The next day, Sunday.
Early that morning, Uesugi Hara woke from a dream and rubbed his eyes, his face still clouded with the confusion of just waking up.
"Did I... dream?" he murmured to himself.
How many years had it been since he'd dreamed? One? Two? Maybe three? He couldn't remember.
This dream, though, had been unusually vivid—and interesting. It had taken him back to his days at the White House.
Uesugi Hara chuckled softly and brushed a fingertip over the corner of his eye. "What's gotten into me? Why would I miss a place like that?"
His memory wasn't as absurdly good as Ayanokoji's—who, in the original story, remembered every single thing since birth—but he still had an excellent memory.
Still, he usually kept those memories of the White House buried deep. They were like old things forgotten in a corner, rarely brought out.
"Maybe running into Ayanokoji brought the past to mind. Or maybe things have been too peaceful lately, and all those buried memories came bubbling up in my sleep." He continued to mutter quietly, as if working out the reason for himself.
"Well, whatever it was, it doesn't matter. I'm living a new life now." He threw back the covers and sat up. Most of the gloom from the dream had faded, leaving only a vague sense of melancholy, which soon dissolved in the morning light.
Today, Uesugi Hara planned to head to the shopping district and pick out a few outfits. Yesterday, when he'd seen Morishita Ai out of uniform, he'd belatedly realized that, as far as he could remember, he only owned the few school uniforms he'd been issued.
But those days were behind him. He had money now, so he ought to learn to enjoy life. There was no need to keep wearing the same few uniforms over and over like before.
After lunch, Uesugi Hara strolled leisurely through the shopping district. Shops crowded both sides of the street, their windows displaying all kinds of fashionable clothes. He was a little overwhelmed.
It wasn't that he'd never bought clothes before. It was just that whenever he passed shops that looked so obviously "high-end," he'd always looked straight ahead and gone around them.
He'd only ever bought clothes from street stalls, haggling with the vendors and trying to stretch every last dollar.
(There weren't many thrifty, household-minded boys like Uesugi Hara anymore.)
But now, standing outside these bright clothing stores, he found himself at a loss. His old "street-stall haggling strategy" clearly wouldn't work here.
Class B had just finished eating together, and the group was huddled up discussing where to go next.
Ichinose Honami, surrounded by her friends, suddenly felt something and instinctively glanced in one direction. A familiar figure entered her field of vision.
It was him.
Ichinose Honami recognized him at once. It was that kind and handsome shop assistant from before.
She watched Uesugi Hara standing outside a clothing store, seemingly lost in thought. Was the shop assistant really a student at their school too?
"Hey~ Little Honami, what are you looking at?" The girl beside her followed her gaze and immediately grinned mischievously. "Oh~ so you're checking out a handsome guy~"
"Really? Really? Let me have a look—" another girl leaned over, took a couple of looks, and said, "Isn't that Uesugi from Class 1-A? I heard he's number one on the handsome-guy ranking!"
"So Honami-chan likes that type, huh?"
As her friends teased her, the white-haired girl among them quietly clenched her fists. Her smile stiffened a little.
"Come on, Mako and Yume, don't say things like that!" Ichinose Honami blushed and hurriedly waved her hands. "I just ran into someone I know. Besides, he helped me before."
At the words "helped me," the white-haired girl seemed to breathe a quiet sigh of relief. Her clenched fists slowly relaxed.
"See? I told you Honami wasn't that shallow," she added in a small voice, though she wasn't sure whether anyone else had heard.
"Mako, you guys go on ahead. I'll go say hello." Ichinose Honami turned to her friends.
"Is it really safe for you to go over alone, Honami? What if that person's a creep?" Shiranami Chihiro grabbed her with a worried look, her eyes full of concern.
"It's fine, Chihiro. The shop assistant is a really nice person," Ichinose Honami said with a smile, patting her hand as she explained.
Amikura Mako and Kobashi Yume exchanged a knowing look, then each grabbed one of Shiranami Chihiro's arms and started hauling her away. "Then go ahead, Honami-chan~ We'll get going first and leave you to it."
Shiranami Chihiro kicked and flailed in midair, shouting, "Honami, be careful! Be really careful!" Unfortunately, she was no match for the two girls, and all her struggling was futile.
To onlookers, the scene looked a little like a husband being dragged away—earnest and funny at the same time.
Ichinose Honami's face flushed with embarrassment. She called after Shiranami Chihiro as they carried her off. "Don't worry, Chihiro. I'll be careful!"
Amikura Mako and Kobashi Yume, meanwhile, leaned close to Shiranami Chihiro and whispered, "Come on, Chihiro. It's obvious Honami-chan likes that boy. We'd just be in the way if we stayed."
Unfortunately, what sounded like comforting words to anyone else fell on Shiranami Chihiro's ears like a devil's whisper.
The girl's face turned deathly pale in an instant. She went completely still, as if a petrification spell had been cast on her, and gave up struggling, hanging her head dejectedly.
Amikura Mako and Kobashi Yume exchanged a look, both baffled. Why had the poor thing suddenly become so dispirited?
After they dragged her around a corner, Kobashi Yume asked quietly, "Hey, Mako, are we really just leaving?"
"Of course not." Amikura Mako raised an eyebrow, as if it were obvious. "Would you feel okay leaving Honami alone with someone she doesn't know?"
At that, Shiranami Chihiro's eyes lit up. She came right back to life and hurriedly asked, "Then what should we do?"
"What else? Follow them and keep an eye on things." Amikura Mako glanced toward Ichinose Honami and lowered her voice. "What if that guy really is a creep? Wouldn't Honami be in danger?"
"But what if Honami-chan catches us?" Kobashi Yume asked softly, still a little worried.
"If she does, we'll say we were wandering around nearby and happened to run into her." Amikura Mako gave her a sly wink. "Besides, if we really do run into them, we'll have a perfectly good excuse to go over and talk. It's ideal."
The more Shiranami Chihiro listened, the brighter her eyes grew. Her earlier dejection vanished completely. She grabbed the sleeves of both girls and pulled them forward. "Then let's hurry! Every second we waste, Honami is in more danger!"
Amikura Mako stumbled as she was pulled along and couldn't help giving Shiranami Chihiro a puzzled look. The girl had been hanging her head just moments ago. What had gotten her so fired up all of a sudden?
But she didn't think too much of it. She simply assumed Shiranami Chihiro was terribly worried about Ichinose Honami's safety. She waved for the others to follow and crept after her.
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