Episode 16: Year-End Party, the Reason That Smile Pisses Me Off
I stepped away from the table for a bit and went to the restroom.
Washing my hands at the izakaya’s sink, I caught my own eyes in the mirror. Eyes soft, corners of my mouth turned up.
“…Oh no.”
I was grinning like an idiot. Full-on dopey face.
Asakura-san, the person I’ve been crushing on, had asked me out to dinner. I was happy about it.
Happy… I should be happy.
But something deep in my chest was churning, strangely. A prickling sensation. Something snagging, something unsettled.
“Just my imagination. I’m just drunk.”
I lightly slapped my cheeks and took a deep breath. Lifted my head and opened the restroom door.
In the hallway, I passed Hanamori.
“Ah…”
“…”
Hanamori’s face was flushed. She looked drunk. Her steps were faintly unsteady, her footing shaky.
I remembered the male sales staff egging her on earlier, and her downing a third cassis orange.
“Good work today.”
“…You looked like you were having fun.”
Hanamori said it, quietly.
“Huh?”
“With Asakura-san. Talking with your agenda written all over your face.”
What, that blunt, poisonous bluntness. This girl clearly doesn’t know the meaning of sugarcoating.
“‘Agenda,’ hold on a second—”
“I saw it. That lovestruck face.”
Hanamori looked away slightly.
“While you were talking with Asakura-san. It was written all over your face. ‘I like her. She smells nice. Her drunk face is cute. The way she smokes is hot. I want to date her already.’ All of it. Completely obvious.”
“Wha—what!? I wasn’t making a face like that…!”
My voice came out too loud.
Worried people nearby might’ve heard, I lowered my voice a little.
“Well, what about you, Hanamori-san, you looked plenty happy with Tamura-san too.”
I got a little worked up and shot back.
“Did I look happy?”
Hanamori’s eyes narrowed, just slightly.
“You were totally into it. Leaning on Tamura-san the whole time, being all clingy.”
“Is that how it looked?”
“That’s how it looked.”
“Huh. You were really watching, then.”
Crap. I’d shot myself in the foot.
“…I just happened to catch it. That’s all.”
“Happened to, huh. Interesting.”
Hanamori swayed a step closer.
“Asami-san, how many times did you look at me?”
“Eh.”
“While I was talking with Tamura-san. You kept glancing over, didn’t you.”
My heart lurched.
“I wasn’t… looking…”
“Liar. You were definitely looking. Our eyes met at least five times.”
Completely self-destructed and cornered. My furtive glances had been thoroughly caught.
“…Isn’t that just your imagination?”
“It’s not my imagination.”
Hanamori stepped closer. Her eyes hazy with alcohol, she stared up at me. A faintly cheeky upward glance. I’m taller than her, but somehow I felt like I was losing.
“Talking with Tamura-san was really, really fun, you know?”
Hanamori made some bizarre point of insisting. Oddly forceful about it.
“Huh.”
“Yep. Super, super, suuuper fun.”
“That’s a lot of ‘super.’”
“Because it was that fun. Way more fun than talking to you, Asami-san. By a mile.”
“I see.”
“I do.”
Strangely intense pressure behind it. What is this, a kids’ fight?
Silence.
An odd pause stretched between us. Hanamori kept staring up at me. I couldn’t look away.
“…Well, let’s head back. Looks like the entertainment’s about to start.”
Just as I took a step forward—
A tug.
“Eh.”
My sleeve had been grabbed.
My heart was pounding hard.
I turned around, and Hanamori had a light grip on the hem of my shirt. No real strength behind it. But she wasn’t letting go.
“Hanamori…san…?”
My voice came out strained.
Hanamori was looking down. Face still flushed, biting her lip. Her mouth opened like she wanted to say something, then closed again, over and over.
“…Um.”
A hoarse voice.
My heart pounded even harder.
Hanamori’s fingers tightened on the hem of my shirt. Gripping it hard enough that her nails dug into the fabric.
“Asami-san.”
“Yeah.”
“I—”
“Asami-san, Hanamori-san!”
A voice from a distance. Asahina-san, the year-end party’s organizer.
“Bingo’s about to start! Come on back!”
“Ah, yes! Coming!”
I answered on pure reflex.
Startled, I turned back to Hanamori.
Hanamori had already let go of my hem.
“…Sorry.”
“…Huh.”
“About that. Forget it.”
Hanamori took a step back, then another. The edge from before was gone from her expression, replaced by something like resignation.
“Wait a second.”
“Let’s head back. Asakura-san’s waiting too.”
“Hana—”
“See you.”
Hanamori turned and started walking away.
I tried to call out to her, but she didn’t look back. Her small figure grew distant down the hallway.
I stood there, frozen in place.
“…What was that, seriously.”
My chest was churning. Loud enough to be annoying.
I should be happy, having made plans with Asakura-san.
A faint one-sided crush that might, maybe, actually come true.
And yet, Hanamori’s expression from a moment ago wouldn’t leave my head.
The feeling of my sleeve being grabbed still lingered on my wrist. That trembling touch of her fingertips.
What had Hanamori been about to say?
Why had she made a face like that?
Why had she seemed so angry?
And more than anything—
Why did my heart ache and prickle like this?
“…I don’t know.”
I murmured it quietly and opened the door to the banquet hall.
Inside, I saw Hanamori back at her seat, sitting beside Tamura-san.
Hanamori was laughing. Her usual calculating, saccharine smile, chatting away with Tamura-san about something.
The expression she’d shown in the hallway a moment ago was nowhere to be found. Not the desperate face, not the angry face, not the resigned face.
All of it, gone.
My chest tightened, hard.
“…Pisses me off.”
I didn’t even know, myself, who those words were aimed at.