"…Um, sorry, can you give me a second?"
I left the intercom and quickly went to Asanagi's side.
"…Yuu is here?"
"Yeah. She's still at the entrance though… By the way, when you left the house today did she, by any chance, see you?"
"No. No way I would get careless like that…"
Besides, Amami-san's house and Asanagi's house were quite a distance away from each other, so it would be unlikely that she saw Asanagi leave her house by chance unless she camped somewhere nearby. But there was no way Amami-san would do that, she had no reason to.
In other words, she came here because she was convinced that Asanagi would be at my house today.
This exact day, during this exact hour.
"Asanagi, have you told Amami-san about our relationship?"
"…"
"So you haven't?"
"…Sorry. There wasn't a good enough time to bring the topic up."
Even if I were to blame her, it was too late already. Besides, she hadn't really done anything wrong.
Anyway, if Asanagi hadn't told Amami-san about this, that meant at some point she noticed that we were unusually close with each other.
If I were to play dumb and try to fool her… No, that wouldn't work. Knowing Amami-san, she would probably have double-checked it with Asanagi's house before she even came here.
I guess we had no other choice, huh?
"Maehara… That… I'm sorry…"
"It's fine. I told you to hide it because I didn't want to deal with the noise that other classmates would make. If we explain this properly to Amami-san, I'm sure she'll understand."
"…"
Now that she found out about our relationship, the best thing we could do is to explain properly. That way no one would be hurt more than they already were.
"Are you fine with this, Asanagi?"
"…Yes."
I let Asanagi sit by the table and invited Amami-san in.
The air inside the house felt stifling.
"…Umi."
"Yuu…"
Asanagi could only turn her gaze away from Amami-san's sharp gaze.
Their position was now reversed. Amami-san was now dominating Asanagi, who had a pitiful look on her face.
"Amami-san, care for a drink?"
"Don't worry, I'm going home after this. I don't want to interrupt your precious time together any more than this… I'm sure you'd prefer it that way. Right, Umi?"
"No, that's…"
"Asanagi, let me."
If I let the two of them talk in this kind of mood, the atmosphere would get worse than it already was. I had to intervene.
"Amami-san, when did you notice?"
"Just recently. But I had my suspicions for a few months now. I mean, Umi kept refusing my invitations and she kept using the same excuse, of course I would get suspicious from that."
"That early, huh…?"
That should be around the time when we first befriended each other. I thought we were being extremely careful during that period.
Guess we underestimated Amami-san a little too much, huh?
"You know… Everyone in the class might disregard you both and keep their attention on me, but… I've always paid the closest attention to my best friend, Umi…"
Asanagi and I got to know each other behind the other classmates' backs. We used Amami-san's reputation as the cutest girl in class as a cover because she was the only one that everyone paid attention to. After we got to know each other, we surprisingly hit it off pretty well. Since then, we started hanging out with each other every week. She even stayed over at my house once, and our parents even got acquainted with each other.
Asanagi kept turning down Amami-san's invitation, using 'having work to do at home' as an excuse. But in truth, she was hanging out with a classmate. I guess Amami-san felt left out because of this…
"Umi, why haven't you told me anything about Maki-kun? I've been waiting, you know? I've been waiting for you to tell me, but you never did…"
"T-that's…"
"My bad, Amami-san, I was the one who told her to not tell anyone. I didn't want the people in class to make a fuss about us, right, Asanagi?"
"…Ah, mhm… We wanted to keep it a secret for the time being…"
There was no doubt that this mess started because of me. I was the one who told her to not tell anyone about our relationship. But why did Asanagi look so down?
It was my fault, why was she acting like it was her fault?
Could it be that she was actually enjoying keeping our relationship a secret? And now she felt guilty because of it?
"Umi, is that true? Is Maki-kun telling me the truth?"
"…"
It wasn't a lie.
It wasn't a lie, Asanagi, why didn't you answer her?
"Umi, why aren't you saying anything? Don't you trust me? Is our relationship actually only one-sided? You've stopped thinking of me as your best friend?"
"…I-I still think of you as my best friend… even though I kept my relationship with Maehara a secret, you're still my best friend, Yuu…"
"Then why didn't you tell me about this right away? If you wanted to keep your relationship a secret from the rest of the class, I could keep my mouth shut, you just needed to ask…"
True. Also, we already decided that we should tell her about our relationship back when Asanagi stayed over.
But in the end, Asanagi didn't tell her anything about us.
"…You're right… If it's you, you'd be able to keep a secret and prevent anyone from meddling with us…"
"Then, why didn't you?…"
"Sorry, I can't tell you why… I don't want to tell you…"
Asanagi squeezed the hem of my shirt tightly.
I've been wondering why she hadn't told Amami-san about our relationship.
I guess she had her own reason for it.
"…Sorry, Maehara. It's late already. Mom will be worried if I stay here any longer, so I'm going home."
"Ah, Umi, if you're leaving, I'm going–"
"Yuu, you just arrived, so you should stay. Have some coffee first and relax or something. Sorry, I need some time alone… Also… I can't bring myself to face you right now… Sorry…"
"Umi…"
That was a clear rejection from Asanagi.
It was the first time that I'd seen a crack in the relationship between the two of them.
"…Sorry, Yuu… I'm the worst, aren't I?"
"Ah, Umi–"
"See you later, Maehara. Thanks for inviting me today… It was a lot of fun."
Asanagi made a lonely smile before she stormed out of the room.
"Hey, Maki-kun… What should I do…? I…"
"…"
Should we chase after her? Or should we leave her alone for now?
I don't know. I just don't know…