“Heh-heh. Are you saying the drink is bad after making me buy it?” said Fuyuko. “You’re a sadist, Haruru. I’m about to flood this place with salt water.” Fuyuko, who was seated on my left, gazed at the sports drink can with a desolate expression on her face and fell silent. It felt like their master-slave dynamic was going to continue even after we graduated. That reminded me… “What can you do? Haruru’s got a unique palate,” I said, looking at Fuyuko. Fuyuko nodded. “She really does.” We weren’t trying to be sarcastic by saying, “Miss Haruru thinks she’s too good for us,” or something; there was a real reason behind it. “Sometimes, I get really sick of my body! I can only drink certain kinds of juice—there are snacks and fast food items I can’t eat, too, and my palate’s way too picky!” Annoyed, Haruru finished the sports drink in one go and crushed the can. There were many people in the world, like wine sommeliers, who had a more refined palate than the average person just because of their profession. But Haruru had an even more unique palate than that. “Haruru, you can tell someone’s health or mood by tasting their fluids, like blood or sweat, right? Isn’t that a pretty interesting skill to have?” True to Fuyuko’s words, Haruru’s palate was on another level—like in America, where people with a discerning palate were apparently called “supertasters.” “It’s never been useful, though. The only time was when I tasted my boyfriend’s half-finished coffee, found it tasted like another girl, and hounded him until he confessed that he was cheating.” “That’s useful as hell! Wait, Haruru, you had a boyfriend?” “Ha-ha, I just made that up. But classmates who know about it have asked me to do stuff like that before. I said no because I didn’t know them that well, though.” “Most mystery novels would fall apart if you were the protagonist… That kind of skill would make a detective weep.” At that point, it was practically ESP. More of a sixth sense than a palate. “But if it was you two, licking your sweat or blood would be…fine?” “The only other people in the world who would say that are vampires.” “By the way, any fluid that comes out of your body works. Like p—” I had a hunch that she was about to say something insensitive, so I stuffed a towel in her mouth. Both my friends had no shame… “Blecch… Nagi, your towel tastes like the daily lunch special from the cafeteria…” “How?! I brushed my teeth afterward! You’re the one who’s particular!” “Nagisa, they say your first kiss tastes like lemon, but it actually tastes like whatever you ate or drank just before. You should carry mouthwash.” “Shut up! Don’t talk like you’ve already had your first kiss!” “Then seeing as we’re both inexperienced… Want to practice with me?” “We are not getting into a flowery yuri romantic comedy here,” I said. For some reason, Fuyuko and Haruru looked at each other and blushed. Had something happened? A flowery development that I didn’t know about? Oh, right, she said she was inexperienced, so it was probably one of her usual jokes. “You’re so responsible, Nagisa. I’m worried that when you’re a college student, some bad boy will lure you into his apartment and do something irresponsible under the influence of alcohol.” “Oh, I can see it, too. He’ll say, ‘How about you do something irresponsible for once?’ and just like that, birds will be chirping in the morning.” “I-if I’m going to do something irresponsible, I’ll be upfront and honest about it!” “Doesn’t that declaration sound a little forced?” “She’s definitely gonna fall for the wrong guy… Oh, I’ve got a message. It’s from Koyo!” Saying that, Haruru retrieved her phone from her cleavage. Her cleavage…? “Haruru, where did you just pull your phone out from…?” “It was in the way, so I wedged it in there when I went to the bathroom before. My very own Haruru Agarie special phone case! Isn’t it funny?” “I think that case could withstand any impact. My brain might not survive the blow it just took, though.” “More importantly, Koyo says a student just came into the pool from the pathway! They’re probably in the locker room already! Wh-what do we do?” Fuyuko and I exchanged glances and nodded at the panicked Haruru. “I’ll head to the locker room. Can I leave the pool exits to you two?” “Got it. But let me back you up, Nagisa. There’s a chance the culprit might resort to violence.” “I’ll guard the exits, then! I’ll stay on the phone with Koyo, so don’t worry about me! Now, let’s hurry!” We rushed from the pool and moved to our positions. Haruru covered the exit that led to the pathway, while Fuyuko stood next to me, prepared for a potential emergency. I opened the locker room door a crack and peered inside. “Someone’s there…! Is that our yellow-panty prankster?” They wore a school-issued tracksuit, a cap from the baseball team pulled down low, and a white mask on their face. Could it be that culprit was on the baseball team? No, it was probably a disguise. “Bet they’re rummaging through our lockers.” Fuyuko peered inside, too, observing the culprit’s actions. The culprit opened three lockers, checked something…and closed them again. Their hands were empty. Our wallets and clothes were safe. Then the culprit pulled something out from a bag that had been in the pocket of their tracksuit. “They stuck them on the locker.” They had attached panties on Haruru and Fuyuko’s lockers with packing tape. Mine was next. I was struck again by how creepy the culprit’s behavior was. “H-huh? Is he leaving?” The culprit put the packing tape in their pocket and started to leave. Oh, I get it. So that’s how it is? So what they were trying to say was I wasn’t worth giving a pair of yellow panties to. In other words, I was the only one safe. No damage at all. That… …really pissed me off! “Hold it right there! I’ll never let a total perv like you get away with this!” Before I knew it, I’d kicked the door open, driven by rage, and burst in. Fuyuko entered next and immediately locked the door. “You can’t get away now. Your days of satisfying this particular fetish are over!” The moment we were about to approach the culprit, he turned his back on us and made a break for the locker room window. I got it. It was the only place he could possibly escape to, and I understood the impulse to try. “…Ugh! Ungh…!” He removed the lock and desperately tried to yank the window sideways, but it was no use. “Sorry, but we already took care of that from outside, using the classic method of jamming the window. Well, then…” “I-I-I-I’m so sorry! Please forgive me!” The culprit knelt on the ground and pressed his head to the floor. Ah, this was awkward. “Even if you apologize, even if your voice is cute, we won’t forgive you…huh? Your voice is cute?” I thought maybe my ears were malfunctioning, but Fuyuko looked surprised, too. In the face of our confusion, the culprit removed their baseball cap and mask—and it wasn’t the high school boy twisted by lust that I’d imagined. “K-Kogane?” It was a girl from the same class as us—Kokoa Kogane. After apprehending Kogane for the time being, we finished changing and headed to the nurse’s office to ask her why she was doing this, along with Ms. Koyomi. We considered handing her over to the teacher in charge immediately, but it didn’t feel right doing that to a classmate. Besides, I didn’t think Kogane was doing this for her own gratification. “And? Why were you doing something so fetishy, Kogane?” “Oh, you can call me Kokoa, Miss Natsunagi. We’re friends.” “Are you trying to escape your crime by suddenly being all buddy-buddy with me?! Just saying, that won’t work!” “N-no…I really meant it.” Kogane’s—Kokoa’s awkward smile made my face heat up. I’d fallen into the same back and forth I did with my own friends, and when she seemed conflicted, my heart sank… “We may have never hung out before, but we’re in the same class, and that means we’re friends. Right, Miss Natsunagi?” “If so, it bugs me that you’re still calling me ‘Miss,’ but…well, whatever. Why were you giving out yellow panties?” I asked her bluntly. She fell silent. I was even more confused that someone whose definition of a friend was so broad was doing something like this. Still, she likely understood that she couldn’t just refuse to answer, and she slowly explained the reason to us. “…A pervert at the station took a video of me.” We were shocked by her confession. That kind of thing wasn’t exactly rare, but it was despicable and repulsive. “Oh, he didn’t grope me, though. I was on the escalator, and he…put his phone up my skirt. Then he jumped on the train and got away.” “That’s a common method. It’s inexcusable that such a cute student had to suffer through that. Didn’t you talk to your homeroom teacher or the police?” Ms. Koyomi admonished her gently, but Kokoa shook her head. “I thought about it. But…I was scared of the video being shared. If it was posted online…everyone would find out what happened to me.” If she had told someone, and patrols were increased without proper planning, the jerk might have realized what was going on and disappeared. Meaning she would never be able to retrieve the original data. “You must’ve been scared, Kokoa. But how is that connected to you giving out yellow panties?” “Um, well…that’s what I was wearing the day it happened. So I thought it would be okay as long as no one could pinpoint that it was me in the video.” “Uhhh, so that means…?” “If I gave out this underwear to everyone and got a lot of girls to wear them thinking they were ‘panties of happiness,’ no one would know I was the one it happened to, right? I know it was a horrible idea, but…” “Sure, but how would anyone be able to pinpoint you from just our school uniform and yellow underwear? No one even knew you were wearing the—” I got that far and came up with a possibility. There was probably someone who knew. Like someone of the opposite sex who you could go underwear shopping together with, even if you were embarrassed. In short— “You mean…you didn’t want your boyfriend to know?” I asked. Kokoa’s face turned bright red, and she nodded slightly. Her boyfriend would be just as shocked as she was to have a creepshot of his girlfriend online, and she didn’t know what he might do out of anger. So Kokoa had caused this incident to avoid unnecessary trouble. “Even if he couldn’t see my face, he could tell by the design of the blazer and skirt what school I went to. There’s always a chance my classmates could find it… Wa, waaah.” Kokoa finally burst into tears while Fuyuko gently patted her on the back. In this day and age, social media was everywhere. The possibility that one of the hundreds of boys at school could find the video and share it with his friends in a rush of excitement was very real. “That’s absolutely unforgiveable,” I said quietly, and Kokoa’s shoulders twitched. I turned to this girl filled with guilt and fear and said, “He won’t get away with this. I’ll never…forgive a pervert!” “…Huh?” For some reason, Kokoa’s eyes had widened, like she’d expected me to tell her off. I wondered why she thought I’d yell at her. “We’re proxy detectives, and we’ll catch that cowardly scumbag! Then we’ll make him wear ghost-pepper-coated underwear and walk him on all fours to the police station!” The blood coursing through my body boiled with anger, and the anger was transformed into words that rushed out my mouth. “Hey, Fuyuko! Haruru! And Ms. Koyomi! Do you have any good ideas? Give me your best idea on how to catch this scumbag threatening the peace of high school girls!” The three of them nodded intently. Then Haruru took a step forward and made her suggestion. “Leave it to me! I have an ace up my sleeve to flush out those rabble controlled by lust!” “An ace up your sleeve…?” I said. “Fine, do whatever. Use me as you like. I’ll do whatever it takes to punish a pervert who thinks he can do anything he wants!” “Heh-heh. That’s what I love about you, Nagi! Then I guess it’s time to bust this out.” Saying that, Haruru produced from her schoolbag… It was seven PM, past dusk. We’d finished our strategy meeting at the nurse’s office, and we headed to the station where Kokoa had been victimized. It was the nearest station to the school. Kokoa usually managed the baseball club, and the day she was secretly filmed, she got off to do some shopping in front of the station after club. “I get it. The evening rush has slowed a bit, but a high school girl would still stand out. It’s the perfect time to hunt for targets.” Fuyuko calmly analyzed the plaza in front of the station. We’d taken a couple buses to get here. “I’d always thought the escalator at this station was dangerous. It’s long and steep, so someone might try to see up your skirt if it’s short enough.” Haruru similarly identified the station’s flaws. “U-um! Hey, you two…are we really doing this?” I was the only one who couldn’t stay calm. Of course I couldn’t. I mean, I was— “I mean, I totally look like a nympho!” I was wearing a shirt with the buttons wide-open and the tails tied at the bottom and a loose necktie. My belly button peeked out just a little if I stretched—it was really laying the gyaru style on thick. My skirt was rolled up as short as it could go, and the loose socks underneath were way too loud! “Produced by me! Isn’t it great? You look really slutty, Nagi!” “Th-that’s not a compliment! Cute or pretty would be fine, but this… Uuuugh! I’m too embarrassed—I can’t! I can’t!” I cowered instinctively, and Haruru just gave me a thumbs-up and muttered, “Good job!” I wanted to kick her. But if I did that, they’d see! Glimpses of…y’know, stuff! “You look so cute, Nagisa. If I were a guy, I’d approach you and ask, ‘How much?’” “That’s the worst thing you could possibly say! I don’t do things like that!” “Hm? I only meant it like, ‘How much did you pay for those socks?’ What did you think I meant, Nagisa? Heh-heh…you really are a naughty girl.” “Arghhh!” I talked a big game! I said I’d do anything! I flew too close to the sun! “Don’t tell me your strategy is a sting operation! That’s impossible!” No, if I thought about it, it was painfully clear. If we were dealing with a repeat offender and recreated the situation with a similar target… Put a high school girl out as bait, and the idiot would probably be all too happy to take it! “You’re being too shy, Nagi. You’ve got an undershirt on top and shorts underneath, so there should be no problem, right?” “…It’s still embarrassing!” “Your defense might look low, but your shielding is dynamite! It’s just like in RPGs where the strongest gear is the sexy stuff, right? Heh-heh!” “Don’t confuse fiction with reality, you nerdy gyaru!” “Sexy gear might improve her defense, but don’t you think it’ll damage her virtue?” “Fuyuko, if you’re gonna comment, don’t make it sexual harassment!” But I had no choice since I’d come this far. One station over—the nearest station to the school—Ms. Koyomi and Kokoa were standing by. The three of us would board the train bound for the school, the one the culprit used to escape, and flush him out. Even if we missed our chance to catch him inside the train, we wouldn’t let him escape. Since I had two friends I trusted, there was no need to worry. But still, still! “…Fine. I’ll do it. I’ll do it, but promise me something?” I grabbed Fuyuko’s and Haruru’s shoulders and glared at them as hard as I could. “If the culprit gets a video and escapes, I’ll take pictures of your panties and post them online as payback. Got it? We’re friends, right?” They seemed to understand that I wasn’t joking, and both nodded enthusiastically. I get it now. I understood a little bit how Kokoa must have felt. Yellow panties aren’t so scary if we all wear them. We entered the station, passed through the ticket gate, and got on the escalator. There didn’t seem to be any suspicious people yet. According to Kokoa, the Peeping Tom was a young man in a suit who stuck close behind her and put his phone up her skirt. Since this was a sting operation, I intentionally took the escalator alone, while the other two headed up the stairs to the second story platform, keeping an eye on me the whole time. Things seemed fine for the moment. “It’s pretty crowded. Be careful, Nagisa.” I met them at the platform and boarded the train that had just arrived. Like Fuyuko had said, it was still crowded for the time of day. The three of us got on the same car, with the two of them still watching me from a distance. “‘A young man in a suit’…huh.” As I stood in the corner of the car, there were three people near me who fit the description. They were all on their phones and didn’t look at me directly, though. It felt like our eyes met a few times. This wasn’t good. I had to stay facing the door without looking at anyone’s face. “…One of them moved,” I relayed to Haruru and Fuyuko through the wireless earbuds in my hand. Just one. There was one man who had crept several steps behind me. W-was he watching me? My smooth, pale thighs protruded from under my skirt. Since the skirt was shorter than normal, it gave the illusion that you could see all the way to the tops of them. If I bent over just a little, everything would be on display, even though I was wearing shorts. No matter what, I couldn’t drop anything. Plus, if someone was standing next to me, they could get a good peek at my chest through the open shirt. I couldn’t explain away anything in this outfit. Yikes. Seeing my reflection in the glass door…I might have been a total nympho. “Hmm…?” There was a guy standing next to me before I knew it… No, he was too young for that. He looked maybe halfway through elementary school. He was on the small side, about as tall as my chest. But the problem was… “Uh-oh! He’s looking at you, Nagi.” Haruru’s voice came through the earbuds in my ears. The boy was probably on his way home from cram school. He was holding a blue backpack in front of him and swaying with the motion of the train. But his gaze wasn’t focused on the streets rushing past beyond the glass door… It was on my thighs. “He’s at that age where he’s curious, heh-heh. I wonder if he likes older women?” “Shut up. Don’t be dumb.” I brushed off Fuyuko in the barest whisper and tried to continue the sting operation, but the boy’s eyes were glued to me. A kid his age with a thigh fetish wasn’t going to amount to anything. No, unless… “……!” I lifted the hem of my shirt just a little, and the boy’s eyes widened in wonder. I knew it. He was staring at my belly button. Why would he even look there? My breasts and butt could hold their own, but… It was a belly button. Didn’t he see anything else he liked? What happened today and my belly button would probably stay in this boy’s memory for the rest of his life. I see, I see… I’m going to be a memory to this kid. Would he think back to this day in junior high or high school, or even as an adult? He had a cute face for such a naughty boy. What was this? I was feeling a real thrill. Since he was already looking, just a little more, a very little—from this older woman— “The exit will now be on the left. Please don’t forget any belongings as you disembark…” An announcement marked our arrival at the station. H-huh? What was I just about to do…? I had the nagging feeling I’d gotten too caught up in my fantasies and almost did something strange. “Good job, Nagisa. We were watching from over there, but we didn’t see any suspicious men… What’s the matter?” “Oh? Nagi, why are you all red? Still embarrassed?” “I—I didn’t do anything, okay?!” I-I’m not a nympho! I’m not!” I shouted once we were on the platform. The two of them stared at me in puzzlement. Ugh… I’m the worst. He was such a cute boy, and I was trying to flaunt my belly button at him. I’d rather be the one getting bullied! It’s all this outfit’s fault! “Whoa. Nagi’s face is all red again, and she’s off in her own world!” “I bet she was fantasizing about doing naughty things to that shota who was standing next to her!” B-bingo! No! It was only an attempt! Nothing actually happened! I didn’t violate the law or the boy’s body whatsoever! “M-m-more importantly, that means…our culprit never got on board?” “Not that we know of. Let’s meet up with Ms. Koyomi and Kokoa for now and decide whether we should continue the sting into tomorrow.” “…It’s your turn tomorrow, okay?” “Hey! You guys! Something’s going down in front of the station!” shouted Haruru, who had gone down the escalator first. We hurried to the ticket gate and saw a number of black and white cars stopped at the traffic circle ahead. “Patrol cars? Was there trouble?” “Miss Natsunagi!” Ms. Koyomi came rushing over while we tried to make sense of the situation. “Ms. Koyomi, what’s going on?” “They caught the Peeping Tom in the suit!” “…Whaaat?! H-how? We didn’t even get to do anything.” Confused, we left the crowd forming at the scene and got the whole story from Ms. Koyomi in front of a nearby convenience store. “After you all took the bus to the next station for the sting operation, Kokoa and I were guarding the station when all hell broke loose…” The two of them had been caught up in the commotion, and they headed for the ticket gate at the station, where they saw him. “There was a bloodied and battered man in a suit lying at the bottom of the stairs leading to the platform. He was clutching a phone.” “Don’t tell me…!” “Yep. That was our culprit. The station staff quickly caught up with him, arrested him, and immediately reported it to the police. Apparently, he was caught secretly filming inside the train and tried to flee when the train reached this station.” “And he was in such a hurry that he slipped and fell?” “No. Apparently, he collided with a high school boy who was passing by and tumbled down the stairs. It’s unclear if the high schooler bumped into him on purpose, though…” My heart jumped when I heard that a high school boy was suddenly involved in the incident. There was no way. No, it couldn’t be. A boy who just happened to be present at various incidents and helped solve them. I wondered if that high school boy could be him. “N-Nagisa! What’s with you all of a sudden?” I took off, wanting to clear my doubts. Where had he gone? If he was still on the scene, he might have helped the police to some extent. Surveying the traffic circle, I…suddenly noticed a single police car parked farther away. A boy in a school uniform was opening its door and about to get into the back seat. “W-wait!” I shouted, but he didn’t hear. The police car was already gone before my legs could move. I might have had the wrong person. There was a possibility it might have been a complete stranger. Even so… My chest—my heart—had a hunch. Its rhythm was etched into me so strongly that it was scary. I had a feeling it was telling me that he was the boy. “Are you all right, Miss Natsunagi?” Ms. Koyomi called out, snapping me back to reality. She had followed me over, and Fuyuko and Haruru were with her. I noticed something. “I’m fine. By the way, where’s Kokoa? I haven’t seen her the whole time.” “When I told the police that she’d been filmed without her consent, they decided to talk to her at the police station. Don’t worry; she seemed very relieved.” “I see… I wonder if we helped her out in the end.” “You did. Thanks to you proxy detectives, a wounded girl was saved. You all did well.” I knew this was insignificant compared to something like a global crisis. It was just a small mystery, something that could happen to anyone in their daily life. Yet in the end, we’d helped someone. If we could right one wrong with our efforts and time— “Being proxy detectives might not be so bad after all, heh-heh,” I murmured, and Fuyuko and Haruru smiled and nodded back. I couldn’t have done it alone. It did feel like the high school boy who’d appeared out of nowhere had taken all the credit, though. It seemed the three of us could do anything. “Here’s a reward for the three of you, then. Should we go have some ramen?” Ms. Koyomi asked, starting to walk ahead of us. “Really, Koyo? Ramen for four girls? Sure, I’m hungry, but don’t pancakes fit the bill more?” Haruru pouted, and Ms. Koyomi cocked her head in doubt. “Is that so? Then let’s look for a pancake restaurant that serves alcohol.” “Ms. Koyomi, don’t tell me you were after beer instead of noodles? What about you, Nagisa? I’m fine with that bubble tea you were looking forward to, or whatever.” “Ramen’s fine. Let’s go!” Everyone seemed surprised by my positive reaction. There were definitely things I longed for in my everyday life. Bubble tea was one of them…but actually, maybe I was fine with anything. “Four girls going out for ramen might be enough of a high school dream by itself, don’t you think?” I couldn’t have known this back when I was always eating hospital food alone—the important thing wasn’t what you were eating; it was who you were eating it with. “If Nagi says so, we have to. She had to endure all those lustful stares from men with her boobs and butt and belly button exposed, after all!” “I’d treat you to a bowl of ramen every day if it meant I could see you like that. To me, Nagi’s miniskirted gyaru style is a complete meal.” “Oh. By the way, Miss Natsunagi, that’s quite the outfit you’re wearing today. Our school does have loose rules, but I can’t approve of loose virtue.” The idiots (including the teacher who knew about the situation) were teasing me again…but it was fine. That high school boy was still bothering me, but I’d forget about it for now. Eating ramen together was way more important! Afterward… As it turned out, while Kokoa had been secretly filmed, the video wasn’t shared online or among the culprit’s acquaintances. The videos on the culprit’s confiscated phone hadn’t been traded on illicit websites or social media; they were just a personal hobby. Even so, it seemed there were quite a few victims, and the police were going to be wasting a lot of time on this creep from here on out. “I’m glad we avoided the worst-case scenario,” said Fuyuko. It was lunchtime, and we were having tea in the café space outside the cafeteria. Fuyuko took a sip of her lightly sweetened canned coffee, looking even nicer than usual since she was quiet. Not that I’d tell her that. “The yellow panties of happiness are still being treated like a rare item by the students, but I’m sure this weird craze will settle down soon!” Haruru was right. High school girls were susceptible to trends. The whole thing would fade away when no one was giving out underwear anymore. I was sure we would talk about it one day at a class reunion or something. I imagined my classmates a few years older, laughing together. What was with those panties? “Kokoa thanked us over and over, too, so it was worth the effort. Oh…I finished my drink. I’m going to throw it out.” The moment I stood up from my seat… It was a nice day out, with a gentle breeze that swept through at intervals, making it a pleasant afternoon. But the breeze wasn’t here to congratulate me on my accomplishments as a proxy detective. Instead, it played a childish trick on me. The breeze lifted my skirt, exposing what lay beneath to Fuyuko’s and Haruru’s gazes. “…I-it’s not like that. Kokoa gave them to me as a thank you! These are expensive! And even if you two don’t like them, I think they’re cute! Aren’t they? Aren’t they?!” My two best friends laughed at me as I desperately tried to explain myself. “I’ve seen those several times now, and I still think they’re hella lame, Nagisa. Hurry and take them off. I’ll take them home with me and let you wear my leggings instead.” “Nagi’s style is unique. So unique that I wouldn’t wear those for fifty thousand yen. They might bring you happiness, though. Ha-ha!” “Ughhhh! Th-they’re cute, I tell you! These have a cute design, no matter what you two say! I’m gonna wear them forever!” And that was how the Yellow Panties of Happiness incident came to a close. True to my word, I continued to wear the underwear Kokoa had given me for a while, but Fuyuko and Haruru forcefully gave me several pairs as gifts, too. I wasn’t going to wear them, but they wound up in my drawer anyway. But that’s another story.
Chapter 3
26 min read