「Whoa, your room’s different than I expected. I thought it’d look more like a stereotypical university girl’s room.」

          As soon as we entered, Utsunomiya said something that sounded familiar.

          「Miyagi said something similar before.」

          The image Utsunomiya had of me in her head was probably still my high school self—the me that tried so hard to fit in with Umina’s group—so it wasn’t surprising she reacted the same way Miyagi did last year. Nowadays, even at university, I didn’t bother putting up much of a front, so I hoped to update the image she had of me.

          「She did? What’d she say?」

          「What did I say?」

          Miyagi asked, frowning slightly as she set her plate of pancakes and a glass of iced tea on the table before sitting down.

          We each had brought our own items. I sat diagonally across from Miyagi, and Utsunomiya sat across from me.

          「When you came over to my house last summer, you also said you expected it to look more like a stereotypical high school girl’s room, didn’t you?」

          I’d blurted out something Miyagi probably didn’t want me to say.

          Utsunomiya already knew that Miyagi and I had been close since high school. Plus, the story we went with was that I’d helped Miyagi with her studies, so there was nothing strange about visiting each other’s homes.

          The more lies we told, the more likely everything would unravel.

          It seemed better to answer harmless questions honestly rather than continue hiding things.

          I glanced at Miyagi, who was glaring at me, but I pretended not to notice.

          「If you two were close enough to be visiting each other all the time, you should’ve told me sooner!」

          「That’s true. If you’d told her sooner, we could’ve had pancakes like this all the way back then, right, Miyagi?」

          「Yeah, you’re right.」

          Miyagi smiled faintly, then added,

          「Shall we start eating now?」

          「Yeah, let’s do that before the pancakes get cold.」

          I replied, not wanting to bother her further.

          The two of them echoed in unison, “Let’s eat.”

          「Oh, these pancakes are so soft and delicious.」

          Utsunomiya said after taking a bite, smiling brightly at me.

          「Thanks. I’m glad you think so.」

          I picked up my knife and fork to cut into my own pancake.

          「I heard from Shiori that you’re a good cook, Sendai-san. Do you enjoy cooking?」

          「I wouldn’t say I particularly like it or anything. Also, did you really say something like that, Miyagi?」

          A good cook, huh.

          I had no idea Miyagi thought that about me.

          Well, not that I’d ever properly asked what she thought of me before. I’d only recently learned she thought I reminded her of borzois, but I’d never heard her say anything specific beyond that.

          「Yeah, that’s what Shiori told me on the way here.」

          「Oh, really? She’s never said that to me before.」

          I glanced at Miyagi, who was seated diagonally across from me. She had a strange expression on her face—not quite a frown, but her temples looked like they might start twitching any second.

          「I always tell you the food you make is delicious, don’t I?」

          Miyagi said curtly, and Utsunomiya giggled.

          Since she wasn’t denying it, what Utsunomiya said must’ve been true.

          Miyagi had actually praised me to someone else.

          That thought gave me a strange, ticklish feeling inside.

          I took a bite of the fluffy pancakes in front of me.

          The sweetness of the maple syrup soaking into the soft batter was delightful. I took another bite and glanced at Miyagi again. She was quietly eating her pancakes, not saying a word about how they tasted.

          I wished she would, though.

          As we ate, we chatted about places with good parfaits and things we’d recently bought. Miyagi was smiling at Utsunomiya with the same expression she used to wear back in high school.

          My hand stopped midair, fork hovering over my plate.

          It was a smile she’d never once directed at me.

          「Sendai-san, are you seeing anyone right now?」

          Utsunomiya suddenly brought up a topic Miyagi and I never talked about when we were alone.

          「Nope. What about you, Utsunomiya?」

          「Neither am I. What about you, Shiori?」

          「Why are you asking me? You already know I’m not seeing anyone.」

          「Oh, well, you know, I was just going with the flow.」

          Utsunomiya said with a smile.

          I was glad our guest of honor seemed to be enjoying herself, but it felt like her joy was taking years off Miyagi’s life.

It wasn’t great for my heart either.

          「You didn’t have to include me in that.」

          Miyagi sighed and took a sip of her iced tea.

          It was refreshing, in a way, to talk about things like this with her—topics that never came up when it was just the two of us.

          But a small part of me tensed up, afraid I might hear something I didn’t want to.

          Still, a few questions circled in my head. Things I’d never had the chance to ask, and things I might regret knowing once I did.

          「Well, do you at least have a crush on anyone?」

          My heart skipped a beat when Utsunomiya asked the question I’d secretly wanted to know myself.

          「You already know the answer to that too, don’t you? I don’t have a crush on anyone.」

          Miyagi answered without hesitation.

          Hearing the response I’d expected left me both relieved and disappointed. Her saying she didn’t like anyone meant there was no chance it was me, but even if she had said she liked someone, I probably wouldn’t have believed it was me anyway. I’d just end up wondering who it was and feeling miserable. Either way, it’d hurt, so I always felt it was better not to know.

          「What about you, Sendai-san? Do you have anyone you like?」

          Utsunomiya asked, fixing her gaze on me.

          Given how the conversation was going, I figured that question would come my way too.

          Well, this puts me in a tough spot, I thought.

          Admitting that I did would only complicate things, but denying it while Miyagi was here didn’t sit right either.

          「What about you, Utsunomiya?」

          I replied with a question of my own for the time being.

          If it were Miyagi, she would’ve complained about that, but Utsunomiya probably wouldn’t, not with someone she wasn’t that close to yet.

          「I don’t.」

          「I see. Do you and Miyagi always talk about things like this?」

          「Not really, but I was curious how your roommate situation would work if one of you did have a partner.」

          「Well, we do have some rules for living together, but we’ve never discussed what we’d do if one of us got a partner. Maybe we should make some.」

          I’d never wanted to think about a day when those rules would actually matter, so I’d avoided bringing it up with Miyagi. But I couldn’t tell Utsunomiya that, so I just went along with the conversation and glanced at Miyagi, who said, “Yeah, I guess we should.”

          「Oh, so you two actually have rules in place, huh.」

          Utsunomiya said with a satisfied tone, and the conversation came to an end.

          After finishing my pancakes, I looked over at Miyagi, who suddenly stood up.

          「I’m going to the bathroom.」

          She said, sounding like she was fleeing from Utsunomiya.

          I couldn’t blame her.

          If this went on, she might’ve ended up getting hit by another stray bullet.

          「Okay.」

          I said, letting her go, knowing she’d probably take more damage if things kept going.

          Alright, that leaves me alone with Utsunomiya.

          Hmm, what should we talk about?

          As I searched for harmless topics to bring up, I reached for the platypus tissue box and started absentmindedly stroking its head. Noticing this, Utsunomiya spoke up.

          「That looks like the kind of thing you’d find in Shiori’s room. Do you like stuff like that too, Sendai-san?」

          「Oh, Miyagi’s the one who picked it out.」

          I said, patting the tissue cover’s head.

          「No wonder it gives off such Shiori vibes.」

          The image of that crocodile tissue cover I’d seen countless times back in high school came to mind. I wasn’t sure if Miyagi still had it in her room now, but considering Utsunomiya—who’d just been there earlier—said it gave off her vibe so casually, it was probably still around.

          I’d wanted to see with my own eyes what Miyagi’s room—the one that had always been off-limits to me—looked like, but there was nothing I could do. It wasn’t Utsunomiya’s fault, though, and I still didn’t know for sure if the crocodile was really there or not.

          「You two are a lot closer than I thought.」

          Utsunomiya said while staring at the platypus.

          「You even have something like that in your room.」

          「Well, we’re close enough to be roommates.」

          「Yeah, true. You wouldn’t be sharing a place if you didn’t get along.」

Utsunomiya said, taking a sip of her iced tea before looking directly at me.

          「You’re a lot easier to talk to than I expected, Sendai-san. You felt kind of unapproachable back in high school…」

          「That was probably because I was always hanging out with Umina’s group, right?」

          「Yeah, something like that.」

          I thought so.

          Umina had always been the flashy, attention-grabbing type—for better or worse—so a lot of students tended to avoid her. She was friendly, sure, but she never followed the rules, and the teachers often kept an eye on her. It wouldn’t have been strange if people found me hard to approach just for being around her.

          「Sendai-san, you said you used to help Shiori with her studies, right?」

          Maybe feeling awkward for what could’ve sounded like badmouthing Umina, Utsunomiya switched topics.

          「Yeah. It started as a way to thank her for lending me money. I hadn’t planned on tutoring her for as long as I did, but I found Miyagi pretty unique and interesting to be around.」

          「Oh, I get that. It’s probably because Shiori’s so different from the people you used to hang around.」

          「I used to read a lot of manga in Miyagi’s room, but Umina hardly had any in hers.」

          「Shiori’s room does have a lot of manga, doesn’t it?」

          Utsunomiya said with a laugh.

          Back then, I’d read almost every manga in Miyagi’s room—a place that had felt strangely comfortable to be in. Even now, I still read the ones she brings over to my room sometimes, but I haven’t chosen one from her bookshelf myself in a long time.

          「And that’s what led you two to become roommates, huh?」

          「Well, living alone would’ve been pretty lonely. I just never imagined she’d tell you she was living with a relative, though.」

          「Yeah, I never would’ve guessed her roommate was you either, Sendai-san.」

          Utsunomiya laughed lightly, then let out a small sigh.

          She looked like she wanted to say something, but lowered her gaze and sighed once more before finally speaking quietly.

          「… To be honest, I was really shocked when I found out you were living with Shiori. She’d never mentioned you before, so I felt kind of like I was being left out. I know I’m just being immature, though.」

          She laughed awkwardly, then looked back up at me.

          「Sorry for saying something weird.」

          「I don’t think it’s immature to feel that way. I’d feel left out too if the same thing happened to me, like my friend had just been taken away from me or something.」

          If anything, I was the one being immature.

          Even though I was the one who invited her over, I hadn’t felt genuinely happy about it. And even though I told her she could go into Miyagi’s room, I hadn’t actually wanted her to.

          I wished I could come out and say what I was feeling the way Utsunomiya did, but that wasn’t possible.

          There was no way I could explain why I wasn’t happy about her being here, or why I didn’t want her in Miyagi’s room.

          I couldn’t talk about these feelings with her—feelings I hadn’t even admitted to the person they were about.

          So instead, I said what I’d planned to tell Utsunomiya from the start.

          「Oh, by the way, you can call me Hazuki if you want.」

          Miyagi always stubbornly refused to call me by my first name, but most of my friends did. I figured that if Utsunomiya did too, it’d make me feel like we’d gotten closer.

          — In other words, I wanted to become close enough to her that I no longer felt jealous of her.

          It was a selfish reason, but that wasn’t all.

          If we got along better, maybe we could become actual friends. And since she’d just opened up to me, that desire only got stronger.

          「Hmm…」

          Utsunomiya let out a soft groan, then straightened her posture.

          「Shiori doesn’t call you “Hazuki” either, so I think I’ll keep calling you “Sendai-san” until she does. But you can call me by my first name if you want.」

          She said with a serious expression on her face, and seeing how much thought she’d put into her answer, I did the same.

          「Then until you call me by my first name, I’ll stick with Utsunomiya too.」

          「Yep, that sounds good.」

          She clapped her hands together lightly, as if wrapping up our talk. Then she followed up with, “Sendai-san.”

          「What’s up?」

          「Do you think we’ll end up becoming good friends?」

          「Yeah, of course.」

          I answered, and Utsunomiya smiled.

          「That’s good.」

          We both laughed—and just then, the door opened, and Miyagi walked back in.

          「What were you two talking about?」

          She asked as she sat diagonally across from me, glancing between us suspiciously.

          「We were sharing all our secrets about you, Miyagi… Just kidding. We were just talking about how I ended up tutoring you back in high school.」

          「Is that true, Maika?」

          Miyagi asked, still keeping her gaze fixed on me.

          「Yeah, it’s true. We weren’t talking about anything serious.」

          Utsunomiya said with a light laugh.

---

< Previous Part | Next Part >