Too Many Losing Heroines! - Volume 1 - Chapter 3.2

I lay on the hot sand, arms spread, and closed my eyes. Today was a day I would never forget. The day I went to the beach with a bunch of girls—and had fun. With that, I could live out the rest of my solitary days in peace.

Something cold touched my forehead. Yanami was handing out drinks in paper cups to everyone.

“Gotta stay hydrated, guys,” she said. “So what’re we doing about lunch?”

She split a pair of disposable chopsticks. My eyes fell to the yakisoba resting on her lap that she had implicitly deemed not lunch.

Tsukinoki-senpai looked around at us while she tied her hair back up. “Any ideas? We can pick something up and bring it back.”

Yanami’s hand shot up. “Yakisoba!”

It did smell pretty good. I was getting the craving.

“You’re literally eating yakisoba right now,” I said.

“Nah, this was a bust. I settled for somewhere less crowded and paid for it.” She slurped up some noodles. “The one down there. That’s a winner. I can feel it.”

I should have known she’d be more than willing to go for seconds.

Yakishio tossed the towel she was drying off with to the side and stood up. “I’ll go grab us some grub, then.”

“Appreciated. Nukumizu, help her out, would you?” the president asked. He glanced around warily. “You can never be too careful. A fair maiden alone is just asking for a pickup artist scene to trigger. You know what they say: The best treatment is prevention.”

“You are aware we live in the third dimension, right?” I said. Better safe than sorry, I supposed.

Yakishio and I set off across the sand. Walking next to a girl in a bikini was a little outside my comfort zone, but I wasn’t complaining.

God, what am I, a little kid?

“Things went pretty late last night,” I spoke up. “You make it home okay?”

“Yup, no prob,” she said. “I usually take a few detours after practice anyway, so it wasn’t much later than usual for me.”

Silence. Dumb me forgot yesterday was still pretty fresh for her. Not the best topic for conversation. God, I was bad at this.

Yakishio peeked at me out of the corner of her eye. “Thinking about yesterday?”

“Just afraid I might’ve opened up fresh wounds, is all,” I confessed. “Sorry if I, er, brought the mood down.”

“I’ll be real,” she said. “Am I still sad about it? Yeah. Pretty sad. I could break down in like, two seconds if I felt like it. But why would I, y’know? There’s always time to cry. I can do that when I’m not out trying to have a good time.” She smiled an unconvincing smile and kicked up some sand. “I swear. Dude’s denser than a brick, and suddenly he’s got a girlfriend.”

“He’s a handsome guy. Smart too.”

“I know, right? And he’s fun to talk to, and nice, and…” Her shoulders dropped. “All those years we’ve been together, and I was never even an option, was I?”

“Uh, well, maybe. But I’m sure he meant well.”

Yakishio looked at me. “You’re not good at this, are you?”

I was not.

“Well, uh… Let’s just have fun, yeah?”

“I can get behind that.” She stopped, turned to me, and flashed a toothy grin. She snickered.

“Wh-what?”

Out of nowhere, she snatched my hand. “Let’s run the rest of the way!”

Oh god, I’m not—

And run we did. Yakishio clung tight, leaving me no choice but to try and keep up.

“W-wait! Hold on!” I hollered.

She was fast. Insanely. Felt like she’d pull my arm out of its socket. It didn’t take long for me to trip over myself and promptly face-plant into the sand. Yakishio tumbled down with me.

“Dude, Nukkun, how slow can you be?” she said. “What are you, a snail?”

“I’m not too slow. You’re too fast!” I hoisted myself up, sand coating my body.

Yakishio made no effort to move. She flopped flat on her back and started cackling. “How does that even happen?!” She held her stomach and cackled some more. “We barely moved, and you’re covered!”

“What does how far we went have to do with anything?!”

What did I do to deserve this? I tried to wipe the sand off my face with my arm but only caked it in even more.

“Stop! I can’t breathe!” Yakishio wheezed. I continued to battle with the sand. “Oh, man. Man, my stomach hurts.” She wiped a tear from her eye.

“Can we just go get lunch, Yakishio-san?”

“Forget the honorifics. Don’t gotta be so formal.” She held her arms out to me from the ground. “Yo.”

“What? There a bug or something?”

She blinked at me a few times before picking herself up. “Yana-chan was right. You’ve got problems.”

“Huh? What are you talking about?”

Yakishio prodded me in the chest. “Look, sometimes girls just wanna be girls. That’s all.”

“Huh. Noted,” I said. Good to know.

She stared at me for a bit, then grumbled, “That right there. She was so right.”

That right where?!

***

“Hey, guys! We got the food!”

“Careful, Yakishio! Quit all the flailing or you’re gonna drop it!”

We returned, covered in sand with yakisoba in hand. From the good place—the one “down there.”

“We’re starving to death over here!” Yanami eagerly took them off our hands. The previous yakisoba was nowhere to be seen. Leave it to Yanami Anna to put to question the very existence of food comas. I knew she wouldn’t disappoint. As she passed out the food, I noticed her sneakily keeping the largest helping for herself.

“Not eating, Komari?” I asked.

She was poking and fidgeting with the sand. Her food went untouched. “P-Prez is…reading my novel.”

Were we finally acting like a literature club? I split a pair of chopsticks with my teeth.

The president took his yakisoba and finally looked up from the phone. “Just finished. Very well put together and pretty entertaining. Whaddya say we upload the final copy tonight?”

“O-okay.” Komari’s lips made a crooked smile.

“You’ve got a good, what, seven-k words here give or take? Let’s split that into three parts while we polish it up.”

“W-we have to split it up?”

“An average chapter’ll be about two, maybe three thousand words. That’s a nice bite-sized chunk that’ll appeal to most readers. You’ll need the title and blurb too.”

I listened while I slurped on my yakisoba. The aroma was sharp and stung my nostrils just right. Yanami hadn’t been ­kidding. This place was a winner.

“B-but it has a title.”

“And it’s not a bad one, but what do you think about adding a subtitle to it to sell it better?” the prez said.

A bit of a narou-style twist on Komari’s original title. Interesting.

But man, I couldn’t get enough of that yakisoba. The noodles were insane. They weren’t store-bought—I could tell that much. Did they have them handmade? They must have.

I glanced at Yanami. She gave a thumbs-up. She knew.

“H-how do I make a subtitle?” Komari asked.

“So, for example, if your title were Beach Time with the Lit Club…what would you go with, Nukumizu?”

“Huh? Me?” I mumbled through noodles. I’d hardly been paying attention. I was all in on this yakisoba. Had to play it safe. There were girls here. “Maybe And Then There Were None?”

A boring answer but one the president seemed satisfied with. “Not bad if you’re going for a mystery vibe. Referencing a more popular work could help readership too.”

“Wh-what would…you use?” Komari said.

“Ah, yes, well, I might be partial to But It’s a Nude Beach?! Or maybe And the More You Strip the Higher Your Score! In my professional opinion, that’d bump your numbers up by—”

Tsukinoki-senpai chopped the president square in the back of the head. “Thank you for your opinion, Shintarou.”

“K-Koto…” he groaned. “I wasn’t actually asking you to strip.”

“Thank. You. For. Your. Opinion,” Tsukinoki-senpai enunciated.

Someone get these two a room.

“The lit club gets up to some complicated stuff, huh, Yana-chan?” Yakishio said, digging through her yakisoba.

“Uh-huh,” said Yanami. “Hey, did yours come with any meat?”

“I’ve got squid, but no actual meat.”

“Man, I want meat.”

“Same.”

Four eyes and a brain cell for each. They were a dangerous duo.

Komari stared down at her phone, muttering to herself, “D-do they have to strip?”

“It was just an example. Your characters don’t have to get naked,” I said.

“A-are you getting n-naked?”

Why?

“I’m not getting naked. No one’s getting naked. Eat your yakisoba.”

***

The after-lunch lethargy didn’t last long.

“Hey, they’re doing an event or something over there,” Yakishio said, leaping to her feet. “Let’s check it out.”

“Wonder if there’re any vendors,” Yanami mumbled between bites of her post-meal grilled corn. She didn’t wait for an answer and stood right up. Her stomach knew no bounds.

Speaking of her stomach, when I looked up it was right in my face. “Y-Yanami-san, maybe throw something on first?”

I held out a jacket. She looked at it, then at me. “Why? I’m good. Just put sunscreen on.”

“I’m not…talking about your skin.” I looked away.

Yakisoba times two plus corn equals: big, protruding belly.

Yanami snatched the jacket from me, then hurled it at my face. “I-I’ll wear my own clothes, thanks! I swear, you never learn!”

She grabbed her own hoodie, shoved her arms through the sleeves, and then marched off in a huff, corn still in hand, of course.

Yakishio started after her before turning back and grinning at Komari. “C’mon, you too! You’ve been sitting there all day.”

Komari made a weird yelp and looked up from her phone just long enough to act flustered, then got to furiously typing something. The president put a hand on her. “P-Prez?!” she sputtered.

“Go on,” he said. “Might be helpful for your novel.”

“I-if you…think so.”

“It’ll be good for you. Koto, mind going with her?”

“Roger,” Tsukinoki-senpai replied. “Let’s go, Komari-chan.”

She and Komari took each other’s hands and trailed behind the other two. Prez and I hung back.

“We not going? I thought the best treatment was prevention,” I said.

“Koto can handle it,” Tamaki said. “If shooting people down were a sport, she’d be a marksman.” Was that a compliment? I couldn’t tell. He pulled out his phone. “Also gotta get ready to upload our stuff tonight.”

“Right. Canned goods.”

I was feeling the pressure of a looming deadline and hadn’t written zip. I scanned through my notes for ideas but was soon interrupted by a DM. The president had sent me a text file.

“What is this?” I asked.

“Bet you’re dying to know what Komari-chan wrote, hm?” He gave me a sly look.

I opened the file.

Literature Club Activity Report: Komari Chika—Ayakashi Café’s Comfy Case Files

Mizuhara Yuri, a first-year high school student, was on her way home one day, when she spotted a curious little creature.

“A fox?” she wondered aloud.

What struck her in particular was the animal’s fur. Silvery and with an almost metallic sheen, it was. Yuri was stricken by its beauty and couldn’t help but chase after it.

However, she quickly lost her way, finding herself in unfamiliar streets and, eventually, a quaint café, ivy suffocating its outer walls. Yuri felt drawn to it and so opened the door.

“Excuse me,” she said, “can someone tell me where I am?”

A man stood inside—a man in chef’s attire and of tall stature. His long, silvery ponytail whipped behind him when he turned in surprise to face the visitor.

“Well, you’re a persistent one,” the man said to her. “Sit, and I’ll brew you a cup of tea.”

“I just want to know where I am, sir,” the girl insisted.

“Why, you’re in Between, and I’m afraid there’s no leaving this town on an empty stomach.”

While Yuri processed this information, another young man appeared, this time donned in the gentlemanly garb of a waiter.

“A visitor. How rare. Please, sit.” The newcomer introduced himself as Sumire, and his smile captivated Yuri. “Welcome to our little retreat in Between.”

Yuri still remembered her first visit like it was yesterday. She looked over the café from her usual spot—the table by the window. The owner, whom she heard referred to only as “Young Master,” was scarcely present, perhaps only two days out of the week. That left only Sumire-san to look after things, though he never seemed shorthanded. They rarely had customers other than her.

Yuri took a whiff of her chamomile tea, a calming aroma, when a man suddenly entered. About him was an aura decidedly otherworldly.

The color left Sumire-san’s face. “Sir!”

“I have come as was agreed,” the stranger said. “You will serve me one dish.”

“I-I’m terribly sorry, sir, but Young Master is out at present,” Sumire-san pleaded.

“Then into the Between you will disappear.”

Sumire-san looked to Yuri with desperate, unsteady eyes. “Oh, please, Yuri! You have to help us, or I’ll be rendered into nothing along with this very café! You must cook for him!”

“What? But I can’t cook!” Yuri exclaimed. “Can’t you?”

“Not with fire. Not me,” he admitted sorrowfully.

Yuri hadn’t cooked much at all, much less for another person. She recalled the omurice she had once made with her mother and, to the best of her memory, attempted to recreate the dish.

The man scooped up a spoonful and scrutinized it. He took a bite. Then a second. He did not seem impressed.

The stranger placed the spoon down, shaking his head. “When next I visit, I expect better.” And then he whisked himself out the door, leaving half of the omurice on his plate.

“You’re incredible, Yuri!” Sumire-san cheered. “He never takes more than a single taste!”

Behind him suddenly appeared the owner. “I see my father’s whipped up a storm in here.”

“Young Master!”

He took a taste of the remaining omurice. “Unrefined,” Young Master said. The spoon clattered as he set it down. “But not inedible.”

“Cook it yourself next time if you can do so much better!” Yuri protested. “Is this how you treat all your customers?”

“I see. So the problem is you’re a customer. We’ll just have to fix that. You start tomorrow.”

“I-I never agreed to—”

The man with the silvery hair backed Yuri up against the wall. “Who was it that chased me to the ends of reality? I believe that makes you a stalker.”

“I wasn’t chasing you. It was a silver—”

He took her by the chin. “Call me Getsuko. Has a much better ring to it than ‘Young Master,’” he whispered in her ear. “Though you’ll get a taste for both in time. Quite thoroughly.”

I see.

I looked up from my phone and stared at a passing thundercloud.

“I see,” I said, out loud this time. It was admittedly beyond my expertise but an easy read. Credit where it was due, I couldn’t put it down.

“She’s good, huh?” President Tamaki grinned proudly. “She’s a talented writer, that Komari-chan.”

“Well, she’s better than me at least.” The petty side of me couldn’t admit it without the self-deprecating twist.

“It’s nice having you newbies around. We don’t have to worry about the club so much anymore.”

Cheers went up over where the event was happening. President Tamaki faced that way.

“So what are you writing?” I asked.

“Me? I’ve been uploading on Narou for at least three years now.”

“Wait, really? Can I see your work?”

“Boy, way to put me on the spot.” He made a show of reluctance while he fished for his phone. The title seemed familiar—The Slave Girl I Found Turned out to Be an S-Rank Adventurer So Now She Calls the Shots.

As a matter of fact, it was more than familiar.

“Wait, I know this. I’ve literally been following this,” I said.

“No kidding? Wow. First time meeting a reader.”

Many self-published authors online were students—that part didn’t surprise me. What surprised me was knowing our club president was Tarosuke-sensei. The guy had over twenty thousand points on that one series.

“That’s insane. You think it’ll get published?”

“Nah, that’s a long way off,” he said. “There’s plenty further in line than me.” It was crazy to me that something with thousands of readers couldn’t make the cut. I took his word for it. “I’ll send you Yanami-san’s later. How’s your project coming?”

“I’ve got a gist of the plot but nothing on paper yet. It’s like I get cold feet as soon as I try to actually write something.”

“Then let’s focus on the title and blurb. The important thing’s that you write something, even if it’s just one sentence.”

I nodded. Couldn’t argue with someone who’d written hundreds of thousands of words more than me.

“What do you think of the outline I sent you last night?” I asked. “I was thinking it’d make a good first chapter and I could get started tonight.”

“Right, I did have a comment. The heroine needs a little bit more.”

“More of a reason for her relationship with the protagonist?” I considered his advice. The main duo could have used a little more interaction.

“The opposite, actually,” the president said. “The reason you gave is because the protagonist rescues her, right?”

“Right. The idea’s that she starts off kinda thorny until the main character finally gets through to her with his kindness.”

“That’s bull.”

I waited for a punchline that never came. “Huh?”

“What you’ve described is a business deal. The hero saves the heroine, so she falls for him. Love’s not conditional like that. Love’s not about favors.” There was no humor on the president’s face. “Love happens the same way water flows downhill. Infatuation is a switch that flips on and off. The heroine can’t be infatuated. She has to respect the protagonist, genuinely admire him for who he is. No strings attached. It has to flow like water.” He gazed wistfully up at the sky. “Wish I could get isekai’d and get the kind of attention those guys do. Think I’d have a chance if I got drunk and took a dip?”

“Maybe if you wait till Obon. I hear isekai’s all the rage around that season.”

I hadn’t pegged him for a griper, not when he had the looks, the personality, and the pretty childhood friend most men dreamed of having. The grass was always greener somewhere else. 

We chatted about nothing for a while until the girls came back, hauling a bunch of new luggage.

“We’re back!” Yakishio called out. “And we brought souvenirs!” She carried a whole bunch of fireworks in her arms.

“Whoa, you guys buy all that?” I said.

Yakishio handed them to me with a smug grin. “You wouldn’t believe it! I was all zoom! And it was like nyoom! And then boom, and I took the flag, and then they gave ’em to us!”

Tsukinoki-senpai heard the dial-up sounds in my head and took pity. “She won them at a Beach Flags contest. You should’ve seen her go.”

“I-it was pretty cool.” Komari nodded enthusiastically.

“D’aww, shucks, you’re making me blush.” Yakishio wiggled and squirmed like a bashful worm. “But don’t stop, though.”

One stick in the mud stood out among the high-running emotions.

“You okay, Yanami-san? You look upset,” I said.

“There were no vendors…” Yanami eyed a beachside stall in the distance, hungrily, her lips mouthing the word “takoyaki” over and over.

“You’re not gonna have room for dinner if you keep stuffing your face.”

“Huh? Why not?”

This was not a question I was prepared to answer. Yanami waited patiently, and I could only ponder it myself. Why wouldn’t she have room for dinner? Did philosophy have an answer?

“Speaking of dinner,” I said, “we have to cook for ourselves at the lodge, right? What’re we having?”

Yanami laughed at the foolishness that dared inspire such a question. “Don’t you worry that pretty little meat-starved head of yours, Nukumizu-kun. Because I reserved a camping spot in advance. We’re having a barbecue, baby.”

“Oh. Okay.”

I chose to ignore the irony of her having come here specifically to avoid a barbecue. Personally, I’d been hoping for curry. Rice in a mess tin just hit different.

“Whaddya mean ‘oh okay’?” Yanami accused. “You got wax in your ears? I said we’re having a barbecue! You know what a barbecue is? It’s got meat, Nukumizu-kun! What more could a person ask for?” She backed off suddenly and put her hands together. “Oh, wait, I get the issue. Don’t worry. We’re responsible high schoolers.” She gave a thumbs-up. “There’ll be beef.”

“Are…high school and beef related somehow?” I asked.

“Uhhh, duh. Everyone knows you can’t have beef until you’re in high school.”

“No. That’s not a thing.”

“Huh? But my dad said…” The reality set in for me. I didn’t like where this was going. “Was it a law? Or did the school say so?”

“It was probably his work or something. You know, like how some people only buy Toyotas for brand loyalty.”

Phew. I’d saved it. No further down that road.

“Maybe.” She hung her head thoughtfully. The ride wasn’t over yet. “What does he do again?”

“I mean, he, er, probably does something, right?”

“Y-yeah! He does…something. He’s always going on about how he’s ‘no sheep,’ though.”

This could not continue. The lore was getting too deep, and I wasn’t equipped to handle where it would inevitably lead.

***

The bus wasn’t too far off. If we wanted to have time to shower and change before it got here, we’d have to start packing up soon. Luckily, Yanami was on her last takoyaki.

Yakishio watched the waves hit the shore, stretching, while the rest of us cleaned up. “Hey, y’know what? Komari-chan hasn’t been in the water yet.”

“I, er—” Komari rifled through her bag for her phone. Yakishio cracked a villainous grin and took the chance to sweep her off her feet—princess carried. She squawked.

“Be right back!”

No one stopped her. We waved Yakishio and her victim goodbye as she darted toward the water. Komari’s flails were in vain. That girl was a hulk.

“I’ll get the parasol,” I said.

“Return that to the counter with the floaty while you’re at it,” the president said. “I’ll get our things together.”

There was a splash, followed by a high-pitched screech. A surprisingly feminine one, coming from Komari.

“Shintarou, the other girls and I are gonna get off early to go shopping. You guys get our stuff to the rooms, if that’s okay.” Tsukinoki-senpai untied her hair. Dark locks fell onto her bare shoulders. She scrunched all the moisture out with a towel and got right up against the president to get a look at the bus schedule in his hands. “Plenty of time until the next arrival for us to get what we need, looks like.”

“Move your hair, Koto. It’s cold,” the president griped.

“Get over it.”

More flirting. Would be a shame if, say, a meteor were to fall from the sky and blow them to smithereens. Sure hope that doesn’t happen.

“Bluh… I’m soaked.” Komari came trudging back, wringing out her hoodie. Against the backdrop of the ocean, her form-fitting school swimsuit was especially striking.

This, I realized, was what Yanami had been talking about. The mismatch. The incongruity of rules and freedom. It evoked a cocktail of emotions born from secondhand embarrassment and immorality. This was high level stuff.

Yakishio brushed her hair back and put an arm around Komari’s shoulder. “How was it? Felt good, huh?”

“A-all I taste is salt.”

“Yeah, I bet! Isn’t it the best?”

“A-all I taste is salt!”

“The ocean’s salty. Didn’t you know that? You say the weirdest things sometimes, Komari-chan.” Yakishio grinned from ear to ear. Komari was fighting a losing battle.

Tsukinoki-senpai clapped her hands. “All right, enough goofing around, everyone! Time to get cleaned off and head to the lodge!”

I’d had my fill and honestly wasn’t opposed to calling it a trip well traveled then and there.

I shelved the thought and grabbed the parasol.

***

The sun was on its way out, and with it the heat of day. Weird, unfamiliar cries from unknown bugs were giving me the heebie-jeebies.

“I’m putting the washed veggies here.”

“Thankies. Set the chopped stuff out on that tray there, please.”

Yanami had, for whatever reason, volunteered for cooking duty and, for whatever reason, singled me out as her sous-chef. You would assume that meant she’d have the skills to back it up. You would assume she worked that knife like a pro—but she didn’t. She peeled that carrot exceptionally averagely. Occasionally leaning a little toward the left end of the bell curve.

“Did you have something to talk about, or…?”

“No, not really,” replied Yanami. “Here, cut these carrots into circles. You know how to do that?”

I didn’t grace her question with an answer. She and I got to chopping. Neither was winning any culinary competitions.

“Can’t help wondering why you picked me instead of Yakishio.”

Yanami froze. “Question. Have you ever been in the same group as her in home ec?”

“No?”

“Ah. Well.” Yanami got extremely distant all of a sudden. “Let’s just say some people don’t belong anywhere near a kitchen.”

My imagination went wild. What had she done? Ostensibly, she was a keeper. An athletics superstar. But it would seem that, deep down, a darker truth lurked.

“You know she’s on fire duty,” I said.

“Nope. None of my business.”

They’d be fine, I was sure.

I remembered something I’d meant to talk about. “By the way, I read the story you wrote.”

“Oh, already? Yikes, that’s a little embarrassing.”

“It was good. An easy read.”

Hers was a short story. Just a cute little snippet about a girl on her way to school. It was a stream-of-consciousness sort of thing centered around her working up the nerve to say hi to a boy she liked.

“Gotta say, I didn’t know convenience store karaage skewers were made like that,” I said.

“Right? Most people don’t.”

Wait, what was the story about again?

I couldn’t recall and didn’t much care to. Yanami seemed happy enough.

She and I brought our prepped veggies over to the booths where the campsite kept the grills. The president was busy fanning some red-hot coals with Tsukinoki-senpai close at hand fanning the president, but one person was missing.

“Where’s Yakishio?” I asked.

“I think that’s her sulking over there,” said Yanami.

There she was, just outside of the lamplight, her face black with soot, hugging her knees while she picked beans from their pods. Environmental storytelling at its finest.

“She looks busy,” I said.

“Agreed.”

***

Beef. Beef. Pepper. Beef. Sausage. Nothing could assuage Yanami’s hunger. She was a meat-starved machine of gluttony. Not even my own slowly browning meats were safe from her talons, and all I’d had was cabbage, a bit of onion, and some corn at that point.

“Hey, I was working on that! It’s not even cooked through!” I protested.

“Oh, whatever. You’re so prissy.” Yanami consumed the slice, caring little for the actual blood still dripping off it.

Some liked their meat well done, some liked them not done at all, and there could be no peace between these factions. Surrendering this battle, I settled for a charred piece of carrot while I eavesdropped on the others.

Reddish juices trickled out of the side of Yakishio’s upturned lips. “Oh my god, this meat’s good! Where’s it from? Mexico?”

“Shintarou,” Tsukinoki-senpai said. “This one’s done. Plate.”

“Th-this slice is done too!” Komari interjected.

“Thanks. Man, nothin’ like the outdoors to make a good meal great.” President Tamaki looked awfully content in the center of his mini-harem. I couldn’t decide if I envied him or not. “You eating, Nukumizu? You gotta try this meat, man.”

“I’ll, uh, try,” I said.

Something felt wrong. I was in danger and didn’t know why. As I scanned my clubmates, a question occurred to me: How were they all engorged on meat already?

Yanami clicked a pair of tongs and laid out some more on the grill. “The texture makes me think Argentina, Lemon-chan. No one does meat like the Americas.”

“Wow, you’re like, a genius,” Yakishio said. “Where’s Argentina again? I know it’s super far away. Maybe they dry-age their beef.” She swallowed another cut.

Tsukinoki-senpai shook her head. “You want dry-aged beef? Come with us again next year. I’ll show you dry-aged beef.”

Wasn’t she a third-year? How was she planning on being around next year?

Komari chewed on a piece herself. “I-it’s been…a long time since I had beef.”

They were devouring the slices Yanami had put on the grill mere moments ago. That settled it. I was in danger. I was surrounded by Team Rare.

I refused to go down without a fight and went for a cut of meat I knew would be fine raw, or close to it at least. After only a few seconds on the grill, I snatched up some sausage.

“Nukkun, you just put that down,” Yakishio said. “Maybe let it cook first?”

“S-so impatient,” Komari grumbled.

What? Why? What was happening? Had I slipped into a parallel universe where these people weren’t literally just eating raw meat? The hypocrisy on display petrified me to my core.

Yanami held out some meat with her tongs. “He’s probably just hungry. Here. This just finished.”

I pulled my plate away from the dripping, barely-browned pork. Déjà vu.

Tsukinoki-senpai offered a plate. “Here, maybe this’ll fill you up.”

Onigiri. And the rice was red.

“Where’d we get that?” I asked.

“Some people over at another grill shared them with us,” Senpai said. “Fresh too.” They were good. Seasoned with just the right amount of sesame and salt. “It was a cute junior-high girl who gave them to me. I wanted to share some of our meat, but I couldn’t find her again.”

I glanced around. Didn’t recognize anyone. I must have been overthinking it.

I swatted away a bug and took another big bite of red rice.

***

The sky cooled from orange to indigo. Buzzing insects and croaking frogs sounded the fall of night. The forest was alive. Ironic how loud it could get out in the wilderness.

From a paper tube Tsukinoki-senpai held at arm length, bright yellow streaks of light arced through the air, shifting green partway, then finally red before fizzling out. She flashed a toothy grin toward President Tamaki, who was too busy eyeing the rest of the fireworks to notice.

Senpai gave him a firm kick. “Those ones aren’t lit, doofus.”

“Huh? Hey, I’m just trying to decide which we should do next.”

“O-okay, fine, what about this one? This one’s big! It’ll need both of us, so let’s do this one!”

“Eh, you can handle it.” Smack. “Ow, okay, fine, stop kicking me!”

The wedding bells in the distance were starting to get a little annoying.

I sighed and put one of the last remaining meat slices on the grill. The coals were still hot enough to get it nice and slow-cooked, which so help me God I would succeed at this time. I named her Setsuko.

Gunpowder popped somewhere. Yakishio had set off a pinwheel, sending Komari squealing for cover.

“Those two got friendly fast.” Yanami nibbled on a bit of raw green pepper. Our definitions of friendly differed slightly.

“Not interested in the fireworks?” I asked.

“Gotta have dessert first.”

“Oh, I think I catch your drift. Only one thing an open fire calls for.”

Yanami chuckled. “You know it.”

“Smore—”

“Offal!” Yanami produced a bag of mixed entrails. How silly of me. “This is always how we bookend our cookouts back home.”

We had already edged too close to the Pandora’s box that was Yanami’s family situation before. I chose not to test fate again.

Setsuko was looking good. One side nice and brown. In ­human terms, I had just sent her off to elementary school. They grew up so fast. I went to flip her over and get the other side.

“Oh, dibs.” Yanami snatched her up, and she was no more.

“Setsuko!” I cried. It happened so fast. There was nothing I could have done. Our memories together flashed before my eyes.

“Setsuwha?”

“Nothing.”

Yanami snickered and held her chopsticks out. “All you had to do was ask. Here. Say ‘ahhh.’”

“Wha? Huh?!” I looked left and right. No one was looking. I opened up and let her guide the fatty meat into my mouth.

“Good?” she asked.

“G-good.”

“So how much?”

I nearly swallowed wrong. So that was how she was gonna play it. I felt cheated, but since she’d asked…

“S-seven—”

“I was just kidding, dude,” she laughed. “Wait, what were you about to say? 700?”

I turned away. “N-no.”

Yanami sneered. “I’m that in demand, huh? Good to know.”

“L-look, most girls don’t go around feeding every guy they see. It’s a supply-side thing. That’s all.”

“Uh-huh, sure. Want another? I’ve got a sale going on.”

I knew she was messing with me, and that there was no way to win—save for not to play. So I didn’t.

Yakishio was off twirling by herself, fireworks in each hand. Sparks twinkled all around her before shimmering away into the dark ground. It was almost cute, the way she giggled and cheered to herself. She usually was, outside of actual conversation.

Komari, meanwhile, busied herself singing the ground with her own fireworks. I could only assume it had killed her family or something.

They with their fireworks and Yanami with her food, everyone was off having fun doing their own things. Now that Setsuko was no more and Yanami was busy with her “dessert,” it was time to decide my own fate. I settled on fireworks. I made my way to the pile and found a small, gun-shaped one around the middle. It was a cheap thing, but I vividly remembered it being my favorite as a kid. I’d pretend to shoot at things, mostly just singe rocks on the ground. Kinda like Komari. I peeked at her while I lit the fuse.

She was kneeling down, trying to light a large tube firework on the ground to little success. After a few tries, the flame finally took, and the sparks flew—for a moment, at least, before stopping entirely. The gunpowder must have been damp. I lost interest.

And then she tilted the tube and peered straight down it.

“Don’t—”

I could barely get a word out before it happened. There was a bang. A flash of light. Everything went white.

When my vision returned, the president was there next to her, the mouth of the tube crushed in his fist. He hurled the firework away.

“Komari-chan, are you hurt?!” he shouted.

“I-I’m—”

“Did it get you anywhere? Show me!” He inspected her hands, then grabbed her by the cheeks and turned her head this way and that. “Can you see? Do you feel any pain? Any at all?”

“N-no… I-I’m okay,” Komari stammered.

“Oh, thank god.” The president finally stopped scowling. “Don’t ever do that again. You could have burned your face real bad.”

“Th-there isn’t much to…mess up anyway. Y-your hand—”

“I don’t wanna hear it.” He slipped the hand he’d stopped the firework with into his pocket. “Don’t ever talk like that.”

“N-no one wants to look at…my face. No one would see.”

“You would.”

“W-well, I…”

“You would look in the mirror every day, and every day you’d think back on today and regret it. I don’t want that for you.” Komari opened and closed her mouth wordlessly. “Don’t ever talk like that. I want you to care about yourself.”

“P-President!” Komari finally cried out, her voice cracking. She breathed in deep, so deep I could hear it from where I stood, and then she said, “I-I love you!”

Time stopped. Yanami flipped some meat. Yakishio singed the back of her hair on a fountain firework.

The president didn’t move. “Komari-chan, I don’t…”

Another deep breath. “I…I have feelings for you! I always have! For the longest time! I lo… I’m in love with you!” She just kept talking like she couldn’t hold it all back anymore. “I-I didn’t think you really…paid much attention to me. But what you said. Just now. I-it means a lot to me.” She started to trail off, each word eating twice the momentum of the last. “So, um, I l-love you! I want us to be t-together!”

When there was nothing more to be said, Komari simply hung her head low, tears at the verge of falling. Tsukinoki-senpai watched it all as still as a statue. Yanami ate her meat. Yakishio flailed at the cinders burning her back.

What an absolute circus troupe.

There was silence for a long time before the president finally said, “Sorry. You just, uh, surprised me a little.” He opened his mouth to continue several times, only to close it again. He chose his next words carefully. “Can you give me some time to think?”

Time flowed again. Komari nodded. She met eyes with Tsukinoki-senpai, flinched, and sprinted away. I had a feeling I knew what was going on here.

The peanut gallery—Yanami, Yakishio, and I—exchanged glances.

Tsukinoki-senpai slowly approached the president. “What was that?”

“What was what?” he shot back. “It came out of nowhere, Koto. What was I supposed to say?” Tsukinoki-senpai yanked his hand out of his pocket and doused it in water. “Thanks. It’s just soot. It’s not burned that bad.”

“Why would you lead her on like that? It’s cruel. It’s just cruel, Shintarou.” She wrapped his hand in a handkerchief.

“Koto, I—”

“You know turning her down is the right thing to do!” Senpai gripped his hand hard and glared up at him with cold, lethal eyes.

“Koto, what are you talking about?”

“So why?!” she screamed. “Why didn’t you?!”

The president couldn’t hold her gaze. “Why does it matter to you? It’s not your decision to make.”

It got quiet again. Popping from the offal on the grill punctuated the droning insects.

“Right,” Senpai said softly. “That’s fair. We’re only friends, after all.” More silence—this time interrupted by a sharp slap against the president’s cheek. “So sorry for getting it twisted!”

She was gone. President Tamaki stood alone. And a black snake firework squirmed between Yakishio’s legs. How I yearned for that girl’s blissful ignorance.

She and Yanami shot me urging glances. I considered finding one of those snakes for myself. They mouthed the word “go.” There would be no peace.

“Uh, hey, Prez,” I said.

He looked up but not quite at me. “Oh. Hey, Nukumizu. Sorry I went and screwed the trip.”

“D-don’t worry about it. We’ll take care of things here. You should, uh, get going.”

“Where? To whom?”

I had to physically stop myself from using harsh language. “I can’t decide that for you.” Not that I was making much of an effort to be polite.

“Right. Sorry. And thanks.”

He stumbled off into the darkness. The rest of us heaved a much needed sigh of relief. Things had taken a hard and unexpected turn into the real.

“Um, excuse me.” A camp employee awkwardly shuffled up to us. “We’re about to start putting out grills if you guys don’t mind cleaning up.” Lord only knew how long they’d been waiting for a chance to speak up. I related heavily.

“Yeah, sorry. We’ll get right on that,” I said.

“So sorry to interrupt.”

There was no reason they had to be that nice about it. I started throwing plates together.

“No problem.” Yanami put on her toughest face. “I’ll have this food gone in a flash.”

***

“Man, who woulda thunk she had it in her. You go, Komari-chan.” Yakishio squeezed her sudsy sponge and shared her passion with the twinkling night sky. “A confession under the stars with the guy who just put himself on the line to protect you. Gah, it’s so dreamy! We’re living in the best timeline, girls. It’s our turn to be aggressive and take the bull by the…”—she dropped her sponge—“horns. Right. Guess I should take my own advice, huh?”

I tied my garbage bag shut. What was it about these loser heroines and pouring salt onto their own wounds?

“Hey, Nukkun,” she said, “so Tsukinoki-senpai and the president aren’t dating?”

“Doesn’t seem like it,” I replied. “I always figured they would be soon if they weren’t already.”

The president made it seem like Komari actually had a chance, though. Tsukinoki-senpai was the last person I’d expected to be up for potential loser status.

“Yah.” Yanami nodded confidently as she stuffed her face with more offal. “Airuh hoo’d huffgl.”

“Yeah, they are cute,” Yakishio agreed.

“Aho deyhodly hadizhive honon hoo.”

“Oh, totally, I felt it too.”

Today I learned that Yakishio was bilingual. Something told me my input wouldn’t be needed in this discussion, so I took my cue to bow out, using one of my famous Irish goodbyes. Those were my specialty. They wouldn’t even know I’d left.

Eventually, I wandered over to the bathrooms, drawn to a single dim overhead light. It was as good a time as any to do my business.

The urinals there were totally open to the breeze at about eye level, allowing for a somewhat disturbing view of the trees and bushes whispering in the distance. The lack of company was similarly unnerving, though admittedly not as unnerving as the alternative.

“Nukumizu.”

I yelped. Were they not already down, I would have needed another pair of pants. “P-Prez? Jesus, you scared the crap out of me!”

“I gotta talk to you, man.”

“Cool, awesome, can I finish first?! And get your hand off my shoulder!”

I zipped up, thoroughly washed my hands, and recentered myself.

“So have you been here this whole time?” I asked.

“I… Well, I just don’t know what to do.”

You could start by doing what I said and going after one of them instead of crying to me about it mid-piss.

“I think I could use an ear right now,” he said.

So he was looking for love advice. From me, of all people. And about a love triangle, no less. He genuinely would have been better off asking a worm how to outfly a bird. I gave him a look. “Um, so, I’ll level with you. I really don’t know what help I could realistically offer. You’re kind of in a league of your own, dude.”

“Okay, but look, I can count on one hand the number of relationships I’ve been in. It’s zero. I’ve never been asked out, and the only Valentine’s chocolate I ever get is from Koto.”

“Ah, but you do get chocolate,” I pointed out.

“And every time it’s got ‘friend’ written on it. Every year, ever since we were kids. Where does she even find that?” Why were we talking about this around a bunch of urinals? What was this actual NPC interaction? “No one ever invites me when they go hang out with girls either. I’m seriously as loveless as it gets, man.”

Little did he know of the true depths of lovelessness. Of how much worse it could truly be.

“Sure, but the fact that you’re hesitating this much should tell you something,” I said. “Maybe you actually do feel something for Komari.”

“She’s plenty cute, but I just never considered her…like that, you know?”

“Then why did you tell her you’d think about it?”

“Look, a girl like her confesses to a dork like me? You’d reconsider a few assumptions yourself.”

Would I? Regardless, there was still one massive elephant in the room.

“What about Tsukinoki-senpai?” I asked. She was probably the biggest reason he’d never gotten chocolates or been asked out.

The president sagged his shoulders. “I guess there’s no reason to be shy about it now.”

“About what?”

“I’ve already asked her out,” he said. “And she shot me down.”

“Wait, what?” How was that possible? If those two weren’t a thing, what hope was there for any of us? “You’re not talking like when you were four or five, right?”

“What? No. It was last Christmas.”

Not even a year ago. Suddenly, everything made sense. The president had been well on the rejection recovery path when in came an adorable little underclassman. She confessed, and now he was conflicted. No wonder. I couldn’t blame him, even if it was a gremlin he was agonizing over.

“That’s why I haven’t been going to the club as much lately,” he went on. “Koto just acts like nothing’s changed.” He got down on his haunches and hugged his knees. I almost reminded him people peed here. “But then you saw the way she snapped back there. I feel like I’m going insane, man. What was that all about?”

That was the question now. It didn’t make sense for Tsukinoki-senpai to have blown up if she’d already made her position clear.

“Either way, nothing’s gonna change the fact that you two need to talk.” I put a hand on his shoulder. “I have a feeling there hasn’t been enough of that.”

“You sound like you know what you’re talking about. Are you, like, an expert or something?”

I smiled sarcastically. “Yeah, just call me Casanova.”

***

I returned to Yanami and Yakishio with instructions from the president to head back to the lodge. The rest was up to him. My role had ended utterly and entirely. I rolled my sleeves up to start helping with dishes.

“Nukumizu!” Yanami snapped. “Where have you been?!”

Someone was not happy. Maybe ditching while everyone was still cleaning had been a bad idea.

“I, uh, had to use the bathroom,” I said.

“Yeah, great, who asked?” I was too shook to answer that question. “Listen. Tsukinoki-senpai just left with all her things!”

Huh. This late? Not very smart. I stared down at the direction she pointed.

A beat later, I realized she was staring back.

“Uh, hello?” Yanami fussed at me.

“Hm? Yeah?”

“You’re just gonna let a girl go out at night all by herself?”

What did she want me to do—go after her? This late? Didn’t sound very smart.

Yanami reeled back and smacked me in the shoulder. Hard. “Lemon-chan went after Komari-chan. I’m looking for the president. Get going!” she barked.

“Come on, it’s pitch-black out—” She made a face that instilled in me far more fear of her than of the dark. “Yes, ma’am. On it.”

I set off after Tsukinoki-senpai, lighting my way with my phone’s flashlight. It didn’t take long for me to stumble across a bus stop. In the dim light, I spotted a girl and her luggage. I called out to her.

“Oh. Nukumizu-kun.” Senpai didn’t try to hide her disappointment upon recognizing me. I, unfortunately, was not the president.

“Senpai, where are you going?” I asked. “The lodge is the other way.”

“I’m going home. I just can’t be around him right now.” She readjusted the bag on her shoulder and resumed walking.

“Hey, hold on. The buses aren’t running anymore, Senpai.”

“I can make it to the station on foot.”

That simply wasn’t reasonable, not in this darkness.

“Can you please just sit so we can talk for a second?” I pleaded. “Whaddya know, there’s a bench right here.”

“Nukumizu-kun!” I had just yoinked her bag. “I don’t have time for this.”

“You can take a little break,” I said. I sat down at the bus stop and offered a couple of drinks I’d bought beforehand. “Gogo or Kochakaden tea?”

Senpai sighed. “Gogo.” She took a seat next to me. Mission accomplished.

I didn’t actually know what to do next. I hadn’t asked Yanami what exactly I was meant to say to her. I looked down the old wooded road.

“Did Shintarou send you?” she asked.

“Huh? Uh…”

Senpai frowned at me. “He didn’t?”

“H-he did,” I lied. “He went looking for you at the lodge, but I guess you just missed each other.”

Please, Prez, don’t you make me look stupid.

Tsukinoki-senpai took a sip of her tea, then slouched. “I’m really sorry this had to happen today.”

Where had I heard that apology before?

I twisted the cap off my tea. This story would have had a quick and easy resolution were it only between her and Prez. Komari was the complicating factor here. Trigonometry was never my strong suit.

“How’s Komari-chan?”

“I don’t actually know,” I replied. “Yakishio’s looking for her. I wouldn’t be too worried.”

There was an awkward silence before Tsukinoki-senpai quietly spoke up again. “Men do like the quiet ones, don’t they? The ones that make you feel like they need you.”

Here came the heavy stuff. These people had to be beyond desperate if they were coming to me for advice.

“That is the stereotype, I suppose,” I said.

“Like Komari-chan. I guess she kind of is the ideal.”

Bold statement.

“I don’t think what most men like is really relevant here. What’s important is how you feel about each other, and, well, for what it’s worth, I definitely got the vibe that the president was more interested in you than her.”

“I know. I thought so too.”

What was that about? Wasn’t she the one who turned Prez down? Something wasn’t adding up.

“You two need to talk,” I said. “I think maybe that might make things more clear.”

“What else is there to clarify? You heard what he said. He’s ‘thinking about it.’ He doesn’t know who he’s interested in.”

I stumbled over my words a few times, trying to decide how much I was allowed to say. “So, uh, here’s the thing. The president… He, er, may kinda think you aren’t into him.”

“What?! Literally why?!”

I’d totally called it. The president hadn’t been shot down. There was a massive misunderstanding at play here. I couldn’t play my hand all at once at risk of screwing something up, so I decided to stay tactful.

“You two went out last Christmas, right? That information’s accurate?” I asked.

“What did he tell you about that for?”

“Uh, humor me. So did he ever, I dunno, tell you anything that day?”

“Yes? He told me lots of things. We talk all the time.”

“No, I mean, like, anything important. You know, about him, his feelings, that sort of thing.”

“He did go on a rant about Dom Dom’s burgers when we were at Mos Burger.”

What kind of Christmas date night involved fast food? I had enough faith in the president to assume that hadn’t been where the alleged confession happened.

“Where’d you go other than that?” I pressed. “Maybe a light show, somewhere with a scenic view. Was there any romance in the air at all?”

“With him?” She scoffed. “Not likely.”

“Okay, maybe it wasn’t a place, but did he ever do anything that stood out? Held your hands when they were cold? Share a scarf? Give you a cake with a ring inside? Did you gaze into each other’s eyes the moment a bunch of lights flickered on while an Oda Kazusama love song played in the background?”

“Does anyone even remember who that guy is?”

I was grasping at straws. Where was that damn confession? Was Tsukinoki-senpai just dense enough that not even the Christmas spirit had been enough to get through to her?

“Come to think of it,” she said, “there was one thing on our way home. He said something to me at the tree in front of the station.”

Oh, thank god he moved past the Dom Dom thing. My faith in Prez had been restored.

“So what did he say?!”

“Well, he roasted me for a bit, and then he backtracked and was like ‘don’t worry’ because he’d ‘take me if no one wanted me.’”

Oh. Oh, that was worse than Dom Dom.

“What’d you tell him?” I asked.

“I told him to get out of my face and take a long walk off a short cliff.” Senpai gave me a confused look. “What’s this about, anyway?”

“Yeah. No. I don’t even blame you. There’s no reduced sentence coming with that confession.”

What an absolute dumpster fire of a man. I started mentally collating rom-coms to recommend him for rehabilitation purposes.

“Conf… What?” Tsukinoki-senpai got real quiet. But not for long. “What?! That was a what?!” It was no longer quiet.

“I’m assuming he meant it in that indirect ‘I wanna see you when I wake up every morning’ sort of way.”

Mystery solved. All that was left was to debate whether I should have said anything at all.

“And on Christmas?! Christmas. Second year of high school, and that was my Christmas confession?! What kind of… Is he mentally fucking deficient?!”

Answer: No. I should not have said any of that. The situation was hanging by a thread, and now it was my responsibility to fix it.

“I mean, I could be wrong. That’s just my interpretation, so take it with a grain of—”

“I’m gonna straight up ban that son of a bitch!” Senpai shouted.

“Can we simmer down, please?”

Feet crashed against dirt and gravel. I turned around to find the president, shoulders heaving and out of breath. He stopped for a moment, then came closer.

“Prez!” I called out.

I was saved. The rest was up to them and no longer any of my business. I quietly and tactfully started to make my way back to the lodge, freed from the burden of a guilty conscience.

Out of nowhere, a hand emerged, sealed my mouth shut, and yanked me behind the tree line.

I tried to yell.

“Hush! They’ll hear you!” It was Yanami. I nodded. Mostly for lack of another option. “Head down. This is for the good of the club.”

Her whispers tickled my ear.

“Are you sure we should be—” She pinched my side. Message received.

I shrunk down below the shrubs and pricked up my ears. Our arms brushed as we shuffled into position. She smelled like smoke and sweat and Febreze.

Tsukinoki-senpai had her head down, her expression hidden. The president played with his hair nervously.

“I-I guess I should apologize,” he said.

Senpai shot back, “I heard a lot from Nukumizu-kun. Is it true?”

“Did you talk about Christmas?”

She didn’t answer. “We’ve been together for over a decade.”

“Ever since we were old enough to be in school. Somehow always got the same class.”

“I’ve never been the most feminine. Do you remember when those girls used to bully me?” She closed her eyes and bit her lip.

“We don’t have to cross old bridges if it hurts, Koto.”

“You stood up for me. You stood up for me, and you didn’t care what they said about you.”

“I can handle a few jerks,” Prez said. He meant it. “Better me than you.”

“See? That right there’s what drove me insane.” Even from far back, I could see the red creeping up her face. She held her hand up to her mouth. “You shot up in junior high. It wasn’t easy keeping you to myself, you know.”

“You make it sound like it was your fault I never peaked.”

It was, I silently quipped.

“You’re awful, you know that? I waited. And waited. And waited. And waited.” She swallowed. Breathed. Swallowed again. Marched up to Prez. “And that was your confession?! You’re unbelievable. Unbelievable! We could be soulmates from a past life and I’d still kick you to the curb!” She only stopped because she’d run out of air to shout with.

Prez laughed awkwardly. “Yeah. You’re right.” He made a clumsy smile and felt Tsukinoki-senpai’s hair. She jumped. “But that’s why I’m gonna make up for it in this one.”

She bumped her head against his chest. “You can try.”

After a moment’s hesitation, the president wrapped his arms around her, and there he held her. More tenderly than glass.

***

“Whoa.” Yanami’s eyes were glued to them, hands pressed together.

We were overstaying our welcome for sure.

“We’re leaving,” I said.

“Dude, it’s just getting good!”

“It’s an invasion of privacy! We need to dip.” I grabbed her hand and got moving. Truthfully, we needed to dip a long time ago.

“Nukumizu-kun.”

“They need time alone,” I said.

“And you need to keep holding my hand because…?”

I recoiled and yanked mine away at once. It was the mood. We’d been crouched together with all that romantic tension ­going around. It was making me loopy.

“S-sorry!” I stammered. “I-I didn’t mean to!”

“You don’t gotta apologize.” She noticed me blushing and immediately flipped into bully mode. “Hey, do I get one? You gonna confess to me next?”

“No.”

“Aww, c’mon. I promise I’ll let you down easy.”

“Not happening.” I walked faster.

Yanami kept pace, still with that same smirk on her lips. “Don’t you have a heart? Weren’t you moved by that just now? Don’t you want what they have?” She leaned over and fixed me in her annoyingly prying gaze.

“Sure, but not with someone who just said they were gonna turn me down.”

“True. I will do that.” No hesitation. “But play your cards right and maybe you can swipe yourself a smooch on the cheek at least.”

“But you’ll still reject me.”

“Man, you’re fussy.” She shrugged. “Whatever. We got more important things to worry about.”

“‘Whatever’?”

She raised her eyebrows at me. “Did you forget Komari-chan? We gotta get back to the lodge and check on her.”

“Right. Yeah. You’re right.” I cocked my head and lowered my voice. “‘Whatever’?”

***

Locked. I had completely forgotten the door to the boys’ room was locked. And the president had the key. One option was to wait in the girls’ room for him to get back, but yeah, that wasn’t happening. I still hadn’t recovered from Yanami’s brusqueness. She’d been all teasy and jokey, and then all of a sudden colder than the arctic. I didn’t get women.

I hauled my tired legs out of the lodge. Maybe I’d find a stag beetle to empathize with.

I passed under a window and heard the latter end of a conversation. There was another group here besides us. Some student council trip for a bunch of local schools. I put some distance between myself and the commotion inside.

That was when I saw her, crouched in the shadows, orange cinders sputtering at the bottom end of a short, thin stick in her hand. It was Komari. Yakishio wasn’t with her.

I made it to her before I could decide what to say. “Hey. There you are.”

“Oh. Nukumizu. Wh-what do you want?”

It occurred to me too late the situation I’d put myself in. I recalled the image of Prez and Senpai in each other’s arms, and I didn’t have the courage to share it with her. It wasn’t my place to, anyway. It had to come from the president himself.

Komari thrust a bag out at me. “Sp-sparklers. Too many for me to finish.”

I crouched down, picked one, and set it alight. The cinders sputtered with unfamiliar vigor before retreating into a smoldering bud. A second of peace. The sparks returned, and this time I recognized the way they danced and popped.

“Hm. Different.” I couldn’t remember the last time I’d played with sparklers. Kaju and I were overdue.

We burned through stick after stick before I eventually found enough nerve to peek at Komari, and when I did, I found her peeking back.

“Wh-what?”

“Wasn’t Yakishio with you?”

“Sh-she was. She did one. Then got bored and left.”

You couldn’t set much on fire with sparklers. Not her speed, I assumed.

“You guys seem like you really bonded,” I said. “That’s good.”

Komari did not look like she agreed. “Y-you need to see an optometrist.”

Is that an oxymoron?

We were getting somewhere, talking normally. She must have been riding the adrenaline from the confession still. Just had to get her back to the room before tragedy could strike. The girls would be more equipped for it than me.

“Th-the president came. Before you did,” she said.

My sparkler died after a pitiful few seconds of life. The bud at the end fell.

“Oh. And what did he…?”

“It’s over.” She handed me the bag and lit my new sparkler. “He turned me down.”

She sounded numb.

“Oh… So he told you flat out, huh?”

Personally, I would have sat on it so I could have backup in case my first pick fell through.

“B-bet you’d have kept me as backup.”

“How’d you know that?”

“B-because you’re the worst.”

Couldn’t argue with that.

The buds on our fireworks smoldered for a while, then burst into sparks at nearly the exact same time, revealing the expression on Komari’s face.

“But he… H-he thought about it. He really, actually considered it.” She was smiling. It looked like it hurt. “I got one over on Tsukinoki-senpai… Even if only for a little while.”

She shook. Her tiny shoulders trembled. The end of her sparkler fizzled out, and she watched as it fell to the ground.

“I-I’m gonna cry now,” she choked. “So g-go away.” She clung to that dead firework, the wind very nearly carrying her voice away. “Please.”

I went back inside the lodge and found a bench to sit on and cracked open my canned coffee before realizing I didn’t feel like drinking it. I didn’t know how to feel.

The lobby’s fluorescent lights buzzed and flickered overhead.

I thought about them. The five strangers who I’d come here with. What would we be once this retreat from reality was over? Yanami and Yakishio weren’t really interested in the literature club. It was just a rest stop for them before they inevitably spread their wings and moved on to something else. Would Komari even feel comfortable continuing to show up? Would our senpai? We were a week away from summer vacation. What would happen to my lunches with Yanami?

I took a sip of coffee. Suddenly felt like writing.