Ryou, wanna go have lunch together at the cafeteria?

It was ten minutes before lunch break. Fushimi stealthily scooted her desk next to mine and showed me the message in a corner of her notebook.

Just as I was writing that I already had the lunch Mana made for me, she added an extra note:

Thump-thump

Is that a heart sound effect?!

Sorry. I already brought lunch, so I’ll go to the physics room like always, I wrote back.

That appeared to bum her out.

I wasn’t against spending lunch with her, but if I did, then the crowds of people trying to get in her good graces would form, and I didn’t want to eat lunch with a bunch of noise nearby. Maybe I wouldn’t mind it if they were my friends, too, but that wasn’t the case.

I want to spend lunch in peace.

With Torigoe?

By myself, I wrote emphatically.

I didn’t go to the physics room to be with Torigoe; I did it because no one wouldbother me there.

Fushimi entered hamster-bomb mode, then scooted away.

The bell rang, and just as I’d said, I left for the physics room.

“Takamori,” someone called to me.

I turned around, and there was Torigoe, holding a lunch box in her hand.

“Hey, librarian.”

“You going to the physics room?”

“Yeah. Like always.”

“I figured.” She smiled.

We both entered the physics room, then closed the door. That was enough to keep the noise of the school at bay, as if we had entered another world.

I sat at my usual spot and started eating.

We had been together there a couple of times after the day we decided on the committees, but I suddenly wondered why she had volunteered. “Did you want to be class rep?” I asked.

“Not really.”

Not really? Then why’d you volunteer?

Surprised, I turned toward her.

She touched her smooth hair on her shoulder, then gave a thoughtful hmm. “Well… Um… I just…figured I was kinda close to you, so…”

I had no idea you felt that way, Torigoe… Seems I’m not the only one who feels this kinship.

Torigoe’s voice was getting quieter and quieter.

“…So I thought…if some other girl was gonna do it…it might as well be me…”

I see. So you were worried about me…

Thankfully, Fushimi had ended up being my partner, but had it been another girl…like, some other popular, noisy girl, then we would’ve had trouble understanding each other.

“T-that’s all!” she burst out, almost at a shout.

“Wow, thanks for thinking about me.”

“…Y-you’re welcome.” She started shoving food into her mouth: chomp, gulp, chomp, gulp.

Looks like my blind guess about her transcript was totally off the mark.

She asked me about Fushimi then, so I explained everything to her: that Fushimi was my childhood friend and we hung out a lot when we were little, that we started going our own ways, that something had happened recently that brought us together like old times. I hid nothing from her.

“So that’s why you acted like just classmates up until this new year.”

“Yup.”

“Is it fun being friends with the school princess?”

“More than fun. Feels just like old times. And she acts nothing like a princess when she’s with me.”

“HRH Fushimi? Un-princess-like? Now that’s surprising. But I guess that’s how it is with childhood friends.”

…She’s suddenly awfully chatty. Also, I’m guessing “HRH” means “Her Royal Highness” because she’s the princess, or something?

“What do you mean?”

“Since you’ve known each other for a long time, it’s hard for you to be in a romantic relationship. You end up feeling more like family, so you can’t see each other that way, right?”

That was the cliché; I’d seen that plenty of times in anime and manga.

However, every time it showed up, I always wondered if it was really the case.

I shook my head. “…Fushimi is smart, she’s fit, and she’s cute. I’ve known her basically all my life, and I can perfectly understand why all the boys flock around her.”

Although I only noticed she was popular last year.

“And if I can understand them, that means I am seeing her that way.”

Being with her is so chill since we’ve known each other so long. It’s fun talking with her about nothing at all and learning bit by bit how she thinks.

It’s more common in manga for the protagonist to end up with a heroine who appears later on in his life, instead of the girl who’s been by his side from the beginning. After all, if he ended up with the girl who’d always been there, the story wouldn’t be as interesting. Too obvious.

…But I don’t need my romance to be interesting. I’m fine with boring.

“If we’d stayed close in middle school, maybe I would’ve noticed much earlier that…” I was confused by what was coming out of my mouth.

H-huh? I would’ve noticed much earlier that…what? What was I about to say?

“Takamori, your face is red.”

“What?! Um, forget it. Just forget I said anything.”

“Hmm? Was someone there just now?” Torigoe tilted her head while looking at the door.

“What? I wasn’t looking.”

“Maybe I’m just seeing things. For a second, I saw the silhouette of a girl in the window.”

But there was no trace of any silhouette that I could see.

“…So you like Fushimi, huh, Takamori?”

“Bwuh?! I-I never said anything like that. Why are you asking?”

“’Cause you basically did just now.”

I thought she was joking around, but I couldn’t hear it in her tone.

“Ryou, that’s not the right kanji,” Fushimi pointed out while I was writing in the class journal. She taught me the correct character, and I continued.

“What was today’s Modern Japanese class about? I remember nothing from first period.”

“See, this is why you should write this down right after class ends, so you don’t forget.”

“…I was asleep.”

“Geez, you’re such a… Okay, so today we…”

Even with all the scolding, she always helped out and refused to abandon me for being so useless… For now, at least.

She could’ve gone home without me on the days I was on duty, but she stayed and waited for me to finish writing.

“I’m always worried you’ll write something dumb” was her excuse.

“You really are diligent.”

“Of course. I’m class rep,” she said with a smug smile, adjusting her invisible glasses.

I was still writing in the journal, without further incident, when she stared right at me with a mischievous smile on her face.

“So I heard you see your childhood friend in a romantic way, huh, Ryou?”

The lead of my mechanical pencil broke. “W-what are you talking about?”

“What am I talking about, I wonder?” She dodged the question, smiling ear to ear.