Our Dating Story: The Experienced You and The Inexperienced Me - Volume 2 - Chapter 1

Chapter 1

July came, and so did the first summer since I started going out with Shirakawa-san. The end of the rainy season hadn’t been announced yet, but the weather was clear today and the temperature was said to be over thirty-five degrees Celsius. The air felt no different from how it was at the height of summer.

And yet, as the two of us left school and walked to the station together, Shirakawa-san had an expression as overcast as a rainy day.

“Man, finals start tomorrow... I’m so totally done for!” she exclaimed from beside me, scratching her head and looking up at the sky with despair in her eyes. “I’m done like a well-done steak!”

“Steak? Now you’re making me hungry,” I said.

“Oh, come on! And what about you, anyway? Are you, like, all prepared for it or something?”

“N-Not really...”

End-of-term tests would be starting the following day. The first day’s exams were going to be English grammar, a science course of our choice, and home economics.

“There’s nothing I can do about English grammar at this point other than look up some words, and the same goes for chemistry... I do plan to memorize some stuff for home economics tonight, though,” I said.

“Oh, you’re doing chemistry? I’m doing biology, but it’s completely beyond me. Like seriously, I’m so finished I’m Finnish!”

“Do you have any Finnish relatives?”

“Huh? I don’t know...” After looking puzzled for a moment, Shirakawa-san pouted. “So, like, are you one of those super smart guys? English grammar by itself is hell enough, but you already have it all down except for some words, right?”

“Uh, no, not exactly...” I got flustered since I didn’t want her to expect too much of me.

She then stared at me with upturned eyes.

“Wh-What?” I asked.

“What was your English grammar midterm score?”

“Huh? Let me think...”

I recalled that I’d made a mistake in an important grammatical construction and got a lower score than I’d expected. Then again, it hadn’t been bad enough to keep it a secret, so I had no choice but to come clean.

“Seventy-eight or seventy-nine...I think,” I replied.

I still remembered how frustrating it had been not to hit the eighty-point mark.

However, when Shirakawa-san heard my confession, her eyes began to sparkle. “Wow, damn!”

For a moment I wondered how she meant it, but judging by the awe in her eyes, it didn’t seem to be negative.

“You really are smart, Ryuto! I only got a thirty-five... I worked pretty hard at it too...”

“Oh...”

I could tell her she’d still done better than Icchi the other day, but that would probably only confuse her.

“The stuff we’re getting tested on this time is completely beyond me,” said Shirakawa-san. “I’m totally getting a lower score on these than I did on the midterms...”

“What about vocabulary? That section always has ten questions, so if you study all the relevant words now, I think you’re guaranteed to raise your score by ten points.”

“Huh? How’s that even possible? I mean, weren’t there a hundred words?”

“Don’t you already know some of them, though? You could just focus on the ones you haven’t memorized...”

“Whaaat?! I really didn’t know anything, huh... Wow, Ryuto, you’re amazing...”

I’d meant to simply give her advice, but it seemed I ended up cornering her instead. Shirakawa-san slumped her shoulders and had a melancholic look on her face.

“Before an exam day, I always think how I should’ve studied better, or how I should put in more effort next time...” said Shirakawa-san. “But right after the tests are over, our classes start covering new topics. I’m lost and just sit there absent-minded from the very start. I can’t understand much because they continue from the previous material.”

“I see...”

“I’m sure if I was like you and actually learned something every time, tests would probably just be sort of an extension of the usual studies...”

I went silent at that. It wasn’t like I was trying to assert dominance by being better at studying because I was an introvert, but I’d still managed to completely bring down Shirakawa-san’s mood.

While it wasn’t for the sake of apologizing, I wondered if there was something I could do... Suddenly, it hit me.

“Oh, so... If you like, we could study together after this,” I suggested.

Finals began tomorrow, so we’d left school early today—before noon. We’d just been thinking of where to eat lunch, so my suggestion was a “while we’re at it” sort of thing.

“Huh?” Shirakawa-san opened her eyes wide, looking thoroughly astonished. “Study...together...?”

“Yeah. If you want, of course. I’m not perfect, but I think I more or less know all the material, so I might be able to teach you something.”

“Wait, you can study with other people? I can’t even teach you anything.”

“Don’t worry about it. You know what they say—you can only teach people if you truly know the subject. By teaching you, I might find something I myself don’t understand.”

“Oh... I guess you can see it that way...” Shirakawa-san looked up at me. “I’d be really happy to. I can’t focus when I’m alone because before I know it, I’m working on my nails or something. I think even I’ll be able to study if it’s with you!”

Her expression was full of expectations and joy, like that of a child about to head on a field trip.

However, thirty minutes later, a shadow was already forming on her face.

Shirakawa-san sighed. “What is this? I’m totally clueless about this stuff.”

Sitting across the table from me at the McDonald’s in front of Station A (the same one I’d gone to with Yamana-san recently), Shirakawa-san was holding her head. An open textbook sat in front of her.

“What part don’t you get?” I asked.

“All of it. The whole thing. Like, this sentence—does it even make sense? What is this?”

Shirakawa-san pointed at an English sentence that read “He is the last man to tell a lie.”

“Oh, this. Okay, so, do you know what ‘tell a lie’ means in English?”

“Uh... ‘Teru a rie’? Oh, I got it—is it a phone call? My grandma often tells me to ‘teru’ her if I need something.”

“Wow...”

The “teru” Shirakawa-san was talking about meant a phone call in Japanese. This was more serious than I’d thought.

“Okay, then do you get the part that comes before it?” I asked.

She read the first part of the English sentence again. “‘He is the last man’...?”

“That’s right. ‘Tell a lie’ means the same as not being truthful. A literal translation to Japanese would be like, ‘He is the last person to tell a lie.’”

“But what does that mean...?”

“Say, for example, that all people in the world told lies. If we put them in order by how many lies they tell, he’d be at the end of that list. That’s what it means.”

“Huh, I see...?”

“Do you understand? Basically, in Japanese, that man would be described by a word that means honest and faithful.”

“Yeah. That’s totally you, though, right?”

Her words prompted me to look at her.

“Huh?”

Shirakawa-san smiled at me. “If all guys in the world cheated, I think you’d be the last one to do it. That’s what I believe.” With that, she cast her eyes down and smiled happily. “I’ve never dated anyone who made me feel this way before.”

“Shirakawa-san...”

I was embarrassed and scratched my chin for no particular reason. Of course, I had no intention of cheating on her whatsoever, but having her place so much trust in me felt ticklish.

“Anyway, that covers that. Do you understand that sentence now?” I asked.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, let’s go to the next one.”

Since it was awkward, I tried to quickly advance things, but then...

“Hey, hold on a sec,” said Shirakawa-san. She got up, taking her notebook and a mechanical pencil in hand. Then, she got close and sat beside me.

We were at a table for two people, sitting face-to-face. Until now, Shirakawa-san had sat on a chair while I was sitting on a bench seat set up along a wall. My seat was connected to a nearby table, so there was, indeed, space for two people to sit.

“Huh...? Huh?!” I was flustered by her sudden approach.

Shirakawa-san grinned at me. “It’s easier to see like this, right?”

Just like she said, if we sat side by side, we wouldn’t need to go to the trouble of turning the textbook sideways and trying to read it like that.

“Y-Yeah. Okay, so the next one...”

I tried to move things along to hide my internal turmoil. However...

“Okay, I got it,” she would say and nod. Her hair beside me would then gently sway, and a floral-or-fruity scent would tickle my nostrils every time.

Focus, me!

Also... There was something I noticed earlier.

Other tables in our row had other pairs of guys and girls sitting together. I didn’t know if they were couples or just friends, but in everyone else’s case, the girl was sitting by the wall... That is, where we were sitting now.

Was this an unspoken rule? Like, that the girl had to sit by the wall? Or was it just that girls got priority on bench seats...? I couldn’t tell, but somehow, I started to feel uncomfortable.

“Um... So... And this is like...” I began, trying to refocus on English grammar.

But when I looked down, Shirakawa-san’s white thighs, peeking out from under her skirt, caught my attention.

I wanted to touch them...but a guy like me couldn’t do such a thing all of a sudden. I’d just be a pervert.

We’re studying here; stop getting all horny. Get a hold of yourself, me!

“What’s wrong, Ryuto?”

“Huh?! Oh, uh... So basically...”

In the end, Shirakawa-san asked, “Huh, what does that mean?” three times before we finally got through the page.

“Oh, so that’s what it meant,” said Shirakawa-san once I finished explaining everything. She looked a little more relieved than before. “I thought you were saying a lot of really difficult stuff. It was surprisingly simple, though. Huh.”

“Exactly. A sentence might look tough because of its length, but it’s just adjectives and adverbs being added to phrases, as well as prepositions.”

“‘Prepositions’?”

“Oh, uh... Like the English words ‘in’ or ‘at’—stuff that shows where something happened, for instance.”

“Oh...”

It was obvious that it didn’t really seem to click for Shirakawa-san, but it was cute anyway.

“Still, I’m really glad! I’m starting to see a little hope for myself! Thanks, Ryuto.” With that, she stood up. “Let’s go get some hamburgers! Taking a load off my mind made me hungry.”

“Yeah, let’s do that,” I replied.

We’d only sat here to study, but I’d originally started all this because I’d been worried about her, so we cheerfully made our way to the register downstairs.

Then, after getting our lunch and returning to our table, she was about to sit back down on the chair, but...

“Uh... Shirakawa-san,” I began.

“Mm?” Shirakawa-san’s hands froze before she placed her tray down and she looked at me. Her large eyes were so adorable and dazzling that I couldn’t help looking down.

“Um, you can sit there if you’d like...” I said, pointing at the couch seat by the wall.

“Huh?” She tilted her head in puzzlement.

“I mean, um...” I didn’t know how to explain it well, so my speech faltered. “I’m not used to doing things with girls... Sorry if I didn’t pay attention to a bunch of things. I just realized that seat is probably better, and so I thought I’d like you to sit there now...”

“Huh...?” A slight blush crept up her cheeks. “I-I don’t really care about such things...” Saying that, she placed her tray before the couch seat and sat there. “Thanks, Ryuto.” Still blushing, she looked up at me and smiled.

“Sorry I’m not thoughtful...”

“It’s okay,” said Shirakawa-san, maintaining her smile and shaking her head. “I’m much happier about this than the textbook stuff other guys do on dates. I like that part of you.”

Her words startled me. My heart leaped in my chest, and I could no longer take my eyes off her.

An awkward smile appeared on Shirakawa-san’s face. “Come on, you sit down too,” she suggested in an unnaturally happy voice as though to hide her awkwardness. “We’ll still sit side by side again once we’re done eating!”

“Huh?!”

“I mean, aren’t you going to help me study some more?”

The way Shirakawa-san looked at me with those upturned eyes only served to intensify the pounding in my chest.

I get to study for finals with such a cute girlfriend of mine... I seriously thought I was the happiest guy in the world.

***

Finals began the next day, and Shirakawa-san and I continued studying together after school even while they went on.

The McDonald’s we kept going to was full of high school students busy with their studies every day—perhaps a nearby high school had finals approaching too.

On the third day of our study sessions, after we ate lunch as usual and studied for a bit, we decided to take a break and instead of sitting side by side, we sat facing each other, sipping at shakes.

“Gotta say, there’s a lotta high school couples here studying together,” said Shirakawa-san all of a sudden after looking around us.

Now that she mentioned it, there was a guy and a girl in school uniforms sitting together diagonally a bit away from us, wordlessly moving their pens across their notebooks. It was hard for me to make eye contact with people I didn’t know, so I couldn’t look around too much, but perhaps Shirakawa-san had noticed even more pairs.

“Wow... To me, studying with a boyfriend was always like...really unconventional, you know?”

“‘Unconventional’...”

Thinking at the back of my mind that she’d probably wanted to say “fresh,” I started to consider what she meant. I recalled how she’d acted the day before finals started, when I’d suggested we study together.

“Wait, you can study with other people?”

Perhaps this kind of date (if you could call it that) was a first for her. Had she never done this with her exes? I wondered why that was. It somehow felt safe to ask.

“Your ex-boyfriends didn’t help you study?”

I recalled that she was said to have even dated college students. Setting aside the hazy feelings I had about them, I was genuinely curious.

When we’d first started dating, I’d hated even thinking about her exes... Had I, perhaps, started to develop a little bit of confidence as her boyfriend?

“Huh...?”

Shirakawa-san looked at me as though taken by surprise. When our eyes met, she timidly shook her head.

“No, never. I don’t think any of them cared about how well I did in school... They’d say stuff like ‘It’s so nice to be a girl—you’re cute, so you don’t have to be good at studying.’”

I could tell by Shirakawa-san’s tightly pursed lips how she felt about those words. The sight reignited my anger toward her ex-boyfriends.

“I see...” I replied.

It was clear to me that she didn’t think it was okay for her to be bad at academics. The fact she was here studying for finals with me served as proof. And they’d still said such things to her? How inconsiderate could they be?

As I went silent with those thoughts on my mind, Shirakawa-san gazed at me with a smile.

“You’re the first one, Ryuto. The first guy trying to do something for me.” Her eyes, slightly narrowed, were trembling. Her cheeks glowed pink. “So I’m feeling a lot of things for the first time too.”

“Shirakawa-san...”

As I sat there, full of emotion and unable to say anything further, her smile became a bashful one.

“Well, let’s study some more,” Shirakawa-san then suggested, fanning her face with both hands and fussing with her hair. She did that whenever she felt awkward.

“Yeah.”

I would never hurt such a cute girlfriend of mine.

When I made such a vow, I still hadn’t the slightest idea of the sheer amount of trouble waiting for us this summer.

***

Finals proceeded quietly. During the end-of-day homeroom on the fourth day, we got our test results for the English grammar exam from the first day of testing.

“Wow! Check this out, Ryuto!” exclaimed Shirakawa-san, approaching my seat right after receiving her test paper. “Ta-da!”

Wondering what an amazing score she must’ve received, I knitted my brows at the sight of the number “42” to the side of her name.

“Mmm...?” I wondered how I should react, seeing Shirakawa-san’s excitement. “Wow...?”

“Isn’t it amazing? I was sure I’d get a lower score than last time, but it went up instead! It’s all thanks to you! Thank you!”

“Oh, uh, I didn’t really do much...”

“What score did you get? Show me.”

“Okay...”

I did as she asked, at which point she opened her large eyes wide.

“Wooow! Are you a god or something?!”

“You’re exaggerating!”

She was reacting as though I’d shown her a perfect score. Still, as it was an eighty-seven, I’d get embarrassed if my other classmates were to put me at the center of attention.

“I’m glad you got a better score than last time, Shirakawa-san,” I said, forcefully bringing us back to the previous subject.

She nodded with a smile. “Yeah! Thanks, Ryuto!”

With that, she returned to her seat. I was a little shocked by what had just happened and was about to put my test paper away, but...

“Kashima-kun,” came a voice from a seat beside me. Turning toward it, I saw Kurose-san looking at me.

Kurose-san... Shirakawa-san’s younger twin sister and the girl who had rejected my confession back in my first year of middle school. She’d lived with her mother after their parents divorced and she resented Shirakawa-san for taking her father from her. That was why she’d initially spread bad rumors about Shirakawa-san right after she’d transferred to our school.

Ever since then, I’d almost never spoken to Kurose-san. We still greeted each other every morning, but she was always fidgeting, and I was being considerate too. It was no surprise that she’d find it awkward to deal with a guy who’d talked to her about her upbringing.

“What?” I replied, surprised that she’d start a conversation with me.

Kurose-san spoke timidly, her cheeks a little red. “You’re smart, Kashima-kun.”

“Huh?”

“I saw your score. Are you good at English?” she asked.

“Ah, well...”

I’d handed my test paper to Shirakawa-san and then got it back from her. It wasn’t like I’d wanted to show it off, but Kurose-san’s comment still made me embarrassed. I finally put my folded-up test paper into my bag.

“You’re giving me too much credit... I guess I’m just not bad at it,” I said.

“It must be so nice... I’m not so good at it myself. I’m worried about tomorrow’s English Conversation test too.” Kurose-san had a troubled smile on her face. Then, she added, a little shyly, “Hey... Could you help me with my studies?”

“Huh...?”

As I remained confused, Kurose-san hurriedly added, “Oh, I regret what I did back when you got angry at me. I know I was in the wrong. I’m kinda grateful that you scolded me... Anyway, I don’t have anything against you.”

“O-Oh.”

That’s good, then...

I myself still had some ill feelings about Kurose-san, since she’d caused trouble for Shirakawa-san. Still, Shirakawa-san herself didn’t seem to be bothered by it anymore, so it was probably best for her sake too that I forgave Kurose-san. After all, they were sisters.

As I contemplated my mixed feelings, Kurose-san cast her eyes down. “I’m still not used to this school... And I don’t have many friends... I’d be happy if you could tutor me.”

“R-Really...?”

Still, why me of all people? Was it not awkward for her? Then again, after what she did, our classmates were doing their best to stay away from her. That was a fact. There were a few kind girls and some guys who were only after her looks who seemed to still talk to her without issue, but it was true that she didn’t seem to be getting along particularly well with anyone.

Sure, she’d brought it on herself, but I still felt a little pity for her.

“Sorry. I’ve promised Shirakawa-san we’d study for finals together.”

At that, Kurose-san hung her head and pursed her lips. “I see. Okay.”

Her voice was calm, which was a relief. Then, she immediately raised her face to look at me again.

“Then what about over summer break? I’m bad at math too, so I was hoping you could help me with stuff I don’t understand from our homework...”

I glanced behind me. “If you need help with math, you should ask Icchi... I mean, Ijichi-kun. He’s better at it than me. Want me to introduce you to him?”

Even though his midterm scores had been terrible overall, he’d still gotten a high one in math. I figured he must really know his stuff on that front.

However, perhaps my kindness had gone unnoticed because Kurose-san immediately went stiff in the face.

“Never mind,” she said in a stiff voice, then looked up at me again right after. “Th-Then... Can I ask for a LINE ID at least?”

“Huh? Icchi’s LINE ID?”

“No! Yours!” she angrily replied.

I was stumped by her unreasonable behavior. “O-Okay... Just so you know—I’m not going to contact you myself.”

I recalled the complicated reaction Shirakawa-san’d had upon seeing that Yamana-san had messaged me in LINE. Since I’d vowed not to make Shirakawa-san worry, I wanted to do my best to avoid getting in touch with other girls.

“That’s okay. I want to message you myself,” said Kurose-san. She had a dark expression that made me flinch.

“I-Is that so...”

Did she have that few friends...? At this point, I went from pitying her to being a little worried about her.

“Thanks,” said Kurose-san with a slight blush after we friended each other in LINE under our desks, hiding our phones from the teacher.

Man, she really is cute...

Sure, I loved Shirakawa-san now, but seeing Kurose-san like this made me recall how I’d felt back when I’d had a crush on her.

But that was over, I told myself, feeling a little sad, then locked my phone.

***

On the morning of the last day of finals, the Japan Meteorological Agency announced the end of the rainy season.

“Yay! It’s summer break!” exclaimed Shirakawa-san on our way back from school, looking genuinely relieved for the first time in a while. “But man, it’s hot! I think I’m gonna melt!” She gazed up at the clear midsummer noontime sky with a few white clouds drifting across it, then stuck out her tongue as if to fight the heat.

Shirakawa-san fanned her chest, her cleavage almost exposed. I couldn’t stop myself from looking, but it was making me flustered.

“I wanna go to the sea! I can’t take it here on land,” she said.

“Wait, you want to go underwater? Like diving?”

“Nah, I just wanna be on a beach. It’s pretty refreshing to go into the water every now and then, no?”

“Oh, that’s what you meant...”

Wouldn’t a beach count as “land” too? Though I wondered that, I didn’t want her to think of me as a guy who jumped on people’s verbal mistakes. I decided to keep it to myself.

Then, Shirakawa-san looked me in the eye. “Hey, do you remember what day it is tomorrow?”

“Huh?”

As I struggled to recall what it might’ve been, Shirakawa-san pouted. “Come on! It’s our one-month anniversary! We’ve been going out for almost a month now.”

“Ah!”

Now that she mentioned it, I remembered that this was roughly when I’d confessed to her last month. Every day I spent with her felt fresh and exciting, so it felt like it had been a while already. In reality, it’d only been four weeks.

“Hey, wanna go to a beach for our anniversary?” she offered. “The rainy season’s over too.”

“Huh? Yeah, sure.”

That said, my entire experience with swimming in the ocean amounted to once-a-year trips there with my parents back in primary school.

“Yay! Tomorrow it is, then!” exclaimed Shirakawa-san.

“Y-Yeah...”

Tomorrow. I had no time to check in advance where we should go.

And wait, we’re going to a beach?! Could that mean I’ll get to see Shirakawa-san in her swimsuit?! A whole day with Shirakawa-san in a bikini?! We’ll fool around, forgetting ourselves, and then at some point, her bikini won’t be able to contain her enormous assets anymore... Okay, I don’t think that’ll actually happen, but damn, I can’t stop thinking these things!

“What’s wrong, Ryuto? You’re spacing out.”

“N-Nothing! It’s nothing.”

This was no good. If I kept thinking about this stuff and leaning forward as I walked, she’d figure it out immediately.

“I-I’m looking forward to our trip,” I said.

“Me too! It’s gonna be great!”

Thus, we decided to go to a beach for our one-month anniversary date.