CH 1.1

Translator: humu

I like the stars. I’ve been so fascinated by the starry night sky that I feel like there’s no other light besides the stars; until a certain turning point in my life. I was so convinced that my future was on the road to follow the stars up until that moment.

My parents were concerned and anxious about their son who wasn’t on the right track. They pressed behind me and gave me a silent pressure. They said that it was a blessing to have a passion that couldn’t be easily given up.

However, a strange occurrence happened in my world.

After a big rain in the third year of my junior high, I casually accompanied my classmates who were absent from the school trip (to a place). And that was where I saw a gleam as bright as the stars.

“Ehehe, Kuresawa-kun? Nice to meet you. I’m Fujimi Yumi. It’s strange to have finally met you after school started a long time ago, but thank you for coming to visit me.”

— Cute……!!

This meeting was like a thunderous bolt on a warm spring day.

This was where my new life with her began.

***

[Entering the new life]

From the entrance of the gymnasium that was open, the sound of a vague microphone reverberated and disappeared into the sky.

The first person on the waiting line received guidance from the homeroom teacher and soon darted off in a straight direction. In half a month, it will be the graduation ceremony for junior high and I was drifting amidst the fluffy atmosphere1.

There was subtle tension and excitement in the air. The stiffness of the brand new uniform could be felt. A red artificial flower hung on the chest pocket. Everything seemed new and refreshing, as if they could only float upright in this place.

Shortly before entering the gymnasium, I sent a photo to her from the classroom where we had to gather, to receive instructions and explanations of the school layout. This was a picture depicting the bustling and lively front yard which I took before entering the school compound. Then, I suddenly recalled the reply I received.

“It’s really just all boys. I also wanna see a photo of Tasuku-kun2.”

…… What should I do?

It might be natural and normal if you’re already dating, but selfies were still embarrassing to send.

I was planning to meet up with my parents after the entrance ceremony, so maybe I should take a commemorative photo there and send it to her?

I hope that you would like it.

I had only started dating my junior high classmate last week. Her reaction to the confession I made on graduation day was, to put it bluntly, unfavourable.

~3

She was ill and had to be repeatedly hospitalised and discharged. Thus, she only had a few days to attend school before graduation. In the months of being classmates, I could only remember her name and nothing else. Even if I passed by her on the streets, I wouldn’t have recognised her as my classmate. She was such a distant opponent4. 

For the school trip, we were assigned into the same group but her teacher told us that it would be difficult for her to participate in it. Hence, everyone started preparations with such mindset. At group meetings, we only discussed what to give (her) as souvenirs. We didn’t talk much about her in general.

Even in the group photo that we took at the beginning of the year, she only appeared in a few frames. She seemed to have little contact with anyone and it was as if she was just floating in the air.

I couldn’t remember who it was in the group that instructed me to pass the souvenirs to her in the hospital room. That suggestion from him or her was the turning point of our fates. She happily thanked each member of the group and remembered me as well.

“Thank you for coming to visit me.”

With that said, she then called me to confirm my name, with a polite greeting of “nice to meet you”5.

That embarrassed and bashful voice tickled my ears.

It seemed that the other members of the group had spoken to her once or twice. Thus, I was the only one. My name, which was called out by her for the first time, lingered in my ears. It was a voice that was hesitant and pronounced in an unfamiliar tone.

“Did Kuresawa-kun enjoy the school trip?”

“Ah, well…… it is as it is.”

“What’s that? Who was it that refused to come out of the planetarium even though I kept calling him!”

A friend, who was standing next to her, butted in from the side.

“Do you like the planetarium?”

“Yeah.”

She was talking to me, but I couldn’t elaborate further on the story.

I could usually talk way more with my other friends.

When I had a difficult time finding more words, the conversation topic shifted to the next. As she hadn’t been to school much, our conversation was somewhat awkward as we flipped through the camera roll, looking at all the pictures. Even so, she tried to talk to everyone in the room, including me, who couldn’t respond well.

As a result, I was completely charmed by her smile, which betrayed the image of a sickly girl. Her supple black hair, as deep and beautiful as the universe, swayed with every word she spoke. Her smile was as if illuminated by the sunshine pouring down from the clear spring sky at the end of the rainy season. It shone like the Aldebaran6, the brightest first-magnitude star in Taurus.

I was mesmerised by the beautiful gaze in her eyes that resembled the clear starry night sky.

She was bright, bubbly and above all, adorable.

From that day on, she was all I could think about.

Even when I thought about the stars, I found my thoughts heading in her direction. It was a repetitive process. 

The deeper into the seasons, the longer the nights I could spend observing the starry sky, the more my feelings for her grew.

Aldebaran was often most visible in the winter, so I looked up at the sky every night and ruminated on her smile.

However, despite my feelings, she seemed uncomfortable with me accompanying her classmates to visit her in the beginning. After all, we had little in common.

Listening to the conversation with my friend, I found out that she liked manga and drama, but I couldn’t get into the conversation because I don’t usually watch drama or read manga. Still, I thought that it would be better to just talk about something else than going with the flow even though I don’t understand it. Hence, I decided to talk about the stars.

Since I was with her friends, I couldn’t be the center of the conversation. So I merely shared my knowledge, little by little. For example, about her constellation, or my own, or the stars that I could find from the window of the hospital room.

The more we talked, the more her expression softened. It was obvious that she was less concerned about my presence, and more concerned about missing out on the excitement of the conversations with her friends.

The way she talked about her favourite things was so lively and powerful that I almost forgot she was in the hospital.

But when her friends bid farewell at the end of the visit, I felt a stab of reality.

“Is it that time already?”

If it wasn’t a visitation but a prolonged chat at the end of the school day, it would have been different. I could call home and say that I’ll be back later, or say I’ll see you in school tomorrow.

But the reality was that she was in the hospital and her fun was limited.

Even discounting the fact that she was still in compulsory education, I couldn’t stand to think about the weight of her environmental restrictions that prevented her from playing around freely. Something in me itched to do something―― I wished she would smile more.

I wanted to do something that would make her happy because she had the strength of mind to stand on her own without me having to worry about her.

I decided to give her something she liked: a manga. Since I had been around her and heard the conversations of her friends, I’ve learnt a lot about her preferences. It’s not too exaggerated or luxurious, and I could buy it with my allowance.

If I got it7 wrong, you could tell me.

After brooding and fretting over it, I finally arrived at the hospital and visited her alone for the first time, with a manga as a gift.

“Hmm? Are you alone today?”

She tilted her head.

“Do you like this?”

When I offered her a copy of the newly released manga,

“Esper?”

I couldn’t help but groan when she reacted by covering her mouth with her hands in surprise.

When I asked her why she covered her mouth, she smiled shyly and replied, “I thought I was talking in my head, so I unconsciously…”, which made her even cuter.

The way she laughed was relaxed, just like when she talked to her friend. Even though it was just me and her here. I couldn’t resist laughing along too.

“Kuresawa-kun, do you like this too?”

“No, not really. But I thought that you might like it.”

“Oh that’s a pity. But now I see. I do like it. Will you read it too, Kuresawa-kun?”

“Yeah. Tell me what kind of books you like.”

Her eyes brightened up.

I thought to myself, “Ahh… that’s nice.”

I wanted to see her face like this.

Amidst the warmth and joy, I listened to what she taught me about manga.

Friendship between men? ……Love? I wasn’t too sure about the content.

“This is where it gets very moe.”

I thought she was adorable as she babbled on.

There weren’t any clouds that night, and that just made the night sky look even more beautiful.

During the months of winter, I couldn’t go to her as often as I would have liked because of the increased risk of infection. But she was impressed with the gifts I bought for her every time I visited.

That day she asked me, “Can you tell me more about the stars?” and on that very same day, we talked till the end of visitation hours. My parents scolded me severely when I got home.

I made a mental note of my mom’s words: You can’t ask the person who visits you to leave even if it’s annoying. 

However, no matter how much we chatted, I was just another classmate who came to visit her once in a while in her eyes. I just didn’t know her well enough, to know that she had many other friends who were closer to her.

I was embarrassed of myself that I had created an image of her purely based on the information of her sickly appearance.

On the other hand, I heard from someone that she was discharged from the hospital while she was busy with her examinations. I didn’t know where her house was. This was the position I had (in her heart); still very, very remote.

I knew it too, but I still told her. 

I told her that I liked her and wanted her to go out with me.

I also told her that I wanted her to have a relationship with me.

“……Why are you telling me this today8? Is it because you won’t have any regrets if you get rejected?”

Her cheeks were bright red.

The air was chilly from the air-conditioning, which must have been harmful for her. I could keenly sense that it wasn’t my sudden confession that made me deathly pale.

The reason for it was that the look in her eyes was neither joy nor embarrassment, but rather suspicion.

“That’s because…… I can only meet you on graduation day, so I didn’t have time to tell you earlier. I don’t know your address, I don’t have your number. I heard you were discharged from the hospital, but you haven’t come to school at all. Are you still running a fever?”

“Yeah. I still have a little. ……Oh, I see, you’re right.”

She giggled and from her reaction, I knew that it was a long shot, the chances of it9 happening was low.

While my classmates were taking commemorative photos, there was a man and a woman talking at the end of the hallway, seemingly out of place. The stare (from others) that stabbed into my skin earlier annoyed me to no end.

The fingers holding the diploma tube were thin and slender. The shape of her nails was beautiful. I took a deep breath, trying not to get distracted by other things. If I didn’t do something now, I was really going to get rejected right here, without a second thought.

t/n: First arc, Kuresawa-kun! It can get a little confusing as there are sudden flashbacks or time skip, so I’ll just make footnotes to remind or warn y’all~ the author uses a lot of short and abrupt sentences… brain is frying as I try to decipher the sentences and make it a smoother read for y’all :”)

Jo-kun has been changed to Tasuku-kun! I’ve made a mistake 〒▽〒