Chapter 74 – Everything Just Works

 

I ended up wasting Christmas away and treated it like any other day. Sad? No, this was simply fate and I accepted it.

 

Meanwhile, Ugin was busy running about in the cold. She went to buy me sweets out of pity and I received that pity of hers with open arms. For the rest of the day, I turned my body into a machine, with the sole purpose of devouring all the sweets I got.

 

On Christmas night, mom and Ugin baked a cake together while me and my father were watching TV in the living room with a glass of wine and tomato juice in our hands. The cake was tasty.

 

This made me wonder, from where did Ugin and I inherited our personalities from? My dad was a quiet man and my mom was a calm woman, but both me and Ugin were as loud as clowns. Well, Ugin was a little bit calmer, but she had been unusually loud recently, so I was worried about her.

 

In the end, I failed to figure out the answer, so it was probably safe to assume that we had mutated genes.

 

By the way, I wonder how Arina was doing?

 

We had been hanging out together since fall and I’ve known her a lot better than before, but I still didn’t know what she normally did on her days off. I was never this interested in knowing about what other people were doing on their days off but I was curious about her. Did she spend her time reading? Or did she spend her time on the phone like any other girl? Or maybe she was the kind of person who did her homeworks seriously?

 

Arina’s existence started to grow on me. I just couldn’t stop thinking about her. If she were to know about this, she would definitely laugh at me.

 

Anyway, tomorrow would be the day when the party started, I could just ask her about it then. We decided to hold the party at an all-you-can-eat restaurant, the cost was affordable for us.

 

I got into the kotatsu and warmed my stomach with the zoni. 

 

I want to be a NEET.

 

I prayed in earnest. I wanted to have enough money so that I didn’t have to work. I hated working. People said I shone the brightest when I was working, but I knew that was bulls**t. I didn’t care about what they thought, I hated working and I wanted to slack off as much as possible. YOLO!

 

“Bro, that’s my feet, move away or I’ll hit you.”

“Yo, sister, put that remote down please. Peace.”

 

That marked the beginning of the annual battle inside the kotatsu.

 

Since my legs were bigger than Ugin’s, it became a threat for her occupation of part of the kotatsu. Whenever I moved, I would bump into her. I had no malice toward her, but the same couldn’t be said for her as her hostility against me steadily grew by the seconds.

 

“Don’t stretch your legs.”

“Are you telling me to sit cross-legged?”

“Yes.”

“If I do that, my knees will be outside the kotatsu!”
“At least your feet will be inside.”

“But I want to put my whole legs in–”

“I’m going to hit you.”

“Peace! Peace! Put the remote down, please! By the way, on which body part will you hit me?”

“That thick skull of yours.”

“Can you say ‘thick’ one more time?”

“Shut up or I’m going to hit you for real. Just stop moving around for a while, okay?”

 

And so an agreement to a ceasefire was formed and I could continue eating my zoni. This was the only time of the year that I could enjoy a good zoni. I didn’t have the time to deal with my angry sister. (T/N: Zoni is a mochi soup. It’s a tradition to eat in the New Years in Japanese.)

 

“You don’t have any plans to go out with your friends?”

“No. Everyone’s busy studying for the entrance exam.”

“Ah, right… It’s such a pity though. I mean, it’s the last year of middle school and you can’t even hang out peacefully… Well, I guess you can do it after the entrance exam is over.”

“Mhm. Also, it’s quite a pain hanging out during this time. You have to watch out what you say to them. Who knows if you would put more pressure on them by mistake. That’s why not hanging out is a better option.”

 

She threw a tangerine peel toward my face. Oh, was she trying to play with me?

 

I quickly placed a hand in front of my face to guard her throw.

 

“…Well, everything will be over soon, no?”

 

I threw it back but she quickly grabbed a tray and used it as a shield.

 

“Yeah… Well, enough about me, aren’t you breaking out soon, Bro?”

“What breaking out? I’m not a prisoner.”

“Sure~ So, are you finally going outside or not?”

“Yes, I am.”

“I see. You’ll go on a date with Arina-san, right? Will you put on some makeup?”

“I’m not going on a date with her and no, if I put on some makeup, she’ll b***h about it.”

“Guess so, huh?~ Fine, let’s just photoshop your face instead of using makeup.”

“That won’t work in real life, dummy!”

 

I finished my zoni quickly and went to the kitchen to wash the dishes. I did it partly to escape Ugin’s teasing. I couldn’t win against her, so the best course of action would be to escape.

 

After that, I went back to my room and checked on my phone. Makoto texted me.

 

[Tomorrow, let’s go together.]

 

I told him to go with Ruka instead. What was wrong with this guy? He had a girlfriend, he should go with her instead of me.

 

I remembered my little chat with Tsuru. She told him to go to the love hotel back then, I wondered if he really went there?… Wait, it was possible… He was dumb enough to actually do it and Ruka wouldn’t try to reject him even if she wanted to. Ah, I got the urge to kill him now…

 

[She’s going with her friends.]

 

I see, so I was his backup plan.

 

Well whatever, that wasn’t important, I need to know the answer to my question.

 

[Did you spend Christmas with her?], I sent him that message.

 

Around ten seconds later, he replied back.

 

[Yeah! The date was a huge success, thanks to Tsuru!]

 

Huge success? What the hell, that wasn’t the answer I was looking for. I mean, good for him, but I wanted to know about the love hotel thing.

 

[Huge success biologically?], I replied.

 

A while later, another reply came.

 

[Maybe?]

 

Ah, I guess time to bring up the sekihan. (T/N: Sekihan is the kind of rice the Japanese eat on huge celebrations. It’s glutinous rice cooked with Azuki beans/sweet red beans.)

 

I replied him with a ‘woah’ and stopped paying attention to him.

 

Then, I sent Tsuru a text.

 

[It seems like Makoto went there for real.]

 

Same like with Makoto, I got a reply almost immediately. Was this the real Tsuru or a bot? Were high school girls nowadays living in a different plane of existence than the rest of humanity? They could read and respond to texts with but a single thought?

 

[Good for him♡]

 

What’s with that childish response? The Tsuru I knew was the greatest, the smartest, the most high-spec high school girl I had ever seen. Where did that Tsuru-san go?!

 

[I hope that Ruka is okay], I replied.

[Huh? Why wouldn’t she?], she replied.

[I mean, they went to the love hotel, no?], I replied.

[Woah, you’re the worst. I’m going to tell Arina.], she replied.

[Wait, you were the one who suggested it!], I replied.

[Dummy, of course I wouldn’t tell him that, I just told him a good place to buy some gifts. You’re the worst the worst the worst the worst the worst the worst the worst the worst the worst the worst], she replied.

 

I quietly placed my phone on my desk.

 

“Sigh…”

 

My phone was still vibrating, but I decided to ignore it for now. She was probably still spamming ‘the worst’ to annoy me.

 

Well, I was a dummy indeed. I shoulda thought more about it, no way that she would say something like that to Makoto, it was an obvious joke.

 

That was embarrassing…

 

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!”

 

I screamed. To wash away the pain.

 

I screamed. To forget about my shameful conduct.

 

I screamed. Like the French during the French Revolution.

 

Oh, ça ira. (T/N: It’s the French revolution song if it isn’t obvious already)

 

I screamed. Everything will be fine.

 

“Shut up!”

 

Ugin opened the door without knocking and hit me in the face with a tangerine. If it had been a tomato, I would look like a bloody mess, but I could lick them all away blissfully, but alas, I could only wish for that miracle to happen.

 

“AAAAAAAHHHH!!!”

 

I screamed as hard as I could.

 

Then suddenly, Ugin opened my closet and began to remove the clothes from the hanger.

 

The bottom of the closet quickly became a mess after she did that. After she was done, she approached my bookshelf and pulled every one of my books out of the shelf and dropped them all to the floor.

 

Oh no, she was actually pissed off this time, look at that expressionless face. The last time she turned like this was back when I entered her room without her permission and she turned all her furniture upside down in retaliation.

 

I got down on my knees to beg for her forgiveness, but it didn’t seem to move her. Instead, she pulled out even more books and she was about to remove the lamp.

 

“I’ll buy you something! Please forgive me!”

 

After hearing those words, she snapped her fingers.

 

“Yay! Please do~”

 

Sakaki Ugin, a middle school student in her third year, left the room with a smile on her face while humming a cheerful tune.

 

Behind her wake was a mess of clothes and books.

 

I was glad that she didn’t resort to violence but this was simply nasty, dear sister.

 

Let’s clean up this mess…

 

I decided to spend the rest of the day quietly.