"Let's go. We still need to buy some snacks." Kazehara Tetsu's voice broke the silence. He pushed the shopping cart and led the two girls onward.
And so, a strange little group appeared in the supermarket aisle.
Kazehara Tetsu led the way, with Shiina Hiyori beside him, occasionally glancing at the snacks on the shelves.
Kamuro Masumi, meanwhile, was forced to keep close to him.
"Tetsu-kun, you told me last time that you can't just look at things on the surface. You have to dig deeper to discover the fun in them. I think I'm finally starting to understand!" Shiina Hiyori said, looking up at Kazehara Tetsu.
The "thing" she was talking about was a certain complicated Mystery Novel.
But in Kamuro Masumi's ears, the sentence was automatically decoded as having an entirely different meaning.
Digging deeper... discovering the fun... Together, those words were full of suggestive implications.
Homewrecker!
Kamuro Masumi's gaze fell on Shiina Hiyori again.
She needed to assess her.
To evaluate this woman's worth and how much of a threat she posed.
From the outside, this girl was practically the very definition of harmless.
A petite figure, a cute face, and eyes so clear they seemed utterly untainted.
She spoke with an innocent air, and the way she looked at Kazehara Tetsu was filled with undisguised admiration.
Was she a hunter who had perfected her disguise?
Or was she an irredeemable idiot?
Kamuro Masumi leaned toward the former.
In a school where strength was everything, a truly "sweet and innocent" girl couldn't survive.
To her, Shiina Hiyori's excessive "purity" was itself the greatest unnaturalness of all—a most ingenious disguise.
Pushing the shopping cart, Kazehara Tetsu leisurely turned past a shelf and entered the Snack Area.
"Anything you feel like eating?" His voice brought Kamuro Masumi's thoughts back to reality.
"Chips. Spicy ones." Kamuro Masumi answered almost automatically.
Kazehara Tetsu reached out, took a bag of the chips she'd asked for from the shelf, and tossed it into the shopping cart.
Then he turned to Shiina Hiyori.
"What about you, Hiyori? Is there anything you like?"
"I-I'm fine with anything!" Shiina Hiyori didn't seem to know much about snacks. She looked at the dazzling array of packages, unsure what to pick.
"Then let's get this."
Kazehara Tetsu picked up a neatly packaged box of chocolate biscuits. "A little sugar while you're reading helps your brain work."
Shiina Hiyori looked at the silent Kamuro Masumi, seemingly trying to find something to say to ease the awkward atmosphere.
"Um... Kamuro, do you like reading, too?"
Kamuro Masumi shifted her gaze from the shelves to Hiyori's face.
"No."
One terse word instantly shut down every other thing Shiina Hiyori had been about to say.
Shiina Hiyori's smile stiffened. At a loss, she looked over at Kazehara Tetsu.
"Kamuro isn't interested in words on a page."
Kazehara Tetsu smiled as he smoothed things over. His hand on Kamuro Masumi's shoulder gave her a gentle squeeze, as if soothing her—or warning her. "She prefers things that are... a little more direct, things that give her a sensory thrill. Right?"
There was a strong innuendo in his words, and Kamuro Masumi's cheeks warmed ever so slightly.
She didn't argue. She simply turned her head away, avoiding his gaze.
"A sensory thrill?"
Shiina Hiyori clearly hadn't caught the deeper meaning. Curiously, she pressed, "Do you mean... like horror novels?"
"Something like that."
Kazehara Tetsu answered vaguely as he placed a carton of milk in the shopping cart. "Come on. It's getting late."
They continued on, but Kamuro Masumi's mind was racing.
Was Shiina Hiyori genuinely clueless, or was she pretending?
Every question she asked, every expression she wore, seemed perfectly natural.
If she was acting, then her skill was far too impressive.
So good that even Kamuro herself couldn't spot a single flaw.
Kamuro Masumi decided to test her one more time.
As they passed the refrigerated section, Kamuro Masumi came to a stop.
"I want ice cream," she said. Her voice wasn't loud, but it was clear.
Kazehara Tetsu stopped the cart and looked at her. "What flavor?"
"The same as yours," she replied.
As soon as the words left her mouth, she fixed the corner of her eye on Shiina Hiyori, watching her closely.
It was a declaration.
She was telling the girl in front of her, "He and I share a preference you know nothing about."
But Shiina Hiyori's reaction once again caught her off guard.
Shiina Hiyori simply looked enlightened. "Tetsu-kun, I had no idea you liked ice cream. I thought someone like you would prefer something that keeps you alert, like coffee."
Her attention had gone completely elsewhere.
She hadn't even considered that Kamuro Masumi's words, "The same as yours," might carry any deeper meaning.
Kamuro Masumi's heart sank little by little.
She began to waver.
Maybe... there really were people in this world with nothing in their heads but books, incapable of thinking about anything else?
Or perhaps Shiina Hiyori was so skilled that she could perfectly hide all her emotions and true thoughts beneath that innocent, harmless exterior?
Just then, Kazehara Tetsu had already taken two cartons of vanilla ice cream from the freezer and put them in the shopping cart.
Then he picked up a carton of strawberry.
"Hiyori, this one's for you." He held the pink carton out to Shiina Hiyori.
"Huh? I-I don't need—"
"Take it. Consider it a thank-you for keeping me company while I shopped."
Kamuro Masumi watched them, looking at the different flavors of ice cream in her and Shiina Hiyori's hands.
"We've got just about everything."
Kazehara Tetsu's voice rang out. Pushing the shopping cart, now full of goods, he headed toward the Checkout Counter. "Come on, let's pay."
There was a short line at the Checkout Counter, and it was their turn soon.
The cashier scanned the items with practiced ease as the numbers on the screen changed.
Kazehara Tetsu took out his phone and paid for everything with his Points after a soft beep.
The three of them walked out of the supermarket carrying their shopping bags. The evening breeze blew toward them, carrying a hint of chill and sweeping away the slightly stuffy air inside.
The sunset had painted the sky a warm orange-red, and the buildings cast long shadows.
"It's getting late. We'd better eat the ice cream before it melts."
Kazehara Tetsu stopped beside a bench for passersby to rest on.
He took the three cartons of ice cream from the shopping bags and peeled off the wrappers. He handed one of the vanilla cartons to Kamuro Masumi, keeping the other for himself.
Finally, he gave the pink strawberry carton to Shiina Hiyori.
The three of them sat on the bench and ate their ice cream in silence.
Every now and then, they chatted about amusing things that had happened recently.
They finished their ice cream in no time.
Kazehara Tetsu tossed the empty carton into the trash can beside them and stood up.
"Hiyori, where are you headed?" His voice broke the silence.
"Um... I was going back to the Dormitory to read."
"Then let's walk together. We're going the same way!"