Episode 36 – I Shouldn’t Make Girls Cry

“…….Hmm, this place.”

My step sister woke up on the bed in the infirmary.

I felt relief as I stroked my chest when I saw that.

It seemed like my step sister didn’t understand her current situation, so when she got up from the bed, she shook her head and looked around.

“….Sora, are you awake?”

“Eh….?”

When I called her out, my step sister looked at me with a confused expression. She’s not feeling well yet, her face is still red.

“W-why are you here ! !”

She pulled the blanket against her body and asked me why I’m here with a red face.

“Sorry, I carried you to the infirmary….”

I explained the situation roughly to my step sister.

The moment I saw my step sister collapsed, I called her name which she forbade me to, and my classmates called the homeroom teacher and told me to take her to the infirmary…..when I briefly explained how I brought her here in a so-called princess-like carry, and how the health teacher asked me to check on her while she called her parents, then Sora said [Un…] but she didn’t say nothing more and silently fell asleep.

“Sora, I’m sorry… I panicked and couldn’t keep my promise to you.”

I broke my promise with Sora.

They’re not supposed to know that she’s having a gloomy person as her family, but I ended up calling my step sister’s name in class.

When the regrets strike my heart, she shouts [You stupid ! !].

Her eyes were moist with tears and she looked at me as if she was about to cry, but she immediately turned her face down.

“Enough, just get out.”

She told me to go back to the class with a murmured voice. 

Her words hurt my heart, but I stood up as she told me to do, then I said [Sorry] and turned my back on her.

Then, I heard a voice say [Hey….] coming from behind.

I was surprised that my step sister, who’s usually unapproachable, called out to me, and as soon as  I stopped, she continued to speak in a feeble voice.

“How can you be so kind to me……”

She was different than usual, her voice that came from her mouth was somewhat uneasy and tense. When I heard her voice, I thought about the answer for a while.

“Isn’t it because we’re…family?”
As I said that, I left without listening to what she had to say.

I didn’t know that my step sister was crying in the infirmary after I left.

When I returned from the infirmary, what awaited me was a bunch of questions from my classmates.

A voice came from all of the directions like [Kaizei kun, were you and Kaizei san brother and sister?] and [why are you keeping it a secret?]

To respond to my classmates’ questions, I only answered [Because I asked her to keep it a secret.]

I was afraid that if I said something imprudently, I would cause hate to build up against my step sister.

I’m used to being hated,  but I can’t deal with it by involving my step sister.

“Just leave it there already. He had a lot of family circumstances you know,”

My classmates’ questions seemed to continue, but Genpaku interrupted them. The questions that were stormed by my classmates stopped when Genpaku gave them a restraining gaze.

Thanks to Genpaku’s help, I was able to breathe a sigh of relief.

A brief moment of calmness came since I haven’t been able to relax yesterday.

After school, I left the classroom alone.

I can still feel the stares from my classmates, but no one came to ask me anything.

Apparently my step sister had already gone home when my mother picked her up in the middle of class.

When I changed my shoes in the shoe locker and picked up my indoor shoes, I heard a voice saying [Wait….].

As I turned my face toward the direction, my childhood friend was standing in front of me.

Her face gave off an aura of wanting to ask something.

“What?”

“There is something I wanted to ask you, do you have……time?”

I flinched a bit at her serious expression, but I knew what she wanted to ask and I said [I do, but….] then she said [Follow me…] turning her back and walking away, I followed her from behind quietly.

After leaving the school, we walked away for a while  on the opposite side of my school route, then we arrived at a certain park. This was the park where we used to play when i was a child.

She goes near the jungle gym in the park, so I follow her.

Then she turned to me and started asking me a question with a serious expression

“Hey, this park…. Do you remember it?”

“No….”

She whispered […..you’re lying] as she predicted my reply.

When she took out her smartphone, she operated something for a while and showed me her phone.

There was another…..the author, Matsudaira Riku.

“Yesterday, when I was cutting your hair, I noticed….You’re Matsudaira sensei, right? You’re Rikkun, right?”

My childhood friend stared at me with her eyes full of tears.

The look on her face makes me feel guilty for lying to her. I don’t know if it’s a good thing to lie to her….just because I had a bad impression of her at first, and time passed in silence for a while.

“…Sorry.”

Just when I made up my mind and was about to tell her the truth…

“Oi, you bastard ! ! I finally found you ! !”

I heard a man’s voice behind me.

When I turned toward the direction of that voice, I saw the three men who had tried to assault my step sister the other day, the three men I had a fight with were glaring at me with the other seven companions.

“You beat the hell out of us last time ! !”

Their angry voices came at me and my childhood friend.