'I joined his smile from the moment I started being in the same room with him.'
Glenn and Akiko sat in his apartment, in the main hall, after another day of school, and worked on improving their school knowledge. As they humbly completed assignments in the pulpit, they scribbled all the important notes in their notebooks, and the quiet rustle of warm air in the apartment extinguished any tension in both of them.
'I've been studying more and more carefully so as not to fill his head with unnecessary anxiety, so the room has been much quieter lately...'
Akiko opened the next page of her notebook, not looking away from her uncluttered reading.
'I seem to have lost track of time, coming to his apartment at the same pace every day. And yet it was the beginning of February, and the fury of the cold winter weather was slowly beginning to fade. Over the course of the day, we had completely adjusted to this change in the structure of our routine and friendly life — Glenn-kun had stopped paying attention to anything at all except spending time studying with me. He must be bored at home alone, with nothing to occupy himself with. I began to feel like he was becoming more and more apathetic about what was going on around him, but he is understandable, because he has been moving around for a long time with only one goal in mind. He also goes to the hospital every morning for a checkup and takes an active part in preventive care of his health, and I still can't stop thinking that very soon he will finally be able to go to our school again! Lilia-chan flew back to Germany on January 9, after which Mari-chan walked around hanging her nose for a few days, and he was very worried about her. Fortunately, we were able to get through that hurdle as well, and everything went back to normal!'
Akiko stopped writing in her thin, neat handwriting, then put her pen down on the table and looked at Glenn with a cheerful face. He, noticing her gaze with his dark eyes, looked away awkwardly. Akiko widened her smile after what she saw and looked especially happy.
'I am deeply in love with Glenn-kun, but my feelings won't bother me if he rejects my feelings. Quite the contrary — I don't even know how I can quell those feelings for him, and even if there's nothing holding me back from letting him go, I won't make that decision, and I don't care at all how selfish I am to do so.'
Akiko took up her studies again.
It was still light outside then, but after an hour of study the glint of the sun faded and the streetlights came on. An evening mood enveloped the city.
"I guess we can call it a day with school."
"Uh-huh," Akiko nodded, then stretched out tiredly to quench her thirst for sleep.
"Please let me walk you to your stop, Akiko-chan," he added, with a leisurely and polite tone that made Akiko pout.
"Stop being so polite already. Be at least a little more familiar!"
Then Glenn tapped her forehead lightly with his index finger, and Akiko let out a surprised squeak.
"Don't pout your lips, it hurts me more."
Akiko was shaken by what he said, and Glenn headed toward the coat rack in the hallway without regret. The girl said nothing in reply, and slowly followed him.
After a while, they were already walking through the city, illuminated by bright lights of different colors, and walking in the center of its central point, looking quietly both at the tall buildings that surrounded the entire center and at the commercials that were shown by the special monitors attached to the buildings themselves.
"Are you sure you want to get by subway?" he asked.
"Actually, I just wanted to walk down the street to cool my brain off from the information absorbed in class so far. It seems like my brain is going to shut down pretty soon, and exams are just around the corner, followed by entrance exams..."
"Hmm, I see. I, on the other hand, am unfortunately exhausted from wondering where to go, for I have absolutely no idea what profession to choose."
"Glenn-kun, don't you know where you want to go?"
"It really seems that way. I have a choice between following in my father's footsteps, or making the unacceptable family mistake of choosing a profession that does not intersect with medicine. My lineage has a special skill in the field of medicine, but I don't know if I should continue this cycle."
"So choose what you like best," she replied, not hesitating to choose the right words. "You differ considerably in your intelligence from the other students in our school. Shouldn't you be thinking about your final choice by now?"
"You're right... Indeed, I have now realized the whole picture."
Akiko misunderstood his answer, to which Glenn responded comfortingly.
"You don't have to worry about me, better think about your goals."
"I'll go where I can continue to see your faces and keep up with all of you. Can you guess, Glenn-kun, what kind of profession it is that allows me such grace? My decision was sent down by myself and no one else, by way of difficult and lengthy deliberation, and in the end I was able to catch that goldfish hidden in one of the countless ways."
Glenn should not have responded to her suggestion, after which the distance between them narrowed slightly. Akiko touched one hand to her scarf and covered her frozen lips.
"I want to ask you, Akiko-chan, what would you choose between the two: living in nature, enveloped by the pleasant and tranquil vibes of the atmosphere, where also the forests have gained peace among the flourishing plants, all alone, but together with the friendly beasts; or living right in the middle of the metropolis, where there would be no stand between the calm and warmth of human souls, but with your faithful friends?"
Akiko pondered her answer with a little thought, and with a voice pleasing to Glenn's ears, she answered while moving her fingers to the beat:
"To live in a com-for-table environment, but with my faith-ful friends."
She stopped conducting with her fingers and added: "Sorry, that answer wasn't in the vote, but I couldn't choose between those two things. It's better to achieve the most successful, albeit at high risk, isn't it?"
Akiko made a harmless smile. Glenn did the same.
"Oddly enough, I wouldn't expect any other answer from you."
"You sound like you don't expect anything supernatural from me!"
They chuckled at each other, then looked ahead again. The city lights weren't going to stop lighting their way, and they patiently headed straight for the underground subway. After a few seconds, his little finger touched Akiko's little finger, and they both weaved them completely together, consciously connecting the ends. Their slightly self-conscious gazes were averted, not intending to cross, but they didn't care, realizing that at the moment they both felt triumphantly happy.
Thus, Glenn's escorting Akiko to the subway went completely unnoticed, and before they knew it, they were waving goodbye in unison to the stopped subway.
'Why,' Glenn thought, waving, 'can't I ask her to stay a little longer?'
All the people who had entered the subway with Akiko sat in the empty seats, of which there were many. Akiko alone remained standing, looking at the teenager, who dared not move until the subway left.
'Why,' he heated up, but didn't show it in his face, 'does it hurt me when she says goodbye? Why can't I dare to stop her? At the sight of her my heart literally stops.'
The subway doors closed, and it began its movement.
'She makes me feel like I'm in seventh heaven.'
Soon his fingers sank and he stopped waving. A distraught Akiko had time to catch a glimpse of his face before it became impossible as the train moved.
***
A few days later, Glenn's restriction on school attendance was lifted, and he didn't miss the opportunity to meet club members again during school hours. He rejoined the literary club, and in the intervening time he became accustomed to the return of a familiar routine. Thus, he did not notice how the second week of February came. On that school day, all the boys in the literature club, including Glenn, were alone in the dressing room, changing into their athletic uniforms for joint physical education between the entire senior class.
"I'm thinking of confessing to Akiko-chan."
Glenn was determined and no uncertainty showed in his voice, causing the other guys to be stunned. Their surprise was boundless, and immediately Glenn turned to them and looked away.
"Really, really, really sure?!" Tomoyuki cheered, to which Glenn nodded.
"That's great news, isn't it!"
"Wait, when do you want to tell her about it?"
Glenn, despite the joy on his friends' faces, looked thoughtful.
"I guess it doesn't matter when."
Tamotsu looked at them with a resigned look, not knowing how to engage in conversation, which also caused him to be in contemplation.
"What do you think she'll say to you!"
"I don't know."
"How do you not know? Is it something like a coin flip?"
"Ryou-kun, how about you?" Glenn inquired, ignoring Tomoyuki.
"Hmm? Nothing has changed. However, I don't care if our feelings aren't mutual. I will surely prevail."
"I guess that's interesting. Glenn, if Aki-chan turns you down in the end, what are you going to do? She has a knack for the subject, after all, and I can't help but feel confident in the assumption that she's had many relationships before."
"It's no use thinking about it, nor do I want to bother with it."
Glenn changed into a white T-shirt, just like the others.
"Tomoyuki-kun, I'm sorry. It must be hard for you to talk about this..." he said shortly, causing Ryou to barely hold back a laugh as he fumbled with his stomach.
"Huh? It's okay, because it's not my fault that it turned out this way to me. At the same time, it doesn't mean I don't know about relationships!"
"Thank you."
Looking back at Glenn, Tomoyuki saw the generous smile on his face.
"Did you fall for his joke, too?"
"Hmm? In what way?"
"Glenn-kun," Tomoyuki called out to him, softly, "Actually, I was joking when I said I was impotent."
"Ah... so that's what this is about..."
Ryou and Tomoyuki laughed out loud, and they made Glenn seem confused.
Soon everything came back to normal, and he continued:
"To be honest, Tomoyuki-kun, I really wouldn't have done anything if I had been rejected."
Glenn's voice seemed more isolated than usual, causing the boys to feel the tension that a dark energy emanated from his back. Glenn leaned against the wall, and with a dusky face staring down at the tiled floor, he added:
"But no one else will I let grieve her."
At that very moment in his lowered tone Tamotsu caught something inhuman in the truthfulness of his words and his sincere affection for the man of whom today's conversation was about. During this time, the young men had become aware of a radical change in Glenn's personality that seemed to them entirely irreversible. This change entailed an increasing increase of mystery and gloom in him.
'All this time we've been missing the undeniable fact of how much everyone has changed,' thought a depressed Tomoyuki. 'What a fool I was to think that everything would stay the same, oblivious to what we had been able to go through. These events couldn't help but change us.'
Tomoyuki clenched his fists.