Part 4

The next day.

I saw Aya Otonashi's corpse.

Umaibō (うまい棒) or "delicious stick" is a small, puffed, cylindrical corn snack that resides at the bottom of most Japanese convenience store candy shelves

8,946th time[]

Upon hearing my words, Mogi-san's eyes turn sad and she ponders for a while. With an uncomfortable look on her face, she then mutters:

"Please wait until tomorrow."

2,601st time[]

"I'm Aya Otonashi."

The transfer student murmurs only these words, and nothing more.

✵

"Oh my god! That's intense!"

My friend Haruaki Usui, who is sitting next to me, says so in a rather loud voice. He does so even though class is still in session, and vigorously slaps my back.

Haruaki? You know, that really hurts, and the looks that our classmates are giving us are also quite embarrassing…

Haruaki's gaze is already turned toward the back of the room, where the transfer student, Aya Otonashi, is sitting.

"Our eyes met! That's intense!"

"Well, when you turn around to look at her, then it's only natural that your eyes meet."

"Hoshii, it's DESTINY!"

Wait, what? Destiny?

"Anyway, she's just too pretty! She would definitely pass muster as a work of art on the world market…and then be acknowledged as a national treasure. Oh, it's too late for me, my heart has already been stolen…I'll go confess to her."

That's fast!!

The bell rings. After we stand up and bow to our teacher, Haruaki makes a beeline for Otonashi-san without bothering to sit down first.

"Aya Otonashi-san! I fell for you at first sight. I love you!"

Uwaa, he's seriously doing it…

I cannot hear Otonashi-san's reply but Haruaki's face is a dead giveaway. Ah, no…it's not even necessary to look at his face.

Haruaki comes back and stands in front of my desk.

"Absurd…I got dumped?"

He thought his confession could succeed…? It's scary because he actually seems serious.

"Isn't that obvious? Confessing to her out of nowhere will only annoy her!"

"Mh, I see your point. Well then, I shall confess again. But next time, I won't do it so suddenly! My feelings are bound to get through to her one day!"

On the one hand his positive way of thinking is almost enviable, but on the other hand, I'd rather just avoid it entirely.

"Having fun? You're providing me some pretty good entertainment, but the girls are giving you guys some serious looks of disdain."

Daiya joins us with these words.

"Eeh?! Isn't it only Haruaki who's getting looked down on?!"

"Nope, you are, too. The girls regard you as birds of a feather."

"Oho, flocking together with me as the same kind of bird? What an honor! Don't you think so, Hoshii?"

A-Anything but…

"Leaving that aside, Daiyan, even you'd want to make a move on her, right?"

Haruaki elbows Daiya. He's able to do that to Daiya without fear, probably because they are childhood friends. Or maybe it's just because he acts impulsively without any concern for consequences…

Daiya sighs and answers right away.

"Not at all."

"That's impossible! In that case, Daiyan, who could possibly move your heart?"

"It doesn't matter whether my heart beats faster because of Otonashi-san's looks. I may have to acknowledge her beauty, but I still have no desire to make a move."

"Huuh…?"

"Haruaki, you have zero understanding, don't you? Well, of course such feelings can't be understood by a monkey like you, who lives by following his instincts and would take any girl as long as she's got a pretty face."

"What!? To begin with, what does instinct have to do with caring about appearances?!"

"It's human instinct to be attracted to someone beautiful because a beautiful child will increase the chances that your bloodline will survive."

"Ooh", "Ooh" Haruaki and I let out simultaneous breaths of admiration. Daiya looks amazed, as if he were shocked that we didn't know something so basic.

"Ah, I got it, Daiyan! So you're saying that her beauty is so far beyond our reach that even you can't make a move on her! Inevitable defeat! That's it, right? Like that fox who made himself think that 'this grape is sour' when he couldn't reach it. Your behavior is called rationalization. How uncool! That's so uncool, Daiyan!"

"How much of my talk did you listen to? What the hell?…well, the first half of your statement wasn't necessarily wrong. But as for the other half of your speech—I'll kill you!"

"Oho, so you really can't make a move on her."

Haruaki has a triumphant look on his face. Daiya finally punches Haruaki. Uwaa, it looks like all of Daiya's frustration went straight into his punch …

"It's not 'I can't make a move on her.' It's 'she won't make a move on me.'"

"How cocky…hey, Hoshii, isn't that guy getting carried away just because of his looks?" Haruaki says without showing any sign of remorse.

"It's not that she won't make a move because I'm out of reach! Well, that could be possible as well, but in her case that doesn't even apply."

"Uwaa, he's boldly saying strange things."

"She doesn't regard me as outside her reach, no, she doesn't even engage in such a classification. She's not interested in us to start with. She's not even looking down on us. Just as we only register bugs as bugs, she registers people as people. That's all. She doesn't care about slight differences among people like my pretty face or Haruaki's ugly face. Just like the gender of cockroaches doesn't even cross your consciousness. How can you possibly make a move on such a girl?"

Even Haruaki seems overwhelmed by this merciless statement about Otonashi-san, and stays dead silent.

"…Daiya."

I open my mouth in Haruaki's place.

"Looks like you're surprisingly interested in Otonashi-san."

Daiya is at a loss for words. Ah, that's an extremely rare reaction. But aren't I right? Setting aside whether his opinion is correct, he must have observed her a decent amount in order to perform such an analysis.

"…tch, I have no interest!"

"Oh, you blushed!"

"…hey Kazu. You're going to step on a land mine if you keep going down that road. Do you want me to show you a way to use a leek that you can barely imagine? You'll end up with such a bad case of PTSD that the mere sight of leeks will cause you to break out in hives! "

I realize that Daiya is quite angry, so I try to change the subject by laughing awkwardly.

Anyhow, Daiya seems to understand that he and Otonashi-san are totally incompatible.

"Despite your crap sense of intuition that's on par with that of an insect, even you'll soon become aware of her abnormality."

It sounded a bit like a bad excuse.

But it really wasn't.

You know, he was totally right.