I wasn’t sure what to say.
“Is it wrong to hide things from your friends? I mean, do they even really think of me as a friend? And do I really think of them as friends? Honestly, I ask myself that a lot. Ah ha ha... It’s not even funny though, is it...” She gave a self-deprecating chuckle as she propped her cheek on her hand. “Maybe if I made some otaku friends, I wouldn’t have to hide hobbies like these. We could share all the things we like and really understand each other. Maybe then I could make real friendships,” she said.
“That’s stupid,” I replied bluntly.
“Huh?”
“Just because you’re both otaku doesn’t mean you’d magically understand each other. Plus, otaku are people who have a really solid sense of self.” I set down my pen and looked right at her while I spoke. “Let’s say you love collecting plastic models, so you only make friends with people who also love that. Some people only collect Bandai models, and some only collect Tamiya models. And in the Bandai group, some will only collect model cars, or radio controlled cars, or mini four-wheel drives. See how many categories there are just with plastic models? There are countless more when it comes to anime and manga. It’s not as simple as just ‘sharing things you love’ with each other.”
“B-But kids at school always look like they’re having so much fun talking about that stuff,” she said, but I had no idea what she was talking about.
“They’re probably having fun just talking about it since they know they’re not gonna find anyone who shares their exact interests. They like to listen to others talking about their interests, and they try to get them to understand their own. Sometimes it just turns into bragging about who knows the most, though.”
“Seriously? That doesn’t sound much different from what goes on in my group!” Hanamizawa-san murmured, looking astonished.
I nodded. “Yep. Friend groups are all like that, whether you’re popular or not. No one’s ever gonna completely understand you. So sometimes you just gotta go along with what someone says, or have them go along with you, and build up a friendship that way. You’ll have to decide whether or not you’re satisfied with that relationship.”
“Satisfied? How can you be satisfied if they don’t even understand you?” She stared at her lap with downcast eyes. It sounded like she was forcing her words out.
“It’s impossible for anyone to ever understand everything about you. But sometimes you can find that one thing that both of you understand,” I said. She looked up with a gasp. “For example, I once recommended this manga to a friend of mine. The main character is an unpopular girl and the story takes a while to get going at first. It’s also a long story, so my friend got frustrated with it really quickly.”
Hanamizawa-san didn’t say anything.
“So I gave my friend the volume where things start to get really interesting, and the volume where it gets resolved. It was like five volumes ahead of where she stopped, but I said, ‘Just read these two volumes!’”
“So what happened?”
“After my friend read them she asked, ‘How did things end up like this?’ She was so curious about the story, she went and bought the other volumes from where she left off. She wanted to see what happened so badly, she even bought the next few volumes. Now we’re following the series together, even though at first she said it was boring.” I felt myself smiling as I remembered the look on her face when that happened. “It made me really happy that she finally understood why I like that manga so much.”
“Oh...”
“Obviously that didn’t always happen with every manga I’ve recommended to someone. But at the very least, someone started liking something I liked too. That’s good enough, right?”
“And that’s why the otaku look like they’re having so much fun?” she asked, and I nodded.
“I think so.”
“Oh, I get it now.” She stared at me for a few moments. “Do you like DIVA songs, Yashiro-kun?”
“Hm? Maybe not enough to get up and dance, but I think they’re fun to watch.”
“Oh, okay.” She said with a smile. “That’s good enough for me.”
◊◊◊
“I had a lot of fun today, Yashiro-kun,” Hanamizawa-san said with a cheerful look on her face. Our time at karaoke had come to an end. “It’s really fun to just go all out and do whatever you want. I feel like I could get addicted to this.”
“That’s good.”
She clasped her hands behind her back and started fidgeting. “H-Hey, Yashiro-kun?”
“What?”
“Um... Would you do this again? You know, come with me while I do karaoke alone?”
I flashed her a grin. “Go by yourself next time.”
◊◊◊
A while later...
“Hey, Chi-chan! Look at this video!”
“What? Another DIVA concert, Kanon? I mean, she’s cute and all, but you don’t have to show me those videos every single day...”
I saw Hanamizawa-san trying to show DIVA videos to her friend in the front of the classroom. Her friend had a reluctant look on her face like she couldn’t care less as Kanon kept pushing her phone towards her.
“Let’s go to her concert sometime! I’m dying to see her perform live.”
“Huh? But I don’t care about DIVA.”
“I went with you to see the movie adaptation of that shojo manga I didn’t care about, remember?”
“Ugh... Fine. Just this once though, okay?”
Looks like things are going smoothly, I thought. Just then, Kanon noticed I was watching her and waved at me. “Ah ha ha... Whoa!” I waved back out of formality, but suddenly I felt this strange, ticklish pressure on my back like I was being poked in my funny bone or something.
◊◊◊