Chapter 10 - If Anything, You're Cute
Today, they visited the pool, and Amane was getting changed in the locker room, feeling vaguely nervous.
He and Mahiru were at a water park on the outskirts of the city, and they had split up to get changed, but…Mahiru had been the subject of many stares from other guys before they even entered the facility, and it wasn’t hard to imagine that they would all be mesmerized by her in her swimsuit.
In a situation like this, Chitose could have been a good distraction if she were there, but today, it was just the two of them. Mahiru had made puppy-dog eyes and said she wanted to go alone together, and there was no way he could turn her down.
Resolving that he would have to protect her somehow from the groping hands of other guys, Amane changed into his swimsuit, pulled on his rash guard, and left the locker room.
He arrived at the agreed-upon meeting place and waited for Mahiru to show up, but she was taking a long time.
He wasn’t going to complain; it was something he had, in fact, anticipated. He figured it probably took girls longer to prepare than guys, and that their locker room might be more crowded.
Appreciating again how tough it must be to be a girl, Amane leaned back against the sturdy lamppost they had chosen as their meeting spot.
Even though it was summer vacation, it was a weekday, so while there were relatively fewer people than there might have been, the place was still pretty packed.
As Amane was standing there absently watching people of all ages, men and women, pass by in their swimsuits, he caught sight of familiar flaxen hair in the gaps between the crowd.
“Amane.”
As expected, his own darling girlfriend was headed his way.
But as soon as he saw her, he wondered whether it might have been a mistake to bring her to the pool. The eyes of many other patrons were following her as she approached him.
Normally, he wasn’t so conscious of it, but Mahiru was truly extraordinarily beautiful. She was equal to any model in a magazine—in fact, he thought Mahiru was even prettier.
So as expected, she was going to attract a lot of attention in her bathing suit.
“Sorry to keep you waiting; the locker room was crowded.”
“Uh-huh.”
They were right by the water, so Mahiru hurried over, without running, and stood before Amane, who was smiling faintly.
Now that she was standing right in front of him in her swimsuit, Amane really wasn’t sure where to look.
Mahiru seemed like the type whose skin would turn red and painful if she got too much sun, and she was much more careful about sun exposure than most people, so she was strikingly pale. There wasn’t a single blemish on her milk-white skin, which had never known a sunburn. Standing there under the summer sun in her swimsuit, she was dazzling—in a single word, magnificent.
Amane had always known that Mahiru was slender, but she really was fit. Though she was slim, she didn’t look too skinny, and her figure retained an unmistakably feminine softness. She wasn’t just thin, she had curves in all the right places, like the soft, full line of her bust beneath her frilly white bikini top.
Amane had always assumed Mahiru chose clothing that minimized her bust, but he’d never realized the extent of it. Yet they weren’t so big that they looked unnatural or mismatched with her small stature. They were the ideal size, well-balanced and just right to fit in his hands.
He was shocked that modest Mahiru had picked a bikini, but there was nothing lewd about her choice. The large frills at the top hid her cleavage, and on Mahiru, the outfit looked elegant and clean.
Seeing Mahiru in her bathing suit made his head spin. Amane had never looked at anything racier than the pinups in the backs of magazines. Seeing his girlfriend in one was dazzling.
“…How is it?”
Mahiru had come close enough to touch, and she asked for his opinion with her hand on her chest, as if she was feeling a little embarrassed.
Because Amane was a little taller, he found himself staring down at the shadow of her bust beneath the frills, gulping.
“Amane?”
When he didn’t answer, Mahiru inquisitively touched his arm, and finally he unfroze.
“…D-does it suit me?” she asked.
There was no question about that. In fact, it suited her too well, and he didn’t know how to look at her.
“Absolutely. It looks great on you. I wish we were alone; it’s very cute.”
“Th-thank you.”
Amane shared his thoughts, knowing that he was supposed to compliment girls on their clothes and that he wouldn’t be much of a man if he couldn’t offer one or two when his adorable girlfriend had done her very best to pick out a swimsuit. Mahiru exhaled in relief.
But it was easy to tell from the way she was blushing that Mahiru must have also felt embarrassed from being exposed more than usual.
Amane thought that if she was so self-conscious, she ought to have picked a suit with a little more coverage, like maybe a one-piece. But he figured that her choice had been influenced by Chitose, who was probably mostly to blame.
Even so…
Glancing around, there were a surprising number of men staring at Mahiru in her swimsuit.
Even men who were with other women were looking at her, completely engrossed, and some of them were even getting slapped by women whom he assumed were their girlfriends.
That was proof that just by standing there, Mahiru had become the angel of the waterside. But as her boyfriend, Amane wasn’t having much fun. It was uncomfortable seeing people ogle his girlfriend in her swimsuit.
“Of course, it looks great on you, but—”
“But?”
“…It’s no good.”
Amane took off his hooded rash guard and draped it over Mahiru’s shoulders.
Since she was so petite, the hem hung down to her thighs, so he figured it was sufficient protection from wandering eyes.
Of course, the beauty of her slender legs would probably still draw attention, but he couldn’t cover everything, so there was nothing to be done.
“Put that on.”
“But…what about you?”
“…What if I told you that I don’t really want other guys to look at you?”
That was how he really felt. He completely understood why Mahiru attracted so many eyes, since he also appreciated her ample feminine figure, but the truth was that he didn’t like it.
When he whispered his feelings into her ear, Mahiru’s cheeks turned so red it looked like she was sunburned, and she answered quietly, “O-okay…”
He quickly zipped up the front of the rash guard and heard disappointed sighs from all around them. Relieved that he had protected his girlfriend from the wicked, wandering eyes of other men, Amane rolled up one of the loose sleeves until he could grasp Mahiru’s hand.
“Come on, let’s go.”
“Okay.”
Mahiru nodded weakly and squeezed his hand back, and Amane started walking slowly.
Since they were by the water, he had intended to take her hand when they were strolling in any case, to keep her from slipping, but now it also served as a major deterrent to other guys.
Walking by Mahiru’s side as imposingly as he could, Amane was headed for the shallow pool, when Mahiru looked up at him and whispered, “…Amane?”
“Hmm?”
“…If we were alone, would you have looked at me in my swimsuit for a long time?”
“If we were alone, I would have gotten my fill of looking, and I probably would have found the courage to touch you, too.” Deliberately exaggerating to make fun of himself, Amane added, “Though, of course, all that staring and touching would be risky, so I’d have to try hard to restrain myself.”
Mahiru looked worried for some reason.
After seeming to worry about it for a full ten seconds, Mahiru, still holding his hand, closed the distance between them even more. To be more precise, she glued herself to his arm. The soft feeling that reached him through the rash guard made it Amane’s turn to blush.
“Mahiru, you bumped into me.”
“…In this case, I think it’s more accurate to say that I’m touching you.”
“The angel part of you isn’t doing her job.”
“When girls are with someone they like, they can become angels or devils.”
Apparently, Mahiru was a devil today.
Despite that, she was shaking terribly with embarrassment and her face was bright red. But she didn’t seem inclined to let go of him and purposely pressed her chest into Amane’s arm, right above his elbow, so that he could scarcely bend the limb without burying it right between her breasts.
“…I don’t really mind you staying close, but you should know that I’m enjoying it.”
“Th-that’s a wild thing for you to say, but…I don’t mind.”
“…You dummy.”
Amane hadn’t expected her to approve. He groaned in spite of himself and, contrary to his word, tried desperately to distract himself from the soft sensation pressing against his arm by mentally reciting the digits of pi that he had been forced to memorize years earlier.
Hand in hand with Mahiru, who still drew plenty of looks, Amane arrived at a comparatively shallow pool and, swinging the small waterproof bag that he had in hand, looked at Mahiru by his side.
“So what’s the plan?”
“The plan?”
“I mean, the pools in this water park aren’t really meant for swimming lessons. Besides, you wouldn’t know what to do if I suddenly suggested you start swimming, would you?”
“That’s true, but…”
Amane was a fairly good swimmer, so he was fully capable of teaching her, but they weren’t at a pool with separate lanes that they could use for swimming class, so they were sure to run into other people.
The pools in the park were mostly meant for people to play in the water rather than do any serious swimming. Those who really wanted to would surely take lessons.
“If you want to learn, that’s fine, but as far as I’m concerned… Well, since we came all the way here, I just want to have a good time with you.”
“Th-that’s—um, me too. I’m happy just being here with you, Amane.” Mahiru turned her eyes up at him and pressed herself close again. He was beginning to appreciate how charming she could be while acting devilish.
To recover his composure, Amane patted his adorable girlfriend on the head.
“All right, let’s hang out and relax together. Besides, if we were going to properly swim, you would have to take off that rash guard.”
Mahiru’s slim yet voluptuous body was hidden by Amane’s rash guard, but the shirt would get in the way if they started swimming, and she would probably need to remove it.
If Mahiru did that, all the guys around them would probably look at her, and Amane wouldn’t be able to take his eyes off her, either.
As her boyfriend, he felt like he didn’t have to feel guilty about checking her out in a swimsuit, but he worried that staring at her beauty for too long would give him a heart attack. The area under her bikini top was especially dangerous to look at.
“…Do you plan to keep me hidden forever?”
“No… Well, it seems wrong to show you off…”
“…Don’t you want to look?”
“I mean, I do, but I have zero doubt that I’d die.”
“Why would you die…?”
Mahiru sounded exasperated. Amane figured there was no way that she could understand how he felt. As a man, he wanted to look at her, of course, but he didn’t know if he could take it. The stress would kill him, socially and spiritually.
“…Well, you almost died when you saw my naked chest, didn’t you?”
“Th-that’s um—”
“By the way, it seemed like you were going to have trouble looking at other guys’ chests, but you appear to be handling it okay today, huh?”
Given Mahiru’s naïveté, Amane had been certain she would feel awkward seeing other men in their bathing suits, but so far, though she had been blushing at Amane’s words and actions, she didn’t seem outwardly embarrassed by any of them.
When he made that observation, Mahiru drew her shoulders together bashfully.
“Um. I’m not interested in anyone but you, Amane… I’m not looking.”
“…Ah—”
“A-actually, my heart was pounding again today when I saw you in your swimsuit, you know? Compared to before, you’re really…lean—and more fit. S-sexy is what I mean.”
Mahiru glanced up briefly at Amane, then her eyes darted around nervously.
The first time Mahiru had seen Amane’s body must have been when she was nursing him through that cold a long time back. Certainly, compared to back then, everything about him had changed, from the way he led his life to his perception of himself. Back then, he had never even considered trying to change his string bean body.
…I guess the results have been pretty good?
He knew he couldn’t compare to anyone who seriously went to the gym for bodybuilding, but Amane liked to think that, for a high school student, he had done pretty well so far.
“I mean, Amane, you’re attracting attention, too, you know? You’re not too skinny, and you look really good—firm but flexible.”
“Thanks for saying so… It feels a little funny when you compliment me, but it’s kind of nice.”
“Wh-what do you mean?”
“Like, to think that you were looking so closely, when you always acted innocent before…”
“A-are you making fun of me? I mean, I want to get a good look at the person I love.”
As she said that, Mahiru looked directly at Amane’s chest, but her eyes immediately started darting around, which was more like her.
She seemed to notice his little smile. Her cheeks flushed again, and she opened her eyes wide.
“Y-you can’t talk anyway, Amane! Your heart’s pounding!”
Mahiru desperately slapped her hand down on Amane’s chest to feel his heartbeat, and there was no way he could really hide it, so he nodded obediently.
Amane thought that any guy whose heart didn’t pound the first time they saw their girlfriend in a bikini wasn’t a man at all, so this was an entirely normal reaction. In fact, he would have appreciated a little recognition for his self-control.
“…It would be crazy to think that my heart wouldn’t be pounding at the sight of the girl I love in her swimsuit, right?”
“Th-that’s true, but in that case, surely it’s all right for mine to be beating this fast, too?”
“Sure. I’m happy to know that.”
That alone was evidence that she thought of him as her boyfriend, which made Amane embarrassed and glad. But he also felt like he was going to melt and wished she would tone it down.
To Amane, who had calmly reassured her, Mahiru kept moving her mouth like she wanted to say something to him. But then she seemed to give up and pressed her lips tightly shut as she flattened herself against his arm. She seemed to realize that words weren’t going to do the trick and tried to win against Amane with brute force, so he pressed his lips together, too, but this time he let her do as she pleased without showing her the agitation she was hoping for.
“You didn’t catch me off guard, so it won’t work this time.”
“…He says, as his heart pounds even harder than before.”
“Shut up.”
Amane turned away, betrayed by his own heartbeat, and Mahiru let out a cheerful laugh and rested her cheek against his shoulder.
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