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Most girls of that age are in love with the idea of love.
Uma Musume are no exception. If anything, girls like them, who live in such a limited environment, may be even more sensitive to anything related to romance. It sprouts from nowhere like little flower buds, needing no watering before it spreads of its own accord. In a place like Tracen Academy, where girls of the same generation share most of their lives together, people’s “likes” and “loves” are consumed almost like entertainment. Who has a crush on whom, which two girls have been getting closer lately—those stories bloom all over the hallways and cafeteria like flowers, only to scatter just as quickly.
The adults close at hand—for example, an unremarkable trainer like me—probably are not exempt either. Especially during meals or breaks, the girls eating with me would sometimes ask light, curious questions in passing.
“Trainer for Dream Journey, have you ever dated anyone?”
Like that.
That day had been the same. A perfectly ordinary lunch break. I was eating in a corner of the cafeteria with a few Uma Musume when the question was tossed out just like that. A harmless tease, the sort of thing people say all the time.
I should have laughed it off. I could have given the classic adult answer, I’ll leave that to your imagination. I should have had any number of model answers ready.
And yet, at that moment—
A single figure at the edge of my vision dulled my judgment.
It was Dream Journey, sitting across from me.
As always, she was quiet and precise in all her motions. The fingertips with which she gently lifted the glass of icy cafeteria tea, the napkin resting on her lap—everything about her was immaculate. And yet, for some reason, she was looking at me. She was not raising her face or tilting her head. Only her gaze had me pinned.
There was no special emotion floating in her eyes.
She was not smiling, and she did not look displeased either.
Still, I felt it for sure: a stillness as though something had clicked to a stop.
(…Journey reacting to a topic like this?)
It came as a slight surprise. I had thought she was the type with little interest in this sort of casual chatter. And yet, today of all days… her gaze looked as though she intended to see where this conversation went.
For some reason, that gaze made me panic.
(…What do I do?)
I started to inhale, swallowed it back—
and my mouth moved on its own.
“…Well, a little, a long time ago.”
The instant the words left my mouth, my heart jumped.
(I did it…!)
I knew I had just told a stupid lie purely for the sake of my own pride. How could I do something so foolish? Shame came rushing in a beat too late, and I pretended to stare into the distance as though reminiscing about the past. I could not properly look at the girls’ faces from sheer guilt. But utterly indifferent to my self-reproach, the Uma Musume took it far more lightly than I had expected.
“Huh, really?”
“Well, trainers are adults.”
“Was it when you were in college or something?”
They nodded to one another and smiled in a way that suggested quiet acceptance. There was no prying, no excited fuss—only a composed sort of respect toward a grown-up world just slightly beyond their reach.
“Lucky,” one of them muttered, and then another immediately said, “More importantly, are you going to the sweets fair next time?”
The mood at the table shifted with a soft rustle.
Sweets, weekend plans, magazines they wanted to buy—
the conversation quickly returned to the ordinary everyday matters of girls their age.
No one seriously tried to dig into my lie. Perhaps that might sound cold, but that was all romance gossip ever really was. Something consumed as casually as instant food and as short-lived as a mayfly. I should probably have been relieved by that.
And yet—
one person was different.
Dream Journey said nothing. She quietly lifted water to her lips. She was not smiling. She did not seem angry. She simply kept her eyes lowered to the table, breathing evenly as though she were checking something within herself.
Then, for the briefest instant—
when I raised my face to respond to someone else—our eyes met.
There was the same stillness in those eyes as on the surface of calm water. But the something sunken deep inside them seemed, just for a moment, to change shape, and I looked away almost at once.
A few days later, in the trainer’s office that evening.
Training was over, the day’s records were finished, and in the room’s returned quiet I was filing documents by myself. Outside the window, the sky had already gone crimson. Gentle light filtered through the lace curtain, staining the room.
The door clicked shut softly, and without even turning I knew who it was.
“…Trainer.”
“Mm?”
“May I have a little of your time?”
Her voice was calm.
Even so, there was the faintest sense of something being off. Words arranged a touch too carefully compared to usual, breaths spaced with curious deliberation.
“Sure, that’s fine. Did something happen?”
I stopped my hands and turned around. Journey was standing in the corner of the room. Her uniform collar was perfectly arranged, her smile the same model-student smile as always—and yet there was a hush about her like the instant before the curtain rises on a performance.
“Do you remember the time the other day when we all had lunch together?”
“Lunch… ah, that time? Yeah. Was something bothering you?”
With a soft “Yes,” she nodded, smiling. The smile sat on her cheeks alone; not a single ripple stirred in the depths of her eyes.
“It was only a tiny exchange, but I have found myself unable to stop wondering about it.”
The sound of her footsteps coming closer was perfectly natural.
And yet, for some reason, I could not look back down at the papers. My back reacted to her movements all on its own.
“You said that you had dated someone in the past, did you not?”
Something in my chest tightened sharply.
“A-ah… yeah, well…”
“What sort of person were they?”
“…Huh?”
“Only within the bounds of what you can share, of course. I was hoping you might tell me what kind of person they were, and what sort of relationship you had.”
There was no malice in it. Her tone was not harsh, nor did she outwardly seem to be prying. But she had not missed it. My moment’s hesitation that day, my awkwardness, the tremor in my voice—she had noticed all of it.
More than anyone else there, she must have been watching me carefully.
“It’s not really anything worth talking about. Just a normal—”
“A normal romantic relationship?”
Her words cut in, and I instinctively held my breath. Her voice was exceedingly gentle. Yet there was a temperature in it that allowed no further evasion.
“…Why are you so interested?”
She did not lower her eyes or look away. She said it while looking straight at me, smiling as always, her tone even and calm.
“I would like to use it as reference.”
For a moment, the words left me blank.
(Reference… does that mean…?)
I see, so that was it. Once I thought of it that way, her behavior made sense. It would hardly be strange for a girl her age to be in love with someone. And perhaps, not knowing how to deal with those first feelings, she had come to hear one of my old stories—as a model case, nothing more.
(…Right. If that’s all this is…)
That was how I tried to convince myself, yet something in my chest still rustled uneasily. It was not merely confusion. Ever since the moment I told that lie, something like a fishbone had been caught in my throat, making it hard to breathe.
(Why did I say something like that back then?)
I had assumed no one would dig too deeply. Some romantic past for a rookie trainer was the most ordinary thing in the world—or ought to have been, at least, if I had actually ever dated anyone, which I had not. I had decided, on my own, that it would pass as no more than a bit of idle chatter. But now, confronted with Journey’s straightforward gaze, the fact that that “someone from my past” was nothing but a bright red lie born of petty pride felt unbearably humiliating—and terrifying.
(I can’t back down. Not now. Not anymore…)
Panic, guilt, and pride too stubborn to let go tangled together into a mess inside my chest.
Still, I forced all of that down and gave a small laugh.
“Oh, so that’s all. Hehe, you startled me.”
I meant to sound relaxed. But even I knew my laughter must have sounded hollow. Journey merely answered with a quiet, “Yes.”
Her smile remained beautiful—yet there was a color behind it I still could not read.
Several days after that, on a languid afternoon, I let out a small breath in the soft light.
I could not settle down in the slightest.
Ever since that day, Journey’s questions had stuck in my chest like a fishbone.
“Where was the first place you had a meal together with that person?”
It was such a trivial question. Within the context of romance talk, it should have been nothing. But to me it felt as though someone had seized my heart in their fist.
(She’s really asking about the details…)
Of course, there had never been any boyfriend I “once dated” to begin with. It had all been a lie, born from the mood of the moment and my own pathetic vanity. But Journey believed it, and because she believed it, she was accepting it carefully and sincerely.
That was exactly why it frightened me.
(If I contradict myself somewhere… she’ll notice right away.)
Dream Journey was clever. Clever enough that she barely needed a trainer at all. And that was precisely why I kept wondering what I would do if she noticed. What if she looked down on me? What if a girl who looked at me with such straightforward eyes learned I was a liar?
“Trainer?”
“Wah—! Wh-what?”
When my name came from right beside me, my shoulders jumped.
“Hehe. Did I startle you that badly?”
Journey smiled apologetically. The same soft, courteous smile as always.
This is bad. I’m acting way too suspicious.
“S-sorry. I just zoned out for a second…”
I smiled as I said it, but I could feel the stiffness at the corners of my mouth.
Journey looked at me curiously, then set down her cup of tea.
“If you would not mind… may I ask just a little more?”
“Ah, yeah… yeah, that’s fine.”
There was no escape. At this point I could hardly say, Actually, it was all a lie. That was partly because Journey’s eyes were so straight and pure—but it was also because I could not bring myself to resist them.
“With the person you were dating… when was the first time you held hands?”
“Huh, hands—!? U-um…”
Cold sweat slid down my back.
My thoughts went blank. I had never expected her to ask about details this fine.
(What do I do? If I just pick some random timing… but then the timeline has to fit the rest…!)
I desperately tried to make all the details in my head line up, but I was panicking too badly for it to work.
“M-maybe around a month after we started dating…?”
“I see. Did you take their hand first? Or did they take yours?”
(You’re asking that too!?)
At this point it felt less like a conversation and more like an interrogation.
“Um, I think… he was the one who did.”
“…How unexpected.”
Journey said that and smiled again.
Her expression did not seem to carry any deeper meaning—but maybe that was just me wanting to believe it.
(She really is in love with someone, then.)
I still could not doubt the meaning behind Journey’s words, I want to use it as reference.
(Who is it? A classmate? Someone who debuted around the same time? Or…)
Whenever I thought about that, a dull ache gnawed at my chest. I did not know why. Maybe it was guilt over learning how she felt by lying to her. Maybe awkwardness. All I knew was that it hurt. Breathing became difficult.
“Did that person ever say they loved you?”
Journey asked that out of nowhere.
I opened my mouth—and stopped.
(Did he ever say “I love you”…? It’d sound more natural if I say he did, right? If I say no, won’t that seem strange…?)
The options spun in circles inside my head. There was no correct answer. No matter what I chose, I was already knee-deep in the swamp.
But I could not stay silent forever.
“Y-yeah. Probably… a few times.”
I had the feeling I failed to hide the tremor in my voice.
Journey, however, merely nodded as though nothing were amiss.
“I see. …How enviable.”
That was all she said, and then she lowered her gaze.
Yet that single line made my heart leap. Journey’s tone had not changed. Her expression had not broken either. And yet to me, those words lodged like a thorn.
She was smiling gently, but it felt as though something cold within her was looking straight at me.
(Is she… angry? No, but why would she be…?)
My thoughts would not come together. My chest stung. It felt as if someone had been tracing circles over my heart with a fingertip for far too long.
Something was wrong. I did not know what.
Only one thing was certain—
I had already come too far to turn back now.
(None of this is even real…)
Cold sweat ran down my spine. How had it turned into this? At first it had not felt like this at all.
It had only been a whim. A small lie told in the flow of conversation, the kind of light bluff anyone might make. But now that nonexistent “boyfriend” weighed on my chest like lead.
(Journey isn’t the one at fault. This is all on me.)
Dream Journey listened to me so earnestly. She accepted my words with such seriousness. The kinder she was, the more miserable I felt.
(I’m sorry…)
I had never imagined lying to the girl before me could weigh this heavily on my heart.
And I was beginning to think guilt alone was not the reason.
(This is so empty…)
It would have been far easier if she had doubted me. If she had laughed and asked, Did you really date someone? then I probably could have brushed it off as a joke by now.
But Journey never laughed.
She believed my lie straight out.
And having believed it, she kept touching my “past” with carefully chosen words.
Carefully, slowly, almost as though she cherished the fiction itself. Could talking about a fabricated past built out of secondhand romantic knowledge possibly do any good for her? That thought crossed my mind more than once, yet I could not say it.
Because I had always believed it would be natural for her to fall for someone. A girl her age would naturally admire someone, naturally talk about love with close friends.
But—
(Why is that someone me?)
Every time the question tried to surface, I shoved it back down. It could simply be that I was the only adult close by. I must not suspect her unfairly.
Still, there was one thing I knew for sure.
Someday, this lie would reach its limit.
And when it did, I would surely be left with something irreparable.
The evening school building was dead quiet.
A faintly damp wind drifted in through the open corridor windows. The early-summer air still holding traces of the day’s heat clung to my skin.
Far away, a single cicada sang like an impatient herald of summer. The western light slanting into the building had taken on a reddish cast, stretching long warped shadows across the corridor floor. Today all my other work had wrapped up early, and I ought to have felt unusually at ease. And yet my chest had been unsettled since morning.
I had already made up my mind.
Tomorrow, I would tell her properly. Everything. That it had all been a lie—that the “past” I had spoken of did not exist.
(It’s late. I might lose her trust. But… it’s better than keeping this lie going.)
I was steeling myself like that as I walked the hallway when I happened to run into Journey coming down the stairs.
“Ah, Journey…”
The moment I called out, she dipped her head with the same gentle smile as always.
“Good evening, Trainer. Were you on your way home?”
“No, not yet… I was just heading back to the trainer’s office.”
“I see. …Then may I walk with you?”
“Y-yeah. Of course.”
Once we started walking side by side, she naturally took a position half a step behind me. Her footsteps were quiet, her presence soft. Even so, I could not stop myself from feeling acutely aware of her at my back.
(…Of all times to run into her. …No, actually, maybe this is perfect.)
Journey did not know anything. Each time I tried to convince myself of that, something in the back of my heart throbbed. I had to say it. This time, properly, with my own mouth.
When we reached the trainer’s office, I took the key from my pocket, opened the door with a click, and stepped inside.
Behind me, Journey’s footsteps paused for only an instant—then she followed me in.
“Go ahead and sit down. I’ll make some tea.”
“No, please don’t trouble yourself. …But before that, may I ask just one thing?”
By the time I turned around, she had already closed the door gently from the inside—
and the quiet click of the lock turning rang out.
That tiny sound felt absurdly loud.
“…Huh?”
When I looked back, Journey was standing there with one hand on the door.
Her smile was soft, the same as always. Yet the fact that the door was now locked felt somehow unreal.
“…Forgive me. I startled you.”
“N-no, it’s not that… but why…?”
“I wanted to speak with you alone, just for a little while.”
Saying that, Journey stepped toward me.
With each step the air seemed to grow denser. My avenues of escape were being shaved away one by one.
Then she stopped directly in front of me and looked straight at me.
“As I told you before, Trainer, I have taken your stories very seriously.”
“…Yeah.”
My throat was dry. I felt as though I might forget how to breathe.
“And yet… in spite of everything you have told me, there are still parts I cannot fully understand.”
As she spoke, Journey stepped forward once more.
“Things words cannot convey. The way one touches another, the timing of a pause, the way one breathes, the closing of distance… I realized that without experience, I cannot understand such things.”
“…Journey?”
“I have a request.”
Her voice remained quiet, her polite speech unbroken. But there was a heat in her eyes I had never seen before.
“Please teach me. Show me how you touched that man—how he touched you.”
I could not speak.
“Not with words. In reality. With these hands, I want to touch your ‘memories.’”
By the time I fully understood what she meant, cold sweat was running down my back. But it was already too late. Her hand had gently taken hold of my sleeve.
Too late to run.
Journey’s hand pressed lightly against my shoulder.
It was not rough. And yet before I could refuse, I found myself backed against the edge of my desk, my spine braced there. Even that slight pressure felt like it possessed intent.
“W-wait, hold on…!?”
So close before me: her smooth brow, her long lashes, the heat of breath almost brushing my skin.
And in her eyes, a quiet obsession burning like a banked flame.
“Rest assured. …I will not hurt you.”
Even as she whispered that, her fingers traced my cheek. They were unbelievably gentle, so gentle it made me want to lower my eyes.
“I only want to know your past. The hand that touched that person. The eyes with which you looked at him. How you smiled. How you loved.”
“W-wait… that’s a little…!”
The words stuck in my throat. My body went rigid. Yet Journey’s voice went on, quiet and even.
“To be honest… I was at my limit.”
The voice with which she said it was low, like an echo from the bottom of a deep well—cool, yet carrying a heat impossible to resist.
“Each time I heard you speak of your past… each time I imagined you smiling while thinking of someone I do not know… my chest hurt so much I could hardly bear it.”
The words were spoken calmly, but every syllable carried the scorch of obsession.
“To think that the hands that touched him, and the eyes that watched him, all belonged to someone other than me…”
She lowered her eyes for a single moment.
Then she let out a slow, deep breath. Only when that breath brushed my cheek did I realize I had been holding my own.
“…I feel as though I could go mad with jealousy.”
The air changed irrevocably.
Her voice was quiet and yet trembling with unrest, and that tremor pierced straight through my chest.
(…Journey…)
Only her name trembled in the back of my throat. Nothing else would form.
Even then, she slowly bent closer.
Slowly—as though hiding every sound and trace of movement so as not to startle prey.
Journey’s lips drew close enough to brush my ear. Her breath wound softly over the cold sweat on my skin.
(Too close. So hot.)
A faint fragrance tickled my nose. Something gentle like citrus, with a smokier note buried deeper beneath. It felt stronger now than when I passed her in the daytime—whether because of the distance between us, or because of the heat within her, I could not tell.
“How one touches… how one breathes upon another… how one closes the distance… these are things I could never understand on my own.”
Her whisper stroked the inside of my ear like silk sliding over skin.
My breathing became uneven. Every time I inhaled, her scent flowed into my chest. Hot, sweet, enough to make me feel scorched.
“But if it is in practice… then surely I will understand. Won’t I?”
Her fingertips slowly stroked my cheek. Careful, as though confirming something about me—yet utterly certain.
Her fingers traced my hairline. The back of my ear. My nape. My neck… Heat spread even to the places she had not yet touched.
(No, I can’t breathe…)
My heartbeat was unbearably loud. It felt almost as though the whole world had filled with the sound of it.
Dream Journey smiled softly, as if she had anticipated every one of my reactions.
And then, in a sweet voice thick with heat, she whispered:
“Please, Trainer.”
There was a brief pause after that—nothing theatrical, just a natural space.
That single second felt eternal.
“Would you… instruct me?”
The instant she whispered that against my ear, every pore of my body reacted at once.
It was not force. Her tone was closer to pleading.
And yet—
to go against those words, against that heat, would have required far more strength than I had left.