Quitting halfway through his freshman year didn’t give Itsuki Hashima the time to make many college friends. He had only one real acquaintance left from that era that he bothered to maintain.
That was Miyako Shirakawa, aged twenty and now a sophomore. She was the same age as Itsuki and was in the same college department, making them sort of ex-classmates. She had an air of refinement, the classic big-city college student, and she had a cute sort of beauty to her. Her light brown hair had a gentle wave—all natural, no dyes or perms. Her flashy looks made her popular throughout grade school, but she had yet to enjoy a steady boyfriend.
The two of them had first spoken about a month after their first semester began. It was a time most freshmen used to squeeze the most out of their newfound freedom—joining clubs, going to parties, getting part-time jobs, making new friends and lovers. But Itsuki was the guy in the department who was always alone. Whenever he wasn’t in class, he was there in the back row, staring intently at the screen of his laptop as he typed away, occasionally grinning to himself or twisting his face up in pain. He put it away during class, but his written notes clearly had little to do with the topic of the lecture as his face alternated through a whirlwind of emotions—smiles, intense concentration, occasionally sheer pathos. And when class was over, he’d go right back home.
Her friends laughed as they called the guy all kinds of mean things—weird, emo, friendless—but Miyako had a different impression. She felt as if he had something really important that drove him, something far more vital than college classes or playing around with friends or falling in love. Something more concrete. Something that Miyako and her friends—more or less drifting through college, bobbing around in life as the semester wore on—didn’t have.
After a while of this, Miyako finally decided to ask this guy, Itsuki Hashima, what he was doing on his computer all day. “Bwuhh?” he replied. “I—I don’t… What do you mean?”
“Come on—I won’t tell,” she said in response to this clearly suspicious behavior. It was a hard push, she knew, but in a moment, Itsuki finally told the truth. “A novel? Do you wanna become a novelist or something, Hashima?”
“Well, no, um,” a distressed-looking Itsuki began. “…I guess I kinda am…already.”
Since he wrote under his real name, it didn’t take long for Miyako to check out the college bookstore and find a single novel under the name Itsuki Hashima. She picked it up and read it, and to be frank, she didn’t really get it.
The next day, sitting next to him in class, she commented, “I tried reading your novel, but it didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.”
“Pfft!” he replied, like a sullen child. “That novel’s not meant for easy college girls like you!”
This evaluation understandably offended Miyako. People had been lobbing insults like that at her based on looks alone ever since middle school, but it was the first time anyone had said it to her face.
“Hey, I’m not easy, you prick! And if it’s not meant for me, then who’s it meant for, anyway? And why does kissing his little sister give the main guy all these magic powers?!”
“Hah-hah-hah! I guess an easy ho like you would have trouble figuring out the deep, sacred mythology behind the sisterly bond!”
“I told you, I’m not easy! I’ve never even had a— Look, we aren’t talking about that! Your story wouldn’t make sense to anybody!”
“Oh, is that what you think? Well, too bad! You read Genesis Sisters of the New World, right? That’s my second series, and Volume One of that sold over a hundred thousand copies!”
“What? No way. Something like that…?”
The blurted-out reaction rubbed Itsuki exactly the wrong way. “What do you mean, ‘that’?” he shot back. “‘That’ broke a hundred thousand copies, which means there’s at least a hundred thousand people out there who fully understood what you couldn’t! And here you are, in public, all like, ‘Aww, gee, I don’t understaaand it!’ Aren’t you ashamed of yourself? That’s so hilarious, it’s practically sad! I mean, being stupid isn’t anything to feel bad about, but it should be a crime how brazen you are with flaunting your idiocy for all to see! A stupid ho like you oughta realize just how stupid she really is and go crawl into a hole or something!”
Crack!
The torrent of insults finally drove Miyako to slap him straight on the cheek.
“Ah…wha…?!”
Miyako stared right at the dumbfounded Itsuki. Tears fell from her eyes.
“You didn’t have to say all that, you asshole! Nnngh…!”
“Oh, um, wait, uh… Ummm, all right. Maybe, perhaps, there’s the possibility that I went just a little too far, all right? I had a crappy review like that written for me on Amazon the other day, and it really pissed me off, so…um… Like, I’m sor… I apolo… Look, can you just stop crying, you easy ho?!”
“For Chrissake, I’m not easy! And I’m not crying!”
“No, you clearly are.”
“I’m not, and I’m not easy!”
“O-okay, okay… All right… You aren’t crying, and you aren’t easy…”
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“Damn right I’m not!!”
Then, simultaneously realizing they were now the center of attention, Itsuki and Miyako instantly reddened.
“…Oh, geez… Now everybody’s gonna think I’m some kind of nutcase…”
“…Oh, you don’t have to worry about that. We all know you’re a nutcase.”
That was their first contact, and for whatever reason, Miyako and Itsuki kept talking after that. To an impartial viewer, the exchange must have looked like a disaster, but to Miyako, curiosity still won out over disgust.
His obsessions over little-sister characters remained a total mystery to her, but he was willing to lend her a bunch of neat books and games, and it was interesting to listen to him talk about the publishing industry and the work he did for it. It felt kind of nice to offer fashion advice for his novels’ female characters, too.
That was why it was such a shock, after summer break ended and the second part of the Japanese school year began, when Itsuki suddenly informed Miyako that he was leaving school. The news came in the form of a text that arrived on her phone just after she stepped out of the bath.
“I quit school”
Just three words, provided to the only college friend he had, without previous discussion or indication that anything was amiss in his life. It shocked and saddened her so much that she didn’t even bother putting on any clothes before calling him.
Over the phone, Itsuki was just as arrogant and self-centered as always. “Hah-hah-hah-hah! I’m a writing genius! I made it in the Oricon top ten and everything! It all made me realize that college is just a waste of time for me!”
He probably meant it, Miyako reasoned. College meant nothing to him, to the point that he felt three words were enough to explain his behavior. To her, it felt as if it should be a much more monumental decision. In some ways, his being able to follow through with that on a whim, without consulting anyone for advice, made her incredibly envious.
The words “waste of time,” in particular, struck home with Miyako. As she fought back the tears that came out for no reason she could articulate, she wailed, “Oh, really! Well, good luck not getting dropped by your publisher, then!”
Her choice of words was harsh, but deep down, she knew she didn’t want to let him go. That was why, as she swore to herself on that day, she still made regular visits to Itsuki’s place. It was just a five-minute walk from campus, so using it as someplace to kill free time didn’t seem unnatural at all…or so she thought.
But today, she was back there again, ringing the bell until she heard the latch turn. Quickly, she prepared the excuse she had conjured up.
“I-Itsuki! I have some free time, and the library’s totally packed, so lemme use your place to study for my—”
She was greeted not by Itsuki but by a beautiful silver-haired girl in her underwear.
“Wha… Nayu…?!”
“Oh. Hey,” Nayuta sleepily groaned at the beet-red, half-frantic Miyako. “Good morning, Myaa. Itsuki’s still sleeping. We were at it until early in the morning, so…”
“At i—?! Oh… Well, sorry I interrupted you, then…!”
“Oh, wait a second, Myaa. If you’re leaving, is it okay if I come with you for a bit?”
She was already edging away from the door when Nayuta stopped her.