When I Started a Volunteer Nursing Service, All the Beautiful Girls in My Class Suddenly Became Gloomy - Chapter 2

Chapter 2: The Other Side of My First Time Taking Care of Someone

April.

I caught a cold right after starting high school.

It was my first time living alone after my parents got transferred for work.

Lying in bed felt lonelier than I expected.

My throat hurt so bad I kept drinking water, and even when I got hungry, no food appeared.

In a moment like that, I suddenly thought,

Who I wish was here with me.

It was a pretty pathetic wish.

It wasn’t anything big like wanting someone to nurse me or be super nice.

Just having someone say “You okay?” would have made me feel a little better.

But my one-person apartment stayed quiet.

I checked my phone, but almost no notifications came in.

Classmates’ social media kept showing fun posts, while it felt like the world had left me behind.

So after my fever went down, I found myself thinking,

If someone’s hurting the same way, I want to help them even a little.

That became my reason for starting volunteer nursing.

But it took a lot of courage.

I’ve never been good at talking to people.

Just making eye contact makes me tense up weirdly, and starting a conversation myself feels impossible.

That didn’t change even after high school started, and before I knew it I had stayed alone the whole time.

So the idea of me taking care of someone didn’t make sense if I thought about it calmly.

Just going to a stranger’s house felt like a huge hurdle.

Being alone with someone I didn’t know.

I wouldn’t even know what to talk about.

What if the mood got awkward?

What if they thought I was creepy?

Stuff like that kept popping into my head.

But every time I remembered how tough that night was, I hated the thought of doing nothing.

The fuzzy head from the fever.

The silent room.

The empty feeling when I opened the fridge and nothing was inside.

I staggered just going to the convenience store, and by the time I got back I was out of breath.

I was probably weaker than I realized back then.

So I did as much practice as I could for nursing.

I made a list of things needed for visiting a sick person’s house.

Sports drink, cooling patches, cold medicine, jelly drinks, pudding.

I looked up easy-to-eat foods for sore throats and even took notes.

I made rice porridge a few times too.

The first try had the wrong amount of water so it turned out like mixed rice, and another time I overcooked it until it was like glue.

“…This is hard.”

Standing in the kitchen by myself, I kept tasting it over and over.

Even though I wasn’t feeding anyone, I got strangely serious about it.

I also wrote lines in my phone notes like,

“You okay?”

“Think you can eat something?”

“Don’t push yourself.”

And then deleted them.

Since I’m bad with people, I needed prep even for normal talk.

“…Nah, that sounds creepy.”

I scolded myself and closed my phone.

Still.

If someone was suffering alone like I was that day.

It would be nice if I could support them even a little.

That’s why I kept practicing conversations.

While I did that, June rolled around.

Two days after I stared at my phone and finally posted on the school social media, a reply came in the morning.

The name in my notifications was,

‘yuki’

A simple name.

The icon was just a picture of a white flower.

But.

“I caught a cold…”

The second I saw that line, my heart jumped hard.

And then it continued,

“I’m feeling so alone…

Um, could you take care of me…?”

I couldn’t ignore that.

I quickly tapped ‘yuki’s icon and sent a DM.

“You okay?”

After a while,

“I feel like I’m dying…”

That one line came back, so I hurried and asked for the address, then headed there.

On the way, I couldn’t help thinking what if it was a prank.

Normally you don’t give your address to a stranger, and inviting someone sketchy like me over is risky too.

Maybe someone was just messing around for fun.

My head stayed full of worry the whole way to the apartment building.

“…Maybe I should go home.”

That thought crossed my mind for a second.

But.

“I feel like I’m dying…”

That one short message wouldn’t leave my head.

Even through text, I could feel how weak she was.

Plus.

If she really was suffering.

It might get even worse for her if I didn’t show up.

“…It’ll be fine, right?”

I muttered it like I was convincing myself and gripped the convenience store bag tighter.

Sports drink.

Pudding.

Cooling patches.

I got everything exactly like my practice list, but it felt heavier than I thought.

My heart kept pounding loud from nerves.

I was only heading to a stranger’s house, but my steps felt unsteady.

I stopped in front of the apartment building at the address she sent.

“…This it?”

It was a slightly old five-story building.

The outer walls were a light gray with faded spots here and there.

Old mailboxes lined up by the entrance, and a few regular bikes were parked messily in the bike area.

I checked the room number on my phone and went inside.

I took the elevator to the fifth floor and walked down the hall.

I stopped at the second door from the front, took a quick breath,

then slowly pressed the intercom.

After a short wait, the door opened slowly and—

“Sorry for the wait… cough… sorry to keep you—”

“Ichinose-san?”

Standing there was my classmate, the prettiest girl in the whole school.