koto Satsuki. Good, her ankle was doing better.
“Thank you for having me.” Satsuki elegantly removed
her shoes, lined them up, and stood while smoothing back her hair.
“What’s that for?” Satsuki
asked.
“Girl, you’re freakin’
working it.”
Satsuki looked as if she
didn’t have the faintest idea what that meant, but that was par for the course.
Koto
Satsuki was the sort of person who, by nature, would never have usually
associated with someone like Kaho; as such, the two shared little to nothing of
a common language. Compared to the manga and anime Kaho consumed, Satsuki’s books of
choice were high literature, restricted to the kind found in libraries. She might dabble in light
novels from time to time, but she was a long way removed from the internet
slang Kaho employed.
“I gotta wonder,
Saa-chan,” Kaho said, “how come we get along so well.”
“Where did that come from
all of a sudden? Besides, I hardly think we get along so well as all that.”
“Um, rude? But it’s
okay. I love
seeing you act like this too.”
“Do
you? Likewise,
I appreciate the amount you pay me for my labor more than anything else.”
If Kaho had to say, she
felt their friendship came from the fact that they both could say whatever they
liked to each other. It was comfortable to be transparent about the transactional nature of
their relationship.
But I wasn’t kidding when
I said I love seeing her act this way, she thought to herself.
She led Satsuki to her
room and immediately stuffed her into a brand-new outfit. Satsuki had agreed to
participate in her next photo shoot, so today was the costume check. Kaho couldn’t help but
relish the moment.
“So, whatcha think,
Saa-chan?” she asked.
“Well, it isn’t too tight. It fits perfectly, in fact. However…”
“I just feel as if the
amount of fabric has shrunk again.”
“Gosh, you think? Well, now that you mention it, the focus of this costume is the faux leather leotard. Because you’re an isekai
adventurer. See,
Saa-chan, it’s totally you.”
Kaho, meanwhile, suffered a mental onslaught from
Hurricane Satsuki. Oh
god, Saa-chan, she thought. You’re so frickin’ pretty. No one else out there is
better suited to wearing these 2D character costumes than you. I can practically hear
the costume I made singing Ode to Joy!
She was so excited she was almost licking her lips. Frickin’ overwhelming beauty!
The costume
brings out the best in Saa-chan, and she brings out the best in the costume! As a cosplayer, I’m hella
jelly, but as the costume maker, I couldn’t be happier. I feel like I’m gonna be
pulled apart trying to decide between delight and envy!
Kaho moaned in perverted joy.
She was
quite adept at using her introverted and extroverted personas when the
situation demanded each, but on the rare chances when her emotions were at
odds—which tended to happen around Satsuki—her inner personality was all too
quick to slip out regardless of her efforts to prevent that. As an otaku, Koyanagi
Kaho was a real introvert at heart.
“Saa-chan, you should be
a cosplayer for realsies!” she
said. “You
have the talent to steal hearts the world over.”
“No,” Satsuki said. “I have no interest in that.”
If she’d been talking to
Renako, this was the point where Kaho would have instinctively hit her with a
rock, but her hands were tied with Satsuki. Holding down a part-time
job to assist with her family’s finances made Satsuki the loftiest being under
the sun, and for her to scorn Kaho’s beloved world of cosplay filled Kaho with
an obscure thrill. Such was the ugly side of being an otaku.
“Oh, Saa-chan, I love it
when you’re mean,” Kaho sighed.
“Wait, can’t I take
another 60,000 pictures first?”
Kaho grinned, all smiles
even in the face of Satsuki’s indifference.
“Say.”
Now back in
her school uniform, Satsuki fixed her hair as she asked, “Kaho, do you like
me?”
“Hm?”
What an odd question. The oddness came less
from the sense that Satsuki was actively asking something and more from the
fact that Satsuki was curious about what anyone else thought of her. Saa-chan
always stays in her own lane, Kaho thought. But I guess she’s got a kinda cute side too.
Without any hesitation,
she said, “Yeah, totes! I love your face in particular. We totally stan.”
“I
see.” There was
a beat of silence.
Satsuki looked at Kaho
for a moment and then asked, “In that case, will you go out with me?”
Kaho tilted her head. “Whatcha mean by that?”
Satsuki didn’t answer. Instead, she abruptly
rose to her feet. “Never
mind,” she said. “If we’re done here, I’m leaving.”
Satsuki speedwalked away
as if trying to outrun her feelings. Kaho watched her go. She understood intuitively
that if she let her get away now, Satsuki would likely never bring the topic up
again. Kaho
didn’t exactly mind, but nevertheless…
Satsuki squeaked as Kaho
tackled her around the waist. Both girls fell to the
floor together, Satsuki in Kaho’s arms.
Satsuki twisted her head
around in anger, a perfectly natural reaction, and spat, “Wh-what did you do
that for? What
on earth are you thinking?!”
“You can’t just not tell
me anything, Saa-chan,” said Kaho.
“Yes, and surely one
can’t spring violence on someone out of the blue either!”
“Sowwy!”
Kaho
immediately flung herself prostrate on the ground.
Satsuki sighed, dumbfounded. “Good grief,” she said. “Look at you being ridiculous. I think Amaori’s worst
points are rubbing off on you.”
“Very possible!” Kaho sat upright in the hallway and looked up at Satsuki. “So, what was that all about?
Oh, I get it. ’Cause me ’n you are the
only ones left over in the friend group, you think we might as well date too,
right?”
“No.”
Satsuki adjusted
her hair.
If nothing else, at least
she showed no sign of wanting to leave anymore. Having won time to
postpone Satsuki’s departure, Kaho crossed her arms with a thoughtful “hmm.” Then it hit her.
“Wait, do you have a
crush on Rena-chin?! So you’re heartbroken right now?”
“I’m going to hit you,”
Satsuki said.
Kaho would rather not be
hit, so she decided to switch the topic. I
really hope I didn’t hit the nail on the head there… she thought. Aloud, she said, “So,
like, do you have a crush on Mai instead?”
Kaho assumed she wouldn’t
respond to that, which seemed to be the case at first. Kaho felt a tad awkward,
as she’d once asked out Mai herself.
However, Satsuki said
straight-out, “No.”
Well, with that attitude,
Satsuki really must not have had feelings for Mai. But that left Kaho even
more stumped as to why Satsuki would ask her out. Unless…
“Wait, did you have a
crush on Aa-chan?!” Kaho
squealed.
That was the stickiest
situation of them all!
“I…do like Sena, but not
in that way,” Satsuki said.
That made sense to Kaho. Even she liked
Ajisai—sweet, cute, blessed with big boobies. But that didn’t seem to
be the answer to the puzzle either.
“Hey, Saa-chan.” Kaho pinched the hem of Satsuki’s uniform. “I’m sorry. I just, like, don’t have a
clue what you’re feeling.”
Satsuki didn’t shake Kaho
off. “Why are you
apologizing?”
“’Cause I wanna help my
bestie when she’s stuck in a jam, y’know?”
“That’s…a rather
self-centered approach,” said Satsuki. “Does what I want not
matter?”
“Nope.
Not a bit.” Kaho had no qualms about
agreeing even in moments like this one. “You know how I’m always
messing around? That’s what makes me the class pet, but to be real with you, I legit
don’t know any other way to act.”
Satsuki remained silent,
listening to Kaho go on.
“So when it comes to deep
convos about relationships and stuff, I dunno how to handle ’em. I’m always goofin’. It’s my job to turn things
into a bit. But I feel like now’s not the time for that, so I think it’s time we
spill our guts on each other.”
She pointed a finger
right at Satsuki. But no, now wasn’t the time for that. She shook her head. “I’m trying to say, like…
I wanna hear what’s going on inside your head. ’Specially if it’s the
kinda thing you can’t tell anyone else.”
Kaho scratched the back
of her head. “I mean… If I can’t do it, even cosplaying as an extrovert’s not gonna
save me, y’know? But now I’m supes good at faking it.”
Satsuki sighed in defeat. “Have you ever had
feelings for anyone before?”
“Huh?
I mean,
yeah…like for Mai-Mai. ’N stuff.”
Where was Satsuki going
with this? Kaho’s
response also didn’t fully answer the question. She wasn’t sure exactly
how to put her feelings for Mai. Did she want to date Mai? Did
she like like Mai? If she had to say…
Yet before she could put
her ambiguous feelings into words, Satsuki continued on. “I see. Well, I haven’t.”
“Romance is like
something out of a fairy tale, something that only exists in books,” said
Satsuki. “That’s
how I see it, at any rate. I suppose my home environment is partially to blame for this attitude. I had no need for romance
in my life.”
She recounted this like
it was something incredibly sad. Kaho wondered what on earth that was about.
“But, like, we’re only in
our first year of high school still,” Kaho said. “Tons of kids have never
had crushes yet. Our friends are just kinda an exception.”
“That is irrelevant to
how I feel. You
see…” Satsuki gnashed her teeth, “now Mai has a crush.”
“Yeah?”
Kaho replied
before immediately letting out a squawk as Satsuki placed her hands over both
of Kaho’s ears. Satsuki’s lips moved, but Kaho couldn’t hear a thing.
“This
is Mai we’re talking about,”
Satsuki told her. “The very same Mai who has always seemed so vacant and lonely no matter
what she does. But now she looks as if she’s come home after a very long journey. Is romance really that
captivating? And if it is, why don’t I understand it? It’s always
Mai.”
She spoke each word with
enough force to drive in a nail, and yet it all washed over Kaho. She picked up nothing
apart from the look on Satsuki’s face.
“You’re smiling,” she
said, “and crying at the same time.”
Mai had looked so happy
on the stage at Makuhari Messe with Renako and Ajisai standing next to her,
happier than Satsuki had ever seen her. And out of everything she
couldn’t stand, that took the cake.
More to herself than to
Kaho, Satsuki said, “I want to know whatever it is that makes romance so
incredible. Or, conversely, I’d love to know just how stupid it really is.”
Mai’s happy ending was
only the beginning for Satsuki.
So, once again, she said,
“I want to find out if I’m right or she is.”
And then, having said her
piece, she lifted her hands away from Kaho’s ears. “There,” she said. “I’m done.”
Kaho stared at Satsuki
blankly. “Saa-chan?”
“Oh?
What a relief.” Satsuki flipped her hair
over her hand, in need of no one else’s affirmation. “If you had, I would have
no choice but to finish you off.”
“Don’t say something so
cursed to someone whose ears were plugged with only your hands!” A perfectly justifiable
objection in Kaho-chan’s book.
Just then, a dull
vibrating noise sounded in the quiet hallway.
The blank expression
snapped back onto Satsuki’s face, as if she’d torn the previous face right off
by the skin. She pulled her phone out of her pocket. “This is rare,” she muttered.
Kaho gave her permission
with a glance, and then Satsuki turned around. “Hello? Yes, Obasama, what can I do for you?”
Kaho noted that Satsuki
used her most proper voice, like she was talking to a teacher. Talk about being a
perfect beauty in and out.
“Yes, that would be no
trouble at all,” Satsuki said. “Yes, I understand. Yes.”
She ended the phone call
shortly, turned back around again, and announced, “I must take my leave.”
As she headed for the
front door, Kaho called, “Hey, Saa-chan!”
As Kaho followed Satsuki
out and watched her put on her shoes, she pouted. “Look, I dunno what’s going
on, but if you go and find someone really nice, I’m gonna be the only one in
the friend group without a girlfriend. And that’s gonna be lonely!”
“If that were to happen,
you could ask out Amaori.”
“Yeesh, when’re you gonna
stop making this Rena-chin’s problem?!”
Kaho offered to walk
Satsuki to the train station, but Satsuki left on her own and set off quickly. Kaho went back to her
room, hugged a pillow to herself, and stared off into space. She really didn’t get
this whole romance thing yet. But even she felt anxious
about it.
The Quintet was a chill
friend group, and she knew she’d be perfectly happy if all five of them could
stay pals for all three years of high school. But that wasn’t how
things had turned out. Three of her closest buddies had gotten together, and Kaho knew she
wasn’t strong enough for things to stay the same.
“I guess this is how
we’re all kinda growing up…” she mumbled to herself.
And, unbeknownst to Kaho,
Satsuki’s story was on the verge of coming to life.
Satsuki arrived at an
austere conference room.
Just after the phone
call, a car had been sent to her home to pick her up and take her to the Queen
Rose office in Shibuya, the progenitor of all information on fashion. With her fine posture and
stately bearing, Satsuki fit in perfectly in this designer building. Anyone would assume she
was one of the many models who frequented the location.
The door opened with a
clack and a “Thank you for coming.” There she stood: Oduka
Mai’s birth mother. Oduka Renée.
As ever,
she resembled a scientist so enthralled in her research that she cared little
for her own personal appearance. A girl who looked to be
an assistant trailed in her wake.
“I regret that it has
been so long since we last met, Obasama,” Satsuki said.
“As
do I. Come, come,
find a seat.”
Satsuki took a seat
diagonally across from Oduka Renée’s place of honor. The girl stood against the
wall, piquing Satsuki’s interest. “Who is she?” Satsuki
asked.
The girl was quiet,
young, and couldn’t have been out of high school yet. However, she was clearly
no model. She
lacked the height for it, and, most importantly, no mere model would dare to
stand before the empress Renée fighting back a yawn of boredom.
“Oh, don’t worry about
me,” the girl said.
Satsuki gave her a sharp
glance and then merely shrugged. Something about this
smelled fishy to her.
Renée threw a piece of
paper down on the desk. “This is related to the matter for which I’ve brought you here today.”
Satsuki said nothing. She could make a pretty
good guess what this was all about. Periodically, Oduka Renée
would claim to want to talent scout Satsuki as a model, but she’d always
digress and demand to hear about Mai. Given that this was the
first time she’d been summoned before Renée since she started high school,
Satsuki assumed this was more of the same. This was in spite of the
fact that Renée should have heard all about her daughter’s personal life from
reports courtesy of Hanatori. According to Renée, this
was because she couldn’t afford to be boycotted again, which, to Satsuki—who’d
been part of the old incident—felt like a painful old wound in the shin acting
up. If Mai
were to find out that Satsuki was having secret meetings to gossip about her
behind her back, Satsuki was in no position to deny it. But Mai likewise also
probably saw her mother at times when Satsuki wasn’t there, so Satsuki forced
herself to consider them equal and feel satisfied with the deal.
“One of your classmates,”
Renée said. “Correct?”
What on earth was Oduka
Renée, Mai’s mother, doing with a photo of Amaori Renako? Granted, Renako certainly
wasn’t the sort of person who could be said to have no relation to Mai. If anything, she was
horribly involved in Mai’s business.
“I met her just the once
at a show,” Renée said, “and she claimed to be a friend of my daughter. However, were she any
ordinary friend, Hanatori would not have hired a detective to run an
investigation on her.”
“Hanatori-san hired a
detective?”
Wow.
That couldn’t end
well. Satsuki looked
away. At any
rate, Satsuki considered Amaori Renako a friend (and had once said as much),
and it would certainly make a lot of people cry were she to be submerged in the
Tokyo Bay. So
Satsuki really would have liked to smooth things over somehow, but…
As if showing off the
specs of a new product, Renée laid out the facts in an utterly disinterested
fashion. “The
detective’s report was relayed to me. I collected it before
Hanatori could lay eyes on it. Therefore, she doesn’t
know any of the things I’m about to tell you.”
“All right,” Satsuki said. “What is it?”
Just then, the girl who’d
melted into the background interrupted. “Um, hey—I don’t really
think this is a good idea. But, like, they picked me out ’cause we go to the same school, and what
choice do I have when I’m an apprentice detective and the president of Queen
Rose is threatening me? Anyway, those’re the results.”
So this girl was a
private detective, Satsuki realized. Awfully young for a
detective. Now
that she mentioned it, though, Satsuki did have to admit that she seemed to
have the same kind of worldliness as the ladies at her mother’s workplace.
Naturally, Hanatori must
have ordered a background check on Amaori Renako because she had suspicions
about Renako’s relation to her mistress. That Hanatori didn’t find
out about the duplicity of their relationship was the silver lining in this
whole debacle, but, as a result, Renako was put into an even worse predicament:
of all people, Mai’s mother had found out.
Apart from Amaori Renako,
the photograph also contained Oduka Mai and Sena Ajisai. The evidence was
conclusive at this point.
Satsuki debated over
whether or not to put herself in a great deal of danger for Amaori Renako. At last, half spurred on
by a sense of duty, she said, “Excuse me, Obasama. I’m afraid she would never—”
Renée interrupted. “Did you know she’s dating four girls at the same time?”
That gave Satsuki pause. She blinked a few times. Four?
“I understand why you
don’t want to admit it to me,” Renée said. She gave Satsuki an
almost pitying look, one that Satsuki had never seen before in her life.
Renée riffled through the
documents. There
were pictures of Satsuki and Kaho too—one of Satsuki backing Renako up against
a wall in an empty classroom, and one of Renako and Kaho huddled together and
peering into the school gym.
“I beg your pardon,”
Satsuki said.
“I’d planned to turn a
blind eye to anything if it was for Mai’s own good. But this goes too far. I mean, four people? And all girls to boot. Do they allow that sort
of thing in Japanese high schools?”
Renée didn’t sound mad,
simply suspicious. This
flummoxed Satsuki. How could she possibly respond?
“I don’t believe they do,
no…” she said.
“Then how come this Amaori
girl is carrying on without a care in the world instead of being locked up? I should have taken Mai
to France after all, whether she wanted to go or not.”
Renée looked downcast,
making her appear—naturally—the very picture of Mai. However, at rare moments,
Satsuki caught glimpses of weakness in her demeanor that Mai did not employ. Perhaps Renée truly
wanted to help her daughter.
The other girl put her
hand to her chest and sighed. “I just couldn’t believe
it either! She
looks like the kind of girl who’d back down if you tried anything on her. But I bet she could even
be five-timing your daughter, ma’am!”
“Wait a minute.” It hit Satsuki—she’d seen this girl somewhere before. “Say, aren’t you one of
the…followers of the Class B group?”
“Oh,
me? I’m not
that close with Himiko-chan.”
“But aren’t you one of
the members of that friend group with the ridiculous name?”
The girl laughed. “Yeah, I guess it is pretty stupid that they call themselves the
5déesses to take on the Quintet, even though there’s only four of them. Well, not much you can do
about it, huh?”
Then, setting that aside,
she continued, “So this girl is dating Oduka Mai, going out with Sena Ajisai, and having a relationship with
Koto Satsuki on top of all that, and fooling around with Koyanagi Kaho and calling her ‘wifey’ on top of all
that. So the president says we can’t let her go on unchecked.” The girl—Terusawa
Youko—lifted a finger and nodded.
Satsuki looked back at Renée.
“Pardon me,
Obasama,” she said. “I don’t believe Amaori is carrying on relations with four people. At the very least, she
and I are not…”
As she began, she
suddenly broke off into contemplation. This situation, she
thought, might well and truly be a terrible predicament for Renako—one that, if
handled poorly, could end up with her dropped in the Bay. But there was hardly a
difference between four-timing versus two-timing, so perhaps that didn’t
matter. Still,
what about Satsuki? Perhaps…?
“I want to find out,” she
had said, and her own voice hit her hard. How much was she prepared
to do in order to find out? Her voice questioned her
own resolve. Well,
the answer to that was…
Satsuki lifted her head. “Obasama,” she said with a
thin smile. “You
know, I think you’re right. You cannot let this go on
unchecked. However,
Amaori Renako still has a strong influence over Mai. If you were to simply try
and persuade your daughter, I fear it would backfire and have the opposite
effect.”
“Yes, it is shameful for
a mother to butt into her daughter’s love affairs,” Renée said. “And above all else, Mai
is still young. But
she gives me no choice.”
She looked down at her
watch and then, as if the unhappy reality had slapped her in the face, she
said, “Ah, it’s a quarter past. At any rate, now is an
important time for her. We need Mai’s ability for Queen Rose to be recognized the world over,
both in terms of what we attain and what is our due.”
“Yes, Obasama.” Satsuki clenched her hands into tight fists, out of Renée’s sight. She took a moment to set
aside her feelings so they wouldn’t appear on her face, and then placed a hand
on her chest.
“Therefore,” she said, “I
ask that you please leave the matter of Amaori Renako to me.”
One couldn’t stay silent
when suffering the disgrace of a girl four-timing her daughter. With such just cause,
Renée looked at Satsuki with blue eyes so like her daughter’s. “You?”
“Yes.”
Satsuki nodded. She knew Renée wouldn’t
suspect anything of her. Renée was socially awkward, yes, but she wasn’t a bad person. In fact, she was just
like her daughter in that regard.
However, Youko clapped
her hands. “Ooh!” she said. “In that case, we should
have a competition!”
“Of what sort?” Satsuki
asked.
“See, I was just about to
take on the Amaori thing for work too. You’re concerned for your
daughter, aren’t you, ma’am? So this is perfect. One of the services we
detectives offer is breaking off relationships, and that means…” Youko spread
her arms out wide like a business woman proposing a project, “we’ll compete to
see who can make Amaori Renako and Oduka Mai break up. Whoever manages it gets
my completion bonus. How
does that sound?”
Satsuki said nothing. She looked back at Youko. Why had she suggested a
competition? What on earth was going on inside Youko’s head? However, if Satsuki
really did just want the money, she should, by rights, go along with it. And if that was really her
only motive…
Slowly and deliberately,
Satsuki declared, “Do whatever pleases you. I have my own objectives.”
Youko stared at Satsuki
for several moments and then giggled as cheerfully as the main character of a
shoujo manga. “Gotcha,”
she said. “Hey,
let’s compare notes when we see each other around. I bet high school’s gonna
get a lot more fun now, huh?”
“Yes, it will.” Koto Satsuki gave her a witchy grin, which made Youko smile all the
more cheerfully.
As Renée stood before the
two girls and their contrasting grins, she murmured, “On n’a qu’une vie. We have but one life in which to live. I don’t want you to look
back on this, Mai, and regret what you’ve done.”
She stared at the
photograph of the girls with foreboding in her eyes.
Afterword
NICE TO MEET YOU. My name is Teren Mikami.
And welcome to TNFWIBYLU season
two!
What the heck’s up with
the 488 pages thing in the Japanese release? Well, fun fact: light
novels are usually capped at 300 pages because there’s data that shows this is
a good number for sales and profit. That’s why you get so
many books that are 256 pages or 272 pages or whatever. Therefore, when a book
gets as big as this one, you should probably split it into two smaller volumes.
I would have
liked to do that. But. I wasn’t able to… There
just wasn’t anywhere to make a good split. That’s because I thought
the story would be way, way shorter!
I even told my editor,
“Oh, I’m going to make Volume 5 a short one. It’s just going to be
everyday fun kind of stuff. Volume 4 was definitely a
chunker, wasn’t it? (ha ha)”
But if you’d asked me
what could be cut out, the only answer I could have given you was my vital
organs. This
means I declare: Volumes 6 and 7 will both be two-parters! And I’ll do my best to get
them both to you as soon as possible. If that doesn’t work out,
you have my permission to bury me under a tree. Ta-da!
Okay, now let’s see. They gave me a whopping
six pages for the afterword in the Japanese release, so I’ll do my best to talk
about Season 2 topics without giving away any spoilers. Let’s go!
1. So what the heck is
Season 2 anyway? (Contains slight spoilers for Volume 5)
Season 1 was pretty
straightforward, as the plot was carried along with each character having their
own book. Volume
1 was Mai-chan, Volume 2 was Satsuki-san, Volume 3 was Ajisai-san, and finally,
Volume 4 closed out the season and featured Kaho-chan.
By way of comparison, the
structure of Season 2 is a little more complex. I’m trying to think of
how to explain this simply, stripping away all the complicated stuff and just
leaving the interesting bits. Part of the reason why the
page count got so high this time is because the foreshadowing took up more
space than I had figured it would. And since this was the
second season, I trotted out a bunch of new characters to be a review of the
first season. This series sure has a lot of characters, huh… But I just love them
all.
Ah, right. That reminds me of something else I need to say.
This is kind of going
into spoiler territory for Volume 5, but in this volume we got another girl who
seemed like an extra protagonist. (There goes the roster,
expanding again!) However, from now on, the main cast will be the five Quintet
girls like always. This is just my personal preference, but do you ever start reading a
story where the main characters start getting less screen time and the minor
characters become the new leads? Don’t you get kind of an
“Oh…” feeling? I know I do. Of course, there are lots
of stories out there that do that and turn out all the better for it, but my
goal in writing is to make you fall even further in love with the Quintet over
time. I’m
the type of trainer who takes the first Pokémon she catches all the way to the
Elite Four.
To sum it all up, I’m
going to do my best to make you fall in love with Mai-chan, Satsuki-san,
Ajisai-san, and Kaho-chan! Good luck out there, Renako.
2. The Satsuki-san
cliffhanger in Volume 4
I’m so sorry to have kept
you all waiting on this for so long.
That’s Satsuki-san’s rash
side coming out, huh? And it’s not like an “Oopsies, I actually did it!” kind of thing either. It’ll still take some more
time to deal with that bombshell she dropped. After all, I heard
deactivating a bomb is a complicated, time-consuming process. Likewise, I think it might
be a while before this story reaches its conclusion.
(But at the very least,
given all the trouble I put you through in Volume 4 and how much you wanted an
answer, we all know it’d be awful if I had Renako go in the next volume, “Oh
yeah, I’m totally dating Satsuki-san too lololol Yay! lololol” You wouldn’t
allow me to do that, right??)
At any rate, just like
there are perks to dating her, there are perks to having her as a friend. Before their relationship
can be taken to the next level (and I have no idea what that means!), I think
it’d be nice to let the readers get a full, exhaustive look at all the fun
things that could only happen with their current relationship. And that’s what I’m doing
my best to accomplish. Good luck out there, Renako.
3. The cliffhanger in this
volume
There’s a lot of wild
stuff brewing, huh? How on earth is this going to turn out? Well, good luck out
there, Renako.
In the 2021 Next Light
Novel Award presented in February 2022, this series won numerous awards,
including the grand prize for new works. This is all thanks to the
support of the readers. Thank you all very much. I truly believe I’ve only
been able to write up to this point because of all your comments and reviews
saying stuff like, “Yeah, I guess it’s kinda funny.” I would be delighted if I
could repay the favor by writing more of this funny story for you. I’m doing my best to make
you say, “Season 1 was good, but Season 2’s even more hilarious!” So please enjoy. First off, Volume 6 will
feature Amaori Haruna as the main character! Hey, Renako, are you upset
that your little sister is stealing your thunder?
Now that I’ve gone on for
long enough, I’d like to proceed to the acknowledgments.
First off, a huge
congrats to Eku Takushima-sensei for the anime adaptation of her series Whisper Me a Love
Song. Woo-hoo! I can’t wait to see all
of the characters Takushima-san draws so charmingly moving around. And thank you once again
for the delightful illustrations. A good tenth of this
series’ popularity is thanks to you, heh heh. The bath scene in Volume
5 was amazing, so I’m putting together another fantastic bathing scene for
Volume 6, heh heh.
And thank you to my
editor Khara-san for everything! Thank you for adding
amazingly funny corrections to Volume 5. I’m the kind of person
whose pen is powered by praise, so a good tenth of always being able to write
this series without compromises is due to you, heh heh.
Also, thank you to
everyone who has helped me publish this book. In particular, I
apologize for sending in unrealistic demands to the designers in every volume. But thanks to them, we
end up with books packed with playfulness and fun! I hope!
I’d also like to give
huge thanks to Musshu-sensei, the artist who draws the manga version of this
series, and her editor Amida-san. I can attribute another
good tenth of TNFWIBYLU’s success thus far to
these two, heh heh. I look forward to seeing the new manga chapters every month. Grr… Curse these two. They make me fall in love
with Renako harder by the minute…
Also, Volume 5 of this
series’s manga drawn by the very same Musshu-san is coming out on March 17th in Japan! They’re now starting on
the Ajisai-san arc from Volume 3! Zoom!
Also also, you should
check out my other GL romcom AriOto! It’s not goofy, like this
series, but kind of steamy. Volume 7 gets a little
hoo-cha-cha, so…watch out!
And with that, I hope to
see you again in Volume 6. Wh-which I’ll make as fast as possible…
Creator Bios
AUTHOR BIO
BORN ON DECEMBER 16 IN
SAITAMA
My favorite basketball
player is Sakuragi Hanamichi from Slam Dunk.
It’s all going to be
okay, because this is a Teren Mikami yuri book!
ILLUSTRATOR BIO
I am a manga artist and
illustrator specializing in yuri.
Thanks for waiting for
Volume 5!
I really do love drawing
the girls in this series, so getting to start my 2023 by drawing them was a
joy. Thank you, TNFWIBYLU!
