“I might already have proven how effective this book is on you,” she said.
“You’ve been using it on me?”
“Are you convinced yet? You and I get along just fine.”
“There’s nothing more credible than that.”
A simple action is better than a hundred hypotheses.
An overweight person who quietly continues to put effort into losing excess fat is far smarter than one who simply uses a bunch of fancy words to talk about the joys of dieting.
So in the end, I decided to buy the book.
After finishing my shift and shedding my uniform in the changing room, I purchased The Chemistry of Men and Women from Yomiuri, who would be on the late shift until midnight. She was lamenting that, unlike me, a kid who could work until only ten, she had a long night ahead of her.
I accepted the book, which was wrapped in a freshly folded cover, then slipped it into my bag. I was about to leave when I turned around one last time.
“Call me whenever another guy gives you trouble,” I said. “I’ll come charging here on my bicycle.”
Yomiuri looked stunned for a minute; then her face melted into a smile.
“A guy I can count on. Okay, I’ll call you and then the police if that happens.”
“I’d rather you called the police first.”
If she called the cops, then she’d have no need for me.
It was past ten PM when I reached the bicycle parking lot at our apartment.
It had taken me longer than usual to get home because I’d been searching for a diary app Yomiuri had recommended. I’d downloaded it while pushing my bicycle up the road.
I parked my beloved bike in an empty space and suddenly felt guilty as I took the elevator up to the third floor.
I had come home at my own pace as usual, but I’d suddenly realized that I hadn’t told Akiko or Ayase when I would finish my shift.
If I was lucky, Dad would have filled them in, but it wasn’t in his nature to notice subtle things like that.
Figuring it was possible everyone was already asleep, I opened the door quietly and tiptoed into the living room. Then I saw that the lights were on beyond the frosted glass door. Someone was still awake.
I straightened my back a bit and stepped into the living room.
There she was: Ayase, seated alone on the sofa.
She was sipping from a cup of— Was it hot chocolate? A sweet scent wafted over to me as she raised it to her mouth, smartphone in one hand, her face devoid of expression. Was she texting a friend? A boyfriend? Either seemed possible for a pretty, fashionable, outgoing girl like her.
“I’m home,” I said.
“Huh? Oh, hi.”
She raised her head and offered a half-hearted response.
She seemed more confused than like she was trying to brush me off, and she glanced blankly in my direction as if some foreigner had asked her directions in a language she didn’t understand.
“…Ayase?”
“Sorry. It’s rare for someone to greet me when they get home, so I didn’t know what to say.”
“Oh…right, because you and your mom were on different schedules.”
Come to think of it, I recalled Ayase saying she and her mom slept at different hours.
I didn’t dwell too much on it at the time, figuring that was just normal for some families, but her confusion over a simple greeting like that tugged at my heart.
“Ha-ha. You look so serious,” Ayase said, smiling wryly.
Apparently, she saw right through me.
“It’s okay,” she continued. “It’s not like I was being mistreated or anything. Mom slept and did things around the house while I went to school, and she was at work by the time I came home… That was our routine.”
“The two of you look so close.”
“We’re mother and daughter. We went shopping together today for the first time in a while, and it was pretty fun.”
She said all this without emotion, and her face remained expressionless.
Listening to her talk about her family, I was starting to understand why she looked so calm and mature. She probably showed no hint of loneliness because she was simply used to being alone.
She’d been raised in a single-parent family, but she was already in high school. I was the same way. We were well past the age where we might make a big deal about missing our parents.
But all that aside, though I still didn’t know if she was texting a friend or a boyfriend, I’d interrupted her while she was doing something on her phone. I started feeling guilty and decided to hurry to my room.
“I’m going to take a bath and go to bed.”
“Go ahead. I’ll take a bath after you’re finished. I like being the last to bathe and go to bed.”
“Oh, okay.”
I obediently did as I was told and got ready for a soak in the tub, all the while thinking over what she’d just said.
She liked being the last to bathe and the last to go to bed.
It was our first day living together, and I couldn’t blame her. I was a guy her age, and she’d only just met me. She probably didn’t want me to soak in a tub after she’d used it or take a chance of having me see her asleep and unguarded.
I might have been keeping her up.
In that case…I’d try to finish up as quickly as I could.
With that decided, I finished bathing in ten minutes—much quicker than the half hour I usually spent in the bathroom. The next twenty minutes went to draining and washing the tub, after which I refilled it for her.
I wasn’t sure yet how best to handle Ayase, but I wanted to use my head and be as considerate as possible.
And just for your information…
Though I was spending the night under the same roof with a girl my age for the first time, I didn’t experience any exciting, suggestive scenes like you often saw in romantic comedies aimed at boys. Living with a stepsister in real life isn’t like what you read in those two-dimensional comic books, just like I said at the beginning.
However, the real reason I was able to sleep without thinking at all about Ayase must have been because she never once let down her guard like you might expect someone to do at home. At least not until after I was unconscious.
The next morning, she was sitting in the living room by the time I got up, perfectly poised, giving me no chances to get excited, but…
“Good morning,” she said. “Did you sleep well?”
“Yep.”
“I enjoyed my bath last night. I appreciate you going to the trouble.”
…through our exchange, I caught a glimpse of her human warmth—not the usual Ayase, who was always as cool as a cucumber. Our relationship wasn’t like those comic-book fantasies, but I thought it was still pretty nice.