It had already entered June, and the world welcomed midsummer.
The sunlight outside the window was bright, the wind was gentle, and the sky was a clear blue like it had been washed.
This ought to be a day of exceptionally clear weather, even the clouds were tender.
But Chihaya Anon's mood was not bright at all. On the contrary, sorrow welled up in her heart.
Netorare in Japan was a very popular genre, meaning "one's partner being forcibly taken by another." From upper-level film and anime to lower-level doujinshi and novels, you could always see the tag's shadow.
As a beautiful maiden in her youth, Anon had, of course, read many romance manga in private. She had also once been disgusted by pure love stories that suddenly turned into NTR, to the point where she wished she could slay the author and wipe out all cuckolding bulls in the world.
But she never could have imagined that one day, such a storyline would actually descend upon her.
'No, wait.'
'Strictly speaking, my situation can't even count as NTR.'
After all, the premise of NTR was, "The relationship of the two being interrupted by a third party must be that of spouses."
Although her relationship with Kaito was steadily rising, they were still one step away from dating. At most, it could be called a half-step girlfriend status, and there was still time to break through.
In this case, a more accurate term should be BSS, that is: The person one is unrequitedly in love with is taken by someone else.
Even sadder than being cucked is not even qualifying to be cucked.
At least the victim once had a brief moment of possessing their beloved. But even if Kaito dated another girl, it seemed it had nothing to do with her…
'Like hell it doesn't!'
'I was clearly first!'
'The first time meeting on the train… The first time becoming classmates… The first time exchanging contact info…'
'As long as you stack up enough "firsts," they add up to a lifetime!'
'I absolutely won't acknowledge this sort of "skyfalling homewrecker cat" situation!'
'So…'
"Wh-what exactly is going on here?"
Anon slammed the table with a "pa" and stood up, her whole body instinctively leaning forward, her delicate cheeks nearly pressing up to him. Her dense lashes, like fine brushes, stood out sharply.
The girl's pink hair softly draped down, a few strands brushing against his arm, like cherry blossoms drifting gently from a tree branch, stirring the heart.
Normally, the safe and effective social distance between people should be maintained at over one meter.
But right now, the unit between them could only be described in "centimeters."
Anon had gotten too close, too suddenly. Like a Squirtle using Rocket Headbutt, charging in with unstoppable momentum.
Kaito instinctively reached out a hand and lightly blocked her.
This wasn't a conscious decision, just like reflexively blinking when facing strong light, it was a self-defense mechanism of the human body.
He only meant to stop the girl from pouncing on him like a facehugger… but by some twist of fate—
Bad news: He touched a place he shouldn't have touched.
Good news: That place technically didn't exist, so maybe it didn't matter?
'Ahem, alright, that was a joke.'
Although he had always thought Anon was flat, but without investigation, there should be no right to speak.
It turned out, he had underestimated anon all this time.
Although the curves weren't very obvious, upon closer inspection, he could still feel a trace of the softness unique to a youthful girl.
At the moment the accident happened, Kaito had already quickly retracted his hand, his movement so fast it almost left afterimages.
But as the party involved, Chihaya Anon didn't miss that brief moment of contact.
The pink-haired girl first froze, as if the air had turned to honey wax, locking her in place. For two seconds, or maybe even less, a vacuum of time, coral-colored blush spread upward from her pale neck, slowly climbing bit by bit.
The uniform still seemed to retain the burning heat of the touch, nearly scorching her, while clearly reminding her of what had just happened.
"…Anyway, that's what happened," Kaito lightly cleared his throat, subtly shifting the topic, summarizing the incident on the train in a few words.
But Chihaya Anon clearly no longer cared about such minor matters.
'Is the second button closest to the heart really that important?'
'I just had the very place where my heart beats… touched!'
The forbidden land she had carefully nurtured and protected for more than ten years had been met with a crude invasion in such a ridiculous twist of fate.
Anon did not respond. She only kept her head down, her cherry pink hair like thin silk veiling her face and emotions, making it impossible to read her expression.
'This is troublesome.'
Kaito felt a bit of a headache.
'Should I offer some comfort?'
But after that extremely awkward scene just now, even if it was unintentional, the fact wouldn't change.
If he spoke rashly, wouldn't it make things worse?
Just then, the civics teacher entered the classroom, knocked on the blackboard, and announced class.
Now even if he wanted to comfort her, he had no chance.
He could only suppress his thoughts and give Anon time to cool off. Everything could wait until after class.
———
As it turned out, Chihaya-san's recovery time was far longer than expected.
Even after class ended, the girl still had her head down, neither speaking nor reacting to others.
This situation persisted for quite some time.
Ding~ Dong~
When the afternoon school bell rang, most of the students had already left the classroom. Seeing Anon still sitting like a wooden statue, Kaito thought for a moment and knocked on her desk.
"Chihaya-san, school's already over."
Chihaya Anon: o_o
'She hasn't snapped out of it yet?'
Kaito hesitated for two seconds, then reached out and poked the girl's cheek.
Still no response.
'Forget it, just let her cool down a bit longer.'
There's no hurdle that can't be overcome by going home and sleeping it off.
If one night's not enough, then sleep a few more nights.
"If anything happens, you can call me."
"I'll head out now. See you tomorrow."
Kaito gave a final farewell and turned to leave.
Snap!
His wrist was suddenly grabbed.
"D-Don't go!", The girl slowly raised her head, her perky nose beaded with a bit of sweat. Under the glow of her cherry-pink cheeks, it sparkled.
'Taking advantage of this lady and then trying to run?'
'In this world, how could there be such convenient things?'
'Compensation! You… You must compensate me!'
Kaito turned around and looked down at the girl before him.
She was like a little lion cub who had just left the den, baring fangs and brandishing claws, trying hard to look fierce.
But because her baby teeth hadn't even fully grown yet, even her bristling hair looked like she was acting spoiled.
The flustered little lioness shifted her gaze around for quite a while before stammering, "I-I still have something to talk to you about!"
"Please go ahead."
"It's just…"
The girl finally let go of his hand and began playing with the cherry hair on her shoulder, "We're… We're almost at the time we agreed to meet Rui and the others for dinner…"
"So… Before playing fake lovers, s-shouldn't we… rehearse first?"
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