After Being Dumped With the Insult, “You’re So Clingy!” and Finding Her in Despair, I Kept Encouraging My Beautiful Classmate and as a Result, That Beautiful Girl Started Directing Her Heavy Emotions Toward Me Instead, but Since I Like Emotionally Heavy Girls, It’s No Problem - 10

Chapter 10: A Talk with Senkawa

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I called Senkawa out and decided to hear him out. After school, I waited for him in an empty classroom. The setting sun streamed in through the windows, and it was a little too bright, so I was closing the curtains when I heard the door slide open behind me. It seemed the person I was waiting for had arrived. I turned around and spoke.

“Sorry for calling you out so suddenly. I’m Kokonoe from Class 3.”

“I’m Senkawa from Class 4. …So, what did you want to talk to me about?”

Reiji Senkawa. I had passed by him a few times before, but this was the first time we had actually faced each other and spoken. I saw what Musashi meant. He was good-looking. Probably among the top in this school. But there was a certain arrogance seeping through his expression, and personally, he wasn’t the type I could like.

After briefly introducing ourselves, I quickly got to the point.

“This is about Jujoji.”

“Hah!? Futaba?”

The moment I brought up Jujoji, Senkawa openly grimaced. He looked like he didn’t even want to hear her name.

“I’m leaving.”

“Come on, just wait a second.”

He turned his back and tried to leave the classroom, but I hurriedly stopped him. He shot me an annoyed look, paused with the door slightly open, then lazily cracked his neck before walking back to where he had been standing.

“Haah… fine. Make it quick.”

“Sorry. The truth is, I saw you and Jujoji arguing the day before yesterday.”

“The day before yesterday…? Oh, that time. So?”

“Well… what happened between you two?”

“Does that have anything to do with you?”

That left me at a loss for words. After all, I was just a third party who happened to witness the scene. I was about as uninvolved as one could be. But I believed in repaying debts of gratitude. Jujoji had taken care of me. I wanted to help her. I wondered if it was possible to remove the cause of their conflict and restore their friendship.

…Because it had to hurt to end things in a fight with a childhood friend you’d been with for so long.

“I owe Jujoji personally. If possible, I’d like to resolve the cause of your dispute. That’s why I stepped in.”

“Hah… so you’re basically Futaba’s white knight, huh? Must be nice being a girl. Guys like you just pop up to protect them.”

“White knight? What’s that?”

“If you don’t know, look it up later. But I’m telling you right now, I’m not in the wrong. She is. It’s all her fault.”

“Just let me hear your side. You can’t understand something like this without hearing both perspectives. Jujoji told me you two were close childhood friends…”

“Close childhood friends? Don’t make me laugh. I’ve hated her the whole time. Ever since we were kids! Our parents were close, so I just hung out with her because I had to!”

Senkawa’s face twisted with anger as he spat that out.

…That was very different from what Jujoji had told me. Which of them was telling the truth? Still angry, Senkawa continued.

“She was always clinging to me! And then she’d act like she was my girlfriend. Whenever I tried to make a move on a girl I liked, they’d turn me down saying, ‘Don’t you already have Futaba?’ It pissed me off to no end!”

He kicked a nearby chair in anger. The chair slammed into a desk with a loud crash that echoed through the classroom. To sum up what he was saying… because Jujoji was always by his side, the girls he liked rejected him, and he resented her for it… was that about right?

“Well… I hate to put it this way, but wasn’t dating Jujoji ever an option? She’s cute, and her personality is devoted and kind.”

I’ll repeat—it wasn’t that I was trying to pair Jujoji and Senkawa up. It was just a genuine question. Jujoji had good looks, was skilled at housework, and was devoted. She was practically the ideal girl most guys imagined. Otherwise, there was no way she would have been voted “Number One Girl Guys Want as a Girlfriend” by the boys at school. If I had to name a flaw, maybe she could be a bit pushy at times, but that was about it.

Why would someone reject feelings from a girl like that? …Though if she just wasn’t his type, that would be the end of it.

“You don’t know what she’s really like. You’ve only seen the surface. I don’t want to date a girl that heavy. I’d rather have someone more normal.”

In response to my question, Senkawa claimed that Jujoji’s personality was the problem. He was right that Jujoji and I were just classmates, and we had only started interacting closely the day before yesterday. It was hard to say I knew everything about her personality. There were probably things only long-time childhood friends could understand.

Even so…

“I understand your side. But wasn’t what you did the day before yesterday going too far? Couldn’t you have said it more… I don’t know, more gently, I suppose?”

Even if he found her troublesome, suddenly yelling at her, hurling insults, and finally throwing a textbook at her and resorting to violence… That was too cruel.

“I’d been telling her for years. ‘I have no intention of dating you.’ But she wouldn’t stop. The day before yesterday, I was talking to a girl I’d had my eye on, and she barged in. So yeah, I finally snapped.”

“I see…”

If he really had been telling her for years and she refused to listen… Then Jujoji bore some fault in that regard. From her perspective, she was probably desperately trying to keep him from being taken by another girl and to make him turn her way.

…Even so, I couldn’t condone violence.

“Now you get it, right? I’m not in the wrong. She kept clinging to me and sabotaging my chances at getting a girlfriend. You could say she’s basically a stalker. What’s wrong with shaking off a stalker?”

“……….”

I had gone into this talk hoping I might somehow reconcile Senkawa and Jujoji. But with Senkawa hating her this much, rebuilding their relationship seemed nearly impossible. This whole situation could probably be called a tragedy born from their personalities being hopelessly incompatible.

“That’s enough, right? I’m out. I’m not as free as I look.”

“Yeah. Thanks for telling me.”

Senkawa roughly flung the door open and stomped out of the classroom. All I could do was watch him leave. In my heart, I apologized to Jujoji. 

I’m sorry I couldn’t help you…

…But I couldn’t just stay discouraged. I hadn’t been able to make Senkawa and Jujoji reconcile, but there was still something I could do for her.

Yes. Heal the wounds in her heart.

Resolving to focus my efforts on that instead, I left the empty classroom as well.

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