Beyond The Bad End - Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Haru’s POV

A week after Maki refused to go out with me, Maki came to meet me as she promised.

We did not have sex because she said she was menstruating.

I was worried of her physical condition when she said she was menstruating, so we just spent the day on my room.

However, Maki seemed to be in a bad mood, it seemed like she was getting frustrated. Around noon, Maki told me that she was feeling not well, and because of that, she went home.

‘Did I do something to make her mad at me? Or perhaps she was in a bad mood just because she was menstruating? But before, when she had her period, she wasn’t in such a bad mood like today. In fact, I had never seen Maki in such a bad mood before.’

I thought about it over and over again in my head, but I couldn’t think of any reason.

The next day, instead of being late, Maki began to skip her part-time job.

She usually came to the restaurant around 7PM, but that day, she didn’t even show up at all. My mom called her to ask her why she didn’t come. Maki told my mom that she had something urgent to do, and because of it couldn’t come that day. After she said so, she immediately hung up the call.

‘Haru, do you know why Maki-chan can’t come?’

My mom asked me.

‘No, I have no idea either. She didn’t say anything to me.’

‘Make sure to go to her house and check on her tonight, okay?’

As my mom told me so, after the restaurant was closed, I went to Maki’s house to check on her. But apparently, she still hadn’t come home yet.

‘She didn’t show up for her part-time job? I thought she had gone to the restaurant.’

Saki-san said to me.

The next day, Saki-san told my mom that the reason Maki didn’t come home that night was because she was playing around with her friends. Maki missed her part-time job because of it too. Maki-san apologized to my mom over and over again.

However, the same thing continued to happen, Maki didn’t show up for her part-time job again. My mom was worried of her and called her every night.

I also went to check on her many times, but I never got the chance to talk to her, she was always still asleep when I went to check on her in the morning, and she was always out and not home yet when I went to check on her in the night, I didn’t even know what time she usually came back home.

Whenever I sent her a message, she took a very long time to reply my message. Whenever I called her, she always said that she was busy and hung up the phone right away. In the end, I couldn’t even meet Maki on my days off during the summer break. Then before I knew it, the summer break ended.

The first day of second semester.

I waited in front of Maki’s apartment to go to school with her. I waited for quite some time for her, but she still hadn’t show up. So, I decided to go up her room and knock on her door.

‘Maki, are you up?’

Not long after, Maki opened the door slightly.

‘I’m sorry, I overslept, it seems like that it’ll take some time for me to get ready, you should go to school first, Haru-kun.’

My school was farther away than Maki’s school. In fact, I was already running late because I had waited for Maki for quite some time. So, I decided to go ahead and went to school by myself.

Obviously, Maki was acting strange.

I wondered since when did she start to act strange.

Come to think of it, she started to show up late for her part-time job during the obon holiday.

That’s right, she was also acting strange when I ran into her at the nearby convenience store, it was in the morning during the obon holiday.

In short, she had been acting strange since the beginning of summer break. She spent a lot of time to hang out with her friends during the summer break.

Even though in the end I didn’t say anything to Maki about it, I thought that she was playing too much and I actually wanted to warn her about it several times.

The next day, Maki came out of her house in the morning and we went to school together.

It had been a long time since the last I saw Maki’s face properly. I was worried of her because she looked really tired, but again, I couldn’t say anything to her. There were a lot of things I wanted to ask her like, why did she stop coming to her part-time job, why did she always come home so late at night, but I couldn’t ask her any of that. I didn’t want Maki to get into a bad mood like before. She didn’t say anything to me and she didn’t even try to make eye contact with me. The only conversation we had while going to school together was ‘Good morning.’

On the morning of our first holiday together since the start of the second semester, I went to Maki’s house.

‘What are you going to do today?’

I asked her so.

‘I’m sorry, I can’t go out with you today.’

Maki told me so.

‘Okay then.’

I knew that Maki would refuse, but I still hoped that Maki would spend some time with me, it had been quite some time since the last time we go out together.

I sighed as I rode my bike.

‘Hah, I’m kind of tired being with Maki.’

I mumbled to myself.

I didn’t have any plans for that day, so I decided to go back home and study. Then suddenly, when I was studying in my room, I received a message from Kataoka.

‘Matsuyama-chi, the restaurant is closed today, right?’

‘Yeah, that’s right.’

‘Didn’t you say that you always have a date with your girlfriend whenever the restaurant is closed?’

‘Yeah, what about it?’

‘Then, doesn’t that mean you have a date today?’

I was totally confused why Kataoka suddenly talked about such things.

‘Why do you suddenly ask so?’

After a while, Kataoka replied me saying,

‘I need to talk to you about something tomorrow at school.’