34
“Mio, I’m sorry.”
I had to apologize.
“I was wrong. I should’ve told you sooner.”
“What…?”
“I don’t like the Mio you’ve become.”
“Huh…?”
“The Mio you’ve become isn’t the Mio I fell in love with.”
I fell in love with the Mio from back then.
“I think you’ve become cuter and prettier. But it’s been hard for me to see you getting fawned over by so many people.”
This is the honest truth.
The ugly truth that I couldn’t even reveal to Mio, my girlfriend—no, that I couldn’t reveal precisely because she was my girlfriend.
I’ve finally worked up the courage.
The courage to finally let it all out, right here, right now.
“Because of my personality, I couldn’t talk to you when you were surrounded by classmates. I couldn’t even talk to you after you became so popular… I felt like you weren’t just mine anymore.”
“…”
Mio listens to me without saying anything.
“I wanted to be with you. But it’s because I thought we could be together forever. The truth is, I hardly spend any time with the Mio you’ve become. If we keep going like this, we’ll only grow further apart .”
“That’s not true.”
“It is. In fact, our feelings have already grown quite distant.”
Otherwise, there’d be no reason for me to have called you out here.
Mio must realize that.
“…Do you hate me, Kou-kun?”
Mio says in a trembling voice.
She’s looking down, so I can’t see her expression.
“…I don’t hate you.”
“But you just said you don’t like me.”
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“…Yeah. I said that. But I don’t hate you. I could never hate you.”
If I had said I hated you, it might have been easier to break up.
But I couldn’t lie to my childhood friend, who I’ve always liked…who I still like.
“Then why are you saying we should break up…? If you like me, that’s all that matters. I like you too, Kou-kun! If we both like each other, what’s the problem!?”
Mio’s voice is choked with tears.
She must be crying.
Drops of water fall onto the classroom floor.
“Even if I like you, it’s no good.”
“It’s not over! We can just start over! We can start over as many times as we need to!! Isn’t that what lovers do!? So why are you suddenly talking about breaking up? It doesn’t make any sense …”
I knew I was hurting her.
It was my fault for giving her false hope.
If I had truly cared about Mio, I would have lied.
“Mio…”
“Listen, let’s start over. That’s right, let’s do that. I’ll go back to the way I was. I can change back. If I go back to being my ordinary self, no one will pay any attention to me. Then we can go home together again and study together. Right?”
It was because I couldn’t do that that I was making Mio act so pathetic.
Mio, who was so popular with everyone, looked so out of character.
“…Do you really mean that?”
“Of course I do! Why don’t you believe me!?”
I couldn’t bear to look at her.
I didn’t want to see her like this.
“…Last Sunday. What were you doing?”
So I played my trump card.
My absolute trump card in this situation.
I knew that bringing this up would only hurt Mio more, but I was going to do it anyway.
I was such a hypocrite, pretending to be so honest. In the end, this is what I was really like.
How self-centered could I be?
“Huh…”
“I want an answer. What were you doing?”
Mio seemed confused.
Maybe she didn’t understand why I was asking her this all of a sudden.
“…I was at my relatives’ house. What about it?”
Mio answered hesitantly, but this was just the warm-up.
“I see. So what about yesterday?”
This was the real question.
I knew it was a cruel thing to ask.
Mio’s shoulders trembled slightly.
I could see that she was shaken.
“Uh, oh… Th-that’s right! Studying! I was studying at home!”
Her eyes darted around, unfocused, and then she finally came up with an obvious lie.
Did she hesitate because she was thinking about Shido?
My chest ached with a sharp pain.
“I see.”
“Yes! That’s right! I was studying for the entrance exams all by myself! Listen, Kou-kun, let’s forget about that and talk about…”
I didn’t let her finish.
“Mio, I saw you.”
“Huh? Wh-what are you…”
“Yesterday, I saw you walking through town with another man.”
As I said this, Mio’s face turned ashen.
“I could tell from a distance. That was definitely Mio. The one walking next to her is Shido, right? The former student council president…”
“That’s not true!”
Mio’s scream echoed through the classroom.