Hanabi froze.
"...What?"
Miki Yūya frowned.
"The funeral feast. Someone's dead, so surely we get to eat something nice?
So all this time, your family just didn't have that custom?
Fine, then I won't bring a condolence gift. I was going to offer a little something, too. Ah, what a shame..."
Hanabi's mind went blank for a moment.
She thought she had misheard.
The words "funeral feast" rattled around in her ears like two stones colliding with a grating crash.
She opened her mouth, forcing the words out of her throat:
"You... what did you say?"
"Didn't understand?"
Miki Yūya picked at his ear.
"Then let me say it again-what does your father's death have to do with me?
If you insist on pinning it on me, fine. I'll take credit for an assist.
But if it's an assist, let's get the feast started."
Hanabi trembled all over.
It wasn't a tremble of hurt feelings.
It was the kind that came from a punch to the chest that made you forget how to breathe.
She felt her blood turn cold, starting at her fingertips, spreading to her heart, then down to the soles of her feet.
She was standing perfectly straight, yet she felt herself sinking into a bottomless hole.
"You... how can you say something like that?"
Her voice grew shrill, like a string stretched to its breaking point.
"My father is dead! Dead! Don't you feel even a little guilty?!"
Miki Yūya watched her, his expression as calm as if he were looking at a cat with its fur standing on end. Cats did lash out under stress, after all, just like Hanabi was doing now.
"Guilty?"
He repeated the word, looking at her as though she were an idiot.
"Why should I feel guilty? I'm not the