The Fourth Period Is Modern Chinese (Continued)

"So that's where it was. I went there once when I had chickenpox."

She walked past behind me to check the bus timetable. A faint, sweet fragrance brushed past my nose.

"I'm a little surprised you became a nurse..."

"When Manatsu was hospitalized, I was always so grateful to the nurses. So I wanted to do work that could help people too."

While I regarded Shiohara's death as "the real thing," as a great hollow void, Utsunomiya had gained something from her death. She connected the interrupted story. The exact opposite of me, who could only cry and mope.

She swung the handbag hooked around her finger like a pendulum.

"I'm sorry about that time. You were hurt when she told you not to come see her anymore, weren't you?"

"It's okay."

I reached up and rubbed my nose.

"After that, she told me not to come anymore too. Manatsu got so thin, and she always looked miserable. She even started taking it out on her mom."

"That... yeah, maybe. But the Shiohara I remember was kind. She was always smiling."

"Same here. She really was a good girl."

At an age when everyone in high school was still immature, when people like Hachiman and Yukino could only speak in roundabout ways, she had foreseen her own death. It was truly pitiful.

A huge truck passed beside us, and I held my breath at the stench of exhaust.

Utsunomiya looked at me.

"Oh, right. My Youth Romantic Comedy Is Wrong, As I Expected ended."

"Huh?"

The unexpected words that came from her mouth startled me. "How did you know?"

"I've been reading it all along. Manatsu lent it to me at first."

"That was my book."

"But she wouldn't let me read the love letters you wrote. You included one