My Stepsister is My Ex-Girlfriend - Volume 6 - Chapter 5.08

11:34 A.M.: I’m Glad He’s Popular, but I’m Jealous

Akatsuki Minami

“Oh, there they are!”

I saw Yume-chan and Irido-kun emerge from the crowd as I waited outside the classroom. I beckoned to them, and they ran to the back door while glancing at the entrance where the customers were lining up.

“Sorry, we ran a little behind schedule. Why are there so many people lined up?” Yume-chan asked.

“Is it just me, or is the line actually going past the classroom next to ours?” Irido-kun asked.

“You’re right! There’re a lot more people than we anticipated. Even with a time limit to rush people in and out and adding extra seating, we’re still having trouble keeping up!”

Good thing the class next to ours wasn’t using their classroom for their cultural festival activity. If they had, it would’ve been a mess distinguishing our customers from theirs.

“Why is our class’s café so popular?”

“Apparently word really got around. People are talking about how the coffee Kine-chan made is a lot better than you’d expect, and... Oh, also, people really liked our walking advertisements—you two!” I showed Yume-chan my phone. She looked confused, but a little happy, when she saw all the positive feedback. Irido-kun, meanwhile, just frowned. “Anyway, come in and help. We really need it!”

“O-Okay!”

I pulled the two of them by their hands into the classroom.

“Oh, that’s her!”

“God the costume looks too good on her.”

Yume-chan’s eyes nervously darted around as the customers buzzed about. I giggled. You have such a low opinion of yourself, Yume-chan. Can’t you see just how cute you are? But, of course, Yume-chan wasn’t the only one making a splash. Irido-kun in his Shosei-style clothes was making the girls—who were about seventy percent of our customer base, by the way—begin excitedly whispering, squealing, or shivering and gawking at him.

In contrast, Irido-kun looked completely unfazed by their reactions and had his usual calm expression on. I hated the idea of him realizing his effect on women, but it pissed me off even more when he pretended not to notice.

I looked over at Yume-chan, who had entered the staff area through the curtain that was acting as a partition. She still didn’t seem to have accepted the current situation.

“Uh... Is it just me, or are there a lot of girls?” she asked.

“It’s not just you. The girls were mainly the ones who were spreading the word among themselves. Thanks to that, the café’s guests are mainly girls and we don’t have to worry about getting hit on at all!”

People could only get in by invitation, and there didn’t seem to be many people needing to be entered into the system that Irido-kun had come up with. It was starting to look like all his hard work had been for nothing.

“There you are, Irido. Where were you?!” A voice with deep resentment called out as a male staff member, dressed in the same style of clothes as Irido-kun, came in.

“All the girls came here after seeing you and they’ve been dissin’ us under their breath nonstop, saying that we look weird in our costumes or that we don’t look nearly as good as that one guy they saw!”

“Of course we don’t! How are normal, modern high school students like us supposed to pull that off?!”

“This is your fault! Your presence makes us look insignificant! Get out there before our hearts take any more damage!”

Yikes... It looked like the guys were having trouble since they didn’t have as much flexibility with their costumes as we did. We’d only really planned for family members and acquaintances to stop by, but the power of our walking advertisements had been too much. Now we were serving people we’d never even met before. Advertising had its downsides after all.

Kawanami, who’d been the most popular due to his perfect flirtatiousness, appeared behind the guys cornering Irido-kun and grinned. “They’re waitin’ for ya. Get out there and give ’em what they want, Irido!”

“Fine...” Irido-kun deeply exhaled. Looking at him, I understood how unfair it was that he looked so naturally good in that outfit, despite his typical sulkiness. “But I can’t do anything extra. Just whatever’s in the script.”

“That’s perfect! I’m sure that’s exactly what they want.”

Kawanami cleared the path for Irido, and I gave Yume a little push.

“You should help too, Yume-chan. I’ll be right there with you, so don’t worry about messing up, okay?”

“O-Okay.”

Yume-chan looked visibly nervous, and Irido-kun’s eyes were hidden by his hat, but as soon as they entered the café, the customers all began raising their hands in unison.

“Oh, over here!”

“Can I place an order?”

“Refill, please!”

Oh god, they are definitely overdoing it. Yume-chan started panicking at the flood of orders.

“Wh-What should I do?!”

“Start from the closest table and I’ll do the rest. Here’s a notepad for orders!” I said as I pushed her towards a nearby table of three girls. This’ll probably be easier for her than interacting with guys or adults.

“You’re really pretty close up too!”

“Wow, how is your hair so nice?!”

“Can I take a picture? I wanna post it on my feed.”

“Uh. Ah. Well—”

“All right, dear customers, please place an order. A photo’ll be a hundred thousand yen!” I jumped in to save Yume as she was overwhelmed by the flood of questions unique to girls.

“That’s too expensive!”

“Scam!”

“Give us a discount!” The girls laughed.

This wasn’t a real café, so playing along with them like this wasn’t a problem.

“Th-Thanks, Akatsuki-san.”

“No problem! It’s not like this is a real café or anything. Take it easy and have fun! I’ll be right behind you, ’kay?”

“I feel so worthless...”

She’s so serious, but that’s also what makes her cute!

On the other hand, Irido-kun seemed to be doing fine.

“So, one café au lait and an unsweetened iced tea. Is that right?”

“Y-Yes.”

“C-Could we take a picture?”

“My apologies, but pictures are prohibited,” he said with a slightly troubled look on his face.

“Hnngh!”

“I-It’s okay!”

Surprisingly, he was pushing the girls to their emotional wits’ ends. I’d imagined him serving customers in his usual expressionless, robotic manner, but he was even smiling at them.

“Not bad, Irido-kun! Why doesn’t he act like this more often?” I asked Yume-chan.

“He apparently gets like this when he works. He even acts like this around the other committee members.”

“Something wrong?” I asked, seeing a mix of emotions revealing themselves on her face as she fought between a smile and a frown.

She hid her mouth behind the notepad out of embarrassment. “I’m happy that other people notice how great he is, but...I don’t really like when he smiles at other girls.”

Who is this girl, and why is she so damn cute?!

“Hey, Irido! Come here real quick,” Kawanami said, suddenly calling Irido-kun over. He looked suspiciously at Kawanami before walking over to him. “Why are you acting so nice to the customers? Be cold and aloof!”

“What the hell kind of instructions are those?”

“Shaddup! Don’t you know the slogan, ‘We hate to see you smile’?!”

“What kind of shadow McDonalds is this?” Irido-kun quipped calmly, making Yume-chan almost do a spit take.