Yahari Ore no Seishun Love Come wa Machigatte Iru - Volume 7 - Chapter 1

1

Hachiman Hikigaya’s life at school is, in fact, extremely peaceful.

It was that season again—the one that makes me think girls are actually more attractive in additional clothes rather than fewer. The cultural festival was over, the athletic festival had come and gone without any major hiccups, and the year would conclude in less than two months. The weather had suddenly got colder, and the wind had turned from cool breezes to wintry chills.

The world around me was colder and bleaker, too.

My seat in the middle of the classroom was like the eye of a hurricane, a vacuum no one dared approach. Everyone seemed to like the edges and corners—perhaps this is a custom of the Japanese. On the train or the bus, people always choose the sides and corners first. If you turned them into cute girls, I’m sure Wall-chan and Corner-chan would be super-popular.

And so there was no one around my spot in the center. It had always been like this.

What was different now was how they looked at me.

They weren’t oblivious to me. They were deliberately going out of their way to tell me they were ignoring me. Their eyes would flick toward me for just an instant, as if they were smothering snickers.

When I’d look to see where the sound was coming from, our eyes would lock. Meeting such looks is the way of the Hikigaya.

So it would be normal for them to look away again, and indeed, that’s what they used to do.

But when they had the upper hand, that didn’t always happen. In fact, after we’d stared at each other for two full seconds, they would giggle about it with their friends and begin their witty repartee interwoven with tasteful jokes such as Like, he’s looking at us (lol) and What’s with that guy? (lol) and Ew (lol).

I felt a bit like a panda— No, that’s an exaggeration. More like an axolotl or a sea monkey or something. Oh man, what the heck? Am I the lovable type? “Gross-cute,” I think they call it.

I had to encourage myself, or it’d break me a little.

There was already a slight chip on one of my edges, and I’d even cried a little in bed at night. I pride myself in my Diamond-level hardness (according to the Superhuman Hardness scale), but diamond is just strong against scratches, and they actually break right apart if you give one a good whack with a hammer. You said diamond is unbreakable, didn’t you? You lied.

But fortunately, it was no longer the whole grade year that was anti-Hikigaya—partly because people weren’t paying much attention to me in the first place, so their attention went elsewhere quickly. They say rumors last seventy-five days, and basically, that’s how it works. They’re like the new waifus you get every season. Since they never treated me like a person in the first place, that period was condensed, and now they were so disinterested in me that I wouldn’t even get a bit on Where Are They Now?

The world isn’t concerned with me. There are plenty of other amusements out there.

That day, the classroom was filled with the same old lighthearted conversations.

The back of the class was abuzz with noisy conversation. It was just like gorillas drumming: an attempt to emphasize their existence. By the way, “drumming” in Japanese is translated taiko-ing.

Within this melting pot of conversation, the chatter of these kids making their mark on the world often reached my ears. Glancing over, I saw the Tobe-Ooka-Yamato trio sitting on desks. There are chairs. Why don’t you sit on those?

“Man, what’re we gonna do on the field trip?” Tobe brought up the topic, and Ooka raised his hand up high to reply.

“It’s Kyoto, right? So we gotta go to USJ. USJ! USJ!”

“Ain’t that in Osaka?” Yamato quipped, strangely calm and quiet.

“Whoo! A punchline from the home o’ comedy, y’all!” Tobe, meanwhile, was hysterical.

…Eugh.

Frankly, I couldn’t stand listening to their bad accents. If someone from Kansai were here, these guys would probably get hit with an ashtray. One of the defining traits of a Kansai local is their fury at crappy imitations of their accent. I reckon Conan said somethin’ ’bout that.

There’s nothing more dubious than a Kanto person’s attempt at a Kansai accent. Should my crimes on that front be forgiven? Probably not.

With no way of knowing what was going on in my head, the three boys continued their exuberant conversation. The way they’d glance over at the girls to see if anyone noticed how much fun they were having was shallow but adorable.

“But, like, going all the way to Osaka’d be a pain in the ass,” Tobe said while tugging at the hair at the back of his neck.

“Darn tootin’.” The smugness radiated off Ooka.

But then in came calm, cool, and slow-on-the-uptake Yamato. He ignored the opportunity for a quip, contemplating silently before taking careful aim and saying, “…Why don’t you just go by yourself, Tobe?”

“Whoa! You wanna leave me out? That’s Whassis-tani, though.”

They all burst into laughter.

Nearby, Oda and Tahara had been showing each other their phones, but I could see their shoulders shaking with little snerks of suppressed laughter if I looked.

Yeah, yeah, laugh it up. So funny. What a riot; better call the cops.

Well, this was how they’d been treating me these days. They made me the butt of all their jokes as they all found their own ways to probe the boundary line of how much they could say and how far they could go.

By the way, there’s no such thing as bullying at my school, and all these things are just jokes. Just playing around. Not bullying at aaaaaall. They were just teeeeasing. The usual. No matter how cruel their words or behavior, they can blow it all off by claiming it was just a joke. It’s superconvenient. Say that to anyone, and you’re Cell telling Vegeta to laugh. They have no choice.

But why do they do it? Well, it’s just the conventional method of making something accepted.

When something difficult to accept is allowed into a group, a compromise is made. The only way it can be done is to make it funny. It’s a necessary step to introduce something foreign into a group.

For a certain period of time, there had also been some passionate lobbying for Sagami in Class 2-F, and you might have been witness to all the disgust directed my way and a lovely sense of friendship and consideration for Sagami. But time flies when you’re in high school. By the time the athletic festival was over, the “poor Sagamin” fad had ended, and now we were in the midst of a “let’s make jokes about Hikitani” fad. I’m the star of the times.

They had already forgotten about Sagami and how everything started with her, and only the dregs remained—the part about treating Hachiman Hikigaya like crap—and it was now a custom. This concept of a ritual reduced to a formality is easy to understand if you imagine some religious ceremony, a historied set of behaviors that once had reasons behind it, losing its original meaning. Take the Bon Odori, or Christmas. People enjoy it and accept it without really knowing where it came from.

These things eventually become part of the group identity, a unified culture, and are performed to reaffirm group solidarity.

They’ll probably get tired of this soon enough, though.

But now that the whole class was getting excited for the field trip, it was at its peak. These rituals become necessary especially at the times when everyone has to exercise their strength as a unit: when they’re putting together cliques and talking about where they’ll go and what they’ll do.

As Tobe and his friends went on about Whassis-tani, Whassis-tani, gradually, the topic of conversation shifted. And hey, my name isn’t even Hikitani in the first place.

Stroking his crew cut, Ooka said, “Anyway, this field trip, though. Sick.”

“Sick,” Yamato agreed. He didn’t ask what was sick. What’s sick is sick. What’s so sick? It’s real sick. If you point out the circular logic, you lose. Sick.

“So anyway, hey, Tobe, like, what’re you gonna do about the thing?” Ooka brought up this subject nervously, as if he wanted so badly to ask he just couldn’t help himself.

Tobe got kinda shy and bashful. “Wait, you’re asking me? I guess you are. Well, y’know, isn’t it obvious?” He cleared his throat lightly and paused for emphasis. “…I mean, I’m gonna do it.”

The other guys ohh’d in admiration of his pointlessly determined expression. Do what, I wonder. Drugs? It sure seems like he’s done enough to damage the speech center of his brain already, though.

Tobe and the guys did a one-eighty, suddenly quiet. It seemed this was something they really didn’t want others to be hearing about.

Since everyone in the classroom, including the trio themselves, was now absorbed in their own conversations, attention had moved away from me. If they glanced over to check on me, they would find me staring blankly at the ceiling.

It’s nice sitting on the edge of your chair, slouching into it with all your weight on the back. Sighing, I slowly closed my eyes. The classroom was abuzz with excited chattering about the approaching field trip. This meant I was freed from uncomfortable looks and sneers.

Suddenly, a shadow fell over me. What? I thought, and I opened my eyes to see a familiar chest—er, face. “Yahallo.” Yuigahama was peering down on me from above.

“Uhhh…” I felt like I was about to fall out of my chair, but I endeavored to reply calmly.

“You’re coming to club today, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay. Then see you in the clubroom,” she said quietly. This consideration was a big deal. She had apparently chosen a moment when everyone wasn’t looking. With an air of secrecy, she gave a little wave in front of her chest, then returned to Miura, who gave me a questioning look but immediately dropped her gaze to her phone again.

As expected of the Queen of Fire. She walked her own path, and it seemed she wasn’t much interested in the lives of the common people. She was neither an enemy nor a friend, but she also wasn’t a neutral party. Her noninvolvement was something to be thankful for.

That look just now had probably not been really about me, but rather her showing concern for Yuigahama. Talking to me under the current circumstances was a fairly risky thing to do, but Yuigahama had a knack for reading the room and keeping everyone uncomfortable. I’m sure a desire for self-preservation was a major factor in her behavior, but the heaviest implication was that she was trying to avoid making me a target.

When everyone hates you but you nevertheless must associate yourself with a group, the first thing you must do is remove the targets of attack to the best of your ability. The three keys are not making mistakes, not showing fault, and avoiding errors. Wait…those are all functionally the same thing.

But even saying that, pride in your own perfection can also be an opening to attack. So first of all, the trick is to do nothing. If you don’t do anything, you’ll never fail.

Also, don’t get involved with anyone.

Involvement with other people inevitably brings about friction—and not just between the two relevant parties. You also have to account for anyone watching. You have to be especially careful about making contact with those who tend to attract attention.

I should be somewhat careful myself. I don’t want to drag anyone else into this.

Yuigahama was always considerate enough to be aware of her position in the upper caste when she spoke to me, and that’s why she chose an inconspicuous moment to come talk to me, but I doubted I should rely too heavily on her for that.

Until now, just avoiding attention had been enough, but from here on out, it might be better to make myself physically scarce, like by leaving the classroom and doing something with my phone. I could pretend like I’d gotten a phone call… No, they’d catch on immediately. They would know right away that nobody would ever call me.

In the end, I was left with nothing to do, and so I lay back down on my desk.

Around the time when the break was almost over, the traffic through the classroom door reached a fever pitch. Everyone who had gone to hang out in other classrooms or to the washroom or to buy drinks was filtering back in.

I opened my eyelids a crack and saw a long ponytail out of the corner of my eye.

Her blue-tinged black hair was tied up in a scrunchie, and when she closed her phone, her beaming smile suddenly turned bored.

That girl with the brother complex. She’s been texting him again? I’ve got to be careful when I text Komachi, too, or they’ll call me a siscon. In fact, they’ll even call me a sispuri. Or not.

Saki Kawa-something—I’ll call her Sakikawa for short—was looking all around the room warily. It seemed she was worried someone might have seen her grinning just now.

Her gaze hit mine.

“Yeep!” She jumped a little with a strange, quiet yelp. Her face reddened visibly, and then she looked down and swiftly headed to her own seat. She’d been like that ever since the cultural festival. She avoided getting anywhere near me, and whenever she met my eyes, she was extremely obvious about turning away.

Yes, yes, that’s best. There’s an appropriate distance to be kept if we’re both to live our lives in comfort.

Some might make the impertinent claim that only we humans kill our own species, but that’s not quite true. Wild animals will make serious attempts to kill one another if their territories collide. There are all kinds of territorial overlaps at school, so of course there’s gonna be conflict.

Most of all, in high school, we each have our own social groups, our own castes, and we’re all of different types.

Each person really is unique.

Case in point, the one trotting up to me right that minute.

“Hachiman.” A voice of heavenly music, the gait of one who walks atop the clouds themselves, and the form of a divine messenger.

Totsuka’s seriously an angel.

Totsuka was so angelic, he wasn’t bothered by the air coming from us foul humans, and so he came to talk to me. “They said we’re going to decide on groups for the field trip in the next long homeroom.” Totsuka passed along the news he’d heard somewhere.

The field trip was looming; it would be a three-night stay the following week. On the first day, we’d all be in class groups; on the second day, we’d split into smaller groups with other classmates; and on the third day, we were all free to do what we wanted. Only the first day had a fixed schedule; from the second day onward, we could all go where we wanted, which meant the hot topic for discussion in the classroom now was the second and third days.

In other words, the groups that would be decided in the next long homeroom were like the prelims that would decide about two-thirds of the field trip.

Not that it had much to do with me, since I’d be paired up with whoever was left over and follow along behind them.

“…Oh, well, everyone’s basically decided already, right?”

“I dunno… I haven’t decided yet,” Totsuka muttered quietly, looking down. Maybe he was embarrassed he still didn’t have a place to go when most everyone else had decided on their groups.

“…”

There was an uncomfortable pause, and noticing the silence, Totsuka lifted his head to cover the awkwardness with a warm expression.

I want to protect this smile.

I’m generally not disposed to invite other people to things, but this was the long-awaited school field trip. Maybe I could give it a shot this time. But, like, giving it a shot with a guy… How did I get here?

“…Well, we could be a group.”

“Yeah!” He seized onto the favorable reply and broke into a grin, and the sight left me content. If I’d been a wandering ghost, that would have sent me peacefully on to the next life. If the JSDF had canvassed me then, I would probably have joined. “So then we need two others, right? What should we do?”

“A group of four, huh…? Well, I guess we need to find another couple of people without a full group yet and dock with them.” Of the ones left over, whoever left the most vivid impression would carry out the operation with us.

“Yeah! And then we have to think about where we’re going.”

“Sure, we can just go wherever.”

It looked like class was about to start. Totsuka seemed ready to dive straight into thinking up ideas, but I gently sent him back to his seat. I didn’t forget to give him a light, casual touch on the shoulder as he went, either.

Totsuka nodded, waved at me, and returned to his seat.

The eyes around us turned to Totsuka for an instant, but I couldn’t sense any distaste for him.

Maybe it was his androgynous appearance. I figure his position is a little different from most.

But I didn’t want to give him undue attention just in case, for the future.

I’d never been the one to go talk to him, and I probably never would. I wouldn’t go out of my way to approach him, either. Things would be fine as long as I maintained an appropriate and reasonable distance. And the responsibility for taking care on that front lay on my shoulders.

I would spend my time as I always had.

Today, like every day, I committed myself to pretending to sleep. At times like these, it’s particularly important to stay in control and maintain your normal pattern of behavior. With my left arm as a pillow, I put my face down on the desk, and in the right side of my field of vision, I spotted a rare duo.

It was right before class.

Hayama and Ebina were coming back. I’d seen them together as part of the same social clique, but I’d basically never seen them talking alone together before.

Oh, now that I think of it, I didn’t see them in the classroom earlier.

The two of them exchanged a few whispered words—secrets, perhaps—and then quickly separated.

“Hey, hey, hey!” Ebina called, an offhand and lighthearted greeting, as she headed toward Miura and Yuigahama. She was cheerful, as always, and they received her with the same reaction they always did.

But unlike theirs, Hayama’s expression was solemn.

Unusually for him, his smile seemed somehow grim. It almost seemed sad to me, like he was laughing at his own expense. It was noticeable enough that even I could pick up on it, and I wasn’t close to him. So of course, the others could tell, too.

Of the three guys, the first to talk to him was Tobe. “Hey, Hayato. Did you go somewhere? Pulling a Whassis-tani and going off by yourself?”

“It wasn’t anything important. Let me go to the bathroom alone, at least. And you really like that joke, don’t you? You’re overusing it.” Still smiling, Hayama poked Tobe in the head.

“Geh!” The sound from Tobe fell somewhere between an exhalation and a word.

Yamato and Ooka followed in Hayama’s footsteps. “Oof, you got told.”

“You mean he got Tobe’d?”

“I’m the joke now?! Come on, man, gimme a break!”

The laughter grew and spread.

As it did, jokes about Tobe-ing and getting Tobe’d ripped out across the whole room, and now Tobe was the trend.

The clique of Hayama the thought leader was a force to be reckoned with. Hikitani jokes were now a relic of the past.

Thanks to that, my days were peaceful once again.

Glorious lonerdom, just as before.

In fact, I even got the feeling that everyone was acting even more distant than they had before. My existence had been buried in the darkness.

Now, I was kind of like a ninja. Domo, greetings, it is I, the ninja Hikigaya.

I’m looking forward to going to Kinkaku-ji Temple in Kyoto…