My Stepsister is My Ex-Girlfriend - Volume 9 - Chapter 4

Chapter 4: End of Olden Days

Determination and Courage

Tohdo Hoshibe

Up until recently, I never cared about Christmas. It was a holiday for a religion I had no affiliation with—a celebration for some guy I had no ties to—so of course I didn’t. To me, it was a weird day when couples would get all lovey-dovey and single people would be strangely loud. That’s all it ever was.

Just a month ago, I never would’ve expected that I’d be walking through the town with my girlfriend on Christmas. Oh, how one’s perspective can change. Last year, I couldn’t have cared less about Christmas, but this year, it felt like it was a holiday specifically for us.

“Phew... It’s already pitch-black out, huh?” Aisa said, looking up at the sky.

We were already well into winter, so the sky had darkened some time ago. But in the midst of looking at the Christmas lights and eating, we’d never had a chance to look up at the sky. That’s how easily Aisa Aso drew my eyes to her.

The time we were spending together was coming to an end for today. It was getting late, so I needed to get her back home. But even though I knew that in my head, I didn’t put it into words.

Do I want to stay with her that badly? Wow, look at me. I’m such a big guy and yet here we are. The disparity is palpable. Even if she were to start pouting, there wasn’t much left for us to do. We’d already gone through all the Christmassy things to do. The only thing left was...

“Hey, Senpai?” Aisa tugged a little on my hand as she held it. “There’s somewhere...I want to go.”

Right now? I turned to ask her this out loud, but as I did, I saw her covering her mouth with her scarf, her face red. From her expression, I immediately got what she was trying to say. Her face was filled with determination and courage.

“Will you...let me have a do-over?”

Girls’ Christmas Party

Yume Irido

As expected, President Kurenai’s house was as luxurious as the houses you saw on TV. There were three floors and a three-car garage.

“It’s because this is my parent’s home. It’s not something I deserve praise for, but...fortunately, the living room is spacious.”

I couldn’t even guess the square footage of the living room. I’d lived most of my life in an apartment, so when I moved into the Irido household, it had been a bit of a culture shock. But this was on an entirely different level.

It was a normal house in the sense that it had a living room, a dining room, and a kitchen, but each was about twice the size of what was at the Irido household. You could comfortably fit twenty people in here for a party.

It made sense that President Kurenai had said that we were welcome to bring friends.

“Aha ha ha! It’s so frickin’ big!”

“This is America. We’re in America!”

“What the heck do you think America is like?”

Akatsuki-san jumped from place to place, Maki-san was astonished, and Nasuka-san calmly quipped at her. I’d invited them partially because I’d had to prioritize the student council until now. I’d worried that bringing them here might not have been okay, but it seemed like I hadn’t had to worry about that at all.

Just as Maki-san had said, the living room was spacious, just like in American houses, and in it were some girls that were probably friends of President Kurenai and Aso-senpai. I was a little surprised to find out that Aso-senpai actually had girlfriends, but the bigger surprise came from the number of friends that President Kurenai had. Six? Seven? Eight? There were some who were high schoolers and others who were in college, and someone who looked like an adult. There was even a girl who looked like a foreigner. But among all of them was a small girl who looked out of place.

“Good evening, Asuhain-san.”

“Oh, Irido-san. Hello.” Asuhain-san looked at me, a slightly relieved expression spreading across her face.

She must’ve not been able to bring herself to have President Kurenai pay her attention in the middle of her going around and greeting her friends. Asuhain-san didn’t know anyone else here, so she must’ve felt lonely. At the very least she was the same age as my friends and I, and she’d met Akatsuki-san once, so I hoped she felt somewhat comfortable with her.

“Where’s Aso-senpai? I don’t see her,” I asked.

“Apparently, she overslept. She’s not sure if she’ll make it in time or not.”

“She overslept?” What time did she go to bed? It’s already night.

“Oh, right. Asuhain-san, let me introduce you.” I proceeded to introduce Maki-san and Nasuka-san.

“Is there something about you that attracts people with big racks, Irido-san?” Maki-san asked, staring at Asuhain-san’s chest.

Though she’d said this, I knew that both Maki-san and Nasuka-san were good with people, so even if Asuhain-san was looking frustrated, I was sure they’d get along. Just as Asuhain-san seemed to be getting involved in their conversation, my chest suddenly felt heavy.

“Can you just think a little?!”

It was the first time I’d ever seen Mizuto get so angry. He must’ve felt so weak and vulnerable. In my mind, he was the ideal boyfriend, my mortal enemy, and a reliable family member. I’d never seen him scream like a kid before.

That’s how much it’d been weighing on his mind. He’d been upset enough to rip off the poker face he was so good at maintaining. He couldn’t hold himself back anymore. I...hadn’t been thinking. It was like I was a middle schooler—I wanted a romance like the people around me and had gotten all hyped up by that dreamlike relationship.

Mizuto had been right. It would’ve been better if we’d never become a family. We could’ve had a normal romantic relationship as high schoolers. I’d unconsciously been looking away from the reality of things. But somewhere in my heart, I’d known it was true. Otherwise I wouldn’t have thought about just staying like this with him a little longer. I’m an emotionally immature coward.

Despite knowing that, I didn’t think about how to make our relationship work. I made Mizuto think about it. More than procrastinating...pushing it all onto him was the most cowardly thing to do.

“Agh! Sorry I’m late!”

We were getting ready to kick the party off when Aso-senpai finally appeared. But...something was off about her voice.

“Senpai,” I called out as I moved closer to her. “Are you okay? Your voice seems kinda hoarse.”

“Oh, Yumechi... Well, this is... Don’t worry about it. I kinda just went a little too hard.”

Was she singing karaoke all night or something?

Then, President Kurenai came out from her group of friends. “Hey, Aisa. I hear that you were passed out until just a little while ago. I’ve heard of people sleeping through the new year, but this is the first time I’ve heard of someone sleeping through Christmas.”

“Yeah, I couldn’t really sleep last night... I took a nap, and when I finally woke up, it was this late...”

“Oh?” Before I knew it, Akatsuki-san had appeared behind me wearing a vulgar grin, her eyes sparkling. “You couldn’t really sleep last night? On Christmas Eve? Hm...”

Huh? No way. Both President Kurenai and I looked at Aso-senpai at the same time.

“Wh-What? Jeez, guys...” Aso-senpai took a step back as if she was being overwhelmed by us.

As she did, she held down her blouse and covered her neck. She must’ve thought she was being discreet, but neither President Kurenai nor I were going to let that go.

President Kurenai slightly grinned. “Looks like you had a good time last night, huh?”

“W-Well, yeah. I guess.” Aso-senpai seemed to have given up and was blushing sheepishly. And then... “It was a whole thing! I never knew that love hotels got that crowded on Christmas Eve! But it was so fun! They had things that aren’t at regular hotels! I think you should all go to one at least once in your lives!”

Thus began the turbulent one-upping. President Kurenai poked her in the forehead to stop her, and I forced a smile to play it off. Even if she’d climbed the staircase to adulthood, Aso-senpai was still the same. But wow, last night, huh...?

While I was showing Mizuto my underwear, Aso-senpai was with Hoshibe-senpai until her voice went hoarse. Oh my god. Oh my god! I was filled with both embarrassment and bitterness. Then I felt a kickback, sending me into a depression. Why can everything go so well for her and not for me?

“Yumechi? Earth to Yumechi.” Suddenly I came to and saw Aso-senpai’s cute face looking at me. I recoiled in surprise. “You okay? You don’t look too happy.”

“Well...”

I hadn’t said anything, but Aso-senpai saw right through me. She moved next to me and whispered in my ear.

“Did the thing we talked about earlier not work out?”

“Yeah...” I nodded hesitantly.

“Oh...” Aso-senpai sighed. “But y’know, it’s gonna be okay!” she said in a cheerful tone, squeezing my shoulders.

“Just because seduction didn’t work once or twice doesn’t mean it’s the end of the world! Just look at that girl prodigy! How many times do you think she’s been turned down by Joe-kun?”

I paused before answering. “True...”

“See?!”

“I could’ve sworn I overheard a really unpleasant conversation...” President Kurenai said, turning towards us while she was talking to other friends.

“Crap,” Aso-senpai whispered. “Just your imagination!” she chirped, trying to allay President Kurenai’s suspicions. “I mean, it took me over a year to ask Senpai out, and then he turned me down. And then I got him to change his mind, and then finally yesterday... Yesterday... Heh heh...”

Her laugh reminded me of Higashira-san’s otaku laugh. All I could do was weakly smile. “Yesterday sounds like it was a lot of fun.”

“Yeah. It was!” I could’ve sworn that her eyes turned into hearts. Her head was probably filled with nothing but thoughts of Hoshibe-senpai. Suddenly, she gasped. “W-Well, anyway, you shouldn’t worry too much. Just keep goin’ on the offense and eventually, he’ll wanna do it!”

“But...”

He probably wants to, but with the way we are now, we don’t have the right to act on it. We don’t have the determination for what door that opens.

“Well, I don’t really know what the problem is in your case, but...” Aso-senpai gripped my shoulders as if she was trying to pour energy into them. “If you have a good long talk with him and try to really understand him, it’ll all work out in the end. That’s what you told me in Kobe, isn’t it?”

“Oh...”

That’s right. Why didn’t I remember that? When I saw Aso-senpai crying after being turned down, I thought that Hoshibe-senpai should have returned her seriousness with his own. And then, she faced Hoshibe-senpai seriously and Hoshibe-senpai reciprocated it with his own seriousness. Seeing that gave me courage, making me go through with what I was doing now. I need to face what Mizuto is seriously thinking with my own seriousness too.

“I think it’s about time to kick everything off. Raise your glasses,” President Kurenai said, holding a nonalcoholic sparkling wine. “Here’s to this holy night and Aisa Aso, who became a woman. Cheers!”

“Cheers!” said the rest.

“Hey! That’s so embarrassing, Suzurin!!!”

Most likely, what I needed to become wasn’t a woman. I needed to become a person who could face Mizuto Irido more than anyone else.

How to Win at the Game

Mizuto Irido

“Earth to Irido. You alive?” Kawanami called out to me in an unconcerned tone when he came back, finding me face down on the ground. I gently raised my hand in response as Kawanami began rummaging through a plastic bag on the table. “I kinda just bought whatever. What’re you feelin’ more, a karaage bento or a mapo tofu rice bowl?”

“The mapo...”

“You like spicy food? That’s a surprise. Here,” he said, placing the warmed-up mapo tofu rice bowl next to me.

I slowly got up and took out the tray that the mapo tofu had been left on and then carefully poured it over the rice in the bowl underneath, dyeing it red. As I did, Kawanami unwrapped his bento and broke apart his disposable chopsticks.

“Havin’ convenience store food on Christmas isn’t too bad every now and then, right? I was wonderin’ why you asked if you could stay over here outta the blue, but...” Just like he said, I was currently in Kawanami’s room. After waking up from a short nap, I’d messaged him and come over here to run away from my problems. “Well, whatever. Feel free to hide out here as long as you want. Everyone has times they wanna run away from girls.”

“Thanks...”

“Wow, not even denying it.”

Kawanami didn’t try to pry any information out of me. He wasn’t acting like his usual voyeuristic self, perhaps because he was currently experiencing some difficulties with a girl as well. Our predicaments were similar but had a key difference: I wasn’t averse to being touched by the girl in my scenario. If anything, being touched by Yume felt really pleasant—too pleasant, to the point that I felt like I was going to be swept away. I hated that.

I was scared that if she came at me like that again, I might give into temptation, and when I did, I’d end up in a situation I wouldn’t be able to take back. I was so afraid. I knew that running away like this wouldn’t solve anything, but regardless... Eating this spicy junk food without drinking water was almost like a way of punishing myself.

At the same time, now that I had some food in my stomach, I was starting to calm down, meaning I could objectively analyze myself. It’s like I’m acting as though this doesn’t involve me. Even in this situation, it was like I was trying to see this through a third-person perspective.

“If you’ve recovered enough to sit up, let’s play one-on-one.”

After finishing eating and cleaning up, Kawanami sat in front of the TV and passed me a controller.

After he shoved it in my hands, I slowly responded. “I...don’t really play games.”

“You’ll get used to it—everybody does. Even on our Kobe trip, I was thinkin’ about how for a person who doesn’t play games a lot, you had a good sense of things,” Kawanami said as he picked up his controller and booted up the game console.

A game...huh? Now that I think about it, I don’t know what kind of game Keikoin-san is working on. Kawanami picked out a random game from the menu screen and told me that I should get used to controlling my character first. With that, he opened up the training mode, and I tried moving the analog sticks and pressing the buttons. So this is how you jump, and this is how you attack...

“You really are smart. Hard to believe you’ve barely held a controller before.”

“Does being smart have anything to do with being good at games?”

“It does. It’s pretty common for pros to have had really good grades in school. After all, people who are smart are good at figuring out how to get good at games. They instinctively know the right answers.”

“Are you saying that they know how to think?”

“Exactly. Of course, precision and good reaction times are important, but that’s just enough to beat your friends. If you wanna be the best in the country or even the world, you gotta know how to think, or else you won’t get far. Did you know that in the competitive FPS scene they have dedicated analysts who analyze enemy teams?”

“Huh... That makes sense. After all, there’s a certain predictability to games since there’s a limit to what can be done in them.”

“Hm? Whaddya mean?”

“So for example, this character throws out a punch at a predetermined speed. No matter how much you work at it, they’ll always throw out the punch at the same speed. In real life, the harder you work, the faster you might be able to throw out that punch, but you can’t do that in games. Games are much more limited in terms of physical aspects, so all that’s left is to use your brain to gain an advantage.”

“Yeah, exactly! When I said you’re smart, I meant how you could understand all that in an instant.”

If I really am smart, I should’ve been able to come up with an answer to my Yume situation in an instant too. Well, whatever. Now that I had the basic controls down, I began fighting Kawanami. Of course, he went easy on me, but the matches weren’t even close. Once I got used to the controls, things became more competitive.

“What?! You’re using that move now?!” Kawanami exclaimed.

“I figured I’d counter you.”

“Seriously? It’s been like two hours and you can already read me like that?!”

Punches couldn’t suddenly get faster. In that case, all I had to do was make sure that I stopped my opponent from being able to punch. This really is an intelligence-based sport.

“All right, I’m switching to my main. I ain’t about to lose to a beginner.”

I thought I’d be able to put up a good fight, but since Kawanami had childishly switched to his usual character, he was landing strings of combos on me, absolutely destroying me. I see. So deeper knowledge of the game is needed.

“Hold on. Let me look something up,” I said.

“You’re really gettin’ into it. You might be the first person I’ve seen lookin’ up a wiki in the middle of playing a game at their friend’s house.”

And that’s how I idly spent my time at Kawanami’s place—beating each other up on the TV screen. I felt like I’d gotten into a lot of new things recently. First, there was managing Isana as an artist, and now I was playing games with Kawanami. Up until now, I’d been spending my time in the same way, day after day—I’d go to school, read books, and then sleep. There was a small bit of time when I had a girlfriend, but even the way I spent my time with her hadn’t been too different than if I’d spent it alone. Maybe, deep down, I felt like I had to start changing things up. It’s not like I was doing it to fit in with others, like Yume had. I didn’t see that as personal growth; it was more like falling in line with peer pressure, conveniently fitting oneself into society.

No, the reason I was changing was different from Yume’s. I didn’t want to be recognized by those around me, nor did I want to fit in with society. I wanted to find what I’d had inside me this entire time and change the person I was to accept myself. I was changing myself for my own sake.

I suppose I could be described as an empty egotist. I barely had a personality, yet I fixated on myself. That’s why if I was ever forced into a situation where I had to choose between myself or Yume, I’d never choose to sacrifice myself. From the start, that was my only option, and I kept coming back to it.

Kawanami had mentioned that I knew how to think. I see. I’ve taken the shortest route, cutting out anything unnecessary, not even realizing who I left behind. Ultimately, all that had gotten me was to a dead end faster. What a joke.

“Games are really nice,” Kawanami said out of the blue in the midst of our controllers clacking. “No matter how untalkative your opponent is, you feel like you get closer to them as you play. There are people who get surprisingly competitive and others who are complete muscle-brains. You might not use those words to describe them normally, but that side of them’s deeply steeped in their playstyle. It can take forever to learn that side of them if you’re just talkin’.”

“True...”

“People who have a bad personality have a bad personality in the game too. They laugh their heads off as they pick off noobs, and only ever derive joy from doing that. Games really bring out the true nature of people.”

“So what? You’re saying my true nature’s showing right now?”

“Well, in your case, you’re...serious.”

“Wow, that’s so specific,” I said with a twinge of sarcasm.

“It is. Even if you’re in an advantageous situation, you won’t act like you already have it in the bag—you stay serious until the end. Until you know how your opponent’s gonna react, you patiently observe them and keep your distance relative to them in mind. That tactic means you respect your opponents. That’s a virtue. You’d get it if you played online for a bit. There are plenty of guys who BM and curse at their opponents.” Kawanami paused before continuing. “Plus, you’re really formal towards games. You’re actually trying to take the time to learn how to play the game step-by-step while always calmly evaluating your own skill.” I fell silent. It felt as if he’d seen through me. Had he really figured me out just by playing against me? “I bet you’re like this with your real-life relationships too. You respect others and check yourself in relation to them. I think it’s a very sincere and serious way to live life, to the point that I think it’s really hard to live like that.”

“Don’t start giving me life advice out of the blue. We’re just playing a game here.”

“Then you should have a proper chat.” Kawanami dodged my attack and countered with a powerful one of his own. “You’re not gonna be able to understand Irido-san from a game.”

I ran out of stocks, ending the match. Kawanami looked at me and flashed a proud smile. Seeing this, I couldn’t help but sigh.

“Don’t brag after beating a beginner. It’s bad manners.”

“I don’t consider you a beginner.”

He’s right. I’m not. I’ve already gone through this once. Back then, I couldn’t do anything and just passed the days by. Was I really going to let this go the same way? Was I going to repeat the same stupid mistakes I had made in middle school and then look back at this time and reminisce about how this had all been a folly of youth? How stupid. Seriously. So stupid.

“Looks like you’ve gotten used to it, Irido. You get what you need to do to win at the game now, right?”

“Yeah...” I’m glad I read books. The words passed down across generations are important. “‘If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles,’” I quoted.

The Feeling of Wanting Something

Yume Irido

Even after I got back from the Christmas party, Mizuto still hadn’t gotten home. According to mom: “Oh, he’s staying at a friend’s house. Maybe it’s Higashira-san’s house, hee hee!” she giggled excitedly.

I knew there was no chance of that, though. Mizuto always told me when he went to Higashira-san’s house. I wasn’t sure exactly why he did that, but after what happened yesterday, I kinda had an idea. Him reporting to me was a result of him being stuck between a rock and a hard place.

What was it about working with her that drew him so much into it that he couldn’t resist? Why did he have to turn his back on me? I needed to know. Until I did, I couldn’t make any plans. So, I sent Higashira-san a message.

Yume: Can I come over tomorrow?

“Thanks for waiting!” Higashira-san said, poking her messy head of hair out from behind the door, dressed in worn-out sweats.

I was taken aback by how lacking in femininity she was. The outfits she’d wear to our house were already eyebrow-raising, but until this moment I’d never realized that, in her own way, that had been her way of putting in effort.

“Higashira-san...did you just wake up?”

“Mmm no. I arose many hours ago. I’ve simply found it too troublesome to change... I apologize for greeting you with this appearance.”

“No, it’s okay... I’m the one who asked to come over out of the blue.”

Higashira-san let me in and led me down the hallway to a door not too far away, which was apparently her room.

“Here we are. As I mentioned over LINE, I’m unable to pay you too much attention due to my work...”

“You’re that busy?”

“I’ve a deadline to meet.”

“A deadline?”

“Yes, one set by Mizuto-kun. Though we just posted an illustration for Christmas, he wants me to make one for New Year’s as well. He’s very spartan in his methods.”

Mizuto really is trying to manage her. He’d mentioned it, but it didn’t feel real until hearing it come from her own mouth.

“Well, thanks for having me...”

Higashira-san’s room could have given Mizuto’s a run for its money in terms of messiness. Unlike in his room, her novels seemed to be stuffed into her bookcases, but in place of the books that Mizuto’s room’s floor was littered with, she had thick books I’d never seen before and a lot of different kinds of magazines across her floor and around her desk.

Higashira-san sat in her chair and picked up her stylus. I found myself standing behind her, looking at her as she worked hunched over her tablet.

“You mentioned a New Year’s illustration, but there’s still about a week until then. Does drawing take that much time?”

“Oh. The illustration I’m currently working on isn’t for the new year.”

“Huh?”

Higashira-san continued her work without skipping a beat.

“There was something I wanted to draw before that, so I wanted to get it done before I began work on the New Year’s illustration. But then my schedule got too full.” Higashira-san chuckled sheepishly.

She has a drawing due but is working on another one on top of that? Without being asked to? If she wants to draw two pictures in a week, then she simply needs to draw one in about three days.

“Are illustrations really that easy to finish quickly?”

“I can complete a rough sketch in about an hour, but these need to be fully colored. When school was in session, it was quite difficult to complete them in a week’s time.”

“So why would you force yourself to draw another illustration on top of that if it’s so exhausting?”

“Huh? Is there another choice? I merely wish to draw,” she said matter-of-factly, as if it were common sense.

Honestly, though, it was in character for her. Even when I first met her, I could tell she was different from other people. The common sense she had was different from a normal person’s. Thinking about it, her unique way of thinking easily made her a type of genius.

Mizuto, being the closest one to her, had been able to discern that first. It became all too obvious now that I had given it some thought. I looked over to the mountain of thick books around her desk. I crouched down and looked at their covers.

“Oh, those books are reference materials,” Higashira-san explained before I asked. “They come in handy when I need to draw backgrounds or clothes. Pictures on the internet are convenient, but the ones you can get from specialty books are completely different in quality.”

“Did you buy them? Is your allowance enough to cover all of them?”

“Oh, no. Mizuto-kun bought most of them for me.”

“Huh?”

“I believed that simple image searches would suffice; however, he insisted that books were the best method by which to acquire knowledge. He promised to reward me if I finished my illustration by the agreed-upon deadline, but that ended up being all these books.”

I picked up the one on the top and looked at the price on the back. It was more than two thousand yen. Reading was a much cheaper hobby than buying games or going out with friends, and it was even cheaper if you bought secondhand books. But still, with the number of books that Mizuto bought, he didn’t have much money left over from his allowance. It was possible that he’d used some of the money he’d saved up from his New Year’s gifts, but still...was he really doing all of this just for the sake of Higashira-san’s growth?

I stood up again and peeked at Higashira-san’s tablet from over her shoulder. Was this called a...clean copy? Above the faint lines of the rough sketch were clear, bold lines. Before my very eyes, a female character’s outline was becoming clear. Higashira-san was really good. Even someone like me who was entirely unfamiliar with the world of art could tell. Would I understand a little more if I saw a finished product? I looked around the room, but didn’t see any completed works anywhere.

“Hey, Higashira-san?”

“Yes?”

“You post your images online, right? Could you tell me your handle?”

“Uh...” She really didn’t look like she wanted to.

“No?”

“Well, I suppose it’s okay, but...it’s incredibly embarrassing to inform my real-life friends of my handle.”

“I’ve only really used social media or LINE, so I don’t really understand.”

“So you haven’t been tainted by the internet yet. How fortunate...”

“So, is that still a no?”

“As long as you keep it to yourself, then...I suppose it’s okay.”

“You shouldn’t hide it. You’re so good.”

“Mizuto-kun has stopped me from doing so. In his words: ‘Don’t seek validation from the people around you—they’re just gonna use you. Look at the bigger picture.’”

“That definitely sounds like him...”

“I agree with him. I’m sure there was a child in your elementary school who drew something really well in art class, and then all the kids rushed over to them and asked them to draw things for them as well.”

“Yeah...there was.”

From my perspective, being good at something was enviable, but from Mizuto and Higashira-san’s perspective, it was a burden. Even if she wasn’t popular in the classroom, Mizuto believed that she could become popular globally.

After Higashira-san told me the website she was posting on and her handle, I looked it up on my phone. There were a total of eight pictures so far, and I looked at them in order of newest to oldest.

I silently gasped. To be honest, I’d had an image in my head that she’d been drawing those kinds of amateur-looking pictures that you see in the reader’s corner of manga magazines. But these weren’t in the same league as those whatsoever.

Her technique wasn’t on a professional level, but the feelings behind each picture were colorful—not literally, but rather, each picture conveyed a message or displayed her unique personality.

Even with my untrained eye, I could tell that was the most abnormal thing about her art. Furthermore, the techniques she wasn’t good with were getting better with each picture. Going back through the pictures, I saw that she’d started about a month ago. It was amazing that she’d improved this much in just a month’s time, but it was also amazing that Mizuto had guided her this far.

If Higashira-san was a drawing prodigy, Mizuto might’ve been a prodigy at guiding and nurturing that talent. When I finally got to the first picture she posted, I gulped. It was a picture of a girl with a broken heart, her expression twisted.

I wasn’t sure what to say. Her expression and emotions were on a different level in terms of vividness. It might’ve been the least technically proficient, but it packed a much stronger punch than anything she’d drawn since. And at the same time, the face was different, the expression was different—everything about it was different from the others. Looking at this picture, I could vividly picture Aso-senpai’s face as she smiled through her tears after being turned down.

That’s exactly what this picture was—a recreation of that scene. The fact that Higashira-san had been capable of pinpointing someone’s exact emotions and accurately recreate them in a picture was nothing short of genius. I wasn’t sure what other words could be used to describe her.

It was obvious. When we went to Kobe, Mizuto had become confident that Higashira-san had a talent for art. Suddenly, I began remembering the tears I’d seen in the pages of The Siberian Dancing Girl.

“This is...amazing.” The words just fell out of my mouth. “You’re amazing, Higashira-san...”

She was so focused, I was sure she couldn’t hear me. That’s why I could be so honest and declare my defeat. There was no way I could win. Even if I’d been the most beautiful girl in the world, I would never be a replacement for the beauty of talent.

If there was a soulmate for Mizuto Irido, it had to have been Isana Higashira. I was just a nuisance in their story. I had no part in it. I was simply the girl that he’d dated in the past. I was simply the girl who lived with him. There was nothing special about me. I just really, really liked him. That’s all there was to me. In the future, if everyone in the world knew his name, nobody would know mine. Nobody would care how I felt about him.

But... But... But still, Mizuto thought about me. Even if in his mind it wasn’t an option for me to be a romantic part of his life, he didn’t just throw away that possibility. He was thinking so hard about me to the point that he was in pain. Was that... Was that really something that had no value?

“Hey, Higashira-san? Can I ask you something random?”

“Go ahead.”

“If Mizuto had a really important girlfriend, and she got mad and said that he couldn’t see you anymore and that he couldn’t help support you...what would you do?”

Higashira-san’s hands stopped, despite moving so purposefully before. Then, she turned around and declared, her eyes resolute. “I apologize, but I won’t relinquish him to you, Yume-san. I need him.”

Though she’d accepted being turned down by him fairly easily and was okay if he got a girlfriend that wasn’t her, Higashira-san didn’t back down here.

“That...makes sense.” Hearing that, I felt relieved.

Up until now, I’d viewed Higashira-san as a person from a different world, one with a completely different set of views than ours. I’d thought she was a different kind of person entirely. Her actions and thoughts had influenced me so much to the point that I couldn’t believe that I’d ever compared her to how I used to be.

But I finally understood. The things that were important to us might’ve been different, but the feeling of wanting something was the same. That’s why...

“Sorry, but I’m not giving him up either,” I declared to her as an equal. I thought of it as my way of being polite.

“You...really won’t?” Higashira-san shrank a little.

“Let’s discuss the finer details at another time. There’s no point counting our chickens before they’ve hatched.”

“That’s true... It’d be extremely pathetic if the both of us talked a big game but were both discarded by him.”

“Don’t jinx it!” I giggled.

Higashira-san chuckled as well. I’m so glad I’m friends with Higashira-san. I’m sure we’ll both find a way forward, somehow.

True Kindness

Mizuto Irido

Even without classes, it was too early for the school to close its doors since teachers still had work to do. Thanks to that, I could get inside. By explaining that my stepsister, the secretary of the student council, had asked me to come here to get something for her, I was able to get the key to the student council room. It was really nice having good grades at times like these. They trusted me much more easily.

Then, I stepped into the student council room for the first time. There was a space for guests, furnished with a couch, and then a long table in the back with a whiteboard for the student council members. For starters, I made my way to the back of the room and saw some details about what were probably status updates on the board that’d been left there.

Progress on Student Council Bulletin, eSports club budget negotiation progress report, meet at 7 a.m.: New Year’s Greeting.

I recognized the writing. After all, I was used to this handwriting after seeing it in her notebook when we studied together in middle school.

My eyes fell to the shelf next to the white board. There was a binder with a label “Student Council Newsletters” on its spine. I took it out and opened it. Each page was neatly placed inside, and all the student council newsletters were there. A lot of it had been typed up and printed out, but parts of the newsletters had been handwritten with the same familiar handwriting—neat, but rounded. It was Yume’s handwriting.

It seemed that the newsletter was printed each week and they were all made by Yume. She might’ve thought that just typing out words might not have had the same personal touch as handwriting, but at the very least, it did catch the eye easier when things were handwritten.

She’s really been doing all this? I’ve never even tried reading these for real. I didn’t feel the same kind of emotional response that I did when I saw Isana’s art. But still, I knew the person she used to be. In outdoor ed, she’d been such a flustered mess that she hadn’t been able to ask anyone for curry ingredients. But now, she was writing these printouts that everyone saw. They weren’t going to touch any hearts, and they might’ve not been read by the majority of students, but still, I could tell just how amazing these were.

“So, it was you.” At that moment, I heard the door open. I looked up with surprise to see a small-framed girl with a strong presence—the student council president, Suzuri Kurenai.

She smiled as she looked at me. “When I heard that a family member of a student council member had arrived, I had an inkling that it’d be you. Did Yume-kun forget something?” she asked, shutting the door and walking towards me.

I looked away. “No...”

“I didn’t think so. She would’ve come herself if that were the case. She’s a very responsible person.” She walked over to the electric water kettle against the wall and opened the lid. “I just came here to grab some documents, but I’ve changed my mind.” She shut the lid and gripped the handle. “Sit down. I’ll treat you to some tea.”

Is it not just Keikoin-san? Are all smart people like this? They just see right through what I’m thinking as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. I moved to the reception area and sat on the couch. It felt right for me to sit there and not at the table since I wasn’t a student council member.

Suzuri Kurenai took the kettle and left the room, then returned shortly, turning the kettle on. After a little bit, she put black tea leaves into a teapot and poured hot water inside. Yume had always preferred black tea. Did the other student council members prefer it too? I didn’t see any coffee powder.

“Here you go,” she said, bringing a tray with the pot and two cups over, placing it on the table and sitting in front of me. Then, she poured a ruby-colored liquid into both of our cups. “Now then.” She leisurely crossed her legs and then calmly looked at me. “What would you like to know?”

She almost looked like a sage. I half expected her to say something like “I bestow upon you, O brave one, wisdom to assist you on your journey.” I had a hard time with her. I wasn’t sure why, though. Was it because of the way she’d had her eyes on me for some reason during the cultural festival?

I wasn’t so sure. She acted like a sage who knew everything and could answer everything—her thinking always came to a stop after reaching a conclusion. For someone like me who was always thinking about things and never stopped, it felt embarrassing to face her.

I had no business with the sage side of her. I only had business with the student council president—no, the upperclassman of Yume Irido.

“I only know what Yume’s like in the classroom and at home.” As Kawanami had said, I was sincere and serious. “Before, that was enough for me. Lately, there’s a new side to her—the one where she works at the student council.” Since I’m so sincere and serious, I’m not going to beat around the bush. I’m going to be direct. “I want to know what she’s like when she’s here.”

“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.” I needed to know more about Yume. I needed to know what had changed and what stayed the same over these past eight months. If I didn’t, then I wouldn’t be able to make any kind of decision. Knowledge was important when forming a strategy. Remaining ignorant made any plan impossible.

Suzuri Kurenai smiled as if to test me and then tilted her head a little. “I believe there’s a little something called privacy.”

“Even so, I need to know.”

If I hoped to become the other wing of the Hiyoku no Tori, I needed to know. Suzuri Kurenai quietly brought her cup to her mouth and sipped the tea. Then she returned the cup to the saucer and smiled cryptically as if she was trying to suppress something.

“Heh heh.”

“Something funny?” I asked.

“Oh, no. Please excuse me. I was just thinking how we’re both up to no good.” Huh? But it looks like Yume’s doing her job right on the student council. “I might never have known before I joined the student council that I’m more normal of a girl than I thought.”

“You are?”

“That’s right. I study, work a part-time job, do my job on the student council, and in our free time during student council, we talk about the boys we like. How more of a typical high school girl can you get?”

Talking about boys? Wait, boys?

“You have someone you like?”

“Don’t look at me with such distrusting eyes. Even someone like me can fall in love.”

I fell silent. I could already imagine that she was most likely interested in Haba-senpai, but my imagination wasn’t powerful enough to conjure up an image of her blushing like Yume. Even when we’d seen the two of them in that empty classroom during the cultural festival, Suzuri Kurenai had looked completely composed while seducing him.

“We have one guy who doesn’t really talk at all, so a lot of our conversations among the remaining girls on the student council naturally end up gravitating towards love. Aisa’s already got it in her head that she can use that time to brag about her boyfriend. I shudder to think what would happen if Ran-kun wasn’t so straitlaced.”

“Does...Yume talk about the guy she likes too?”

“I know the identity of her romantic interest, but Aisa doesn’t. Ran-kun still thinks you’re dating Higashira-san. But...it might be best if you don’t know too much. If you hear the contents of our girls’ talk, you might want to start dating one of us.”

Being told that only made me want to hear what she had to say more. But I held back, despite my hands itching to open Pandora’s box.

Suzuri Kurenai giggled. “The normal Yume-kun is very serious and calm. She’s the spitting image of an honor student. However, she becomes a different person when the conversation switches to love affairs. She becomes extremely animated when receiving advice from Aisa and becomes quiet when there’s something that catches her attention. She’s a very adorable girl. The fact that she has a guy she likes makes me so envious, I feel my brain is going to overheat.” Why are you acting like you don’t know who she’s in love with? You already said you do. “She acted a little differently during the Kobe trip as well. It was rare for me to see her mad like that after Aisa was turned down. It didn’t stem from pity, but from her thinking that it wasn’t right or sincere. Righteous rage, I think you’d call it. That might’ve been her preference. I’m not sure where she learned that from, though.” Sincerity. Serious and sincere. “She’s different from other girls in the sense that she doesn’t have the same unfounded empathy or sympathy for others. That’s what I like about her. After all, that means she’s putting herself in other people’s shoes and thinking about things from their perspective. She is truly kind—not just because of some obligation to society—but because her kindness comes from the bottom of her heart. Wouldn’t you agree?”

A kindness that comes from the bottom of her heart? Yeah, that’s true. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have thrown away the reputation she’d built for herself right after we started school. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have supported someone else’s crush on her ex. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have been so involved in her friend’s relationship with their childhood friend. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have been able to find a lonely guy who was trying to watch the fireworks by himself. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have worried about the rumors about her ex’s romance. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have worked until the late hours of night to try and make sure her class’s stall worked out. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have been so worried about the health of her rival. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have gotten mad at the person who turned down her upperclassman. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have accepted living with her ex.

Yeah, I agreed. I had evidence. I could confirm the reproducibility. So, I should know what to do from now and when. I didn’t know what the far future held. The near future felt murky. There was just one person who was an exception. If that was the case, then didn’t it behoove me to think and come up with an answer? I need to be a little harsh and see your determination.

“I think that’s about all I can say on my end,” Kurenai-senpai said, placing her empty cup down. “Aren’t you going to drink any?” she asked, looking at my cooled down cup of tea.

I picked it up and downed the still slightly warm tea all at once. “Thanks for the tea.”

“Have you gotten your answer?”

“No.” I stood up. “I’m gonna keep thinking about it.”

The Start of Everything until Now

Yume Irido

In what could only be called a folly of youth, I had a so-called boyfriend during eighth and ninth grade. We met at school, exchanged our feelings, became a couple, flirted, got into a fight over the smallest thing, and then I began to feel more annoyed than in love, which ultimately ended with us breaking up upon graduation. Then, we became a family.

That being said, we barely had any awareness of that fact because we’d only just graduated from middle school not even a week prior. Back then, I still hadn’t gotten used to putting in contacts every morning and walking outside with my hair down. I had still been in the process of trying to change myself. That’s why moving from the apartment I’d always lived in to the Irido household happened at the perfect time.

I let out a satisfied sigh as I looked at my perfectly organized bookshelf. My room was a lot bigger than the one I’d had in the apartment, so I could fit three whole bookcases in here. If the increased space were the only thing taken into consideration, then moving here was a great idea!

But...there was an asterisk to that. It was great living here aside from the fact that he was in the room right next to mine. I knew it had been my decision, but I’d yet to accept the situation. At that time, though, I’d found that I couldn’t help how I acted towards him. After all, I was in a contradictory environment where I lived with the very same person I’d broken up with. How else was I supposed to reconcile these two things if not by being cold towards him?

I’ll be honest: I had hated Mizuto. We hadn’t liked each other one bit, or at least that’s how it felt on the surface. Even trying to analyze my feelings from back then now left me drawing a blank. It was extremely difficult to precisely explain how I had felt.

It was true that seeing his face had made me angry, but out of the blue he’d have me swooning, leaving me feeling like we’d returned to how we used to be.

But if I hadn’t been able to make it clear how I felt about him internally, I wouldn’t have been able to stay sane. That’s why I’d chosen to hate him. After all, we’d broken up. The reason we broke up wasn’t because we hated each other; we hated each other for breaking up.

Still, something was still left between us: trust. That’s why I’d agreed to live with him and become his stepsister. At the time I truly believed I’d never get back together with Mizuto. That trust was what had allowed us to become a family. Looking back on that now... Seriously, what naive thinking.

The first day after moving was filled with new experiences. It wasn’t just the newfound space I had in my room. Living in a place with stairs, having meals with three other people, taking a bath and brushing my teeth right after—everything was fresh.

It felt like I was sleeping over at somebody’s house. I couldn’t begin to comprehend that this lifestyle wasn’t a temporary one. But the newest thing out of all of that was...

“Ah.”

“Ah...”

I ran into Mizuto on the first floor. We both froze. But this wasn’t just a normal encounter. We were both in our pajamas. Mizuto was wearing his ugly gray sweats. There wasn’t anything uglier in this world. He wasn’t really the type to be interested in fashion, but when I had been a love-addled middle schooler, he’d appeared to me as a much more handsome guy than he actually was. Now that I was seeing him for real, the mismatch between my idealization and reality was in clear view.

I never intentionally wore my pajamas in front of Mizuto. The only time he’d ever seen me in them had been when he visited me at my apartment when I was sick. My body had completely changed since then. Plus, I could barely remember what’d happened back then because of the high fever I’d had.

Despite being together so often, he’d never properly seen me in my pajamas. We stared at each other before I broke the silence, returning to my senses first.

“What’re you looking at?” I hugged myself as if to cover my chest and took a step back.

Finally, Mizuto looked away. “Nothing. Self-conscious, much?”

“You really think you can fool me after all this time? You closet perv.”

“I don’t remember ever acting perverted towards you.”

Well, that’s because when we were still on good terms, I was still a shrimp with no curves. “My condolences to you for not getting the chance to touch my adult body.”

“Since when did you start acting like you have self-esteem, you gloomy loner?”

“We’re living together starting today. Don’t sneak into my room, okay?”

“You kidding? I wouldn’t dream of it.”

We argued like this back and forth, exchanging insult after insult. The rhythm we did it at was new. The space between us was new. Oh. So this is the appropriate way to act towards your ex. This is how we should act with one another from now on.

“Later.”

“Later.”

Then we passed by each other, ending our argument, turning our backs to each other as if we were never going to see each other again. But even so, neither of us could get away without one last phrase.

“Good night...”

“Good night.”

And that’s how it all began. We began to learn who the other truly was—something we wouldn’t have had we stayed together. We didn’t know each other as boyfriend or girlfriend now, but as new people entirely.

My Answer to Everything from Now On

Mizuto Irido

In what could only be called a folly of youth, I had a so-called girlfriend during eighth and ninth grade. We met at school, exchanged our feelings, became a couple, flirted, got into a fight over the smallest thing, and then I began to feel more annoyed than in love, ultimately ending with us breaking up upon graduation. Then, we became a family.

I remember not being able to sleep well on the night that Yume and Yuni-san moved into our house. There was the nightmare of the unreal situation of living in the same house as Yume, but also the anxiety surrounding how we were going to hide our past relationship. Those thoughts kept spinning around my head, and I couldn’t even sleep to get away from them.

The biggest thing that I couldn’t get out of my head was Yume’s appearance. She’d changed way too much. All she’d done was stop wearing glasses and let her hair down, so it’s not like it was a dramatic change, but she looked like a completely different person than the girl I’d dated, Yume Ayai.

Even when we were dating but hadn’t seen each other in a while, I’d thought that she’d grown, and that her boobs had gotten bigger. But seeing her entire appearance change this drastically really threw me for a loop. There was another big mismatch from the girl I remembered too; the way she talked so coldly to me made it hard to imagine that we’d even dated.

She was so different to the point that I’m surprised I even realized it was her when our parents introduced us to each other. But maybe that was a testament to how closely I’d been looking at her face. No, that’s not right. What I’d been looking at wasn’t her face, specifically, but her countenance. And I hadn’t been looking at it but examining it.

Romance was all about feeling out the other person, figuring out what they were thinking about and their hopes and dreams. Being in a relationship involved a constant need to anticipate, imagine, and interpret all of that.

Somehow or other, I’d spent eight or so months accomplishing just that, so there was nobody better than I at examining Yume Ayai’s face. But that was strictly just Yume Ayai.

“Agh!”

The next morning, after a practically sleepless night, I woke up early despite it being spring break, and ran into Yume, who was in the middle of brushing her teeth. For some reason, she took a step back from me, looking surprised as she looked at my face.

“Morning.”

“M-Mowrming...” she said, her toothbrush still in her mouth.

Fortunately, there was space at the sink for me. I was thinking that if all went well, I could go back to sleep, so I decided not to wash my face. Instead, I grabbed my toothbrush and the toothpaste, and began brushing my teeth.

As I did, I found something strange as I looked in the mirror. Yume kept glaring at me, her toothbrush idly hanging in her mouth. What’re you doing? If you’re done brushing your teeth, you should rinse out your mouth. After I finished, I filled a cup with water and used it to rinse. The entire time I did that, she just stood there, staring at me.

“Mm!” she grunted, jerking her chin towards the changing room’s door.

It seemed that she wanted me to leave. “What did I do to deserve this?” Seriously, why can’t you use your hands?

“Mm!”

“Rinse out your mouth if you have something you wanna say. C’mon, what’s your problem?”

“Mmmm!!!” she groaned, seemingly unhappy about something.

Then she desperately stomped over to the sink, spit out the toothpaste, and quickly gargled. After that, she wiped her face with a towel.

“I don’t want you to see me gargling!” she spat. “Problem?!”

“I don’t get it.”

“Spitting out water is undignified! Why don’t you get that, you idiot?!” she exclaimed before storming out.

How would I get that? I wouldn’t know without you spelling it out for me. No matter how much of a professional I thought I was at reading her facial expressions...

“How am I supposed to know that if you don’t tell me?”

Thinking about it, from start to finish, the two of us were always communicating without actually talking that much. We would always try to read each other’s minds, guessing what the other person was thinking about as if it were a competition. Whenever that caused problems, we’d solve it by changing our perception of it from a problem to something else entirely.

But that wouldn’t continue forever. The longest it could continue was eight months. If we started in August, we’d start falling apart in April. If we started around the end of March, we’d reach our limit around December.

The hypotheticals of what if I’d gone to the summer festival with her, gotten her a Christmas present, and gotten Valentine’s chocolate from her didn’t matter. There was something that the two of us needed to do before we could have any expectations for any of that. This wasn’t a story with just blank pages. If there weren’t any words written, it was just a collection of plain paper. The first thing we needed to do was talk. If there was an answer, talking was the only way to discover it.

Birds Can’t Fly with Just One Wing

When I got back from school, it didn’t seem like anyone was home. Dad and Yuni-san were probably still at work, doing their best to get through the last business day of the year. I wasn’t sure where Yume was. I didn’t know her well enough to be able to predict her actions.

But that was probably for the best. I only needed to know the essential stuff, anyway. I walked into my room for the first time in a day. It didn’t seem like anything had changed too much. I mean, of course it hadn’t. It’d only been a day. It was still overrun with books, just as messy as I was used to.

Suddenly, I recalled the latest memory I had here—Yume fixing her clothes before running out of my room while apologizing. I didn’t remember her taking anything with her, though. I looked around my bed and then lifted my comforter. I didn’t see anything, so I looked on the floor, but nothing was there either. That only leaves... I got on all fours and looked under the bed. There it is.

I reached under my bed and pulled the object out. It was a box as big as my palm with a ribbon drawn on it. I sat on my bed and opened the lid. Inside was a ring with a wing design, still as silver as I remembered it.

I stared at it in silence, not taking it out of the box. This ring didn’t suit me. But the mere action of gifting a ring must’ve required a lot of courage. Everyone who’s been in a relationship has had that idea at one point or another, before deciding it’s too early or too emotionally heavy of a gift. A ring as a gift is way too grown-up for kids.

Honestly, even if it was grown-up, it might’ve been exactly what Yume and I needed right now. I wasn’t sure if that’s what Yume had in mind, but even so, the decision that we needed to make carried a weight to it that most students wouldn’t ever have to deal with at our age.

It had nothing to do with the labels of being a kid or an adult, or a student or worker. It had to do with us as people. The decision before us was about us as human beings.

Was this really love? Pining for someone and not knowing what to do with how much you cared for them definitely felt like love. That being said, our decision wasn’t just about whether we were in love—it was something much bigger. Not only would it affect the present, but it would affect our future as well. Breaking up didn’t give us an escape route anymore. Our decision was heavier than that of a married couple who could divorce and go their separate ways.

If this were a romance novel, getting together was the happy ending, but in reality, we had to think beyond that. We had to think about the future. Could we really decide the rest of our lives when we were only sixteen?

I scoffed. What a stupid question. Of course we can’t. Thinking that we could was just proof that we weren’t thinking things through. I couldn’t do it. Not alone.

I took out my phone, searched for “Ring Wing,” and then began looking at the different pictures and giftboxes of rings. After that, I went to my desk and pulled something out. It was a business card. The name written on it was Ryosei Keikoin.

I called the number on it, and after four rings, I heard a click followed by the sound of a man’s calm voice.

“Hello? This is Keikoin.”

“It’s Mizuto Irido.” I decided to be as brief as possible. “Could you introduce me to a job? Ideally one that could give me a paycheck in three days.”

Seriousness with Seriousness

Yume Irido

After returning from Higashira-san’s house, I saw that Mizuto’s shoes were at the entrance. As soon as I saw them, I felt a little nervous, but also relieved. We were going to continue to return to the same house. Deep down, I knew I was being clingy, but the fact that we couldn’t get rid of each other even if we tried felt like salvation to me.

Oh. So that’s why... Suddenly, it popped into my head. Things were different this time. We didn’t have to make plans to meet each other. I could see him whenever I wanted. In that case, I made a conscious choice to go to my own room instead of visiting his room, even though I could tell he was in there.

I wanted to think a little. I wanted to catch up to him since he’d given this so much thought. I wanted to be by myself for a bit. I was sure that as soon as I neglected trying to think as much as he did, our relationship would be over.

And then, five days had passed. Mizuto would hurry out of the house in the morning, and I would hang out with either the student council or my friends. Even so, I didn’t stop thinking about my relationship with Mizuto, Higashira-san’s talent, our parents’ lives, and my own future.

I couldn’t even imagine taking entrance exams two years in the future, so what could I really guess about the future beyond that? Even so, I continued thinking. Madoka-san had said that it was best to steadily take care of things, like summer homework. She’d said it was important to put family, friends, and everything else aside for a little bit to straighten out my feelings.

I’d figured out my feelings, so now it was time to think about my family, friends, and everything else. But still... Even so, it was now the last day of the year, and with it, the end of the olden days of this year.