[Sad News] Living Together with the Unattainable Beauty—Her Overwhelming Affection Is Way Too Calculated - 54-55

Chapter 54: The Answer Was Already Decided

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“Am I still no good? I’m serious. I want to tell you how I feel, one more time.”

Yamada-kun stared straight at me with eyes so earnest and aching that I had never seen them before. There were always lots of girls around him with glittering smiles. Maybe this was the first time he’d ever truly confessed like this, to someone he really meant it for. The sincerity hit hard. His feelings were probably real.

But…

My heart didn’t waver an inch. If anything, I wanted this to be over as quickly as possible. Because in my heart there had already been, for a very long time, only one person. That timid, clumsy boy I couldn’t help but care for.

The adorable person who wore a sad, lightless face as if the world had lost its light just because I’d been away for two days. The person who said “delicious” to my sloppy home cooking with a childlike smile straight from his heart. The helpless one who panicked and ran away when I made lewd advances. The person who greeted me with the warmest “welcome home” voice in the world.

Gen-chan.

Just thinking of his face made my chest twist with a sweet warmth. Compared to this helpless, precious feeling, any sweet words from Yamada-kun, any earnest gaze of his, faded and blurred.

I looked straight back into Yamada-kun’s eyes. Then I spoke clearly. Not with an ambiguous smile. Not with a teasing attitude. I gave him my single, honest, true feeling.

“I’m sorry.”

My voice came out crisp. It was clearer than I even expected.

“Yamada-kun, I’m really grateful for how you feel. Thank you. But I’m sorry.”

I could tell his confident gaze trembled a little. I continued.

“There’s someone I’ve loved for a long time.”

The moment I said those words, of course the image that popped into my mind was Gen-chan’s slightly troubled, gentle smile. The little hero who, back when we were in elementary school, had timidly but bravely reached out his hand to me when I was crying and lost. From that day on my heart had belonged only to him.

“I see…”

Yamada-kun murmured weakly. Then he gave a self-mocking smile uncharacteristic of him, a sad sort of smile.

“…Right. There’s no way someone would leave a woman like you alone.”

He said that, then ran his hand through his perfect hair roughly.

“Who is he anyway? Is he better than me?”

“Yeah.”

I nodded strongly without a second’s hesitation.

“He’s the most wonderful person in the world to me.”

Those words were my honest truth, without a cloud over them. Yamada-kun was silent for a while, then he let out a long breath and forced back his usual bright smile.

“…I lost, huh. So I got turned down.”

He said it brightly on purpose; in that last bravado I could see his pride.

“Sorry for bothering you. See you, Fujigaya.”

He said that and turned his back on me. His usually big presence looked, for once, a little small and lonely.

I was left alone in the back yard. The setting sun dyed the school building a burning red. I exhaled deeply. This was for the best.

I glanced toward the shadow of the equipment shed. Earlier I could have sworn I had felt someone there, but now there was no one. Maybe I had imagined it. But if he had been watching, I hoped he had heard my answer. I hoped he had seen how I felt.

Gen-chan, you’re the one I love.

When would you finally realize it? There was so little time left. I looked up at the crimson sky and spoke to him silently in my heart. I prayed, with all my might, that this helpless feeling of mine would somehow reach him.

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Chapter 55: The Coward Who Ran Away

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I ended up running away. I was too scared to witness what reply Fujigaya-san would give Yamada — that decisive moment that could determine my fate.

From the shadow of the equipment shed’s cold wall I bolted, tumbling away. So nobody would find me. So nobody would see how pathetic and miserable I was.

I fumbled on my indoor shoes at the entrance, swapped them for sneakers in a panic, and headed home with almost no memory of the walk. My head was a mess the whole way. Had Fujigaya-san nodded? Had she said “yes” while shyly smiling?

Right now maybe they were walking hand in hand, sparkling in the sunset. The worst images kept flashing through my mind again and again. Each time my heart ached as if a rusty tin had been wound tight inside my chest.

I somehow made it home. The apartment was hollow and silent. Normally her warm presence would fill the place and make it comfortable, but that ear-splitting quiet only emphasized my loneliness and despair.

I threw my bag on the floor and collapsed onto my bed as if it would swallow me. I pressed my face into the threadbare pillow.

“…Why’d I run away, of all people?”

My voice trembled.

Coward. Sniveler. Worthless.

At the very moment I had clearly recognized my true feelings, I had again looked away from reality. In the end, I hadn’t changed at all.

I lay there for how long, I didn’t know. I slowly lifted my face. Through the blur of tears and fatigue, my familiar room came into view. Bookshelves crammed with light novels and manga. Piles of game discs on the floor. My world. My castle. But right now it looked like a heap of junk.

Memories of her flooded back like a slideshow.

The strange cohabitation that had started because of a real-estate mix-up. The crooked, heart-shaped ketchup on the omelet she’d made for me at first. The late-night anime we’d binge-watched together. The clumsy way I taught her a fighting game, hand over hand. Her gentle hand that had tended me all night when I had a fever. 

The fluffy pajamas that had made my heart race and that black baby-doll that had destroyed my reason. Her warmth and sweet scent sneaking into my bed. The way she masturbated. That white baby-doll that I had even found beautiful. The warm softness inside her soft butt.

One by one those memories snapped into place like puzzle pieces. Until now I had tried to stuff all of it into convenient explanations — “coincidence,” “her kindness that she would show to anyone,” those kinds of comforting lies — because otherwise I couldn’t make sense of it.

I had convinced myself, stubbornly, that there was no way a perfect someone like Fujigaya Kanoko would take a liking to a nobody gloomy otaku like Genji Miyazuka. That sort of light-novel coincidence could not exist in the real world.

But that was wrong. It wasn’t random. Of course it wasn’t. She wouldn’t have shown such acts, such indecency, to someone she didn’t care about. None of it was random. It had all been her desperate messages to me. She had kept sending signs so that even someone clumsy, dull, and low in self-esteem like me could understand.

『I like you.』

Her words — “I’m more myself when I’m with Miyazuka-kun” — flashed vividly in my mind. The slightly embarrassed, but sincere look in her eyes back then. She had been trying, all along, to tell me how she truly felt. And I — I had looked away from everything, covered my ears, and kept running. And today I had run away again.

“…What a fucking stupid, loser, gloomy otaku I am.”

The words escaped me. Tears streamed down.

But it wasn’t only despair. Buried under the regret and self-hatred, I felt a sliver of light. I had noticed her feelings. And I had discovered my own true feelings as well. I wouldn’t waver anymore. This time I absolutely would not run.

I slowly rose from the bed. Outside the window the sky had turned a beautiful deep crimson.

She would be home soon. What kind of face would she wear when she came back? And what face should I show her when I opened that door?

I clenched my fist tight. The fight wasn’t over yet.

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