EPILOGUE

Chitose’s Peaceful, Uneventful World, Continued

It was the Monday after Golden Week. I woke up earlier than usual and headed slowly along the riverbank in the direction of school. Once I entered the classroom, I was immediately met with the sight of a face I’d gotten entirely too familiar with over those three weeks.

“Hey, Kenta. You’re early.”

“…Ah, King. Good morning!” Kenta turned to me, looking somehow refreshed.

“How long are you gonna keep calling me that? You can just call me Saku, like normal.”

“Ah, I guess I just got used to King. It feels weird to call you Saku now.”

“Eh, suit yourself.”

I slung my bag on my desk, pulled the chair out from in front of Kenta, and sat down on it.

“So what have you been up to?”

“Oh, right! Listen to this, King! Kura is a complete demon! Look at all the homework he gave me. And he wants it done by the weekend!”

Kenta opened up a cloth tote bag he’d brought along with his Arc’teryx backpack. It was bursting with printouts and workbooks.

“Yikes, that’s a lot. Still, you deserve it. And Kura never assigns more work than he knows a person can handle. Remember how he gave you some breathing room once you came back to school? Well, now he’s letting you know you need to work your butt off if you wanna make it up.”

“Yeah, but… There’s a ton of homework here. I wasn’t in class, so there’re so many things I don’t really understand just from reading the textbooks… Heyyy, King…”

“Don’t give me that look. What happened to all your big talk about taking charge of your own life by yourself from now on?”

“That’s totally unrelated! Come on, King, help me out! Help me study!”

Still, asking me straight out like this instead of hinting and whining…? That was proof Kenta had really grown.

“Aw, man, seriously? Just when I thought I’d gotten you off my back at last.”

“Oh, I know! I’ll treat you to a coffee! You’ll do it for a coffee, right?”

“Don’t insult me. Cute girls get my help for coffee. For guys, the going price is much higher.”

“Oh, then I’ll treat you to a bowl of Hachiban’s. Hachiban’s would do it, right?”

Kenta was nothing if not persistent.

“…Tch. All right. But you’d better throw in two marinated eggs and a side of fried rice. And fried chicken, too.”

“Anything for you, King! Hail to the King! Huzzah!!!”

“Exploiting the generosity of the king for your own aims. Tch.”

Still, for a bowl of ramen, I could help Kenta study. The ramen would keep things transactional. Just so he didn’t get any funny ideas about us.

I looked down at Kenta, who was scowling at his stack of printouts. “You know…,” I began. “…You know, you really have become one of those plain guys who has hot-guy aura. And those glasses really suit you.”

Kenta blinked at me warily. “Wh-what? Don’t get all weird on me, King.”

“Don’t get the wrong idea. I’m the type to praise beauty when I see it, whether it’s on a girl or guy. It feels better to pay someone a compliment than to put them down.”

“You’re right. But when you say something like that to girls, they’ll get the wrong idea. You should be careful, you know, King.”

“Yeah, but what if you’ve got a girl next to you who thinks she’s worthless? Don’t you want to boost her spirits?”

“I know what you’re like, King, so I understand you don’t mean anything by it. But it’s you doing things like that that makes you gain more haters. Maybe I don’t have any right to say this, but you should be more discriminating, instead of being nice to everyone you see.”

“Hmm. I do try to draw the line… But hey, I’m not sure I want to get advice from the likes of you.”

While we were chatting, the rest of our group trickled into the classroom. Kaito’s forehead was beaded with sweat. Probably had morning practice.

“’Sup, Kenta? We heard from Saku. Your revenge plan went pretty well, huh? So now that you’re done with that Miki chick, you and I should go out and try to pick up girls together!”

“Uh, I don’t think I’d have any success if I went with you, Kaito…”

Kazuki should have had morning practice, too, but he didn’t have a hair out of place.

“Kenta, you should come to me for advice on girls. Not Saku. You take his advice, and you’ll end up going down entirely the wrong path.”

“Yeah, I figured.”

Oh, shut up, dumbass.

Nanase and Haru walked into the classroom together.

Nanase patted Kenta on the shoulder.

“Hey, Yamazaki. You did good, huh?”

Haru slapped Kenta on the back. “Great job! I’m seeing you in a whole new light!”

“Ah yeah. Thank you both… Thank you for everything…”

Yua smiled her usual soft, sweet smile at Kenta.

“I guess today marks a new start for you, huh? If you need help with anything, please come to me!”

“Uchida… Thank you.”

Yuuko bounded into the classroom, squealing: “Good mooorning!!! …Kentacchi! They just opened this new crepe shop in front of the station! Do you wanna go after school?”

Kenta smiled charmingly. “King can come, too, right?”

“You betcha!”

Atomu was watching this and had had enough. “Keep it down,” he snarled. “It’s too early in the morning for all this noise.” Nazuna, Inaba, and Inomata were also giving us death stares.

Then Kenta turned to me, looking like he’d just remembered something.

“Now you can go back to focusing on being the awesome OP star of your own harem rom-com story, King. But you know, I hate getting bad endings, so just make sure you don’t get yourself stabbed in the back.”

He gave me a cheeky grin.

“You’ve really gotten ballsy, haven’t you? Next time we play soccer, get ready for me to pass the ball to you every chance I get.”

I grinned back at Kenta, before getting to my feet and going to open the classroom window.

A warm May breeze came in, rustling the curtains. The scent of new greenery surrounded us, filling the glass terrarium in which we all lived.

The sky was blue. The sun was warm, heralding the coming of the next season. It made the dust motes floating in the classroom air sparkle.

Someone was always catching feelings for me. And someone was always out to get me.

But every now and then, someone went from hating my guts to becoming one of my best friends.

Yep, everything in my world was just as it should be…