Chapter 6: Ichinomiya
After that, Sara left without a word, as if she had nothing more to say.
Yuki watched Sara’s retreating back, then just said, “I’m sorry,” and left.
I walked home slowly, battered by the rain, illuminated by the faint light of the streetlights.
Everything I had tried to protect was shattered into pieces, beyond repair.
And both Sara and Yuki had faces contorted with pain.
The two people I loved were suffering. How could I fix the trio’s relationship? How could I bring back their smiles?
The night passed as I continued to ask myself unanswerable questions.
“Good morning, Shinya-kun.”
I opened the front door in the morning, and Sara was there.
Her beautiful black hair, as always, reached her waist, her posture was straight and dignified, and her uniform was perfectly neat. She was Sara Segawa in every way, my first love and my girlfriend, Sara Segawa.
“How long have you been here?”
“Since six.”
She said it so calmly, but considering the distance from Sara’s house, she must have left quite early.
I didn’t need to ask why she was so early. She was worried that Yuki might make a move on me.
“Let’s go.”
I was led by Sara as we walked to school.
“If you were here, you could have at least rung the intercom.”
“It’s not a big deal.”
As we walked along the tree-lined main street, Sara clung to my arm. But it felt less like an expression of affection and more like a child clutching a precious treasure.
“S-Sara, you’re sticking too close.”
“It’s fine. We’re dating, after all.”
The Hoshinomiya students walking around us did a double-take. Sara had never clung to me in public before.
We walked with Sara, who didn’t seem to mind the stares, and entered the classroom.
Yuki hadn’t arrived yet. When I sat down, Sara, whose seat was normally far away, stayed by my side, chatting about trivial things. But the next moment, Sara’s eyes instantly sharpened.
“Morning~”
Yuki arrived at school and greeted her classmates as if nothing had happened.
When Yuki looked at me flirtatiously, Sara clung to my arm to keep her in check. But Yuki ignored Sara completely and started chatting with other girls. It was as if Sara wasn’t even there.
Yuki was playing the villain to protect me.
But the fact was that we had been the Daily Girlfriend, and there was no way to defend myself now. From Sara’s perspective, she had been cheated on, which brought up her trauma, and Yuki was 100% at fault.
Now that things had come to this, anything I said to Sara would be met with hostility, insisting that Yuki was the one to blame.
In the end, I couldn’t do anything, and time just passed.
At lunchtime, Sara, who had wrapped her usual tiered lunch box in a cloth, came to my desk.
Yuki had already pushed her desk together with her friends and started eating.
I thought Sara would be uncomfortable eating lunch in a place where Yuki was, but Sara pushed a nearby desk next to mine and sat down.
“Let’s eat.”
Sara unwrapped the cloth, revealing the tiered lunch box and a cute pink lunch box.
“I made this… I want you to eat it.”
Sara opened the lunch box, revealing a home-style lineup of octopus-shaped wieners, tamagoyaki, and spinach with sesame dressing.
“You made this, Sara?”
“I made it last night, with the housekeeper teaching me.”
She didn’t usually cook, but she had clearly tried hard despite her inexperience.
I hadn’t been to the school store yet and didn’t have a lunch or bread. I was about to take my chopsticks, but Sara took them first. She picked up a piece of tamagoyaki and,
“A-Aang.”
She brought it to my mouth.
I hesitated for a moment. The whole class was watching us, and Sara’s face was bright red.
But I felt sorry for Sara if I left her hanging, so I took the tamagoyaki into my mouth. It was sweet, salty, and delicious.
“It’s good, Sara.”
Relieved by my words, Sara continued to feed me.
The whole class had stopped eating and was watching us, but Yuki was chatting with her friends. Moreover, she was giving me meaningful glances.
That reaction seemed to fuel Sara’s frustration, as she looked toward Yuki more and more often.
From Sara’s perspective, the woman who tried to destroy her happiness was reacting like this even after she had tried to check her. It was only natural that she was annoyed.
And when about half the lunch was gone, Sara finally lost her patience.
“Shinya-kun!”
Sara rarely raised her voice, and the whole class focused on her again.
Her outburst was completely unexpected.
“I’m coming over to your house today! I’m not going home until tonight!”
The moment school let out, Sara walked home with me and followed me all the way back to my house.
“Here you go, for now.”
“Oh, thank you.”
I brought the tea I’d steeped for Sara, who had already gone up to my room. I’d bought it at the convenience store we’d stopped at on the way home. I set it on the low table, and we sat down next to each other.
But Sara didn’t even glance at the tea. Her eyes were fixed on the treasure box on my study desk—a cookie tin I’d bought at an amusement park when I was a kid.
“That’s the one, isn’t it? The one you said has the charm for finding love.”
“Yeah. I’ve kept it safely tucked away ever since I got amnesia.”
Apparently, before the drowning accident that caused my amnesia, I never let that Ichinomiya-san’s charm out of my sight, not even when I was swimming or sleeping. But I nearly lost it during the accident.
Thinking it might happen again, I decided to put the charm inside the treasure box.
“You cherish it so much,” Sara said.
And then she fell silent.
She didn’t say that she was Ichinomiya-san. She must have a difficult past she couldn’t bring herself to talk about, a past she couldn’t just bring up.
From then on, neither of us spoke.
A tense silence dominated the room.
The chirping of cicadas, the shouting of neighborhood kids, the drone of the air conditioner.
It was Sara who broke the silence.
She looked down for a moment, and then, completely out of the blue, she started unbuttoning her shirt.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa!”
I instinctively reached out to stop her, but Sara didn’t pause. This was clearly out of character for the bashful, innocent Sara.
One button, then another, came undone, revealing a deep cleavage and a seductive black lace bra. I couldn’t help but avert my gaze.
“I-I’m a G-cup, so I’m bigger than Yuki. I bet that’ll make you happy, Shinya-kun!”
I mean, yeah, I was happy, but hold on a second! Before I could say anything, Sara leaned into me, and I felt a faint warmth. Then a ticklish sensation brushed against my thigh...
I looked back down to see Sara, her body leaning on mine, tracing my thigh with her beautiful fingers in a feather-light touch.
“Sara?!”
Because she wasn’t used to this kind of thing, her touch was clumsy. Her face was bright red up to her neck.
Usually, Sara would be too embarrassed and would just flee, but today was different.
Sara’s fingers moved up from my thigh and brushed against that part of me, right over my trousers.
The unexpected stimulus made my thing twitch violently. Sara flinched in surprise but, still timid, began to rub it with her soft palm.
“M-Maybe I’m not as good as Yuki, but I’ll try my best to make you feel really good, Shinya-kun!”
She was obsessed with the thought that Yuki would steal me away. That’s why she was doing this. To get my attention.
“Ngh, Sara!”
My brain was buzzing with sweet pleasure, and the words I tried to squeeze out to stop her only came out as a gasp.
Seeing my reaction, Sara looked relieved.
“Thank goodness... You are enjoying it, aren’t you?”
Yes, to be honest, it did feel good.
Sara’s palm was soft, and perhaps because she was paying close attention to my reactions, she was a quick study. She understood right away what made me feel good.
As I trembled from the pleasure, my lower half began to heat up.
It wasn't just the friction from Sara’s hand. My thing was growing hot and expanding.
“This is... your size, Shinya-kun...”
Sara’s gaze was fixed on me.
Today, Sara was still pushing forward. With fumbling hands, she lowered the zipper of my trousers. And then, my thing was exposed.
Sara’s eyes widened as she looked at it, standing erect toward the ceiling.
“Sara—!”
I finally tried to stop her. This was seriously too much.
But then a thought flashed through my mind.
What good would stopping her do? Wouldn’t it just increase Sara’s anxiety? After all, Yuki and I supposedly did it, so it would be strange if I didn't do it with Sara.
If that happened, Sara would be the one who suffered the most. So, I couldn’t say a word.
“I’m not a loose woman. It’s only for you, Shinya-kun...”
She whispered this in a voice so faint it was almost swallowed by the air, and then straddled me, facing me.
Sara’s soft bottom pressed against mine without even her skirt as a barrier. It was big, soft, and her body heat felt comfortable. Her skin was moist, firm, and a little damp... damp? I was feeling her soft skin directly. Where were her panties?
As if answering my question, Sara spoke.
“I took them off while you were getting the tea, Shinya-kun.”
I can’t believe this high-class girl is doing something so crazy!
“But don’t worry. I’ve thought this through.”
Well, she wouldn’t go any further than this, right? I thought, relieved.
Even if jealousy had made her aggressive, Sara was still a complete and total beginner at love. Nothing more could possibly happen.
Ignoring my relief, Sara rummaged through the convenience store bag she’d placed beside her and pulled out a small box.
“０・０１mm”
It was a condom for doing that.
This high-class girl is seriously unbelievable!
“I’ve done this in class, so I know how...” Sara said.
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That was the practice of putting a condom on a cardboard tube. I definitely remembered doing that.
That’s not the point, I thought, but I still couldn’t bring myself to stop Sara.
Sara took the thing out of the box and, with a tight, nervous expression, tore open the foil. Then she began to slip it over my thing, hidden beneath her skirt. It was clumsy, but once she finally managed to get it on, some of the tension visibly left Sara’s body.
“Wait, is it actually on?” I asked.
Sara nodded.
The fit was incredible, and the rubber was so thin. I could barely tell it was there.
“Since it’s my first time... I’m sorry if I’m not good at it,” she said. But I’ll try my best to make you feel good. She said this, her eyes cast downward.
Even if I told myself I didn’t have the right to stop her, shouldn’t I still stop her? That thought was screaming in my head.
Sara was supposed to want a pure romance with me. A relationship where we slowly and carefully deepened our bond. She might occasionally step on the gas a little too hard, but fundamentally, she was a girl who blushed and looked happy just from holding my hand.
That Sara was clearly overstepping the line.
But if I stopped her now, Sara would be crushed, thinking I was only intimate with Yuki. If I didn’t stop her, I might hurt the genuine Sara by forcing an intimacy she didn’t truly desire.
“Shinya-kun...”
Sara buried her face into the side of my neck and lifted her hips. If she brought them down, it would happen. Something between us would change forever.
But we didn’t go any further than that.
Sara pulled away from me and sank to the floor, tears already tracing paths down her cheeks. Soon, they began to pour out as if a dam had broken.
“I know... I know,” she squeezed the words out in a raw, hoarse voice.
Her voice broke into a sob as she struggled to form her words through the tears.
“I know this is wrong. I shouldn’t be doing this with you just out of jealousy, and I really wanted it to be more romantic. I wanted it to be only because of my pure feelings for you, Shinya-kun.”
But that wasn’t possible. Not because of Yuki.
The relationship between Yuki and me. The dynamic we three had shared until now. It was all a complete mess, and Sara herself was probably overwhelmed, unsure of what to do.
That’s why she’d done this.
“I really want to make up with Yuki. I said all those things, but we’ve been friends forever, and I want to apologize for going too far. I want to apologize for slapping her. I want to talk it all out.”
“But I just can’t do it. I don’t want to lose you, Shinya-kun.” She said this, collapsing onto the floor in a fit of tears.
I could only watch Sara as she wept, unable to do a single thing for her.
I could cram my head with all the knowledge of neuroscience and psychology in the world, yet I couldn’t even protect one girl I cared about.
I was forced to face my own powerlessness. The sheer inability to even tell a single, gentle lie.
Even after that, Sara’s tears didn’t stop.
“I’ll do anything, anything at all, if it’ll help,” I spoke, desperate for her to calm down.
Sara raised her head, sniffling, and squeezed out her request.
“This weekend’s... Tanabata Festival... I want to go with you.”
“Yeah, let’s go.”
I had already promised Yuki I’d go to the Tanabata Festival, meaning I’d double-booked myself.
Even so, this wasn’t the time or place to refuse Sara’s request.
“Um, Shinya-kun... will you be taking part in the Tanabata Festival’s main event?”
“Yeah, since we’re going, why not?”
From what Yuki had told me, the festival was about writing wishes on tanzaku paper strips. I figured that was what she meant by the main event. Even with everything going on, I wanted to try and enjoy it properly.
Because if we had a fun time, maybe Sara would cheer up a bit.
And perhaps because she was happy to be going to the festival with me, Sara was back to her usual self the very next day.
However, the tense standoff between Sara and Yuki remained completely unresolved.
A few more days passed, and then, just before we left for the day, Sara went to the restroom.
As I sat at my desk reading a book and waiting for Sara, Takanashi-san came over to me.
She looked a little awkward.
“Hayacchi, come with me for a sec.”
“Huh? Wait—”
She half-dragged me by the hand down the hallway. When I asked where we were going, she just told me, “Just come on.” This wasn’t the usual goofy Takanashi-san. Her voice was strained and deadly serious.
We climbed the stairs, reached the door to the rooftop, and finally stopped.
“Yo, Hayasaki.”
Watarai was there, leaning against the wall.
But he didn’t have his usual carefree demeanor. Just like Takanashi-san, he looked strained and troubled.
Watarai twisted the doorknob of the rooftop door and quietly opened it just a crack.
What drifted out was a sob. A painful, wrenching sound, like the emotion was endlessly pouring out even though she must have cried until she had no tears left.
“Take a look.”
I peered through the gap as he instructed.
There was a girl kneeling and crying, clinging to the rooftop railing. It was Yuki.
“Yukicchi swore me to secrecy, told me not to tell Hayacchi. But seeing this every day... I got worried.”
But neither Watarai nor Takanashi-san knew what to say to Yuki. That’s why they brought me.
“It’s been like this for ages now.”
Every day after school, Takanashi-san borrows the rooftop key from a student council member she knows. Yuki gets the key from Takanashi-san and, making sure no one sees her, she comes up here to cry and cry and cry, crying even after her tears run dry. She only leaves when the school is about to lock up.
“Well, me and Takanashi... we heard the whole story, y’know.”
Yuki apparently told them as a courtesy for letting her borrow the key to the rooftop.
“I guess Yukicchi just has nowhere to put all her feelings, you know? That’s what I think is happening.”
She was completely cut off from Sara. She couldn’t get close to me. The “daily girlfriend” arrangement was gone. Every relationship that had been Yuki’s emotional bedrock since she quit being an idol had completely crumbled.
I knew she was putting on a brave face. But I never imagined she was bottling up this much pain. Even so, I couldn’t bring myself to speak to her. I couldn’t find the right words.
The smiles had vanished from both Sara and Yuki. Worse, their emotions were a mess, and they were both weeping. The peaceful life I’d had with them was completely gone.
“...For now, let’s move somewhere else, yeah? It’ll be a pain if Aiba sees us.”
We moved to the clubroom and sat on the sofas. As usual, Watarai and Takanashi-san sat side-by-side, with me sitting across the low table from them.
“Actually, things are pretty bad with Sara, too,” I said.
I told them about Sara’s situation.
That she’d been pushed to her limit and had almost had sex with me, that she’d broken down crying, and that she desperately wanted to reconcile with Yuki but felt unable to.
“Sounds like you’re having your own struggles over there, I tell ya.”
“Saracchi doesn’t usually show her feelings, so she’s probably been bottling up a lot, huh?”
But Takanashi-san insisted that Yuki was bottling up even more.
“We asked Yukicchi a lot of stuff, you know.”
She had thought it would be enough if she could just be my number one, even as the “daily girlfriend.” Being my number one was what mattered; the official status didn’t.
She’d told me the same thing.
“But, what was it? The false memory thing? She gave up on being number one after that whole incident, she said.”
Yuki was a great actress. But the moment the false memory incident made her greedy, the moment she thought she could become my number one, she couldn’t control her feelings anymore. That’s what caused the friction with Sara. And I, caught in the middle, was on the verge of telling a lie.
“That’s the real reason Yukicchi decided to quit being the daily girlfriend.”
Me telling a lie. That would be an act that warped the me that Yuki loved. It would also destroy the promise of my first love. Because Yuki valued that first love so much, she understood the gravity of it.
So, Yuki planned to have one last date and then revert to being just friends—all to protect my first love, to prevent a scenario where I had to lie, and to keep me from suffering.
But Yuki only told me the reason for ending the daily girlfriend arrangement was “because I love my friendship with Sara and the time the three of us spend together.”
That was for my sake. If Yuki had said, “I’m quitting the daily girlfriend arrangement so Shinya won’t have to lie,” I would have tried even harder not to lie, which she must have known would only increase my burden. That’s why she hid the real reason from me.
It was a reason typical of the incredibly thoughtful Yuki.
“If the daily girlfriend thing ended, Hayasaki and Segawa’s relationship would be safe, and so would the three of you as friends.”
“And that way, I wouldn’t be forced to lie.”
“Exactly. That’s why Aiba chose to sacrifice herself, I tell ya.”
Yuki might be academically challenged, but she was a girl capable of this kind of planning.
But her plan failed when Sara found us at the very end of that last date.
“Do you know why Yukicchi chose to be the bad guy then?”
“To protect the relationship between me and Sara, at least?”
That way, my happiness would be preserved. That’s what Yuki must have been thinking.
“It wasn’t just that. Yukicchi was trying to protect your first love, too. Because at that moment, the only way for Hayacchi to get out of it was to lie, right?”
That meant—
“Yukicchi was only thinking about protecting Hayacchi, from start to finish.”
Takanashi-san continued sadly, adding, “Because it might be related to the daily girlfriend thing, I also asked Yukicchi why she quit being an idol.”
“She was exhausted by a world full of lies, where she couldn’t trust anyone, and then she met Hayacchi, who never lies. I think that saved her. That was a bigger deal than Hayacchi realizes, and it’s been her rock all this time.”
I realized that was probably still true.
“That’s why Yukicchi wants to do anything and everything for Hayacchi.”
“But Yuki is still hurting.”
And she was still crying all alone.
To protect me, Yuki chose to be covered in the lies she hated so much—the same kind of lies that had caused her to quit the idol life she loved.
“Don’t you think it would be better to tell Saracchi about the daily girlfriend thing rather than letting this situation keep going? You have a good reason, like her being your ex before the amnesia.”
“I tried telling Yuki that, but...”
She refused. I was also complicit in the daily girlfriend arrangement, and if I told Sara, I would get hurt. Yuki would never allow that.
And on top of all this, I had one more problem hanging over me. The double-booked event, even though the relationship between the two girls was at its worst.
“What should I do about the Tanabata Festival?”
“...What did you just say, man?”
The atmosphere had been heavy before, but now the air in the clubroom seemed to freeze solid.
Takanashi-san’s face was pale.
“W-What’s wrong?”
“H-Hayacchi... did you just say Tanabata Festival?”
“Yeah. Apparently, it’s a festival they hold every year in Hoshinomiya. I promised Sara and Yuki I’d go with them.”
“You don’t know because of the amnesia, do ya, Hayasaki?”
“W-Well, I guess it can’t be helped...”
And just as Watarai was about to open his mouth.
“Shinya-kun, are you here?!”
The clubroom door flew open, and Sara rushed in, her hair flying.
Because of the Yuki incident, was she going to interrogate me about why I’d suddenly vanished? Was it a bad idea that Takanashi-san, another girl, was here?
Would she be wary of Takanashi-san and say something crazy this time?
But that wasn’t it at all.
“Rio’s coming over here on the day of the Tanabata Festival!”
“...Rio?”
Who was that? A friend of Sara’s?
That’s what I thought, but Sara was about to say something far more shocking than I could have ever imagined.
“It’s your first love, Ichinomiya Rio!”
“...Huh?”
It didn’t make any sense.
Because Ichinomiya-san, the girl I thought was my first love, was Sara.
This Rio person also had the last name Ichinomiya, but was Sara mistaken about something?
But I felt a strange sense of dissonance, and I voiced it.
“I thought Ichinomiya-san was you, Sara?”
Sara tilted her head, confused by my question.
“My maiden name is Ichinomiya, of course, but the Ichinomiya-san you’re talking about is my twin sister, Ichinomiya Rio, isn’t she?”
Apparently, after hearing my stories about Ichinomiya-san, she had become convinced that the person I was talking about was her twin sister, Rio.
In other words... the conditions were so perfectly aligned that I had simply, and wrongly, assumed Sara was Ichinomiya-san.
But it wasn’t strange that they looked alike. As twins, their genes were nearly identical, and they would have received similar upbringings.
Plus, Sara had said this about her first love: “It was back in elementary school, but I never even spoke to him...”
That’s right. The Sara from my childhood never spoke to me. She must have just been watching me and Ichinomiya-san play together.
I should have realized it sooner.
“You wanted to see Rio, didn’t you, Shinya-kun?”
“Well, yeah, I always hoped I could.”
“So, I adjusted the schedule, and she’s going to be able to come on the day of the Tanabata Festival.”
Watarai, who had been listening, leaned in and whispered awkwardly.
“About what I was saying earlier, the Tanabata Festival has a main event, y’know...”
He hesitated, but then he spoke clearly.
“Everyone kisses, following the legend that couples who kiss will be bound together forever, I tell ya.”
“...Huh?”
I had been convinced the Tanabata Festival’s main event was writing wishes on tanzaku paper. But I was wrong.
And I had already told Sara:
“Um, Shinya-kun... will you be taking part in the Tanabata Festival’s main event?”
“Yeah, since we’re going, why not?”
Which meant, having made that promise, I had to kiss someone... either Sara, Yuki, or Ichinomiya-san.
And that kiss would be a declaration of, ‘I want to be bound to you forever.’
If I chose one person, the other two would be miserable.
But I had to choose someone.
In other words, the situation had escalated into a love quadrangle.
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