Work Text:
“I-I bought it...”
—God, please forgive me, sinner that I am.
How many nights has it been now since I last slept properly?
On the walk home after work, I had begun to feel the turning of the season in the air as it slowly gathered more and more humidity.
The faint haze blurring the streetlights. The sound of dripping rain from somewhere in the distance. The heavy, clinging atmosphere peculiar to the rainy season seemed to soak all the way down into my heart.
Maybe my body couldn't keep up. Maybe my heart had been left behind. More than likely, it was both.
Even when I climbed into bed, the only thing that floated up behind my eyelids was her face. Lately especially, I couldn't stop thinking about her.
Dream Journey.
My trainee.
Calm eyes. A slightly low voice. A way of speaking that was always polite, almost too refined, as if it belonged at a distance. She rarely broke when I joked with her, and yet every now and then she'd show me a soft smile so unexpected it felt like it stole my heart away.
I am her trainer.
In racing, we are partners. Ours is supposed to be a relationship built on trust. There shouldn't be room for vague emotions in that space—
and yet.
Why does a single thing she says or does unsettle me this badly? Her offhand glances, her casual words—they catch in my heart in the strangest way and refuse to leave me even after night falls.
It's not that I was afraid of her, exactly... and yet for some reason lately I couldn't stop thinking about her. I didn't even understand why I was this preoccupied, and still I found myself following her with my eyes.
But then one night, when I couldn't sleep and was idly playing with my phone, it happened.
On the recommendation feed of a video app I had opened without thinking, there was a clip labeled a “situation voice.” Or at least, I think that's what people call them. I'd never really had much contact with that sort of culture before, so I didn't know the finer distinctions.
“—Oh? You're still awake?”
The instant I pressed play, something burst inside my chest.
...It sounded like her.
Not exactly. The pitch was different. The tone too.
And yet the way she spoke, the way she chose her words, the warmth that lived in them—
hearing that voice whisper at my ear, I undeniably felt Journey in it.
From that day on, I drowned in that voice.
Every night I searched for new uploads, turned notifications on, and made listening before bed part of my routine.
At first I told myself it was because she sounded like Journey. But before long, I realized I had come to like her voice in itself.
The way she spaced her words. The breath mixed through them. The edges of her voice when she seemed to laugh softly. Whether it was acting or not stopped mattering. I was simply drawn in too deeply.
There were nights I cried listening to her read poetry aloud, and nights when her languid lower register whispered, “Shall we go to sleep together?” and I found myself clutching my pillow to my chest.
The time I spent listening to that voice had become my place of comfort.
Like soaking in hot water, it loosened my heart little by little. Each time that voice spoke to me through my earphones, the boundary between myself and the world blurred gently at the edges.
Before long I had learned the voice actress's name too. Her work history. Even her Uma-tter account.
A post that said only “I uploaded something new” was enough to make my heart jump.
I had always been careful not to step too far into someone else's space, and yet by now I had become a full-fledged “fan.”
And yet, strangely enough—the more I listened to her voice, the more the face I saw was Journey's.
The echo of Journey's own voice kept layering itself over that other woman's lines.
I understood rationally that it was only coincidence, that they merely sounded alike.
But I was helpless before it.
When she said, “You must be tired,” I would picture Journey after training, holding out a towel.
When she whispered, “Good night,” I would remember a previous trip for a race, when we'd been staying in neighboring rooms and Journey had said those exact words before returning to hers.
Strictly speaking, her voice and Journey's voice were not the same. I understood that logically. But somewhere deep in my heart, the images of those two had started to overlap. Maybe I had been drawn to Journey's voice all along. Maybe from the very beginning—
The instant I thought that, my mind slammed on the brakes.
No. I must not look at Journey that way.
She is my trainee. My precious student. My comrade in battle.
There cannot be sweetness there. There cannot be ambiguity.
And that was precisely why I kept telling myself I was only attracted to the voice actress.
She was a being unrelated to reality, a safe fantasy.
No one would be hurt if I poured my feelings into that.
...And still, there are nights when something deep in my chest creaks.
The faint breathing hidden in a recording, the way she chooses her words—they are all too much like Journey.
On nights like that, Journey's name rises in my chest.
I pretend not to notice.
But I am surely wavering, little by little.
I'm afraid of going on drowning in that voice. And yet I can't stop. In the voice of that girl, in the voice of someone who sounds like that girl, I am being saved again tonight.
Tonight too, I press play.
“...You've worked hard today. Have you been resting properly?”
Each time the sound begins to flow, my heart quietly fills.
And still I go on pretending not to notice.
Without even knowing whether that is indulgence or escape, I fall asleep again.
I wonder how much time passed after the lunchtime chime rang.
My smartphone, lying on the desk, gave a short little buzz. Thinking it was probably a message, I picked it up, only to find a very familiar notification on the screen.
“[New Release] For the ‘senpai’ who wants a lap pillow.”
My heart leapt that instant.
I knew from the name alone. It was a new upload from that voice actress.
The word senpai in the title struck me with absurd directness. I could already imagine the contents.
And this time, it was lap-pillow comfort. The coddling sort. Whispered in that voice.
Technically, I was on my lunch break—but I was also still at work.
Common sense said I probably shouldn't play it here.
But my finger pressed play faster than reason could object.
“I-I bought it...”
I darted my eyes between the screen on my device and the clock hanging on the wall, hurriedly took my earphones from the desk drawer, and put them on. There was still time before lunch break ended. I'd only listen to the beginning, then save the rest for home. Just a little. Just a little. I repeated that to myself, drew in a deep breath to hide the way my heart was pounding, and then—
“...Senpai? Are you tired, maybe?”
At the very first line, I had the strange sensation that the edges of my vision had gone blurry.
It was a soft voice.
A whisper that seemed to fall quietly right beside my ear.
The tone was gentle, slightly troubled, and yet faintly smiling as she spoke to me.
“Why don't you rest your head over here for just a little while? Hehe, you don't need to hold back.”
The words, flowing into me through the audio, felt far too real.
The setup was that I was getting a lap pillow, with the rustle of clothes and sound effects like fingers stroking through hair mixed in.
If I closed my eyes, it really did feel as though someone were petting my head.
“You've been trying hard this whole time, haven't you? I know, you know. I've been watching you properly.”
That voice dropped just a little lower.
“So today, please let yourself be spoiled. Just a little... won't you lean on me?”
—Journey.
Her name rose inside my head.
It sounded so much like her.
The rhythm when she spoke. The way she restrained emotion. More than anything, the temperature of the voice itself.
“...Good night. I hope you have nice dreams.”
By the time I heard that last line, my consciousness had already drifted.
I was wrapped in something soft.
A faint warmth touched my cheek, and the air was full of pale afternoon sunlight.
A low, quiet voice whispered beside my ear.
“Senpai, you really are tired... the skin under your eyes is a little red.”
That voice was so calm, so gentle, and carried such a terribly familiar ring.
My eyelids were heavy enough that even blinking felt bothersome, and my whole body had gone loose as though it were melting.
And still I thought—
I know this voice.
But no.
This isn't the real Journey.
It's a dream.
I'm dreaming right now.
I don't know why. But I knew it for certain.
At the edge of my vision stretched the shadow of a metal fence and afternoon light.
A school rooftop somewhere that wasn't Tracen Academy. A bench placed on a small patch of artificial grass surrounded by high-rises.
I was wearing my old school uniform, and the hem of my skirt stirred a little in the wind.
And in front of me was—
Dream Journey.
And yet, strictly speaking, she wasn't Journey.
She had none of the distinctive horse-girl ears and tail, none of that deeply thoughtful gaze. She was only a human girl with a slightly childish air, someone like Dream Journey. The way she wore her uniform was a little more careless, and the ribbon at her shoulder fluttered in the wind.
And I, seated beside her, had my head resting in her lap. Half-dreaming, I lay there wrapped only in that softness.
Then I noticed the scent.
A calm perfume floating somewhere between flowers and smoke. Not too sweet, full-bodied, and yet with a lingering trace to it. A fragrance that felt, somehow, like her.
It was exactly the same perfume the real Journey wore.
That restrained, refined scent I'd caught a few times when she happened to stand close in reality. Which was why, the moment I smelled it inside the dream, I nearly lost the boundary between dream and reality altogether.
“You were sleeping so soundly just now. ...Hehe, you looked very comfortable.”
My head was in her lap.
The warmth of the hand gently stroking my hair felt so real there wasn't even the slightest sign I might wake.
If anything, every time she touched me, the deepest part of my heart seemed to float up lightly.
“...I love you, Senpai.”
The words were spoken directly, and without hesitation.
My heart jumped.
Those eyes were fixed only on me, and even the hair brushing her cheek was being toyed with gently by the wind.
I swallowed hard. There was no way I could answer that.
But in the dream, I had already lost the strength to resist.
Ahh, no.
It's over.
“...I love you too.”
The moment the words spilled from me, the world of the dream blurred.
The scent of perfume still lingered in my nose.
But that scent—
continued into reality.
The next instant, Dream Journey was in front of me.
Her big fluffy ears were pinned back, her brows drawn tight. There was even a harshness in her eyes.
“...Hah.”
A low, crisp voice dragged me back to reality.
The same voice I'd heard in the dream—but incomparably sharper—stood right in front of me.
“...Good morning.”
That low, calm voice whispered by my ear.
It was the same as in the dream.
No—quieter than that.
Colder.
No.
This isn't a dream anymore.
The one in front of me is the real Journey.
It was only when that voice reached me beside my ear that I finally let go of the last scraps of sleep.
“Eh? Ah... um...”
I jolted upright in a panic, and found Journey looking down at me from point-blank range.
Her posture was calm. Only her eyes looked faintly severe.
“To loosen your expression that much in your sleep... what sort of dream could you possibly have been having?”
When she said it so quietly, my mind went blank.
The voice in the dream that I'd answered with I love you too echoed inside my head. Not to Dream Journey—no, to someone whose voice merely resembled Dream Journey's.
...But there was no way I could say that.
“...I just had kind of a strange dream...”
Even as I faltered, I kept my eyes lowered and confessed as much.
The guilt and embarrassment churning in my chest made the backs of my ears burn hot.
“A strange one...? You will let me hear about it, won't you?”
She asked the question in her usual calm way.
And yet behind that voice was unmistakable curiosity—and a sharply probing emotion like a blade edge.
I took one deep breath, then clenched the hands in my lap.
I can't run from this. I have to face it properly.
“...Actually, for a little while now...”
My voice shook. The words wouldn't come smoothly, but I had to say them.
“Lately, I found out about those... ‘situation voice’ things, and I've been listening to them before bed. The coddling kind, a little... healing and sweet, I guess.”
I tried to choose my words carefully, and yet even to my own ears they sounded somewhere between pathetic and ridiculous. My palms were damp with sweat in my lap.
“And the voice... well, somehow, it sounds like you, Journey...”
Only then did I finally raise my face.
“...Like me?”
Journey's brow twitched.
Her voice was quiet, but what lay in her eyes was clearly anger—
and yet, only for an instant, her gaze wavered.
The surprise in it, and along with it the faintest trace of pleasure, were surely not my imagination.
“Yeah... It's very calm, and kind. It affirms work and ordinary life and everything, somehow... When I listen to that voice, I feel strangely at ease. Maybe because it feels like being spoken to by you.”
Journey's gaze seemed to soften a little.
There was even something like bashfulness in her expression.
But—
“...And before I realized it, I'd listened to a lot of them. So I think that's probably what showed up in my dream. ...It was the first time it'd ever been that vivid. At first it was just because she sounded like you, but little by little... well, maybe I started being drawn to the voice actress herself...”
The instant I finished saying it, I knew I'd made a mistake.
Absolute zero. That was the only phrase that fit how drastically the temperature of the room seemed to drop. The faint softness from her face vanished in an instant, replaced by a cold silence.
“...In other words, at first you were attracted to a voice because ‘it resembled mine,’ but now you harbor favorable feelings toward ‘the voice actress herself’?”
Her tone remained polite. Her expression didn't change.
And yet there was an uncanny pressure behind it.
She wasn't smiling, and still a chill ran down my spine.
“N-no, that's not exactly what I—!”
I tried to make excuses, but I was too late.
Her eyes had already settled completely.
“...Would you let me hear that audio as well?”
Journey said it suddenly.
Her voice was calm.
But it allowed no refusal.
“...Huh?”
“Let me hear it. That voice you say sounds like mine. I can hardly evaluate the matter without listening for myself.”
As she said this, Journey let her gaze fall to my smartphone.
The silent pressure radiating from her was unbelievable.
Cowardly though I felt, I took out my phone and timidly offered her an earphone.
Journey put it in one ear and pressed play.
“...You've worked hard today. You really did so well. ...Hehe, you don't need to make that face, you know? I'm on your side.”
Every time a line played, one of Journey's brows twitched.
I could tell she was trying hard not to let her expression break.
“You don't have to push yourself. Here, relax... I'll hold you tight. It's all right. I'll stay by your side forever, Senpai.”
By the time the play bar neared the end, I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me. My face burned, I didn't know where to look, and I could only sit there staring down with my hands clenched.
At last, with the little click of an operation sound, Journey removed the earphone.
Several seconds of silence passed.
And then—
“...I see. Hehe, yes. In that case...”
Murmuring low, she walked over to the sofa and sat down without a word.
Then, quietly, she beckoned me closer.
“Come here.”
No explanation. No naming what she intended.
And yet there was no room whatsoever to escape in that tone.
Like I was being swallowed, I obeyed that hand.
As if drawn by it, I carefully rested my head in her lap.
The exact same position as in the dream—
except this was reality.
And the Journey of this moment was unmistakably angry.
Even so, her hands were very soft, stroking gently through my hair. Her fingertips were astonishingly delicate, brushing my bangs from my forehead with exquisite care.
“...You've worked hard today. You really did very well.”
That whisper by my ear made my heart leap.
It was the very same phrase from the audio. And yet it pierced much deeper.
“Hehe... you don't need to make that face, you know? I'm on your side.”
From where I lay in her lap I couldn't see her expression.
But the sarcasm seeping through the edge of her voice, and the restrained anger beneath it, burned slowly through my ears.
Embarrassment, guilt, and still the sense of comfort I couldn't help feeling all mingled together until my head swam.
“You don't need to push yourself. So... this sort of whispering is what you liked, was it?”
The question was openly mean.
And yet I was in no position to refuse it. I couldn't even shake my head or talk back. I could only lie there, breath caught, sinking deeper into her lap.
“Now then, relax... I'll hold you tight.”
Her arm descended softly and drew my shoulders into a gentle embrace. That alone made my chest ache unbearably. It was all too real—far more painful than any dream.
“I'll remain by your side forever... all right?”
The whisper lingered in my ears like an echo, and I found myself closing my eyes. The voice from my dream and the voice whispering to me right now overlapped perfectly. The only obvious difference—
was that the owner of this voice was the real Journey.
“...To say it was ‘because it resembled my voice’... what a heartless person you are.”
Combing through my hair, she murmured the words.
There was a smile in that voice.
A gentle smile. A mean one.
“If you like my voice that much—then wouldn't I myself do just fine?”
Her fingertips traced softly around my ear as she whispered. It tickled, and yet I couldn't escape. A shiver ran up my spine, and I shrank in on myself without thinking.
“...!”
Curling up smaller there in her lap, I lowered my head.
The center of my chest was hot. My breathing had gone shallow.
This isn't a dream.
This is undeniable reality.
Why is it—
that reality is so much sweeter, so much more humiliating, and so much more impossible to run from than the dream was?
“My, my. This won't do. You're making such a hungry face.”
Her quiet laugh dissolved all the way into my ears.
Whether she was mocking me or cherishing me, I couldn't tell. Either way, her hands never once stopped. She kept on stroking me, gently, gently.
And then, softly, she whispered:
“I love you, Senpai. ...And your answer?”