On our first day back at school, Ushio and I were the talk of the class for a little while. People wouldn’t stop coming over to us during break periods and pestering us with questions, like why we’d bailed on the rest of the group or where we’d run off to. But we were both determined not to say a single word about what actually transpired.
“Hey, leave them alone!” said Hoshihara, shooing away a herd of gossipers for us. “That’s their business, not yours! Stop trying to interrogate them!”
As always, her undying friendship and supportiveness made me want to tear up. And thankfully—whether due to Hoshihara fending them off or everyone getting tired of asking when we clearly weren’t going to give up any details—people stopped bothering us about it by the time fourth period rolled around.
During lunch hour, I stepped out of class to take a leak.
Hoshihara seized the moment to pull me aside. “Kamiki-kun!” She peered at me with a great big grin on her face and clapped a hand on my shoulder. “Looks like you actually pulled it off, huh?”
“Nah, don’t say it like that,” I replied, chuckling sheepishly. “I don’t deserve that much credit…”
Evidently, Ushio had already given her the rundown. I felt pretty embarrassed to know that Hoshihara had probably heard all about my stupid plan and all its oversights, but judging from her demeanor, it seemed like she’d come away with a positive impression of how I’d handled things overall.
“See? I told you so, didn’t I?” she said.
“Told me what?” I asked.
“That Ushio-chan’s really in love with you, Kamiki-kun.”
“Ohhh… Yeah, maybe she is, isn’t she?”
“Ha! Is that a hint of cockiness I hear? Boy, you’ve really changed, Kamiki-kun…”
“Er, do you mean that in a good way?”
“Of course!” said Hoshihara—though her wording sure made it sound like an insult. “Just don’t get too comfortable, you hear me? You two still have a long road ahead of you. It’s not starting a relationship that’s the hard part—it’s keeping it going.”
“Yeah, thanks… I’ll take that to heart.”
I looked Hoshihara square in the eye. How many times now had this sweet, brave, and bubbly girl come to my rescue when I really needed a friend to lean on? That day we’d randomly bumped into each other after school and traded contact info had to be one of the luckiest things that had ever happened to me in my entire life.
“Well,” I said, “if things do get rocky between me and Ushio somewhere down the line…I hope you won’t mind me coming to you for advice again.”
“Absolutely! I’m always happy to lend an ear,” said Hoshihara. “Anyway, I’ll let you get going! See you after school!”
And with that, she trotted back into the classroom.
I continued down the crowded hallway toward the boys’ bathroom. When I passed by Classroom D, I spotted Sera leaning up against the wall, as if he’d been waiting there for me. When we made eye contact, he cracked a wry smirk.
But I ignored this and just kept walking right on by.
“Hey, hey, hey!” he exclaimed, chasing after me. “You could at least stop to say hi, sheesh! No need to play so hard to get all the time!”
I clicked my tongue in frustration, then turned around. “What do you want? I’m really not in the mood to deal with you and your stupid bullcrap right now, okay?”
“Wowie, Sakuma… You sure have been getting awfully feisty with me lately, haven’tcha? Not that I don’t like seeing you stand your ground for a change. It’s kinda cute, actually.”
“You say that like it’s a recent development. I’ve never been afraid of you.”
“Oh yeah? You sure about that? ’Cause I seem to remember you tried to run for the hills that time we met up and got coffee… Or was that just my imagination?”
Is he talking about the time he introduced me to his girlfriend squad? Yeah, pretty sure just about anyone would feel intimidated in that situation, buddy.
“Why are you bringing that up again?” I said. “Just forget about it already…”
“No can do,” said Sera. “I could never forget anything about you, Sakuma. I’ll always remember every word you speak, every action you take… Forever and ever.”
Now he was trying to sound ominous to creep me out.
I assumed Sera was also curious to know what had happened between me and Ushio on the class trip after we last spoke. There was no way in hell I was going to tell him anything about that. He was the last person in the entire world I’d want to know even a single detail about our adventure—mostly because I didn’t want to give him any material he could work with to try to sully those precious memories for me.
“So how’d things go with you and Ushio, huh?” he asked, right on cue.
“Like I’d ever tell you.”
“You two gonna keep on truckin’? Or did you already break up?”
“I don’t have to answer that.”
“Well, it ain’t gonna last, I tell ya.”
Sera grinned at me, but not in his usual smarmy, insolent way.
No, this smile was a challenge. An arrogant, undaunted smirk.
“Face it, Sakuma,” he said. “You and Ushio are doomed to fail eventually. All you’ve done is delay the inevitable. Sooner or later, you two are gonna hit another brick wall in your relationship, and this’ll happen all over again. In fact, I can guarantee it.”
“Yeah, of course you’d think that. I know you’re going to be doing everything you can to instigate some sort of conflict between us at every turn.”
“Nah, you don’t have to worry about little old me anymore.”
This was a bald-faced lie if I’d ever heard one. Sera was the one who’d orchestrated the discord between me and Ushio on the class trip, after all. He was probably already slinking around behind the scenes, trying to get dirt on us or devise some new scheme to make one of us resent the other. He’d probably keep at it until the day we graduated.
“Hey, Sera,” I said. “What do you say you and I make a little bet?”
Sera raised a curious eyebrow at this. “Oh yeah? What are we betting on?”
“On whether Ushio and I will still be together on graduation day.”
“Hoo-hoo! Sure, I’ll take that bet. You two won’t last even half that long.”
“And I say we’ll last even longer than that.”
Sera was now grinning from ear to ear. It annoyed me to no end to see just how confident he was that he had this one in the bag. “So what do I get if I win?”
“Whatever you want.”
“Mmkay… Then I want you to take a video of yourself trying to eat a whole plate of spaghetti through your nose and then post it online.”
This cheeky son of a… Well, whatever. Not like it matters, since I’m not gonna lose.
“And what do I gotta do if you win, Sakuma?” Sera asked.
I mulled this over a while. What would I like to make Sera do?
“Okay, how about this?” I said. “If I win…”