"Wait a second! You got in a fight with the girls?"
"You made Ami-chan and the other girls mad? What were you
doing?!"
"Stuff happened. To sum it up, you're outta your mind if you think
you can be friends with girls. They think they can make guys do whatever's
convenient for them. They see us as their pawns. All they can think about is
how to justify themselves for it. You'll never be able to be on an equal
footing as friends." Noto pouted as he nibbled at his pickled vegetables.
"Well, that's probably enough," Kitamura admonished him.
Ryuuji washed down the last of his rice with miso soup and looked at
the table where the five girls from their group had congregated. It looked
like the situation was about the same over there—the girls were also talking
to other people from Class 2-C.
Even with the heating, the dining room was sprawling and freezing.
Filled with the groups of high school students, it bustled like a poked bee's
nest under the fluorescent lamps. They'd finally been released from their
terrible ski gear, free to wear tracksuits or their own clothes as they pleased,
while they ate from the same menu.
Enjoying a good meal with everyone else should have been fun,
but…
The girls had huddled together and were talking about something.
They definitely had to be badmouthing the boys. Maya looked unhappy and
sullen, and absolutely would not look at them. Looking a little troubled, but
still trying to smile, Minori was talking brightly with Maya, but it seemed
that she wasn't getting any results.
Under circumstances like these, Ryuuji couldn't ask how Minori
actually felt, talk to her, or even approach her. It seemed like the trip might
even end without him ever being able to. He hadn't even gotten in a fight
with Minori, but given the situation, the other girls probably wouldn't let
him talk to her.
Just how had they ended up in this boys-versus-girls scenario? Next
to Minori, Taiga also looked troubled as she gripped her chopsticks and
looked at a giant, dried-out, boiled fish. Normally, her gluttony couldn't
even be subdued by a full serving of rice.
He and Taiga were both probably about as disappointed by how
things had turned out. Ryuuji didn't think to question why Taiga would be
upset—they had had a fight, after all. The back of his head still hurt from
her hitting him with the sled. She had hit him over and over again, and he
was just upset that he hadn't been able to get her back even once.
"Heey, Taka-chan, you wanna swap? Can I eat the rice you've got
there?"
Ryuuji shook his head and gave Haruta the rest. Taiga wasn't the only
one put off by the bland boiled fish. Regardless, Ryuuji still used his
chopsticks to skillfully separate the meat from the bone so that it looked
prettier.
"You don't have much of an appetite. You've just been poking at it
and not actually eating anything."
Kitamura, who was sitting next to him, peeked at his hands. Ryuuji
stopped.
"Hm? What is it?"
"No, nothing…"
Looking at Kitamura's face, Ryuuji wanted to put down his
chopsticks. He'd just realized something.
It wasn't just Taiga who hadn't told him about going shrine visiting
during New Year's—Kitamura hadn't, either. Now that he thought about it,
the reason why Kitamura hadn't asked what happened to Taiga when she
left the Christmas Eve party was probably because they met with each other
behind Ryuuji's back.
Of course, Kitamura didn't need to tell him everything that had to do
with Taiga! It was just a little strange that he hadn't said anything. It felt as
though Taiga and Kitamura had colluded to keep something from him.
What would he call this feeling? Was it alienation? Basically, was he just
sulking?
There are things I don't tell you, Taiga had said to him. The world
was still turning, even if he didn't know it. There were people living in
places he had no clue existed, and they were doing as they pleased—why
did it shock him to realize something so obvious as that now?
"You don't look too happy. In the afternoon…you and Aisaka had
some sort of fight while we were out skiing. Is it that?"
"No…my stomach is upset. Sorry, I know it's dinner."
Even though he was super oblivious about his own stuff, Kitamura
was strangely sharp when it came to how other people were feeling. In
order to escape from that, Ryuuji stood up. He felt the presence of
Kitamura's ever-watchful eyes on his back as he left the dining area alone.
Beyond the corridor with the cheap-feeling carpet that wasn't really
to his taste, there was a dim lounge-like area that was a little worse for wear
but had a bathroom in a corner.
Perhaps because it was cold, there weren't many people around.
Ryuuji sat down on one of the sofas and breathed in. If someone asked him
where he went, he wouldn't be lying if he said it was the bathroom.
Beyond the large window was the broad scenery of snow. The sky
was already dark, but there were visitors going out night skiing, and the
lights reflected off the slope.
At some point, powdery snow had started falling. It looked beautiful
enough for him to want to take a picture, but he didn't really feel like doing
it at that moment. Ryuuji closed his eyes.
"Ahhh…"
"I've caught a sigh!"
He practically jumped as he turned around.
Gotta catch 'em all! she said and gave him finger guns. Minori was
standing there. Her black fleece jacket was zipped right up to her chin, and
she was wearing casual cargo pants tied at the waist with a rope.
"You can't do that," she said. "Don't sit around sighing by yourself."
Her wide smile scrunched up her face as she turned to Ryuuji, who
was so shocked he couldn't breathe.
"Why're you here…oh. The bathroom…sorry, I'll hang around over
there instead so you can go in without worrying about me. Do your best."
He didn't know why he was doing it, but he gave Minori a fist pump,
expecting her to go.
"Noooo! I saw you leave, Takasu-kun, so I told everyone I needed to
go to the bathroom and left, too!"
"Huh…"
"Secrets should stay hush-hush, shush-shush."
Minori went around, putting a table between them as she sat down on
a sofa. She looked him straight in the face. He could see her eyes light up.
Ryuuji's heart felt like it was being squeezed.
What are you trying to say this time? he tried to say, but his mouth
wouldn't move the way he wanted it to. What came out instead was "What
say you…?" It made him sound like an old nobleman, but Minori seemed to
get what he meant.
"Actually," she said, "I've been waiting for an opportunity for a
while. Look, I have my hands full with Maya-chan still being like that, and
you probably have to deal with Noto-kun, too. That was my thought
process."
"Y-yeah…"
I was waiting for an opportunity, too! The thought felt like it was
being squeezed out from the bottom of his gut. Ryuuji nodded his head up
and down like a puppet. His neck felt stiff, and his whole body shook
almost comically. He tried to move around so that Minori wouldn't notice
and crossed his legs, but he couldn't stop trembling. He couldn't stop
fidgeting, either.
He wanted a chance to ask Kushieda Minori how she really felt.
He wanted a chance to get a different answer.
Was this it? This might be it.
Trying to find words to say, he writhed as he faced her. However,
Minori spoke first.
"This all turned into a fight, didn't it? I want to find a good way to
settle it."
She looked serious, her forehead wrinkled. She hadn't even come
close to broaching the subject about what was going on between them.
Gwah! Ryuuji choked on his own breath.
It's fine, he thought. This isn't anything to get worked up about. Do it
slowly. It's fine if it's slow.
"H-how?"
"That's what I wanted to talk to you about. This school trip is
supposed to be fun, after all. I really don't want it to end with everyone
fighting. I want them to patch things up and go back to how we were."
"I do, too…right. That's what I was thinking, too."
I might even want the fight to end sooner than you. He didn't say that
part out loud. Minori was scowling slightly as she nodded. She took her
slippers off and put her hands on her folded knees as she sat with her feet
ungraciously on the spongy sofa.
"I wonder if there's a good way to fix things? Basically, well, in the
end…Maya-chan is all mixed up about Kitamura-kun, and that's the
problem. That's one of the things that led to this."
"…" Ryuuji froze even further. His vital functions were going to stop,
and he was going to turn to stone.
"So that's related… But actually, what happened was Noto-kun said
some stuff that started the fight. And then everyone started saying the stuff
they were already kind of thinking. Hmmm, this is going to be difficult…"
Minori hadn't even noticed that he'd turned to stone. As the dizziness
closed in on him, Ryuuji thought, How can you talk about people's love
lives in front of the guy you rejected?
"I wonder if you know, Takasu-kun?" Minori brought her
defenseless, completely oblivious face even closer. "The reason why Notokun is trying to get in the way of Maya-chan's romance is because, well…
he's got the wrong idea that Taiga-chan likes Kitamura-kun. Apparently,
he's trying to cheer Taiga on, so he clashed with Maya-chan…"
Ryuuji knew he didn't have the right, but he couldn't help but feel
something impatient and almost irritated rise up in him at her obliviousness.
What even is this? he wanted to say. Just how little did she know? She was
Taiga's best friend and didn't even know Taiga's feelings.
"Are you sure he's actually got the wrong idea?"
Ryuuji's voice was suddenly prickly. Minori's eyes went wide.
"There are things you don't know about Taiga, too, right Kushieda?
Taiga might actually like Kitamura and just not have told you."
"There's no way… I try to know everything about Taiga."
You're saying that again… Ryuuji thought about telling her about
Taiga and Kitamura going shrine visiting, but he just barely stopped
himself. Spreading that around wouldn't help anyone. It was just an
unshakable fact that Minori wasn't aware of.
Minori didn't know, and she didn't know she didn't know.
"Anyway," he said, "the situation is way more complicated than you
think. But I agree with you about wanting to make everything better."
"It's complicated… You're right, it might be. It might be more
complicated than either of us think. That might be true."
She pouted a little and pushed up her hair as though it were bothering
her. The sound of the not-very-useful heater was the only thing that echoed
through the lounge. Ryuuji was uneasily silent, and Minori was, too.
They definitely both had things they couldn't say to each other.
Minori was acting as though she hadn't rejected Ryuuji. Ryuuji could tell
that she didn't want to talk about it, but he didn't feel the same way. He
couldn't forget what had happened. In fact, he wanted to try it again.
I used to be able to talk normally to her about things like this, he
thought. So why couldn't he talk to her now?
"I wonder what we should do… Like really." Minori hummed in a
low voice.
Realization dawned on Ryuuji at last. There was only one way to
cancel out the discord between them, and that was for him to join her in
pretending that she hadn't rejected him and that he hadn't been rejected by
her. The two of them were like gears within the same mechanism that
refused to bite and that resisted adjustment. They were starting to grate
disharmoniously. If this kept up, the mechanism would break down.
If he wasn't able to follow along, pretending to be an oblivious part
of Minori's nothing-happened-at-all world, their gears would never turn
together.
But if he did, it would be nothing more than a lie.
Yes—that was right. Not a single thing had gone well so far. Not
when they carried Taiga's bag together, not when they spoke window-towindow or were in Taiga's kitchen, not even when they were just skiing
together. The reason why he had thought things were going well—the
reason he'd thought they would be able to keep this up—was because he'd
successfully deceived himself. It was because he'd stifled himself and gone
along with Minori.
If Ryuuji ever tried to change Minori's path, he would lose his
balance. Just like when they were skiing.
"Hmm, we need to do something for the sake of the trip. Plus, this is
the last one. I'd really hate that… I really want us to just stay like this."
Minori slowly put her hand in her pocket and pulled out something small
and shiny. She used it to pin up her pesky bangs.
"Where'd you get that?"
"Hm? This hairpin? Taiga gave it to me. She told me it's special, so I
have to keep it really, really safe or something. Cute, huh? Oh, I don't mean
me, I mean the pin."
As Minori smiled, an orange hairpin glittered in her hair. It was the
one Ryuuji had chosen himself. So Taiga had had it all along.
"Ha ha…"
Ryuuji laughed and put his face in his hands.
I'm done.
After seeing the hairpin that had been the last remnant of his feelings
for Minori, he realized that the gears had broken beyond repair. If you tried
to forcibly align things that just wouldn't work together—well, look.
Everything would come crashing down.
She wanted things to stay as they were. She didn't want anything to
change. Minori had said as much herself. It would be better if everyone
could stay like this. It would be better if we could always be like this.
To turn in harmony with Minori's gear, Ryuuji would have to take
that hairpin and stomp on it in secret to kill the truth. He would have to kill
a part of himself.
He could have gone along with Minori's nothing-ever-happened
world, laughed it off, and pretended he hadn't ever been rejected. But…he
couldn't do that anymore. Ryuuji's heart was still alive. If he tried to kill it,
he'd just be bleeding.
Everything that had played out so far was all a way for Minori to
create proof that nothing had happened. The feeling of when she had
touched him, when they laughed and he felt ticklish, even her coming out of
her way now to see him—all of it.
She was doing it all on purpose. So she could pretend Christmas Eve
had never happened.
"Aha ha…right… so that's how it was."
"What's wrong, Takasu-kun? Why have you been so quiet? What is
it? Hey?"
"No! It doesn't matter anymore."
Ryuuji kept his face covered but opened his eyes.
Everything was in pieces. He couldn't stand bleeding in secret or
deceiving himself any longer. Minori's desire to keep the status quo
basically meant Ryuuji would have to keep slaying his feelings, and Minori
knew that. She'd gone out of her way to preemptively reject him that night
on Christmas Eve because she knew that, and still, she wished for nothing
to change.
I'm stubborn and unfair, Minori had said to him in the past. He
finally understood what she meant.
If you like me, stubborn and unfair as I am, then you need to still like
me despite knowing that. She wanted him to be aware of that, even as she
asked him to crush his own heart. She wouldn't reciprocate, but if that was
fine with him, he could keep on liking her.
But why?
Why wouldn't she just tell him that she didn't want to date him
because she didn't like him?
Oh, I see. It's because she's stubborn and unfair.
It was because she didn't have the courage to hurt him.
"Takasu-kun…Takasu-kun! What's wrong? Did something happen?
Sorry…did I say something wrong?"
Ryuuji raised his head and smiled as though to say, Nothing,
nothing's wrong. There's nothing wrong at all. He stood up and took two
large steps away from Minori. When he heard her voice call to him, "Where
are you going?" he turned on his heel without saying a word.
Everyone was probably still in the dining hall. He kept his smile
plastered on his face as he quickly walked down the hallway and back to
the bustling dinner area. He went back to the table, where only his seat
remained empty.
"I'm going to go back to the room early. My stomach hurts. Where
are the keys?"
"Takasu…"
He realized Kitamura was shocked at the sight of his face. He
realized that Noto and Haruta had stopped talking and were looking at him,
too.
But they said nothing, and Ryuuji took the keys and left the dining
area.
***
Ryuuji had thought the worst night of his life was Christmas Eve. He
couldn't have imagined that those ugly memories would be unearthed so
soon.
He returned to the dim and dusty smelling Japanese-style room on his
own and quickly laid out one set of the bedding that had been piled in a
nook. He set his bed up in the farthest corner of the room possible. He
didn't even tuck in the sheets but only put out the bottom-most layer of
bedding and threw the pillow and blanket down onto it. He hadn't even
taken his evening bath, and he was still in a sweatshirt and sweatpants, but
he dove right in.
He wanted an hour—no, even just thirty minutes alone like this. He
prayed no one would come into the room.
On that night, he'd had a home to return to. There was a bed he could
slip into without anyone seeing. On top of that, his flu symptoms had
started, and his head had been fuzzy. Even his memories of going home
were ambiguous, like it had been a dream.
Now, though, reality was playing out incredibly clearly and tangibly
before his own eyes. It was being etched right into the folds of his brain.
Kushieda Minori would never accept his feelings. Kushieda Minori
had decided that. It was a reality he couldn't change. She had scrubbed
everything clean from start to finish so that Ryuuji's unrequited love no
longer even existed.
Minori would never accept that he liked her. She wouldn't even
accept that his feelings existed in this world. Ghosts aren't real, UFOs are
just your eyes playing tricks on you, and Takasu-kun doesn't have feelings
for me.
That's how it was.
But why?
Why?
He held his pillow, rounded his body up, and squeezed his eyes shut.
He bit his lip. Please, please, make it so no one comes into this room.
At that moment, he heard shuffling.
"Takasu, what's wrong? Did something happen?"
"Is he asleep? We're worried about you, Takasu. We're just worried."
"Does your stomach actually hurt? Did you eat something by
yourself?"
His wishes were easily betrayed. The three guys gathered around him
without hesitation.
You've got to be kidding—unfortunately this was reality, too.
Pretending he hadn't heard anything, Ryuuji stayed curled up in the
bedding like a raccoon.
"Hey, you." Haruta's finger poked him right in the butt. If he really
had been sleeping because his stomach hurt, that would have spelled
disaster. "What? He's seriously sleeping?"
Haruta actually tried to pull the covers off him. Ryuuji held onto
them, but resisting too much would have been suspicious, and he was
forced to let go. The covers were stripped right off of him, and Ryuuji felt
the creepy sensation of the idiot's breath on his cheek as Haruta looked over
his face. He curled up his whole body and desperately kept his eyes closed.
"Ugh…"
"Oh, there we go! Let's see, is he really sleeping?"
He absolutely didn't have it in him to tell everyone what had
happened. He just wanted to be alone right then. He wanted them to
somehow read his leave-me-alone aura.
"Aw, he's asleep. Ah well. Then we'll just have to be really quiet!"
Right, right, that was good. Sorry, Haruta. Sorry, everyone. But the
moment Ryuuji began to feel the slightest bit of relief, the most mindboggling of comments came from none other than Noto's mouth.
"Hey, Kitamura, what do you think you're doing?! Why're you
taking off your clothes all of a sudden?!"
The eyelids of the sleeping raccoon twitched. Stop. Don't do that.
Ryuuji held his breath in spite of himself, feeling some incredibly
unpleasant presence nearby.
"Well, Takasu is sleeping, so I thought I'd get ready for bed, too."
"Gaaaah! Why're you taking off just your pants? How perverted are
you, master—I mean, ass-ter?!"
"I'm sleeping with my shirt on. Now, where's my bag? Where'd it
go?"
"Ahhhhhh! You're being a little too liberal, ass-ter!"
"Put that thing back! This is too realistic!"
Kitamura…your bag is on the bottom shelf of the cupboard! Ryuuji
desperately told him, but unfortunately, it seemed his telepathy didn't reach
Kitamura. He heard Kitamura walking on the tatami mats. Just imagining
Kitamura's disrobed state was terrifying, and even more terrifyingly, those
footsteps came to a halt directly above Ryuuji's pillow. They stopped
literally right above his head.
He can't be straddling my head right now. His mind was occupied by
the unthinkable image—
"Oh, dear. I feel some mysterious gassy substance coming out of my
butt…"
"That's a direct hit, Kitamura! It's not even going to filter through
anything!"
"Phew! You're the worst! Poor Taka-chan, that's such a tragic fate!"
No way.
No way. No way. No way. Nowaynonononono—
"Poot."
"YOU…IDIOOOOOOOOOOT!"
Ryuuji sat up.
"Kitamura, you better not have gotten your noxious, filthy spray of E.
coli-filled gas on my face—oh?!"
"We lied…"
"I didn't think he'd believe it…"
"He so fell for it…"
He faced the three stooges. Kitamura stood over Ryuuji, fully clothed
in his normal tracksuit, hands pressed together as he squeezed the air
between them out into jovial "Poot poot poot ♪" noises.
"Why…you…"
For a good five seconds, Ryuuji just looked at them in a stupor.
"ARGH! Do you guys even know how terrified I was?!"
"Sorry, but we were worried because you were acting weird."
Faced by Kitamura's serious face, Ryuuji held his head and writhed.
He couldn't put it into words, but he wanted to tell them, You're the ones
being weird with that convincing performance!
"So, what happened?" Noto also looked earnestly at Ryuuji with eyes
about half the size of Kitamura's (and they weren't cute).
Haruta said, "My feet are cold. Lemme under there, too." He tried to
force his toes into the toasty covers Ryuuji was under.
"Nothing…really…happened…"
"Would a guy who had nothing happen to him go back to the room on
his own and pretend to sleep? You were worried about me before, and you
talked to me about it. This time, I—we—want to do that. If there's anything
we can do, we want to do it. We're worried about you. Talk to us, please."
Kitamura sat down with his legs folded directly under him and leaned
forward. Ryuuji understood painfully well the feelings that made Kitamura
say that. He really had been worried the time Kitamura had gone blond.
But Kitamura has things he can't talk about himself, doesn't he?
Ryuuji ended up thinking.
"Hey…please."
Suddenly, he felt embarrassed for thinking that. The moment he
raised his eyes, he was hit with Kitamura's sincere, direct gaze. Noto and
Haruta were looking straight at Ryuuji's eyes, too.
These guys were his friends.
Whether he liked it or not, they were allies.
All allies did was believe in the person they were there for, didn't
they? If an ally didn't tell him something, then Ryuuji just had to believe
they'd had a reason for it. It was time to throw up his hands.
Ryuuji—mostly unconsciously—had already raised his hands in
unconditional surrender.
"I couldn't tell any of you for a long time, but…" He hesitated. "II…"
Haruta straightened up. Noto and Kitamura had already been sitting
upright.
"…l-l-l-liked Kushieda, but—"
"Wha?!"
"Huh!"
"Keep going!"
"…she rejected me on Christmas Eve…"
"Ngh…"
"Uhh!"
"Keep going!"
"…then I talked to her just now…and it's completely over…"
"Guh…"
"Fwoo…"
"K-keep going!"
"That's all I've got!"
Whoo! Ryuuji collapsed. All the strength rushed out of him at once,
and the inside of his head went white. He felt like he was about to crumble
into ash. He felt like he'd be scattered by a passing wind.
All of them were silent.
Kitamura looked stealthily at Noto. Noto was looking hesitantly at
Haruta. Then Haruta looked slowly into Ryuuji's eyes.
...…
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
They flipped.
"EEEEEEEEK!" "WAAAAAAAAH!" "OHHHHHHHH!" They
yelled like idiots. "NUOOO!" They writhed, rolled on the ground, scratched
at the floor, and arched their bodies backward.
"What the hell, Takasu?! Since when?! Kushieda… Kushieda!
KUSHIEDAAAAA?!"
"Wait, Takasu, why? Why is that how it is, and how is it like that, like
why?!"
"Kushieda?! Kushieda?! Huh, but Kushieda… You can't possibly
mean that Kushieda?!"
Ryuuji jutted out his chin and stared at the ceiling. "That's right! It's
Kushieda Minori! That—that weird girl is the one I liked for over a year!
I'm sorry I ever liked her! But she doesn't seem to have feelings at all! It's
like she couldn't even imagine it happening! She doesn't feel anything for
me, I'm telling you! Nothing at all! WHYYYYYY?!"
He fell face down onto the blankets. He didn't care what happened
anymore. He didn't even care if he breathed in mites. He didn't even care if
he had a slight allergic reaction. He wouldn't even care if he started crying
right there.
"But actually, come to think of it, you and Miss Kushieda were pretty
close, weren't you?! Like I remember seeing you guys talking enough to
make me think twice?!"
At Noto's voice, good old Haruta with his weak memory followed
suit.
"I thought so, too!"
Like that would console him… Ryuuji started to deny it, but they
kept going.
"Why'd Miss Kushieda reject you, Takasu?! What's her reasoning?! I
can't accept that—like at all! I haven't heard of her having a boyfriend
either, and it's not like she'd like anybody else?! But I'd never ever have
imagined…a guy liking Kushieda! Like seriously, why?!"
"That's what I want to know! Why don't you ask her?" Ryuuji wailed
desperately.
"How about we do it? Let's ask her."
Kitamura quickly stood up. Huh? Ryuuji looked up at his face.
"I can't believe it either. If I'd been a girl, I definitely would've dated
Takasu."
Me, too! Yup, yup! Noto and Haruta raised their voices. Kitamura's
expression was completely serious. He pushed his glasses up on his nose as
he declared this without hesitation.
"Are you an idiot?!" said Ryuuji. "That's not funny! That's not even a
joke!"
"Well, it's not just asking Kushieda about you, Takasu. Actually, I'm
in the mood to ask the girls some stuff."
"Then why don't you pay a visit to their room by yourself?! D-D-DDon't use me as an excuse!"
Kitamura put a gentle hand on Ryuuji's shoulder as he writhed.
"Instead of staying in bed like this, you should be facing up against
the girls, fair and square, starting with Kushieda. There's been so much
happening today, even my head feels like it's going to explode. Since it's
come to this, we might as well be frank about it. Nothing comes of fighting!
Mutual understanding is the first step to a stable society!"
"No, no, no! There's something wrong with what you're saying!
Don't get me involved, I'm begging you!" Ryuuji waved his hands in a
desperate attempt to stop Kitamura's recklessness.
"Well, Takasu, there's stuff I want to ask the girls, too. So, let's go.
I'm pretty sure the girls' room is one floor down."
"Taka-chan! This is definitely how you get your revenge! Like no
matter what happens…we want to protect our precious Taka-chan! I won't
forgive her for rejecting you! Curse you, Kushieda!"
"Okay, let's go. Right now."
"Okay, we're all going now. C'mon Takasu."
"HURAH! GURAH! We're coming for you, Kushieda!"
"Stop, stop, stop! Stop! Anyway, just sit down—huh?!" Ryuuji
grabbed Kitamura's enthusiastic arm and tried to stop him, but instead, his
hand was taken, and he was pulled right out of bed.
"Noto, you have the key, right?! Let's go!"
"Wait, wait, wait, you're serious?! You're really serious?!"
The other three nodded solemnly.
"This is just like Chushingura—that story where the forty-seven
ronin avenge their master. If you're the master, Asano Naganori, then we're
the Aka-roshi that were involved in the attack."
"Aren't you just using me as an excuse to go there?!"
"Think of Kushieda as the villain in Chushingura—she's Kira. But
we're trying to have a gentlemanly conversation with her. Okay, room's
locked."
"It's not like we can talk to them about it! We'll just end up getting in
another fight!"
"Oh yeah, Kira. He's so cool! I've got every volume! It's kind of hard
to follow though! Maybe I'll cut my hair, too! Bringing a manga to the
hairstylist might be kind of embarrassing, though?!"
"I think you're talking about something completely different?
Whoa!"
Kitamura and Noto took off running down the hall, and Haruta
followed after them without hesitation.
"Hey! Damn it…seriously…seriously. I seriously don't care what
happens anymore!"
Ryuuji was on the verge of crying, but he couldn't stand them pulling
a Chushingura without him. He ran after his friends as fast as he could.
***
"We're coming in, girls! Be good now and open this door… Wait, it's
already open?!" The door just popped open as Kitamura grabbed the cheaplooking doorknob.
"We got hella lucky! Hey, gals! I don't know if you're changing or
doing something else, but you're the exhibitionists for not locking up!"
"We're heading in, Kitamura, Takasu!"
Haruta opened the door without hesitation and dove in. He pushed
Kitamura before him and grabbed Ryuuji's arm. Noto followed after them.
As they rushed into the room, Ryuuji froze up, automatically preparing
himself for shrieks and denunciations.
"Huh? What? No one's here!"
"Yeah…they're just careless. Actually, what even is this?!"
Ryuuji looked around the eight-tatami mat room and scowled like a
medium possessed by a spirit. Could this room really have the exact same
layout as theirs?
The girls' five people's worth of bags were laid out right on the floor.
The ones that had their zippers closed were in a better state, but there were
several that were wide open, their contents spilling out. Brushes, hot
curlers, phones with too many key chains on them, pouches, magazines, and
girly stuff that he didn't recognize were scattered all around. They had
dropped their still-damp gear wherever they wanted, and the only things
they'd put up on hangers were two jackets and four skirts.
To top it all off, there was just a single sock thrown into a corner.
Ryuuji really just could not stand socks in uneven numbers.
"This is so gross! Ahhh!"
"Hold back, Takasu! You can't clean this!"
As Kitamura held him back, Ryuuji's body shook. Incidentally, under
Ryuuji's instructions, the boys had put all their bags into the cupboard and
put their uniforms up on hangers. Their gear was already wiped down and
drying by the window. He even had a rule that everyone had to put their
personal belongings back in their bags after using them.
These eight-tatami mat rooms had to have four to five high school
students stuffed into them, after all. If they didn't clean it up right, they
wouldn't be able to keep their own zones of privacy. Plus, messes always
invited friends. If one thing was left out, it would immediately contaminate
the area around it. If a place was messy, the minds of those living in it
would also be scattered. Actually, if he had to live in such a small, messy,
chaotic room like this, Ryuuji would probably have gotten sick.
How did they even do that…? Why wouldn't they want to live in
more comfort for the two nights and three days they would be there? He at
least wanted to do something immediately about that gear and those
uniforms. The gear would get smelly, and the pleats of the skirts would get
all messed up…
No. He couldn't. Ryuuji bit his lip and desperately turned his eyes
away from the area he wanted to clean.
"They left the room unlocked when it's like this… I wonder if they
thought it'd lock automatically behind them? Maybe they're at the baths?
Just how many snacks did they bring?" Noto also seemed exasperated as he
looked around the room. Then, he exclaimed, "Oh!"
"What's wrong, Noto-chi?"
"I saw it! I saw a camisole! It's blue!"
"I found a whole bunch of damp towels! Whoo!"
Haruta raised the treasures he had found. Class 2-C's conscience,
Kitamura, admonished them. "Hey, stop that you two! And even you?
Takasu, stop!"
"Oh no…I'm not doing that. That's not what I meant." Ryuuji
quickly hid that unbearable, single dropped sock behind his back.
"Seriously, even you, Takasu? You can't touch other people's
personal stuff. Now, put it back! Oh no, I stepped on something. What is
this… 'Aroma cream'? Oh…so it's a type of hand cream, and you can put it
on your face? Ohhh…yeah, that's an aroma. It smells like what you'd
imagine for an aroma."
"Lemme see, oh…"
"Yeah, this is it. It's an aroma…"
"Ohh…it's kind of a sexy smell, hee hee."
Kitamura had squeezed a tiny bit of the cream from the tube onto the
back of his hand, where everyone sniffed it. Kitamura rubbed it in and said,
"Yeah, it's smooth." How was this the conscience of class 2-C?
"Hee hee…"
Suddenly Haruta laughed.
"If anyone were looking at this scene right now, we'd really look like
perverts. This is the kind of thing you end up in cuffs for."
"Stop being stupid. We just came here for revenge, right? Our final
goal was to be diehards."
That was right. Ryuuji and Kitamura nodded at Noto's words.
"But we look kind of outrageous."
Well, they might have looked weird from an outside perspective.
Haruta had a towel someone else had used around his neck. Noto still
had the camisole in his hands. Ryuuji was still hiding the sock. And
Kitamura was being allured by the fragrance of the cream he'd rubbed on
his hand.
"You're right that it might look like that," Kitamura said. "We might
look a little dangerous, but we're not perverts, and we didn't come here
aiming to mess with the girls' stuff. How about we put everything back
before the girls come in, and then start over, my friends?"
It was a splendid idea. Everyone agreed, but just then…
Clack. The door the perverts had come in through to mess with the
girls' personal things began to open.
***
Out of anyone it could have been, it was Taiga.
The boys just barely managed to jump into the small closet, their
hearts racing. Out of all the girls, the most savage and unreasonable one had
come back to the room alone.
They lined their eyes up to the slightly open sliding door, where a
line of light spilled through, to see the room.
"This is bad. This is bad…"
Shhhh. They hushed Haruta's wail, but Ryuuji, too, felt overwhelmed
with despair and was close to peeing himself. This went two steps beyond
just playing around with people's personal belongings while the owners
weren't present. They couldn't say, "We're diehards" or "We're getting
revenge," anymore. There was absolutely no way they could say any of that
now.
Still unaware of the fact Ryuuji and the rest were watching from their
hiding place, Taiga threw her key onto the tatami. It looked like she hadn't
even noticed that the door had been open.
She'd probably just finished taking a bath. She was wearing a parka
and, unusually for her, matching pants. Her long hair was still soaking wet.
Her face was red, and she was breathing loudly.
Taiga wiped her hair with the towel around her shoulders and
grabbed a dryer that she had left sitting right out in the middle of the room.
She pulled on the cord as she let her eyes wander around. It seemed she was
looking for an outlet. There was one right before her eyes in an easy-to-spot
location, but Taiga seemed despondent.
"Guess there isn't one…" she muttered, and her shoulders slumped.
Ryuuji slipped. If his butt hadn't fallen onto Noto's leg, he probably
would have made a sound.
"Takasu!"
"Sorry!"
Ryuuji couldn't help it—Taiga was just too much of an idiot. She
hadn't even noticed the outlet right in front of her! She gave up on the
dryer, tossed it aside, and then trotted across the room as though she'd
remembered something. She opened the room's refrigerator and pulled out a
bottle of tea she seemed to have brought with her. Perhaps she was feeling
thirsty from her bath. Taiga put a hand on her hip and heartily tipped the tea
back.
"Gah-hah!"
She coughed hard, and in that moment, spilled tea all over the place.
"Oh, ew."
Don't say ew… Inside the closet, the same sentiment bloomed like a
cloud. Ryuuji felt like grinding his teeth as he looked at the tea spilled on
the ground. If they didn't wipe it up quick, it'd form a stain.
As though Ryuuji's thought had made its way to her, Taiga
immediately bent down and started wiping the tea off the tatami. But—she
used the towel she had been using on her hair. What was she going to do
with her wet head now?
As Ryuuji watched, disturbed, Taiga did the unthinkable. With that
very same towel, she once again started drying her hair.
Whaaaaa?! Even Haruta made a low noise. Ryuuji nearly fainted.
Oh, Taiga—why are you so careless?
Despite that, when Taiga started drinking her tea again a bit more
carefully, her profile really looked exactly like a doll. She looked like a
princess from a fairy tale.
"Guff!"
Stop… Don't burp either, please.
Taiga capped the bottle and held it in one hand as she started
wandering around the room. She wiped her hair with the tea towel as she
walked.
"Ah!"
She tripped on someone's bag. BAM! She fell onto her face. And
then, out of all the things that could have happened…
"Ow!"
…the bottle that had flown out of her hand landed right back down
onto her head.
"…!"
"Oh…" The boys wriggled, covering their mouths before they could
blurt anything out. The klutz god had descended to earth right in front of
them. That said, this was probably an everyday occurrence for Taiga.
"Ugh, what's with this…ngh…"
Taiga held her head but stayed calm. Still on the ground, she rolled
over onto her back and lay splayed out on the tatami. She yawned. She
arched, and her back cracked loudly. Then she closed her eyes and began to
hum.
Vrmmmm vrmmm. ♪ Vrmmmmm vrmmmm. ♪
Her humming sounded just like a mass of cicadas. That was Ryuuji's
limit.
"Bwah ha!"
"Huh?!"
Within the closet, three fists hit Ryuuji in the back. However, the
sound he'd released could no longer be taken back. With her usual cat-like
reflexes, Taiga leapt up. She held her bottle like a bat.
Her pale face looked like a Noh mask, and her large, emotionless
eyes were open so wide they seemed like they might split at the seams.
Taiga scanned the whole room and somehow, now of all times, came to the
correct conclusion. She stared at the closet.
Bottle held high in her right hand, and poised to defend her face with
her left, her footwork was obviously far from amateur as she stepped
towards the closet.
And then, something unthinkable happened.
What if Tiger locked the room and went to sleep?
Unbelievable! But when it comes to Tiger, I'd believe it.
Aha ha ha ha…
They heard the sound of four people laughing. They heard Maya and
Ami's voices approaching them through the thin walls of the closet. They
were close. They were almost there.
And then, right before them, Taiga's hand was on the sliding door.
"Ahh! To hell with it!"
It was his fault for making a noise. Ryuuji sent up a quick prayer to
heaven and then, faster than Taiga could reach out her hand, he suddenly
threw open the sliding door. BAM!
"Eeeeeeeeeeeeeep…"
It seemed that when people were truly afraid, they couldn't even
scream. Taiga made a noise like a strangled baby monkey as Ryuuji
appeared before her eyes and grabbed her legs, making her fall backward
onto her butt.
"Please, please, be quiet, please! Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, please,
forgive us!"
"HAGBHAABABABARYURYURYU…"
Ryuuji grabbed her frozen arm and pulled her into the bottom half of
the closet while apologizing, his face in full-on possessed-medium mode.
Taiga was halfway to fainting.
"I'll explain things later," he said, as if he were a husband caught
cheating. The timing was dangerous and last minute.
"Huh, it's still open. Hey, Tiger, you're so careless!"
The door opened with a clack, and Maya's voice echoed through the
room… Just as Kitamura quietly closed the sliding door.
"Hel…!"
…lp me! Taiga probably tried to yell.
"Please…just this once…please…please, okay…"
Ryuuji had become an actual pervert. He whispered hotly into Taiga's
ear as he begged her, pinning her arms behind her back with all the strength
he could muster. He could feel the warmth from her skin through her parka
and pants, as though she were a child who had just come out from the bath.
This really could land him in jail. On top of that, even as he
apologized, he covered her mouth. Taiga tried to bite him like a wild
animal, but he somehow stopped her from screaming. Her wet hair flailed,
and her hard head hit his chin. BAM!
Even then, Ryuuji didn't yell. He couldn't make the same mistake
again. He noticed the thinness of the arm he held so tightly, and weakened
his grip, but then she butted his chin again hard enough to make him feel
like he might die. Her strength weirdly reassured him. He felt something
that was a little different from guilt, but it dispersed with his pain.
"Huh? Taiga's not here…but she said she'd come back first to dry her
hair."
"The key is over there, so maybe she went to the bathroom? Ahh, that
was a nice bath. It wasn't a hot spring, but it's nice when it's that big."
"I so agree. I want to go in again later. We can go as many times as
we want before lights out, right?"
"Nanako, you seriously love baths. But if you're going, I'll go, too. I
want to get thinner. Actually, Ami-chan, why don't you become a pinup
model? I think you'd seriously be a hit! For sure!"
"You think so? It's not like I want to become an entertainer, though."
As soon as they entered the room, Minori, Ami, Maya, and Nanako
immediately started talking. They were bustling around, asking to be
handed their toner, eating snacks, and turning on the TV. No one had noticed
the secret sexual harassment feud in the closet, but Ryuuji couldn't hold
back the Palmtop Tiger all by himself forever.
Just when he thought it was only a matter of time before Taiga
escaped, Maya spoke.
"Hey… Maybe Tiger went to the boys' room by herself? Maybe she's
with Maruo-kun right now."
Maya wrapped her long hair with a towel and plopped down crosslegged. Taiga's body froze as her name was said. Kitamura probably jolted,
too.
Across from Maya, Nanako smiled, putting cream on her face (the
same one Kitamura had been rubbing on his hand). She sat down, as well.
"Tiger? Go to the boys' room by herself? No way. You're
overthinking it."
"Oh, but maybe she's doing something with Takasu-kun, and
Yuusaku will come by, and there'll be a situation," Ami said. "That could
happen."
"What do you mean, they're doing 'something'?" Nanako poked fun
back at Ami. Ryuuji agreed with Nanako, too. What are we supposedly
doing? he thought.
"What?! It'd be so terrible if that actually did happen! Actually…
what is it with Tiger, really? Is she actually after Maruo? No matter what
anyone says, the one she's really the closest to is Takasu-kun, isn't it? Back
when we went to Tiger's house, Takasu-kun was doing the dishes. That's
pretty clear, isn't it? Maybe the whole Maruo thing is just a
misunderstanding, and in the end, she's really after Takasu-kun? Honestly,
that'd be nice!"
That was the point at which Taiga stopped resisting. Even if she got
free of Ryuuji's arms, this newest development put Taiga in a situation
where she couldn't really jump out and say, "I've been here the whole
time!"
She stopped moving and looked up for a second at Ryuuji's face. He
felt like her lips were moving to mouth something. Remember this…
"Hey, Kushieda, what's going on with that? You're close to Tiger,
right? Who is Tiger really after, Takasu-kun or Maruo? It's Takasu-kun,
right? Right?"
"Well, that's hard for me to say, partner. Why don't you ask Taiga
directly when she gets back?" Pinning up her washed hair with a clip,
Minori cocked her head.
"What?! It's not like Tiger would tell us! Actually, Kushieda, you've
been kind of quiet since earlier? What happened?"
"You think so? I might have skied too hard. I'm kind of sleepy."
"What?! We're not going to let you sleep tonight! We're having girl
talk! Actually, if Tiger would just like, hurry up and get Takasu-kun already,
we wouldn't have any problems!"
"Oh, that stings…and then Minori-chan pleads the fifth. ♥" Ami
smiled suggestively.
For a moment, the air in the room froze. The air in the closet froze in
the same way.
"Huh, what? What do you mean? Ami-chan, I wanna know. You do,
too, right, Nanako?"
"Yeah, of course. Actually, Ami-chan said something that only
Kushieda got a while ago, too, right?"
"Ohh, you two heard that? Sorry, Minori-chan…you pretend to be
oblivious so often that I've said too much, now."
Minori turned to face Ami. Ami was blinking her big Chihuahua
eyes, acting purposefully cute as she smiled and looked back at Minori.
"Look, don't just talk to each other through your eyes. Just say it,
Ami-chan!"
"Maya's asking, but should I say it? Should I let it out?"
Minori tilted her head. "Say what?"
Ryuuji swallowed. Putting aside the dangerous topic at hand, it was
Minori's expression that got to him. Her eyes were a little narrowed, and
her chin was raised. She was looking right through Ami.
He'd seen that face once before. He could never forget it. It was
during the practice for the culture festival. Minori had asked him about
Taiga's dad, and her face now looked exactly the same as it had back then.
In other words, it was her face when she was actually angry.
But Ami wasn't cowed. She put a placid smile on her face. Then she
said:
"Minori-chan rejected Takasu-kun when he tried to confess to her on
Christmas Eve. Did you forget? No way, that's how precious popular girls
are! You're so calm about it! How cool! Like you don't even remember that
you rejected him! Aha ha!"
"Huh? What? Whaat?! Takasu-kun tried to confess to you?!
Seriously?!"
"And then you rejected him?! On Christmas Eve?! No waay!
Actually…how do you know that, Ami-chan?!"
"I wonder… It's a mystery."
Maya and Nanako were getting excited, but next to them, Minori
inhaled and said, indifferently, "Ahmin…I wonder why you would say
that…"
Ami replied, "Because you were acting so airheaded all the time. I
can't believe you're pretending everything is fine."
Her words and voice were terrifyingly true to her nature. She came
directly at Minori, targeting her weaknesses, spoiling for a fight.
"Takasu-kun likes Minori-chan, not Tiger, it turns out. But, Minorichan rejected him. But now she's acting all oblivious, like, 'We all need to
get along!' and 'Don't you wanna be like this forever?' Like…what? Do
you really think someone can stay friends with the girl who rejected him?
You were obviously clinging to him on purpose when we were skiing. You
were just trying to show him how oblivious you are, right? Just how cruel
are you?"
The team in the closet and the one in the room both swallowed
without thinking. No one could say a word…
"When did you see me acting fine? Did you really see that? What do
you know about me? Can your eyes see through to my heart? Actually, this
doesn't have anything to do with you, Ahmin. Don't stick your nose into
this."
…other than Minori, that was.
"So this doesn't involve me, huh? Oh, I see. Sorry. But…when I
heard that you rejected Takasu-kun, I had this thought that you might be
acting out of a sense of guilt. I guess it doesn't involve that…"
"I told you already. It has nothing to do with you. I don't know what
you're trying to say. If you think I'm doing fine, then that's great. Just leave
it alone."
"Oh, good. I'm so relieved it doesn't have anything to do with me.
And that it doesn't have anything to do with the guilt, either. Oh, what a
relief—so Minori-chan and Takasu-kun clearly aren't as upset as I thought.
See, I thought you'd rejected Takasu-kun because of guilt over a certain
someone, Minori-chan, but I guess you just really genuinely hate him? I'll
tell Takasu-kun that tomorrow. I'll tell him you rejected him because you
hate him. It's much kinder not to string him along, like you are now. You
should just tell him exactly what you think and break things off."
"Do what you want…"
"Okay, I get the message. Oh, maybe I'll go tell him right now?"
"I said you could do what you want."
"Your face looks pretty great on the surface…"
"What're you even saying?"
"I wonder what I mean…"
"Get a hold of yourselves!" Maya sounded resolute as she intervened.
Time, which seemed to have frozen over, finally started to creak forward
again.
"Ami-chan, what's gotten into you, too? Let's stop. We're on a nice
school trip and fighting among girls is just so—I don't want to know any
more about this! It's Noto we should be angry at! Isn't that enough?
Kushieda, you too, okay? Let's just move on from this, please!"
"I think it'd be really hard on Tiger if she came back and she saw you
two still fighting," Nanako said. "Tiger's parents are divorced, aren't they? I
only have one parent at home, so I get it. When you see your friends
fighting, you remember your parents and how the house felt. But…you said
too much just now, Ami-chan. Please just apologize and let it end here."
There was a bit of a pause.
"Sorry, Minori-chan. I said way too much. Could you forget it all?"
Ami lowered her head slightly. Seeing that, Minori slowly and loudly
clapped her hands together once.
"There! It's a deal. Okay, I've forgotten it!"
Finally, the air in the room relaxed.
"Actually, where is Tiger? How about we look for her for a bit?"
Maya said in a much brighter voice. Everyone, probably wanting to change
the mood, nodded to each other and left the room.
The sliding door of the closet fwooshed open.
"I feel like we saw something we really weren't meant to see!"
The first one to fall out was Kitamura. Noto and Haruta also rolled
out after him.
"Actually, Miss Kushieda is kinda…like how do I put this…I'm
really, really glad that I didn't ask her anything weird, now."
"Am I the only one who didn't get the point of their fight at all? How
is Ami-chan involved in this? Taka-chan, what's going on?"
"That's what I want to know! Really! Everyone…everyone is just…"
Disoriented, Ryuuji crawled from the closet.
"You…you…you baaaaaastaaaaaaaaards…"
Her wet hair disheveled, her face red from wrath—among other
things—Taiga was breathing heavily as she got up. It stood to reason. He
had done all of those things to the Palmtop Tiger. He had asked for this.
Ryuuji closed his eyes and waited in silence. He prepared himself for
a slap with the weight of her whole body in it, but Taiga's right hand just
passed limply through the air. She drifted to the ground, sat with her legs
folded to the side, and pitifully hid her red face in her hands.
"This is just too awkward! What is this… Why did you have to
involve me in something like this?! It doesn't hurt you—you can just go
back to your rooms and be fine! I have to pretend that I don't know
anything for two more nights and pretend to be upbeat when Minorin and
Dimhuahua are so on edge! I need to put on an act…"
"Oh, right, that's pretty hard."
"Shuddup, you brainless, hairy caterpillar! But, but, really what is
this… Why are Minorin and Dimhuahua fighting? Maybe I shouldn't have
told Dimhuahua everything…"
There wasn't a single person who could answer Taiga's question. The
boys could only look at each other uneasily, still overwhelmed by the fight
that they shouldn't have seen.
"Anyway…" Kitamura said in a low voice, his glasses still halfway
down his face. "We didn't see anything. Aisaka met Takasu on the way
back to her room and was talking to him in the hallway. When she came
back, it seemed the girls had been there but had gone somewhere again.
That's right…right?"
Taiga somehow nodded, though her face was still hot.
"We really did something stupid, getting carried along like that."
Kitamura lightly smacked his own head. Ryuuji didn't know what he meant
by that, but the words didn't seem to be meant for him.
The closet perverts had successfully made their escape. Left alone by
herself in the girls' room, Taiga, who had to pretend not to know anything
for two days, watched them leave with an endlessly resentful gaze.
"Actually, what did you guys come here for…?