Café LycoReco had closed for the day. The store signboard had been brought back inside…but customers were still in the café. That usually only happened on board game nights, but they weren’t meeting today.
The customers in question were Yoneoka, Itou, and Tokuda, who’d been working on their projects all day and still weren’t finished. By nine PM, they had finally put their laptops and tablets away.
Itou finished sketching, and since she had no more energy left, she decided to leave coloring to the designer she worked with. In any case, she’d finished her assignment.
Tokuda had also managed to write a first draft of his article and send it to his editors and designers.
Meanwhile, Yoneoka decided that even if he had spent the whole day working diligently, he wouldn’t have made the deadline anyway, so there was no point in trying. Instead, he started chatting up anyone who would give him the time of day. The manga artist looked at him warily, thinking that no matter what, she must be careful not to ever become like him.
“Okay, here it goes!”
“Uh… Chisato…! Guh!”
Itou was lying on her front on the tatami floor, with Chisato straddling her back. She groaned when Chisato put both hands under her chin and pulled back. In pro wrestling, that move was called the camel clutch. Chisato performed the move slowly. It was very effective on Itou, who’d spent the whole day hunched over a tablet. Her joints were making popping and cracking noises.
“Okay, you’re good!”
Chisato was such a nice girl. She modeled for Itou, gave encouraging but honest feedback on Itou’s drafts, cheered Itou on when a deadline was approaching, and even helped with the illustrations sometimes… When Itou finished an assignment, Chisato even helped her with stretches.
Itou thought that if she had a son, she’d make him marry Chisato by any means necessary.
“Chisato, I could use a helping hand with stretching too,” Yoneoka said in a slightly lewd tone, gobbling up a large sundae.
Chisato was, of course, having none of it. The man himself wasn’t expecting her to take him seriously.
“Forget about it. This massage is a special service reserved only for those who make their deadlines!”
She walked over to Tokuda, who was drinking warm milk, perhaps to calm an upset stomach. When she started massaging his shoulders, Tokuda smiled awkwardly. He said he was twenty-eight, but sometimes he seemed distinctly inexperienced. Maybe he was nervous because of the age difference between him and Chisato. Having a peer rub your shoulders was nice. If a child did it, that was just cute. But a high-school girl and a single man in his twenties…that was treading a very fine line. That must have been what made Tokuda antsy.
“Oh, Mr. Kazuhiko! Remember our little deal…?”
“Ah, yes. It’s in, as promised.”
“Really?! Yay, you rock! Thanks! I’ll pay you back with a special favor!”
…Suspicious.
Itou furtively glanced over at Yoneoka, meeting his gaze. Almost imperceptibly, he nodded at her.
“You’ve given in to the temptation of crime, Tokuda? Pity. I thought we could be friends,” said Itou.
Tokuda looked at her, flustered, but before he could say anything, Yoneoka cut in, staring at the ceiling with his arms folded.
“I’d hate to have to report an acquaintance… Do you know Detective Abe? Do us both a favor and turn yourself in.”
“Sorry, but… What am I being accused of…?”
“Dealing in…guns? Or no, what would be more popular with youngsters? Drugs?”
“To think you were a dealer! Getting our dear Chisato hooked on that filth to get ‘special favors’ from her! We’re not turning a blind eye to that!”
Itou laughed, and Yoneoka joined in. Tokuda smiled awkwardly, but Chisato looked a bit uneasy for some reason. Maybe she was too young to enjoy that sort of banter.
“Hey now, let’s not throw around accusations like that, even as a joke. It doesn’t fit in with the good vibes we want to have at the café.”
“Sorry, sorry! No more suspicious topics at LycoReco, then… But wait, there’s just this one thing I wanted to mention earlier.”
Itou told them she thought there was something strange going on with Kana, the middle-schooler who often hung out at the café. She couldn’t talk with the other regulars about it earlier since she was in a rush to finish her work, but it had been on her mind the entire time.
“Kana? Strange? Why do you say that? She seems like an ordinary girl to me,” said Tokuda.
He was right that she did seem like an ordinary girl. Kana was friendly and cheerful. She’d chat with the grown-up customers, but she never forced herself into any conversation, and she openly admitted when she didn’t understand something… That was all perfectly normal. She was a nice girl, maybe too nice, even. Girls her age often tried to act older, to be taken seriously by grown-ups.
But Itou’s doubts concerned certain practicalities, not Kana’s behavior.
“Where does she get the money to be hanging out in a café all the time?”
LycoReco wasn’t super pricey, but a drink and a dessert added up to about a thousand yen. Junior high schoolers usually got pocket money to buy a snack on the way home, but a thousand yen was a lot of money for a young girl.
Next, Kana’s school, Kiuchi Kawara Junior High School, wasn’t even in Tokyo. It was in Saitama. Getting there by train from Kinshicho was easy enough, but that trip still took some time, and the train ticket cost a few hundred yen. Kana spent at least an hour a day traveling to and from the café, and it cost her almost two thousand yen.
Yoneoka cocked his head, thinking.
“That sounds like a lot, but she’s taking some classes here, right? So I imagine her parents are paying for her travel expenses.”
“But how do you explain the timing of her visits? I’ve seen her come in at all times of the day. Made me wonder if she even actually goes to school.”
Yoneoka clapped his hands.
“I’ve got it! Her school’s in Saitama, but she lives around here!”
“And if that were the case, why would she be enrolled at a school in Saitama? There’s no shortage of junior high schools in Tokyo. Kiuchi Kawara is a big school but not prestigious enough that students would travel from far away just to go there.”
Several things about Kana were bugging Itou, the issue of Kana’s spending most of all.
“Maybe she simply comes from a rich family,” suggested Tokuda. “Some kids get more pocket money than others.”
It seemed reasonable to him, but Itou shot him down right away.
“You’d know if she was from a rich family from her outfits and makeup. That’s also something girls spend their pocket money on.”
Kana was commuting from Saitama dressed in her school uniform and white sneakers. That alone wouldn’t be so unusual, but her bangs were overgrown, with strands sticking out in odd directions. Her hair was black, undyed. She didn’t seem to use any makeup, and her nails weren’t manicured. She only carried her no-brand schoolbag with her. Not the look of a girl coming into Tokyo to hang out.
Most girls Kana’s age would prioritize so many other things to spend money on before coffee. If Itou, in her thirties, could think of many fashion items that seemed indispensable to young girls, then actual young girls could probably think of twice as many.
“Her school might have strict rules about makeup. Besides, she’s so young and pretty. She doesn’t need makeup,” Yoneoka proposed.
“Strict rules or not, I guarantee you no schools have rules against simply straightening your hair. And nobody but old people think naturally pretty girls don’t need makeup.”
That stung Yoneoka, who was approaching his forties. He looked down at his table dejectedly. Itou felt terrible, but at the same time, fear of growing old crept into her mind. Eager to change the topic, she turned to Chisato.
“And what do you think, Chisato?”
Chisato only laughed in response. She smiled awkwardly and walked to stand behind Yoneoka. She started massaging his shoulders, which immediately cheered him up. With the young Chisato behind him, Yoneoka looked even older… Or did he look older because of his lecherous geezer energy? Itou wondered.
Mika emerged from the back room.
“My friends, let’s be respectful and not speculate about the girl’s private life… Instead, may I suggest a game before I chase you out?”
Chisato’s hand shot up.
“Let’s play Mapputa Two-Tone Soul!”
It was a new board game featured on LycoReco’s game nights. Chisato preferred playing something new rather than sticking with old favorites. She liked games that relied more on intuition than logic, and Mapputa fell into that category.
“Chisato, it’s your break time. You should get some rest.”
“I don’t need it! I’ll have more fun playing the game with everyone! You’re up for it, right? Right?!”
Yoneoka was the first to sign up.
“Let’s do this!”
The other customers saw the irony in how Yoneoka had the energy for playing games but not for working on his project, but they didn’t say anything. Yoneoka’s editor would have a fit, though.
“We can’t leave out Kurumi,” said Itou. “And…what about Takina and Mizuki? Are they off today?”
Chisato smiled.
“No, but they’re working elsewhere today. Even without them, we have enough players for an awesome gaming session!”
The two writers put their laptops away. Mika went to the kitchen to prepare drinks and snacks for the game, and Chisato went to get the game box. She opened it and quickly checked that everything was there.
“By the way,” she spoke quietly to Itou, “you said earlier you’ll be working on a one-shot story?”
“Yes, for a quarterly magazine. Why do you ask?”
“It’s a crime story, right? Or no, some other kind of mystery?”
“It is a mystery. I’ve never done one before, actually. It’s not easy coming up with ideas for the plot. But why do you bring it up now?”
“I just thought that you might have a talent for this sort of thing.”
Itou tilted her head to the side, puzzled by this unexpected compliment.