Too Many Losing Heroines! - Volume 1 - Chapter 4.1

Loss 4:

When You Gaze upon the Losing Heroines, the Losing Heroines Gaze Back

MONDAY MORNING. I RESTED AN ELBOW ON MY desk, listening in and out of the myriad conversations going on in the classroom. Some were about shows on TV, some were about the baseball game, others about mutual friends, and still others about unfinished homework. Some were bold enough to humblebrag about how difficult their significant others could be.

Normal topics, all of them. Normal topics for normal people who lived normal lives together with other normal people. Normalcy came naturally to my classmates.

“Morning!”

Yakishio Lemon came bursting into the room. Several greeted her back. So much for my brooding.

She came straight up to my desk and thunked her bag on it. “Morning, Nukkun! The trip was fun, huh?”

“Er, uh, m-morning,” I stammered out.

“Anyway, so here, this is yesterday’s.” She slipped a piece of paper out of her bag and handed it to me. Another entry for the picture journal already. This time it depicted a girl sprinting alongside a moving train.

“When did this happen?”

“Fell asleep on the way home last night. That’s when I had to run back to my stop.”

Interesting choice of tableau.

“We’ll get it posted,” I said.

“Thanks!”

She headed to her seat, waving at and high-fiving a few friends on the way. Where did she get that kind of energy this early in the morning?

Not all of us shared her enthusiasm. I stretched, my social batteries already running low, and let my eyes wander over to Yanami. She’d been spending less time with Hakamada Sousuke and his girl Himemiya Karen and more with a different group of friends. She was chatting with them now, as a matter of fact. That bubbly smile so rarely seemed to leave her face.

She noticed me staring and directed it at me. I pretended not to see. We never acknowledged each other in class. It wasn’t intentional—we simply occupied a weird space between kind-of-secret and not at all.

Scattered laughter came from the classroom next door. Amanatsu-sensei must have waltzed into the wrong class again. It happened at least twice a month. Our class knew the drill and started making their way back to their seats.

Another normal day that we’d never see again.

***

Yanami left moments after lunch break started, but I waited a little bit before following. I considered it one of our unspoken rituals. I made a detour to grab some milk at the vending machine before heading to the usual spot.

Just as I was about to cut around to the back of the building, I heard a group of girls laugh. I stopped short of the corner. They were classmates, and I recognized the voices. Most probably would. They were a loud and gaudy bunch—my one weakness. I calculated a route to skirt around them in my head, and then I heard a name.

Yanami.

Their voices were low and callous. I stabbed the straw into my milk and sipped.

“Like how does it even happen, y’know? After all that work she put in, some transfer student pulls the rug out from under her.”

“I’d literally stop coming to school.”

Laughter. Yanami had mentioned things being uncomfortable, assumptions being made. Now I understood.

I doubted they’d say any of this to her face, but words could linger. People didn’t necessarily have to say things out in the open for someone to hear what was being said.

This was what Yanami had been dealing with while I went around reviewing water fountains.

I started to leave. I wanted nothing to do with it.

“But did you hear? They’re saying she’s got her eye on someone else now.”

That made me stop.

“She does?!” a couple others shouted.

She does?

If Yanami had a boyfriend, she hadn’t hinted at it during the trip. For what I liked to think were obvious reasons, I glued myself to the wall, quieted my breathing, and listened even harder to the clique’s shrill voices.

“Who is it? I know the basketball captain was talking to her the other day.”

“It’s that, uh… What’s his name? Nuku… Nuku…mizu?”

“Nuk-who?”

There was someone else in this school named Nukumizu?

Wait, no there wasn’t.

Are they talking about me?!

This was bad. Where had I gone wrong? Was I not careful enough? Had someone seen us eating together? At the family restaurant maybe? On the trip?

“I sorta kinda remember that guy? He’s the one who’s, like, right in the middle of the class roster.”

Evidently, that was my most defining quality.

My thoughts continued to race at mach speed, and meanwhile the girls had gone quiet. One spoke up rather loudly. “Come on, Yanami’s got it going on! She can do way better than him.”

“For real. Bad taste, honestly.”

“He’s probably ugly.”

What little I knew of Yanami rushed through my head. She was still in love with Hakamada. If this rumor spread…

“Honestly, she kinda got on my nerves. Like, get over yourself, y’know? Most halfway decent guys can probably see the red flags.”

“Yeah, honestly, they probably deserve each other.”

More laughter. I only stuck around long enough to hurl away my now-crushed milk box.

***

“What was that all about, Nukumizu-kun?” Yanami was ready and waiting at the fire escape.

“Wh-what was what?”

“Didn’t you see me look at you? Why’d you ignore me?”

“Hey, I was trying to be subtle. You know, so everyone in class doesn’t catch on to us hanging around each other.”

The laughter echoed inside my head. Something I couldn’t describe grabbed my heart and squeezed.

“Bit late for that,” Yanami said. “We’re in the same club, dude. We can talk, at least.”

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to ignore you.”

“Better not have.” She pulled out today’s lunch. “That trip sure was eventful, huh?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it was.” There were a lot of words to describe it, but I had to admit I’d also add “fun” to the list.

I’d written a little bit more of my story. Writing always seemed like a purely solitary affair to me. This project felt different, though I couldn’t place why. Having people in it with you was new to me.

“I got to show off my cooking skills, so I’m happy,” she said. “Now, I present today’s lunch!”

The former half of that statement was questionable, but I could confirm the latter. Today’s was sandwiches. Not convenience store sandwiches—actual handmade sandwiches. I saw ham and lettuce, egg, and a mysterious third variety with slices of a green something-or-other in it.

I picked the mystery one. “Cucumber. And is that Moromi miso?”

Morokyu: a tasty snack that combined the satisfying crunch of a cucumber with the salty sweetness of miso. And it was now in sandwich form.

“Go on and try it! I wanna know how it tastes.”

I gave it a bite. “Mh, yeah. Surprisingly good. You might be onto something here.” If you ignored the soggy cucumber bread. “I think some margarine would really elevate this.”

“Ah, shoot, forgot that. How bad’s that gonna hurt the price?”

I’d nearly forgotten about that. What was the tab even at again?

Good sandwiches took a surprising amount of work to put together. That in mind, I was leaning toward 500 yen at least.

Honestly, they probably deserve each other.

I heard the girls again.

Yanami was fun, pretty, and a class icon. I was a background character. We didn’t deserve each other.

I was a parasite.

“Nukumizu-kun?”

“2,867 yen,” I said.

“Whoa, no way, that’s a new record! Wait.” Yanami cocked her head. “Isn’t that how much I owe you?”

“Guess it is. You’re debt free.”

“Okay, I’m flattered and all, but they’re just sandwiches.” She looked at them, perplexed, then at me.

Yanami Anna was an enigma I hadn’t even begun to crack. I couldn’t make heads or tails of her. When was she joking? When was she being serious? Roll the dice. Win or lose, she’d come out smiling.

“It’s just starting to feel like I’m extorting you or something. I dunno. Just doesn’t feel right.”

Hers wasn’t the type to involve themselves with guys like me. She belonged at the top. She was attractive. She was bubbly. She was popular. She was goofy. She was admittedly kind of a crybaby.

“Thanks for all the food,” I said. “It was good.”

She was a heroine, and she was a damn respectable one. Hakamada didn’t know what he was missing.

Quietly, calmly, Yanami finally replied, “We started this because I needed to pay you back, sure, but I haven’t hated it. It’s been fun.” She took a morokyu sandwich and bit into it. “Feels icky to end things like that.”

I stared at the cross-section of bread, cucumber, and miso, and against my better judgment told her, “People are starting rumors about us.”

I watched for her reaction. Found none. She eyed a bit of cucumber-stained bread.

“I’m sure you don’t want people assuming things about you.” I couldn’t stop talking. The silence scared me. “You’ve got so many friends, and I don’t think I’m the kind of guy you—”

“Slow down, please. I’m trying to understand.” Yanami lidded the bento box. “Have I done something to upset you?”

“No, that’s…!” I stopped, shook my head, and lowered my volume. “It’s not that.”

“You sure?”

I looked away. It wasn’t her that made me upset.

The Yanami I had come to know, even if only a little, was in love with Hakamada. The Yanami I knew now, and who sat next to me, was in love with Hakamada.

What upset me was that people were ascribing things to her that weren’t her. Feelings she didn’t feel.

“I just don’t like what people are saying.”

I stared down at the half-eaten sandwich in my hand. Yanami said nothing, but I could feel her searching for the words.

She put the bento box on my lap. “Okay,” she said. “Okay.” She spoke firmly, her words cutting deep. “I’ll stop talking to you then.” She stood. “Thanks for the memories. Bye, I guess.”

And that was it. She was gone. She left, bento box and all.

A few words. A few words were all it took to end it all. She hadn’t even looked back. A part of me wished she had.

I opened the bento box. Meticulously crafted sandwiches were crammed together, end to end. In the corner, I noticed two cherry tomatoes for decoration. She would have woken up early to put all this together—this little ritual just for us.

It was then that I started to realize the magnitude of what I’d truly lost.

Three days to the closing ceremony.

***

I didn’t eat much for dinner that night. Bed was too comfortable.

I went over the conversation in my head again for the ­umpteenth time, reconvincing myself that I’d done the right thing. We weren’t together, not romantically or platonically. The relationship we had would have ended sooner or later.

Different worlds.

But more than that, I couldn’t stand being the reason people had started to badmouth her.

“Oniisama, you seem down. Did something happen at school?”

Kaju suddenly materialized next to me in bed, ending the merry-go-round my thoughts had become.

“Little sisters aren’t supposed to sneak into brothers’ beds, Kaju.” Even my quips lacked their usual energy. The ceiling was too interesting.

Kaju giggled and poked my cheek. “Did someone get rejected?”

“In a sense, I suppose.”

That set her off. “I knew it! I knew you’d been acting strange lately!”

“Huh? Wait, no, not like that. Who would the girl even be?”

Yanami’s ditzy smile came to mind. I turned over, facing my back to Kaju.

“Is it that girl I saw you grilling with? She was cuuute.”

I shot up. “H-how do you know about her?!”

“That got your attention.” Kaju grinned.

“Were you there? How much did you see?”

“Maaaybe I’ll tell you. If you tell me about her.” She mischievously put a finger up to her lips. “Or are you going to make me talk?”

I ignored the latter statement and flopped back down. “She’s just a clubmate. And for the record, she’s into someone else.”

“It must be the short-haired girl then. I think an outgoing kind of person like her would be good for you.”

“Another clubmate who’s into someone else.”

She thought for a moment, then clapped her hands together. “The mature one with the glasses? Though I’m curious about her role in whatever chaos I saw ensue.”

“Dating the club president.”

“There was another, but she didn’t strike me as particularly remarkable.” Kaju frowned. “No. You must keep an open mind, Kaju. Oniisama’s judgment never errs.”

I went ahead and assumed she had seen pretty much everything. 

“Would you listen to me? I’m just tired from the trip. That’s all.” I rolled away from her again. “Your brother wants to sleep. Go to your room.”

“I will not budge a single nanometer until you tell me which girl has stolen your heart. Plans have to be put in order, you know. I have to discern for myself whether they’re really—”

She yiped as I threw the blanket over her and wrapped her up in it. That would buy me some peace.

“Ahhh, Oniisama’s scent,” Kaju sighed. This girl had some problems. “Yes, I can feel us becoming one. I see now. I will find a partner for you, dearest Oniisama. This I swear.”

I threw the whole comforter on top of her next, for good measure. Back to my thoughts.

Everything replayed again. I went over it all—every choice, every word she and I shared—and again I found no answer, nor its question.

Current tab: 0 yen.

***

Two days to the closing ceremony.

I was back to my solo lunch, though the fire escape remained an attractive spot to eat it. After finishing up some tuna bread and milk, I wrote a bit on my phone, then made for class again when it got closer to time.

It had only been a day, and yet our get-togethers already felt like a distant memory. Maybe that was all they were. I had to remind myself that they had been real.

I went straight to my seat, noting the clock for when the bell would chime. I watched Yanami chat with her friends out of the corner of my eye.

“Why do you look all down in the dumps, Nukkun?” Yakishio crouched down and planted her elbows on my desk, penciling herself into my alone time.

“That’s just how I look,” I said.

Unfortunately, I was still brooding and didn’t have the patience to deal with her at that moment. Puppy dog eyes or no.

“That all it is?” she wondered aloud. “You seem awfully interested in a certain someone.” I silently cursed her for saying that here, in the middle of the classroom of all places. A smile crept up her extra-tanned cheeks. “Hey, none of my business. If I were you, though, I’d say something. Before you regret it.”

“Before I…?”

Yakishio smacked me on the back and turned her smile into a toothy grin. “Take it from someone who had to learn the hard way.”

***

The hallway to the club room was deserted. It got me to thinking just how long the day had been. Where before I would have spent the former half of the day thinking about lunch, then the latter half remembering it, now the minutes seemed to trickle by. I could have counted them and all the nothingness that occupied the space between.

“What am I, a dog?” I muttered.

Lit club was my sole remaining obligation. Mostly Komari just griped and glared at me, but it was a convenient way to wait out the crowds after school.

I turned the knob. Unlocked. The first one here was always either me or Komari. I entered, ready for daggers, and got something else.

I froze.

“Yanami-san.”

She pulled her hand back from a high-up shelf. Whatever she felt upon seeing me, her eyes didn’t betray it. “Oh. Nukumizu-kun. Long time no see.”

It hadn’t been. We’d had lunch just yesterday. We were in the same class. I couldn’t decide whether to point that out.

“You’re still coming,” I said. “For…how long?”

“I’m just returning some books I borrowed. Got plans with a friend later, so I was just leaving.” She slung her bag over her shoulder. She didn’t look at me again.

I felt it then. As she started to leave. Something inside was screaming at me. I couldn’t describe it. It didn’t make sense. But I knew.

This was my last chance.

“Yanami-san, can I say something?”

“What? My friend’s waiting.” She still didn’t look at me. There was an edge to her voice that made me hesitate. “I can’t stand here forever.”

“Wait!” I thought of her and Yakishio. The weight of the regret they shared. The burden of missing your chance. “I think I… I actually, um, really enjoyed it. The lunches we had together.” The strength with which Komari faced a losing battle. “I just…”

“You just?”

I just…what? We weren’t a couple. We weren’t even friends.

So what were we?

A lender and a debtor.

“I just…wanted you to know. It was fun.”

Yanami gripped the doorknob and stood there for a while. And when that while was up, she simply said, “Okay.”

The door opened. The light from the hallway poured in, obscuring whatever expression she wore when she finally turned around.

“I’m gonna go now,” she said.

***

Nothing happened for the rest of that day. And then it was the next. The closing ceremony was tomorrow.

The classroom was more alive than usual, what with summer vacation right around the corner. Amanatsu-sensei almost handed out our report cards early, to no one’s surprise. The people loved her for it.

The last lunch break of the semester came. I occupied my spot at the fire escape yet again, nibbling on curry bread and entertaining myself by staring at nothing. Afternoon practice for the sports clubs had been suspended on account of the heat, which didn’t stop Yakishio, of course. Seeing a teacher practically drag her away from the track was about as much show as I got with my lunch.

“Girl’s crazy.”

I squinted at the breeze rushing across the field and shielded my bread from the dust cloud riding it. That was when I heard the footsteps clicking down the stairs behind me.

I sat up straight.

“O-oh. There you are.” None other than Komari Chika in all her huffy glory came over and helped herself to the spot next to me.

“What’re you doing here?” I asked.

“Y-you’re literally the one who invited me.” I cursed past me. “And I heard you got…rejected.” A smug grin plastered itself across her face. “C-couldn’t help coming to laugh at you.”

Little bit short on sugar for the coating there.

“Where’d you even hear that?”

“You k-kinda shoved it in my face at the clubroom yesterday.”

“You’ve got the wrong impression. Yanami and I aren’t like that.”

“S-sore loser.” Komari dug around in a bag and pulled out a roll—the kind you could find by the half dozen at the store—that she promptly started munching on. “Wh-who gave you permission to go off and b-be happy?”

“Who’s the sore loser again?”

“Sh-shut it!”

Everyone seemed keen on jumping to the same conclusion. Did we really look that into each other? What we had wasn’t like that. It was…

What did we have?

I smiled mockingly at myself. Nothing. What we had was nothing. She owed me money, she paid me back. The transaction was done, and so were we.

Suddenly, I didn’t feel like eating. I slid my bread back into its packaging.

“That all you’re eating?” I asked. Komari bit into her second roll, still huffy from my last comment. She didn’t even have anything to drink, I noticed. I offered my milk. “Here. Don’t choke.”

“Huh? B-but that’s yours.”

“I’ve got tea in a water bottle.”

Komari eyed the milk box greedily. “No additives…” Then she snatched it and poked the straw right in.

Watching her suck it down made it feel like I was feeding a stray cat—which, come to think of it, you weren’t supposed to do. You had to either ignore them or take them home. No in between.

Komari noticed me staring and pulled away. “N-no takesies-backsies.”

As it happened, mine was a no-pets household.

***

Komari and I didn’t talk much. I ended up leaving halfway into the break. She could have my oasis for the day.

“There you are! Nukumizu, I wanted to—hey! Hold up, dude!”

“Huh?” I stopped next to some guy, having nearly walked straight past him. It was him—Hakamada Sousuke. “Uh, can I help you?”

Busy day today.

“Mind coming with me?” he said. “Wanna go somewhere a little more private.”

I followed him around the back of the old annex. It didn’t take much to guess what sort of business he had with me.

“Sorry to bug you like this, man. I think you know what I wanted to—” I started to pull out my wallet. “Uh, why’re you doing that?”

“Oh. Sorry. Just assumed.” I shoved it back in my pocket. Wrong guess.

“Didn’t take you for a jokester,” Hakamada laughed. He could take me for whatever he wanted if it meant skimming over that miscommunication. He stammered a bit. “So, look, you’ve been hanging around Anna a lot, yeah?”

I had to take a second to attach the name to Yanami. “Huh?! W-well, I, er… I dunno. Not really.”

Hakamada relaxed a little. “Hey, you can be real with me. You’re that couple people have been talking about, aren’t you? The one that hangs around the old annex. I heard something about a proposal, someone said you were getting all cuddly one time—everyone knows about it.”

How had so much been so perfectly taken out of context? This was just silly.

“You’ve got it all wrong,” I said. “Okay, well, not all wrong, but it’s not like that!”

“You don’t gotta be shy about it. These things just happen.”

These things did not just happen, and I wished they’d stop ­happening. What did he want from me anyway? Was he about to shake me down and tell me to back off his best friend? Hakamada was pretty sporty. I didn’t have a shot in hell against him one-on-one, but hey, I was a man. I could last a cool two seconds if push came to shove.

Hakamada shot his head down. “Take care of her for me!”

Take what of who now?

“Wait, wait, wait, you’re seriously not understanding something!”

“I’m happy for you guys. I really am. I just want the best for Anna, and it means a lot to meet the guy her heart’s set on.”

“Look, you need to listen.”

What was this guy’s problem? Was he deaf or just one of those protagonists?

“Sorry to spring this on you,” he went on. “I know we never really talked. Just thought we might change that.”

“Okay, great, but you’re not listening.”

The guy had already friend-zoned Yanami. Logically, there was nothing to be gained, no reason this should have gotten me heated.

But it was.

He flashed one of his perfect, innocent smiles. “The four of us should go on a double date someti—”

“Can you stop for a second?”

“Oh, my bad. I’m rambling, aren’t I?”

I didn’t care that he was rambling. I didn’t care for his apologies.

What I cared about was one thing and one thing only.

Something compelled me to step right up to him. “You know that she loved you, right?”

“I… Hey, did I say something?”

“You do, don’t you?”

She wasn’t my friend. I had no business saying these things. So why was I?

Hakamada recoiled, flitted his eyes around, and scratched at his nose nervously. “I mean, I had a feeling. That’s why I was glad to hear she found someone else.”

“Well, she still does!” I shouted. “She still loves you! Present tense! And it’s not right for you to just pretend that she doesn’t because of some stupid rumor!” It occurred to me a little late that I wasn’t sure where I was going with this. Right. There was one more thing. “It’s not true, by the way.”

“Then why were you two having lunch together all the time?”

I had to stop myself from telling him that it was because he’d saddled Yanami with the bill after having a steak so he could go pick someone else. Not that Yanami was any less guilty with her udon dessert.

“Maybe you guys just eat too much,” I said.

“What?”

We were getting further from the point with every word.

“Talking to myself.”

This guy could not be real. It was like every rom-com protag had been stuffed in a blender and mixed into one.

In the midst of my self-aggrandizing, Hakamada suddenly froze solid like he’d seen a bear. Which was ridiculous, because there were no bears this far away from—

I followed his gaze, and behind me was something worse than a bear.

“Anna!” Hakamada yelped.

“Hey, guys,” she said. She was shaking like a volcano about to erupt. “So, um, quick question. What’s going on here?” Her face was bright red, and I couldn’t tell if it was from rage or embarrassment.

“Yanami-san! Wh-what are you doing here?” I stammered.

“Komari-chan messaged me and said you were getting mugged by some hot guy. That it would make ‘very good material.’ So I came, just to be safe.” She mad-dogged Hakamada, then me. “Now will someone please answer my question?”

That would be difficult, because not even I was sure what we were doing anymore. Or what Komari’s ominous “material” was, for that matter.

“Lemme make this easier,” Yanami said. “Nukumizu-kun. What were you just telling Sousuke?”

“That, uh, the limited edition Garigari-kun mint chocolate popsicle is actually the bomb?”

“I’m going to give you one more chance before I totally lose it.”

We had already crossed that line. I could see it in her eyes.

Regardless of how screwed we already were, I had only one option: deny, deny, deny. Because for some reason that tended to work out better than confessing. The wonders of the justice system.

“Hold on!” Hakamada blurted. “It’s not his fault. I’m the one who forced him to spill everything. I wouldn’t listen.”

I would have been moved by his selfless attempt to defend me if it hadn’t simultaneously condemned us.

Yanami shook even harder. “Everything?! How much is everything?!”

Her tremors were exceeding chihuahua levels and nearing the Richter scale. Hakamada grabbed her shoulders in (what I could only assume was) an attempt to calm them. “I’m sorry, Anna. I just wanted you to find someone new.”

“What?” The color left Yanami’s face, the context finally dawning on her. “No. Don’t start that,” she whispered. Her bite was gone. She was so small now.

“I just want you to be happy,” Hakamada continued, entirely oblivious. “To find someone who can treat you better than a guy like me ever could.”

“Stop it.” She looked moments from crumbling.

My body moved on its own. I threw Hakamada off and stood between them. “She said stop it, man!”

It was stupid. I was a million kinds of out of line. And I didn’t care.

“Listen, and really listen this time, Hakamada! You’re free to date or not date whoever you want. Reject Yanami-san, reject the whole damn world, I don’t give a rat’s ass!” I could feel Yanami staring daggers at me for real this time. I was so dead. “But you’re not free to decide how she feels! Okay?! What happens to the things she actually feels then?! The things she feels for you?!”

The hot air that had been sweltering inside me for days was all coming out at once.

“You’re the one person she doesn’t want to hear that crap from! You can’t tell her to be happy! You can’t tell her to move on! You lost that right when you broke her heart!”

Hakamada. Man, that guy. What an ass. The way he stood there all cool and suave while I blustered like an idiot. He had it all. The looks. The personality. He didn’t need to put on airs. He really was just that decent a guy.

Yanami and I were nothing in comparison. We weren’t special or close like they were.

But I had seen strength and sadness he hadn’t.

“You’re supposed to be her friend! You rejected her! So own it! Quit using her to make yourself feel better about your own stupid guilty conscience!”

I started to hack and cough. Shouting didn’t come naturally to me.

Hakamada hurriedly patted me on the back. “Hey, you all right?”

“F-fine…”

What a sorry display. If I had half of what Hakamada had, maybe I wouldn’t lose my temper and then totally flub the landing. Maybe I would have had the courage to say the things I should have said to Yanami when it mattered most.

My head cooled, lethargy came hard and fast.

“You’re right,” Hakamada said. “You’re absolutely right, Nukumizu.”

“O-oh. Um. Sorry for going off like that.”

He offered a hand. Timidly, I offered my own. And then we—

“Will you people stop screaming about my relationship ­status?!” Yanami roared, shoving her way between us. “What the hell is wrong with you two?! Who said you could go tying all my business up in a pretty little bow?! Uh, hello! I’m here too! Do you have tapioca for brains?!”

“I-I, uh…” I had nothing to say.

Yanami had her foot on the gas, and she was straight flooring it. First in line for vehicular manslaughter was Hakamada.

She grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him close. “Yes, I love you! I always have, and I still do! I am not over it—not even a little!”

“Anna, I—”

“Don’t you dare apologize!” Yanami’s eyes raged with over a decade of unspoken feelings. She buried her face in his chest. “I’m not over you, and you’re just going to have to deal with that!”

“I love you! And I’m going to keep loving you! So shut up and go be happy with her! Go be happy with Himemiya Karen and let me deal with it!”

Yanami stayed there for a while, quietly shaking. Meanwhile, I was getting the feeling I was overstaying my welcome.

Before I could find the right timing to dip, she pulled away from him. “I’m going to keep loving you, and you’re gonna have to deal. One day I’ll stop loving you, and you’ll have to deal with that too!” She let go of his shirt, shoving him away.

She then set her sights on me next. I shuddered.

“Nukumizu!” she barked. “What was I going to say to you?!”

“Um, I’m not sure,” I said.

“Me neither! Totally forgot! It was probably nothing!”

She whacked me on the head.

“Ow! What was that for?”

“No reason!”

Well then, that was just mean.

Yanami pressed her finger against my chest and got in my face. “Now, I know you were trying to be sweet, but you can’t go jumping to conclusions about who loves who, and I think this, and she thinks that, and then running your mouth! You’re supposed to talk about these things first! Communicate!”

“But I…thought I couldn’t.”

She rolled her eyes hard. “Says who? Use your words! It’s not against the rules!”

“It’s not?”

“Dude, whose permission do you think you need to talk to someone at school? On what planet do you live?!”

None of this computed with my brain. On my home planet, chatting up girls was the ultimate faux pas.

“I dunno, I just thought that I’d be annoying you. Or something,” I said.

“That’s not your problem, dude! There’s literally no way for you to know that. And guess what? I’m not a mind reader either!”

I… Huh. Hm.

Maybe she had a point. I was a friendless weirdo, but did that exclude me from having free will? I was allowed to talk or hang out with or avoid whoever I wanted just as much as anyone else. What I wasn’t allowed to do was assume how those people would feel about it. Only they could decide that.

“So basically,” I said, “I am allowed to talk to you?”

“At appropriate times and places!” That went without saying. I felt my lips start to turn up on their own. “What’s that about? Stop that. It’s weird.”

“Nothing. Just, thank you. Really.”

“I’ll never understand you.” Yanami sighed and shook her head. “Anyway, both of you! Don’t forget what I said! Got it?”

“Yes, ma’am!” Hakamada and I replied together. Our hearts were one in that moment.

“Now, Sousuke,” Yanami continued. “Apologize to Nukumizu-kun.” 

 Wait, why?

Hakamada turned and bowed to me. “I’m sorry for getting you caught up in all this, Nukumizu.”

I waved my hands and did the whole “oh, no, please” song and dance. To what end, I did not know.

“Nukumizu-kun, now you apologize to me,” Yanami said.

“Um, okay?” I didn’t question it. Questions would not help. “I’m sorry. I won’t run my mouth anymore.”

Yanami crossed her arms and nodded. “Good. I forgive you.” She tilted her head next. “So, what now?”

No one knew. We all exchanged glances, and then the bell rang. Lunch break was over.

Yanami wiped a few remaining tears hanging from her eyelashes and smiled. “All right, whatever. Back to class, everyone. About-face!” We about-faced. Yanami passed between us, slapping each of us on the back, and ran ahead. She turned and waved. “Don’t be late, slowpokes!”

Hakamada put a hand on my shoulder. “Let’s go,” he said to me.

“R-right,” I said back.

We looked at each other, wearing the same exhaustion on our faces, then followed after her.