After all that had changed with time, he had finally taken the first step.

On Wednesday, September thirtieth, after school, Moon Jinguuji sat on the sofa in the student council room, reading, while Hoshinomori Seina sat on the opposite sofa and waited to refill his teacup whenever his black tea ran dry.

Golden evening light spilled through the window, and from outside came the faint crack of a baseball being driven into the air.

The entire room seemed cut off from the world, with nothing of sports or youth to do with it; only the steady turning of pages disturbed the silence.

“Quite peaceful,” Moon remarked.

“Yes, isn’t it?” Seina replied with a smile.

“The first-year study trip was wonderful.”

“Oh? Why do you say that?”

“Because the annoying ones aren’t here.”

“Yomiya would be hurt if she heard that.”

“That one perks right up if you buy her a drink.”

Seina covered her mouth and laughed softly. “You’ve already become quite close with your junior, haven’t you?”

“I’d call it taming,” Moon said without the slightest shame.

“Is that so? I think the one being tamed is you, Jinguuji.”

“Hah? Me, by Yomiya? Don’t be ridiculous.”

It was outright insulting, an insult to the dignity of youth. No matter how incompetent a senior he might be, how could he possibly be tamed by a junior?

The student council president in front of him slowly shook her head and said, “No. By me.”

“......”

Moon went rigid, at a loss for words. Or rather, if he said anything now and she answered with a simple, “You’re lying,” it would only be more humiliating. So he picked up his cup and silently drank.

Seina smiled. “Is it good?”

“...Well, it’s fine.”

The boy turned his gaze away, avoiding her eyes, and muttered that much.

After the sports festival, first-year students entered their first school trip of high school life. At Shinsakura High, the timing and destination of the trip differed by grade.

First years went in September or October of the second term.

Second years went in January or February of the third term.

Third years, burdened by the pressure of entrance exams, took their trip before the end of the first term and then devoted the second and third terms to serious study.

In truth, Shinsakura High’s university advancement rate was quite high; it was a school well known far and wide.

Back in middle school, after acquiring his near-perfect memory, Moon’s grades had improved by leaps and bounds.

To avoid being separated from him in high school, Sakura Oji Sakura had thrown herself into studying with unprecedented fervor, barely passing the entrance cutoff and managing to enroll in the same high school as Moon.

And yet, once she entered high school, she slackened off immediately; that was Sakura Oji Sakura in a nutshell.

Now, with the second term under way, third-year students were becoming ever more burdened by academics. The reason Seina looked so composed was, first, her absolute confidence as the top student of her grade, and second, the fact that she had already secured a recommendation to the school of her choice.

“Come to think of it, where did they go again?”

Seina quietly turned a page in the book in her hands. The day’s student council work had already been completed, so this counted as a small break.

“Nagoya,” she said.

Moon blinked, then couldn’t hold back a laugh.

“No wonder Yomiya looked so displeased before she left. Her very first high school trip, and it’s back to her hometown. That’s too funny.”

Seina shot him an exasperated look. Seeing his gleeful expression, she was suddenly reminded of the first time he had met Yomiya.

“Jinguuji-kun, compared to a month ago, you seem quite different.”

“For example?”

The student council president considered it for a moment, then said, “More like a person.”

“That sounds like you didn’t regard me as human before.”

“That’s hard to say.”

“Then what was I in your eyes back then?”

“Hm? Do you really want me to answer that, Jinguuji-kun?”

Moon stiffened. He realized he had asked what he shouldn’t have. But when he saw Seina’s calm, mischievous expression, he suddenly understood that, as she had said, perhaps he alone was still trapped in the past.

Maybe even without having his memories taken away, Hoshinomori Seina was the sort of person who could stand strong on her own. She never needed his trivial pity.

With that thought, it was Moon himself who seemed to be the one in need of sympathy.

Realizing this, the boy admired her even as he came to understand more clearly what sort of person he himself was.

That did not mean he intended to become some hopeless, slovenly fool from now on. Moon was reflecting on himself, not wallowing.

A person cannot decide who they were in the past, but at the very least, Moon Jinguuji could choose what kind of person he would become from this point on.

He sighed softly. “President, there’s no need to tease me any longer.”

“What do you mean, tease you? It’s clearly that Jinguuji-kun refuses to say anything and leaves me to make wild guesses.”

“Then may I hear your guess?”

Seina took a small sip of black tea, tilted her head slightly, and said at once:

“Hypnotic app.”

“......”

“You see? I told you from the very start that my memory is quite good. Unless something unscientific was done to me, how else could I have forgotten so completely?

“Jinguuji-kun, are you perhaps one of them? Secretly hiding some mysterious power? Like those recent otherworld reincarnation stories?”

Seeing the sly look on her face, Moon shook his head.

“President, you don’t need to worry so much about my feelings. After being dragged around like this, I honestly don’t even know how to face you anymore. And besides, otherworld reincarnation hasn’t been ‘recent’ for a while.”

“Well, well. I finally try to talk about something lighthearted that you might like, and Jinguuji-kun just doesn’t know how to read the room.”

“I believe I’ve said before that I have no need to read the room, since I have no friends.”

Seina gave an enigmatic “hm~~” and set her teacup back on the table.

“...Still, it doesn’t matter. I’m not the kind of woman who obsesses over the past. By my own values, if I don’t remember something, then it never happened.

“There’s a saying, isn’t there? Women who dwell on the past are heavy. I have no interest in becoming one of those.”

Moon thought that if only he had the ability to see through other people’s lies, that would be wonderful. Not necessarily every lie, of course. If he could see through anyone’s lies, the world would surely be a despairing black.

He simply wished he could see through the lies of the person before him. Which of her words were false, and which were sincere?

To pierce her composure, tear away the mask of easy indifference, and peer carefully into her heart to see whether she was truly saying what she meant.

If that were the case, then Hoshinomori Seina would surely be the most foolish woman in the entire universe.

With a giggle, Seina closed the book in her hands and said gently, “Rather than someone like me who isn’t interested in Jinguuji-kun, I think you’d be better off paying more attention to the people around you.”

“...What do you mean by that, President?”

“I dislike men who pretend not to understand.”

Moon considered it briefly, then caught her meaning.

“President, what exactly is your relationship with Saku... with Sakura Oji?”

“From her point of view, I seem to have become her number one romantic rival. How annoying. I don’t have even the slightest such interest in Jinguuji-kun.”

“That’s fine. I don’t have that sort of interest in the president either.”

Moon caught the book she threw at him with quick reflexes.

He smoothed the cover and shook his head. “A lover of books shouldn’t do things like that.”

“Anyone who saw the situation just now would think Jinguuji-kun was in the wrong. Even if it’s the truth, you shouldn’t say it in front of a girl.”

He set the book back on the table. “Then how should I answer?”

“You don’t need to say anything. Just blush. The best effect is when it reaches your ears.”

“Controlling a bodily reaction sounds awfully difficult,” Moon said in awe.

That made Seina laugh at once.

When tea time was over, Moon returned to his desk and resumed working.

Seina came over curiously, thinking he should already have finished everything assigned to him.

“What’s this?”

“Revisions to the drama club script. This is the third draft already. That Kudou guy has completely been treating me like a convenient tool. He clearly has no idea how to respect a senior. Once the school trip is over, I’m going to make him pay.”

“Oh? I thought Kudou-kun was treating you like a dependable senior.”

“Those words, when they cost you nothing, are the same as what I’m saying. It’s like not paying someone and sending them to the school kiosk for bread. That’s the same principle.”

“Pfft... Jinguuji-kun really does have a twisted personality.”

“Please refer to it as being awake to reality.”

“There you go again. Saying that is just a way to save face, isn’t it? You’re actually happy that a junior relies on you.”

“President, has anyone ever told you that you also don’t read the room?”

“There have been some, but I’m not changing. Integrity and frankness are my strengths. Do I look like someone who would cater to the atmosphere?”

Moon gave a thumbs-up to signal defeat.

Seina bent down with interest to look at the script on the desk. Her long blue-green hair fell forward, brushing at his neck with a ticklish, numbing sensation.

“Hey, hey. I still don’t really get what’s so interesting about this kind of thing.”

“The illustrations,” Moon answered immediately.

Seina looked slightly baffled, so Moon stopped joking and took a paperback volume from his bag, handing it to her.

“If you’re interested, you should try reading it too. Always reading books like Black Petals will make your head go strange.”

“That’s your prejudice. Unlike you, I’m not so fragile that books can distort my values. I’d advise you to read less Murakami Haruki, otherwise you’ll mope all day. Or come read Natsume Soseki with me.”

Moon shrugged. “I’ve been following Totsuka-sensei’s mood lately.”

“Totsuka-sensei?” Seina looked blank for a moment, briefly troubled in her mind by not knowing which author he meant.

Moon pointed to the light novel he had handed her, and she saw the name of the author beside the cover illustration of a red-haired beauty dressed in very little fabric.

She was instantly furious.

After school, Moon Jinguuji and Seina Hoshinomori returned the key to the staff room together. When they changed shoes at the lockers, they happened to run into Sakura Oji Sakura arriving with her club members.

The two girls greeted each other, while Moon said nothing. The one walking beside Sakura Oji, Sasa Mi, gave him a shy smile.

Moon didn’t know how to respond and could only tug at the corners of his mouth in a stiff imitation of a smile.

On the way out of school, Seina demonstrated her astonishing social ability, easily blending into the conversation with Sakura Oji and the others.

Moon walked behind the girls, keeping his distance like a complete stranger.

At the station, they entered the platform separately. Just as Moon stepped into the train and the doors were about to close, Sakura Oji, rushing headlong forward, leaped into the carriage, and the doors shut with a clap behind her.

“Sa~~~fe!”

Moon couldn’t help flicking her on the forehead.

“Don’t make it so dangerous and nerve-racking.”

Sakura Oji rubbed her forehead and broke into a silly grin.

The two sat side by side. Moon quietly took out his book to read, while Sakura Oji played with her phone.

Strangely, his childhood friend did not come to bother him.

Moon glanced at her phone screen; the top of the messaging app showed Seina Hoshinomori’s name, which only made him more confused.

When he asked Seina earlier that day, she had wriggled out of the question. Sakura Oji Sakura was, after all, simpler-minded than that woman.

But when the words reached his lips, Moon no longer knew what to ask, or rather, some sense of purpose had slipped away.

At first, he had worried that Sakura Oji would start babbling about the past, but there was no need to worry now.

Seina seemed to know far more than he had imagined.

Even so, that girl showed no sign of demanding an explanation from him. In Seina’s eyes, perhaps the fact that she had once dated him was nothing more than a trivial matter.

Then he ought to let it go too, just as she had said today.

He should care more about the people beside him.

Perhaps now was the moment when Moon Jinguuji ought to take that step.

He had always thought about what sort of adult he wanted to become, yet he was already sixteen, almost seventeen, and then eighteen, with twenty arriving in the blink of an eye.

Did growing older naturally make one an adult?

No, that was probably wrong. People do not grow slowly; they grow in an instant.

When those instants accumulate, they become a person’s life.

Unknowingly, it seemed he had reached that moment: to face the past honestly, accept his imperfect self, and then, with someone, open the door to a brand-new future.

“Sakura...” The boy thought for a long while, then slowly spoke.

The train clattered on without pause.

As he recalled the countless little things from the past, Moon suddenly tightened his grip on his childhood friend’s hand, startling Sakura Oji.

“Would you go out with me this weekend?”

Sakura Oji sat frozen for quite a while.

“Eh?”

“Eh~~~~~??!!”