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Fourth floor of the special building, east side ‐ there, you could find a room to look down at the grounds if that was what you wanted.
The sounds of youth came in through the open window. The voices of diligent boys and girls in the midst of their club activities reverberated throughout the room, mixed with the clanging of metal bats and high‐pitched whistles and accompanied by the clarinets and trumpets from the concert band.
Amidst that wonderful BGM of youth, what were we at the Service Club doing? Absolutely nothing. I was reading the off of Arxiv, Yukinoshita was immersed in a pocket‐sized book with a leather cover, and Yuigahama was playing with her phone listlessly
As usual, when it came to living out our youth to the fullest, we got zero points.
What sort of dumbass club was this where all we did was waste time? It was like how the rugby club turned into a mahjong club. I heard they played half games before and after practice. Because of that, you could always see the rugby club coins (the currency circulated within the rugby club. Totally not real money. Its main feature was that it looked a lot like a Japanese yen coin) scattered in the classroom and the hallway the next day. If you asked me, it was only mahjong, but to those guys it was cutting‐edge communication and a sparkling page of their youth.
Just how many of those guys who took part in those games were even aware of the rules of mahjong before they started?
There couldn't be that many people who played Shanghai or Strip Mahjong at Tsudanuma's arcade centre like I did. I'm pretty sure those guys only studied and learned the rules of mahjong so that they could suck up to each other. Incidentally, the rules are completely different for Shanghai Mahjong even though you use the same tiles. In other words, you only learn the rules of Strip Mahjong for one reason. People really muster up the energy when boobs are at stake. The internet loves porn. It fucking loves it. Can't get enough of it.
Having a common element is absolutely indispensable when it comes to making friends. That was the kind of ilk Yuigahama Yui had once belonged to.
Those thoughts went through my mind as I finished checking the hyperbolic sines of my figure. When I was done, I turned my gaze towards Yuigahama. She was holding her phone in one hand with a vague smile floating on her lips, but she was sighing deeply ‐ only so softly it was inaudible. I couldn't hear the sound of her sigh, but I realised how deeply she was exhaling from how much her chest heaved.
"What's wrong?" The one who said that wasn't me ‐ it was Yukinoshita. It seemed she had realised Yuigahama's strange behavior without even looking up from her book. Perhaps she had heard that sigh. Just as you would expect from satan herself.
"Oh, uh… nothing, I guess," said Yuigahama. "I just got this weird text, so I was all like whoa."
"Hikigaya, unless you'd like to end up in court, I suggest you stop sending those obscene texts immediately."
So she was assuming that this was a sexting case and that I was the culprit.
"Nice. Roasted me," I filled this away. It would not be forgotten. "It wasn't me…" I said. "Where's the proof? Show me the proof, I say."
With a smirk, Yukinoshita flipped her hair over her shoulder. "You just proved my point. Those are clearly the words of a criminal. 'Where's the proof?' 'What a brilliant deduction; shouldn't you become a novelist or something?' 'There's no way I can stay in the same room as a murderer.'"
"That last one's more like the words of a victim…" I said. It reeked of a death flag
Yukinoshita nodded at what I said. "Perhaps you're right," she replied as she flipped a page in her book. It seemed she was reading a mystery novel, of all things.
"Nah, I don't reckon Hikki's the culprit, you know?" Yuigahama said, half a minute too late.
Yukinoshita's hand, which was in the midst of turning a page, stopped suddenly. 'Where's the proof?' she asked with her eyes alone. Man, did she want me to be a criminal that badly?
"Hmmm, well, you see, the text was about my class. So that means Hikki's got nothing to do with it."
"But I am in your class…" I said.
"That makes sense," said Yukinoshita. "In that case, Hikigaya‐kun couldn't have been the culprit."
"So she accepted that as evidence…"
Hello everybody, this is Hikigaya Hachiman from grade eleven, class F. I was so butthurt I did a self‐introduction in my head without even realising it. But I'd escaped criminal charges, so maybe that was a good thing.
"Weeell, I guess these things happen from time to time," Yuigahama said solemnly as she closed her phone lid with a snap. "I won't worry about it too much." It was like she was speaking from deep personal experience
She said "from time to time", but I never got a text from that sender, just so you know.
…good thing I don't have friends, huh!
I chuckled darkly. No, but seriously, people who have plenty of friends have to put up with a lot of crap. Seemed like tough work, honestly. On that note, I was liberated from the disgraceful worldly ideas my classmates had been tarred with. With all my profound thoughts, I was totally the Buddha himself. I'm so great.
"I hate that laugh," Yukinoshita cut me down. Why? She saw me having fun. She said to herself 'that must stop at once.'
And with that, Yuigahama refused to touch her phone.
I had no way of guessing what was in that text, but it probably wasn't pretty. Yuigahama was a fool, to say the least, and she was the kind of fool who wore her heart on her sleeve. She was a total softie who always worried herself over Yukinoshita and I, and so she probably also had a side of her that got unusually down‐hearted over things.
As if forcefully shaking her depression away, Yuigahama leaned back against her chair and stretched. "…there's nothing to do."
Without her phone to waste time on, Yuigahama slouched idly against the back of her chair. Doing that made her chest stick out unintentionally, which really made me hot and bothered, so I switched my gaze over to Yukinoshita, whose chest didn't inspire any such reaction.
Yukinoshita, whose breasts were the triumphant epitome of Safe For Work, closed her book shut. "Then why don't you study if you've got nothing to do?" she said to Yuigahama with a note of disapproval in her voice. "Midterms will soon be upon us, after all."
From the way she spoke, Yukinoshita lacked any sense of urgency whatsoever. To her, it was someone else's problem entirely. But that stood to reason ‐ to Yukinoshita, the midterms were nothing more than routine work. This chick was the number one ranked student in just about anything you could get tested on. It went without saying that not even the midterms could ruffle her.
Yuigahama turned away looking somewhat put off, as if she was well aware of that too. "What's the point of studying?" she mumbled out of the corner of her mouth. "No one uses that stuff in real life…"
"You just uttered the standard dunce line!" I exclaimed. It was just so horribly predictable that it took me off guard. Were there seriously people who said stuff like that nowadays? "I use that bullshit every day of my life."
Inflamed at being called a 'dunce,' Yuigahama desperately clung to her position. "There isn't any use for studying, I mean it! High school life is short and that sort of stuff is a waste of time! You only live once, ya know?"
"But that means you can't screw up."
"Omigosh, you're such a wet blanket!"
"I prefer to think long‐term." I gave that deep laugh.
"In your case," said Yukinoshita, "you fail at every aspect of high school life."
Pretty much. You can't always win everything. Wait, come on! Was she saying that I didn't have a life? That I should check out of my earthly existence the same way people check out of a hotel?
"Watch me ace these fucking exams without studying at all," I challenged. "It's just a part of my personality."
"Yeah! Sucking at studying is part of my personality!"
"Kaneko Misuzu would have turned over in her grave if she heard that… 1 " Yukinoshita sighed, face‐palming. "Yuigahama‐san, what you said earlier about studying being meaningless is incorrect. In fact, studying is the act of finding your own meaning. Because of that, different people might have different reasons for studying, but that is no reason to deny the entire purpose of studying."
It was a sound argument. So sound, in fact, that it would go right over an adult's head ‐ which is to say that it would go in one ear and out the other. Even a deceptively simple statement like 'Just what is studying?' would cause that effect. So anyone who was trying to become an adult these days wouldn't get the message.
Actually, I wasn't just showing off how smart I am yet again by coming to that conclusion. The one who genuinely believed in it was Yukinoshita, it seemed.
"But you're the smart one, Yukinon…" Yuigahama said in a small voice. "I'm just not cut out for studying… and plus no one in my group does it…"
Yukinoshita's eyes suddenly narrowed. Sensing that the temperature of the room had dropped at least ten degrees through Yukinoshita's frosty silence, Yuigahama shut her mouth, startled. It looked as if she still remembered all the nasty things Yukinoshita had uttered to her once before.
She caved in on her own volition. "'k‐kay, I'll do it properly!" she insisted vehemently. "A‐anyway! Hikki, do you study at all?!"
Oooh, so she had dodged Yukinoshita's wrath. It seemed her cunning plan was to push the brunt of the attack onto me. Nice try, Yuigahama. "Yeah, I study," I said. "Just not school. I study all the time. All I do is study."
"Traitor! I thought you were a dunce like me!"
"Bitch, please. I was ranked third in Japanese." I paused for effect. "Plus, I'm not bad at my other subjects either. Like I don't know… calculus? Or computer science? Or physics? Or chemistry? Where I'm first? Or english which I'm fluent in? Come on Yuigahama. Just because I don't care about school doesn't mean I'm bad at school."
"No way… I had no idea…"
Incidentally, they don't post up the test results at this school. They only tell you about your ranking and score in person. As a result, while people did reveal their rankings to each other, no one knew mine ‐ because there was nobody I could have told. Pretty much no one asked me what my ranking was.
Of course, nobody asked me anything about myself in general.
"So does that mean you're actually smart, Hikki?"
"No! I'm dumb as a rock! I can't invent a new theory of particle physics and I can't find the prime numbers! I'm bad. And on top of all that I don't understand girls. Or boys. Or myself," I added.
"That's not much to brag about," said Yukinoshita.
"Just because you're not first you get snippy with me. Try and keep up and have an interesting conversation with me on quantum computing or spintronics. If and if ya dare," I challenged.
"What are spintronics?"
"You can make electrons and photons do math based off their spin and chirality. You can make the universe do complex arithmetic on your behalf if you know what you're doing. What do you know about quantum computers?"
They were both silent.
"Okay." I granted. Quantum computers were hard. "What do you know about regular computers?"
They were still silent.
"Okay that's just unacceptable," I mumbled. "Do you ladies know what a transistor is?"
I got silence.
"This is embarrassing for everybody in this room," I proclaimed. I shot a glance over at where I was working with hyperbolic geometric shapes.
"Aww," Yuigahama whined. "So I'm the only dumb character here?"
"Don't jump to that conclusion, Yuigahama‐san." Yukinoshita's frigid tone and expression had defrosted, and her eyes showed clear conviction.
Upon hearing those words, Yuigahama's face brightened up like a light bulb. "Y‐ Yukinon!"
"You're not a fictional character. Your stupidity is a natural trait."
"Waaaaaah!" Yuigahama beat her hands against Yukinoshita's front.
Looking as if she had absolutely no idea how to react to that, Yukinoshita let out a short, strained sigh. "What I've been trying to say is that measuring a person's worth solely by their exam scores and their ranking is foolish. There are remarkably inferior human beings even among high‐ranking students."
"Hey, why are you looking at me as you say that?" I asked. For a brief moment, I got stares from all directions. "I'll say this just in case, but you do know I study because I like it?"
"That so…"
"That's because you had nothing better to do."
The two girls spoke in unison. Yuigahama uttered the single word exclamation of surprise, while the longer statement belonged to Yukinsohita. Their foreheads pressed against each other's without them even realising it.
"Oooh," I grimaced. "Roasted me. Yeah, but neither do you," I said to Yukinoshita.
"But you didn't deny it," she said.
"Deny it already! It's making me feel kinda sad!" Yuigahama shouted.
"Never," I breathed.
Yukinoshita spoke as coolly as ever, but Yuigahama was fired up with empathy. Yuigahama embraced Yukinoshita warmly, as if she was even trying to soothe the wounds in Yukinoshita's heart. Yukinoshita had "…can't breathe!" written all over face yet didn't utter a single word voicing her discomfort. All the while Yuigahama went on squeezing her tightly.
Oi, come on! What about me?! I don't have anything better to do than studying either! I thought as it became clear that no hugs or squeezes were forthcoming in my direction. Well, I suppose it would have been awkward for me if she had hugged me, come to think of it.
But seriously, why do those riajuu creatures get so touchy‐feely with each other? Is skinship such a natural occurrence, huh? Do they think they're Americans, huh? They'll muck around and hit each other for a joke, but if something serious happened, they'll hug each other as if that's the really smart thing to do. If those guys and gals ever piloted an Eva, they wouldn't even be able to use an AT Field. There is no limit to the kindness in their hearts.
As she was holding Yukinoshita's head and stroking it, Yuigahama opened her mouth. "But y'know, Hikki, I was kinda surprised you study so hard."
"I have no math and I must cram," I mumbled. "I set due dates for myself and exams. I have a partial differential equation exam Thursday to test my knowledge. And after that it's time for statistics. Hypothesis testing and the t-distribution."
"You don't take summer classes?"
"Nah," I breezed.
Chiba Municipal Soubu High School was dedicated to preparing students for university. As a result, the university entrance rate was quite high. My fellow students who were aware of that probably already had entrance exams on their brains since the summer of their second year in high school. It was getting close to the time when they would start worrying about whether they'd attend the help seminar at Tsudanuma or the Kawai Cram School Centre or the school at Inage‐ Kaigan.
"Oh, but there's one thing," I added. "I am aiming for a scholarship at my prep school. That's if I don't master any big proofs which can get me into locked rooms with professors on the material I want to master."
"…schoolship?" Yuigahama repeated.
"In your case, you don't need to aim for anything when you've already reached your pinnacle," said Yukinoshita. "You're much like industrial waste."
"What's this, Yukinoshita? You're being nice today. I thought you'd deny my right to live outright."
"An excellent suggestion." Yukinoshita pressed a finger against her forehead, a nasty look on her face.
"Hey, hey, what's a schoolship?" It seemed Yuigahama had been lost ever since the 'scholarship' part. Wow really, Yuigahama‐san?
"A scholarship is when you receive a money grant for your studies," Yukinoshita explained.
"Prep schools these days are exempting good students from paying the tuition fees," I said. "Basically, if I get a scholarship, the money my parents pay to the prep school goes to me."
My parents would rest easy if I could study diligently with a clear purpose in mind and reap the results to justify their investment. And I could pocket the money while I was at it. It was an ingenious plan, if I do say so myself.
But both girls looked highly doubtful. "Isn't that fraud…?"
"There is no problem for him since you can't claim he's disadvantaging his parents by adopting a results‐oriented approach to his classes, and it's only really a matter of a prep school accepting a scholarship student. According to this boy's twisted personality, you cannot by any means call it fraud," Yukinoshita said scathingly.
"Plus there are all kinds of grants for the severely mentally disabled. My twisted personality might be a boon."
Yuigahama glanced at me. "So that's your plan in life, huh…" she murmured. And then she clung onto Yukinoshita's sleeve even more tightly than before
Startled at her intensity, Yukinoshita peered down at Yuigahama's face with tentative concern. "Is something the matter…?"
"Oh, um, nothing, I guess…" Yuigahama said, not fooling anyone with her nervous laugh. "I was just thinking that since you guys are so brainy, I dunno if we'll ever meet again after we graduate."
"Indeed…" Yukinoshita said with a slight smile. "I for one won't be seeing Hikigaya ever again."
I just shrugged wordlessly at that. Puzzled at my lack of verbal reaction, Yukinoshita glared at me quizzically. Give me a break. I'm agreeing with you here, Yukinoshita. Why would I want to see you again?
Well, they did exist in this world: people who studied their arses off so that they could get into the most elitist school away from their middle school companions. Those types decide to throw away their past and swear never to meet their classmates ever again. Yuigahama more or less hit the nail on the head about those types.
Then there were the people who clung to their friendships by communicating with those in their group. With technology, they could retain some shred of intimacy. So pretty much anyone who refuses to stay in touch ends up alone. What I mean to say is that you only connect to others through phone or email, or you never connect at all. Could you call that friendship? I'm sure you could. That means cell phones handle everything for everyone, and the number of friends you have can be equated to the number of cell phone contacts you have.
Yuigahama gripped her cell phone tightly as she flashed Yukinoshita a smile. "But there's no problem since we've got phones. We'll always stay in touch!"
Yes, but I'd like you to stop sending me texts every day…" Yukinoshita replied.
"Huh?! Y‐you don't like it…?"
Yukinoshita was silent for a moment, searching for words. "It is, at times, an extreme nuisance."
"How blunt!"
…those two really got along well, though. Since when did they get so chummy that they'd be sending texts? On that note, I couldn't imagine what Yukinoshita's texts would even look like. "Just what kind of texts have you been sending every day?"
"Uhh…" said Yuigahama. "Stuff like 'I ate a cream puff today '"
"I said 'indeed'," said Yukinoshita.
"'Yukinon, can you make cream puffs?! I want to try eating other sweets next time!'"
"'Very well.""
"What sparkling conservational skills, Yukinoshita..."
Yukinoshita looked away guiltily. "There's not much to contribute," she grumbled. It was sad that I knew how she felt.
No, really, what are you supposed to say to that kind of small talk? Stuff like the weather was a conversational staple, but it ends right after they say 'Nice weather, huh?' and you say 'Yeah.' It was like saying, 'Er, uh, un ange passe. Eheheh,' after an awkward silence on the phone.
"Yeah… I don't put much stock in cell phones," I said. "I think it's quite an imperfect means of communication."
I think those cell phone things are a certain type of device that emphasises loner behaviour. You can leave your phone alone even when there's an incoming call, you can block numbers, you can refuse to answer your texts ‐ stuff like that. You can choose to accept or deny all communication depending on your mood at the time.
"Indeed. The receiver is obligated to answer a text or pick up the phone." Yukinoshita nodded firmly at my casual mutterings.
She's not bad when you're only looking at her face. Come to think of it, that's probably why she's been asked for her phone address and number by so many different people.
As for me, there was this one time when I mustered up the courage to ask a cute girl for her phone address. This was back when I was an innocent middle schooler. Whenever I asked for her address, she told me, 'Sooooorry, my battery's dead right now. I'll text it to you later, okay?' It was a mystery how she never told me her address and yet for some reason intended to send it to me. I'm still waiting for it to this day…
"Besides, I don't look at any texts which disgust me…" Yukinoshita admitted, as if as an afterthought.
"Hmmm?" Yuigahama pressed her index finger against her chin and tilted her head to the side. "So that means… my texts disgust you?"
"…I didn't say that." Yukinoshita, who had been staring straight at Yuigahama until now, turned her eyes away. "They're just a nuisance." Her face was red. It was a kind of cute reaction, I guess, but since it had nothing to do with me, I gave zero shits.
Upon seeing Yukinoshita's expression, Yuigahama jumped and let out a squee. Mysteriously enough, Yukinoshita turned away with a softened look on her face ‐ she had completely defrosted. Again, it had nothing to do with me, so I gave zero shits.
"Oh, I see. But phones aren't that perfect, yeah." Yuigahama held onto Yukinoshita's body tightly, as if pained over how shallow their bond was. "I'll study real hard, yep… it'll be awesome if I could go to the same school as you," she went on in small voice, her gaze dropping to the floor. "Have you decided on your university and stuff, Yukinon?"
"No, not in definite terms. I plan to enter the science faculty at a public nation‐ wide university, however."
"You know so many big words!" Yuigahama exclaimed. Then she said, "So, um… what about you, Hikki? I m‐may as well ask you too."
"The idea is to be so godlike that they have to let me into the super-Kamiokande detector."
"Eh?" Yuigahama wondered.
"I'd like to skip school if at all possible and jump into the big problems of particle physics. The best place to do that here in Japan is the Super-Kamiokande detector and neutrino laboratory."
"That sounds really hard…"
"Einstein did it," I shrugged. "Von Neumann did it. I want to be that good."
"I don't recognize Von Neumann…"
"You… dullard," I accused.
"Ooooh… so I'll work hard, then!" Yuigahama let go of Yukinoshita. "And that's that. We'll have a study group starting from this week," she declared loudly.
"…just what do you mean?" Yukinoshita asked dubiously.
Yuigahama completely ignored her question and promptly launched into organising things. "We don't have club activities one week before the tests, so we've got free time in the afternoon, y'know? Oh, Tuesday's good too, since the teachers have an excursion this week."
The 'excursion' Yuigahama was talking about was a meeting with the city's education research department, and because it was mandatory for teachers to attend, classes were cut short and club activities took a day off.
"I don't study for school," I cut her down. Yuigahama wilted.
"You wouldn't help me with calculus?" She wondered.
"Who the fuck do I look like? Terrance Tao?"
"I don't know who that is either!" Yuigahama protested.
I threw my chalk at her head and bounced it off her skull.
"Hey!"
"He may have solved one of the big seven! He did Navier-Stokes smoothness but not existence! Or lack of smoothness! The problem wording is vague. So his proof might qualify. It's the biggest development in fluid dynamics since Von Neumann's algorithm for artificial viscosity in blast waves."
"I don't know what you're talking about! But if you're so good you should be able to teach me…"
"I'm not Terrance Tao!" I decried.
"Terrance Tao sounds like a fake name," Yukinoshita rolled her eyes.
"It is. It's like Lambdu Lambda or Student," I agreed. "A lot of mathematicians publish under pseudonyms."
"We'll study and then we'll go to Saize in Chiba?"
"I don't really mind…" Yukinoshita agreed. You bitch.
"This is the first time we're going out together, Yukinon!" Yuigahama interrupted me. "Just the two of us!"
"Indeed," said Yukinoshita.
I rolled my eyes. So I had never really been invited from the start. That was fair enough. I didn't have time to teach calculus like that.
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-WG
