The kettle started whistling. Miku poured the hot water into the bowl of noddle which she had put the condiments inside, and then covered in up with a round plastic lid.
"Y'know, when I first heard of this story, I was equally as confused as you are. After all, in my whole family, I was the only one who had blue hair besides my uncle."
"Your uncle had black hair though."
"That's a different uncle. Anyway, yeah, I was confused. Remember when I said something about you remembering those events?"
"Yeah, I guess."
The moment I woke up from the dream of her story, she asked something like that.
"When you said yes, my confusion just went up even more. After all, and I'm just assuming this, you probably didn't have this kind of childhood, which would make it seem impossible for you to remember if you at least hadn't experienced it."
"So what are you saying?"
"I'm saying this story may somehow have a connection towards you. The fact that you projected yourself in your own dream, even remembering it despite not having experienced it, is already enough fact about that. Say, do you have any more dreams that you felt like you experienced, despite not having actually done it?"
Now that she mentioned it, there was another dream. One where I was a famous kid in class and everyone acknowledged me as a person, something that has never happened before. It happened on Saturday, in other words, yesterday.
When I said all that to Miku, she nodded and picked up the lid of the bowl, placing it on the sink. The smell went through my nose, and it had quite the fragrance.
"That sure is bizarre," she said. "I mean, you being popular? I can't imagine that."
"I can't tell if you're taking pity on me or just shaming me."
She giggled as she grabbed a pair of disposable chopsticks.
"I'm just surprised, is all. Come on, I think we kept Yuumi-chan for a bit now. She must be hungry from all the events earlier."
We went upstairs and opened the door to Miku's room. Yuumi appeared to be normal, just reading a book again.
"Yuumi-chan~" Miku said. "Dinner's ready~"
"Miku-chan-senpai, you looked cute."
"Eh?"
"As a child, I mean."
Upon further inspection, Yuumi was not reading a manga or a light novel, but rather a photo album that appeared to be worn out and not at the same time.
"Where'd you find that?" I asked.
"It was just laying in her desk wipe open. I thought I'd take a peek or two, but my curiosity got the better of me and I ended up scanning for a bit."
"Yuumi-chan, you do know you're invading my privacy, right?" Miku asked.
"I thought it would be fine if it's you."
She sighed as she placed the bowl in the desk along with the chopsticks.
"Well, can't argue with that I guess. You should eat first, then we can look through my embarrassing photos together."
I tried imagining a flustered Miku with us as we scanned through the photo album, but nothing seems to be appearing.
***
"…And this one is when I went on my first trip to the beach," Miku said, pointing on a child version of her. She appeared to be wearing a swimsuit, and the distribution of the sunblock was very much noticeable.
"You sure looked adorable, didn't you?" I said.
"It's true," Yuumi said. "You look like the type that can get everyone together."
"Well, I did get those types of comments back then. But really, I wasn't that popular. I didn't even know how to pronounce my name right."
She looked to be at least four to five years old in this image. Comparing her to the current one, there was so many things that's really changed.
This is mostly just speculation, but considering that she doesn't know how to pronounce her name right in that age, I'd assume she wasn't like much of the kids who some knew how to read words, technically making her someone who doesn't really value education.
Now, fast forward to today, and she's pretty much the class representative of my class, and she's also one of the top students of our year. The drastic changes that she had was rather bizarre. I'm just assuming things though.
"What about this?" Yuumi asked, pointing in another picture.
"That was the time we went camping. It was the most memorable moment in my childhood. I'm not sure why though."
The picture depicted the child Miku being carried by his uncle, the one we met earlier, with other people in the family whose faces I didn't recognize. The uncle and Miku seemed to be a having a great time, while a woman was taking the picture as she struck a peace sign with a wide smile. She looked blurry, so all I can assume is that the picture was frantically taken.
The other people seemed to be having fun as well. There was a kid who was Miku's age in this picture who seemed to be laughing real hard, and a young woman beside her who looked like she was worried about the uncle and Miku, but decided to stay put. She was also holding a baby. There was also a guy with blue hair who was laying on the blanket with a book blocking his face, presumably him sleeping. This guy looked like the person Miku was talking about─her other uncle.
Other than those people, the picture was too blurry to identify the other ones. I could see a tent and a few other kids playing in the background accompanied by adults, but they're all just too blurry to identify the features they had.
Taking a closer look, the Miku in this picture seemed to look familiar, as if I had met her. But it didn't take too long to notice that something was off. The Miku in this picture looked exactly like the one from my dream, down from the facial expressions, body language, and even her clothes.
But that's impossible. As Miku had said earlier, this was just a story that she had heard from someone. She also didn't change the characters in that story. The only chance my mind could recreate a child version of Miku in my dream was if I had met her in my childhood, or if I saw a photo with her in it.
We've never met each other in my childhood, so that's out of the bag. The dream that I had was earlier, and I'm only seeing Miku's childhood photos now. Considering that there was no other options left for me to choose, the only thing I could come up with was nothing.
"And this is the photo where I got my first award," Miku said.
"1st place is running?" Yuumi asked.
"Yeah. I panted real hard after I finished that. It felt really accomplishing as well. I wish both of you could see that day."
I set aside my thoughts for now. They're both having fun, so I wouldn't want to complicate things the way they are now. This problem of mine doesn't matter much to them, and I'd feel bad if I just interjected myself.
We kept looking at Miku's childhood pictures with her junior high ones, and every single one of them represented her having some awards from her previous schools which was mainly awards for sports, and some other ones just looked like she was having fun alone or when she's with her family. Strangely enough, there was only one picture of her with a friend by her side, and it was Rin Satou.
There was a single thing that was present in every single picture in her photo album, and it was just her looking absolutely cute.
"Y'know, now that I think about it, you're both the first people that I've showed my photo album besides my family."
"That would make sense," I said. "Why would you suddenly change your mind?"
"It just happened on a whim. Truth be told, I hadn't looked in this album for a while now, and although I'm not exactly obligated to do so, every single memory that I've made is saved here. You could say I just wanted to share myself with the both of you. Y'know, as a thanks for letting me stay in your house all of the time."
"I'm pretty sure letting us stay in your house is already plenty, if you ask me. I forgot to mention this earlier, but thanks for letting us stay here."
After that, we went back to scanning the photo album, but this time, we just kept quiet. The only sounds that could be heard were our breathing and the turning of pages. Before long, we reached the final page which just looked empty.
"…That was a pretty long album, wasn't it?" Miku asked.
"Yeah. It's pretty cool how you've got so many memories stored in a single book."
"Yeah, but we should probably sleep already. It's been a really long night, and we still have school tomorrow. Yuumi-chan probably thinks so, too."
I looked at Yuumi, who was looking in the album earlier, and saw that she was leaning on my shoulder, sleeping soundly. It seems that she'd given up halfway on staying awake. I was already pretty tired myself.
I yawned as I stretched out my arms.
"Yeah, that's a great idea. Where will I sleep, though?" I asked.
Sleeping in Miku's bed is also out of question, since this is her house with her parents in it. It'd be a different story in she was sleeping in our house in my bed, or if it's Yuumi sleeping with her here.
"Don't worry, I have a futon in the closet. I'll just lay it down for you."
"Sure, but wouldn't that be a bad idea?"
Like I said earlier, sleeping in Miku's bed was already out from my options, but even just sleeping in her room is a no go.
"Don't sorry, I let my friends sleep in here all the time."
"Really?"
"No, I don't even have any friends besides you, Yuumi-chan, and Rin. I was just trying to not make myself sound sad because of not having any sleepovers with anyone."
"Not even Satou-san?"
"Yep."
"That actually does sound sad."
"Like you had anyone that slept in your house besides me."
I can't exactly argue with that one. In any case, it doesn't seem like Miku is going to let me go from sleeping in her room anytime soon.