She nodded emphatically. “Yeah, that!”
“Hmm... I’m not sure if that’s a sound theory, but I guess it’s an idea.”
“Hee hee. You definitely can’t teach someone else by yourself!” she said triumphantly.
Not too fast. “Actually, you can.” I showed her the notebook I was looking at before. Then I showed her a different notebook, the one I had been writing in.
She gave me a confused look. “Huh? I thought you were reading your textbook?”
“I was using this notebook as my textbook.” I handed her the one I had been looking at.
She flipped through the notebook and commented, “You have surprisingly girly handwriting. Your letters are all round and cute. And you use colored pens?”
“Well, that’s not my notebook.”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
“Those are notes someone else took. I really suck at Japanese history, and the person who took those notes sucks at science. So we swap notebooks before tests to study each other’s notes.”
“Why would you do something like that? Sounds like a pain!”
“What we were just talking about. Output. I take science notes in a way that will be easy for her to understand, and she does the same with Japanese history for me.” That forces me to take neater notes for her sake and focus on the important points, which makes for good review for me too, and she does the same. Then, since her notes are so thorough and neat, it makes me want to study harder to repay her for going to all the trouble, and it forces me to do a better job studying a subject I dislike. I let out an embarrassed chuckle. “It’s the same as teaching each other. See? So you can do it by yourself.”
“What...?” She seemed a little bewildered.
“Hm? What is it?”
“Uh, um, nothing. I was just startled because you had such a tender smile on your face.”
“Did I?” I asked after a pause. I touched my cheeks. I couldn’t tell. “Anyway, this is what I’ve been teaching Hanamizawa-san. Are you satisfied now?”
“Yeah...”
“What are you doing after this? I don’t have to go shopping now, so I’m thinking of staying here and studying for a while.”
“Well, that test is coming up, so I think I’ll study a bit more too.”
And so we continued studying. I didn’t set a timer this time, since I figured we’d both go home when we got to a natural stopping point.
“I don’t like this feeling,” Ido-san murmured all of a sudden. I glanced over at her, but she hadn’t even looked up from her notes. I figured she wanted to chat while we studied. “All I do is spend time with my friends and people point and say we’re just the cool kids who can’t stand up to peer pressure.”
I didn’t say anything.
“What’s so wrong about spending time with people you get along with and having fun? Why do people have to look at me like that? I hate it.”
I glanced over at her again and she was gritting her teeth like she was holding something back. She had such a sad, frustrated look on her face. I could tell there were some intense feelings welling up inside of her that she was fighting to keep contained.
“If you’re having fun being with other people, who cares?” I said, but she glared at me.
“Oh, please. I bet you think I’m just some weakling who can’t do anything alone! That’s why you’re probably just making fun of me! I spend time with everyone because I like it!” All her feelings rushed out as she yelled at me. I was glad it was just the two of us in the classroom. Anyone else probably would’ve thought she was nuts.
I was surprised that’s what had been on her mind this whole time, though. I guess everyone had their own issues they were struggling with. “That’s why you’re probably just making fun of me!” Was I?
“I’ve definitely thought it must be hard to always go along with the crowd.”
“I knew it.” She turned her face away in a huff.
“But I never thought you were weak, and I never made fun of you.”
She looked back at me, her eyes wide. “Liar.”
“It’s the truth.” What could I say to make her believe me? “Hmm... All right, so a while back, there were a ton of light novels and manga series that had unpopular kids as the main characters.”
“Huh? What are you talking about?”
“Just listen. The main characters would always say something along the lines of, ‘I bet those popular kids just make fun of people like me! They’re probably laughing and talking about what awful social skills we have!’ You know, that kinda thing. Anyway, there was a bigger difference between popular kids and unpopular kids in stories that took place at school. The whole theme back then was basically ‘Cool kids can go to hell!’”
Ido-san didn’t say anything, so I figured I could continue. “Worst case, sometimes a popular kid would be nice to the main character and they’d be like, ‘I bet you’re just feeling sorry for me!’ or ‘You’re so fake! You’re just trying to make yourself look good!’ and they’d never accept anything the cool kids had to say.”
“Isn’t that being a little too self-conscious? Maybe the other person was genuinely trying to be nice?”
“You’re exactly right. They were definitely being too self-conscious,” I said, propping my cheek up on my hand. “And they only realize that later on when they’re looking back at it—that the person with the worst intentions was themselves. That the cool kid was just trying to be nice. But they hurt them, and ended up hurting themselves too. And so now they’re filled with shame and regret.”
“And it becomes, like, their dark backstory?”
“Ah ha ha. Yep, that’s right.” I turned towards her. “Don’t you think that sounds really similar to what you just did to me?”
“What?!” All of a sudden her face tensed up.
“Don’t you think you’re being a little too self-conscious? You never heard the unpopular kids saying any of that. You’re putting words into their mouths, just like those stories I told you about.”
“W-Well...”
“I realize I’m not popular in this class. But I’ve never heard anyone say a bad thing about you or your friends.” I figured that mostly had to do with the fact that the popular kids never bad-mouthed the unpopular kids either. Surely it would be different if they got into a fight or something, but Ido-san and Hanamizawa-san were good people. No one had any reason to talk badly about them.
Ido-san seemed stunned. I looked right into her eyes as I spoke. “I only really learned about how things were for the cool kids once I read those books where there were those conflicts that happened over and over. And I thought, ‘Man, cool kids have it rough sometimes too.’”
She stared at me silently.
“At some point I stopped being jealous of them, and my life got a lot easier because of it. Actually, I feel like cool kids might even have it worse.”
“So the unpopular kids don’t think badly of the cool kids?” she asked, and I nodded.
“Yeah. Just like how the cool kids were only trying to be nice in those books.”
“Oh... I guess I made a big deal out of nothing.” She looked like a huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders.
“In our class, at least.”
“Yeah...” All of a sudden she smiled at me. “Um... I’m really sorry I blew up at you like that. But after talking to you—well, I don’t know how to put it, but I just feel a lot better now. I was so worried this whole time for nothing. It’s such a weird feeling.”
“Well, I’m glad to hear it.”
“I understand why Kanon likes talking to you now.”
“I’m not glad to hear that!” I’d prefer if she left me alone.
She giggled. “Sorry, but we can’t help it. We’re both extroverts who love being with people.”
Now it was my time to be speechless. I turned to frown at Ido-san, who just laughed even harder.
◊◊◊
The next day, during break.
“Yashiro.”
I’d just pulled out a book to read when Ido-san came over. “Thanks for talking to me yesterday.”
“Oh. Sure.”
“I feel so much better after talking to you. But there is one thing that’s been bothering me,” she said, taking a seat on my desk. She leaned over, putting her elbow on my shoulder. What was with this suddenly intimate position? “You said if you can do it in a group and have fun, you can enjoy it alone too. But I think I have fun because I’m with everyone in a group.”
“Hm... For example?”
“Well, I can’t think of an example right now, but...” She pulled away from me and crossed her arms. “But it’s bothering me, so go with me on this one. I feel like if you have fun because you’re with other people, then you won’t be able to enjoy the same thing if you do it alone. So I want you to prove to me that you can have fun doing those same things by yourself.”
“I don’t know why I need to prove it to you... Wait, do you mean you want me to prove I can have fun by myself, or you can have fun by yourself?”
“Well I doubt we think the same things are fun,” she said, rolling her eyes. Well, that’s not very nice.
I had no obligation to go along with her, but I had a feeling she wouldn’t take no for an answer.
“A barbecue... You can definitely grill meat by yourself. Solo camping is definitely getting more popular lately... Hm, I guess I can’t think of anything. I’m stumped.” She was really getting worked up over this.
Just then, Hanamizawa-san came over. “Hm? What are you two talking about?”
Ido-san looked at her and laughed triumphantly. “Nothing. ‘It’s a secret between me and Yashiro!’”
“Grrrr! Are you trying to get back at me from before? C’mon, Yashiro-kun! Tell me!”
Ah, jeez. Here we go again. All I wanted to do was read my book in peace. Why did this have to keep happening?
◊◊◊