“Well, then—about this single envelope we have here,” he began. “Turns out, we were fortunate enough to get ourselves one truly unbelievable gift for this party.”
Unbelievable? What does that even mean gift-wise? I mean, we all probably bought stuff that only cost us a thousand or two thousand yen at most. Did someone decide on their own to cough up extra cash and buy an additional present? But if that’s the case, why?
Everyone else stood around, visibly confused, and generally seeming to be thinking the same thing I was. Hitoshi seemed to be enjoying our reaction; he turned his back to us, as though he were stalling.
And now he’s getting booed. Even Teshikaga-kun’s chuckling. Hitoshi’s crying out for support, but Teshikaga-kun’s totally ignoring him. People are even laughing at their exchange.
Those two sure do get along. They seem to be fast friends, way faster than me. Not that I’m jealous; I’m just genuinely impressed. I simply can’t grow friendships that fast.
“Fine, fine, I’ll tell you what it is! Today’s grand prize is...this!” Hitoshi exclaimed, raising his phone high above his head. There seemed to be an image displayed on his screen, but he was too far and the screen was too small, so none of us had any idea what he was showing us.
There was another onslaught of boos, but Hitoshi just grinned, not bothered at all by our reaction. If anything, he had the look of a little kid who knew something fun was about to happen and couldn’t wait for it to start.
And just as he seemed to have expected, all the booing subsided at his next remark.
“While we were shopping earlier we entered an opportunity drawing and won these: a pair of tickets for a trip to the hot springs!”
Hitoshi held his phone up high like it was a championship trophy. Maybe he had taken a photo of the tickets with it or something.
Hey, wait a minute...when did we win something like that?!
The booing ceased, and the party venue quickly fell silent, total stillness spreading through the room the way a stone dropped in a pond spreads ripples across the water.
No one said anything even as we all looked at each other. When we looked back at Hitoshi in disbelief, he just looked at us with the biggest smirk on his face, happy that he’d managed to completely shock us.
Oh dang, now everyone’s getting mad. I mean, I get that Hitoshi looks super annoying and all. Funny, I always think that Nanami’s cute when she looks smug, so why does Hitoshi’s smug look irritate me instead?
But at the look on his face everyone was convinced: This guy was dead serious.
The tense silence was shattered by cheers of excitement. Those who were most worked up were probably the people with boyfriends and girlfriends.
Actually, pretty much everyone seemed to be shouting excitedly.
“Weren’t you the one who won the tickets, though? Don’t you want them?” someone asked Hitoshi.
“Well, I used everyone’s tokens to do the opportunity drawing, not just mine. Plus if I kept quiet about it, it would seem like I stole them or something. And it’s a pair of tickets, not just one,” he replied.
“But if it’s a pair, couldn’t you have just found someone to go with?” another remarked.
“Who am I supposed to go with when I don’t even have a girlfriend, dammit?!”
Oh no, that question totally broke him. You really are a good guy, Hitoshi. You’re doing your best to keep things fair for everyone. I mean, it’s a pair of tickets to the hot springs, for crying out loud. It’d be the perfect winter break activity. I haven’t been to the hot springs in a while. It’s only gonna get colder, too, so getting to take a nice, long soak in a hot spring would be awesome.
“Anyway, we’re gonna do another round of bingo right now! Whoever gets bingo first gets to take home this grand prize!” Hitoshi shouted.
I see, that’s why Hitoshi passed out those bingo cards again. And with this kind of prize at stake, it’s like our class has been replaced with a pack of starving animals. Things are heating up already...
“Wouldn’t it be crazy if we won this and got to go together?” Nanami whispered.
“Yeah, really. Though I have a feeling we won’t,” I replied.
Our odds weren’t that great. Not only that, everyone seemed to want those tickets. I could almost see the flames of battle flaring and erupting throughout the room.
Amid all that killer intent, Nanami and I remained rather chill about the whole affair.
Why, you ask? Because neither Nanami nor I had managed to get anywhere with the previous round of bingo. We figured it was going to be the same again this time around.
With our luck, we decided to play just for fun, without any real need to compete against other people for the prize.
At least, that was what I was thinking...until I found myself in the dead center of the heat of battle.
“All righty, then! Let’s have Yoshin and the class rep play rock-paper-scissors to settle their tie of getting bingo first!” Hitoshi exclaimed.
“I’m definitely gonna win...!” Shirishizu-san growled.
I was in complete disbelief as I stood in front of everyone, facing off with Shirishizu-san. Of all the things that could’ve happened, I ended up calling out bingo in the exact same moment that Shirishizu-san did. The final showdown, therefore, became a rock-paper-scissors match between the two of us.
“Before we begin, let’s hear from our two contestants about how they’re feeling as they go into this historical match. We’ll start with you, class rep,” Hitoshi said, clearly enjoying the situation as he pretended to interview Shirishizu-san with a makeshift mike made out of a rolled-up spare bingo sheet. Shirishizu-san’s eyes were in their usual narrow glare, but she seemed as though she were on fire. And given her current outfit, she looked downright surreal.
“I’m gonna get me those tickets and soak in the hot springs with Taku-chan!” she shouted.
“Kotoha?!” Teshikaga-kun blurted, panicking at Shirishizu-san’s absurd declaration to the crowd. Said crowd, though, was going wild. Completely forgetting the fact that Teshikaga-kun was a delinquent—though I guess I’d forgotten too—everyone was cheering the couple on.
As though to tell me that at least mentally, she had already won, Shirishizu-san flashed me a peace sign. Is that her way of looking smug? How am I supposed to respond to this, exactly?
“And what’s on your mind as you go into this match, Yoshin?” Hitoshi asked, turning to me.
Dang it, this guy’s really enjoying this. I mean, it’s fine, since it’s a Christmas party and all. But still, what am I supposed to say? I thought to myself, glancing at Nanami.
As nearly everyone in the room cheered for Shirishizu-san, though, Nanami was cheering for me. When I heard that, I knew I had to step up my game.
“I’m...gonna go in the hot springs with Nanami too!” I declared, making a fist and thrusting it out toward Shirishizu-san. This was serious; I had to give it everything I had. Thinking that it would be rude of me not to, I sincerely and earnestly tightened my fist into a proper grip.
The excitement in the room was reaching a climax. My skin was vibrating so much that I could have sworn the room was shaking—my body was tingling from top to bottom in a way I’d never felt before. I wasn’t sure if all this was because everyone was screaming so loudly, or because my body was actually trembling in the face of the intense battle I was about to plunge into.
I had had people cheer me on before, when Nanami and I had participated in the couples contest, for example, and even when we ran our butts off at the sports festival. And yet—somehow, this felt different.
Was this what it felt like to go up against something on your own?
“All right, here we go,” I said.
“Bring it on!” Shirishizu-san let out.
She and I stood and looked at each other head-on. I felt like the ground and the air were quaking. I would have bet good money that, if we were in a manga, there would have been fiery sound effects in the background of our panel.
I spread my feet shoulder-width apart and brought my fists up around my waist. This almost felt like a martial arts competition. Shirishizu-san, on the other hand, had her hands dangling by her sides as she stood in a completely natural, relaxed manner.
The bizarre nervousness I felt manifested as literal sweat beading on my forehead, even though I had barely exerted myself. My ears shut out any noise in the room, focusing solely on Hitoshi’s pending words to call the beginning of the match.
I swore I heard him gulp, and then...
“Rock-...paper-...!”
As if to match Hitoshi’s words, both Shirishizu-san and I swung our arms back. Our movements drew symmetrical crescent-shaped arcs, and then we revealed our hands to each other.
I had never taken rock-paper-scissors so seriously before.
“Scissors!”
With that final call from Hitoshi, we both stilled our arms. My hand was gripped in a tight fist...a rock, in other words. My solid will expressed in physical form.
Meanwhile, Shirishizu-san’s hand was pointing two fingers...a pair of scissors.