This morning, something unexpected happened. The blonde girl named Lumiya could be found amidst the crowd on their way to school. I noticed her straightaway thanks to her conspicuous bright hair and significant height, but she didn’t seem to have noticed me. There was a pair of headphones on her head, and she appeared to be looking down. Since the distance between us was considerable and I was focused on riding the bike, I couldn’t catch a glimpse of more details. 

It was my first time seeing her in such circumstances. Without a doubt I hadn’t seen her on her way to school ever before – there was no way she wouldn’t catch my eye if I happened to pass by her. I could guess that she, until today, had been taking another route or leaving her house earlier. Did what happened yesterday cause her to have a change of heart? 

Either way, I felt bad for her after what happened. Despite it being her birthday, nobody seemed to care about it, and I couldn’t prepare to bring her a present. In the evening, I spent almost a good hour trying to think of a proper message to send her, but in the end I gave up and didn’t send anything. What if she was eagerly waiting for it? I disappointed her. 

It’s true that I was finally feeling somewhat closer to her, close enough not to fret and start a conversation when I happened to come across her somewhere, but I still couldn’t bring myself to barge into her classroom full of other people and approach her. 

•

Another ordinary school day had passed without anything remarkable happening and I was preparing myself to leave the classroom along with everyone and head home. Having shoved all my books into the bag, I stood up and hung it on my shoulder. 

Slowly wading through the sea of people, I reached the first floor. Everyone on the third floor finished their class at the same time, and since the clubrooms were located in another building, everyone had to change their shoes in the same place no matter if they were going home or not. Since the density of the racks was high, and there was a lot of people ambushing them, I ended up having to wait politely in a line. 

For that reason, I usually hurried up and ran out of the classroom as one of the first, but recently I hadn’t been in mood to do that for some reason. 

Right next to me, there was a line for people from class 3-A. With a short act of turning my head over, I could see almost every person from that class. If I only happened to see someone with blond hair there, for sure I would have noticed it. Since it had never been the case, I assumed that she was using the staying longer in classroom tactic – five minutes would be enough to avoid standing in the queue and change one’s shoes peacefully. She definitely seemed like a person to do that. 

Today, though, something unexpected happened for the second time. It was only when I was in the middle of changing my shoes myself when I noticed that girl actually waiting in the queue. She was almost at the end of it, with merely three people behind her, and she appeared to be looking indifferently down with that one eye of hers. I didn’t know if she only pretended to or she really hadn’t noticed me, but I was left quite confused. 

Only when I noticed her, I averted my gaze and proceeded to change my shoes as if nothing happened. Since there was a lot of people around, I couldn’t bring myself to talk to her there. What was I supposed to do now? Wait for her outside, or just go home like always? But who said that she wanted to talk to me? And even though there shouldn’t be much people outside anymore, there still were some, and it was enough to make me uneasy. 

“...” 

Having changed the shoes, I took a few steps towards the door and left the building. I immediately felt the heat on my entire body, but this time, it wasn’t the annoying kind, but the pleasant one. The one that usually appeared in the evening and made you feel good in a short-sleeved shirt and shorts. I was wearing trousers, unfortunately, since it was a part of the school uniform. That blissful weather made me think about going for a walk in the evening, and for some reason I also thought about going to the beach. Too bad it was a little too far away from here, and the easiest way was to ask my parents to take me there during the weekend. 

Nevertheless, I stepped aside thinking that I might as well wait for that girl and see what happens. I would be surprised if she wouldn’t notice me there, but I think that I could approach her by myself if it was necessary. I had to apologize to her because I hadn’t sent her a message yesterday as I promised. If someone was wondering, the chances of Yamaguchi noticing us were poor since he had already entered the club building. 

Thinking about the weather and that girl, I forgot that I had to pick up my bike. I quickly ran towards the parking and unlocked it. The moment I turned around holding the vehicle, that girl had left the building through the door and kept going forward steadily. 

It was quite difficult to make my legs move in her direction, but all of a sudden, I noticed her turning her head over in both directions and when she noticed me, she looked at me with a nonchalant expression. 

“Ah.” 

As I made a quiet sound, she began walking quickly in my direction. For some reason, her expression paired with that angry gait made me think that she was about to smack me. Finally, she stopped in a distance of an outstretched leg from me and I realized that she had been looking not at my face, but somewhere around my chest. 

“Uh...” 

It was me making a sound, feeling overwhelmed solely by her stare – I honestly didn’t know that it had such powers before. 

“I-I’m sorry that I didn’t text you yester–” 

“No, it’s not that.” 

“Huh?” 

“There is a lot of humans here. I’ve never seen so many of them gathered in one place that it’s terrifying. We have to retreat from here.” 

Was it her first day at school or something? Ah, and I’m also a human. 

“I guess...” 

“But... I want you to let me ride this thing first.” 

She switched her gaze to the bike behind me as she said in an unvarying tone. She had already done it and ended up falling down painfully, but yet she was willing to try again? 

“Um... then you may want to take off that eye– no, you wouldn’t do that, so at least give me that bag.” 

As I told her, she took off the bag from her shoulder, handed it to me and hopped onto the bicycle that I gave her. Her figure was significantly smaller than mine, but she had no problems pushing the pedals and driving off at a casual pace. This time, she didn’t pretend to be a plane and drove carefully – maybe she had learned something from the last time? 

She made a huge circle around the school yard, clumsily startling a few passersby by unexpectedly appearing on their way, and returned to me without any bigger issues. 

“Thank you”, she said in a constant tone, such that I didn’t take her words as sincere whatsoever. 

It seemed that what had caused her to fall down last time wasn’t her eyepatch, but the bag that was noticeably heavier than mine, even though its contents should have been almost the same. What was the extra weight – I could only wonder, but I forgot about it the moment I returned it to her. 

For some reason, she seemed to like this bike, so I decided to ask her: 

“Er... do you have your own bike?” 

“I do, but it’s not enough for me anymore.” 

“I see... if you want, you can ride around on it.” 

What she said was that she had a bike, but she had grown out of it. Even though she managed to make a circle without falling down just now, the idea of her riding it with only one eye seemed dangerous and irresponsible to me. I mean, there would be no problem if the road was empty and she was riding slowly, but I would never let her drive on a busy street. 

“No, that won’t be necessary.” 

Having said that, she started walking forward without turning around to me, and that confused me. Was I supposed to follow her? She didn’t seem to care about me in the least, but it could have been part of her act as well. Going home together with someone... we would part at the intersection either way, since this time I wouldn’t have any doubts about whether to follow her, but there were still a good few minutes of walk before that, especially if we walked slowly. 

Other people were an issue. There was almost nobody behind us, especially someone we would care about, but it still caused a feeling of uneasiness. People seeing us together would assume that we were a couple, which was pretty embarrassing by itself. It was quite strange having a friend of another gender. Most boys my age thinking about girls had some not necessarily decent thoughts, a good example would be Yamaguchi, but I did not. There was also this thing called love, but let’s be honest, there was no way a girl would fall in love with me within the next 10 years... and I also didn’t feel like it. In the end, I didn’t worry about it consciously at all... but subconsciously I did, which made me have a harder time. 

I didn’t take a step for a while, and I was surprised when she suddenly stopped in the middle of the road in a fair distance away from me, but didn’t turn around. Was she perhaps waiting for me after all? 

Taking it as an invitation, I started walking forward... no, I rushed quite quickly to catch up to her. When I got closer to her, she began moving out of the blue again. I took notice of that her usual pace was hastier than of other people, including me. It resembled a march rather than casual walk, and I found it difficult to keep up with her. She didn’t seem to be doing it on purpose, so she was most likely simply used to it since she had always been walking alone, with an intention of reaching the destination rather than getting the most out of the walk. 

We continued without saying a word to each other. It wasn’t that I was too timid to talk to her – the most embarrassing thing currently was the act of us walking next to each other itself. I simply didn’t know what to talk about – I didn’t have any questions, and I didn’t think there was something interesting happening lately to have a discussion over. 

That was when I remembered one detail from yesterday – the rice ball she had given me. I ate it after I had returned home and it tasted... like a rice ball, which was quite good by itself. 

“Um... thank you for that rice ball yesterday.” 

When I said that, she seemed to slow down for a split second and then returned to the normal pace. 

“Fufu, but of course. After all, I made it myse–” 

She suddenly stopped mid-sentence, and her pace became unsteady again. Had she just said something she didn’t want to, I could only wonder. 

“Rice is amongst the best food available in this realm – you could even call it the food of gods. You can make so many luscious meals with it – my personal favorite is paella, a dish originating from Spain including rice and seafood.” 

Was it just me, or she made a speech about rice with some fantasy elements added to it as if she were a food reviewer from TV? Either way, it seemed that she liked meals involving rice, and her favorite food would be paella. Thinking that this knowledge may come in handy later, I tried to keep it in mind. 

“I see... it’s true, rice is good...” 

“I’m glad you understand. I’m proud of you.” 

In response, I only laughed awkwardly. Why would she be proud of me? What did that even mean? Ah, I forgot, I was supposed to be her servant in that pretend game of hers... but she got flustered when I called her ‘master’. While it wasn’t like I had anything against it, it made me feel like an elementary schooler again... and it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. 

Before I knew it, we reached the intersection where we were supposed to part. Thanks to her quick pace we made it faster than I thought, and I sort of wanted to talk to her more, but this time I was more or less sure that I would get to talk to her tomorrow, or maybe even later today since I had her contact info. 

I had never been good at goodbyes – and it became noticeable again when we stopped at the middle of the crossroads. Thankfully, she held out a helping hand to me: 

“Remember, they are always lurking in the shadows. So long, human.” 

She said in a composed manner. Who was she talking about? That was one peculiar goodbye. 

“Ah... I’ll text you later today for sure... See you later.” 

Having heard that, she didn’t respond but walked away in her direction in a nonchalant manner. When I hopped onto the bike in order to drive the rest of my way, I knew that I certainly had to muster up my courage and text her later. 

•

After I had reached home and taken care of myself and the studies, I was sitting on the bed, my both hands tightly grasping the phone and my eyes mindlessly staring at the colorful carpet on the floor. There were no sounds coming from outside and the temperature in the room was just right. 

That said, inside my head I was in the middle of a conflict. I was about to use that phone to send that girl a message – the contents of which I wasn’t sure in the slightest. Was it a good time? Had she finished studying or doing other chores? Maybe she was in the middle of a conversation with another person and I would distract her if I were to text her now? And if I finally decided to message her, what should I write so it wouldn’t feel out of place? 

Would it be better to send her a message similar to a letter or just a few words would be enough? Argh, I wasn’t sure of anything, but since I had already betrayed her expectations once I didn’t want to do it again, so I had to send her something. 

Hello. One word, suggesting an invitation to a longer conversation. What if she responded ‘Hello’ too? Then I would have to think of a longer message either way, so rejected. 

Hello, what are you doing now? I just came home and did my homework, and I don’t really have anything interesting to do now. That sounded like an invitation to do something together, like, a walk? Or maybe I was reading too deep into it? Either way, it was too ambiguous. Rejected. 

Hello, I want to say sorry again for not messaging you yesterday. What are you doing now? I just finished doing my homework and I’m pretty bored. I thought about watching a show, maybe you can recommend me something? You said before that there was too much people at the shoe racks at school - if you don’t like crowds like that, you can wait 5 minutes before leaving your classroom and almost everyone will be long since gone. 

This message resembled a letter, but it wasn’t that long. There was one more sentence that I wanted to add but was afraid that it would sound ambiguous, or rather it would suggest something I didn’t necessarily want to: I don’t mind waiting for you a bit longer if you want. 

Today, since she had left the classroom along with everyone for the first time, we managed to meet and go till the intersection together. Was it just a one-time situation, or was it supposed to be like that every day? If it was the former, then this message would suggest that I liked it and... that would be quite embarrassing. In the end, I decided not to add it and my finger found itself a few centimeters above the ‘Send’ icon. 

Yeah, tapping that button was just as difficult as I thought. It took me good half an hour to come up with that message, which still was a bit faster than I was expecting, but every normal person would do it in less than a minute. 

I closed my eyes, and moved my finger up and down quickly. It was too far away from the screen to accidentally click the button, so I gradually brought it closer and... it touched. I opened my eyes and saw my message leaving the input box and appearing with a green background. It seemed longer than I thought... and when I read the first sentence, I already wanted to delete it. 

Under it, there was only ‘Delivered’ written in small text. I didn’t know how long was I going to wait for the response, so I switched the screen off and stood up. With a lot of unpleasant thoughts in my mind, I sluggishly left the room and went downstairs. When I reached the first floor I didn’t know what I was doing there, so I just went to the kitchen and opened the fridge. Seeing that there were no snacks inside, I closed it and went to the toilet. When I finished doing my deed there, I returned to my room. It had been five minutes, and I took the phone in my hands. 

When I turned the screen on again, I saw that there was a notification... something I hadn’t seen in a long time. Surprisingly, it was a reply from that girl. She actually replied. 

Fufu, I was expecting your message. I’ve been studying this world’s political structure. As for the show recommendation, there is a set of questions I want to ask you so I can ensure your best experience. Do you want it to be long or short? Do you want something relaxing or suspenseful? Do you prefer crying or laughing? 

She actually added that peculiar laughter of hers to the message – that made me chuckle inside. She was also oddly detailed with those questions; I was expecting her to just throw a title or even ignore that part altogether. 

Uh... 

Ah, I don’t mind if it’s long or short. I think I want something relaxing, and I choose laugh. 

Composing and sending this message was at least a hundred times easier and quicker than before. I clicked the Send icon without any bigger struggles. This time, the word ‘Delivered’ changed into ‘Seen’ in less than a few seconds. I received a response from her not more than a minute later. 

Non Non Biyori then. 

This time, her reply was a title of something she deemed relaxing and funny. I didn’t recognize that title at all, but I was going to walk downstairs to try to find it in a movie streaming app on the TV. 

Alright, thanks. I’ll tell you tomorrow what I thought of it. See you later. 

And sent. It was easier than I thought – actually, texting her was a lot easier than talking to her in person. Surprisingly enough, I could see more of her ‘human’ side in her messages than when I was seeing her in person... or maybe she would react the same if I asked her for show recommendations? 

Either way, I left the phone on my desk and headed for the living room. I turned on the TV and found this show... it turned out to be an anime. Whatever, I thought. I used to watch some in the past, usually those that aired during the day and were aimed at children, but sometimes I did read some manga or light novels. 

Did that mean that she liked... no, it was pretty much obvious since she had an anime character on her profile picture and also on her phone wallpaper. Another thing that I learned about her, would it prove to be useful, I wasn’t really sure, but I remembered that. 

Ah, and the show was pretty good. I managed to watch half of it at once. My sister came back home in the meantime and laughed at me, thinking that I was watching a kids show.