Chapter 5: Meeting on a Narrow Road

Chapter 5: Meeting on a Narrow Road

“Hey, I saw that boy again. He’s seriously so good-looking... I really can’t hold back from asking for his contact info anymore, but I don’t dare, sob sob.”

“...Is he really not some celebrity? He’s dressed like a student too. Are boys nowadays all this handsome?”

On the subway, there were middle-aged people reading newspapers.

There were young people discussing fashion.

There were also girls whispering together in low voices.

Yatsuno Gen could even clearly sense that someone was secretly aiming a camera at him, pretending to chat as though nothing were happening while pressing the shutter.

Yatsuno Gen had long since grown used to all this.

Speaking of which, he did not care about his appearance. If he had a choice, he would not want to look so attention-grabbing.

But there was no helping it. His inborn temperament and divinely crafted handsomeness made him like a firefly in the dark night, the most dazzling diamond in a coal mine.

Sigh, if he could, he really did not want to be this handsome.

But what could he do about something he was born with?

After getting off the subway, he made his way familiarly to Shoujitsu Private High School.

In this season that made people hot and restless, yet also filled them with hope, it was easy to see countless girls in pleated skirts, wearing socks of various lengths.

They revealed legs in all different styles. A world full of legs throughout the school was truly wonderful.

When he entered Teaching Building One, an unusual aura appeared not far from him.

He turned his head slightly. It was that proud black swan.

The girl named Asagiri Rin had an outstanding figure and a noble temperament that seemed innate.

Beneath her dense black hair was a face exquisite to the extreme. It was just that her aura was cold enough to keep strangers far away.

Yatsuno Gen turned his head and glanced at her, seeing her gaze shift slightly toward him.

Yet the next moment, she quickened her pace and swiftly left Yatsuno Gen behind, as though some futures could only be reached by her alone.

When the sunlight in the corridor bathed her figure, even her side profile shone brightly because of it.

At last, she stopped at the end of the final stair. But when she turned her gaze downward toward the young man whose steps remained unhurried.

Kazama Sakura’s hand landed on Yatsuno Gen’s shoulder with cheerful excitement, causing the young man to turn back.

He did not see the unusual look that appeared in the eyes of the lofty black swan.

“Good morning!”

The girl seemed full of energy early in the morning, her smile sweet, as though she represented an entire blazing summer.

Yatsuno Gen looked at her with a smile.

“I really envy Kazama-san’s vitality.”

Kazama Sakura deliberately sighed helplessly.

“I would love to lend some of my energy to Yatsuno-san too, but unfortunately, Yatsuno-san is someone who is very hard to change.”

“Really? Do I look like some stubborn old man?”

“Not exactly. It’s just that Yatsuno-san has a very strong heart. Saying you envy me and all that must definitely be a joke.”

Kazama Sakura shook her head, and the ponytail behind her head swayed along with it.

“I didn’t expect that even though I hid it so well, Kazama-san would see through me so easily. Oh no, could it be that I’m actually living inside a youth mystery novel?”

“Talking nonsense again.”

Kazama Sakura stood on tiptoe beside the young man and reached out, seemingly wanting to tap his head. But because she did not dare get too close, even though she was roughly 1.7 metres tall (~5 ft 7 in), it still looked somewhat difficult.

But when Yatsuno Gen saw Kazama Sakura’s movement, he did not mock her for overestimating herself.

Just as Kazama Sakura was about to give up, he actually took the initiative to bend down slightly, then looked straight at her and blinked innocently.

That action made Kazama Sakura freeze in place, and then a sunset-like colour rose onto the girl’s cheeks.

Especially since this was a stairwell with people coming and going, she immediately turned away with her face red all the way to her ears.

“What are you doing?!”

“Didn’t you want to tap my head?”

“So you crouched down for me to tap it?”

“Yeah.”

“...”

The girl bit her lip and struggled to suppress the impulse of the little deer she had raised in her heart, which was about to smash through the wall around it.

“Are you an idiot? If someone wants to hit you, you even offer your head up for them to hit.”

The young man smiled, straightened his back, returned to that lazy standing posture, and stepped onto the next stair.

At the very front, Asagiri Rin had already vanished. In his impression, she seemed to have stopped at the end for an instant. What was it because of? It seemed as though there should be nothing that could make her stop.

“Because it’s Kazama-san, so it’s fine.”

The girl’s cheeks flushed as she cautiously stood on the same stair as the young man and muttered.

“You’re spouting nonsense to trick people again. You were clearly staring at Asagiri just now...”

“Hm? You saw that?”

The young man actually did not deny it, which made Kazama Sakura very unhappy. But from her position, she did not seem to have any reason to say she was unhappy.

So she could only carefully hide her little emotions.

“It’d be hard not to see, right?”

Only, that tone was also very hard to interpret as normal.

Yatsuno Gen smiled indifferently.

“It doesn’t matter if you saw. I didn’t say a single word to her. It was only because we happened to appear here together.”

“You say that as if the person who went up to confess to her not long after first year started, only to be rejected right away, wasn’t you.”

“I told you, that wasn’t a confession...”

“Then what was it? Did you know her before?”

Hearing Kazama Sakura say this, Yatsuno Gen’s expression paused for a moment.

Kazama Sakura bit her lower lip.

“I’m not interested in any of that anyway. Say it or don’t, whatever.”

Tap tap tap.

She quickly reached the top of the stairs, then looked at the handsome young man who was raising his head to gaze at her.

The girl proudly lifted her head, seeming to try to play the white swan he had called her.

“Hurry up, we’re going to class.”

“Mm.”

Yatsuno Gen indeed did not explain anything. In his view, there was no need to explain what had happened between himself and Asagiri Rin.

Back then, when first year had just begun, he had indeed walked up to that black swan in front of many people, but what he said had absolutely not been a confession.

But was there any need to explain? There was not, because people were more willing to believe the more topical possibility, only believing the truth they thought they knew.

And since she did not care, Yatsuno Gen naturally cared even less.

Life was long, and time flowed like water. Many old matters were suited to being buried in memories, with no need to bring them up again.

“Hurry inside. Don’t always arrive at school at the last second. Pay more attention in class.”

“...I understand, Teacher Yamazaki.”

When Yatsuno Gen arrived at the classroom door, Kazama Sakura, who had still been lively and full of energy earlier, was standing before a handsome young man with her head slightly lowered.

Her expression had clearly fallen.

The young man wore a shirt, his hair styled high. His face was fair and clean, and he also wore a pair of refined gold-rimmed glasses. He revealed a gentle smile.

“Alright. Come to my office at noon. There are some things about your studies I want to discuss with you.”

“...Okay.”

Kazama Sakura looked somewhat conflicted, but still agreed.

She turned her head and happened to see Yatsuno Gen looking in that direction. Yet he said nothing and walked straight into the classroom.

Yatsuno Gen calmly walked toward the doorway. That handsome young man, whose manner of dress was also rather flashy, frowned as he looked at Yatsuno Gen.

“You see me and don’t greet me. Are you waiting for your teacher to greet you first?”

Yatsuno Gen looked at this young man named Yamazaki Jihei, their class teacher.

“Teacher Yamazaki. You don’t greet one of the top three students in the year first, and instead wait for one of the top three students in the year to greet you? How arrogant.”

“What did you say?!”

Yamazaki Jihei’s expression immediately changed. The spring-breeze warmth he had shown Kazama Sakura turned into obvious anger born of embarrassment.

Yatsuno Gen ignored the first signs of the other party’s flustered rage and walked straight into the classroom.

Nor did he care at all what kind of gaze the other party, as his class teacher, would use to look at him from behind.

Arriving in the noisy classroom that had not fully quieted down, he sat in his seat and looked toward the front right, at the girl who had put down her school bag and now seemed entirely downcast.

Daylight fell upon her hanging hair.

Her hand, opening her textbook, was clenched very tightly, her knuckles turning pale.