Walking beside Ishikawa-kun, she was clearly in much higher spirits than usual. Her eyes even secretly peeked out from beneath her bangs to study his face.
There was also a cute blush on her cheeks. It definitely wasn't from the streetlights or the lights nearby.
She hadn't been like this yesterday.
Had something happened afterward?
In such a short time?
As they walked on, they drew closer and closer to the place where she would part ways with them. Kita felt like she couldn't just do nothing.
Her heart began to tighten.
Should she make a move? And how?
But seeing timid, meek Gotou-san looking so happy, she couldn't help feeling that, for Gotou-san—
Ishikawa-kun really was the best boyfriend.
He would carefully protect Gotou-san.
Yet even as she thought that, she felt unwilling to accept it.
"Kita, you're awfully quiet today," Ishikawa Hayato suddenly said.
Lost in thought, Kita jumped at the sudden voice. Noticing Ishikawa Hayato's gaze, she looked up and gave a vague smile.
"I was thinking about guitar stuff. Ishikawa-kun startled me."
"Really?" Ishikawa Hayato asked meaningfully. "You weren't thinking about some weird nonsense?"
"What do you mean by that?!"
Feeling as though he had seen through her, Kita panicked and asked defiantly.
Ishikawa Hayato swayed his head as he spoke in a chanting tone.
"Like running away, running away, running away, that sort of thing."
Though her dark history had been brought up, Kita relaxed in relief, then explained with feigned anger.
"I only did it once, okay? And I'll never do it again."
As she spoke, she slowly lowered her head. She had suddenly remembered that joining the band in the first place had been entirely due to a moment of impulse.
That impulse had led her to do something that embarrassed everyone. Though it had worked out perfectly that time, she wouldn't always be so lucky.
Would she act on impulse again this time, then regret it later?
She glanced at Bocchi.
She watched the bangs covering Bocchi's eyes and the tracksuit that lacked even a trace of girlishness.
Gotou-san might not even be Ishikawa-kun's type, and she had only known him for a month.
What should she do? Well... she would wait and see for a while longer.
Ice Cubes
After parting with the much quieter Kita, only Ishikawa Hayato and Bocchi remained as they headed toward the station.
On a bustling street packed with people, he walked alongside a timid tracksuit-clad beautiful girl—no, a girl who could only still be called an unpolished gem.
It was quite an interesting feeling.
Teasingly, Ishikawa Hayato lagged half a step behind her, matching her pace perfectly.
Having lost her point of reference, and with mixed feelings in her heart, Bocchi's pace would slow for a while, then speed up again as if she were worried.
As she walked, her mouse-like eyes kept secretly glancing his way, quietly observing the reaction of the man beside her.
Sensing her gaze, Ishikawa Hayato looked down and met Bocchi's eyes.
Bocchi immediately looked away shyly and lowered her head.
A lot had happened today, Ishikawa Hayato thought.
He had gone on a date with Bocchi in the morning, visited Bocchi's home at noon, attended a band meeting in the afternoon, and then gone to Ryo's house.
It had been a busy day, but also one spent surrounded by all kinds of girls.
The beginnings of a harem king, huh.
He smiled self-mockingly, then said to Bocchi, whose head remained lowered as her pace kept slowing.
"Bocchi, are you okay with working part-time?"
Bocchi stopped walking, and Ishikawa Hayato stopped as well, looking at her.
Only after a moment did her weak voice come.
"Mm..."
Ishikawa Hayato did not press the matter and said casually.
"Let's just say you are. Come on, Bocchi. You're not planning to stay here forever, are you?"
Bocchi slowly shuffled over. Seeing her head hanging low, whether from disappointment or habit, Ishikawa Hayato couldn't resist reaching out to pat her head.
The pink-haired girl, wrapped tightly in an all-pink tracksuit, stiffened a little before relaxing again.
Amid the noisy, rushing crowd, Ishikawa Hayato heard her quiet murmur.
"As long as Hayato is beside me, I'm not scared."
Ishikawa Hayato said nothing. He lowered his hand, took hold of her wrist, and led her toward the station.
"I'm home."
The moment Bocchi called out upon returning home, she heard quick footsteps coming from the living room.
"Hitori, welcome home."
Her mother came out with a bright smile. Her eyes swept over Bocchi, then turned toward the already closed door, and her smile faded slightly.
As if disappointed in her daughter, she gave a faint sigh.
"Mom!"
Bocchi understood the meaning in her expression and called out unhappily.
But her mother ignored her and headed toward the living room, speaking as if to herself.
"Hayato-kun is such a good boy. Why didn't Hitori bring him inside...?"
Bring him... inside?
Then where would Hayato rest? Surely not in her room?
Besides, Hayato had only visited their house today. Were her parents really that at ease with a friend their daughter had met?
As Bocchi thought this, her gaze became far more pitiful.
She changed out of her shoes alone in loneliness and walked into her home.
Afterward, once she returned home, it was as if she had gotten back on track.
Amid her father and younger sister's lively chatter, along with one or two comments from her mother, she silently finished dinner. Then she returned to her room, climbed into the closet, and began playing popular songs while recording videos.
After finishing, she practiced guitar for a while.
Finally, lying on the tatami and blankly staring at the familiar ceiling, she began reviewing the day and thinking about what she needed to do tomorrow.
The girl in her tracksuit and utterly unflattering black socks first curled up with a smile, then rolled onto her other side.
Then she twisted back again, rolling around on the tatami.
But once she had finished thinking about the happy things, things she did not want to think about quickly surfaced as well.
Her part-time job.
Tomorrow... working at STARRY... working...
She suddenly sat up, terror in her eyes, then scrambled and thumped her way downstairs at top speed.
She didn't want to work. She absolutely didn't want to work!
And working at a live house meant she would definitely have to face all sorts of people.
Bocchi immediately imagined men with apocalyptic Mohawks dressed in studded jackets, along with women in the same outfits carrying whips.
Though she had told Hayato she wasn't afraid, that had been when he was there. Now...
Let her run away just this once.
Bocchi hurried downstairs and left the house under her parents' puzzled gazes in the living room.
A short while later, just as they were considering whether to cook some red bean rice, Bocchi returned carrying a bag of something that clacked together like stones.
The two rose from the sofa in confusion and looked outside from the living room together.
They watched Bocchi carry the bag into the bathroom.
Before long, Bocchi emerged from the bathroom again and walked resolutely toward the refrigerator.
In front of her curious parents, who had followed her, she opened the refrigerator, took every ice cube from the ice tray, put them into the bag, and carried it into the bathroom.
The two followed her into the bathroom.
When they saw Bocchi pouring bag after bag of ice cubes into the bathtub, they silently exchanged a look and sighed together.
Bocchi's parents were fairly open-minded and did not interfere much with things Bocchi decided for herself.
Besides, their daughter had already done plenty of strange things. There was no need to specifically stop this one.
But today—
"There's only one option, isn't there?" Gotou Michiyo looked at her husband.
Her husband nodded, picked up the phone, and dialed a number.
The call was answered quickly.
"Hello, Hayato-kun. Ah, you guessed right. Hitori really is doing something strange. Mm, I'll put her on the phone. We're counting on you. No, no, we're very happy that Hitori has made a friend like you."
After saying that, he took the phone and walked over to Bocchi, who had come out of the bathroom and was preparing to head upstairs.
"Hitori, phone."
Bocchi, who was getting ready to change clothes and race a cold toward death, froze when she saw her father holding out his own phone to her.
Then, full of confusion, she accepted it. But just as she held it to her ear without knowing what to say—
Ishikawa Hayato's voice sounded from the phone.
Ishikawa Hayato: "Bocchi, it's Ishikawa Hayato. What are you doing?"
Hearing the voice from the phone and that crisp, direct question, Bocchi's eyes widened at once.
"Ah... ah..."
She looked at her father in confusion, then at the bathtub where she had already placed the ice. Her mouth opened and closed, but she could not say a word.
The fact that her father would tattle to Hayato was something she had never expected.
When had their relationship become so good?!
Was this the power of a normie?
After a while, with no response from Bocchi, the voice on the other end said—
Ishikawa Hayato: "Let's not take up Uncle's phone. Bocchi, call me on your own phone."
Bocchi: "Ah... okay."
After the call-ending sound rang out, Bocchi stiffly returned the phone to her father, then trudged toward the stairs step by step as though heading to the execution block.
Her parents smiled at the sight of Bocchi like this.
The time returned to an hour earlier, before Bocchi had gone home.
Before you continue