My Stepsister is My Ex-Girlfriend - Volume 12 - Chapter 4.2

Akatsuki Minami: You’re the Only Guy for Me

Let me preface this story with the fact that the walls are thin in our apartment building. Because of that I heard someone asking him out, someone whose voice sounded familiar. She sounded just like the girl that Kawanami had been good friends with in middle school. They’d been so close that I got jealous of them when he and I dated. They always acted like they were guy friends, though, so ultimately, I let my guard down with regard to her. But right now that very girl was asking out my ex.

I had no right to complain. Over the past year and a half, a lot of things had happened, and he and I still weren’t exactly back to where we used to be. There was absolutely nothing wrong about a single guy being asked out by a single girl. If anything, it made sense to me. Makoto Koyama had more in common with Kawanami than I did, knew him better than I did, was cuter than I was—not to mention more cheerful—and...she wouldn’t be as clingy as I would be.

If I had to compare the situation...it’d be like Irido-kun dating Higashira-san. They didn’t end up dating, though, so how would things play out for me? It wouldn’t have been weird if they started dating. If anything, it was weird that they didn’t end up dating. When a guy and a girl who were as thick as thieves reunited after a long time, it’d make sense for them to realize just how important they were to each other and make the decision to date.

Maybe that was okay. Maybe it was for the best. Oh. I’ve already come to accept it in my head. It made more sense for him to date Koyama-san than a mental case like me. He’d have a much easier time and a much healthier romance. I understood this even if I didn’t want to. My heart felt like it was cracking. But this was the punishment I deserved. If this could help him get back the years he missed out on, then working to cure him over this year and a half was good.

Then I heard him ask if she was serious. In the place where my love ended, I started feeling joy—or I should’ve...

When I heard her say that she was serious, there was a heavy sound like something had fallen. After a while, I heard the sound of someone frantically running away and a door opening and closing. What happened? Out of curiosity, I poked my head out of my front door and saw a familiar girl frantically running down the hall. After losing sight of her, I left my apartment and went to the one next door. It was unlocked. I guess Koyama-san ran away without locking the door.

“What happened...? Are you okay?” I asked in a hesitant voice as I opened his door.

When I went into the living room, I saw him passed out, curled up, with vomit on the carpet.

“A-Are you okay?!”

I panicked and ran over to him. As soon as I looked down on him, balled up, I realized what’d happened. His allergy... I thought it was already healed. He’s not even affected by anything I do anymore.

I’d started exposure therapy because I knew that one day his allergy would hurt someone’s feelings, and now he wasn’t breaking out into hives over a bit of flirting...or at least that’s what I’d thought. But why had the thing I feared most happened?! For the time being, I needed to do something about him. I squatted next to him.

“Are you okay? You conscious?” I asked while slowly reaching for him.

“Don’t...touch me.” After hearing his groaning voice, I stopped. “Your clothes’ll...get dirty.”

Kawanami’s clothes were dripping with vomit and even in his mostly unconscious state, he was worried about it getting on me.

“Ugh, you idiot!” I didn’t have time to try and convince him. I stood up and stripped down to just my bra and panties. “Look, now I won’t get my clothes dirty!”

I put my arm underneath his armpit and began to move his body slowly, taking him away from where he’d thrown up. By that point, he’d completely lost consciousness. His eyes were shut and he looked like he was hurting.

What do I do? What’s best for me to do here? Should I take him to his bed? But maybe it’s best to take off his clothes first. Otherwise his bed’ll get dirty. I laid him on the ground and pulled both of his arms up over his head so I could take off his shirt. Then I took off his shorts. For the time being, I left his clothes there and took him to his room.

I took a breath and then realized that it probably wasn’t the best to leave the living room in the dirty state that it was in. It’d be a whole thing to have to explain what happened here to his parents if they came home.

I found a cleaning rag and then wiped away most of the vomit. It sucked that there was still a stain, but it wasn’t any different from a stain from a juice spill or something. After that, I washed his clothes in the bathtub before throwing them into the washing machine. After turning it on, I went back to Kawanami’s room to check on him.

He was out cold on his bed, still practically naked. I put a blanket over him, but that probably wasn’t enough to keep him warm. I need to put clothes on him... I began searching through his drawers and found pajamas, but try as I might, it was much harder to put clothes on an unconscious person than it was to take them off.

I stood up, still holding his pajamas. What should I do now? I already had an answer. What should I do? Even so, I repeated this question in my head, not looking at reality. What should I do?

Why did it have to be you? Maybe because I wasn’t frantically rushing around anymore, I suddenly found I wasn’t panicking anymore. Now all that was left in my head were complaints and regrets.

No matter how much I thought about it, I couldn’t figure out why. There were all kinds of guys in that same middle school classroom. Takahara was good at any sport he tried, Tsukishima was really chill; even outside of our classroom, there were some cute underclassmen and reliable upperclassmen. And honestly, even outside of guys, there were a lot of girls that were just as great. For example, Takinaka-senpai was a star in track and Midori-chan looked up to me.

But out of all these people, for some reason, it still had to be Kogure Kawanami. We only became friends by pure chance. Sure, he was a funny guy, considerate, and sometimes a gentleman, but there were so many better options than him for me to fall for. But somehow, it was Kogure Kawanami.

I’m sure this plays right into the age-old question “Why do people fall in love?” It was a question with no answer, so instead of spending my time thinking about one, it would’ve been more productive to work a part-time job or something. Even so, I couldn’t stop thinking about Kogure Kawanami, no matter how pointless it was, no matter how silly it was—as if I had some lingering feelings for him. He occupied so much space in my head without even deserving it.

What am I even doing here? I wondered as I looked down at him as he slept. I didn’t have the right to be here. I was just a third wheel no matter where I went. There was a perfect person for him and I had no doubt I was just in the way. Koyama-san was much cuter than me. She was much more cheerful than me. She was so much more...

Why did it have to be you? My friends always told me there were plenty of fish in the sea, but for some reason I couldn’t stop thinking about him. I had no clue why I couldn’t stop thinking about him to the point that I was standing in front of his bed. Much to my chagrin there was only one Kogure Kawanami in the world. If I could redo middle school, could things turn out differently? Could nobody have been hurt now?

Why does it hurt so much? It wasn’t possible for someone to become someone else’s. No matter how close you were, how much you loved each other, how long you’d been dating, even if you got married and stayed that way until you died, nobody could become someone else’s possession. That’s why there was no such thing as “losing” someone.

Even if that guy I was so close with was with someone else and not me, it would be impudent to say that I lost him. But even so...I thought I didn’t want to lose him. I thought about how I wanted him for myself. I didn’t want him to leave. I wanted him to be with me. For that’s sake, I’d become as cute as I needed to be. I’d act like a girly girl as much as I needed to. I’d do all this even if it meant we couldn’t be friends anymore. If the alternative was losing him, then, I... I would...

I dropped his pajamas on the ground and went back to the living room, and found something that I’d noticed the minute I’d come in here. There was a can of beer on the living room table. Right now, there were two things I needed. One was a way to warm up Kawanami. The other was the courage to be selfish again.

I picked up the can, pulled the tab, and drank the warm beer down to the last drop. I could feel it soaking my throat, all the way to the depths of my stomach. Then when I was sure there wasn’t any left, I tossed the can in with the recycling.

Warmth radiated from deep within me. It was like my brain was floating. Is this what it’s like to be drunk? I feel so free. My brain wasn’t holding my body back anymore. I could let my emotions take over.

Ko-kun. I went to his room as if spurred on by something. Ko-kun. I knelt on the bed and got underneath the blanket. Our almost naked bodies touched and I felt his smooth but firm skin. Ko-kun... Ko-kun... Ko-kun... I don’t want you dating someone else. I want you to always be with me. I don’t want you to look at other girls. I want you to only ever look at me. I want you to only touch my body. I won’t say anything selfish anymore. I won’t do anything selfish anymore. I won’t cause problems for anyone.

I wrapped my arms around him and held him tightly in order to warm him up...in order to not let anyone take him away from me.

There’s only one guy for me. For me, it’s just him. Not even Yume-chan or that time I tried to get with Irido-kun...nobody could take your place. Even if someone tells me that I just don’t know what’s out there, or that I’m casting a very small net, there was never a choice for me besides Kogure Kawanami. I’m sorry that your childhood friend is such a mental case, but I promise I’ll take responsibility. I’ll take responsibility for making you like this, so please... Please don’t leave me!

Kogure Kawanami: Break

“This is just who I am,” A-chan admitted in a soft voice that melted into the night. “I can’t be kind like Yume-chan. I can’t separate my feelings like Higashira-san can. All I can do is be self-centered, stuck in the past, and cling to others. I’m pathetic. I’m just a parasite...”

It was like she was dissecting herself with a sharp knife. She might have been trying to punish herself by spilling everything that was inside her. Or maybe she just couldn’t hold anything in anymore.

“Pretty annoying to have someone lay all this on you as if they’re expecting you to comfort them, right? It’s not too late, you know? I bet Koyama-san’s not this type of person.”

“Then why did you help me yesterday?” When I was trapped in my own delusions and thought that the entire world was my enemy, she found me crouched down and crying in the hallway of the karaoke place. “You already remembered what happened that night by that point, didn’t you?”

“Yeah... I remembered after we came home from Ichijoji after I got undressed.”

“And so just like what you said, you feel bad for what you did that night, right?”

“Yeah... I wanna crawl into a hole and die. It makes me sick how shallow a person I am.”

“That’s why during the reunion you stayed away from me, right? But then why did you come to me and tell me that you’d help me? That we should run away?”

A-chan stayed silent for a little before finally saying the truth. “Because I’d made up my mind.”

“About what?”

“There’s no way to go back in time. There’s no way to pretend nothing ever happened. That’s why I made up my mind to take responsibility. No matter how you felt at the end of everything...all I could do was accept how you ended up.”

That was why she’d tried to tempt me like that at the hotel? She was trying to take everything on by herself because she was the only one that didn’t trigger my allergy.

“But that ended up being a swing and a miss too. You really hurt my pride as a girl.”

“That’s what you think?” I replied without any hesitation. “If you didn’t take me to Osaka... If you didn’t tempt me like that...I might’ve fallen apart. It’s only because of you that I was able to calm down, and I...” The night breeze brushed past my ears and the burning character in the mountains was going to be extinguished soon. “Hey, A-chan?”

“Wait!” she shouted, cutting me off. “You just turned down Koyama-san, right? You should wait a bit, you know? Like a mourning period.”

“Is that really what you’re worried about?”

“I-It’s kinda cold, huh? The fire’s almost out too. Let’s go back inside.”

A-chan’s ponytail flipped as she turned around, disappearing behind the white barrier between us. It’s okay to break it, right? After all, this is definitely an emergency. I kicked it as hard as I could and broke through it.

“Huh?!”

A-chan turned around, her hand still on the glass of the balcony. In that instant, I grabbed her hand so she couldn’t run away anymore. A-chan, Akatsuki Minami looked up at me, stunned.

“Wh-What are you—”

“It was an emergency.” I forcefully pulled her small body against mine and pressed my lips against hers.

I could feel her breathing. Her body felt different from when we were at the hotel. It was soft and warm, but also so small, dainty, and fragile. That was all I could feel on this midsummer evening. When I finally took my lips off of hers, I could see her wide eyes and red face.

“I’m sorry for making you wait so long,” I continued while looking into her eyes. “I fell for you once, then I hated you, and then I fell for you all over again. Please go out with me again.”

Akatsuki opened her mouth a little and her lips quivered before she shut them. Tears welled up in her eyes and she lay her face against my chest as if to hide them.

“I’m...crazy. You know that, right? Dating me is like navigating a minefield.”

“I know.”

“I might go too crazy again...”

“I’ll warn you.”

“I might never listen to you...”

“Then I’ll run away. I know you’re the kind of person that just needs time.”

“I... I... What I did to you...”

“Any mistake you made can be fixed. I make mistakes too. Back in middle school, I couldn’t say no to you. There’s nobody out there who’s perfect, but it’s not right to never fix your mistakes.”

That’s why last year when you lost your mind with the Irido siblings, I just watched. But if I had any regrets, if I had anything that I wanted to change, then...

“I accept you, and all your mistakes. I’ll stick with you until you fix all of them. I’ve been there from the beginning because we’re childhood friends, and I’ll stay with you to the end.”

Akatsuki silently tugged at my shirt and cried into it. I held her small back until the last of the fire in the distance died out.