[Sad News] Living Together with the Unattainable Beauty—Her Overwhelming Affection Is Way Too Calculated - 37

Chapter 37: A Small Success

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The presence of Ryou Yamada cast a heavy, black shadow over my heart. The sight of Fujigaya-san talking and laughing with him (or at least looking like she was) burned itself into my mind and wouldn’t fade. Every time it replayed, I was forced to confront my own powerlessness and misery until it hurt.

Wanting to change—I felt stupid for even thinking about it. Changing my hairstyle a little, paying a little more attention to my clothes—none of that would ever make me into Ryou Yamada. Just like a pebble, no matter how hard it tried to polish itself, could never become a diamond.

Every day, I sank deeper and deeper into the bottomless swamp of self-loathing. Even at home, I couldn’t bring myself to look Fujigaya-san properly in the eye. Her kindness only hurt me now. 

Every time she was gentle with me, I would see her laughing by Yamada’s side and get wounded all over again. I knew it was selfish, even as I felt it.

“…I can’t go on like this.”

One night, lying on my bed staring at the stains on the ceiling, I murmured the words. I didn’t want to rot away, drowning in jealousy and inferiority.I didn’t want to keep holding onto such ugly, muddy feelings toward Fujigaya-san.

I had nothing. No sunlike radiance that drew people to me, no unshakable confidence like Ryou Yamada. Nothing at all.

But…Even so, wasn’t there something I could do right now? Something for her—for once, instead of always relying on her, worrying her, and depending on her kindness. That was when it struck me. 

Food.

The warm, delicious meals she always made for me. I had almost no experience with cooking. My household skills were abysmal. The only thing I could manage was pouring hot water into a cup of instant noodles.

But maybe that was exactly why it was worth trying. I would cook her dinner. Just that. But to me, it felt like the one and only thing I could do for her right now.

The next day after school, I went home before Fujigaya-san, tied on an apron (of course, one of hers I borrowed without asking), and marched off to the battlefield. The menu: fried rice. I searched “beginner easy amazing fried rice” on my phone and stared at the top recipe until I could burn a hole through the screen. This, at least, I could do… or so I thought.

Reality was not so kind. The first hurdle: the onion. Trying to chop it into pieces had me bawling in seconds. My eyes, my eyes! I screamed like a certain colonel from an anime, cutting through tears until I finally finished. The pieces, of course, were wildly uneven.

The second hurdle: the eggs. Cracking them into a bowl ended in disaster—shards of shell scattered everywhere. Trying to fish them out with chopsticks, I ended up mercilessly breaking the yolk and making things even worse.

And the final hurdle: the main stir-fry. The moment I tossed the rice into the heated frying pan—“Hot!”—nearly half of it went flying out, splattering spectacularly around the stove.

“Aaah! The food-wasting ghost is going to come for me!”

The kitchen was a warzone. I was drenched in sweat, tears, and oil. In the middle of that hellish cooking session, the front door creaked open.

Crap. Crap, crap, crap! It’s Fujigaya-san.

“I’m home! Huh, Miyazuka-kun? Something smells really toasty—wait, what!?”

She peeked into the kitchen and her eyes went wide at the sight.

“Wh-what are you doing!? The kitchen—it’s exploding!”

“Ah, n-no, this is, um… I was… Trying to make dinner…”

Flustered, frying pan in hand, I stammered, my face burning with shame.

For a moment she just stood there, stunned. Then she broke into peals of laughter.

“Fufu…Fufufu! Sorry, it’s just… It looks so outrageous, I couldn’t help it.”

That unclouded, carefree smile saved me a little.

“I’ll help.”

“N-no! It’s fine! I’ll do it myself! Fujigaya-san, you just sit down!”

I stubbornly refused her offer. It wouldn’t mean anything unless I did this on my own strength.

“Then… Is it okay if I just watch from behind?”

She asked with a gentle, Madonna-like smile.

“Ah, uh, y-yeah… if you’re just watching…”

After several more grueling minutes, somehow, a single plate of fried rice was completed. Its appearance, to put it mildly, was terrible. The rice clumped together, the egg was uneven, and some of the green onion was scorched to black. It was less “fried rice” and more “something like rice stir-fried in oil.”

I presented the pitiful dish to her with the dread of a criminal walking to the executioner’s block.

“…If it tastes bad, you don’t… You really don’t have to force yourself to eat it…”

My voice trembled.

Without a word, she picked up a spoon. She scooped up a bite of the misshapen fried rice and placed it in her mouth. I held my breath, waiting. Seconds of silence passed—feeling like an eternity.

Then, her face lit up, blooming like a flower.

“It’s delicious!”

Her smile was pure, radiant, with not a shadow of doubt.

“It’s really delicious, Miyazuka-kun!”

She said it, then eagerly took another bite, then another, happily devouring the fried rice.

The moment I saw that smile, I felt it. The heavy, black clump of jealousy and inferiority that had been swirling in my heart quietly melted away without a sound.

Yamada didn’t matter anymore. Not at all. Just seeing that smile. Just hearing that single word, “delicious.” That was enough to make me feel rewarded.

There was something I could do. Even I could make this sunlike girl smile.

It was such a tiny, tiny success. But that one imperfect plate of fried rice had, without doubt, pulled me powerfully up from the bottom of the swamp of self-loathing.

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