Episode 8: Even the Everyday Routine of Living Together Is Just Too Convenient!
About a week’s passed since we started living just the two of us.
What’s changed, now that our parents are gone.
It’s quiet.
Mom was basically a walking storm the whole time, so having stretches with nobody in the living room feels strange — and a little nostalgic, if I’m honest.
What hasn’t changed.
—Getting woken up by Makina every morning.
That one, apparently, is simply non-negotiable.
◇◆◇◆◇
“Yotsuka. Wake up.”
A faintly sweet voice, right by my ear.
“…Mmn.”
“Come on, wake up. It’s morning.”
Through the sheets, my shoulder gets gently shaken.
“…Just a little more.”
“No.”
“Five more minutes…”
“You said that ten minutes ago.”
A soft, exasperated laugh drifts down, and then — without mercy — the blanket gets yanked clean off me.
“Okay, okay! I’m up, I’m getting up!”
Giving up, I crack both eyes open, and there’s Makina, standing right beside the bed.
Oversized pajamas. Completely bare-faced. Catching the morning light, one strand of her smooth black hair keeps springing up and down on its own.
I’ve seen this childhood friend just-woke-up look more times than I can count.
And yet — witnessing that bare-faced, pajama-clad state, alone together in this house, hits my brain with an entirely different order of magnitude of destructive power.
◇◆◇◆◇
Before I even noticed, breakfast had become a rotating duty.
Today’s Makina’s turn.
Toasting bread, frying eggs.
The apron on top of it all — she looks weirdly practiced at this.
“Here you go. Yours, Yotsuka.”
Clink — the plate sets down on the table, and with my brain still half-asleep, I find myself drifting into a thought.
Hang on.
What… is this, exactly?
A morning where you eat breakfast made by the girl you like, sitting across from her, alone in the living room.
July sunlight spilling in through the window.
Wait — isn’t this just… a cohabiting couple’s morning…?
“Yotsuka? Not eating? It’ll get cold.”
“Oh, I’m eating, I’m eating! Thanks, Makina.”
Forcibly shoving the delusion out of my head, I take a big bite of toast.
Looking up, the morning sun through the window is reflecting softly off Makina’s pale cheek.
Past the smell of toasted bread, I catch Makina narrowing her eyes, looking satisfied.
Toast made by the girl I love, even with slightly burnt edges, is obviously going to taste like the best thing in the world.
◇◆◇◆◇
“We should probably restock the fridge soon.”
In the afternoon, once the homework quota’s done, Makina pulls out a notepad in the living room.
“What do we need?”
“Um, eggs, and milk, and vegetables… Yotsuka, what do you want to eat?”
“Whatever’s fine~”
Yeah, honestly, anything Makina cooks is fine by m—
“Don’t say that. Actually think about it.”
As if correcting my hazy train of thought, Makina taps the back end of her ballpoint pen lightly against my forehead.
“Ah, sorry… okay, how about curry?”
“Alright… then, potatoes, carrots, onions, and meat.”
Smiling happily, Makina jots it all down smoothly.
“Not using your phone to take notes?”
“Hmm, I feel like I won’t actually remember it unless I physically write it down.”
“Isn’t the whole point of a note that you don’t have to remember it?”
“Well, if my phone suddenly breaks, I wouldn’t be able to make curry anymore.”
…No, at that point, curry would be the least of our problems.
Sitting right next to Makina, I watch the pen trail smoothly across the white paper.
Kind of.
Kind of, you know, this—
Isn’t this basically a cohabiting couple’s day off…? (Round two.)
◇◆◇◆◇
Somewhere along the way, we’d settled into a division of labor at the supermarket without ever discussing it.
Makina pushes the cart loaded with the basket, and I pull items off the shelves and put them in.
“Potatoes, three okay?”
“Let’s do five. More is better.”
“Got it. You really do love potatoes, huh, Makina.”
“The fluffier, the better.”
From the produce section to the meat counter.
Makina compares pork and beef with a dead-serious expression.
“Which one, I wonder.”
“Beef for curry, right?”
“But pork’s hard to give up too.”
“In that case, wouldn’t cubed stew meat be even better? Big chunky pieces?”
Despite going back and forth in this perfectly peaceful little debate, what ends up in the basket in the end is the beef short rib Makina grabs with a “yeah, this one” — decided entirely on her own.
Where did my opinion go?
…Well. Whatever meat Makina picks is fine with me, honestly.
…Anyway.
Objectively speaking, how does this look?
Friends?
Sisters?
…Or.
“Yotsuka, do we still have soy sauce?”
“Pretty sure we do… should we grab some just in case?”
“Let’s do that.”
…Isn’t this completely a cohabiting couple’s grocery run…?? (Round three.)
◇◆◇◆◇
We made dinner curry together.
Makina cut the vegetables, I did all the stir-frying.
Standing side by side, shoulders almost bumping.
“Yotsuka, the heat might be a little too high.”
“This much?”
“Yeah, that’s good. Thanks.”
Snapping the curry roux blocks apart, Makina’s expression softens.
“This is kind of fun, cooking together.”
“…Yeah?”
“Yeah. Way more fun than cooking alone.”
A completely unguarded direct hit, out of nowhere.
Saying that, Makina gives a bashful, soft little smile.
Still staring at the cutting board, ears just slightly red, her profile hit me with a sudden thump in my chest.
Are you trying to kill me?! You’re too cute to look at directly!!
The smell of spices rises softly from the pot.
Makina’s body heat, standing right next to me, feels unusually vivid.
Right.
I’m having fun too.
…Wait, hold on. Isn’t this completely a cohabiting couple making dinner…??? (Round four.)
◇◆◇◆◇
After dinner, we washed dishes together.
I lathered up with soap and washed, Makina rinsed with water and dried with a cloth.
…Our kitchen doesn’t have some modern-era luxury like a dishwasher.
But this teamwork, too, had already become an unremarkable routine before I even noticed.
“Today’s curry turned out really good.”
“Yeah, stupidly good.”
“There’s still a ton left in the pot. Let’s eat it again tomorrow, and the day after?”
“That amount’s gonna take like a full week to get through, honestly…”
“We’d upset our stomachs if we ate it for a whole week, though.”
“Then we’ll portion it out and freeze it. Beginning of curry hell.”
“Don’t be silly, Yotsuka… curry existing at all turns the world into heaven, you know?”
Wash and hand off, dry and stack. Even our hand movements were perfectly in sync by now.
The rushing sound of tap water.
That was the only thing echoing pleasantly through the quiet nighttime kitchen.
…What even is this.
Nothing special happened. Not one single thing.
And yet I found myself thinking, from the bottom of my heart, that I wished time would just stop right here.
…Isn’t this completely a cohabiting couple’s after-dinner…??? (Round five.)
◇◆◇◆◇
We were zoning out in front of the TV in the living room.
Makina sat right beside me, hugging her knees — bare from her half-pants loungewear — staring at the screen.
Some completely unremarkable variety show was playing, nothing special about it at all.
But it’s fine.
Honestly, it’s really, really fine.
The routine itself is exactly the same as when our parents were around — and yet the density of the air feels completely different.
Because it’s just the two of us?
Is that all it is?
“Yotsuka.”
“What.”
“What do you want to eat tomorrow?”
“…We’ve still got the curry.”
“We might finish all of it by lunch, though.”
“That much?! Makina, you eat way more than your face would suggest.”
“That doesn’t sound like a compliment, somehow.”
Makina puffs out her cheeks in a little pout.
—That childish side of her too — it’s all cute, every bit of it. Not something I could ever say out loud, not even on pain of death.
“…Hmm, what should we do.”
Makina laughs softly.
The TV light illuminates her profile.
…She’s beautiful.
No matter how many times I see it, genuinely, beautiful.
“—Ahh… let’s figure out dinner tomorrow, and get some sleep, yeah?”
Stifling a small yawn, Makina stands up.
“Yeah.”
Just then, Makina’s phone on the table buzzes.
The screen shows “Dad.”
“Oh, it’s Dad.”
Makina picks up.
“Hello, Dad? Yeah, I’m doing fine. …Yeah, getting along great with Yotsuka.”
An unremarkable, routine little check-in call.
But her voice sounded just a little more grown-up than usual.
After hanging up, we walk down the hallway side by side, stopping in front of our respective doors.
“Night, Yotsuka.”
“Night, Makina.”
The sound of the door closing felt like it was saying, “Fine, I’ll let you off the hook for today.”
◇◆◇◆◇
Alone in my room, I collapse onto the bed, staring up at the ceiling.
We’d been together since morning.
Breakfast. Grocery shopping. Dinner. Dishes. TV.
All of it, together.
…What is this, exactly.
Not girlfriends.
Not sisters either, not yet.
But under one roof, together all day, every day.
Completely, without question, objectively speaking—
“…No, this is just… living together as a couple.”
The words slip out before I can stop them.
In the empty room, that single sentence just falls, and dissipates into nothing.
I bury my face in the pillow and kick my legs for a while.
A soundless scream gets absorbed into the blanket.
Quickly wrapping myself in the throw blanket, I grab my phone.
Message recipient: Ia.
“Help me, I’m dying.”
“My condolences. I’ll at least visit your grave. Night.”
The reply comes back within seconds, cold as absolute zero.
Then the chat window falls silent, permanently.
Ugh, anyone, please, somebody, save me.
Staring up at the pitch-black ceiling, I mutter it again.
“…Living together, huh.”
At this rate, by the time summer ends, I’m definitely going to have crossed some point of no return!!