“Dude Nara wasn’t lying… You really did get the shit beaten outta you,” A boy that looked a few years older than Katsumi entered his apartment while taking off a windbreaker. He leaned in towards Katsumi and inspected his eye, “How’d it happen?”

“I think that’s what we all wanna know! Would you move out of the way!” Directly behind him was a girl with long blonde hair, who looked to be around the boy’s age. 

She slipped by the boy and rushed up to Katsumi, closely inspecting his face. Seemingly heart broken, like a mother rushing to her child after they scraped their leg.

Before he could realize it, she grabbed onto him and embraced him, pushing his head onto her shoulder, “Katsumi how’re you feeling? What happened?” The girl was a few centimeters taller than him.

“Maaya knocking my head around like that is excruciatingly painful… Can you get off please?” However she refused to listen and kept holding onto him. 

Katsumi shot the boy a disapproving glare, “Nobuo please get her…” 

Nobuo smiled in return, “Maaya, come on, let’s go to the living room.” he put his arms on her shoulders and pulled her off Katsumi. He kept an arm around her shoulder as they made their way in.

Behind Katsumi, a very tall man entered the apartment. “Can’t believe it’s still so damn cold at night. Isn’t it supposed to be summer?” 

The newcomer was almost thirty centimeters taller than Katsumi. Along with that he was one of the most fashionable people Katsumi had ever met—always having a new outfit to wear.

“Katsumi, I heard you got attacked at the Yaesu mall. Did you even get a punch in?” His comment was followed by some cheeky laughter..

“Yeah yeah, whatever,” Katsumi dismissed his comment by waving a hand, and motioning him to move along.

Seriously? Everyone knows? 

Soon Katsumi heard greetings and chatter amongst the three once Kenshi got to the living room. 

A girl wearing a bright smile popped her head around the doorway, “Hello~!” She was covered in an extremely large dark-green coat that went halfway down her thighs. Her long brown hair had been tucked into the back of the jacket. 

She unbuttoned the coat and took it off, beneath it was a baggy grey sweater that almost entirely covered her mini-skirt. 

“Hi Shouko.”

“Woah, Katsumi, what happened?”

“Kenshi can explain it, he’s over in the living room.”

“Are you alright though?”

“Yeah I’m fine, don’t worry about it.”

Trailing not too far behind was a guy wearing a messy suit, looking as if he had just got off a long day at work. 

“Here he comes… Looks like someone didn’t have the greatest of days,” Shouko commented

“Greatest of day? It fucking blowed,” The man struggled with removing his dress shoes for a moment before successfully getting them off.

“Come on Makoto, you of all people should know it doesn’t always work out,”

Makoto just grumbled then stood up, striding past the two into the apartment.

It was Saturday. Nara had invited over her entire friend group to Katsumi’s apartment, like she had many times before. Katsumi was well acquainted with all of them, but not as close as Nara was.

The living room was already a lively scene. Despite the fact all these people showed up within the last few minutes, they looked and acted as if they’d been here for hours, talking and enjoying each other’s company. 

Nobou was sunk into the cushions of the couch, his legs stretched out onto the coffee table with an arm around Maaya who was leaning her back against him. The two of them were chatting with Shouko. At the far end of the couch in the corner was Kenshi, he had his phone screen tilted towards Nara, who was on his right. The two laughing at whatever Kenshi had on his screen.

As Makoto walked in he was greeted by a laugh from Kenshi, “Hey there he is! Makoto, how was the date today?”

“What!? Makoto had a date today!?” Maaya blurted out in surprise.

“Yeah I set him up with one of my friends,” Kenshi responded.

“As you can see it went great, she’s here with me right now in fact,” Makoto gestured to where Katsumi was standing.

“Hey man, don’t look at me.” Katsumi commented. 

Kenshi’s smile faltered a little and he slightly furrowed his brows, “Well why’s that? She’s so kind and super cute. What went wrong?”

Maaya sat up and leaned in towards Kenshi, “You got a picture?”

“Oh yeah, sure—” He unlocked his phone and handed it to Maaya.

Katsumi stepped over Nobou’s legs and found a spot between Maaya and Kenshi.

Makoto continued, “I think you forgot to mention ‘judgemental’ and ‘bitch’... The whole time she was making remarks about random people around us and me. Constantly saying stuff like, ‘Oh look, isn’t that ugly? Who would do that?’ or ‘Why are you doing that?’”

“Don’t blame me, I just arranged the date. You’re the one that went on it.”

Nobou chimed in with a laugh.

“Eh, Whatever… I think I should give up. For a while at least,” Makoto walked over and sat in front of the coffee-table, letting out a huge sigh in the process. 

“Hey don’t say that…” Shouko leaned into Nara’s ear and whispered, “Switch spots with me, I got this, I’ll cheer him up.” 

The two quickly shuffled spots and Shouko was now near the end of the couch, next to Makoto .

“They’re plenty of girls out there. Tens-of-millions in Japan alone,” She put a hand to the back of Makoto’s head and started gently patting it.

“I’ve heard that a hundred times before. Ninety-nine of those times are from Kenshi. I really don’t think it’s true.”

“No, really. There are plenty of girls that would—” she abruptly stopped mid-sentence, as if all her thoughts had been erased. Makoto stared at her, his sadness becoming mixed with a little bit of hope. 

Shouko’s loss for words caused any hope in Makoto’s expression to fade, “Yes go on. Girls that would…?

Her mouth was agape, the dumb look on her face shifted to a nervous smile, “that would like— that would find… Uhm… something in you?”

Kenshi looked up from his phone with a giant smile plastered on his face, “Naah— Shouko, you can’t do that to my boy,” He held back some laughter, “You just aren’t able to see his true beauty.”

“Thanks Shouko, you really did an amazing job comforting me.”

Shouko was going to speak up again but before she could Nara interrupted her, “I’m thinkin’ what Shouko is tryna say is that there're’ millions of people out there and you shouldn’t give up after one bad date. Right?”

“Yes yes, that’s right,” Shouko quickly agreed.

“One?” Makoto looked taken aback, “One bad date…? Try nine this month.”

“Oh… yeah sorry, that’ll do it…” She grew silent and looked down at her feet. However, in an instant her demeanor changed, “Oh!”

“Huh? What is it now? Got more cheering up for me?”

“No no no, there’s a really cute girl next door! I bumped into her on the way here!”

Are they talking about who I think?

“And…?”

“And— you could try asking her out! She seemed really polite and reserved, nothing like those past girls.”

“You got all that from what? A thirty second interaction with her?”

“Yeah!”

“Uhm,” Katsumi interrupted, “I don’t really recommend that.”

Shouko’s mood deteriorated after hearing this, “Why’s that…”

“She doesn’t really agree with anything we do… She’d probably report all of you to the police.”

“Oh… That’s a shame. She seemed so nice.”

Maaya looked up from her phone and turned the screen towards Makoto, “Okay, but what about her? and tomorrow?” On her screen was a picture of foreign girl in a red bikini with a head of flowing blonde hair. She was leaning back on her hands, sitting on a beach of incredibly white sand—overhead a vast blue sky stretching into the horizon.

Makoto didn’t budge.

“Makoto, if you don’t go on this date I think I’ll have to,” Kenshi snatched the phone and intently zoomed in on the picture.

From the corner of his eye, Makoto caught a glimpse of the picture. His attention was instantly grabbed. He sat up and peeked over Kenshi’s shoulder at the phone, “...Well… I think I could maybe make some time… You know what they say, tenth time’s the charm.” 

Katsumi postured himself forward to join the other two boys in looking at photos of this girl. 

Makoto looked up at Maaya who was smiling triumphantly, “What’s her name?”

“Jackson—But we call her Jacky.”

Hold on… Jackson… Could she be related to the Jackson in my class? There’s probably no way right? “Maaya, does that Jackson girl have a brother?”

“Yeah she has a few, how’d you know that?”

“There’s an American guy in my class with the same last name and blonde hair. Seems a little too convenient to be a coincidence.”

“Jackson!?”