Chapter 2: Trouble with Downtown Classmates

His theater troupe parents belonged to the tiny fraction of humanity who actually managed to 'make a living doing what they loved.' Even after having a child, the two of them were still actively chasing their dreams.

For Kouya, his musical actress mother and stage director father were parents he was proud of.

But at the same time, to say he harbored absolutely no resentment toward them would be a lie.

He had spent almost all of his highly impressionable childhood being raised at his grandfather's house. And when neither his parents nor his grandfather were available—even if it was only for a year—he was abruptly dumped at an acquaintance's house in Kyoto.

At the time, the first-grade Kouya had headed to Kyoto full of bitterness, not even given the time to say goodbye to the classmates he had finally become friends with at his elementary school in Tokyo.

He still remembered making a firm resolution in his heart: I'm just gonna have to say goodbye again soon anyway, so there's no way I'm making any friends.

Back then, his grandfather was hospitalized, and his parents weren't even in the country.

With a single backpack on his shoulders and no one to see him off, he boarded the Shinkansen at Shinagawa Station and headed from Tokyo to Kyoto. It was during summer vacation.

He remembered it was a terrifyingly hot day, the kind where sweat dripped from your brow just from walking.

He remembered the sky being an almost ironic shade of blue, with towering cumulonimbus clouds floating within it.

And he remembered the grating, unpleasant shrieking of the cicadas ringing in his ears.

Stepping off the air-conditioned Shinkansen, Kouya was overwhelmed by the sheer heat of Kyoto Station. Spotting him, a girl in a straw hat waved her hand.

An elderly driver wearing a happi coat from an inn stood beside her.

The name of the inn had surely been written on the driver's happi, but he couldn't recall it—Looking back, it must have been 〈Suimeisou〉.

"You're Kouya-kun, right? Your mom and dad said they were busy, so I came to pick you up."

The girl in the straw hat welcomed Kouya to the ancient capital of Kyoto.

Her parents, too, were busy with work—rebuilding their inn—so in a way, Kouya and the girl were kindred spirits.

Kouya never made any friends in Kyoto, but she alone was always by his side.

————That was a story from when Kouya was six, a full decade ago.

Those childhood memories had been pushed into the past, to the point where he couldn't even remember the face of the girl he had spent his time with in Kyoto, nor did he remember her real name.

The only memory that remained was that he had called her "Kii-chan."

But the ties of fate are a strange thing.

He never would have imagined that he'd end up living under the same roof as "Kii-chan from Kyoto" again.

And this time, the girl had come all the way to the capital in the East—

A minor incident occurred shortly after Kiyoko and Kouya began living together.

The incident was, quite simply, their commute to and from school.

Torame Kouya and Shizuishi Kiyoko lived in the same house, and they attended the same school.

Naturally, they took the exact same route.

Leaving the house at the same time and walking shoulder-to-shoulder down the same streets resulted in them instantly becoming the talk of the entire school.

"Why's Torame in Class 2 walking with Shizuishi-san?"

"What's their deal? Weren't they walking home together yesterday, too?"

"Are they dating?"

"Idiot. No way."

"They probably just happened to run into each other. I mean, Shizuishi-san just transferred here."

The students gossiped amongst themselves.

Kiyoko was the center of attention for the entire student body, and being seen with her meant Kouya was inevitably drawing attention as well.

Kiyoko was quick to take countermeasures.

"Kouya-kun, let us pretend to be complete strangers at school. Otherwise, I would feel terribly guilty toward your girlfriend."

"I don't have a girlfriend."

"You must have a girl who fits the bill, surely. To avoid any trouble, we are strangers starting today."

Girlfriend business aside, it was true that explaining their living situation to everyone around them would be a massive pain, just as Kiyoko pointed out.

Explaining the family circumstances that led to them living together would be even more of a pain, and having everyone make a fuss about it was downright annoying.

As a result, the two of them agreed to pretend they were strangers at school.

————Cohabitation.

It meant complete strangers with differing habits living their lives under a single roof.

In this world, even parents and siblings bicker endlessly. Even blood relatives cannot understand one another completely.

For total strangers raised under entirely different cultures and customs, this was even more true.

Kiyoko and Kouya were no exception.

"Let's sing music♪ Yeah!♪"

On a night exactly one week after they began living together, Kouya was in high spirits, a bright red electric guitar in hand as he sang his heart out.

Music was one of Torame Kouya's several hobbies. Perhaps because he was raised in an environment with parents deeply involved in musical theater, music had surrounded him since birth. As a result, Kouya himself loved both singing and playing instruments.

As for his actual skill—just as the proverb goes, 'the boy by the temple gate recites sutras unlearned'—he certainly wasn't bad, but he wasn't exactly at a level where he could charge money for it like his parents.

To make money in music, you needed talent, not just a good environment.

Regardless, that night, Kouya was strumming his guitar in his room and happily singing along as usual.

Knock, knock. It was then that someone rapped on the boy's door.

Setting down his headphones and guitar, Kouya opened the door to his room.

"Kiyoko-san?"

Kiyoko stood there wearing rabbit-print pajamas.

Glancing at the clock, he saw it was ten at night. Wondering what business she could possibly have at this hour, Kouya gave her a puzzled look. Kiyoko smiled sweetly.

"Kouya-kun, you certainly do love singing, do you not? I can hear it quite clearly all the way in my room."

"Eh..."

"You are singing with such wonderful energy."

Her face was smiling, but her voice held a certain coldness. No, it was a smile, yes, but it was a smile of pure darkness.

"You are truly talented. (Translation: You are being incredibly noisy.)"

"..."

Kiyoko's inner voice rang out loud and clear.

Kouya caught on immediately. She was furious. Shizuishi Kiyoko was euphemistically warning him about the racket he was making in the adjacent room.

For a brief moment, a conflict sparked within Kouya.

Should he read between the lines and obediently apologize, or should he pretend not to notice her sarcasm and keep right on singing?

—The angel inside Kouya whispered:

Living with someone requires consideration and compromise. You should accommodate Kiyoko's feelings here.

—The devil inside Kouya whispered:

Why should you hold back on your own hobbies in your own house? This might not be your parents' place, but it's your grandfather's house, and you practically own the place. Why should you have to cater to a total stranger from Kyoto like Kiyoko?

Two conflicting feelings warred within him.

After a moment of hesitation, Kouya shook his head and decided to strike a compromise within himself.

"I was actually thinkin' of setting some rules. Y'know, singing too much at night is a nuisance to the neighbors."

Kouya opted to propose a middle ground.

"I won't play past ten at night. Even before then, if I'm playing an instrument at night, I'll drop the electric and use a normal acoustic guitar. I'll keep the windows and doors shut. But I ain't gonna stop singing altogether. —How does that sound?"

"I see. I feel as though I have interrupted your fun, and for that, I apologize. (Translation: That is fine, just hurry up and stop already.)"

In response to Kouya's proposal, Kiyoko feigned a disappointed expression, trying to steer things so it looked like Kouya had voluntarily decided to hold back. Her acting skills were quite impressive.

————And so, due to these circumstances, the late-night neighborhood nuisance concerts hosted by Torame Kouya were put to a permanent end.

Shizuishi Kiyoko—a girl who absolutely refused to state directly to someone's face, "I don't like it, so stop."

Because Kouya had lived in Kyoto and was her childhood friend, he realized she was indirectly warning him, but he feared that their high school classmates in Asakusa would never understand her phrasing.

And it wasn't long before Kouya's fears were proven right.

————Perhaps it was better to say they had been proven right.

In Class 2-3 of Kouya's high school in Asakusa, there was a girl named Shiga Meika.

If one were to describe her, she was a girl with a slightly short semi-long haircut and a personality that screamed "The Shitamachi Girl." She was snappy, energetic, and the type of student who bluntly spoke her mind.

For better or worse, Shiga Meika was a fast worker, but her sole flaw was that she was a bit sloppy.

Incidentally, Shizuishi Kiyoko currently suspected that Shiga Meika and Torame Kouya were childhood friends on the verge of mutual, unrequited love.

And as fate would have it, this Miss Meika's seat was directly in front of Shizuishi Kiyoko's. This meant the two of them were placed in the same group when the class was divided up.

In high school, you rarely did activities by group, but cleaning duties were rotated on a group basis.

In other words, being in the same group meant Kiyoko and Meika had been assigned seats that obligated them to handle class chores together.

————It happened during the lunch break of a rainy day.

At Kouya's high school, cleaning was done on a rotating group system during the time between lunch and the start of afternoon classes.

Unfortunately, it had been raining since morning that day. With few students going out to play in the schoolyard, Shiga Meika, having finished eating her lunch, rushed through her cleaning duty at super-high speed.

Just how super-high speed? She was so fast that the entire cleaning process took her a mere sixty seconds.

Meika later gave Kouya the excuse that she had plans with a friend in the next class and was in a rush so she wouldn't be late. However, that was purely her own personal circumstance and hardly an excuse to half-ass her cleaning duty.

Naturally, the classroom wasn't clean in the slightest.

Dust remained in all four corners of the room, and the trash in the wastebasket had been left completely untouched.

It wasn't just sloppy; it was a negligent, half-assed attempt at cleaning.

And for Kiyoko, who was raised in a ryokan, that level of negligence was apparently unacceptable.

Kiyoko, who was in the same group, redid the classroom cleaning that Meika had slacked on, then called out to Meika and gently offered a warning.

"I suppose you left this work for me, but if you rush through your cleaning like that, the one you hold dear in your heart might be quite appalled."

Kiyoko's roundabout warning seemingly struck a nerve with Meika.

"Wait, are you warning me right now? And who the heck is 'the one I hold dear'?"

"I am simply speaking with your future in mind, Shiga-san."

"Huh? My future?"

"I am saying that if you do things so sloppily, it will cause trouble for your future spouse."

"...Marriage? What the heck are you talking about? Look, we've been in the same group for a whole week since you transferred here, Shizuishi-san. You should know my personality by now. This is just how I am!"

"I haven't really spoken with you properly, Shiga-san. Even though your name is Shiga, your presence is about on par with Wakayama or Mie, so..."

"Apologize to Wakayama and Mie! It's rude to call them invisible!"

"...I didn't quite go that far, but..."

"For the record, not once in my entire life have I been told I lack presence!"

"Is that so?"

"Yes! Did you just want to say something spiteful?"

"I didn't say anything of the sort, did I? I am simply thinking of you, Shiga-san, and—"

"You said it in a roundabout way! You've got a nasty personality, you know that!"

"At the very least, could you use the word "ikezu"?"

"It means the exact same thing!"

"It is because you think it is the same thing that you treat absolutely everything so sloppily."

Following this exchange of a fruitless verbal war, Meika's anger reached the boiling point in response to Kiyoko's gentle retorts.

"————!"

Grinding her molars and trembling at the shoulders, Meika clenched her fists tight.

————Three seconds until the anger explodes.

Snap. Just as the Shitamachi girl's patience was about to snap entirely...

"Halt right there!"

A voice cut in, echoing through the lunch break classroom of Class 2-3 mid-cleaning.

Kiyoko and Meika temporarily paused their argument and turned toward the source of the voice.

A male student seated at the front of Class 2-3, who had been listening to their argument while reading a book, slowly set his paperback down, stood up, and walked over to the two girls.

He was a tall boy, over 180 centimeters, exuding an aura of pure intelligence.

Pushing up the bridge of his glasses, the tall boy declared,

"We must not unfold any further fruitless conflicts with no battle results. Therefore, I shall take custody of this situation."

Kiyoko looked bewildered by the sudden intruder.

"Umm... Dazai-kun... was it?"

For the record, having been raised in a customer service household, Shizuishi Kiyoko was exceptionally good at remembering faces. Naturally, despite what she said earlier, she actually remembered Meika's personality perfectly well.

"Indeed. I am the One-Man Science Club President, Dazai Taishi."

The bespectacled intruder—Taishi—introduced himself, causing Kiyoko to tilt her head in suspicion.

"...One-Man Science Club?"

"Heh. Allow me to answer your query, Shizuishi-kun. At this school, if a club does not possess a minimum of five members, it is not recognized as an official club, and therefore, no club budget is granted."

"Is that so?"

"However, there is currently no one in our school's highly traditional Science Club other than myself! If we are demoted to a mere hobby group, we will receive no budget, creating a dire situation where we cannot even purchase reagents! To avoid this fate, I bowed my head to four acquaintances in the go-home club and secured their names on paper. As a result, ostensibly on the roster, the Science Club possesses five members including myself, fulfilling the requirement for club activities. In other words, under the guise of operating as a legitimate club, our Science Club continues to receive a club activity budget!"

"Isn't that just a scam?"

"I think so too, but putting that aside, Shizuishi-san," Meika glared anew at Kiyoko, who had delivered the leisurely deadpan. "I don't know how to sugarcoat things, so I'll just say it straight. I really don't like it when you use those roundabout phrases on me."

"Likes and dislikes are up to the individual, so I have no right to stop you, but..."

"See! There you go again with that phrasing—"

"Calm yourselves!"

Dazai Taishi thrust himself between the two girls.

Literally, physically, he slid his tall frame right into the space between Meika and Kiyoko.

The tall Science Club President became a wall between the two girls and proudly declared,

"The Science Club President, Dazai Taishi, shall settle this!"

————An incompetent hard worker only creates more work for everyone else.

Unfortunately, that was common sense in human society.

Kouya, who had been watching the events unfold, panicked the moment Taishi appeared.

You see, Torame Kouya and Dazai Taishi were bad friends.

They had known each other since middle school, and to tell the truth, Torame Kouya was one of the phantom members lending his name to the aforementioned Science Club. He was, of course, purely doing it as a favor to Taishi, possessing not a shred of interest in the Science Club. He did absolutely no science-related activities.

For Kouya, who looked sociable but actually had very few friends, Dazai Taishi was one of his rare buddies. Kouya's reluctance to make friends might have been trauma from a childhood spent being dragged around by his parents' jobs, but we'll set that aside for now.

The issue here was that Torame Kouya knew Dazai Taishi's true character extremely well.

Taishi looked intelligent and exuded an aura of competence, but Kouya knew from firsthand experience that reality was an entirely different story.

Of course, naming himself the Science Club President wasn't completely baseless; his grades in science subjects were excellent.

But he was utterly hopeless at everything else. Especially interpersonal relationships.

Academic excellence and social excellence are two entirely different beasts. When it came to human relations, there had never been a single instance where this guy stepping in actually resulted in a smooth resolution.

Dazai Taishi possessed immense logical reasoning skills, but logic was entirely useless in emotional human conflicts. As a result, whenever this Science Club President poked his nose into people's emotional affairs, things always took a turn for the worse.

"Wait a sec, Taishi, this has got nothin' to do with you."

You're just gonna make it more confusing, Kouya thought, abandoning his lunchbox and striding over to the scene of the argument.

Kouya grabbed his bad friend by the shoulder and lowered his voice so Kiyoko and Meika couldn't hear.

"If a guy like you sticks his nose in, things are just gonna get way more complicated!"

"Haha, my dear friend Kouya. I assure you, there is an immensely logical reason for my intervention in their squabble."

"A logical reason?"

"Indeed. I am sticking my nose into this because I wish to resolve this situation with my overwhelming mediation skills and earn their utmost respect."

"For what purpose?"

"It is obvious! I wish to look cool in front of Meika-kun, nothing more, nothing less!"

Even while lowering his voice so Meika and the others couldn't hear, Taishi declared this to Kouya with absolute certainty.

"..."

Torame Kouya stood momentarily astounded by his friend's logic.

"Hold on, there's zero logic in your motive! That's just a desire overflowing with one hundred percent personal bias!" Kouya snapped back to reality and retorted.

Heh, the one-man Science Club President slicked back his hair and puffed out his chest.

"What is wrong with the desire to look cool in front of the girl I like? Kouya, are you truly suggesting you would deny the tropical bird that dresses in flashy plumage, dances nimbly, and sings coolly, all to catch the attention of a female? Is it not the instinct of all living creatures to initiate events that draw the attention of the opposite sex and maneuver advantageously for the prosperity of one's descendants?! This is none other than the logic of life that encompasses all of humanity! In other words, this is a survival strategy to save Meika-kun in a remarkably cool fashion and win her love!"

"I don't care about your mystery logic, just please stop stickin' your nose in where it doesn't belong and making things worse!"

Kouya screamed. Though strictly at a volume the two girls couldn't hear.

That was right. Dazai Taishi had a crush on Shiga Meika.

His motive for acting was simple and clear. It was also blindingly obvious that while pretending to mediate fairly, he intended to secretly side with Meika and casually score points with her.

There was no way the situation would be resolved with something like that.

Kiyoko furrowed her brow slightly, then looked at Meika.

"Is this person an ally of yours, Shiga-san?"

"No, he's not. Don't go lumping us together, you're jumping to conclusions," Meika snapped back indignantly.

"Aren't you being a bit hypocritical saying that?"

"Excuse me?!"

Just as it seemed Kiyoko and Meika were about to resume their argument—rendering Taishi's intrusion entirely pointless—

"Hold it right there!"

A third girl's dignified voice echoed through the lunch break classroom.

The door to Class 2-3 swung open, revealing an incredibly serious-looking female student with braided hair. In short, yet another classmate who had eaten lunch elsewhere had returned to the classroom with an empty lunchbox in hand.

Since this third girl was a student of Class 2-3, Kouya obviously knew her name and her role within the class.

"Class Rep..."

Kouya wearily muttered the fragmented information he had on the third girl.

————Ugh. Another troublesome one just showed up.

That was Kouya's honest impression.

The girl's role was the Class Representative for Class 2-3, and her real name was Higuchi Hitoha.

Fundamentally, she was someone with a strong sense of justice, but she was the textbook definition of 'just because it's justice doesn't mean it works in a positive direction.' "Shizuishi-san, Shiga-san. I haven't heard what you were discussing, nor do I know what happened, but judging by the atmosphere, something is clearly amiss, so allow me to resolve it. After all, I am the Class Representative of Class 2-3."

"If you weren't listening, stay out of it."

Kouya coolly shot back at Hitoha, but she refused to listen.

"No, I cannot simply ignore this. After all, I am the Class Representative of this class. If you prefer the English, I am the Chairperson."

"Why'd you translate it to English? Makes no sense."

"Because it gives off the vibe of a high-ranking official in something like the Football Association, providing a sense of superiority. There is no deeper reason than that," Hitoha declared flatly.

If one were to express Higuchi Hitoha's defining attribute in a single word, it would be "Meddlesome." It was the kind of meddling born from good intentions that rarely ever proved useful.

Sensing a different kind of crisis than Kouya, Taishi filed a complaint with Hitoha.

"Step back, Hitoha-kun. I have already decided that I will be the one to resolve this situation. If you resolve it, you will completely steal my chance to shine!"

"Are you assuming I'm trying to steal your achievements for myself? What a narrow-minded person you are."

Hitoha directed a gaze full of contempt at Taishi.

The Science Club President's cheek twitched.

"Narrow-minded... I must admit there is some truth to that critique. However, Hitoha-kun. My narrow-mindedness is but a minuscule fraction when compared to this Earth. Furthermore, compared to the solar system, the Milky Way galaxy expanding behind it, and the infinite cosmos, it is practically equal to zero."

"What on earth is that twisted logic? To compare something to the universe and claim that a small number is equal to zero... Mathematics might forgive that, but the tax office certainly will not. Can you honestly look a tax official in the eye and say, 'An annual income of a few million yen is practically zero compared to the vastness of the galaxy, so I shouldn't have to pay taxes!'?"

"No, well, never mind the tax office, mathematics wouldn't forgive that either."

"You're the one who brought it up, what are you even saying?!"

"Isn't that just a lack of reading comprehension on your part, Hitoha-kun?"

"Who do you think you are, questioning the reading comprehension of someone who reads one book a week?!"

"Nonsense! I read through seven books a week. That is an average of one per day! Unlike you, who reads girls' novels with manga illustrations, I read the academic texts of Iwanami Paperbacks!"

"How do you know what reading labels I buy from, Dazai-kun?!"

————These guys are hopeless. Forget ending the argument; they were running wildly in the completely wrong direction.

Kouya cast a quick glance at the clock above the teacher's podium.

It was 1:17 PM. The chime would ring in three minutes, signaling the start of afternoon classes. He had to wrap this up somehow.

"Hold it."

Kouya pushed his way into the circle of arguments.

"Kouya-kun."

Kiyoko widened her eyes in surprise.

Kouya decided he would deal with this problem one person at a time. First, he turned to Hitoha and told her,

"Class Rep."

"Yes?"

"Class starts in one minute. You ain't gonna be able to wrap this up, so back off. I'll handle this."

"...Isn't it a bit prejudiced of you to assume I can't wrap this up, Torame-kun?"

"The fact is, it ain't wrapped up right now, is it? Got a counterargument?"

"...No. I certainly cannot deny that."

Hitoha let out a single sigh and reluctantly took a step back.

Next, Kouya glared at his bad friend, the Science Club President.

"Taishi."

"What is it?"

"Back off."

"That is quite a blunt command."

"I owe you one. I'll make it up to you later. Just shut up and back off."

"...Very well. However, you owe me. Do not forget those words. I am not a charity worker, you know. Even if you are my friend, I will absolutely ensure you repay your debts."

Kouya sensed he was going to be dragged into something troublesome later, but for now, Taishi also took a step back from the scene.

Next, he looked at Shizuishi Kiyoko, one of the primary parties involved.

Coming from Kyoto, Kiyoko followed her own style of avoiding direct statements and expecting the other party to read between the lines. But here in Asakusa, that didn't fly.

While keeping up her composed facade, Kiyoko looked slightly awkward. She looked like a cat that knew it was about to be scolded.

Kouya shook his head and sighed.

"Kiyoko-san."

"...Yes?"

Kiyoko asked back, putting her guard up slightly.

"Look, Kiyoko-san, I understand the way you talk."

"...Mhm."

"But, guys here have a hard time understanding it."

"...I suppose so."

"You gotta communicate your feelings properly."

"I will be careful. (Translation: I have no intention of changing.)"

"..."

Receiving the transmission of Kiyoko's inner voice, Kouya gave her a half-lidded stare.

No matter what she said out loud, it was glaringly obvious that this Kyotoite had no intention of changing a speaking style she had cultivated her entire life.

However, Kouya wasn't about to give up here. His cheek twitching, Kouya pressed the issue.

"If you think you were in the wrong, apologize to Meika."

"...I'm sorry, Shiga-san. I feel bad for pointing it out the way I did. But I honestly thought that if you keep doing sloppy things like that, the people important to you might end up disappointed."

Kiyoko turned to Meika and bowed her head.

"...Are you trying to pick a fight with me?" Meika groaned in a low voice.

For the time being, Kiyoko had offered a formal apology. That just left—

"Meika."

"What."

Meika crossed her arms and shot back indignantly, practically screaming that she wasn't the one at fault.

Kouya let out an inward sigh.

"Kiyoko-san ain't used to our vibe of saying things straight to people's faces like you do. She didn't mean to be spiteful; she really was warning you with your future in mind. It just ended up becoming a shouting match."

"..."

"Besides, the fact that you half-assed your cleaning is an objective truth, ain't it?"

Having the root cause—her one-minute cleaning job—pointed out, even Meika seemed to realize she was fighting a losing battle and fell silent.

Kouya pressed his advantage.

"Apologize for half-assing the cleaning."

"Alright, alright, I'm sorry!"

Sounding slightly desperate, Meika offered a perfunctory apology.

Deep down, she absolutely didn't believe she was at fault, but having secured apologies from both parties, the situation was unlikely to deteriorate any further.

Even before considering whether they could understand one another, Kouya felt that Kiyoko and Meika simply had terrible chemistry as human beings. But he decided to offer a bit of follow-up anyway.

"Kiyoko-san's been helping out at her family's ryokan since she was a kid, so she's hyper-aware of little details. Just treat it like an occupational hazard and watch over her with warm, forgiving eyes."

"Oh? Someone destined to be the future landlady was doing menial chores like cleaning?"

Taishi, who had been listening from the sidelines, crossed his arms and tilted his head. In his mind, the job of a landlady carried a far more glamorous image.

Kiyoko offered a troubled, bitter smile.

"Future landlady is a misunderstanding. And ryokan work is basically the pinnacle of menial chores. My family is short on staff, so to save on labor costs, I did absolutely anything I could. Cleaning, making beds, working the reception desk, serving customers, purchasing supplies, flower arrangement, interior design layout, making flyers and menus, running the social media... seriously, anything."

"Wait. Shizuishi-san, does that mean you can make, say, halfway decent posters?"

The Class Representative shoved her way right back into the conversation.

"Uh, well. I made a lot of our display materials, so if it's just that..."

"In that case, the ball games tournament is coming up soon. Would you be willing to help us create a poster for it?!"

Eyes practically sparkling with expectation, Hitoha looked up at Kiyoko.

"Our school's student council is completely defunct, so we run our events through an executive committee made entirely of class reps. But quite frankly, the posters and websites put together by a bunch of reps whose only redeeming quality is being serious are painfully unrefined. It screams amateur hour."

"You're saying that about yourself?!"

Ignoring Kouya's blunt retort, the class rep edged even closer to Kiyoko.

"You can gather all the people you want, but if none of them have a single shred of creativity, a sense of design isn't just going to magically sprout. To put it bluntly, our school's PR materials are always lame. Calling them 'aggressively tacky' would be an understatement. Walking around handing out posters made in modern-day Word using rainbow-colored fonts is just so, so humiliating."

Hitoha gently took Kiyoko's hands.

Then, tightening her grip, she pressed forward, refusing to let the daughter of the historic inn escape.

"Could you please use that same power you used to rebuild a historic inn to help our school break free from our absolute trash-tier media?!"

"I suppose I do not mind making a poster, but..."

Bewildered by the class rep's intense pressure, Kiyoko had no real reason to refuse and gave a vague nod of agreement.

Just then, through the hallway window, they spotted the teacher for their next class walking toward the room.

Time was up. Kouya chose to pull the plug on the conversation.

"Teacher's here, let's wrap this up! Both sides are guilty, case closed, dismissed!"

It was painfully obvious that the two girls hadn't reached any sort of mutual understanding, but for now, the hostilities had ceased.

"If you're making posters, I'll help out too, ya know," Kouya said.

Thinking it might be a good opportunity for Kiyoko to blend in with the rest of the class, Kouya casually offered his assistance. The girl in question, however, shot the boy a skeptical, half-lidded glare.

"Kouya-kun, do you know how to use Illustrator?"

"Not even a little bit."

"......I appreciate the sentiment. (Translation: You are completely useless, aren't you?)"

Just as Kiyoko inwardly sighed, realizing he honestly wouldn't be of any strategic value whatsoever, the chime signaling the start of fifth period rang out.

"Everyone, take your seats. We're beginning the fifth-period class."

Afternoon classes began, and a middle-aged female Japanese teacher walked into Class 2-3, roster in hand.

The group that had been arguing during lunch and the group that had stepped in to stop them scattered to their respective seats.

While Meika and Kiyoko hadn't reached a perfect reconciliation, the situation had somehow been managed.

Just as Kouya was breathing a sigh of relief, the Japanese teacher called out to him.

"Torame-kun, please erase the blackboard."

A direct order by name.

"Eh, why me?"

"You're on day duty."

Looking up at the teacher's words, he saw that the math equations from the morning classes were still on the board. And written in the corner of the blackboard was the name of the student on day duty.

Sure enough, just as the teacher pointed out, Torame Kouya's name was right there.

"Oh, sorry. I'll erase it right now."

Kouya hurriedly began erasing the board.

The Japanese teacher shook her head.

"How many times does this make? This class just can't seem to grasp the basics. Pull yourself together, Torame-kun."

"Eh. Are you saying that to me...?"

"Then who else would I be saying it to?"

"The Class Rep or somethin'."

"I object."

Sitting in the front row, Higuchi Hitoha raised her hand and countered the Japanese teacher.

"I am fulfilling my own duties. Cleaning up the mess of the person on day duty is not the role of the Class Representative."

"Well, I suppose that is true."

The Japanese teacher tapped her own shoulder lightly with the roster.

"It's just as Higuchi-san says. It is wrong to force the burden and responsibility onto a single person with a specific role. The point is, it's important for everyone in the class to spend their days with an awareness of fulfilling their own roles. Do you understand? Specifically, if the person on day duty forgets their job, this class needs an atmosphere where someone can naturally remind them."

Kouya had poked a hornet's nest and brought the Japanese teacher's lecture crashing down upon them.

Amidst the bad weather, kicking off the afternoon with a lecture mode that absolutely tanked the classroom's mood, Kouya finished erasing the board and returned to his seat.

His seat was in the back, by the window.

Suddenly, he felt someone's gaze on him.

Tracing the line of sight, he locked eyes with Kiyoko, who was sitting in the hallway-side seat.

The moment their eyes met, Kiyoko suddenly looked away.

"?"

The girl seemed to be preoccupied with something.

Kouya looked toward where Kiyoko's gaze had been directed moments before.

It was the classroom window glass.

As mentioned earlier, it was unfortunately raining that day. Condensation from the rain had completely fogged up the glass, obscuring even the schoolyard from view.

On that fogged-up glass, a short string of characters had been traced with a finger.

Just two short words.

————Thank you.

Kouya reflexively glanced over at Kiyoko by the hallway, but she was staring intently at the blackboard. She absolutely refused to look his way.

It was very her, to say the least.

She had been exactly this type of person since elementary school. She hadn't changed one bit.

"Kiyoko-san..."

Kouya let out a single sigh.

"Kiyoko-san, seriously..."

Similar words spilled from Kouya's lips twice, and then no more.

————That was the event that transpired in Class 2-3 on a certain rainy day.

"It's lacking a little dynamism... Let's raise the magnification and blur the background... Is this about right?"

In the Class 2-3 classroom after school. Operating Illustrator and Photoshop through trial and error on a laptop brought from home, Kiyoko processed and pasted photos of the ball games tournament taken by the photography club.

"Kouya-kun, which one do you think looks better?"

Displaying two prototype patterns of the poster on the screen, the Kyotoite girl, who had been drafted into poster editing, called out to the boy sitting next to her working on his own laptop.

"The right one, probably. I finished the logo. Just sent it over."

Having been tasked with fine-tuning the color scheme, Kouya spoke as he sent the logo to Kiyoko.

"Hmm, let's go with the right one then. Oh, the logo looks great—Paste this in... and, done!"

Just as Kiyoko completed the editing work and hit the save button, the melody of Auld Lang Syne began playing over the school broadcast.

The time for students to leave school was rapidly approaching.

"I'll go grab the Class Rep."

Standing up to hand over the finished product to the girl who had requested it, the boy was stopped as Kiyoko silently grabbed the cuff of his sleeve.

"?"

"...I missed my chance to ask yesterday, but is it alright if I ask you one thing?"

"Ask what?"

Kiyoko looked up at the blinking boy.

There was something she simply had to confirm. Something that had been bothering her since yesterday.

"...Kouya-kun, why do you call Shiga-san by her first name?"

"Huh?"

The question came from such an unexpected angle that Kouya blinked in surprise.

She was asking why he called Shiga Meika "Meika" instead of "Shiga," but since it was something Kouya himself had never even paid attention to, the boy looked bewildered.

"No real reason... We've been in the same school district since elementary school, so I guess I'm just calling her what I always called her..."

It was true that among their classmates from nursery school and elementary school, some had switched from first names to last names once they hit puberty. In Kouya and Meika's case, consciously changing how they addressed each other felt like a pain, and since neither of them cared, it just stayed the way it was. That was the only reason, but—

"I see..."

Just as I thought, Shizuishi Kiyoko thought, feeling a slight shock but also strangely convinced.

Kiyoko also had male students in her class who had gone to the same nursery school as her, but by the time they entered middle school, they were all calling each other by their last names.

The fact that Meika and Kouya still called each other by their first names meant they were both perfectly fine with the baseless rumors that might arise from their peers. And from a teacher's perspective, Meika and Kouya seemed to spend a lot of time together. Naturally, Kiyoko deduced that they must harbor at least some level of affection for one another.

"Well, you do make a lovely couple..."

Kiyoko muttered her internal thoughts aloud.

She felt half-lonely. But because she wanted her childhood friend to be happy, a mysterious sense of duty welled up inside Kiyoko, urging her to ensure the two of them ended up together safely.

Kouya panicked for no apparent reason.

"Wha... what's with that reaction?"

He felt like a massive misunderstanding was forming regarding him and Meika.

Not that he was bothered by being misunderstood. For better or worse, even if they were misunderstood, his relationship with Meika was entirely open and devoid of those kinds of feelings.

But the realization that Kiyoko might be misunderstanding something made Kouya inexplicably flustered.

"It's fine, you don't need to hold back on my account. We may both be your childhood friends, but Shiga-san has been watching over you for much longer than I have."

"Kiyoko-san, ain't you misunderstanding something?"

"Misunderstanding—"

Just as Kiyoko opened her mouth to speak, the door to Class 2-3 slid open with a clatter, interrupting their conversation.

"Shizuishi-saaan, is the poster done?"

The instigator of the whole affair, the Class Representative Higuchi Hitoha, poked her head into the classroom.

"I just finished it right now. ...How does it look?"

When Kiyoko presented the finished poster, Hitoha leaned forward, her eyes sparkling.

"This is amazing! It's a world of difference from the aggressively uncool rainbow-formatted Word documents our committee makes! With this, our school can finally say goodbye to 'handmade-looking' posters! Is this the professional skill that rebuilt a historic inn?! As expected of Shizuishi-san!"

"It's really nothing that impressive..."

"A sense of design honed on the front lines of the industry—it's one of a kind! Oh, this is just a consultation, but while you're at it, could I ask you to do the flyers for the Autumn Culture Festival as well?"

"Well, if I have free time then, I don't mind..."

Lacking a strong reason to refuse, a bewildered Kiyoko nodded in agreement.

She never expected to be showered with gratitude for the menial chore skills she acquired just to cut down on labor costs.

Tucking the rolled-up poster under her arm, the now highly-spirited Hitoha, having secured Kiyoko's promise, grabbed both of Kiyoko's hands and pumped them up and down.

"Thank you so much! Please, let me show my gratitude. Are you perhaps free after this today?"

"I don't have any plans..."

"I have two free coupons for Baskin-Robbins, so let's go get some ice cream."

The Class Rep invited Kiyoko without taking no for an answer, before suddenly seeming to realize Kouya was there. She had free coupons for Kiyoko and herself, but she had apparently forgotten about Kouya, who had also helped.

Kouya let out an exaggerated sigh and roughly scratched his head.

"You two go on ahead. I'm good."

"I wouldn't mind giving my portion to Torame-kun and letting you two go instead, but—"

"I don't need it. Ice cream is a lukewarm food for women and children, I ain't interested."

"I'm not sure why you suddenly went into hard-boiled mode... And for the record, ice cream isn't lukewarm."

As if pushing the back of the Class Rep, who was torn over what to do with only two coupons, Kouya grabbed his bag and stood up brusquely.

"Well, I'm headin' home."

"Ah... Kouya-kun."

"Good for you. You made a friend."

Telling Kiyoko to go have fun with her, Kouya gave a flippant wave and left the classroom.

Hearing the voices of the Class Rep and Kiyoko chatting from the receding classroom, Kouya felt a small sense of relief.