When I arrived at the train station to meet Kaho-chan, I found her decked out in her street fashion best, complete with a baseball cap as the cherry on top. Honestly, I envied the heck out of girls who could pull this look off. You had to be darn cute to do it.
“So, where are we going?” I asked her. “Are we meeting her at a diner or something?”
“You know it, bestie. There’s a super cute place in Shibuya!”
“Shibuya?! Why on earth would we ever go somewhere so…uh, far?”
I was about to say, “Why on earth would we ever go somewhere so horribly toxic to us introverts?” before I switched gears and made it a problem of distance. Distance was always an issue. Had Ashigaya been just a little farther away, I might’ve stopped going to school for a whole different reason.
As we got on the train and felt it rumble under us as it pulled away from the station, Kaho-chan raised a triumphant finger and cackled. “It helps sell our story.”
“Our what now?”
“I had to pull out all the stops to get you this meeting with Serara. Am I awesome or what?”
“Huh? Uh…yes?”
“You don’t sound like you mean it.”
“You can’t expect someone to give sincere compliments at the drop of a hat!”
A slight shiver traveled down my spine at the chill in Kaho-chan’s voice. The sheer dichotomy between her sternness and her usual peppiness made it all the worse when she told me off.
I schooled my face into a serious expression and said, “You need to be nice to me, Kaho-chan. Those are the rules, right?”
“Since, like, when?”
“Satsuki-san’s the bad cop, so you, Mai, Ajisai-san, and the rest of the human race need to be the good cop. Got it?”
“That’s a whole lotta good cops… Whatever. Moving on from that all-too-Rena-chin-centric image of the world.” Kaho-chan stopped on a dime and shot me a look. What was that for?
“I gotta get this out of the way,” she continued. “See, I’m in the camp of people who say it’s no biggie to cut class.”
“You and Satsuki-san both,” I said. It came as no surprise to hear that from Kaho-chan.
“Just ’cause everyone’s different, you know? Like if going to school cuts into the time you could be using to chase your dreams, who gives a hoot about school?”
I tilted my head, giving it some thought. I didn’t think that was my sister’s issue.
“I have a lot of cosplay oomfs, see,” she said. “Some of ’em don’t finish high school so they can start working early. And then there’s streamers and stuff. Plus people who get their Certs.” Certs being short for Certificate for Students Achieving the Proficiency Level of Upper Secondary School Graduates. It’s basically a Japanese GED. “But if you go that route, you gotta make sure your family’s on the same page. Eighth graders are basically kids, y’know? They’re not independent yet. You can’t decide your whole future on your own at that age.”
Now that she mentioned it, I recalled her saying she had to bring her grades up to get permission to keep cosplaying. Her folks let her shell out a lot of her own cash to pay for the photography shoots and whatnot, but in spite of that (or maybe because of that), she did things by the book when it came to her family.
“But that’s why I think your sis should go back to school,” Kaho-chan said, her finger surging upward once more. “Yeah, I know she’s heard it a million times, but it’s true. School’s not worthless. And if whatever stopped her from going’s so big she can’t handle it on her own, I wanna help however I can.” She flushed and looked away from me. “Just ’cause I’m so nice. You know me, I’d stick my nose in anybody’s business if it could help ’em. Plus, me ’n your sis are buddies now after that basketball thing. And she and Serara are tight. I thought I’d be pushin’ it if I came to talk to her directly, but I figured I could help out on the sidelines. Y’know?”
“Y-yeah, I do. Thank you, really!”
It was a beautiful sentiment, and one surprisingly well thought-out. Very mature. And so cool. Honestly, I stanned. Kaho-chan for prime minister.
“’Kay, so now you know where I’m at,” she said, digging out her phone to show it to me. “And Serara’s been ghosting me for ages now.”
“H-huh? Why’s that?” I asked.
“Prolly sensed some bad vibes. I made seventeen alts to talk to her, but she ignored me on all of them.”
“No, that’s on you. Literally who does that?” If Kaho-chan tried spamming me with texts from seventeen different accounts and I didn’t know what was going on, I would’ve run for my life. “But in spite of that, she finally got back to you?”
“Nah.” Kaho-chan gave her head a cute little shake. Excuse me? Was this some kind of joke?
“But I thought we made plans…?”
“Through Mai-Mai.”
“Oh. That makes sense. So we’re meeting up with Mai?”
“Nope.” She shook her head again. She looked like she was enjoying messing with me.
“Stop it, Kaho-chan!” I said. “You’re supposed to be the good cop!”
“I love how you say that, like it’s an actual thing.”
Then she whispered something I couldn’t comprehend. What was she saying? I thought we were “emotionally unstable, abusive boyfriend Rena-chin and the girl who will never, ever stop loving her no matter how much Rena-chin beats her, so please, please don’t leave her…”
Kaho-chan stuck her tongue out at me (so cute!) and grinned. “I borrowed Mai-Mai’s account.”
“Say what?”
“Serara took the bait hook, line, and sinker.”
“Uh, I don’t know how to feel about this one, chief…”
I flashed back to the time I met Seira-san. She was so obsessed with Mai that she insisted we swap contact info. Well, if she was a big Mai fan…I guess we could use that to our advantage? But this was definitely against the rules. The little sister figure of Ashigaya High was a fiend!
“How else were we gonna get her to talk?” Kaho-chan said. “And it’s to help your sis. Justice is on our side. Right? Right, Rena-chin? Yoo-hoo, Commander Rena-chin!”
“Why am I suddenly the mastermind of this operation?”
Not gonna lie, this did not sit right with me.
“K-Kaho-chan,” I said. “Should I grab a rock? For, uh, self-defense?”
“Good idea, Commander Rena-chin! Let’s arm up.”
“Would you cool it with the commander thing?!”
I felt like I was dying. Kaho-chan could sport a disarmingly charming grin while committing atrocities. She was the kind of girl I’d never want to have as an enemy—and I meant that in a whole different way than with Satsuki-san.
While we waited at a far back table at the café in Shibuya, the door behind us opened with a clang of the bell. In waltzed Seira-san, wearing a brand new autumn outfit that fit her to a T. She was dressed to the nines. As if her normal prettiness wasn’t bad enough, she had enough glitz and glamour to boost her looks a good 50 percent.
“Yoo-hoo!” she called into the shop. “Thank you so, so much for waiting.” She tittered. “You’re the best, Oduka Mai-san!”
Then, when she saw me sitting there, she froze.
“Uh, hey,” I said. I bowed in greeting.
Seira-san blinked maybe half a dozen times. “Huh? Oneesan-senpai? What are you doing he—”
And then she saw the person behind me and turned rigid. Seira-san squeaked, but it was too late, as Kaho-chan shoved her into the booth, sat down next to her—blocking her escape route—and whisked off her hat.
“What’s poppin’, Serara?” Kaho-chan snapped her a peace sign.
I could see the gears turning in Seira-san’s head as she realized what was going on. For a couple of seconds, she said nothing at all. Her face was frozen in a look Picasso could have painted.
And then. She took in a huge breath of air. And…bawled her eyes out.
Oh. My. God.
Still sniffling and snuffling, Seira-san moaned, “C-curse you, Nagipo!”
“Whoopsies,” said Kaho-chan. “I didn’t think this would make you cry so hard.”
“I’m not crying!” Seira-san insisted, crying.
A half-eaten plate of pancakes sat on the table in front of her, courtesy of me ’n Kaho-chan’s wallets. I was glad to find that even Kaho-chan had a sense of shame for making an eighth-grade girl sob her head off. I couldn’t have stayed her friend otherwise.
“Aww, poor widdwe Sewawa-chan,” Kaho-chan teased. “Whatevew you say. You’re not cwwying, are you? Big girls like Sewawa-chan don’t cwy, do they?”
“I want to go home! Let me out of the booth!”
“Shh, shh, don’t be wike that. Let’s get Sewawa-chan anothew dwink. What sounds yummy? Your oneechans wiww pay for whatevew you want.”
Seira-san moaned, clearly torn. “Fine… I guess I’ll take a melon soda float.” Her eyes were turning red as she snorfed up the last of her snot.
“I’m really sorry, Seira-san,” I said, “for extending the invitation like this.” My crushing guilt pushed me down into another bow.
“You don’t need to apologize,” she said. “It wasn’t like I was happy about seeing Oduka Mai-san or anything!”
She whipped her head away before her gaze dropped to her lap. “It’s not like, when the Oduka Mai-san said she wanted to meet me…because I caught her attention at the cosplay summit, and now she just wanted to talk…I definitely didn’t spend days thinking about it or get so worked up last night I couldn’t sleep. I swear.”
“I’m so, so sorry.”
With every word, Seira-san’s frown drooped lower and lower. I bowed so deep my forehead just about hit the tabletop. Kaho-chan, on the other hand, grinned. I was beginning to question whether Kaho-chan had any empathy at all.
“I can try to set the two of you up later…?” I offered.
“What do you mean?” Seira-san glared at me like I was her archnemesis. Eep.
“I mean, the next time Mai gets a break from work, I can text you…? And, like, you guys can make real plans to hang out and…stuff…”
Seira-san fell silent. But even as she glared like her life depended on it, I could see the tiniest fraction of that animosity draining from her eyes. With pursed lips and a lidded stare, she demanded, “Gimme a date.”
“Uh, it depends on Mai’s schedule.”
“You’re just trying to backstab me again, aren’t you?”
“No, I swear! And what do you mean ‘again?!’”
“You’ll trick and toy with and use this poor, innocent teenage girl until she’s chewed up and spat out. You’ll take everything from me and then leave me to die. Like a dirty old rag…like a dirty old rag!”
Her voice rose to a feverish pitch so loud everyone in the shop could hear it. Everyone turned to look at us.