Pin Pon Pan P-on.
The xylophone notes sound throughout the school PA system and the secretary announces.
Paging Class 2-C, its following students are to report to the Principal's office immediately: Kawashima Ayu-san and Kanzaki Hanako-san. Repeating, paging Class 2-C, its following students are to report to the Principal's office immediately: Kawashima Ayu-san and Kanzaki Hanako-san.
Hanako and Ayu are walking down the hallway together.
"I bet it's got something to do with Ichikawa," Hanako said.
"Yeah," Ayu agreed, "she must be in some sort of trouble and we just might be forced to rat her out."
"But what could it be? She's never caused any sort of trouble before."
"Uh oh." As Ayu takes on a frightened expression.
"What is it?" Hanako asked.
"Remember what Ichikawa warned us about this morning?"
"About how we might've blasphemed the Buddha?!" As Hanako's expression turns panicked. "Aw, shit, we're in for divine punishment!"
The two girls enter the Principal's office with fearful though curious expressions and are confronted by the sight of a sorrowful looking Momona.
"Have a seat, you two," the Principal said as he is still sitting at his desk while giving them a dour expression.
The girls do so on the sofa. The Vice-Principal stands in the doorway facing outward.
"Please send an announcement that Urisugi Haruo, also of Class 2-C, is to go to the library and wait until called."
Ayu and Hanako glance side on at each other with a panicked look in their eyes.
They know! Their thoughts synchronize.
The message is sent over the PA. Later, the Vice-Principal stands in front of Ayu and Hanako with his cellphone to show them those incriminatory pictures as he did to Momona. The two girls end up looking terrified.
"As the both of you can clearly see," the Principal said dourly, "each of you were photographed on separate occasions entering and leaving that apartment, of which is being rented out to your fellow classmate, Urisugi Haruo. That in itself is not a problem . . . The problem is that the both of you were going there and paying him for sexual favors, known as compensation dating, also known as prostitution. And that means, expulsion."
Ayu and Hanako stare up at the Principal with wide-eyed shrunken irises of dispair.
"But then Ichikawa-san had something to say about that," the Principal continued.
Earlier . . .
Momona got up and stepped away from the desk to get enough space and got down on her knees, bowing her head low to touch the floor with her forehead and her hands pressed before herself, doing the dogeza
"Please do not expel my friends! They did not start this, it was Urisugi-san who did! I even confronted him and told him to stop, but he said he wasn't going to!"
"What would you have us do?" the Principal asked with a sour expression with hands extended. "This is something that cannot be ignored."
"What if I offer a deal?!" Momona suggested as she looks up at the Principal with an earnest expression.
"A deal?" The Principal mused.
"Give them a suspension and I will share in it!" Her expression profound.
Ayu and Hanako stare at Momona with thunderstruck expressions of wide-open mouths with wide eyes and shrunken irises.
"What an incredible friend you have," Kadowaki said with a profound expression, then turns to the Principal and Vice-Principal. "They have both sexually harassed various boys. And this one I caught reading a pornographic magazine in the class." Thumbing at Ayu. "Ichikawa-san is impressive. I didn't think she had it in her. Maybe that sickness she had changed her somehow. I've heard that recovery from a serious sickness or injury can change some people. What do you think, Principal? Vice-Principal?"
The two men stare at each other, pondering.
"In all of my years involved with the school, I have never heard of, let alone had, a student pleading to spare their friend from being expelled by offering to share in a suspension with them," the Principal said with a profound expression of his own. "So I will show mercy."
The three girls all breathe a sigh of relief as they bare just such expressions.
"I will be calling each of your respective parents to tell them to come over here as soon as possible to discuss this matter," the Principal concluded.
Urisugi Haruo is in the library sitting at a table, reading a magazine.
Why were Kawashima and Kanzaki called to the Principal's office? Ichikawa-san was also absent from the classroom. Is she absent from the school or is she down in the Principal's office too?
He turns the page of the magazine and comes upon an article about prostitution in Japan's high schools; with some high school boys engaging in compensation dating.
Oh my God! That has to it! As he now has a horrified expression. We got found out and now I'm in shit for it!
The respective mothers of the three girls are sitting with their respective daughters alongside them on one sofa; the Principal, Vice-Principal, and Kadowaki-sensei are sitting across from them on the other.
"Okay, Principal-sama, what trouble has our daughters caused you?" Momona's mother asked.
"Before I answer that," the Principal answered, "I want to assure you, Mrs. Ichikawa, that your daughter was in no way involved in the activities of these two girls." Gesturing at Ayu and Hanako. "If anything, she tried to discourage it. Now as to the mothers of the guilty girls, there is no easy way for me to reveal what your respective daughters had done, but here it goes . . . Since last year on separate and multiple occasions, they have been paying a boy in their class for sex."
"HUUUUH?!" As Ayu's mother jumps to her feet and glares down at her daughter. "We swap porn and I tell you my sex life, and you keep this a secret from me?! I am very disappointed in you, Ayu! Why did you keep this a secret from me?!"
"Because you might've wanted in on him too and get in bigger trouble than me!" Ayu countered with an exasperated expression.
Ayu's mother's expression softens and with a sigh she sits back down.
"Yeah, you got a point there. I probably would've ended up cheatin' on your dad. So," as she slaps her hand down Ayu's knee, "that explains your part-time job: it's to pay for your good time . . . So how much was he chargin'?"
"Three thousand yen," Ayu answered.
"What a bargain!" As Ayu's mother arches backward while looking upward with a sorrowful expression.
"Well you may be amused by this but I certainly am not!" Hanako's mother stated with an outrage expression. "Hanako! Were you giving your allowance to that boy to prostitute himself to you?! Answer me!"
"Y-Yes!" Hanako answered with a meek and fearful expression. "But I didn't start this, mom!" Her expression intense. "Kawashima did! Ayu-chan I mean!" Making it clear that she was referring to her friend and not her friend's mother. "It was back when Kadowaki-sensei sent me to get some supplies from the old school from where I spied Ayu-chan having sex with him-"
"You were having sex on school grounds during school hours?!" Kadowaki stated at Ayu with an outraged expression.
"Whoa, couldn't wait could ya!" Ayu's mother snickered at her daughter.
Everyone grimaces at Ayu's mother.
"Oh sorry," Ayu's mother said sheepishly as she rubs the back of her own head. "Please continue."
"Anyway," Hanako continued, "at first I thought he was her boyfriend but I next overheard him saying something about three thousand yen. So I ran off and later thought that if he was only doing that for money, then I could . . . well . . . you get it now." Finishing in a humbled manner.
Hanako's mother glowers back at her. "That still does not change that fact that you used the allowance I give you to proposition that boy into doing . . . that with you! Your allowance is permanently cut off!"
Finally, a woman who takes this seriously. Momona thought with a relieved expression.
"So all this was started by you walking up to that boy and offering him three thousand yen to have sex with you," Ayu's mother said to her own daughter.
"Actually," Ayu answered, "he walked up to me and said I could have sex with him for three thousand yen."
"Seriously!" As Ayu's mother has an surprised expression. "Now that is a rare sort of guy! Where is he now?! Is it possible I-"
"Mom!" Ayu's expression is of embarrassment.
"Okay, now that this issue has been revealed," the Principal spoke up, "it is time to met out the judgement . . . Normally, Hanako-san and Ayu-san would be expelled but Ichikawa Momona-san did a dogeza and pleaded that I only give her two friends here a suspension, and that she will share in it if I agreed to do so."
"Momona!" Her mother stares at her daughter with an awed expression.
"Whoa, you're amazing! What an honourable friend you are!" Ayu's mother also stares at Momona in awe, then glares at her own daughter. "Oy Ayu! You owe that girl!"
"And to that I have agreed," the Principal revealed.
"Oh you definitely owe that girl, Ayu!" As Ayu's mother stares at her daughter more profoundly.
"My thoughts exactly," as Hanako's mother glares at her own daughter.
"So how long is the suspension for, Principal-sama?" Momona's mother asked.
"Up until the end of the month should cover it," he answered.
Up until the end of the month. Momona thought with a glum expression.
"Um, not to ask a stupid question," Ayu's mother said with a curious expression as she momentarily raises her hand, "but what's gonna happen to that boy?"
"Oh him I'll just expel," the Principal answered as he waves casually.
The mothers nod in unison.
"Kawashima Ayu-san, Kanzaki Hanako-san," the Vice-Principal next said as he glares at the girls. "Show the proper gratitude toward this school's Principal for his mercy."
Those two girls are quick to do a dogeza.
"Thank you very much, Principal-sama! We are very grateful for your mercy!"
"Rise," the Principal said, compelling the girls to do so, then leans forward with a grim expression at Hanako and Ayu. "And if the both of you ever again indulge in something this sordid while still going to this school, the both of you shall leave this school before your graduation. Understood?"
"Hai!" Their fretful voice shouted as one.
"Good," as the Principal stands, prompting the others to stand as well. "Now go home for the day. Because tomorrow, you will show up at the staff room with instructions on where to go. And remember, an hour earlier than usual. Now go collect your text books. This meeting is over."
"Ayu, bow your head to your savior!" Her mother instructed firmly while pointing at Momona. "Bow!" And does so herself, making Ayu also bow.
"Lower!" As her mother clasps her daughter by the nape and pushes her lower so that their heads are lower than their waists.
"Hanako, you too," her mother also commanded while doing so herself. "Come on!" And Hanako does so.
Both Momona and her mother are in awe of her friends along with their mothers bowing their heads lower than their waists to them. The four keep their heads bowed low.
"We are both so very sorry for the trouble our daughters have caused you, Mrs. Ichikawa," Hanako and Ayu's respective mothers intoned together.
"I . . . I understand," Momona's mother said humbly.
"You have clearly done a wonderful job raising such an honourable daughter," Hanako's mother intoned. "I can only hope that my daughter learns from your daughter's example."
"I too hope that my daughter can learn from your daughter's example as well," Ayu's mother intoned.
The girls are now returning to their classroom alone.
"I wonder how Urisugi's mom is gonna handle this?" Momona pondered.
"She'll probably go beast mode on him," Hanako said wryly.
"Yeah, he is a boy after all," Ayu noted.
"A boy," Momona echoed with a resentful expression, causing her to think about that.
Even if Urisugi-san had started this whole thing, what Kawashima just said shows that this world is also hypocritical about gender responsibilities. Back in my world, compensation dating resulted in the girls involved getting punished worse than the boys involved, even if the boys were the ones who started it.