Kiryu Kyouka
AAAAAAAUUUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHHHHH! I’M LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAATE!
...Gotcha! What, you really thought I’d pull the same stunt three days in a row? As if! I woke up bright and early today! I’m walking the road to redemption!
As such, my morning commute was a calm and casual stroll to school, in sharp contrast to the panicked and harried road to death from the previous few days. Honestly, I feel like being late is best avoided as a general rule. I mean, I only ran into that crazy pervert guy the other day ’cause I was late, and being late yesterday got me worked over by my teacher (no, not like that; get your mind out of the gutter). I just kept repeating the same mantra to myself: Don’t be late... Don’t be late... And so, gradually, my mind emptied of all other thoughts. I was like an extremely punctual houseplant (not even remotely true).
“Quit clinging to me, Tsumugi! It’s hot enough out as is!”
“C’mon, what’s the big deal?”
Oho! And who should I spot walking in front of me but our hero, Ayase Kaito, accompanied by his jovial childhood friend Kotou Tsumugi! It’d only been a day since I last saw the two of them, but somehow that one day felt like an eon.
The weather was getting sweltering, summer vacation was just around the corner, and our school had just swapped over to summer uniforms. Tsumugi had her arms wrapped around Kaito’s, and her chest pressed right into him. Picture an adorable cartoon animal bouncing along with a little “boing, boing!” sound effect, and you’ve got a pretty good idea of my state of mind at that precise moment. I could practically feel them in the palm of my hand.
Okay, no, sorry, that was a lie. I was bluffing, I honestly have no clue what they feel like. Yeah, I admit it, I have no idea whatsoever! Got a problem with that?! I wish I could practically feel them in the palm of my hand! If only grasping the wind felt like a boob. Man...
“Oh, hey. That you, Kou?”
“Hey...”
“Whoa, what’s got you so down first thing in the morning?”
Kaito the eagle-eyed protagonist spotted me and went out of his way to say hi. Naturally, the boo—ahem, Kotou came with him.
“Morning, Kunugicchi!”
Apparently clinging to Kaito in front of me was a bit much for Kotou. She let his arm go and gave me a big, childish wave as she said hello, smiling happily and calling me by a nickname more suited for a farming game’s mascot animal than an actual human being.
“’Sup, Kaito, Kotou...”
“N-Not much, really. Morning, Kou. Hey, you okay?” Kaito tilted his head. “You sound pretty glum.”
“Don’t worry about it. Just lamenting the injustice of the world a bit, that’s all.” I shrugged.
Kaito smiled in a kinda strained “what on earth is this guy talking about?” sort of way. Honestly, I sort of regretted bumping the scale all the way up to “the world.” Should’ve narrowed it down to “the local vicinity.” As a side note, it’s not like Kotou and I were on bad terms or anything, but we definitely didn’t have anything even close to a hero/heroine relationship. If I had to pin our relationship down with a single word, I think it’d probably be reasonably fair to say that we’re friends, I guess, maybe. She’s Kaito’s childhood friend, and he’s my best friend. Nothing weird about us coming into contact every once in a while through him.
Okay, let me establish something in advance: it is absolutely not normal for a heroine to be a jerk. If your heroines are mean, they won’t pull in readers, and your rom-com won’t sell. If you make a heroine with a nasty personality then you have to do so under the assumption that the readers will hate her, and at that point you’ve pretty much just written a villain. Are you following me here? Real heroines don’t verbally abuse the people around them for no reason, and, just for good measure, they don’t go to the bathroom either!
“Good morning, Ayase-kun, Kotou-san. And oh my, I see you have a bipedal pile of garbage following along after you today.”
And, I was instantly proven wrong as a genuinely catty heroine reasserted her existence.
“Ah, good morning, Kyouka!” Kaito grinned.
“Morning, Kiryu-san,” Kotou said, less enthusiastically.
Another one of my classmates, Kiryu Kyouka, entered the scene with an incredibly aggressive greeting (to me exclusively). Then she turned her cool dial back up to its usual position at eleven, smiled so genuinely it was almost sickening, and gave a perfectly normal and friendly greeting (to everyone except me), which Kaito and Kotou replied to. Kotou was never a big fan of Kiryu’s—or rather, wasn’t very good at dealing with her—and looked a bit put off by her sudden appearance. I could sympathize. I can’t handle her either.
Kiryu’s tongue was so sharp and my poor, sensitive heart so fragile that she could (and regularly did) chop my state of mind to mincemeat with a single sentence. I had a feeling that Kotou’s grudge against her ran so incredibly deep that it made mine look downright petty in comparison, though. I was sure they had one of those rivalries that only women can truly appreciate.
“What?” Kiryu noticed that I was staring at her and faintly shuddered with disgust. Just faintly—just the tiniest little shake—but Kotou was apparently incredibly sensitive to her movements and noticed. The cheerful light immediately faded from her eyes for one incredibly obvious reason: Kiryu’s chest.
To be clear, it’s not like Kotou’s poorly endowed! By normal standards, she’s perfectly impressive! It’s just that compared to her, Kiryu was at least twice... Wait, no, three times bigger?! What the hell is she, some sort of mutant?!
“Keep it together, Kotou! You can still win this; she hasn’t beat you yet!”
“It’s no use, Kunugicchi, I’m done for! Just look at her—she’s got a full circumference, and here I am stuck with plain old pi... What’s pi supposed to do against that...?”
Aaand she lost me. That was a real head-scratcher of an incomprehensible quip, but she looked like she was about to completely go to pieces and I couldn’t just abandon her, so I desperately made crap up and ran with it.
“And what’s wrong with π, Kotou?! π’s great! π makes calculating stuff way easier since you don’t have to type out ‘3.14’ every single time! π’s been the salvation of countless math-hating kids from all across the world!”
I was starting to sound like a πling from the planet π who starts every sentence with π under all circumstances, but my pep talk had its intended effect. Kotou gradually rose from the depths of despair. Apparently, my shot in the dark actually landed! I owe you one, πlings.
“You really think so...?”
“Heck yeah! You’re a chamπon! Keep your sπrits up!”
“It’s way too early in the morning for this nonsense!”
Wham! Kiryu scored a clean hit to the back of my head with her bag, knocking me over. I toppled right past her chest, which was even more clearly defined than usual through the thin fabric of her summer uniform. The way they gently swayed in the air drove in the harsh cruelty of the unjust reality we live in. “Boing boing” didn’t even come close to doing them justice. Picture that adorable little cartoon animal from before getting blasted out of the park by a big-league slugger and you’d have a pretty good idea of the level of ordinance she was packing.
Kotou must’ve been watching too—her eyes were dull and lifeless, with no hope of recovery in sight. Kiryu really was gifted, whether she knew it or not. Kaito, meanwhile, was exactly as entranced by her chest as me and Kotou. I worry about him sometimes, but it looks like he’s got manly desires like the rest of us after all! His personality meant the most he could do was steal glances, of course, and I sighed at him internally...while simultaneously stealing glances of my own.
“Unbelievable... Leave that dullard behind and hurry up, you two. We’ll be late.”
Completely failing to notice that her three companions were preoccupied in two very distinct ways, my assailant set off ahead of us.
“Y-Yeah, right. Let’s go, Tsumugi. C’mon, Kou, you too.”
“O-Okay...”
“You hit me! Not even my own father ever hit me!” I spat out, thirty seconds too late.
The three of us chased after her, Kaito in the lead with Kotou and me trailing behind. We took a lot of damage back there, mentally in Kotou’s case, and physically in mine.
“I’m not giving up. I’ll win out against Kiryu-san someday!” Kotou quietly but resolutely muttered to herself.
I couldn’t bring myself to reply. Rock can never win against paper—it’s a tragic but undeniable fact of life. I was completely powerless to help my friend through her predicament. The best I could come up with was “That’s, uhh, probably not happening,” and I sure as heck wasn’t about to say that out loud.
Sorry, Kotou, but that’s just the sort of relationship we have. You’re a friend, yes, but you’re also one of Kaito’s love interests. The sidekick’s just not allowed to give any real assistance to the heroines. The most I can do is offer some perfunctory encouragement—actually helping them out is a protagonist-exclusive territory. The sidekick only gets to support one of them if he has some sort of driving motivation, like being secretly in love with her, or whatever.
Live strong, Kotou. Don’t let this get you down! You have plenty of good qualities! You’re bright, you’re lively, and even though you can be sorta tactless, you’re still fun to be around! Seriously, you’ll be okay. Uh, but we should just forget the whole boobs thing.
The two of us walked along glumly behind Kaito and Kiryu, occasionally exchanging a sentence or two. Kotou’s usual exuberance was nowhere to be seen, but cheering her on internally was the most I could manage.
❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤
The day passed by, and school came to an end. Yeah, really, already. Absolutely nothing noteworthy happened during my classes, and though I did end up having my wallet squeezed by a certain pipsqueak at lunchtime, that didn’t bear any special mention either. Point of order: doesn’t “Kou buys for his kouhai” sort of sound like the punch line to an awful dad joke? Gags like that are at least a millennia out of date! What kind of rubbish sense of humor does it take to come up with something like that?
“Hey, Kaito, wanna go somewhere after school?”
“Sure, sounds good.”
Kotou brazenly strolled in from the classroom next door, and Kaito immediately accepted her invitation. After-school date: secured! That’s pretty much the usual pattern for days when she doesn’t have club activities.
“Ah, you wanna come too, Kiryu?” Kaito threw out an invitation to Kiryu, who had already finished packing her bag and was standing up to go home. Meanwhile, Kotou looked deeply conflicted.
“I’m sorry, but not today. I have some business to take care of.”
All right, boys and girls, listen up: I’ve got some very important advice for you. There are a lot of mean, nasty people out there in the world, and Kiryu Kyouka is absolutely one of them. She might have said she’s sorry, but there’s a zero percent chance that she actually meant it. It was obviously lip service, and anyone with half a brain and at least one eye could see it! And she turned down an invitation from the protagonist himself? Seriously, that girl has absolutely no self-awareness of her role as a heroine whatsoever.
“You in, Kunugicchi?”
Wait, what?! Kotou, what are you doing?! Stahp!
Seeing Kiryu get invited must’ve really shaken her up. Either she was hoping that I could back her up by occupying Kiryu’s attention (in which case oh wow, bad call, I’d almost certainly be totally useless), or she was just hoping my presence would provide some mental support. Whatever her reason, she invited me in spite of the fact that Kiryu instantly turned the offer down. Come on, girl, if you hadn’t opened your big mouth, you’d be in date city right now!
“I, ah, err...”
What should I do?! Man, I can’t handle making decisions in times like these! I don’t have the authority to stick my nose directly into hero/heroine relations! I couldn’t exactly take her up on it, but I couldn’t exactly turn her down either! The fact that the heroine involved invited me herself made this so much harder to cope with!
It’d be a billion times easier if Kaito had been the one to ask me along! If I said okay, it’d turn into one of those scenes where the thickheaded protagonist spoils an almost-date and the heroine gets super worked up about it. I could also totally say no by being all “Ooooh, someone’s got a daaate! Look at Mister Popular over here! Not gonna catch me being your third wheel, no siree!” and teasing the hell out of him.
And if I hadn’t been invited at all? Naturally, I’d go absolutely mad with jealousy of stupid Kaito and his stupid after-school date. What’s that? You think that’s totally unreasonable? Like hell it is! (I say, lashing out to cover up the fact that I’m totally in the wrong.)
“Yeah, sorry, I’m sorta busy too...” I wasn’t confident I was making the right call, but in the end I squeezed out an incredibly half-baked excuse to turn her down. Guess it’s time to go home alone and reflect on my mistakes.
“Oh, too bad. Maybe next time.”
Kotou actually, genuinely sounded disappointed that I couldn’t make it. I’m really fond of that side of her, but I also think she’d do well to be at least a bit more aggressive when it comes to pursuing her love interest.
That was around when I noticed that Kiryu was still in the classroom. She was standing by the door, silently staring right at me for who knows what reason. For a moment, our eyes met. Then she gave me a slight but pointed glare and walked out the door. Yeah, get outta here, lady! This isn’t a show!
“All right, let’s head out, Tsumugi. See you tomorrow, Kou.”
“Laters, Kunugicchi!”
“Yeah, later.”
I saw the two of them off, and almost immediately started doubting my decision. Speaking as Kaito’s wingman sidekick, watching him leave without raising a finger would be a pretty major dereliction of duty, right? He’s finally going on a date, and I put myself in a position where I can’t intervene at all? Lame!
But wait, okay, no need to jump the gun here. This might be a great chance for the two of them to build up some affection points with each other. I might really just be a third wheel if I was around. If you’re gonna get involved, make sure you do it in a major scene, not one of those private side events! The Sidekick Handbook is very specific on the matter!
Yeah, that settles it. Today’s a perfect day to go straight home, call it an early night and get a healthy fourteen hours of sleep or so. I’ll recharge my energy level so much, it’ll send me straight into overdrive mode! This works out perfectly for me!
“So, where do you wanna go, Tsumugi?”
“I thought we could wander around the shopping district, maybe... Oh, no, I know! I’ll cook dinner for you tonight!”
“Really? I’d better give Hikari a call and let her know. Thanks, that sounds great!”
Ten minutes later, Kaito and Kotou were well on their way into what an outside observer could only describe as a date, and a certain man was following along about ten meters behind, stealthily observing them. I probably don’t need to specify that said man was none other than me.
I-It’s not like I was stalking them because I was lonely, or anything! I just thought that the two of them might be getting an awful lot closer to each other pretty soon, and if they did, I’d be able to pull a “Hey, I just happened to win these tickets in a raffle or something and don’t have anyone to go with, why don’t you take them and invite Kotou?” It’s a classic wingman move, but I need to know what sort of date spots are popular with the young’uns these days, and figure out how much tickets cost, and all sorts of other stuff! It is not what you’re thinking! Hmph!
Apropos of nothing, Kaito doesn’t actually have any tsundere-types in his harem. Kotou’s got the friendly-and-lively-but-a-bit-ditzy vibe covered, and Kiryu fills in the calm-and-cool-honor-student slot, but doesn’t have an affectionate bone in her body. Neither of the two heroines I have yet to introduce really fit the tsundere bill either. I’ve heard the archetype was super dominant at one point in history, but it looks like they’re about as desirable in a harem as a sumo wrestler’s used loincloth nowadays. It’s kinda sad.
“Whoops, gotta keep an eye out! Looks like they went into that bookstore? Nice. Good move, Kaito.”
I followed them in and watched them make their way towards the manga section. I took up a position in a convenient blind spot where I could keep an eye out (right around the reference book section) and pulled out one of the many disguises I keep on hand, just in case: a pair of lensless glasses! With the glasses equipped and my honor student persona assumed, I grabbed a random book to pretend to read. It was about...poop? Huh. That works, I guess.
I loitered around, pretending to read but secretly observing Kaito and Kotou. Best as I could tell they were browsing the weekly magazines and chatting about manga. And, I mean, they were clearly enjoying themselves, but that’s not exactly the most romantic date activity, is it? That was one of Kotou’s biggest weaknesses in the war for Kaito’s heart—they were close, sure, but close in the sort of way that would almost make you think their relationship was totally platonic. That mindset was majorly holding her back, in my book.
She was actually pretty popular with other boys in our school, but Kaito was trapped in the just-childhood-friends pit as well, and barely seemed to think of her as a girl at all. Unless a mischievous weather god happened to pass by and summon a sudden shower for the sake of some pulse-pounding, super embarrassing wet T-shirt action, the odds of him breaking out of that mindset any time soon were pretty darn low. And considering you can buy an umbrella at just about any convenience store these days, that probably wouldn’t even help. Heck, Kaito and Kotou are both the sort of people who carry around those little foldable umbrellas in their bags. They’ve got absolutely no weaknesses!
“Grr... What am I supposed to do about this...?”
“Hey, you.”
“Sorry, can’t talk right now. I’m thinking about something extremely important.”
“You realize that’s an elementary school workbook?”
“Wha? Wait, why’re you here, Kiryu...? Kiryu?!”
Oh god why?! The sadistic honor student herself, Kiryu Kyouka, just happened to catch me reading a poop-themed children’s textbook! Wasn’t she supposed to be busy with something?!
“Wh-What do you want? Don’t tell me... You’re after this book?!”
“No. Weren’t you listening? That’s an elementary school workbook.”
“O-Oh, is it? Hmm, well, I mean, I knew that, of course. Yup.”
Pausing for a moment to take a proper look at it, I found that it was, in fact, a poop-themed workbook full of kanji drills. The perfect study aid for a kid who loves potty humor. Y’know the sort of workbook that makes studying fun by turning its problems into a little story about kanji-man vs. the forces of ignorance, or whatever? Yeah.
“So, what are you doing here? If you’re looking for the picture book section, it’s over that way.” Kiryu glared at me.
“Don’t you think you’re giving my mental age a bit too little credit there?”
“Well, apparently you can’t even read kanji yet.”
“Can too!”
Not that I sound very convincing, given the elementary school workbook I’m holding! Ah, crap, gotta keep it down—can’t let Kaito notice us.
“Look, we can talk later, okay?”
“Talk? Why would I ever want to talk with someone like you?”
“Ha ha, right, yup, fair enough. Bye.”
That seemed like a pretty natural point to say goodbye and make a break for it. I was not expecting a heroine to show up out of nowhere and was really panicking for a minute there, but it turned out decently enough in the end. Withdraw!
“Wait.”
“Huh?”
“...All right. If you want to talk, I’m willing.”
“Huuuuuh?”
“This works out perfectly. I was just thinking it was about time we made it perfectly clear where we stand with one another.”
I really didn’t like the sound of that.
Kiryu exuded a pressure unlike anything I’d ever felt before; I couldn’t resist. We decided to find a better venue for our chat, eventually ending up in a nearby fast-food joint. It goes without saying that Operation: Tail Kaito and Kotou was a bust. I wasn’t about to try stalking them with another heroine in tow; no way that could possibly end well.
“I’ve never been to a place like this before,” Kiryu mumbled to herself as she looked around the store. She seemed fascinated, which was weird, seeing as it was an absolutely mundane, run-of-the-mill chain restaurant you could find literally anywhere. She looked sort of like a country bumpkin gawking at the sights during their first visit to the big city, and I had to hold back a laugh.
“Want something? I was thinking of grabbing a bite.” I figured I might as well ask. It was still fairly early for dinner, but if I was gonna hang out at a fast-food place, why not get a meal out of the way as well? I knew perfectly well that Kiryu would decide to get a drink and nothing else, of course.
Snobs like her always go on about the calories, or the sodium content, and turn their noses up at fast food (I assume). They’re under the false impression that belittling fast food makes them look sophisticated, but the truth of the matter’s that the biggest snobs always have the smallest brains (okay, so I have a bit of an ax to grind). I was all prepared for Kiryu’s snobbery to clash with my dullard-level commoner tastes and spin out into our second spat of the day. I was about to be shocked.
“Hmm... All right, I suppose I’ll get something too.”
“Whoa, seriously? You actually eat this stuff?”
“I’ve never tried it, but my family won’t be home today, so...”
Sexy! Something about that phrase was weirdly erotic! Maybe it was the way she was bashfully twirling her hair around a finger while she said it? Personality aside, she’s got all the makings of an absolute jaw-dropping beauty, so even the tiniest gestures of hers can have that effect. The majority of men would fall for her in a second if she could keep that act up! If you took a recording of that and put it out as a ringtone, you’d be hearing Kiryu’s “my family won’t be home today” all over town within the day, no doubt about it!
That said, all the glorious you-can-stay-over-tonight implications in the world couldn’t change the fact that we weren’t at her house. We were at an utterly garden-variety chain restaurant, and the odds of Kiryu and I ending up in that sort of relationship were substantially less than one in a million.
The conversation sorta trailed off after that point. We waited in line until our turn came, then we stepped up to the counter together to look at the menu. And I mean, like, together together. Uncomfortably close together. I don’t know how to deal with this! Kiryu and I would never end up standing this close to each other under normal circumstances! It’s totally unthinkable! I leaned over to look at a nearby sign advertising the restaurant’s current specials, which conveniently bought me some distance.
“Do you know what you’re getting?” she asked.
“Ayup. You?”
“No, not yet... I’m surprised by the menu’s variety. I was under the impression that these places only served hamburgers, but it seems they have chicken sandwiches, fish, shrimp—there’s even a vegetable-based option...” Kiryu mumbled to herself. She was absolutely captivated by the menu.
The clerk, meanwhile, was absolutely captivated by her, and I couldn’t blame him. It’s really rare to see a girl like her act that unguarded. I already did the “Wait, maybe she’s actually her twin?!” thing yesterday, so I’ll spare you that whole schtick (reluctantly).
She spent a couple minutes pondering her options. “All right, I’ve decided,” she said, taking a step off to the side. I took that to mean she wanted me to order first.
“I’ll have the special on the sign—err, the soft-boiled egg burger. With fries, thanks.”
“I’ll have the same.”
She ripped off my order! “I’ve decided” my ass! I raised an eyebrow at her, and she glanced away.
“As Yoshida Kenkou once wrote: ‘Even in the most trifling of matters, it behooves you to follow the lead of one more experienced.’”
Wow, what an incredibly petty thing to quote classical literature about! Pretty sure that Yoshida Kenkou didn’t have french fries in mind when he penned that particular parable, but what do I know, I’m not a 14th-century Buddhist monk.
“What would you like to drink?”
“To drink...?” She glanced over at me.
“It comes with the meal.”
“...I see.” She nodded.
Following the established pattern, I should’ve ordered first again, but I wasn’t planning on playing along. I’d make her choose a drink before me, like it or not! I mean, it’d be super embarrassing if she copied my drink too. We’d look like we were friends, or something! I already had my drink picked out, of course—I always get the same thing.
“All right... I’ll have apple juice.”
“Guh!”
“And you, sir?”
“...Apple juice.”
“Thought so,” interjected Kiryu. Did you?! What’re you insinuating, lady?!
Kiryu scowled as we collected our drinks and receipts, then found a table. This particular fast-food joint was actually one of those places that brought you your food when it was done.
“Now, then.” Kiryu Kyouka sat right in front of me, her arms crossed, and stared me down. She didn’t so much as touch her apple juice. Side note, crossing her arms made her chest even more eye-catching than usual. Don’t stare! Eyes up!
“It’s been quite a long time since we talked face-to-face like this.”
“Weird way to put it when this is our first time talking like this.” I sipped on my apple juice. That had come out harsher than I intended it to—I was sort of surprised by how unhappy I sounded, myself. Kiryu’s scowl deepened.
“Yes, I expected you to play dumb.”
“About what?”
“...About me.”
“What’s there to play dumb about? Your name’s Kiryu Kyouka, you’re the universally acknowledged number-one beauty in our class, and you’re so cold to your many suitors that you straight up ignore them instead of properly turning them down. You’re also a prodigy with the highest grades in our year, and have a black belt in Aikido.”
“Y-You’re well-informed.”
“I did my homework.”
I’ve looked into all of Kaito’s potential heroines, gathering up all the information I could find with some digging. I didn’t know their weight or measurements or anything that personal, of course, but Kiryu still looked repulsed.
“I see,” she sighed, and took a sip of her juice. “Ah... This is actually good.”
“I know, right? This place’s apple juice is crazy good for a chain restaurant.”
From what I understand, the company started out as an orchard, and they get the apples for their juice fresh from there. It’s a uniquely delicious juice that you can only get from this one specific chain!
“You have quite the palate,” she quipped.
“Huh? Was that supposed to be sarcasm? ’Cause I sure do, as a matter of fact! Always have! Any time, any place, I got the best taste!”
“No, I wasn’t being sarcastic. Not this time.”
“What do you mean ‘this’ time?”
“I’m actually impressed, for once.”
“Okay, sarcastic or not, you’re definitely making fun of me!”
We kept bantering and jabbing at each other like that for some time, and surprisingly enough, it didn’t feel mean-spirited at all. When I actually stopped to think about it, I’d never truly had an extended conversation with her before. The fact that we didn’t have Kaito literally standing between us probably helped.
“Thank you for waiting! Two soft-boiled egg burger meals.”
Conveniently, our food arrived just as the conversation was reaching a lull. Kiryu stared at her wrapped-up burger for a moment, then glanced over at me.
“What?”
“Where’s the silverware?”
“Oh my god could you at least try to not be a living, breathing cliché?”
“It was a joke.” She chuckled, then ate a french fry, apparently not concerned in the slightest with getting her fingers greasy. If I’d snapped a picture of that moment, her fans would’ve probably flocked to me in droves, begging me to take their money for it. Might’ve kept one for myself too.
“This certainly is a strange development, isn’t it?” Kiryu mused.
“Hmm?”
“I never imagined we’d ever share a meal like this. You know, just the two of us.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Even if we were the only ones at the table, a crowded fast-food restaurant didn’t exactly have a just-the-two-of-us sort of ambiance. I couldn’t deny that it was a pretty weird turn of events, but I also felt weird about agreeing with her when she was sitting right in front of me like that. I was totally thinking it, though. Man, I really can be petty.
“You’re the same as ever in some ways, but in the end, you really have changed.”
“Wait, what’s that supposed to mean?”
“Good question.” Kiryu looked calm on the surface, but something about the way she sipped at her juice felt oddly desolate.
I, meanwhile, had a furrowed brow, an obvious frown, and a slight but distracting throbbing pain building up in my forehead. She was messing with me, and it was really starting to get on my nerves.
“About the apple juice,” she continued.
“Wha?”
“Why do you like it?”
“Why...? I mean, y’know, I just do. Just sorta think it’s good... Y’know the forbidden fruit in the Bible? Some people say that it was an apple, so I figured they’d be a perfect fit for the dark, brooding emotions that secretly eat away at me!”
“You like that it’s sweet, but a little sour too.”
I was acting like an idiot again, but Kiryu wasn’t about to play along, and muttered so quietly I barely heard her.
“Wait, what?”
“Or so I heard.” Her words felt really loaded. What, was she interrogating me now?
“...From who?”
“How much do you remember from when you were a kid?”
I almost quipped about not answering questions with questions, but I held back. She sounded really serious, and I could tell we were about to reach the real issue at hand. Childhood memories, though...?
“When I was a kid? I dunno. That was a long time ago.”
“...Like from elementary school, for example.”
I presumed that was what she’d been aiming for this whole time. I closed my eyes and tried to cast my mind back, but was greeted with nothing but pitch-black darkness.
“Sorry, but I don’t really remember much from back then at all.”
“No, I suppose you don’t. You’d never be like this if you did...”
“Okay, look, this is getting old. Stop beating around the bush and just tell me already! What’re you after?”
She glared again. It really did feel like she was blaming me for something, and I was getting progressively more and more upset, myself. There was no way she could’ve known, but her question had touched on a really sore subject for me. It was drawing my attention towards a certain truth that I did my best to keep locked away safely in a deep, dark corner of my mind.
If she’s really set on dragging it out of me, though—if she’s so convinced that something will change if I give her an explanation—then fine. My pride’s not worth much, so now was as good a time as any to throw it away.
“I don’t have any memories from before five years ago.”
“You...what? No memories...? You didn’t just forget?”
“I dunno if it’s any different from forgetting, really, but I don’t remember anything from before that point whatsoever. From my perspective, it’s like I never had any memories from then to begin with.”
“So, you have amnesia?”
“You could call it that, I guess.”
“So then... You don’t remember Daiki at all?”
“Daiki?”
“My little brother.”
She squeezed the words out with obvious difficulty.
“Kiryu Daiki. That name doesn’t ring a bell...?”
“...It doesn’t. Sorry.”
She was clenching her fists so hard, they trembled. It was like she was shaking with the effort of enduring something, but I didn’t know what, and I had no idea what I could say to her.
“I... I hated you,” she managed to spit out.
“Yeah, I sorta figured that out already. The constant trash talk was a pretty big hint.”
“Of course I did! I met you again after all this time, but you acted like you didn’t know me, and you never said a word about Daiki. I thought you were playing dumb. How could I have possibly imagined you had amnesia?”
She looked like she was about to break down in tears, and I was at a complete loss. What if I hadn’t lost my memory? She looked so weak, so tragic and frail, that I couldn’t help but ponder that totally pointless hypothetical. I wanted to help her.
I’m the one who forgot her, but Kiryu was the one who scorned me without understanding my circumstances. It was all too clear to me how much she regretted it now. If it was going to turn out like this, maybe we’d have been better off letting this misunderstanding drag on forever.
“...Let’s go somewhere else. It would be hard to talk about this in here,” she muttered.
Kiryu had barely even started on her hamburger. She wrapped it back up and put it in her bag—I guess she thought throwing it away would be a waste. I hadn’t even touched mine, so I followed her example, stashing my burger in my bag and standing up.
To be totally honest, I didn’t think we had much to gain from carrying on the conversation. I couldn’t force myself to remember her brother, and I knew that even in my current state I wouldn’t be able to avoid getting involved with her if she told me about him. Unfortunately, though, it was already a bit too late to back out. I’d have to be a gigantic asshole to trample all over her feelings like that, and I didn’t quite have it in me to play that sort of role.
“Where should we go?”
“My house. It’s not far.”
The unimaginable had happened. “My family won’t be home today” had actually turned into an invitation into her house. For once, though, I didn’t feel like running my mouth about it. I let Kiryu take the lead, following her silently through the gradually darkening streets of the shopping district.
❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤
Kiryu lived in a lovely, two-story tall, single-family home. I was still flabbergasted by the fact that I was visiting the home of the Kiryu Kyouka, the beauty queen of class 2-B. It was finally starting to feel real, and I was finally realizing just how big of an event it really was.
“Hey, do you have any friends?”
“Where did that come from?”
“Nowhere, really... Was just wondering if it’s okay for someone like me to be the first classmate that the Kiryu Kyouka brings home...”
“I don’t particularly care. And, besides...you’re not my friend in the first place.”
If I’m not your friend, do you think you could try to look a little less dejected about all this? She almost certainly wasn’t aware of how she was coming across, though, doing her best to act unperturbed as she unlocked the door and walked right on inside. She totally left the door open too. It’s not like I expected her to have the consideration to hold the door for me, given her usual attitude, but, like, it felt kind of awkward being left out there like that. I decided to just let myself in.
Wait, is it just me, or did she just admit she doesn’t have any friends...? Nah, no way, she’s just never had them over at her house. Yeah. Gotta be that.
The fact that she’s such a beauty has always made her kind of hard to approach, and she’s got a sort of hard-to-describe “don’t touch me aura” on top of it. Surely that’s the issue—she’s just kind of hard to strike up a conversation with! I nodded to myself, convinced by my own rationalization as I obediently followed her into the Kiryu estate.
“Sorry to intrude...”
“This way.”
There was a staircase just past the entryway, and I was immediately confused when Kiryu started climbing up it. Weren’t we going to the living room? Is it on the second floor in this house? That’d be pretty weird.
“Hey, where’re we going?”
“My room.”
“.........Huh?”
“Come on, hurry up.”
“My room,” as in, Kiryu Kyouka’s room? Nooope, nope, nope, nope! This is way too much, too fast! I cannot deal with this!
“Whoa, hold up! You’re seriously underestimating the significance of inviting a totally average high school boy into a girl’s room!”
“I couldn’t care less.”
“Care! At least a little—hey!”
Kiryu finally lost patience with my grumbling, grabbed me by the arm, and dragged me up the staircase and down the hallway. I had just enough time to see her name written on a plate on the door before she shoved me inside.
“Wait here.”
She turned around and walked out, leaving me in her room on my own.
Okay, seriously, what on earth is that girl’s deal? We were skipping past so many stages it genuinely freaked me out! Why would you leave a classmate (note: not a friend; definitely just a classmate) in your room on their own?! Who knows what kind of weird crap I could get up to in there! There are men out there who run around the streets in the nude first thing in the morning, y’know?!
Even if she has a black belt in Aikido and could wipe the floor with a perfectly ordinary citizen like myself, her guard’s way too low. I mean, I am a guy!
“So, this is Kiryu’s room...”
Even as I was freaking out, I couldn’t help but glance around. Her desk was clean and tidy, and there was a weird plushie of some mascot character I couldn’t identify on her bed. There was a shelf (full of books that looked way too dry for my taste) and a hanger on the wall, where I assumed she kept her uniform when she wasn’t wearing it. There was also a closet (shut) and a dresser (shut, and almost definitely full of the sort of clothing guys dream about on a regular basis). A rug was laid out on the wood-panel flooring. The lack of cushions to sit on was a pretty clear hint that she didn’t have visitors very often.
And so there I was, left alone in an actual, authentic girl’s room. I had no clue whatsoever what to do with myself, so I sat down dead center in the middle of the rug and waited for Kiryu to return, not budging a muscle. I’m sure most high school boys would be over the moon to get invited into a beauty’s room like this, but considering the subject at hand, I felt more like an inmate waiting to be led off to his execution.
“I’m back.”
Kiryu returned a few minutes later. She was carrying something, but it wasn’t the glass of welcome-to-my-home tea I was expecting, but rather some sort of big book.
“What’s that?”
“A photo album...from when I was in grade school.”
“Okay, but why?”
“Surely you can guess, amnesia or not.” She sighed as she opened it up. “We went to the same school.”
“Huh, that so?”
I had, in fact, pretty much already guessed that. If I couldn’t figure that out from context, I’d have serious doubts about my language comprehension ability on the whole. It’d be horrifying for me to be that bad at Japanese, considering I’ve supposedly been whipped into shape on the subject.
“I’m fairly certain we’re the only students at Oumei High who went to that school. It’s in another prefecture, after all.”
“So you moved here?”
“Yes. My father’s job transferred him to the area.”
That would imply it really was a total coincidence that we bumped into each other again. I guess from her perspective, it must’ve seemed like I’d chased after her. My missing memories made it hard for me to judge how much of a coincidence it truly was—the whole situation still barely felt real to me at all.
“Man, though, the same elementary school... What’s it like, anyway? Like, how do kids interact with each other?”
That might’ve come across as pretty blunt, but since I didn’t remember anything from that period, I was actually genuinely curious. Of course, that’s probably one of those things where it’s different for everyone. Kiryu sat down on her bed, still holding the album.
“I’m not really sure how to answer that. It’s different for everyone.”
“Y’know, I had a feeling you’d say that.”
She gave the obvious answer with complete sincerity, and I pretty much had to accept it. Then the conversation came to a grinding halt. If you were to compare conversations to a game of catch, then Kiryu’s signature tactic was to take the ball and go home. The silence was deafening.
“S-So, elementary school friends, huh? Is it like that one kids’ song? Y’know, make a hundred friends, eat lunch on top of Mount Fuji, go on a tour across Japan and make the whole world laugh with joy, that sorta deal?”
“I’m aware of that song, but I can say with confidence that not a single elementary schooler in history has ever done all those things.”
“Okay, fair enough! Heck, considering the declining birth rate and all, you’d be lucky just to have a hundred kids in your grade level, let alone a hundred friends!”
“Yes, that’s true.”
...Silence. Deafening.
“I don’t suppose you’d mind if we got to the point?”
“Yes, please.” I gave up on playing dumb. If I went any further with it, she’d peg me as the sort of guy who can’t read the mood at all (assuming she hadn’t already), so I quietly leaned over and took a look at her album.
“Is that me?”
One of the pictures on the page Kiryu opened the album to had a picture on it of a young version of her, along with a boy who I could just barely recognize as myself. I could tell it was her in an instant—she had the same striking features as a kid, apparently. She and the boy were pressed up against each other, so close their faces were practically touching and smiling the bright and innocent smiles you’d expect from kids their age. It was hard to believe a girl like that grew up to be the stone-cold ice queen I knew. A label on the page informed me that the picture was from a second-grade field trip.
“I guess we were pretty close?”
“We were.”
“Oh... Huh.”
I hadn’t expected her to agree that easily. It was sort of awkward.
“The seating chart was arranged by ABCs, and our names put us right next to each other.”
“Aaah, gotcha. Yeah, that makes sense.”
I hadn’t really thought about it like that before, but she was right. “Kiryu” and “Kunugi” were pretty close together, alphabetically speaking. We were in the same class again, of course, and the seating chart was still alphabetical, but we had a kid named Kudou in our class as well this time and ended up one desk apart. Our surnames are close, but they’re not so close that there couldn’t be an interruption between them. No wonder we became friends if we sat next to each other all the time. Little kids are like that.
...Side note, “arranged by ABCs”? Surely Kiryu’s the sort of person who’d say “arranged alphabetically”? What, is she trying to look cute by acting out of character?
“You sat right behind me, and could absolutely never sit still, even during class. You were always messing with me during the lessons, and the teacher would always end up scolding both of us together.”
“Ah. Err... Sorry?”
“It’s not like I’m holding a grudge over it. If anything, I’m grateful.”
She wistfully brushed her fingers across the album’s page.
“I was incredibly shy back then, and couldn’t make any friends, no matter how hard I tried...”
“Wow, considering what you’re like now, I...can totally imagine that. Yeah, sorry, that checks out.”
“I’m not shy anymore. I just don’t particularly feel the need to socialize.”
That certainly checked out as well. I couldn’t think of a single time I’d seen her chatting with our classmates. She probably spent longer answering our teachers’ questions in class than she did talking with her peers. But on the contrary, my dear Kiryu, saying it like that implies you’re just making up excuses! I knew she’d give me the death glare treatment if I said that, of course, so I kept my mouth firmly shut.
“I guess that means we were friends back in the day.”
“I suppose...” she started, before rectifying her statement. “Yes, I believe we were.”
“You don’t sound very sure about that. What, do you have amnesia too?”
“No. It’s just that things were...complicated back then.”
She rested her fingers on the young me in the picture as she spoke. Complicated, huh? I guess even elementary schoolers can have a lot going on.
“You were a really important person to Daiki.”
“Daiki... That’s your little brother, right?”
She had just told me about him at the restaurant, so his name was still fresh in my mind. I had to assume he was the point of all this—the reason she’d brought me over to her house. In all honesty, no matter how much I feigned composure and playfully bantered...if I could’ve found a chance to run away, I absolutely would have.
I was seriously regretting going along with her. Part of me had wondered if, just maybe, there was a possibility that hearing her story would make me remember something. But it was no use. Seeing that old picture of myself and learning that Kiryu and I used to be friends wasn’t sparking any memories at all. Didn’t ring even a single bell. Kiryu Kyouka, Kiryu Daiki, and even the young Kunugi Kou in the picture—to me, they were all just characters in a work of fiction. None of them even felt real in the slightest.
Kiryu pulled another picture out from her desk. It showed a slightly older version of her—probably around middle school age, or so—smiling and standing next to a young boy that I could only assume was Daiki. Even in a picture, something about his appearance struck me as oddly delicate.
“Daiki was sickly from the day he was born. He couldn’t go to school much at all, and even when he went, he never seemed to make any friends.”
The Kiryu siblings were both in the same boat in that respect. Having a circle of friends can make a world of difference when school’s concerned, and elementary school in particular’s hard to get through when you’re isolated, supposedly. Little kids are seriously ruthless when it comes to bullying.
The qualities that can earn you friends in elementary school are things like being hyper, or fast, or strong. Being smart or sickly’s the opposite of helpful. It paints a target on your back, if anything. I couldn’t exactly remember what they were like firsthand, but it was easy enough to imagine that the two of them fell into the latter category.
“Must’ve been pretty rough on him, huh?”
“Not in particular.”
“Huh. Really?”
“Really. Because you were there.” She smiled faintly, but I wasn’t following her at all. Why would I crop up at this point in the conversation?
“But wait, he wasn’t in our grade, right?”
“No, he was one year below us. But you and I were, well...we were friends.”
“Oooh...” I guess it would be pretty normal to get to know your sibling’s friends, when you put it that way.
“Daiki really looked up to you. He thought you were the funniest person he’d ever met, and considered you a role model. You were all he’d talk about, even after we got home, and thanks to you he started looking forward to school. His condition was never stable so he couldn’t go every day, but whenever he did, the three of us would walk to school together...”
“Jeez... I’m, ah, sorry I can’t remember any of this.”
“Right...” Kiryu’s voice grew quiet and subdued. “You’re not going to ask where Daiki is now?”
“Well, umm... Can I?”
“...His condition took a turn for the worse three years ago. He never recovered...”
“Ah...”
Between the fact she was so confident her family wouldn’t be at home and the knowledge that she had a brother, I already had my suspicions, and seeing that picture more or less confirmed them. Still, though, hearing it so directly left me speechless.
“The time Daiki spent with you meant the world to him. More than anything, except maybe the time he spent with his family. He more or less stopped going to school after you went away.”
“After I ‘went away’...?”
“You vanished out of nowhere when we were in fifth grade, just a short while before summer vacation. You’d promised to play with me and Daiki over the summer, but of course that never happened. You never submitted any notice that you were transferring to a new school, and your parents vanished right along with you, so there were even rumors floating around that you might’ve been the victim of a family murder-suicide.”
Her words carried an edge to them, along with an implicit question: did I really not remember any of this? But the truth of the matter was that I didn’t. I didn’t even remember what my own parents looked like. I shook my head, and she looked crestfallen.
“I admired you. When we were in elementary school together you were lively, and funny, and had a knack for leading the kids who gathered around you. It wasn’t just Daiki and me—the whole class idolized you. You were incredible...”
“Wow. Really?”
“So, the way you are now is just...”
She didn’t finish her sentence, but I could guess where it was going: she couldn’t stand the new me. After facing her pure, unreserved emotions head-on, I could tell. It wasn’t just a matter of hostility—I could hear her disappointment, her pain, and her grief, all mixed together into her voice. It was excruciating to listen to.
“I knew it was you the moment I saw you at the opening ceremony, but you acted like you didn’t know me at all... Having you—having Kunugi Kou look at me like I was absolutely nothing to him was painful. I ended up hating you because it was the only way I could protect myself.”
Protecting yourself by hating someone else, huh? She was desperately keeping her emotions in check, holding them back lest they overflow. It was the first time I’d ever seen her look so vulnerable. I wondered if the old me knew about this side of hers.
“Do you remember the time I tried to talk to you, back when we were first-years?”
“...Yeah.” I remembered it all too vividly, in fact. I was deeply suspicious—why would a beauty like her be talking to a guy like me?
It was about half a year after we enrolled at Oumei High, and I’d already secured my role as Kaito’s best friend. I figured that he’d done something to earn her affection, prompting her to seek me out as a way to get closer to him. When she started lashing out at me after our first meeting, I lumped it into the same category.
I thought her feelings for Kaito explained everything about her, but apparently that assumption was woefully misguided. I believed it because it was what I wanted to believe, but the fact of the matter was that she’d been after me from the very beginning. Kaito had nothing to do with it. She just wanted to talk to me...
“I’m sorry.”
What else could I say? Not that apologizing would fix anything. I couldn’t remember a single thing about Kiryu or her brother. She poured all her feelings out onto me, but still, none of it felt real at all. It was almost sickening. There she was, telling all these stories about my past, and there I was, unable to see them as anything other than someone else’s history.
The worst part was that I knew it probably had nothing to do with my amnesia. Kiryu probably sensed it too: the problem wasn’t my memory, it was with me. My inability to empathize with her was a flaw in my character, plain and simple. No matter how long I spent watching her agonize over our history, I still wouldn’t be able to face my own past. I was too scared. That was my only reason.
“Amnesia, of all things...? Why?! How could you forget?! The only people left to remember Daiki are my family and you! Please... Please, remember him... I know I’m being irrational, and I know I’m being selfish, but if you don’t remember him, then...then Daiki... Daiki really will be dead...”
“Kiryu...”
She was crying. But still, even after all that, I didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t the Kunugi Kou she wanted me to be. I wanted to make something up on the spot, to tell a white lie and reassure her, at least for the moment, but I couldn’t spit it out. She stared at me, silently, tears pouring down her grief-stricken face. It was all too much for me, and I awkwardly looked away.
“...When I got into high school and found you again, I was happy...at first. I was never satisfied with all the explanations for why you disappeared, and I thought that if I could just say a few words to you, that’d be enough for me... To my family and me, to the very few people who knew Daiki, you were a special person. I thought that would be enough.”
She paused for a moment, swallowing her emotions to make one final, cold, definitive statement.
“But I was wrong. The Kou-kun we all loved... He doesn’t exist anymore.”
I left the Kiryu household—I practically fled from it. I was in a daze on my way out, barely capable of paying attention to Kiryu’s parting words. With each step I took, it got harder and harder to remember the one that came before it. Kiryu’s raw words from before resounded in my mind, drowning out everything else.
How must she have felt going to school up until now? How must she have felt every time she saw me? How must she have felt while she was eating that hamburger? And how must she have felt, telling me all about her little brother?
Maybe if she’d confronted me after the opening ceremony, maybe if we’d ended up in the same class during our first year, things would’ve turned out differently between us. But thinking about what-ifs wouldn’t change anything.
“How could I forget, huh...?”
If I’d told her how I lost my memories, would that have satisfied her? Hah, as if.
“If I told her that, I bet she’d have decked me in the face. She’d have thought I was making crap up to dodge the issue.”
I could make all the excuses I wanted, but the reality was that I completely brought this upon myself by losing my memories—no, by throwing them away. I did it for my sake, and mine alone. I was convinced that the Kunugi Kou of the past, the Kunugi Kou who Kiryu loved, would tell me that it was the right decision if he was here.
But that decision was tormenting Kiryu. I gave her hope, then dropped her right back down into despair. I hid behind my amnesia, excusing my actions away, and caused her to blame herself for hating me, even though in the end it really was all my fault. Kiryu had every right to blame and abuse me, but even if she did, it’s totally possible she’d just be making herself feel even worse.
“I’m such a piece of shit.”
Maybe this is just who I am. Maybe all I’m good for is making people suffer. I’m jealous of my elementary school self. I bet he’d be able to do all the things I want to, all the things I can’t bring myself to, and he’d make it look easy.
“Why should they care about a waste of space like me...?”
Just as I moaned feebly to myself, my phone buzzed. I felt a sudden rush of relief as I answered. There it was—my chance to run away from everything. I didn’t even bother to check who was calling. I just shoved all the jumbled, messed-up thoughts that were preoccupying me into the back of my mind and tried to force my normal self to the surface again. The ideal me: the protagonist’s best friend sidekick, a cheery, flippant, insignificant dumbass whose only adult-like trait is his overinflated sense of pride. With no small amount of effort, I squeezed out a greeting.
“Hello?”
Of course, going back to normal couldn’t possibly be that easy. Even I could hear the weight and stiffness in my own tone of voice.
“You finally picked up, Senpai!”
A voice cut through the dizzy, almost nauseous sensation that was overtaking me. The voice of a girl I’d met just recently.
“Is that you, Ayase...?”
“It sure is! It’s your cute little kouhai, Ayase Hikari speaking!”
It sounded like she was trying to banter with me, but I couldn’t find it in me to give her a decent reply. A second or two of silence passed before she followed up.
“Can you come meet up with me?”
And she continued.
“Let’s go on a date, Kunugi Kou-senpai.”
She sounded absolutely serious.
