There was nothing inherently worse about being friends than lovers. Ushio was totally right about that. At the same time…hadn’t she wanted us to be more than friends? If not, then why had she made advances on me in the past, like stealing my first kiss or asking me to hold her? Had she simply changed her mind about that in the short time that we’d been going out? In that case: Why? Was our romantic chemistry not as good as she’d always envisioned in her head? Was there something I’d done to make her lose interest? I could accept the former, but what if it was the latter? What if there was another reason she was doing this that she simply wasn’t telling me?
I needed to clear that up before this was over, for the sake of closure.
“Can I just ask you one thing, though?”
I could almost hear Ushio gulp as her face went taut. “Sure,” she said, nodding.
“Is that…really all this is about? You don’t have any other reason for wanting to break up with me?”
Ushio’s gaze shifted. It was only the tiniest of movements, yet it spoke volumes. My trepidation was beginning to turn to certainty.
“I really hate to say this, Ushio, but…I kind of get the sense that there’s something you’re not telling me. And if you’re only keeping it from me because you don’t want to hurt my feelings or whatever, then I’d prefer you just come out and say it. Because I don’t think…I’ll be able to put this behind me otherwise.”
I had to be prepared for the worst too. But nothing worth having could ever be gained here unless we both were willing to bare our souls, for better and for worse.
“I’m not sure we can call ourselves best friends if we’re going to keep those kinds of secrets from each other,” I said. “I need you to trust me a little more than that.”
The large boat just offshore blew its foghorn.
To me, its wail sounded like an omen.
“…What’s that supposed to mean?”
Ushio’s voice was trembling. She clenched her fists as if attempting to suppress her anger, but I could hear and see it all too clearly in her tone and body language. And it wasn’t just pure, unbridled rage either—there was a sort of yearnful desperation to it as well.
“So I’m not even allowed to keep certain things to myself anymore? Is that what you’re saying?” Ushio asked. “I have to be one hundred percent open and brutally honest with you at all times, even when I’m really not comfortable sharing how I feel? Any other prerequisites I should know about if I want to apply for the privilege of being your ‘best friend,’ Sakuma?”
I couldn’t move a muscle; I felt like I was bound hand and foot.
“Since when does simply being friends with someone mean you have to air out all of your dirty laundry to each other?”
I couldn’t even blink myself free from Ushio’s exacting gaze.
“Is wanting to end things amicably really so wrong?”
Tears welled up in her ash-gray eyes.
I swallowed hard. My mouth was dry as a desert, yet my palms were sweating like crazy, to the point that it felt like I’d dipped them in a sink full of cold water.
Here I thought I’d been prepared for this to turn ugly—but now regret was already beginning to creep up on me. Could I salvage this situation if I apologized and took everything back right now? I wasn’t sure. I couldn’t even tell exactly where I’d gone wrong. But I was painfully aware that things were only going to fall apart at this rate.
Ushio wiped her eyes with her sleeve, then looked back up at me. “Okay, fine,” she said, her expression cold as ice. “Let me ask you something, then: Do you actually even want to be in a relationship with me, Sakuma?”
“Of course I do.”
“Oh yeah?! Well, in that case…!”
A massive wave crashed against the breakwater.
With tear-soaked eyes, Ushio gripped the sleeves of her jacket. “How come you looked so terrified…the last time we kissed?”
The last time we kissed—that was up in her bedroom.
On the night she helped me finish my winter homework.
No… You’ve gotta be kidding me… This can’t be happening.
Had she been able to sense it all along, then?
“So what if I’m not sexually attracted to her?”
“Pretty sure Ushio would cry if she heard you say that.”
How crushed must she have been when she realized I was forcing myself to do something I wasn’t truly comfortable with?
“No offense, but you’re kind of easy to read, Kamiki-kun.”
Why did I ever think I could get away with faking it?
Ushio had seen right through me from the very start, yet she kept quiet and continued going out with me regardless—all while smiling and acting as though everything was okay, and there wasn’t anything bothering her whatsoever. Hell, she even tried to end things in a way that wouldn’t require me to ever find out she’d been in pain.
And I’d just thrown all her efforts and consideration to the wayside.
I knew I had to say something, but what?
What could I possibly say to her right now that would make things right? Simply apologizing like there was nothing we could do about it would probably only make her feel even worse. But I couldn’t deny it, and trying to explain myself would be rubbing salt in the wound. I needed to think of something, and fast—there wasn’t much time left until we had to meet back up with the others at the rendezvous point.
Ugh, goddamn it… Why am I always like this?
“Sorry,” Ushio said softly, averting her gaze before lowering her head.
“Why are you apologizing?” I replied. “You haven’t done anything wrong…”
“Neither have you, though. There’s no one to blame here. It’s just a compatibility issue, that’s all… Or, no—I guess it’s even simpler than that.”
Ushio turned her back on me, ready to leave.
“It’s just a matter of…sexual orientation.”
She took one step forward, then another.
And all I could do was watch her go.
She wasn’t out of reach just yet; if I really wanted to, I could easily run up and grab her by the arm and try to talk this out a little longer. But something told me that emotionally, she was already far beyond my grasp—and no amount of begging and pleading could ever bring her heart back to me.
It felt like there was a bottomless rift between us. A chasm that, in truth, I knew had existed there all along, but had only grown deeper and more eroded with time. For so long, I’d done everything I could to bridge that gap and reach her on the other side.
But right now, I was too afraid to even look over the edge.