Vol 1 Chapter 6 – I’ll Give It to You Again【Volume 1: The Road to Romance】

Something hard kept tapping against his forehead.

Sandai groaned, scrunched his brow, and cracked one eye open.

“Wake up~”

He squinted against the daylight coming through the window and turned toward the voice. Shino was standing over him, ladle in hand.

“…My forehead hurts.”

“That’s what you get for not waking up.”

“Hitting someone’s forehead with a ladle because they won’t wake up is completely unreasonable… wait, is that smell—”

He sniffed, pushed himself upright, and looked at the table.

Steamed white rice. Grilled fish. Miso soup. Pickles. A simple breakfast — but a proper one.

“I made breakfast.”

“You made it? There’s nothing in this apartment remotely close to a real ingredient—”

He was genuinely baffled.

He wanted to know why she’d made it, yes — but more pressing was the question of how. Sandai’s meals were almost entirely convenience store or supermarket bento. He never cooked. The only things he kept on hand were rice and a few basic condiments. So where had the fish come from? The pickles? The miso soup?

“I woke up a little early, so I slipped out and grabbed a few things. The typhoon had passed, so I figured a supermarket that opens early might be running — and one was.”

“That explains it. But why go to the trouble—”

“You let me stay over. The least I could do~”

So it was her way of saying thank you. But Sandai hadn’t let her stay because he wanted nothing in return. The thought hadn’t even crossed his mind.

Still — telling her to take back food she’d already cooked wasn’t something he could reasonably do. The only real option was to accept it gracefully.

That said, she’d spent money. That part nagged at him. He reached for his wallet —

“Ow.”

— and got tapped on the forehead with the ladle again.

“Why are you getting your wallet out? I just said it’s a thank-you.”

“You spent money, though.”

“I only bought exactly as much as I needed. It wasn’t even a thousand yen.”

“There’s still the trouble of going out to buy it, and making it, and—”

“The supermarket was right nearby, and nothing I cooked takes any effort. It’s all quick stuff.”

With each exchange, Shino’s expression was creeping steadily toward impatience.

Sandai didn’t want an argument. He let it go and said what he should have said first.

“…Thank you.”

He said it quietly. Shino broke into a proud little smile.

It was, without warning, extremely cute — and he found himself holding his breath.

Right. She’s supposed to be one of the most beautiful girls in school.

He felt as if he were being reminded of that for the first time.

Her face was perfectly proportioned without a single feature out of place — clean double eyelids, a nose that sat exactly where it should, neither too high nor too low. Her complexion was pale in a way that, when caught in the morning light, gave off something almost cool and crystalline.

Her hair — dyed a soft grey-blonde, falling to just below her shoulders — carried an air that was somehow both gentle and striking at once.

Her figure was just as striking—everything where it should be.

The kind of looks that would make a reasonably famous idol or actress feel a little nervous.

“Hm? What are you staring at?”

“…Nothing.”

I got a little lost looking at you because you were cute — no. That wasn’t something he dared to say out loud.

Last night’s comment about her being genuinely kind and a wonderful person had come out because he’d wanted to say it more than he’d been embarrassed by it — and it had been about who she was, not how she looked.

Telling someone to their face that they were cute required an entirely different kind of experience. One he didn’t have yet.

“Also — there is nothing in your fridge. Absolutely nothing. You must have a terrible diet.”

“Cooking is a lot of effort…”

“And the award for most pathetic thing said this morning goes to.”

☆

After breakfast, since they were going to the same place anyway, the two of them headed to school together.

“Walking to school with a guy — I’ve actually never done this before.”

“I’ve never walked to school with a girl either.”

They talked as they picked their way around the puddles left from the night before, moving at an easy pace. Then Shino stepped ahead of him and turned around.

“Oh, right — here.”

She rummaged through her bag, pulled out a small folded note, and pushed it firmly into his chest pocket.

“What’s this—”

“I wrote it before you woke up, so the handwriting might be a little rough… It’s my contact info.”

“Contact info…?”

“Mm. I put a note in with your clothes last time, too, but I thought maybe you’d lost it. So — I’m giving it to you again.”

The memory surfaced immediately.

The pink slip of paper. The one he’d crumpled up without a second thought and dropped in the trash.

He understood now what he hadn’t then. It hadn’t been a prank. She’d meant every word she’d written. The number, the ID, the address — all of it had been real.

He pressed his lips together in a way that did a poor job of hiding how he felt about that.

Shino laughed.

“Don’t lose it this time, okay? I’ll be waiting to hear from you.”