Our Dating Story: The Experienced You and The Inexperienced Me - Volume 1 - Chapter 5.1

Chapter 5

Until just a short while ago, I’d thought it would be terrible if people were to find out Shirakawa-san and I were dating. I’d expected them to stare at me curiously, or point their fingers at me and laugh... Hell, I’d even imagined them showering me with abuse when I walked past them.

That was why, on the day following my revelation, it was anticlimactic how surprisingly normal everything was in my class.

If I had to mention some kind of change, there was only a minor one...

“Good morning, Kashima-kun.”

As we passed each other, several girls from my class whom I’d never talked to before greeted me.

“G-Good morning...” I replied to them.

As I stood there in confusion, the group of girls went to a corner of the room and started whispering to each other.

“I never cared since he doesn’t stand out, but Kashima-kun isn’t so bad, right?”

“He looks kind. It’s not like he’s ugly either.”

“Yeah, he must be nice if Shirakawa-san of all people chose him!”

From the scraps of their conversation that I could hear, it didn’t sound like they were bad-mouthing me.

As I got to my desk, Kurose-san glanced at me from her adjacent seat.

“Ah... Good morning,” I said, since our eyes met.

It was still awkward after what had happened the previous day, and I thought she might ignore me, but...

“G-Good morning,” she replied quietly. Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes swayed to and fro in apparent embarrassment.

I assumed it was awkward for her too and decided against trying to talk to her further.

However, during the end-of-day homeroom...

The class had to submit our classwork, so everyone started passing their papers forward from the rear seats to the front. Once we collected them, we’d need to put them on the teacher’s desk. After I had all the papers from my row, I looked toward Kurose-san, who was still waiting for people to pass them.

“Kurose-san,” I addressed her, planning to hand her the papers from my row.

She was looking away from me, and her shoulders trembled. However, it didn’t seem like she would be turning around. I assumed she hadn’t heard me, so I tapped her shoulder.

“Agh!” Letting out a quiet shriek, she then turned my way. Her face was bright red, and she looked so put off that you’d think she was dealing with a molester. “Hey! D-Don’t touch me all of a sudden!”

“Huh? S-Sorry.”

“I hate you!”

I went silent at that. It seemed she really couldn’t stand me now.

No wonder, I guess... After I talked the way I did yesterday, like I was lecturing her...

Those thoughts lingered in my head as we finished submitting the papers. After that, the teacher started handing out printed notices and the class became noisier.

“Hey.” Kurose-san was starting a conversation with me this time, taking me by surprise.

“Yeah?”

As I looked at her, wondering what she wanted, she shot me a few glances and her earlobes went red.

“I...feel bad about what I did,” she finally said. “I called and apologized last night.”

“Huh?” I needed a moment to process what she was talking about. “You mean you called Shirakawa-san?”

Kurose-san nodded. “So... Could you not come to hate me...?” Her voice trailed off at the end.

Since she spoke with embarrassment, with a red face and lowered eyes—

“What...?”

—for the briefest of moments, I couldn’t help finding her cute.

I was dumbstruck. Why is she asking me that? Didn’t she just say she hates me...?

I pondered that for a while, but then it hit me: she’d been making an effort to get people to like her. It must’ve been hard for her to bear the thought of me hating her after what had happened the day before.

That was how I interpreted her attitude, and it was a satisfying explanation.

“It’s okay; I don’t hate you.”

As I gave my reply, Kurose-san looked at me like she was about to cry. But the next moment, she turned away from me without a word, facing forward but hanging her head.

“Huh...?” I uttered, wondering if I’d given the wrong reply.

Either way, there was nothing more I could say to her. I decided to leave her alone for a while. Perhaps, with time, the awkwardness between us would disappear and we’d be able to act like normal classmates.

With that wish on my mind, I put the handout from the teacher into my bag and got ready to go home.

***

Something I realized over the next few days at school was that people didn’t concern themselves with others as much as I’d used to think.

One day, during break time, Shirakawa-san unexpectedly came to my seat.

“Morning, Ryuto!”

“M-Morning...”

I supposed she’d assumed it was okay now that everybody knew. Since I’d almost never talked to her at school before, I was nervous, minding the eyes around us.

“Hey, check out my nails. I did them myself yesterday!”

Shirakawa-san showed off her flashy nails to me—which were totally against the school rules—but I found myself too worried about who might be watching us.

Contrary to my expectations, however, people didn’t care as much as I’d thought they would. Sure, some of them stole glances at us from far away, but the vast majority of my classmates were preoccupied with themselves instead.

“That’s how it is, I guess,” I said.

What was I even afraid of? This is how it goes with people who aren’t involved.

“Come on, look at them!” urged Shirakawa-san, persistent in her efforts to show me the results of her hard work. She thrust her hands in front of my eyes while I was distracted.

“Oh, right, sorry,” I replied, looking at her once again.

“Aren’t they cute? Whatcha think?”

Hers were the delicate, pretty hands of a girl, with fingers and nails on the long side.

If I were an experienced flirt, this would probably be the part where I’d skillfully take her hand and say, “You’re right, they’re beautiful,” or something. I wouldn’t be fazed by physical contact either.

Obviously, however, that wouldn’t be like me. I didn’t feel like I could act that way, and I didn’t want to either.

“What’s wrong? You don’t like nails like these?”

I’d been staring at Shirakawa-san’s hands with such a stern expression on my face that a dubious look appeared on hers too.

“Ah, no, I think they’re nice. They suit you.”

At my hurried reply, Shirakawa-san smiled like a blooming flower. “Glad you like them! I did a pretty good job, right? Nicole complimented them too.”

After saying that with pride, Shirakawa-san must’ve been satisfied, because she returned to her group of good-looking girls.

At the same time, even the few classmates who had been glancing our way seemed to lose interest and averted their eyes.

With that, I learned that people hadn’t started talking about us as much as I’d feared. However, that still left the problem of not having touched Shirakawa-san at all unresolved, giving me a pent-up feeling.

Nothing had changed about my desire to treasure her, so it wasn’t like I was suddenly getting wild ideas such as wanting to have sex with her. Not that I didn’t want to, of course.

Instead, if Shirakawa-san now liked me more than she’d used to, I wanted us to have a corresponding level of physical intimacy.

But that would be putting it in a roundabout way. To put it bluntly, I wanted to kiss her! The mere thought of it had me feeling like a nosebleed was coming on.

I wanna do it... I wanna kiss her! But I haven’t the slightest idea how to make it happen!

What technique could I use to bring about such a development? If this were a soap opera, two people’s eyes would’ve suddenly met, and they’d be drawn to each other, moving closer until they ultimately kissed...but I didn’t expect such a scenario to be in store for me.

For a few days now, I had thought about this constantly, barely getting any sleep at night. I’d agonized over the subject so much that I could see myself collapsing.

I couldn’t possibly express such a desire to Shirakawa-san directly. Having put on airs by telling her I wanted to treasure her, I didn’t want to do something that would make her think I was actually only after her body.

How did couples around the world make physical contact naturally? What kind of opportunities led to it? How did they decide to take action?

I wondered whom I could ask for advice at times like these—and then I realized that in the end, I could only turn to them.

***

During lunch break, I was eating from my lunch box alongside the other two-thirds of my usual trio.

Icchi put his chopsticks down all of a sudden. “Kasshi.”

“Huh? What is it?” I asked.

This was Icchi we were talking about—a guy who’d never let go of his bowl once he’d started digging in until it was empty. He was totally obsessed with food. And he, of all people, had just interrupted his meal while his lunch box was still more than half full.

I watched him as I thought about this, and Icchi suddenly bowed before me.

“I’m sorry! I should’ve believed you when you said you were going out with Shirakawa-san.” Speaking with integrity, he let his shoulders droop. “I was so frustrated that I didn’t want to believe it. But I realized I had to when I saw what you and Shirakawa-san were like the other day. We’re friends and all. You two really are dating, I guess. I’m happy for you. Hard to believe it started from me forcing you to confess.”

“Icchi...”

Had this been weighing on Icchi these past few days since that incident in class?

I started to feel moved, but Nisshi, sitting beside him, folded his arms. “Well, I’m not gonna apologize,” he said with the air of a stubborn father, shooting me a glare. “So what if we’re harsh on you? You still get to have a good time with Shirakawa-san on weekends. Go to hell, normie!”

“Nisshi...”

But then again, I couldn’t be sure I wouldn’t have been just as spiteful had I been in Nisshi’s shoes. Icchi was just too nice a guy.

Suddenly, Icchi drew closer to me. “So, did you do it? You must’ve done it by now. Come on, out with it!”

“Huh? What’s with you?!” I asked.

Dude, your eyes are all bloodshot! I thought you were a nice guy!

“Yeah, about that...” I began. I explained my current troubles to the two.

“I see,” said Icchi, though he looked exhausted. “You want to kiss Shirakawa-san, but you don’t know how to go about it. And so you’d like to start by holding hands with her and need some ideas.”

“Are we really the right people to talk to about this...?” added Nisshi, looking like a boxer completely burnt out after a bout.

“S-Sorry. I just don’t have anyone else to turn to...” I hurriedly explained.

Icchi and Nisshi exchanged glances and sighed. Then, they looked at me with resolve written on their faces.

“Fine. Might as well use our brains to make Kasshi a man.”

“Yeah. Let’s think of a plan that will not only get him to hold hands with her, but bring them closer too.”

You guys...!

“Thanks! You two are a huge help.”

That said, my friends were hardly any better off than me in terms of experience. Three virgins wouldn’t have the insight of a playboy.

“How about saying you can read palms?”

“That would be a straight-up lie. It’s not like I could read anything if she showed me her hand,” I replied.

“You could just make something up—how would she know?”

“I don’t want to lie to her.”

“Then how about going like, ‘Man, it’s so cold! My hands are gonna freeze!’ or something?”

“That’s so roundabout that it’s annoying! She’d think I was just playing up being sensitive to the cold!”

“At this point, why not just directly ask her to hold hands?”

“If I could, I wouldn’t be asking you guys for help...”

“Man, you’re hard to please.”

After giving me as many ideas as they could on the spot, the two were stumped.

Nisshi was the first to throw in the towel. “Man, screw this!”

Next, Icchi looked up and tossed his hands in the air, totally fed up. “Yeah, this is totally beyond us! It’s not even like I can hold hands with a girl.” He then heaved a huge sigh.

“Come on, guys,” I pleaded. “I need your help...”

“Dude, seriously, forget it. Go worry about it all by yourself.”

“I know I tried to sound cool earlier, but I’ve been this close to dying of jealousy and crying tears of blood this entire time.”

The two had utterly haggard looks on their faces and started to back away from me.

“Let’s leave this normie alone and go watch KEN’s new videos or something,” said Nisshi.

As I heard his words—

“KEN’s videos...”

—an idea sprang to mind.

“Of course! I should’ve thought about KEN,” I said. Maybe even I can pull this off. “Thanks, guys!”

As Icchi and Nisshi sat there with their mouths hanging open, I got up from my seat—I wanted to gather my thoughts somewhere quiet.

I couldn’t think of anywhere else to go, so I headed to the bathroom. On the way, I thought about the idea I’d gotten from KEN’s playstyle.

In battle royale shooters, KEN often lured opposing players along a path of his choice before attacking them. Since he was a former pro gamer, his aim was extremely accurate—as long as he could make an opponent walk into an area with no obstacles, he would hit every shot.

Couldn’t I do the same thing? That is, rather than taking the initiative to hold hands with Shirakawa-san myself, I could create a situation where she would reach her hand out to me of her own accord. But how?

The first thought that came to me was a haunted house, but I shook it away immediately. Shirakawa-san seemed to be okay with ghosts and such. She’d mentioned watching a foreign horror movie over LINE the night before.

That left the physical approach—specifically, taking her to a place with unsteady footing. Something like a suspended bridge would’ve been ideal, but I didn’t think there were any in my area. That wasn’t a realistic date location either. A large pool of water that blocked your path would work too, but I had even less of an idea where to find one of those. It wasn’t like I could search for one online.

Then, after all the thinking, it finally occurred to me.

“A pond.”

We could take a boat out on a pond. Getting on and off would be ideal for creating moments of unsteadiness. And most importantly, boat rides were fitting and natural for dates.

It was perfect.

“All riiiiight!!!”

After impulsively shouting from within a stall in the boys’ bathroom, I quickly came to my senses and got embarrassed. A few minutes would pass before I could finally leave.

***

That day after school, Shirakawa-san walked up to me.

“Hey, Ryuto! Let’s go home together!” she said.

“Huh?!”

While I was taken aback, Shirakawa-san looked at my face with upturned eyes.

“We can’t...? People know now that we’re going out, so why not do it every now and then from now on?”

“Y-Yeah, okay, I guess...” I said, relenting.

“Great!” Shirakawa-san said cheerfully.

Thus, we ended up leaving school together.

“What about Yamana-san? You’re not leaving together?” I asked.

“Nicole has to work today. It’s fiiine; we’ll talk on the phone at night.”

“She has a job? Where?”

“A bar.”

“Huh. That kinda suits her.”

“She said she had an interview at a family restaurant first, but they turned her away because of her nails and hair color. Said it was demotivating,” she explained.

“I see.”

“Nicole gets home late when she has work, so we end up calling each other late at night.”

That explained their long phone conversations before weekends.

“What about you? You don’t have a job?” I asked.

“Nah, I’ll pass on that. Nicole tells me about some real bad customers sometimes, and that sounds stressful. I get by with the allowance my grandma gives me here and there.”

“I hear you.”

Then, Shirakawa-san stared at my face. “Wait, should I be working somewhere too?”

“Nah, that’s not it...”

I’d simply imagined her in a work uniform for a moment.

“I just thought about how a uniform from a cake shop would suit you.”

Hearing that, Shirakawa-san opened her eyes very wide. “Oh, that? And hold on—a cake shop?! You’re into cutesy stuff, I see.”