CH 28

It has been a few days since Aisaka told me that he has feelings for Mari and that Ayana has told me that a new outside coach is coming to the school.

I promised Ayana that I would spend as much time as possible with her during the rest of the summer vacation, even though I would be busy with preparations for the gymnastic festival. Ayana wants to go to the swimming pool with me when I say I want to do things like yakiniku. …… Well, I guess there are lots of things to do when couples are together,…….

“Yukishiro~!”

“?　Yes~”

I was hanging out after school when my homeroom teacher called me over to his office.

“Sorry, I’ve got a meeting to go to. Could you lock up the audio-visual room if you don’t mind?”

“That’s fine. What should I do with the key?”

“Leave it on my desk when you’re done.”

“Got it.”

“Thanks a lot. I’ll be counting on you.”

I waved back at my homeroom teacher, who waved back in a friendly manner. The homeroom teacher in my class is a young teacher, but he is popular in our class because when problems arise, he deals with them from the student’s point of view. In this day and age when there are so many cocky people who look down on teachers and think they are in the way, I feel that our class is really peaceful.

On the way to the audio-visual room, I passed by my class, and Ayana, who I had promised to go home with, was still in the class.

“Oh, Towa-kun!”

I’m sorry, but I have to do something my homeroom teacher asked me to do. I told her that Ayana was going to follow me and we were going to go to the audio-visual room together.

“You could have waited for me.”

“It’s too late for that. I want to stay by your side for as long as possible.”

I’ve always thought that Ayana is the kind of girl who gives me the words I really want to hear. Even though we were still in the school building, I held Ayana’s hand, which reached out to me smoothly and naturally, and she squeezed it back with such strength that she said she would never let it go.

“Will Endo-sensei warn us again?”

“I wonder.”

Endo is the homeroom teacher we just met.

The classmates are smiling and letting it slide with Ayana, but from the teacher’s point of view, she seems to be a little too attached to me.

I know the second half is just backhanded, but my homeroom teacher is like this. And it was embarrassing because he said this in the middle of the class. Well, I laughed when afterwards they started talking seriously about how to get a nice wife for the teacher. I thought Endo was well-liked when I saw that the boys and girls were also giving him advice on how to do this and how to do that.

“And the preparation room. Let’s get in, Ayana.”

“Yes!”

I went into the audio-visual room and closed the lock of the preparation room first. Then… Then I heard the sound of the door being locked.

“Ayana?”

Of course, Ayana and I are the only ones in the room right now, so it was inevitably Ayana who locked the door. Ayana smiled and opened her mouth as she closed the lock with her hands behind her back.

“It’s just the two of us ……, isn’t it?”

Ayana’s cheeks flushed, as if she wanted something from me. I went to Ayana’s side and put my hand on her head and stroked it, and she squinted her eyes and looked comfortable.

“Right. Then let’s go home.”

“…… Muu. Towa-kun is a tough one.”

We just talked about thinking about time and place, didn’t we? Well, Ayana probably knows that, too, and she switched her expression to a “yes, of course” look and unlocked the door.

“We’ve been in a lot of trouble before. ……”

“……………”

……I’m sorry Ayana, I’m still sorry too.

After finishing locking the entrance to the audio-visual room, we went straight back to the classroom and took our bags to the staff room with each other. I put the key on the homeroom teacher’s desk and we left the school building.

The schoolyard was filled with the cheerful voices of the baseball team, including Aisaka, and the members of the track team who had been running outside the school were returning one after another.

“Oh, it’s Mari-chan!”

Ayana said, and Mari was running, sweating. The first time I saw her, she waved at me, but she didn’t come over to me.

When Ayana said this, Mari was running, sweating. When Mari notices us, she waves to us but doesn’t come over to us. I can’t do anything on my own because they’re in the middle of club activities, right?

“That’s the outside coach, isn’t it?”

“I guess so. Towa-kun, shall we go home?”

“Yeah.”

He looks like a good-looking, muscular guy, which seems to be popular among young girls. He is actually touching her body to help her stretch, but the girl who is being touched seems to be happy and not too full of smiles, even though her face is bright red.

Ayana took me by the hand and I was about to leave when Tachibana pointed at the girl and asked her what she was doing. Then Tachibana walked away from the girl and came to us.

“Hello. Is this the first time I’ve met you guys?”

“Hello. You are Tachibana, right?　The teacher told me your name.”

“I see. Then I’ll save you the trouble of introducing myself.”

He’s a person who smiles freshly,……, but what is it about his smile that seems to have a backstory, even if it’s just for some reason? Am I being too suspicious?　I don’t show it in my expression, but in the back of my mind I’ve been thinking about this for a long time.

The girl from earlier told me you two are dating.　I’m jealous of her beauty.”

“Thank you for that.”

“…… (Pecori)”

Unlike me, who thanked her, Ayana did not open her mouth. Ayana told me before that she hates it when other guys tell her she’s beautiful or pretty.

[I improved myself for Towa-kun. I am not happy to hear someone other than Towa-kun say something like that because I did not work hard for them. It makes me feel sick and gives me goosebumps, so I don’t want anyone else to say that to me.]

I remember she said that in a really disgusted way.

The fact that Ayana wouldn’t open her mouth was a sign that she really didn’t want to. So I pulled Ayana’s hand and was about to leave, when I heard the voice of a girl from the track team.

“Coach~!　Shall I go get out some corn or something?””

“Aah please …… no, I’ll go.”

Then Tachibana looked at Ayana for some reason.

“I’d like to talk to other girls outside of the athletics department. Otonashi-san, if you want, you can help me.”

…… No, why is he relying on Ayana when he has me as his man-handler? My gut feeling, that there might be a deeper motive, might not be so wrong.

I was about to open my mouth to say, “I’ll go,” but Ayana answered first.

“I understand.”

“Really?　Then…”

“I’ll go with Towa-kun, so please concentrate on teaching the others.”

Ayana pulled my hand.

“W-Wait a minute. Leave it all up to ……”

“Coach has just recently arrived here. Then I think it is important to get to know everyone in the athletics department. Please leave this chore to us. Daily practice is very important for everyone in the club. Moreover, with Murakami-sensei gone, the only people you can rely on are the coaches, and I don’t want you to waste even a minute or a second.”

“L-Like I…..”

“And besides.”

Ayana then hugged my arm.

“I have a disease that if I leave Towa-kun, I will die. Do you think that coach wants me to die?　You wouldn’t say such a terrible thing, would you?”

“……Uhm”

“I’m going to go with Towa-kun, okay?　Come on, let’s go.”

“……………”

…… That Tachibana face, he totally has the face that Ayana thought she was a pain in the a*s.

Tachibana went straight back to instructing the students and we went to the equipment room to get cones.

“… disgusting, those eyes make me want to vomit.”

Ayana may think she’s hiding it, but her expression is awesome. Then I took the cone and Ayana and I quickly left. I can look out at the schoolyard as we leave, and I’d say half the club members adore Tachibana. Mari and the other kids were stretching a little further away.

“But even so, it’s unusual for him to say something like that.”

“Yeah, ……, I just thought it would be nice to say that so people would think I’m a pain in the a*s.”

“I knew that was your intention.”

“I got chills because I felt like he was looking at my bre*sts or my buttocks or something. I’ll let Mari know to be a little more careful.”

It will be after the practice that she will see the message from Ayana,…..But I don’t know. Mari doesn’t suspect people too much, or she seems like a typical gullible girl.

(…I’m starting to forget, but this is the world of an eroge game. I’m completely off-script and there are a lot of things I don’t understand. It’s really something.)

That’s why I’m the only one who can protect this girl who is by my side. ……

I need to do what I can to protect Ayana, who is holding my arm and smiling happily, and to make sure I don’t lie about my declaration that we will be happy together.

“Well, if they try to mess with us, I’ll handle it.”

What do you mean by “handle,” Ayana?