SCPK 47

Chapter 47 

 Love Consultation (Part 1)

It was a sunny Thursday afternoon, and during track club practice, I found myself training alone.

Tsukiyo had said she’d be going to the literature club today, and without her around, the track team’s energy was noticeably low.
Even our self-proclaimed woman-hating captain sighed deeply.

Technically, Tsukiyo was just splitting her time between clubs, but she still came to track quite often.
Even though we walked to school together in the mornings, not seeing her during practice made the day feel… lonely.

The gloomy mood was too much, so I decided to head out and run laps around the school grounds.

After several laps, a girl suddenly dashed out from the front gate.
Crap!

I tried to stop, but couldn’t in time—we collided.
Fortunately, I’d managed to slow down enough that neither of us got hurt.
Before I could say anything, the girl stood up quickly and took off running again.

“I’m sorry!”
“H-hey! Wait—Urihara-san!?”

The girl I’d just run into was someone I knew.
Without realizing it was me, she bolted off school grounds.
She’d looked like she was on the verge of tears… That quiet, reserved Urihara—something must’ve happened.

Concerned, I ran back inside the school, heading in the direction she’d come from.

And there, I found someone—
A boy, kneeling on the ground, completely dejected.
When I got closer, I realized it was another familiar face.

“Amatsu…?”
“Oh, Yamada-senpai.”

It was Yusa Amatsu, the first-year I’d gotten to know recently.
But today, his usual composed expression was gone—his face was twisted in shock and sorrow.

“I saw Urihara-san running just now. Did something happen?”

At my question, Amatsu’s body gave a sharp twitch.

“So something did happen.”

Knowing his personality, I doubted he’d done anything bad like harass her or something, but… that expression on Urihara’s face still worried me.
As a mutual acquaintance, I figured I should at least ask.

Amatsu finally stood up, though his expression remained dark and heavy.

“I know it might be hard to talk about, but could you tell me what happened?”
“Heh… It’s simple, really. I got rejected.”
“…What?”
“I like Urihara-san. Ever since I first entered this school. And today, I finally worked up the courage to confess.”

Ah. So that’s what this is about.

Wait, he liked Urihara-san!?
I totally thought he was into Tsukiyo or maybe Sera.
But… yeah, Urihara’s cute too, so that’s fair.
Still, she’s been hung up on Seiya all this time—no wonder it didn’t go well.

“So she turned you down?”
“Not exactly… I kind of confused her, I think. She just ran away. That counts as a rejection, right?”
“Hmm… hard to say. I’ve never confessed to anyone myself. Maybe we should ask someone with more experience.”
“Huh?”

—Ten minutes later—

“So that’s why you called me here?”
“Well, I figured Tsukiyo’s rejected more confessions than there are stars in the sky, so she might know what’s up.”
“Hey! That’s rude!”

Tsukiyo puffed up her cheeks, clearly offended—but it only made her look even cuter.

Still, I thought calling her was the right move.
We couldn’t really tell what Urihara was thinking otherwise, and though I felt bad exposing Amatsu’s feelings, he needed some advice.

“I had no idea Yusa-kun liked Kinori. I knew he had someone he liked, but not who it was.”
“I didn’t tell anyone. Not even my friends,” Amatsu admitted, still sitting miserably on the ground.

“I asked Urihara-san to come meet me,” he explained. “When she showed up, she started saying things like, ‘You’ve got a message for me from someone else, right?’ or ‘You’re delivering a letter, aren’t you?’ I didn’t understand what she meant at all.”
“Huh… I think I get it,” I said.
“You do, Taiyo-san?” Tsukiyo tilted her head.

“Well, Urihara’s got some popular friends. My guess is, she thought Amatsu was just passing along a confession for someone else—probably for you or Sera. Happens all the time.”
“Oh, that makes sense,” Tsukiyo nodded. “People often use Kinori to relay confessions to me. But I’m impressed you figured that out so quickly.”
“Please. Do you know how many confession errands I’ve had to run for Seiya? I practically bring a notebook with me now.”

Both Tsukiyo and Amatsu gave me pitiful smiles.

“These days, I take notes—name, class, reason for confessing, romantic history—the works.”
“That’s not a confession, that’s an application form,” Tsukiyo sighed.

“Hey, it keeps things efficient.”

“Who knows,” she said teasingly, “one of those confessions might even be meant for you, Taiyo-san.”
“Yeah, no. Not once.”
“Really…?”

For some reason, Tsukiyo looked pleased to hear that—though I wasn’t sure that was something to be happy about.

Anyway, we’d gotten off-topic. Time to steer back to the matter at hand.