Chapter 5: CH 5

The night he confessed his feelings to me, I could hardly sleep.

No, technically I was asleep, but I felt like I had dreamt so many dreams that I was rather tired.

I opened my eyes and saw that the room was still dimly lit, and the alarm clock by my bed showed the time in the early morning.

As I lay in bed, I tried to review the fragments of the dream I had just had with my foggy mind.

It was a memory of my life up to now, or a reliving of a memorable scene from a drama or movie I had seen. What they all have in common is that they always center on me and Yuki-kun.

For example, in a classroom at dusk, Yuki-kun, a junior high school student, hugs me and says,

“Kanae, I’ve always loved you.”

And now, in the gymnasium of an elementary school, the high school student Yuki and I are holding hands while attending a school assembly.

The scene suddenly changes, and I’m being chased by a zombie in the city, and the current Yuki-kun powerfully saves me.

The next scene is me in the living room of my house, watching TV with Yuki-kun’s head on my shoulder.

The memories of dreams become hazy and fade away as time goes by, but the most memorable ones remain as if they are emphasized and burned into my mind.

I’m sure I’ll never forget the last one, where we looked like lovers or a couple.

“It’s… because of Yuki…”

My face starts to heat up again. I’m ticklish in the back of my chest, and I’m writhing on the bed in tremendous embarrassment.

Even though Yuki’s confession was such a shock to me, I never thought I would dream about it.

If I do this, I’ll definitely be conscious of Yuki-kun when I see him at school today.

“Maybe I should get up now…”

I can’t sleep anyway, so I might as well get ready for school. It’s still early in the morning, but I’m sure my mom will be up to see my dad off for breakfast.

So I got up from the bed, walked out of the room and went downstairs. Then I saw that my mother was awake.

“Oh, you’re up early, aren’t you?”

“Yes, I’m up.”

“That’s unusual. But if Kanae was in a club or something, I wonder if she would have been up at this time every day for morning practice or something.”

I was a little embarrassed to find out that it was just a jibe at my occasional oversleeping.

But something about what my mother just said reminded me of him, and my attention turned to that.

Morning practice – Yuki-kun, who is on the soccer team, said that he has morning practice almost every day. I wonder if he always wakes up and leaves his house at this time?

“I think I’ll go to… school.”

“What? What’s wrong? Do you really have some kind of morning practice?”

“Well, no, not really… See, I’m going to school anyway, so I thought it would be nice for a change.”

“So, yeah… well, it doesn’t matter because the food is ready…”

Mom said, sounding terribly confused.

Ugh… Sure, I always sleep until the last minute, and suddenly I’m not sure I do, but I think that reaction is a bit harsh.

-But I’m going.

I got ready to go to school and left early.

My usual route to school. I can’t help but feel unsettled when I pass that road, which I haven’t used since I left school yesterday, because it reminds me of yesterday.

“I wondered if Yuki-kun had already passed through here.”

We live in the same neighborhood and go to the same school, so we’re on the same route to school. I thought that maybe I would run into him by accident, so I looked around and tried to find Yuki-kun.

“Already gone ahead…?”

I don’t know if I’m disappointed or relieved that Yuki-kun is not here.

But if I go to the classroom, I’ll definitely see him… What should I do, how should I treat Yuki-kun?

I’m not sure if it’s a good idea to reject his confession and treat him the same way I’ve always treated him, or if it’s a bad idea to avoid him…

“What do you want me to do, Yuki-kun?”

If possible, I’d like to make sure that Yuki-kun doesn’t feel uncomfortable. But I won’t know that until I ask Yuki-kun.

What should I do? What should I do?…

As I agonized over this, I realized that I had already arrived in front of the school.

I don’t know how focused I was…

Feeling ashamed and embarrassed, I hurriedly headed for the entrance.

Then, in the schoolyard that I could see on my way there, the soccer team that Yuki-kun belonged to was having their morning practice.

Yuki-kun, are you there?

I tried to look for him with my side eyes, but I couldn’t see him from here…

I wanted to see Yuki-kun play soccer for the first time in a long time, so I hurried to the floor where my classroom was located.

When I got to the top of the stairs, I saw a washroom at the end of the corridor – my hands were sweaty from the morning, so I thought I’d wash them first.

Standing at the washroom, I took out a hand towel to wipe my hands, put it in my mouth, and rubbed my hands together to wash my hands.

Wiping my wet hands with a hand towel, I entered the classroom and was surprised at how few people were there. Including me, there were only five people in the class.

All of them were classmates I hadn’t really talked to before, but when I mumbled to myself, “Good morning…” a boy near me nodded his head.

I put my stuff down on my seat and looked out the classroom window at the schoolyard.

“Yuki-kun… Oh, there he is.”

I spotted Yuki-kun in front of the goal. It seemed he was practicing shooting in a line in front of the goal. I was able to see Yuki-kun kick and score a goal. That’s what we used to practice in junior high school, right?

Then it occurred to me.

By the way, I used to watch Yuki-kun play soccer more than ever before, although I stopped watching him after I started to care about Souta-kun…

When I was still a little kid, Yuki-kun kicking a soccer ball was so cool that I used to squeal . I’m a little embarrassed when I remember it.

Maybe Yuki continued to play soccer because I told him he was cool… I felt so self-centered and self-delusional that I hated myself.

It’s not right to think that way, because I rejected Yuki-kun’s confession that he took the trouble to give me…

I turned my head gloomily and looked up after a while to find that the schoolyard had somehow become unpopular.

“Oh, what?”

Is the morning practice over? -It’s already this late? What, so Yuki-kun will be here soon!

I looked at my watch and saw that a good amount of time had already passed.

I was in a panic, wondering what I should do. Then, I reflexively turned my eyes towards the entrance of the classroom, and at that moment…

“Ah…”

“What?”

Yuki-kun had just walked into the classroom, and our eyes met in a way that I couldn’t fool him.

My mind went blank and we stared at each other for a while, then I quickly turned my head away.

My face is hot… I’m sure it’s red… Did you understand…?

I glanced over at Yuki-kun and saw that he had just turned his back and was leaving the classroom.

Eh-where are you going ……? Could it be because your eyes met mine ……?

Immediately, my back chills and my chest jumps up with a throbbing pain.

I’m so nervous, I can’t even stand still. I wonder where Yuki-kun went…? It would be weird if I chased after him… Oh, but if I decided to go to the bathroom or washroom, I could…

I’m not chasing Yuki-kun, I’m going to the hallway because I have something to do.

So, thinking of it as an excuse, I grabbed a hand towel and went after Yuki-kun.

It was just like chasing after Yuki-kun’s distant back after his confession on the way home yesterday.