Why Not Make Both Twins 'Girlfriends'?-Chapter 11Volume 1 .1 - The Present and the Past...?

The Present and the Past…? 1

Tuesday, June 14th. It’s been raining continuously since Saturday.

Chikage had a meeting again today, so Sakuto came to the station alone.

Hikari was already waiting, and when she saw Sakuto, she waved her hand and showed him where to go.

Hikari’s expression was a bit gloomy.

‘Could something have happened to Chikage?’, he wondered.

“Yesterday, you know, Chii-chan came home late, and she seemed different than usual. She looked gloomy or maybe angry… It might be because of the upcoming joint event.”

“I see… I haven’t seen her since yesterday. She seems busy even during breaks… so, did you hear anything?”

“No… But that face she had, it looked like something unpleasant had happened…”

Sakuto said ‘I see’ and looked down, but he had a rough idea.

It’s probably those two from Yuki Academy──but it’s too early to conclude since Chikage hasn’t said anything.

“Sakuto-kun, what should we do? Usually, when Chii-chan’s like that, she tries to do everything by herself…”

“Are you worried about Chikage?”

“Yeah… Chii-chan has always been the type to keep her worries to herself… I just hope she doesn’t get too overwhelmed…”

Hikari spoke with an unusually gloomy expression.

Sakuto was also becoming increasingly worried.

“…Hikari, how about we go to the arcade?”

“Ah? I don’t tink it’s a good idea…”

“Hikari, you need a change of scenery. You’re looking so gloomy too right now.”

“Eh? D-do I? I don’t know… maybe you’re right…”

Sakuto smiled and took Hikari to the game center.

***

Having arrived at the game center, they didn’t know what to do and wandered around the first and second floors.

They didn’t feel like playing Ensam today. Hikari didn’t seem in the mood either.

Eventually, they went down to the first floor, walked around the UFO catcher area, and looked at the plushies through the glass case.

“…This is cute.”

The character Hikari muttered about was ‘Usapyoko’, a rabbit character.

Inside the case were keychain types, both a small white one and a black one.

Sakuto vaguely remembered his visit to the Usami house last week.

That day, it was a bunny girl, but does Hikari like rabbits?

“Do you like rabbits?”

“Yeah. You know, my family name and Chii-chan’s is ‘Usami (rabbit)’, so I’ve kind of liked them since I was little.”

Saying that, Hikari inserted a coin and started operating the arm.

“──Ah, no good…”

Hikari laughed ruefully and gave up after one try, still seemingly not in high spirits.

“Which one were you aiming for? The white or the black?”

“The black one. I thought of giving it to Chii-chan because she likes Usapyoko too.”

“I see… You two really are close, huh?”

“Yeah. We’ve hardly ever fought.”

He can somehow picture it. Even if Chikage gets angry about something, with Hikari’s personality, they probably don’t end up in big sisterly fights.

“Hikari… Have you ever wanted to go to school with Chikage?”

“Yeah. When I was in elementary school… well, not every day…”

“What?”

Hikari laughed like a child who had been caught in a prank.

“When I was in fourth grade, there were two girls in my class I was close with,”

Hikari suddenly started reminiscing about the past.

Although she seemed to be reminiscing fondly, there was a hint of sadness in her expression.

‘There were two of them’ probably means those two are no longer with her.

“But, for some reason… suddenly the two of them started fighting over me. ‘Come play on this side? Hii-chan, come here,’ and so on…”

“Were you caught in the middle?”

“Yeah… It was really tough, I was wondering why they couldn’t just get along.”

Hikari frowned with a bitter smile.

“So, I started thinking that the bad relationship between those two was my fault… I was really worried and consulted with Sensei, but was just told, ‘It’s tough being popular,’ and not taken seriously… at that time, I wondered if it would be better not to go to school…”

‘Is that the reason she stopped going to school?’

For the sake of mediating the fight—well, he’s not sure if it can be called mediation in this case. But at that time, maybe Hikari had no other choice but to do so to solve the problem.

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“After taking two days off, when I went back to school, the two of them were together, worried about me. ‘Hii-chan, are you okay?’ And then, I realized…”

“…Realized what?”

“That it’s better for me not to be there for them to get along. If them worrying about me is what connects them, then I need to stay away from school…”

Sakuto wanted to understand what Hikari was implying, but it didn’t quite click.

He had never thought of ‘needing to stay away from school'” before.

Even though there are various reasons and purposes for going to school…

“But, if I don’t go to school, Chii-chan and Papa and Mama will worry, so I started studying on my own. Right now, I’m interested in physics and chemistry, but before that it was biology and ergonomics.”

“How did you study that?”

“There are books and the internet, but YouTube is amazing! People from all over the world are doing research in various fields, and there’s a translation function. Though those subtitles can be funny sometimes.”

Sakuto chuckled, ‘That’s certainly true.’

“Astronomy and rocket science too… I talked with the school counselor and thought clinical psychology seemed interesting.”

That might also be a form of escape, he thought.

She seemed somewhat like him, and he felt like he could understand her.

“So, Hikari… did you become afraid of going to school?”

“…Yeah. I’m probably scared, scared of going to school… scared of ruining the atmosphere because of me…”

Hikari curled up so small he thought she might disappear.

Then she lightly grasped Sakuto’s sleeve.

He thought if he shook off this arm, Hikari might vanish right before his eyes.