Kanade explained what Sakuya had said when she got home that evening; they spent a listless dinner at the table, saying nothing, followed by a silent evening staring at the TV, leaning against one another on the futon.

They said very little to each other the next morning, and almost nothing at all to their coworkers the next day.

A day passed.

Two.

The date Shinji had written on the card passed, and the day after that, with no incident.

Towards the afternoon of the third day after the deadline, Yukino received a text from Kanade, casually mentioning that she might get takeout that evening on the way home; Yukino responded with a single happy emoji.

Normalcy.

Five minutes later she heard Kanade's voice, quiet but clear, coming from a cubicle down the aisle.

"MY SISTER IS THE CUTEST GIRL IN THE WHOLE WORLD!"

She stood up as if she'd been bitten, looking over the dividing walls towards the sound. One of her coworkers - a small man with glasses, she didn't remember his name - rolled his chair back out of his cubicle, stared back at her, smiled briefly, then turned back to his computer, the glare from the screen reflected in his lenses.

Kanade's voice came from another cubicle in another direction.

"MY SISTER IS THE CUTEST GIRL IN THE WHOLE WORLD!"

Yukino stepped back, only to hear Kanade's voice coming from behind her now.

"MY SISTER IS THE CUTEST GIRL IN THE WHOLE WORLD!"

Her phone chimed with a text message; she looked down to see it was coming from a number she'd never seen before. And then another text from another number, and another, and another.

And seemingly all around her: "MY SISTER IS THE CUTEST GIRL IN THE WHOLE WORLD!"

Without thinking she grabbed her coat and purse, and started walking to the office. Some of her coworkers - friends - called out to her, but they were almost drowned out by Kanade's voice.

"MY SISTER IS THE CUTEST GIRL IN THE WHOLE WORLD!"

By the time she was near her floor's lobby she was running; Kanade's exclamation fading behind her but echoing more and more loudly in her mind. She hammered on the button, waiting the agonizing 30 seconds for the elevator to appear.

Then down, the other riders looking at her quizzically because her phone kept going off.

Then their phones started to go off.

Quietly, tinnily, from two or three tiny speakers:

"MY SISTER IS THE CUTEST GIRL IN THE WHOLE WORLD!"

She started sobbing as she ran out of the building, and she didn't stop running for a long, long time.