Episode 37: My Girlfriend and I Are Just Too Convenient!
Still sitting side by side on the bed, I kept turning the same thought over and over.
“I feel like something’s off about pretending to be sisters and living as four people again. …Um, is it okay if I say it?”
This isn’t something I get to decide on my own.
I don’t want to give them anything extra to worry about, so let’s stay quiet about us until the day of the remarriage.
That’s what Makina had said, the day we got together.
So I wanted to properly check with her first.
Hearing that, Makina’s expression softened.
“…I’m glad.”
“Huh?”
“I didn’t want to keep hiding it either.”
“Really…?”
“Yeah. It’s been hard for me too. Staying beside you, Yotsuka, without being able to say the truth.”
“…Guess this is basically us saying we want to be all lovey-dovey right in front of our parents, huh.”
“…Fufu, I suppose it is. Though, is it really that different from how we’ve been already?”
We both laughed a little, and Makina gently laid her hand over mine.
“Let’s tell them together, Yotsuka.”
◇◆◇◆◇
The next morning. Today was the day the two of them headed back to Hokkaido.
I kept thinking, I have to say it, and just like the night before, I barely slept.
…Unusually, Makina still wasn’t up yet.
“Oh, morning, Yotsuka.”
“Morning, Mom.”
Chewing on the toast that had been set out for breakfast, I found myself curious about something else entirely.
“So, hey, forget about us for a second — how’d things go with you two? Get along okay out there?”
“We were completely lovey-dovey, weren’t we, Tokio-san~?”
At that, Makina’s dad choked and spat out his water.
Flustered, he wiped his mouth with a tissue, eyes darting everywhere.
“Eh, ah, well… I mean, I think we managed a fairly average, peaceful time together…?”
I threw that out half-joking, teasing them a little.
“I mean, weird for me, the daughter, to say this, but — please don’t be giving me a little sibling or anything, okay…? You’re both plenty old enough to know better…”
My parents glanced at each other.
Something about that look made my voice crack, unnaturally high.
“Wait, seriously?!”
“Hmm, well, if Yotsuka really wants one, maybe we should try a little harder?”
“Harder, how?! I take it back, I never should’ve asked!!”
◇◆◇◆◇
“Alright, you two, take care of the house until summer, okay?”
Once they’d finished getting ready, right as Mom and Makina’s dad were about to head out the door—
This is it. No more waiting.
I steeled myself and clenched my fist tight under the table.
“Um, so…”
“Hm? What’s up, Yotsuka?”
Beside me, Makina gave a small nod.
That alone was enough to settle my resolve completely.
“Actually, so… the two of us—”
◇◆◇◆◇
A few months passed after that.
July.
Summer sunlight poured in through the classroom window, beating steadily down on the paper on my desk.
The handout in front of me read: “Career Survey Form.”
“Ugh, this again…”
The words slipped out of me before I could stop them.
The exact same paper as second year.
And yet, somehow, it looked like a completely different piece of paper this time.
“Yotsuka, how’s it going this year?”
Ia, seated next to me again after the new-term seat change, leans over to peek.
“Hmm… what about you, Ia?”
“Me? Been thinking it over, actually. Here.”
The paper Ia held out had a few university names already listed on it.
“Whoa, you actually thought this through.”
“Well, can’t exactly stand still forever, you know. So, what about you, in the end?”
“I’m… more like, still deciding, I guess…”
“Ohh, look at you, making progress.”
“Progress?”
“Last year you left the whole thing blank. This year you’re ‘deciding.’”
…It was only when she said it out loud that I really noticed.
She’s right.
Last year, I couldn’t write a single thing.
Right now, nothing’s settled yet, but I’ve made it as far as “deciding.”
Somehow, that alone felt like it meant something different.
“Oh, right, did your parents come back home? Wasn’t the transfer supposed to be over?”
“Ah… yeah, beginning of July. They’re back home now, living totally normally.”
“Huh. So, how’s it been, since then?”
“Since when?”
“You know… didn’t you say you told them? Properly?”
Ia’s voice dropped just slightly.
“…Yeah. I told them. Properly.”
“And?”
“That’s… a secret.”
“Huh?! You can’t just leave it there after building it up like that!”
“Yotsuka, still undecided?”
Makina, seated in front of me again this year as usual, turned around to cut in.
“Not yet. What about you, Makina?”
“Same as always, unchanged. Already decided on my first choice.”
“Of course you are…”
“But Yotsuka, Ia-chan’s right, you know. You used to just space out completely.”
I looked down at the still-blank survey form.
“Before, it just… felt scary, somehow.”
“Scary?”
“Because, no matter how much I thought about it, it always came back to you, Makina.”
The words caught in my throat, and I let my eyes drift out the window.
“If the only future I could pick was staying beside you as your sister… then thinking about anything past that, no matter how it turned out, felt kind of pointless.”
“Yotsuka…”
“But now.”
I spun the pen between my fingers.
“I’ve actually got room to be undecided, I guess…”
Hearing that, Makina smiled a little.
“I think that’s a good thing.”
“Right?”
“Which means it’s thanks to me, isn’t it. Because I chose to date you, Yotsuka, you’re finally able to actually think about your future properly…”
“…If you hadn’t gotten so close to me in the first place, maybe none of this would’ve happened at all.”
“What, so it’s my fault, not thanks to me?”
While we were at it, Ia leaned in from the side, grinning.
“Okay, seriously, can you two take your lovers’ spat somewhere else? Keep gushing like this and you’re gonna start reciting wedding vows next.”
“Mm. In sickness and in health, I vow to eat delicious meals with Yotsuka, every single day.”
“Wha—?! Ia! Makina, don’t play along in that dead-serious tone!!”
I screamed, face boiling red as an octopus, and Ia laughed, saying “yeah, yeah, thanks for the show,” before turning back to her own desk.
Amid the classroom’s noisy chatter, I looked down at the blank survey form one more time.
What do I actually want to become.
The right to slowly, properly think that through — was finally, at long last, sitting in my own hands.
For now, honestly, that alone feels like enough.
…Man. Isn’t that, like, a little too convenient?