Episode 2

A smile that blooms like a flower. A serious gaze that seems to see straight through you. A sweet voice that draws you toward deep water. The faint sting at my neck and the warm, damp sensation that followed.

“Ughhhhh—!!”

I’ve been like this ever since I got home. She keeps echoing around inside my head and I feel like I’m losing my mind.

“…What am I supposed to do.”

I put the question to the stuffed animals by my pillow. They look vaguely concerned, somehow — but they don’t say anything.

A few hours since I got home from Seriha’s. I’d checked the work messages and finally caught my breath — and then this. I was probably making strange noises to myself the whole way home on the train too. Everyone must have thought I was odd.

I’m not a child. I know perfectly well what this feeling is.

Because I love you.

“—!”

I thump the pillow. Once, twice.

This is serious. My thoughts are going in circles.

I pick up my phone, open the messaging app, and tap Tsumugi’s name.

We’ve known each other for years — and yet I’d never once reached out to her first. Scrolling back through our history, all I could find were her lunch invitations and wellness checks.

I really am a cold person, I thought.

Tsumugi is prickly, and her manner of speaking isn’t always kind. She digs her heels in over things she doesn’t like, and plenty of people would probably describe her as intimidating.

And yet — she never crosses into territory she shouldn’t.

When we first met at university, I’d told her a little about myself. A very little. About five percent of what I’d told Seriha.

Even that seemed to be enough for her to sense something, and she’d never pushed further.

What she does is invite me to lunch. She almost never tries to extend my world beyond that.

Every now and then she tries to draw me out into the wider world — but she never pursues it. After years of watching me stay the same, she must be worried.

Hi. Are you free this weekend?

A message that couldn’t be more ordinary. And yet the finger about to press send was trembling.

The stuffed animals by my pillow were cheering me on, I felt. In honour of their expectations — they’d shared my bed for years — I sent the message to Tsumugi.

It’s just asking a friend out. Even so, what a handful I am.

◇

While waiting for Tsumugi’s reply, I put dinner together.

Boil water, put in the pasta, set the timer. While it cooks, fry some sausages in a pan, add frozen spinach and seasoning and leave it on the heat.

Once the pasta’s done, toss everything together with some butter. Finished.

Not the kind of cooking I could serve to someone with any confidence — not like Seriha’s — but I can at least make the minimum required to keep myself alive. The taste isn’t bad, either.

But…

I find myself thinking I’d like to try more of her cooking.

Knowing her, if I said what I wanted she’d make it for me with everything she had. Even something she’d never cooked before — she’d look up the recipe, and try to make it in a way that would please me.

My fork hand stops.

“I’m not a middle schooler…”

I sigh at how hopelessly naive I’m being. That’s ten sighs since I got home. Might be a personal record.

I was staring blankly at the television and putting pasta in my mouth when an incoming call from my phone pulled me back to reality.

Tsumugi calling. She sends messages sometimes — but a call might be the first time.

“Hello?”

“Hey. You alive? Where are you?”

Her voice through the phone sounds hurried, slightly breathless. Unusual for someone who’s always composed.

“Hm? Home. I ended up pulling an all-nighter, so I took the day off. Are you — on your way somewhere?”

She lets out a long breath, and then speaks in a voice that mixes exasperation with concern.

“I knew you were off. Good to know you’re alive, at least. So — what do you want?”

We work for the same company but different floors. How did she know I’d taken the day off?

“Um… I mean, it’s fine, isn’t it, every once in a while. I just felt like reaching out.”

I’d acted on impulse in sending the message, so I hadn’t thought through what I actually wanted to do. Fair point — why had I reached out?

To talk through how I was feeling? To tell her about what happened with Seriha?

Silence.

“Hello? Bad signal? Can you hear me?”

“…Quiet, I can hear you fine. Whatever. Do you want to do something?”

“I haven’t decided anything specific, but — I just wanted to talk. Dinner somewhere? I’ll look for somewhere with drinks.”

“That is genuinely strange behaviour from you. What happened…”

A mutter, barely above her breath.

“Fine. I’ll pick the place. I’ll send you the details. Bye.”

She told me what she needed to say and hung up promptly.

She called me strange — but Tsumugi herself sounds a little different from usual too.

That’s probably how much it’s thrown her, me actually reaching out for once. I’m always causing her trouble.

A little while later, a message arrived with nothing but the time and place. No extra words — that’s very her.

I haven’t decided what to say. I might say nothing. I might say everything.

It’s not a feeling I recognise from someone who lived carefully, always trying not to make the wrong choice.

I finish the washing up and make a cup of tea in a mug. Chamomile, today.

Just as the scent of herbs spreads gently through the air — I quietly felt the colour that had seeped into me spreading, little by little, in the same way.