Episode 9: [Yuri Friends] Hey, Let’s Just Talk. Normally.

Monday lunchtime.
I was face-down on my desk, my brain feeling like it had been pickled in pink sugar.

The reason being.
Over the two days of the weekend, I hadn’t stepped outside once, and had spent every hour hunched over my desk.

Not over reference books or vocabulary lists.
Over the top ten ranked works from “best yuri manga” lists purchased as e-books, yuri game let’s-play videos.
And on top of that, a great quantity of “couples analysis” articles adrift in the ocean of the internet.

(The preparation is complete. I’ve studied the patterns and countermeasures for every possible scenario…)

The cost being that I hadn’t touched today’s prep work, let alone the weekend homework.

“Oh, there she is! Mama-pi~, heyyyy!”
“…Mama-pi?!”

I looked up to find not Hiyori, but her circle of friends standing there, grinning knowingly.
Behind them, Hiyori watched with the detached look of someone who had nothing to do with any of it, thoroughly entertained.

“Hey, come have lunch with us? Hiyori’s here too~”
“Yeah yeah, we heard over the weekend — you two actually got close, right? We’re sick of the usual crew, thought we’d bring Mama-pi in too!”

Clearly just looking for amusement.
They wanted to watch me shrink up like a borrowed cat in the middle of their loud, saturated little group. Obviously.

“Um, well… I still haven’t finished the homework for this afternoon’s class…”
“The Yamami-mama? Unusual, isn’t it! Hey Hiyori, she turned us down~”
“Ahaha. Maya’s just that conscientious. Airi, Yuina, Meiko — we’d better not bother her, let’s go.”

Hiyori cast me a long, unhurried sideways look as she drifted past.
Those eyes were unmistakably the same ones from Friday afternoon — when she’d been sitting on the sofa watching me slumped on the floor with my legs completely gone.

(That look…! She’s mocking me…!)

I squeezed my fist tight as I watched her walk away.

Friday was the greatest humiliation of my life.
But in the afterword of a yuri manga I’d read last night, it said this:

“Even the most confident gyaru can’t resist a surprise wall-slam.”

…Really? That invincible-looking Asahina Hiyori?
But it was written right there. No choice but to try it.

After school, I’ll hit her with the secret technique I’d studied — the “wall-slam.”
If I corner Hiyori against the wall and look down at her from above… that composed expression of hers should crack, at least a little.
And then I might recover some of the “dignity befitting a discipline committee chair,” and get one step closer to making her delete the video…!

Armed with that entirely baseless intelligence gleaned from a manga afterword, I stood up, breathing fire.

◇◆◇◆◇

And then, after school.
Fired up and ready, I was lying in wait in the empty discipline room.

The door slid open without ceremony.

“Sorry for the wait~”
“Hiyori. Today I’m different—”

I leapt to my feet triumphantly, and then immediately deflated.

“Mm, so, today let’s just hang out as normal friends for a bit?”
“…What?”

Thrown completely off guard, I froze.
Hiyori pulled a chair over and sat down right beside my desk, propped her chin in her hand, and smiled brightly.

“I mean, Yuri Friends are still friends, right? I don’t know anything about Maya at all. Getting to know each other seems important for the Yuri Friends game going forward, don’t you think?”
“Th-that… well, as logic goes…”

Is that right…?

“Right? Okay, question time then. I’ll ask, Maya answers. Go!”
“Wait, hang on—”

There was no time to brace myself.
From Hiyori’s mouth erupted a machine-gun barrage of questions.

“Where do you live? Birthday? What’s your MBTI? Favourite food? Sweet tooth or savoury? Where do you buy clothes? Hobbies? What do you do on weekends? Current obsession? What do you watch on YouTube? Give me your social media. Favourite colour, do you have any pets, when was your first love, do you prefer older or younger types—”
“Wait — just wait a moment! What on earth!”

The sheer momentum of it made me reflexively clap both hands over my ears.

“Too much? Want me to go first then?”

Hiyori leaned forward and said it, peering right into my eyes.

“My place is in the apartment block at the station two stops from here. Birthday’s February 14th, Valentine’s Day — funny, right? MBTI is ENFP. Favourite food is tiramisu! Can’t handle spicy. Clothes from Shibuya or online. Hobbies are café-hopping and people-watching! Weekends I’m mostly sleeping or out with friends. No particular obsession right now, but I’ve recently found an interesting little toy♡ …That toy’s reactions are so adorable, I just can’t help wanting to tease it. Oh, I’ll send you my socials later—”
“Stop! Stop, stop, stop! I can’t keep up with the information!!”

My head was about to burst.
Does she even breathe? And “interesting toy” — that’s obviously me, isn’t it!

“Ah, too fast? Okay, Maya’s turn then. Come on, we’re taking turns.”
“Ugh… fine…”

I gave in and started answering, haltingly.

“I live… twenty minutes’ walk from here, in a residential area. Birthday is… September 1st. Um, MBTI? I don’t know what that is. Food, I… like Japanese food, I think. Clothes are… whatever my mum picks out…”
“Oh, mum-curated wardrobe. And? Hobbies?”
“Hobbies…”

The word snagged.
Hobbies. My hobbies?

Studying? That’s just what students do.
Reading? Honestly, it’s almost entirely reference books.
Clubs? I’m not in any — just discipline committee activities.
Weekends? Review and prep work, ironing my uniform, and that’s about it.

“…………”

Silence fell.
Suddenly a cold feeling crept up from the floor.

Looked at objectively like this — there is nothing I can call mine.
Yamami Maya was nothing but an empty vessel, existing only to follow the school rules and do what adults told her.

A hollow misery welled up, and my eyes dropped.

“…Nothing.”
“Hm? What’s nothing? Hobbies?”
“That’s what I’m saying. I don’t have any hobbies. I don’t have a ‘me’ worth telling anyone about, not like you, Hiyori…”
“Oh, could it be that student guidance is your hobby?! Wow, you’re dedicated.”

Hiyori laughed, needling.
Normally I’d fire back with a “how rude!” — but right now I didn’t have the energy to argue.
She’d hit the mark. This is all I have.

“…So what? Is that a problem?”

I muttered it, throwing the words away.
And then.

“Mm, but — isn’t that a bit off?”

Hiyori’s tone shifted, softly.
The bright note from before was gone, replaced by something sweet and slow, weighted with a particular humidity.

“I think I might already know what Maya likes best.”
“…What?”

I looked up.
Without my noticing, Hiyori had leaned forward, her face close.

“What Maya likes best is…”

Her lips formed the words beside my ear, with obvious enjoyment.

“Naughty things, isn’t it?”

“…?!”

“I mean, it’s right there on the video. Touching herself with her own hand~”

My breath seized as though my heart had been grabbed bare-handed.
Into the hollow that had opened inside me, hot, muddy shame came pouring in like a flood.

“Th-that’s, that’s not — that was involuntary, it was — you’re the worst! That’s harassment!”

I flailed both hands frantically and denied it with a force that could have set my face on fire.
Hiyori found this absolutely irresistible, and dissolved into laughter.

“Ahaha! Your reactions are too good~”

“It’s not funny! Right, I’m going home!”

I grabbed my bag and stood up, making for the door at speed.
I couldn’t take any more. My nerves would not survive another minute of this.
I was nearly at the door when it happened.

A gentle tug.
From behind, the hem of my skirt caught between someone’s fingers, held with a soft, almost tentative pull.

…Right. Fine. I know what this is.
Another one of those spiteful smiles, another threat — “You sure you want to leave? Don’t mind what happens to that video?”

I braced myself instinctively, bit down, marshalled my retort, and turned around.

“Listen. Just because you have that video doesn’t mean I’ll do whatever you—”

The words dissolved in my throat.

“…………”

Hiyori said nothing.
None of the usual mean-spirited smirking. No triumphant, self-satisfied look.

She was just sitting there in her chair, looking up at me.
Quiet as the silence before rain, the machine-gun chatter of moments ago completely gone, not even her breathing audible.
Her eyes were still as glass beads wet with rain.
Fixed on me, wordlessly, unmoving.

“…What?”

The threat I’d braced for didn’t come.
In its place, something heavier than words flowed through the connected line of her gaze.

What.
Why are you making that face…?

The discipline room, at dusk.
The only thing I could feel with any certainty was the warmth of her fingers, still holding the hem of my skirt.