"What do you think... about me?"
His slate gray eyes widened at that question before the woman sitting across from him seemed to catch herself. Her lips parted just slightly as realization dawned on her face.
"Ah! No, no, no, I didn't mean it that way!" Almost vehemently, she shook her hand to dismiss the notion and he played dumb as though the dual meaning was lost on him.
"What do you mean?"
"Um... About universities..." Ah. "For example, this... What do you think about this university?"
Her delicate finger pointed at a name and his eyes trailed from her small hand down to her painted nail until they reached the big, bolded characters. And at that moment, he almost didn't believe what he read.
"In Tokyo, huh?"
He said it more to himself, to make the surreal, real. She was aiming higher—he should be happy, proud, and he knew this was bound to happen ever since he tried teaching her to have more self-confidence—but his body wouldn't lie; the sinking feeling in his stomach was proof of how much he disapproved.
Her bright brown eyes were looking expectantly right at him, all too clear and betraying exactly what she felt. She'd always been like this—trying to keep her feelings and thoughts inside—perhaps it fooled everybody else, but he could see through her clear as day. He knew she was still hesitant, he knew she still needed that push, still needed to hear those words that only he could say.
'You can do it.'
He wanted to tell her, and yet his throat dried up and his tongue felt heavy. Pathetic. He was a teacher, the one students looked to for advice, and he'd tried so hard to get Yano to believe in herself. All his efforts were coming to fruition and he was about to let it go to waste. No, this was much bigger than him; he knew fully well that he wouldn't hold her back over something petty.
"So, what kind of answer did you want to hear?"
In spite of it all, he still couldn't wholeheartedly tell her to go, so the next best thing was to make her see how much she wanted it herself.
And the results were beautiful.
He could count, on one hand, just how many times he'd actually seen her flustered—it never failed to amaze him, though, how the color rushed to her cheeks and turned them rosier than any lipstick she applied.
It was hard to tear his eyes away, but he still had a job to do. "Well, realistically speaking, I wouldn't say that you'll safely get in. You'll have to work hard." Despite not looking at her, he could see the image of her honest face burned into the inside of his eyelids. When he first advised her, it was with nothing but honest intentions of being a teacher, being a guide to the wayward lamb. Over time he watched her grow and change, he watched her start to like herself again.
He never would have expected, and she would never know, just what effect Yano Ayane had on him.
