Epilogue: Secrets

Epilogue: Secrets

Epilogue:

Secrets

T WO DAYS INTO WINTER VACATION. CHRISTMAS WAS quickly making way for New Year’s all over town.

I stepped off the elevator, squinting against the sunlight pouring in through the wide window in front of me. The entire top floor of Toyohashi City Hall was a free-to-the-public observation deck. What was I doing in such a place?

One word: Yanami.

The class Christmas party had taken place at that one karaoke joint. I’d hardly opened the door a crack before everyone’s eyes were on me (just my luck, I’d shown up right as a song was ending). Obviously, I tried to run, but Yanami had been faster.

“God, that sucked.”

Every class extrovert had been there, on top of a few select visiting extroverts from other classes for some godforsaken reason. And there I was, smack dab in the middle of their merry jubilations. To be honest, most of what happened was a blur. All I remembered was counting bubbles in my soda, and the utter absence of any expression whatsoever on Yanami’s face while she stuffed it with french fries.

Other than that? It was anybody’s guess.

As was Yanami’s reason for calling me out here. My personal theory was heavily based on a poster I’d seen on the way in about testing for metabolic syndrome. She was looking a little big around the waist lately. Foreshadowing?

I suddenly stopped in my tracks. Someone was at the window I’d been heading toward, bathing in the early afternoon sun. She looked about my age, wore a cute coat, and she swayed in rhythm. To a song? Must have been humming something.

Wow, she’s pretty, I thought to myself.

And then she turned, and there were not enough words in any language in the world to adequately describe the whiplash I felt in that moment.

Yanami twirled to me, her coat, different than the one she’d worn at karaoke, fanning out. I couldn’t have known. I was a victim. That earlier thought? Never happened. Stricken from the record.

“Hey,” I said.

“Oh, hey. Thanks for comin’.” She grinned weakly, which wasn’t like her at all. Her complexion looked kind of pale too. Maybe her organs weren’t doing as good and stuff as she’d hoped.

“You all right?”

“Oh, you know. Still recovering from Christmas.” Her shoulders dropped.

“But you were just—”

“You saw, huh? Yeah, I slept real bad, and I’ve got this insane crick in my neck.” She clutched it and popped it a few times. “Can’t stand still without it throbbing.”

I felt robbed. Was this what I’d nearly swooned over?

I didn’t blame her for being traumatized after the party, though. For my part, I had Kaju at home to supplant all those memories with ones from some compilation she’d put together of my past year, which we spent literally all night watching. I’d been spared lasting damage.

“You looked down for the count by the time I got there,” I said. “What happened? Himemiya-san announce their engagement or something?”

“Why do you gotta do this to me seconds after ‘hello’?” Hey, prepare for the worst, hope for the best. She shrugged. “No, they were normal. Most normal they’ve ever normal’d.”

“Then what’d you need me around for? You had other friends there.”

Yanami scrounged up enough energy to glare at me. “You and Shikiya-san’ve been awfully close lately. And then that thing after the closing ceremony. You were all over those two.”

Were not. If that was what “close” was, I’d be single for the rest of my life.

“You know why I had to hang around them.”

“Okay, but literally everyone who saw you guys doesn’t. And now there’s all these rumors, and guess who has to listen to ’em? Spoilers, it’s me.”

What did my supposed two-timing with the student council have to do with her?

“What’re they saying?” I asked.

Yanami shook her head painfully. “That I got rejected,” she groaned. “By you.”

Me? I rejected Yanami?

My slack-jawed look only seemed to make her angrier. “Like how does that even track?! As if I haven’t literally rejected you already!”

“Never happened, but I’d try to ignore them if I were you.”

Unbothered, she inserted herself right into my personal bubble. “You realize this is your fault for fooling around with the student council, right? That crap at the gym was a total catfight!”

My back forced against the window glass, I was feeling a bit like a mouse myself.

She kept the pressure on until there was nothing left to do but slam her hand against the window just by my head. “Confess to me, Nukumizu-kun.”

“Excuse me?”

Her face came right up to mine. Her hand did not move. “So I can turn you down! Then poof , problem gone.”

Problem decidedly not gone, I quipped in my head.

“Relax. All we gotta do is lay low until it blows over. There’s no basis to any of it, so give it time and people’ll move onto something else. Yeah?”

“Yeah, no ! Do you have any idea how insulted I feel?! A little empathy, please!”

Right, because she was a total empath.

I took out a piece of candy and placed it in her free hand. “Relax, Yanami-san. Have a Sugimotoya mini yokan. You like those.”

“Matcha flavor? Really?”

Excuse me, was that not good enough for her?

She tore into it anyway and started nibbling on the candied jelly. “Wait, but this kinda hits. Get me ogura next time.”

Good old glucose, making things all good and stuff.

Now that she’d cooled off a bit, I swiftly steered us toward a different topic. “You’re here for that metabolic testing, right? Better go see reception.”

“What? No. What? We’re here for this.” She dug in her bag and flaunted a slip of paper. The lunch voucher Tsukinoki-senpai had given her. It was for use on the thirteenth floor of city hall, which just so happened to be this one. “You just had a birthday, didn’tcha? Thought we’d grab lunch.”

With the ticket she’d been bribed with. I was touched.

Next, she produced a long and thin box. “Also, just ’cause I’m nice.”

We’d see about that. I opened it, and inside was a shiny, blue ballpoint pen. “Wait, for real? This looks expensive.”

Yanami sent her gaze out the window, twirling her hair around a finger. “That one pen you’re always using was just such a piece of junk and all. It took a while to get this since they do this whole thing where you can have your name printed on it.” Piece of junk was subjective, but whatever. She turned her eyes up at me. “Unless you, uh, don’t like it.”

“Nah, it’s awesome. I’m just surprised. You said my name’s on it?”

I picked it up out of the box. Yanami leaned in too, curious to see for herself.

Along the length, in golden letters, written in English, was the name—Anna Yanami. For some reason.

“Wait, crap!” Yanami snatched it out of my hand.

“Huh? What…?”

“Sorry, forget you saw that! I’ll handle it! Gimme a bit and I’ll get you a new one, ’kay? Promise!”

“Then I’d feel bad. We can just get some nail polish remover or something and cover up the mistake.”

“What’d you just call me?” I was doing my best here. “Okay, whatever, I’ll just have them fix the name! Let’s go have lunch before someone eats it all!” She started shoving me toward the restaurant.

So much for my new pen. She couldn’t have bought one for herself and mixed the two up, could she? Nah, no way. I doubted she’d want matching pens with me. Yanami being inscrutable was nothing new, so I was wasting energy trying to understand her.

She eyed my throat closely as my last sigh of the year left it.

“What?”

“Have you always had that scarf? You weren’t wearing that at the closing ceremony.” She cocked her head. “Were you?”

“I wear it when it’s cold enough, but not really at school,” I replied without thinking.

Yanami hummed boredly, then sauntered through the restaurant’s automatic doors. I followed a little later. After I’d recovered from the shock.

I’d just lied to her.

It was a little one. A white one. But an unnecessary one. What did I stand to gain from it? Nothing. But something had compelled me, and I’d listened.

I stopped. Yanami was staring at me all of a sudden. “Y-yeah?”

She didn’t reply. Only sneered. Then she reached for the scarf and gently, but not at all ambiguously, tightened it around my neck.

“Remember what I said about head starts?”