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It's been quite an eventful last several months, hasn't it?
Being able to attend high school has opened doors to experiences that I could only dream of before that first day of class in September.
It's difficult to put into words the joy I felt when I first laid eyes upon that school uniform. Furthermore, one that could be opened from behind, to accommodate my wind-up key! The professor can be very forward thinking at times, and I am eternally grateful to her for accommodating my indulgent desire to live the life of a normal high school girl.
Had I not gone to this school, I would have been able to become friends with Naganohara-san, Minakami-san, and Aioi-san. Although I don't think any one of them would fit my preconceived notion of what a 'normal' girl entails. Oh dear, that means I have quite the unusual bunch of friends, don't I?
Ah, but that's not a bad thing. I think of them as 'unusual' in an endearing way. Perhaps there is no such thing as a 'normal' high school girl, after all. Everyone is special in their own way. My friends all have traits that can only be described as uniquely theirs, and yet they seem to fit in with the class just as well as I myself. (And I'm a robot with a giant wind-up key protruding from my back, an existence one would expect to stick out like a sore thumb.)
For instance.
Naganohara-san harbours a love so intense that she once jumped through a school window. (I'm cheering for you, Naganohara-san! Although, please pay more heed to your own safety!...)
Unlike her, I have not experienced such a strong love of my own, so I can only imagine what must have been going through her mind at the time. I did once receive an anonymous letter from someone with the initials K.N., although when I went behind the gymnasium as the letter instructed, I fell into a pitfall trap, so perhaps the letter was nothing more than a prank.
As for Minakami-san, she seemed cold and distant at first. For a while, I feared that she was collecting evidence of my robot nature to use against me. If I had been revealed in front of my class, I don't know what I would have done. But she didn't do as I had feared. When she came over to play with the professor, I saw a side to her that put my worries at ease. Deep down, I feel that she must be a truly loving and caring girl. She gifted a shark drawing to the professor, who still treasures it deeply.
Minakami-san once showed up to class wearing two pairs of glasses and contact lenses. There was another time when she walked around with a bird feed dispenser attached underneath one of her shoes. I can now see that she simply has a very esoteric sense of humour.
As for Aioi-san, she's a warm and empathetic person who makes me feel comfortable in her presence. She and the professor became natural friends, and the words she spoke to me that day have stuck with me. "Nano-chan is Nano-chan." She may not have the highest grades in school, but I can tell that she thinks very deeply about things. Although she seems simple-minded most of the time, sometimes, she tells people exactly what they need to hear.
I did not truly understand the depth to those simple words until my second birthday, when the professor was about to remove my wind-up key, per my request. After having asked her to remove it for so long, the sense of loss and nostalgia surprised me. This metal item attached to my back held memories good and bad, of new friendships and experiences, of bonds and trust. This metal accessory of mine was a key part of who I was, and it took me until my second birthday to realize it.
I wanted to keep it, after all.
Aioi-san must have an inkling of my true nature, at the very least. I suspect so. On the day that she first visited our home, I thought it was a miracle that I wasn't found out, after so many close calls. Looking back upon that day, calling it a miracle might be too insult to her intelligence. Rather than having not noticing the obvious cues, I think she did indeed notice them, but instead purposefully opted to ignore them. This is what I truly think.
"I know you're a robot, but it doesn't make a difference to me—Nano-chan is Nano-chan..." is what I think she was saying on that day. But perhaps she kept that first part unvocalized to respect my decision to keep it a secret.
It's remarkable how friends seem to just know things without being told.
I don't think I've ever mentioned my birthday to Aioi-san, Naganohara-san, and Minakami-san. Yet despite that, they all somehow knew to come over today.
I had been only planning a small, private celebration with Sakamoto-san and the Professor, so I was really surprised when they told me that they would visit. Aioi-san even went to the trouble of bringing a cake.
In the Professor's eagerness, she accidentally knocked over the cake that Aioi-san had brought. Although we happened to have another cake in the fridge, the Professor tripped in her rush to bring it out to the others, and she ended up dropping this one, too. The cake ended up all over Aioi-san's shirt. (I'm so sorry, Aioi-san!)
Minakami-san salvaged which clean parts she could, and then distributed the most peculiarly shaped cake slices amongst ourselves. No two looked alike, and they were so lumpy and irregularly shaped that they hardly looked appetizing. Regardless, they tasted amazing.
I suppose food does taste better when shared with friends.
I'm truly grateful to have been able to meet them. It for this reason that I am truly grateful to the Professor for indulging in my wish to attend high school.
The classrooms, the hallways, the yard, the teachers, the students at Tokisadame High…
Well, to be frank, I expected to go to a normal school, be part of a normal class, make normal friends, and share normal conversations about normal everyday life. But come to think of it, I don't think any one of my new friends would really meet my preconceived notions of a 'normal'.
Perhaps there is no such thing as 'normal', after all. It seems that reality has a tendency of ending up being more unusual than I could have imagined.
Ah, and so it turned out that the Professor hadn't been intending to remove the large accessory on my back, after all. The "small one" that she had been speaking of was just an addition that went underneath my existing wind-up key. So, it was something like that.
Given the Professor's track record, I suppose I should have seen this coming, but I was too relieved for it to really matter either way.
"The small one spins when you're happy," explained the Professor.
"What kind of key is that!?" I sighed.
(Perhaps one day, I would tell them the truth.)
The mess had been cleaned up, and Minakami-san was lighting the candles.
"Hm? Nano-chan, why are there only two candles?" asked Aioi-san.
"Uh..." I stammered.
"Nano was made two years ago!" explained the Professor.
"No way! Then does that make Nano-chan some sort of robot? Just kidding!" Aioi-san laughed.
"Don't be rude, Yukko," said Naganohara-san, tugging on Aioi-san's shoulder.
"Actually..." I looked away. "Er... About that..."
"Hm?" Naganohara-san turned to look at me.
"..." It was too nerve-wracking, after all. The idea of admitting the truth to them briefly passed through my mind, but I couldn't go through with it right now. "Never mind," I murmured.
"Cake," said Minakami-san.
"Cake!" shouted the Professor.
I let out a deep breath and tried to calm myself. Everyone had returned their attention to the cake, which took the pressure off of me. It looked it was going to take a while for me to muster my courage to broach the topic, after all.
After we finished the cake, Aioi-san suggested that we play a card game. "It's called Egyptian Ratscrew," she explained.
"What kind of name is that!?" I exclaimed.
"Well it's a real game!" said Aioi-san. "Anyway, the fastest way to learn how to play is to just play, so let's have a rehearsal round."
We sat in a circle, and Aioi-san dealt out the cards on the carpet in the middle. I hadn't seen anything quite like this game before. The rules seemed straightforward enough once she explained it. The Professor seemed to catch on quickly as well. It was a game that prioritized reflexes and speed over all else.
Aioi dealt out the cards, with each of us ending up with a fair share of cards from the full deck.
One oddity about the game was that we weren't allowed to look at our cards! We had to keep our cards face-down and then take turns drawing one of our cards to place in a central main pile.
"One." Aioi-san set down a 4 of spades.
"Two." Minakami-san set down a 7 of hearts.
"Three." Naganohara-san set down a king of spades.
"Four." I set down a 9 of diamonds.
"Five." The Professor set down an 8 of clubs.
"Six." Aioi-san set down an 8 of hearts.
Whap!
With a swiftness that surprised me, Aioi-san's right hand blurred forward and slapped the pile. "Now, I slapped the pile because that was a double." She carefully moved the top card aside to reveal the 8 of clubs just underneath it. "So now I get all of the cards in this pile."
"The goal of this game is to win all of the cards," Naganohara-san reminded us.
"I see, I see," nodded the Professor.
"There are other patterns, too, but we'll see them as we come across them."
We continued counting. Once we reached thirteen, Aioi-san explained that we had to start counting from one again. Then, when it was my turn again, I took yet another card from my pile and set it in the middle. "Six," I said.
Whap!
Minakami-san's hand was on top of the pile.
"Mai-chan?..." Aioi-san seemed confused for a moment, but then she smiled. "Ah, good call! Look, Nano-chan." She moved Minakami-san's hand aside, and pointed at the 6 of hearts that I had just set onto the central pile. "See, the card number is the same as the number that you just said, so that makes this slappable."
Oh, so that was why we were counting! I nodded.
The rehearsal round went on, and Aioi-san continued to show the Professor and me the other patterns that would give us a chance to take the cards in the pile.
"Sandwich," explained Aioi-san. "For example, here, it went 4-2-4. The card number on the top and bottom are the same, so that makes it a sandwich. But the sandwich can't go deeper than one layer, so the sandwich always has to be three cards, okay?"
The Professor nodded enthusiastically.
Naganohara-san was the one to demonstrate the one remaining unseen pattern.
"Ah, good job, Mio-chan!" Aioi-san held up the cards 10-8-9. "This here is a consecutive, because the three numbers here make a three-in-a-row. It's always three cards, but they don't have to show up in order, so be sure to pay attention." She turned to Naganohara-san. "Is that it?"
"I think that's it," said Naganohara-san. "I don't remember any other patterns."
"Okay then, let's start for real!"
For the first several rounds, it would always be Minakami-san or Aioi-san who ended up winning. How could they react so quickly? I barely had time to make out which card was put down, let alone recognize any patterns, and by this time, a hand or two would have already slapped the cards in the middle.
"You're all so fast at this," I said, smiling.
"I used to play this all the time in elementary school," explained Aioi-san, dealing out the cards for another round. "So that's just the experience showing."
Even though I wasn't getting any hits in, I still found myself enjoying watching them play.
"Ah, Mio-chan! That's not a sandwich!"
"Geh! I was mistaken!" She said. As penalty for slapping incorrectly, Naganohara-san took two of her own cards and added them to the bottom of the pile in the middle.
In some rounds, the timing was like a photo finish.
Aioi-san added a card to the central pile. "Fou—" Her hand hit the pile and Minakami-san's hand hit Aioi-san's hand just a moment later. "Ha! I was first!" grinned Aioi-san. She gathered up the cards, laughing. "All mine!"
Sometimes, there would be a curious pause before a hit.
"Eleven," said Aioi-san, setting down a five of clubs. Her eyebrows furrowed, and then she hesitantly moved the cards on the top of the pile to get a better look at the cards underneath.
Then, she slapped the pile.
"It was a consecutive after all!" she shouted, sounding relieved.
"We can forget which cards were put down, so this sort of thing happens," laughed Naganohara-san. "We get penalized if we slap incorrectly, so..."
In the fourth round, the Professor started getting hits in.
"Sev—"
"Whoa!"
On the top was Naganohara-san's hand. Below hers was Minakami-san's hand, and on the very bottom was the Professor's hand. They checked the cards and confirmed the pattern. It was a sandwich.
"Yes!" cheered the Professor.
I smiled. She really was a fast learner.
This round continued for much longer than the previous ones. After Naganohara-san and I were eliminated from the round, it came down to Aioi-san, Minakami-san, and the Professor.
The intense round went on for quite a while.
Then, Naganohara-san slapped the pile before anyone else could, and she was back in the game. "Even if you don't have any cards left, you can still slap back in," she explained. "I'm not giving up just yet!"
After many tense, high-paced exchanges, the round ended in Minakami-san's victory.
"Again!" shouted the Professor.
"Rematch!" said Aioi-san.
This time, it was Minakami-san's turn to deal out the cards.
Among all of us, I was probably the most surprised when I made a successful hit for the first time. It was for a 6 of diamonds that Naganohara-san had set down while saying the number six.
"I... I did it!" I stared in disbelief.
"I can't believe I missed that!" Mio gave me a smile. "Good job, Nano-chan!"
Maybe... even someone slow-paced like me could do well in this game.
At first, the game had seemed rather discouraging. It was as if I was just a spectator, unable to do anything while the others dominated. But even though Naganohara-san was this fast now, I learned that she had played this game for the first time only a few weeks ago. Perhaps this just goes to show how even the most talented individuals start out as a beginner.
After a handful of rounds, the Professor was fast enough to give my classmates a good challenge, despite being half their age. As for me, even though I wouldn't call myself fast at all with numbers, I started finding that I could keep up.
"That's not a four!" laughed Aioi-san, adding her penalty cards. "Oops!"
The cards continued piling on.
"No one saw that?" Naganohara-san laughed. "It was a consecutive, but now it's too late!" Even if there had been a valid pattern, it became no longer available for slapping once another card was placed on top. We ended up missing rather many patterns because we were layering on the cards too quickly.
I felt a little jump in my heart every time a hand landed on top of mine. Ah, come to think of out, this game has a lot of physical contact, doesn't it? Though at the time, I was too focused on spotting the patterns before anyone else did, so it would seem much more embarrassing in hindsight...
"Whoosh!" shouted Aioi-san, laughing and patting Minakami-san on the shoulder. "When I put the card down, your hand was going right for it because you thought it was a double, but then you saw that it wasn't, and then your hand went whoosh! Right up like an airplane!"
Minakami-san held out her hand. "Whoosh," she said.
"Whoosh!" Aioi-san laughed again.
Such a simple game was more captivating than I could have imagined. There was even a round where it came down to just Minakami-san and me, competing one-on-one. I lost, of course, but it was exhilarating, that feeling of being so close.
I didn't want to stop playing.
The game was so engrossing that we might have allowed ourselves to get a little too carried away. It wasn't until I heard the growl of the Professor's stomach that I glanced up at the clock and gasped. "It's already eight!" Where did the time go? I started to panic. "This is bad, I haven't started making dinner at all!"
"Oh crap, it's a school night," said Aioi-san.
"Crap," repeated the Professor.
"Yukko!" hissed Naganohara-san.
"I'm sorry," I said, leaping to my feet and grabbing my apron. "I need to start cooking right away!"
"Ehh?" Aioi-san tilted her head. "But you're the birthday girl! You shouldn't have to cook!"
"It's our fault, too, for losing track of time," said Naganohara-san, getting to her feet. "Let us make something. You just sit and relax."
"Yeah," said Aioi-san, pumping her fist into the air. "I know how to cook a mean twice-cooked pork, so let us at it!"
"I... I... couldn't," I stammered. "You're all guests, so that would be..."
"I'm hungry!" whined the Professor.
Minakami-san raised a hand as if voting on a legislative council. "Hungry," she said.
"Let's get pizza," said the Professor.
"Pizza," said Minakami-san.
"Pizza!" said Aioi-san, with a huge smile on her face.
"Pizza, as a birthday dinner?" Naganohara-san wore a skeptical smile.
Come to think of it, where was Sakamoto-san? Surely, he would have noticed that it was past dinnertime? I still needed to prepare his meal. If dinner were to be delayed long enough, the Professor would fall asleep before it was ready, and that would be no good. "Umm, sure." It couldn't be helped. At least pizza was fast.
"All right!" Aioi-san clapped her hands together. "I hear Daiku Pizza takes orders online now. They even show you the progress of the pizza and everything, so you know when it'll arrive! Do you have a computer around here?"
"Erm, not exactly..."
The Professor leapt to her feet and ran to the kitchen. "Ah! Nano! The next train will be passing in three minutes!"
"But Professor!" I called. "I think that the train would pass too quickly for us to make a complete order!"
"Train?" Naganohara-san blinked. "What do you mean, Nano-chan?"
"Um..." I rubbed the back of my head sheepishly. "We don't really have internet installed here."
"That's okay," grinned Aioi-san. "I have their phone number memorized, so we can just call them! Okay!" She leapt to her feet and went over to the phone. "Um."
"Aioi-san?" I asked.
She stared blankly at our phone on our table, a bewildered look on her face. It was a rather old model, after all.
"Ah, Aioi-san, that's a rotary phone," I said. "They're not very common these days, but we still have one."
"Right, right," she nodded. She picked up the receiver, paused for a moment, and then pressed the '4' on the phone.
I fidgeted as she stood there and nothing happened.
"Yukko, you need to dial it," said Naganohara-san.
"I know that!" said Aioi-san.
"W...We should decide on the order before we call," I said.
Fortunately, Aioi-san happened to have a pamphlet in her bag detailing the prices and choices of pizza that Daiku Pizza provided.
"Oh." Naganohara-san suddenly stood up. "Ahh... actually, I already spent most of my money on that cake."
"Mai-chan and I forgot our wallets at home," said Aioi-san, smiling sheepishly.
"Pizza!" said the Professor.
I smiled tiredly. "It's fine. I'll pay for it."
"Sorry, Nano-chan!" said Aioi-san, clapping her hands together. "We'll pay you back!"
I shook my head. "No, it's the least I can do, as thanks for bringing that cake over. Even if it was dropped, it still tasted good."
"Ah hahhh..." Aioi-san and the Professor both smiled sheepishly.
"Are we getting drinks?" asked the Professor, leaning forwards to take a closer look at the pizza pamphlet.
I shook my head. "We already have drinks at home. Besides, the juice and tea we have here are much healthier than the sugary soda drinks that they have."
The Professor pouted. "But they taste good!"
I stood my ground. It was best to avoid spending any unnecessary money. We conferred and finally decided on our order. I wrote it down on a piece of paper so that I could be sure to get it right.
I read it over to make sure that we all agreed. "That's one medium pizza, half pepperoni, half Hawaiian, and another medium pizza, half extra cheese, half mushrooms and green peppers?" After receiving nods all around, I dialled the number that Aioi-san provided and gave our order to the nice man on the other end.
"And will that be pick-up or delivery?" asked the man on the phone.
"Um..." I smiled sheepishly. "What's the difference?"
"With pick-up, you come here to pick it up after it's ready. With delivery, we send someone over to your place to deliver the pizza. Then there'll be an extra 250 yen delivery fee."
I winced. If I could just go there myself to pick it up then there was no need to pay for a delivery, especially if the pizza place was within walking distance. "Then, may we have pick-up, please?"
"Okay. Your pizza will be ready in about twenty minutes. Thank you for choosing Daiku Pizza."
I inclined my head. "Thank you," I murmured. With that, I hung up the phone.
"Wait, we're not getting delivery?" asked Aioi-san.
"The place is within walking distance, so there's really no need," I said.
"But it's already this late," said Naganohara-san. "Going out at this hour..."
Perhaps she was worried that I might be robbed? Ah, that's true, a lone high school girl would be a prime target in dark and secluded places at night. But this was a rather safe neighbourhood, and the directions on the pamphlet showed that the pizza store was on a major street, so there shouldn't be anything to worry about. Regardless, I was secretly a robot. If, heaven forbid, anything were to actually happen, the assailants would have more to worry about than I would.
"I'd better leave right away if I'm to arrive by the time it's ready," I said, pulling out my jacket from the closet. At this time of the year, it got rather chilly at night.
"Nano-chan, you're going?" asked Aioi-san, getting up as well. "It's your birthday, so you shouldn't have to go do something so tedious! Let me go, instead. I've been there before anyway, so I know how to get there."
"I wanna go, too!" said the Professor, jumping to her feet.
"No!" shouted Naganohara-san. Everyone stared at her. Her sudden outburst brought about a rather awkward silence in the room. She blushed. "I mean... That is, you remember what happened to the cake, don't you?"
Aioi-san and the Professor both looked very sheepish.
"Don't worry, I'll go pick it up," said Naganohara-san. "With tax, it'll be 1952 yen, right? Just give the money to me, and I'll take care of it."
"Ehh. Mio-chan, are you sure you want to do that?" Aioi-san asked in a lilting voice, tilting her head. "You remember what happened to my wallet, right?"
Naganohara-san flushed bright red. "That was a one-time thing! It won't happen again!"
"I should go instead," said Aioi-san, "since I already know the way."
"If Yuuko's going, then I wanna go, too!" said the Professor.
"I could go as well..." offered Naganohara-san.
What should I do? It was very kind of them to offer to help, but I would rather that I went myself. I didn't want the Professor out and about in the streets this late at night. I just needed to go and bring the pizza back here as quickly as possible.
"It's fine," I said, smiling. "I will go. I appreciate the offer, but I wouldn't want to trouble you. You've already done so much for my birthday, and I wanted to thank you. Ah, while I'm gone, maybe you could go and see where Sakamoto-san has gone off to?"
Naganohara-san blinked. "Sakamoto-san?" she asked.
"Our cat," explained the Professor. "He can be real snooty sometimes 'cause he's older than all of us, but he's still a cool cat."
"Erm!..." I said, waving my hands frantically. How could a cat be older than a high school girl? This must be what they were thinking. "What she means is—"
"Ah, so Sakamoto-san's crawled off somewhere and is missing?" Aioi-san gave me a thumbs up and winked. "No problem, detective Yukko is on the case! Isn't that right, Hakase?"
"It's Sakamoto search time!" shouted the Professor.
"Thank you," I said in gratitude. I bowed and then began walking towards the front door. "I'll return with the pizza, so just hang in there a little longer!"
"Wait, Nano-chan, you shouldn't go alone, this late at night," said Naganohara-san. In the meantime, Aioi-san and the Professor had already jumped to their feet and the Professor was pulling out a giant magnifying glass out of the cupboard. "I... I'll come too," said Naganohara-san.
"She thinks that you might get mugged," said Aioi-san, scanning the blankets in the closet.
"Yukko!" Naganohara-san blushed slightly. "You didn't have be so blunt about it..."
At this moment, Minakami-san brushed past me, her bag in hand, and stepped into her outdoors shoes. "I'll come," she said.
"Ah." Aioi-san blinked. "If Mai-chan's going, then Nano-chan has nothing to worry about."
Naganohara-san nodded hesitantly. "That's true."
"A...are you really okay with this?" I asked Minakami-san.
"Pizza," responded the taciturn girl.
Well, if this gave them a peace of mind, then I couldn't really argue. I smiled sheepishly as I sat down on the front step and began putting on my shoes. "Sorry about this," I said.
Minakami-san just nodded.
I slid open the front door and the chilly late evening air greeted us.
"Have fun!" shouted Aioi-san, waving from inside the living room.
"We'll be back soon," I said, stepping out into the street, with Minakami-san at my side.
We had barely taken a couple of steps when I stopped abruptly. Wait. Had I just asked them to find Sakamoto-san? I did, didn't I? What if they discovered that he could talk? Then my ordinary high school life would be...
I clutched my forehead.
It... It didn't really matter, did it?
Minakami-san glanced at me.
I stood up straight and took a deep breath. If they discovered that we had a talking cat, then perhaps that realization might make it less shocking if I were to additionally reveal that I was a robot.
"S...sorry about that," I said to Minakami-san. "Shall we be off?" And so off we went.
I had taken the time to memorize the map on the pamphlet, so we found our way to the pizza store without any difficulty.
Our pizzas were already done by the time we arrived. I gave the man at the counter my name and he brought over our two pizza boxes. After I paid him, I tucked the receipt and the change in my pocket, picked up both boxes, and prepared to walk out of the pizza store.
That was when a deafening thunder rattled the sky just outside the store.
I froze in horror as rain began pouring down outside, soaking the sidewalk and the pavement outside in a matter of seconds.
Minakami-san blinked and then touched her hand against the window. "Ah," she said. "It started raining."
"E...ehhh?" Water was streaking down the window pane at such a rate that it looked as if someone had tipped over an entire bathtub of water from atop the store. Oh no! How would we get the pizza home at this rate? I looked down at the pizza boxes, still warm in my arms. "What should we do?"
We absolutely couldn't allow the pizza to get wet. I could already imagine the distraught expressions on their faces, reluctantly picking at their cold, rain-soaked pizza slices. But who knew how long it would take for this to rain out? The pizza would get cold in the meantime. Not to mention, we would be keeping the others waiting...
"Um," I said, turning to the man at the counter. "Would you happen to have a plastic bag of some sort, to cover the boxes?"
He shook his head.
I bit my lip. What should we do?
Whump. To my right, Minakami-san was opening a bright blue umbrella that she had pulled out from her bag. "I have one," she said.
"Minakami-san!" I was so incredibly grateful that she had chosen to accompany me. Who knows what I would have done if she hadn't been there?
She held the umbrella close over our heads as we carefully pushed the door open. When we stepped outside, the rain came down on our umbrella so hard that it sounded as if there were a band of heavy metal drummers above our heads.
I blinked rapidly as my eyes adjusted from the brightness of the store to the darkness of the outside street. Minakami-san was holding the umbrella so low that I could barely see more than a couple of paces ahead of myself. But if she held it any higher, the rain would get in. Despite the protection of our umbrella, my shoes were already rather soaked from the splashing near our feet.
"U...um," I said, glancing at Minakami-san.
"This way," she said, turning to our right.
We began trudging forwards along the sidewalk, slowly and carefully.
"Th...this is really slow, isn't it," I said, smiling nervously.
"It's safer to be careful," she said.
That made sense, I suppose.
Ahead of us, the bright headlights of a car came into sight. I gave a little eek! as it zoomed past to my left, sending up a spray of water droplets onto the sidewalk. Fortunately, the puddle was a bit ahead of us. If we had been only a few steps forward when the car drove by, the both of us would have taken that splash head-on!
Minakami-san blinked and then switched sides with me, taking the side closer to the road.
"Oh... Thank you."
She looked at me, and then glanced away. "It's to protect the pizza," she said.
I nodded. Of course, that made sense.
With that, we pushed onwards, trying our best to stay as far away from the road as the sidewalk would allow. Minakami-san was trying valiantly to shield the pizza from the rain, but it seemed that the water was getting through anyway. The box on the top was already looking noticeably soggy from stray droplets here and there.
"S...sorry about this, Minakami-san," I said, not looking at her directly.
"It's fine," she said.
We carefully walked our way around a large puddle. When we arrived at the traffic light, we looked both ways twice as an extra precaution, even though our light was green, and then made our way across the street as cautiously as possible.
"Don't drop it," she said.
"I've got it," I said.
The thunder split the air once more.
I froze. "Y...you don't think there's lightning, is there?"
She turned to me. "If there's thunder, then there's already lightning."
"Ah... I see." How foolish would it be to go walking about in the streets when there was thunder and lightning? Especially given that we were holding up an umbrella that would be a perfect lightning rod? Maybe this wasn't the smartest idea...
No, we already made it this far! J-just a little bit further!
Minakami-san glanced to the side. Ah, we needed to turn here. Okay.
I glanced down at the pizza boxes. "You don't suppose the others would enjoy rain-flavoured pizza?" I asked, forcing a smile.
She looked down at them as well. "It's okay. The lid will protect the inside."
"But the rain will leak in if it's already this soaked..."
"It'll be fine."
We walked onwards in silence for a while, focusing on carefully placing one foot after the other
"Formality," she said, breaking the silence.
"Minakami-san?" I glanced up at her. "What do you mean?"
The girl paused for a moment, and glanced meaningfully at me for a brief moment before returning her attention to the road. "…If you called me by my first name, I wouldn't mind."
I grimaced. Was she talking about… First name basis? "I… Is it really okay? Ah, but then what about Aioi-san and Naganohara-san? I haven't asked them, and I need to ask them, too, otherwise it would be unfair…"
Come to think of it, the only two people I was really on a first-name basis with were the Professor and Sakamoto-san.
"I'm sure they wouldn't mind. They already call you 'Nano-chan'."
I bit my lip. That's true, isn't it? In all rationality, I knew that they should have no qualms with a first-name basis. But being so forward... I simply wasn't that brave.
"It's unbalanced like this," said Minakami-san.
I frantically glanced down at the pizza. Unbalanced? No, the boxes were still firmly in my arms. I looked up at Minakami-san, who was giving me a certain look. Oh. She was talking about her… our friends.
This was just irrational fear. If I asked to call her...Mai-san. (I felt my face heat up rapidly with embarrassment), I was sure that they would be okay with it. I really had no reason to hesitate, and every reason to ask. Ahhh, why was I hesitating?
"Don't drop it," Minakami-san reminded me.
"R…right!" That was close! Lost in my thoughts, I had almost forgotten about the precious pizza in my arms. "Umm…" I smiled at Minakami-san. "Thanks! I mean, you're right. I really should start, you know…" I looked away, blushing. "…Mio-san… Yuuko-san."
"Ah." Minakami-san reached out with her free hand and grabbed the far end of the pizza boxes to stabilize them.
"S...sorry!" I stopped and quickly moved my hands to get a better grip on the boxes. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have allowed my attention to lapse."
She nodded.
There was a sudden gust of wind and she grimaced, struggling to keep the umbrella in place.
"Eek!" I said.
Minakami-san moved around me so that she could point the umbrella against the wind, a grim look on her face. Oh, that's a good strategy to keep the umbrella stable. I tried my best to not get in her way. We absolutely could not afford to let the wind flip the umbrella inside-out, lest the pizza boxes get soaked.
After a few seconds, the gust died down, and Minakami-san managed to get the umbrella under control again. She had managed to keep the umbrella over us for the most part during those few seconds, so the pizza boxes didn't get considerably more wet than they were already. I let out the breath that I'd been holding.
"Not the best umbrella weather, wouldn't you say?" I smiled nervously.
She moved back to my left and we pushed onwards.
"Ah, we need to cross here," I said, glancing to our left. Here was where we exited the main street to access the smaller, more residential streets.
She nodded as we approached the pedestrian crossing.
"S-Sorry, Minakami-san," I stammered, feeling awfully flustered. "Regarding the names… Just give me a bit more time to mentally to prepare myself. After I ask the others if they'd really be okay with it."
Minakami-san nodded.
We walked on in the rain for a while longer. Finally, the streets started looking more familiar. Slowly but surely, we were making our way back home, pizza still fairly protected for the most part.
And then, when we were perhaps only a couple of minutes or so away from home, Naganohara-san suddenly appeared before us, a spare umbrella in hand. It surprised me, because we were holding this umbrella so low that I didn't see her coming until she was practically right in front of us!
"Nano-chan, Mai-chan?" asked the blue-haired girl. "Ah, it is you! Thank goodness, I wasn't sure if you had an umbrella or not!"
Minakami-san nodded. "Provide additional shielding," she instructed the blue-haired girl.
The girl nodded, understanding. She turned and held the umbrella protectively to our side. "This freak rain came out of nowhere!" Naganohara-san said conversationally. "Like, what the heck?"
"Indeed," I said, still focusing my attention on the pizza boxes in my hands. "I normally check the weather forecast, but I must have missed it this morning."
"Good thing Mai-chan is so cautious, right?"
"You can say that for sure!" I said, smiling.
We managed to make it the rest of the way back to the lab without incident.
Minakami-san held open the door as I carefully stepped in. "Don't slip," she said, glancing at the floor, which was already starting to get considerably wet from the water dripping off of us.
"Geez!" exclaimed Naganohara-san. "I was out in that rain for only a few minutes and my shoes are already squishy wet."
"Everyone?" I called into the household. "We're back with the pizza! It might be a bit soggy, but…"
The Professor slid into the hallway, grinning cheerfully. "Pizza!"
Closely following the Professor was Aioi-san, also grinning cheerfully. "Pizza!"
"Don't tackle her this time!" warned Naganohara-san, clearly still remembering the incident with the cake.
"Did you find Sakamoto-san—" I did a double-take. "Aioi-san, why are you soaking wet?"
Indeed, the girl was soaked from head to toe, and was dripping water all over the floor! What on Earth happened?
"Er," she said, smiling cheerfully. "It turns out Sakamoto was stuck on the roof! So I found a ladder to get him off, but it looks like I wasn't fast enough to get ahead of the rain, ehe…"
"Oh no, I'm so sorry!" I said, carefully stepping out of my shoes and into my slippers, pizza boxes still in my hands. My socks were all wet. An unpleasant feeling. "You can borrow some of my clothes, but we need to get you changed out of those clothes. You're going to catch a cold!"
"No, no," said Aioi-san. "Don't worry about me. I'm invincible to colds. Experimentally proven."
Nonsense. No one is invulnerable to sickness. "Actually hold on, let me put these down first…" In my slightly squishing slippers now, I carefully walked through the hallway, past the Professor, and into the living room.
Sakamoto-san was waiting patiently in the living room, eating away at his own dinner. Oh good, it looked like either the Professor or Aioi-san had the presence of mind to give him his food. He wasn't waiting too long.
His scarf looked quite wet. He must have been caught in the rain, too.
I dropped the pizza boxes on the table and hurried over to our cat. "Sakamoto-san! Are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere?"
Sakamoto-san paused for a moment, his eyes flickering up to me for a moment. Then, he rolled his eyes, grumbling "Fine" under his breath, and then returned his attention to his dinner.
That's… unusually.
Normally he would be more talkative than this.
Oh wait—I turned around frantically, suddenly remembering that my classmates were here in this room right behind me. I was so worried about Sakamoto-san that I completely forgot they were here!
This was such a messy situation. First the rain, then Minakami-san suddenly asking me to be less formal with her? And now Aioi-san got her clothes soaked while helping out Sakamoto-san?
I glanced at Sakamoto-san.
Hold on a minute.
Was he being taciturn for my sake, knowing that I didn't want to be outed as a weirdo who owns a talking cat to my classmates?
I closed my eyes. Somehow…
When you put it like that…
It seems kind of unfair to Sakamoto-san.
"Oh wow!" exclaimed Aioi-san as she lifted the box lid to one of the pizzas. "The lid's kinda wet, but the pizza inside is still dry! Nice!"
"The lid protected the inside, then," remarked Naganohara-san. "That's good."
I turned around, struggling to regather my composure. Right. I should think about all that later. First, dinner!
"All right!" I walked to the side closet where our clothes were stored. "Aioi-san, first we need to get you changed out of those wet clothes. Let me fetch you one of my spare outfits." I carefully handed Aioi-san a folded set of clothes. "You can borrow these! You should probably do a proper shower after you get back home. Or you could wash here, if you prefer, that's fine, too. But if it's still raining, you might get wet again, so perhaps it would be better to wash at home." I clapped my hands together. "And everyone, make sure you wash your hands first, and then we can eat!"
The girls stared at me.
Oh. Why were they staring at me like that?
Aioi-san smiled. "You're like a mom, Nano."
"Eh?" My face heated up.
"You just seem like you really have it together!" said Aioi-san, grinning. "You're just like, super responsible. Unlike me."
I took a moment to gather my thoughts. "Nonsense! You helped get Sakamoto-san down from the roof, didn't you?"
Aioi-san smiled abashedly. "Ehe."
A short while later, after Aioi-san had changed into some drier clothes, we started eating.
"It's tasty!" exclaimed the Professor. "Why don't we have pizza every day?"
"Fast food is fine once in a while, but it's not healthy to eat it often," I said. "This is just for a special occasion. And if you ate pizza every day, eventually you'd get sick of it."
"Awwww," pouted the Professor.
As we worked our way through the pizza slices, I took a moment to take a deep breath and just let everything sink in for a moment.
Well, this was certainly an unexpected birthday.
Here we were, at 9 in the evening, eating a late pizza dinner while in varying levels of soaked from the rain. In fact, I don't think I've ever had classmates at our home this late before. This was a new experience.
"The night is still young!" exclaimed Aioi-san, a half-eaten pizza slice in her hand. "Let's have a sleepover!"
"Huh!?" I exclaimed. Sleepovers? I'd only read about such things in novels and TV dramas. But… I had a sneaking suspicion that if Aioi-san stayed over, she and the Professor would stay up way past their bedtimes. "It's a school day tomorrow, though."
"I didn't bring a toothbrush," Naganohara-san added.
Minakami-san just looked around at the room, contemplative. "It sounds like the rain stopped," she pointed out.
"Ehhh?" Aioi-san frowned. "Y'all are all Debbie Downers."
"Some other day, perhaps?" I suggested.
"Sounds like a plan!" grinned Aioi-san.
"Yeah!" cheered the Professor.
The pizza boxes were almost empty now. We ordered a lot, so I honestly wasn't sure if we'd be able to finish it all. But it looks like high school girls have quite an appetite!
The clock ticked away.
The Professor's movements started getting more sluggish. She was clearly starting to get more sleepy.
"Welp…" said Aioi-san.
Minakami-san nodded.
"I guess we should be heading out soon," said Naganohara-san. "Since we still have school tomorrow and all that."
I nodded, getting up. "Let me show you out."
My classmates gathered their belongings and started making their way out. I followed them out, with the Professor, albeit a bit sleepy, not too far behind.
"Ugh, my shoes are still all squishy wet," muttered Aioi, making a face.
"Same," murmured Naganohara-san.
"Anyway, thanks again for the party!" Aioi-san said, waving at me. "It was fun."
"Um…" I closed my eyes. taking a breath. And then I opened my eyes. "No, thank you!" I should really do something for their birthdays too. I didn't even know when their birthdays are, I should ask about that. Ah, but they were leaving, so I should ask some other time.
They waved their goodbyes and started making their way out the door.
"Um!" I said.
The three girls turned around, halfway out the door.
"M-Mai-san, Yuuko-san, Mio-san, thank you for celebrating my birthday with us," I said.
Their faces brightened up.
"Group hug!" declared Yuuko, running forward with her arms outstretched.
"Ehhh!?" I exclaimed.
The Professor cheered, wrapping her arms around me from behind. "Group hug!"
Mio and Mai exchanged a glance before smiling wryly and stepping forward.
"It was fun," said Mio, patting my shoulder.
Mai wrapped her arms around Yuuko from behind and by extension, me as well.
Hugs.
Oh. I wasn't used to receiving hugs from classmates.
This was… an interesting experience.
I didn't dislike it.
Yuuko flashed a peace sign, winking. "See you again, Nano-chan! Hakase!"
And then, waving as they went, they were off.
All in all, among all of my past birthdays, this was by far my favourite birthday experience so far.
I'm truly grateful to have gotten the chance to meet such wonderful friends.