Just then, something gave me pause: Since when does Mickey act like this? Was she really the sort of self-centered jerk who would bully someone just because they had a disagreement? Was I wrong about her all this time?
As my panic started to lead me down an unexpected rabbit hole, Mickey took a deep breath and then pressed the tip of her pen to the body of the paper.
Instantly, Kyou-kun jumped to his feet, his chair clattering behind him. At the sound, everyone in our vicinity glanced over…but a moment later, the incident was dismissed as just another part of the library. The only one who couldn’t shrug it off was Mickey.
Blinking in confusion, she reached over to the memo paper and wrote “What’s wrong?” Then she held it up for him to see. My eyes were glued to the paper.
Kyou-kun reached for his pen, fumbled, dropped it, then picked it up again and wrote “Bathroom break.” In response, Mickey wrote “K. I’ll wait until you get back.”
Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.
She kept grinning widely, paying no mind to the fear it instilled in her victims. After I watched Kyou-kun make his brief escape, I gathered all my courage, then leaned across the table and whispered, “Wh…wh-wh-what are you doing?!”
Still smiling, she turned her eyes on me, then picked up her pen and wrote: “It’s nothing! Don’t worry about it!”
At this, I shook my head. Oh, no you don’t! I know for a fact something’s going on!
She looked at me and let out a tiny laugh under her breath. Then she scribbled out: “I’m here to set things straight.”
Oh God, she knows?
As if to answer this silent question, she added: “I’ve got it all figured out.”
My heart was pounding so hard, I was terrified the whole room could hear it. What did she figure out? My pulse spiked, and a muddy stream of thoughts filled my mind, but no words came out—I just flapped my lips helplessly like a goldfish.
Kyou-kun returned, and I wasn’t sure I was happy he’d come back. I saw him read what Mickey wrote—and watched as he panicked even harder. It made me wish I’d hidden the paper when I had the opportunity. But of course, it was too late now.
As he sat back down in his chair, Mickey took this as her cue to grab her pen and press it to the stationery.
Hastily, I scribbled “Wait!” on the memo paper. It was one word—why didn’t I just say it out loud? I couldn’t think straight. All I knew was that there was one question I needed to ask right off the bat: “Should I be here for this?”
I made eye contact with Mickey and then Kyou-kun. Mickey put a hand to her chin in contemplation; Kyou-kun nodded faintly. Then I watched as Mickey wrote “It’s cool.” So I closed my eyes and attempted to summon the resolve I didn’t have.
She knows. She knows. She knows.
The only thing she could possibly be referring to was Kyou-kun’s crush on her. What else could she have “figured out” about me or Kyou-kun that she didn’t already know? My special power? No one could possibly find out about it unless I told them myself.
If my hypothesis was right—if Mickey had noticed Kyou-kun’s feelings for her and was now attempting to tell him how she felt in return—then chances were likely they’d reach a happy conclusion. But why did she seem sort of…angry? Was it just impatience?
Either way, her pen would decide today’s outcome, and I could only sit there and watch. I couldn’t stop her by force—if anyone was going to do that, it was Kyou-kun. But of course, I knew he wouldn’t.
At last, the tip of her pen embedded itself against the paper. But before it could leave an inky dot, she started scrawling letters, one by one:
You have a crush
And that was where she stopped.
I was stunned. So was Mickey. So was Kyou-kun—understandably so.
After all, he’d probably never imagined he would reach out and put his hand on hers to stop her.
He hastily retracted it, but there was no undoing what he’d done. He stared down at his hand, clenching and unclenching it. “Sorry,” he muttered in a tiny voice.
Mickey froze for a moment, dazed. Nevertheless, she recovered more quickly than the rest of us—she was probably used to this sort of thing. She reached over and wrote “What’s the matter?” on the memo paper. Then she offered him her pen, even though he clearly had his own right there in front of him.
He looked at it for a moment. Then, reluctantly, he accepted it. And after a moment of thought, he wrote a carefully chosen one-word response: “Stop.”
When I imagined how it must have felt for him to write those four letters, a mix of emotions welled up in my chest, and for some reason I felt like crying. But of course, I held it in.
Mickey scowled, snatched her pen back, and wrote “Why?” before offering the pen back to him. He avoided looking at her as he responded. Judging from the look on his face, he was biting back the urge to scream. It was all so unbearably painful to watch.
“I’m sorry, Miki-san,” he wrote. “I had a feeling you might have figured it out, and I appreciate you coming here to tell me. I figure you probably want to make things clear. But I don’t want to make you feel awkward, so don’t worry about it. Oh, and for the record, I’m not planning to follow you to your college, either. Sorry I’m such a loser.”
It ended the way it began: with an apology. His confession shocked me. He knew she’d figured it out, but instead of pressing her about it, he wanted to back off?
But it was the last line that resonated with me most of all. Sorry I’m such a loser, or in other words, sorry a loser like me is in love with you.
How was Mickey going to react to this? I watched her as she read his response and prayed she wouldn’t hurt him. I didn’t know what made her decide to try to write her letter right in front of him, but if only things weren’t so weird and complicated, the two of them would surely…
“What do you mean, you’re sorry?” Mickey asked, in a tone of voice that suggested she had completely forgotten we were in a library.
It wasn’t hostile or accusatory in any way, and yet it felt like Godzilla’s fire breath.
“Why are you sorry?”
I had witnessed Mickey’s irritation and annoyance many times in the past, but this was my first time seeing her genuinely furious.
“Don’t talk to me like I’m stupid!”
Her chair screeched as she leapt to her feet. Altogether, this deviated too far from the norm for the rest of the library to ignore. But naturally(?), she paid them no mind. Instead, she shoved her things back into her bookbag and then snatched up her stationery, crumpled it into a ball, and tossed it back onto the table. Then she shot me one final look, and without another word, turned and loudly stormed off.
Kyou-kun and I dazedly watched her retreat down the stairs. Then we looked at each other and froze for a good ten or twenty seconds.
During that time, we were both probably thinking about a lot of things. Why did Mickey get angry? What did she mean when she said those things? Which part of Kyou-kun’s apology offended her? And what were we supposed to do now?
I didn’t have the answer to any of these, but before I knew it, my mouth was moving on autopilot.
“Go.”
Kyou-kun gave me a questioning look. Evidently I, too, had forgotten we were in a library, among other things. For that brief moment, I forgot I was a loser with no identity. I wasn’t supposed to stick my nose in his business, either, but I forgot that, too.
“Go after her! You have to go after her right now!”
Ordinarily I never would have wanted to make a scene, and yet I was shouting. Because if I didn’t, I was afraid Kyou-kun might not see the light.
He froze for a few more seconds. Then I watched silently as he rose to his feet and ran out after Mickey.
As my shoulders heaved, and everyone stared, I suddenly realized: Maybe this is it. I still had the rest of my life ahead of me, but…maybe I was given this power for this one moment in time. After all, the only reason I managed to advise Kyou-kun with full confidence was because I could literally see the arrow shooting out of Mickey toward him.
So I started praying…but this time, I didn’t turn around. No, this time I prayed from the very bottom of my heart, sending him all my love and support. Then I rose to my feet, bowed in apology to all the other people nearby, and left the study area.