ƥαṇdα- ηθνε|·ƈθm

Aside from Hanabi’s message, I also found two more unread messages that were sent recently or, at least, from the last 12 hours that I focused more on my girls than any other incoming messages.

One of them was from Kanno-sensei. That teacher from Third High who’s taking care of the sickly dude. And the other was from Saionji, the egocentric girl.

What a great coincidence, right? All three from that school contacted me on almost the same day.

It was as if someone was telling me to check on all of them. But well, why do I need to when they could check on me instead? Saves me the trouble of setting aside time for that.

Kanno-sensei’s message was a simple update about the sickly dude who seemed to have regained his enthusiasm after that talk with me. As I expected, she was full of praise for him, more like a mother to her son and not as a special someone. Apparently, my lie that I am his junior had yet to be exposed. Maybe they never talked about it yet or Kanno-sensei waved that off and she’s just glad that my visit improved that guy’s mental condition. He’s already physically weak, if his mind also crumbled, that woman would probably be sad for him.

On the other hand, Saionji’s message oozed out every bit of her egocentric nature that it almost read like an out-of-the-norm delinquent trying to extort someone by praising herself to the high heavens.

She said, “Oi, junior who does not know shame. This gorgeous lady had taken her precious time to type this message for you. Accept my friend request with graciousness and reply to me! I’m waiting!”

Yeah. The exclamation mark was also included. I could imagine her smirking as she typed all of that.

But knowing that girl, she’s once again trying to mount her comeback by doing this. Given how our first interaction turned out to me almost taming her, she’s the type who wouldn’t give up until she got the upper hand.

Unfortunately, her attempts would always end up as a miss.

Another thing to note was... I didn’t give her my contact details. I only took hers. That’s why the last time we had a conversation was when I videocalled Nao and she just so happened to be around.

Well, my girl already took her under her wing and for what it’s worth, she’s also having a giggle seeing a girl with that much pride crumbling against me.

Before the bus reached my destination, I replied to all three messages.

For Hanabi, I told her to not trouble her sister. Although I did ask her to let me meet Matsuri, I meant it not to be a surprise. That girl kept her distance for a reason. If we met without the girl having prepared for it, she might just not talk to me or become silent throughout that meeting.

Furthermore, if Matsuri truly changed from her rather rough personality back then, then I had no idea how she would take knowing that I, unbeknownst to her, met up with her sister.

Our separation was abrupt and it didn’t happen like how I cut off my girls before. We just stopped seeing each other when I refused her suggestion of letting her break up with her boyfriend and start dating me.

For now, I’ll see how she will respond. The meeting won’t happen right away, anyway. And my days are still too hectic to squeeze that in.

For Kanno-sensei, I replied positively and continued with my act as a junior who admired that sickly dude. Thinking about the advice I gave that guy, he probably hadn’t confessed yet. If I’m not wrong, he’s still waiting to produce some result to do so but because I told him that someone could swoop in and steal the woman away, he must’ve been brimming with determination.

I'd feel a little guilty if the dude suddenly dropped dead from exhausting himself.

Due to that, I added another line, telling Kanno-sensei to remind him not to overdo it and take care of his sickly body first.

Maybe I would get praise from the woman but I couldn’t really care less about it.

For Saionji, my reply was short and it’s a simple question, “Who are you?”

As I already know how to deal with her, annoying her first would definitely work in my favor. Let’s see how long she could still be haughty.

With that done, the only thing left for me to do was to wait for a few minutes.

-

-

Traversing this unfamiliar neighborhood early in the morning earned me a lot of quizzical gazes from those early birds who were either sweeping their front yard or jogging to condition their bodies.

I also had a little urge to check on my other girls nearby, however, after reinforcing the thought that I was here for Saki, I dropped that urge and simply took another path towards their house.

Around five minutes after I got off the bus, I reached my destination. And even from afar, I could already see Saki waving her hands energetically.

Upon reaching her, she unhesitatingly jumped at me before pulling me away from the area. She didn’t even wait for me to greet her or return her embrace.

She just wanted us to be away from their neighborhood as soon as possible.

As I wondered for the reason, Saki enlightened me about it at the same time as she stopped pulling on my arm.

“Uhm. I apologize, Ruki. I don’t want the gossipers in my neighborhood to create rumors about us.”

Gossipers, huh? I guess her neighborhood was different. They’re probably malicious ones who’d embellish the events they saw in their eyes. More often than not, those gossipers just wanted something to stave off their boredom.

“I don’t mind. I also don’t want to trouble you. Your parents still don’t know about us, right?”

Right. Unlike with Hina and Nami, I still had yet to meet them even when I already sneaked into her bedroom. Although I already got the impression that her mother would probably be hard to convince, I still had no idea about her father.

In any case, asking that question was a wrong move.

Saki bit her lips and shook her head, looking a little down, “... They know that I’m already dating someone. But, they’re not welcome at the thought of it.”

I quickly racked my mind to recover from this and cheer her up.

“Not welcome, huh? Should I have shown up with a box of chocolates and a bouquet of flowers?”

“Pfft. I’d like to see that but they’d look at you weirdly for sure.”

“Probably not if I say that I’m going to take you on a date as a celebration of your birthday.”

“Yes, because they’re going to be confused. They know I don’t celebrate it. And too bad for you. The chance has already closed for that.” Saki replied, continuing her pleasant waves of laughter.

Her response was fairly positive but there’s no trace of her prominent trait of being an opportunist. If I have to guess, the girl never considered the idea I was presenting before her. Hence, it sounded fun to her, for the most part.

“Oh, Saki. Don’t you know your boyfriend? If it’s for you, I’ll make it possible. What do you think about this? Let’s go back and eat this breakfast along with them.

“Eh...?”

“Don’t look surprised. This is your birthday, let us make it as special as it can be. But obviously, I won’t do things impulsively without your permission. Should we take the chance or not?”

Adding that last line to provoke her opportunistic instinct, I put on a sly grin as I pulled her close to me before turning us back to face the direction we came from.