Chewing the candy in her mouth, Eriri Spencer Sawamura froze. Her heavy mood eased a little—because of Katsuragi Ren.
She had thought that seeing her like this, Ren had come to comfort her...
(꒪⌓꒪)
By habit—and after being bullied by Ren more than once—Eriri stayed silent.
She couldn't beat him in a fight, and going to her mother wouldn't help. When she faced Ren, she felt even more powerless than when she faced Tomoya Aki.
"Eriri, you're a pig."
Ren pinched one side of Eriri's cheek with two fingers and pulled it out as he spoke.
Eriri didn't argue. She didn't resist.
She lowered her head and let him do it. Her cheek, soft and delicate, had already been tugged red.
Head down, Eriri bit her lip hard and forced the tears back. She couldn't cry. If she cried in front of Ren, she wouldn't get what she wanted—she'd just get mocked.
This girl, who had been protected by Sayuri Sawamura since childhood, tried to be strong for the first time.
"Eriri, you're a pig."
Ren still didn't let go. He kept hold of her cheek, tugging it now and then, repeating the words in an irritating tone.
There was no hidden intent. He was just messing with her.
And then he went further. With his free hand, he grabbed her other cheek. He lifted Eriri's lowered head and forced her to look him in the eye.
Ren looked at her and kept going.
"Eriri, you're a pig."
With her cheeks being pulled and his expression in her face, Eriri snapped again.
"Katsuragi Ren, you are the pig!"
"Katsuragi Ren, you pig!"
Ignoring the pain in her cheeks, Eriri threw punch after punch at Ren's chest, eyes blazing with hate.
She could endure being called a pig.
She could endure him pulling her cheeks.
But forcing her to stare at him while he mocked her—she couldn't take that.
Eriri, who had never swallowed this kind of humiliation, wanted to knock Ren out with one punch.
"So you can resist. Then why didn't you resist when you were facing Tomoya Aki's twisted logic, Eriri?"
When Eriri had mostly finished venting, Ren caught one of her wrists mid-swing and held it up.
Eriri's eyes met his again. The mockery she expected wasn't there. Ren just looked at her.
"Tell me, Eriri."
"Why is it that when I call you a pig, you know to dodge it, to resist, and you know you're not a pig?"
"But when it comes to that Tomoya Aki you mentioned, you believe whatever he says?"
Eriri didn't try to pull free. Her head drooped again.
"I... I already told you at home..."
"I... abandoned him when we were kids..."
Ren's presence pressed down on her. Her anger was spent, and her voice dropped.
People who submit too easily in life often feel smaller the moment they meet someone forceful. They don't refuse. They answer.
Eriri shouldn't have been like this. But under Tomoya Aki's pressure, the Sawamura family's jewel had been worn down into low self-esteem.
"He says you abandoned him when you were kids, so you accept that you abandoned him?"
"Why do you let his words define you?"
"Did Aunt Sayuri never teach you to look at the other person when you speak?"
Seeing Eriri lower her head again, Ren brought up Sayuri directly.
"Katsuragi Ren, do you... do you have to see me cry to be happy!"
Eriri looked up sharply. Ren was looking down at her. Tears ran clearly down her face, and she looked fragile in a way she hated.
"I'm not happy. I only feel that you really are a failure."
The moment Ren let go of her wrist, Eriri covered her eyes with both hands and began to cry, the sound caught in her throat.
She didn't cry when she fell out with Tomoya Aki today. She didn't cry when Ren called her a pig. But when Ren said she was truly a failure, something in her broke.
Why... why does Katsuragi Ren only know how to bully me...
"No crying."
"I won't! I'll cry! I'll cry!"
When emotions hit the limit, even someone with low self-esteem will push back. Eriri wasn't scared of Ren anymore. She just needed to let it out.
"Do you know why I say you're a failure, Eriri?"
Eriri's crying stalled. She wanted to hear what he would say next. But with Ren, she didn't want to talk.
"Tomoya Aki says you abandoned him when you were kids. What was he like then, and what is he like now?"
"From what you've told me, Tomoya Aki is the same as before. He hasn't changed at all. But you, Eriri—you changed. You're living much better than when you were a child."
"This isn't 'abandonment.' This is Tomoya Aki trying to hold you back."
"He's stuck in place, and he doesn't want to see you move forward. He wants to use 'morality' to trap you and keep you there with him."
Ren, who couldn't see anything admirable in Tomoya Aki, laid it out.
"Hold me... back?"
It was the first time Eriri had heard it framed that way.
She slowed her tears and lowered her hands a little, revealing misty blue eyes.
"Has Tomoya Aki made any progress compared to before?"
Thinking about meeting him again in her first year—and everything since—Eriri shook her head without meaning to.
"Has Eriri made any progress compared to before?"
Thinking about how she was no longer the lonely child she used to be, and how her drawing had improved, Eriri nodded.
Without noticing, Eriri started viewing it from Ren's angle.
"After reuniting with you, has Tomoya Aki shown any real desire to move forward?" Ren broke it down piece by piece for her.
"Desire to progress..."
"I will definitely make the most perfect galgame in the world!"
That was the big goal Tomoya Aki declared when he invited Eriri to join the club he founded.
"If I don't work hard at my part-time job, I won't have money to buy galgames!"
When Eriri and Utaha Kasumigaoka called him out for having a "project plan" that was only those three words, he scratched the back of his head and answered without embarrassment.
"Eriri, can you go ask Aunt Sayuri to talk to the school so the club we built doesn't get dissolved?"
When the club faced dissolution because it hadn't produced anything, Tomoya Aki's first idea wasn't to make something—it was to have Eriri ask Sayuri for help.
Eriri shook her head.