Chapter 3

Can you pretend to be my boyfriend?

Translated by Dawn
Edited by Dawn

Can you pretend to be my boyfriend?

I was walking side by side with a girl right now.

And the girl I was with was Karin Mizutani.

She wants the title of the most beautiful girl in the school.

Could you believe it? This situation. Normally, it would find it hard to believe, wouldn’t it?

Because even I, the person in question, am doubting if it was real or not.

I sneaked a peek next to me.

She was a little shorter than me, but her hands and feet were slender and well-styled.

I looked at her eyelashes again, and they were long.

They didn’t look like fake eyelashes…..I was sure people would be jealous of a natural product with such long eyelashes.

Satomi, in particular, seemed to put her life on the line in that area.

“What’s wrong?”

Mizutani, perhaps noticing my gaze, turned her head toward me.

The way she tilted her head was too destructive to see at close range.

I hurriedly turned my head and said, “It’s nothing.”

But……I seriously had nothing to say.

To begin with, I wasn’t very good at conversation.

If I had something to say, I could speak fairly well, but the everyday conversation was so free that I didn’t know what to say.

If it were my family, I would be able to talk without worrying about anything.

It took about 10 minutes to walk from the school to the station.

Normally, it was a very short walk, but today, it felt very long.

I hope I could get to the station as soon as possible.

As I was moving my legs, Mizutani opened her mouth.

“You know…I wanted to thank you for what you did for me earlier.”

“It’s fine, you don’t have to. I just lied a little.”

“No, I mean about the sixth period.”

“….Huh?”

I involuntarily shifted my eyes from the view in front of me to Mizutani.

Mizutani looked back at me.

“Aizawa, you volunteer to be the representative for me.”

“No way, that’s not the case. What kind of a good-natured person would volunteer to be the class representative for someone they’ve never even spoken to?”

“Then why did you raise your hand?”

Mizutani stared at me. I looked away.

Looking into her deep blue eyes, I felt like I was about to uncover everything.

“I wanted to be the class representative. I thought I could change myself if I got a position with responsibility.”

“If Aizawa says so, I guess that’s that.”

When Mizutani said this, she finally turned her face forward.

She continued in her usual low-temperature voice.

“Aizawa, is there anything you want right now?”

“Huh? What’s it all of a sudden?”

“Anything, just answer me, five, four, three…”

“Huuh!?”

When I thought about it, there was no need for me to be in a hurry just because she was counting down.

But that was probably because it was the first time I had spoken to the person I was talking to, and because it was Karin Mizutani.

I hurriedly looked around for an answer and found a vending machine on the side of the road.

I decided to answer with a drink that caught my eye.

“….Milk tea.”

“Okay, milk tea.”

Mizutani must have also noticed the vending machine.

She went to the vending machine, put in some money, and pressed the button for milk tea.

With a clunk, the bottle dropped, and Mizutani took a 500 ml bottle of milk tea.

“Here you go.”

“….th-thanks?”

Mizutani shook her head at me as I tilted my head and was about to pay.

“No, it’s fine, this one’s on me.”

“If this is a form of your gratitude, I don’t want it.”

“It’s not. Because, Aizawa, you didn’t do it to help me, right? Then there is no reason for me to do that. So this is just me wanting to buy you a drink.”

“….Isn’t that logic a bit unfair?”

“It was you who lied to me first.”

“…..”

I couldn’t even get a word out.

I had no choice but to put the milk tea in my bag.

After closing the zipper, I looked at Mizutani walking next to me.

Her expression hadn’t changed, but…perhaps it was just my imagination, but she looked more happy than usual.

***

“Come to think of it, Mizutani always goes home early, right?”

While waiting for the train to come on the platform, I tried talking to Mizutani.

Not because I was interested in Mizutani, but rather to ease the awkwardness of the situation.

I felt less nervous than before, probably because we had talked a little.

Mizutani looked at me with eyes that were somewhat still.

“You’re not the one to talk, Aizawa.”

Well, that’s true.

The fact that I often took the same train at the same time as Mizutani, who got home early, meant that I got home early, too. ….But, there was a good reason for this.

“I don’t have many friends, and there’s nothing for me to do if I stay at school. But Mizutani is different, right? Don’t you have any trouble with people who come to you like before?”

“If a lot of them came to me like that, that would be a problem.”

Mizutani said nonchalantly, ignoring my self-deprecation.

That kind of thing…well, it was fine.

But if people like him come to the classroom in droves just for Mizutani…..it would certainly be more than just a hassle.

The train was coming. The two of us entered the train together.

I was seen by more people than usual.

That was a given. Since Mizutani was next to me.

I looked at Mizutani’s expression.

She maintained the same face as usual, in other words, her face was almost expressionless.

From Mizutani’s point of view, that was probably normal.

It just showed the difference in the world we live in.

With a whirr, the door slammed shut behind me.

I looked around the inside of the train once again and saw that the seats were quite empty.

Well, this was the way it was at this time of the day.

Normally I would just sit down, but…..now, what should I do?

After all, Mizutani was here today.

Sitting next to her was a bit hard for me.

“What’s wrong, Aizawa?”

Before I knew it, Mizutani, who was sitting in the corner seat, was looking at me quizzically.

She tapped the empty seat next to her.

If I didn’t sit next to her, I would hurt Mizutani.

I sat down timidly, though I was scared.

The distance was even closer than when we were walking side by side.

Her luxurious blonde hair touched my shoulder just a little.

A flowery fragrance wafted through the air, gently tickling my nostrils.

….But it was strange when I thought about it.

Since entering high school, I had seen Mizutani on the train many times.

And yet, this was the first time I had ever talked to her.

I was certain that we had never talked, but I felt as if I had known her for a long time.

That was so weird, right?

I had no idea what I was thinking just because we were on the same train.

If Mizutani could read my thoughts right now, I was confident that she would be drawn to me.

“I play piano.”

Mizutani said out of the blue.

The abruptness of her words blew away the tension of having Mizutani sitting next to me.

“Hm?”

“What you just asked. Why do I always come home early.”

“….Oh, about that.”

I didn’t know that topic was still going on.

I thought it was already over.

“Do you learn from a teacher or something?”

“My mother is my teacher. I mean, it’s not wrong to call her a teacher, but…”

“Hee. Mizutani’s mother teaches piano lessons, huh.”

Mizutani nodded and continued.

“For a long time, I couldn’t play with my friends because I had to practice piano all the time after school. So I’m the same as Aizawa. I don’t have friends at school either.”

“…Ah, I see.”

What was that sudden appeal to the negative side?

No, if you thought about it, wasn’t it just about being a “negative person” or something like that?

Mizutani had her own reasons for not having many friends, and I have……mine—

“…You know, Aizawa. I have one favor to ask you.”

Mizutani’s words brought me back to reality.

I looked at her sitting next to me and saw her playing with the ends of her hair.

She seemed to be fidgeting in some way.

“What is it?”

“I don’t think this is the right thing to ask Aizawa, whom I just met for the first time, but….”

Mizutani hesitated for a moment and then looked at me as if she had made up her mind.

Her blue eyes twinkled.

“Can you pretend to be my boyfriend?”

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