However, the unshakable truth was that he’d saved me from danger.
“T-Th-Tha-Thank you,” I stammered─while getting my hands on his chest and pushing him away, since he was still embracing me.
“Mm-hmm.”
He let go with surprising readiness─leaving me feeling quite guilty for treating my savior like a pervert. He didn’t seem the least bit bothered, however.
“So you like stargazing?” he asked, looking straight up at the sky.
“Um… What makes you think that?” I asked in return, trying to gauge the proper distance between us─the physical distance, of course, but also the psychological distance, which was hard to figure out since I knew nothing about him.
“The deduction was very simple─elementary, really. That is, I can’t think of any other reason why someone would be on the roof alone at this time of night.”
He grinned.
His ridiculously roundabout way of talking, the haughty word “deduction,” and his snarky smile didn’t suit his read of the situation─at night, I like to look at stars from the roof of the school.
It would probably be absurd to tell him he should find the two mistakes in that sentence…
He started talking again, breaking into my thoughts. “I know how you feel, getting lost in those beautiful sparkling stars. I love them, too,” he mused, barking further up the wrong tree. “After all, those beautiful sparkling stars do me the favor of casting me in a beautiful light.”
On and on with his completely off-base─huh?
Wasn’t there something odd about what he’d just said?
I did a doubletake, thinking, Oh my goodness, I must have been so exasperated I wasn’t paying attention and misheard him, but the mysterious character just went on talking.
“Looking for something?” he asked again. “If that’s the case, I’m ready and willing to help.”
Help? Hardly. The whole reason I was on the verge of throwing myself off the roof in despair of the world was that he had asked me that question out of the blue.
“…What makes you think that?”
Once again, I answered his question with a question.
It was ridiculous, what did I expect from this boy I’d never even met before? There’s not a person in the world who could find the mistakes in my sentence, which is to say, find my mistakes.
“Another elementary deduction. The most elementary of elementary logic. Only someone who was completely absorbed in searching for something could have failed to notice my beautiful self standing so close by.”
He said that. He genuinely said that. “My beautiful self.”
Realizing with terror that even if he wasn’t a pervert he was definitely a sketchy character, and worse, he was standing right next to me, I was feverishly attempting to figure out an escape route when he tilted his head to the side with an inquisitive “Hmmm?” and made a comment that obliterated all my sensible thoughts.
“Oh my, how could I have been so inobservant? I was so taken by the way your long hair looked from behind that I didn’t notice until now. You have very beautiful eyes.”
His words didn’t just obliterate my sensible thoughts, they infuriated me. I flew into a ferocious fury.
Maybe he intended them as a compliment, or maybe they were merely a social nicety, but they were the exact words I least wanted to hear─a flowery phrase that had the power to make me angrier than a hundred insults.
I took my glasses from my pocket and put them on as quickly as I could─I had to do something, anything, because even if this guy was sketchy, he was still my savior, and I was in grave danger of screaming at him. I wanted to avoid that.
“What? Why are you trying to hide those beautiful eyes of yours? What a shame to hide something so beautiful. If it’s because I’m too dazzling, I’ll happily dial back my aura, but you must take those glasses off at all costs. And you needn’t worry that the beauty of your eyes will be dulled by standing next to me. Beauty is not something that can be compared.”
Was this guy trying to get punched?
Jabbing away at my weakest spot over and over like that, I could only imagine he was trying to make me mad. My anger had passed the boiling point and was now going critical, which had the reverse effect of making me smile.
With a strained grin on my face, I belatedly answered his question. “Yes, I’m looking for something. Would you be so kind as to assist me?”
It’s not that the sketchball was winning me over─my insane anger was just making my words come out strange. I didn’t even want his help. If anything, I wanted him to disappear.
But I also wanted to give this weirdo a hard time by putting him on the spot─by gratuitously telling him my sob story. It wasn’t just because he’d brought up my eyes─I was also mad that he’d interfered with my last night of stargazing, which I’d at least hoped to spend in a quiet, peaceful state of mind. Though to be perfectly honest, I also wanted to take out my feelings about the whole miserable situation on him.
Perhaps I was trying to pull this excessively cheerful boy, this perfect stranger, into the final act of my dream, which was to end this very night─but for all his talk about logic and deductions, he didn’t even notice my vile scheming.
“Of course! Leave it to me. All aboard the icebreaker, full speed ahead!” he said, puffing out his chest.
To the contrary, he seemed delighted, like my request was exactly what he wanted to hear─icebreaker, huh?
He was really bending over backwards for me.
“After all, selfless service to others is the fundament of beauty! I’ll need to hear your story, so come along with me─you’re really in luck, by the way. All the principal members should be there today.”
“M…Members?”
For some reason, I sensed dark clouds gathering.
I thought I’d done a neat job of ensnaring him in my malicious trap, but now I got the strong sense that I was the one who’d been ensnared─had I made some terrible misstep?
“Come along with you…um…where?” I asked nervously. His response confirmed my ominous hunch.
“Why, isn’t it obvious? To the headquarters of the Pretty Boy Detective Club, of course!” he proclaimed proudly.
And with that, I unfortunately became involved with the Pretty Boy Detective Club, that mysterious and much-talked-about organization with which I had fortunately avoided involvement up until that day.