CH 85

Flimsy



My taunting made Mary very unhappy.



“Hah …… they say the weaker the dog, the more it barks, right?”



“Woof woof.”



“Oh, sweet puppy, is it time for you to shut up? I’m in a bit of a bad mood.”



“Then I think it’s time for me to go home.”



I don’t like to chat with her.



“Do you want to get out of the car? Even if I told you we’re deep in the mountains with no streetlights and no houses around?”



“No, I’ll just do my puppy dog thing and lick your feet to get you in a good mood. Then I’ll ask you to take me home.”



“…… Boring. Can’t you react better, like Ryoma?”



“I’m not the main character. Mob characters can only do what the main characters want them to do.”



“I’m not the main character. You called me a subheroine earlier.”



“Subheroines are main characters too, right? Sub-characters have different significances, so I don’t think there’s anything odd about that.”



“…..Huh. Mob characters who understand the story like that are kind of a nuisance.”



Mary sighs exaggeratedly.



Then she hit the switch on her hand and lifted the filter on the window that was blocking the view outside.



“Ah, my house.”



And what I saw was my familiar home.



It seems that the car had stopped before I knew it. …… I couldn’t tell because the shaking was so small. It’s a rich people’s car indeed.



“I’m glad you dropped me off. Thank goodness it wasn’t in the mountains.”



“I wanted to leave you somewhere, you know? Kotaro is good at making me unpleasant.”



“Thanks for that.”



I wonder. This feeling that I am conversing with a superior person is very creepy.



I decided to get out of the car as quickly as possible, because continuing this conversation would only make both of us feel bad.



“Thank you very much for the ride.”



The elderly man who was probably driving opened the door for me, and I bowed lightly to him and thanked him. He smiled gently and slowly bowed to me as he saw me off.



“Hurry home, Grandpa. I’m tired, okay?”



“Understood.”



Mary said something very ladylike.



When I looked back as I was leaving, she was no longer looking at me. The man called she “Grandpa” closes the door to the back seat and walks back to the driver’s seat. Then the limo starts moving again.



After making sure they were left, I opened the front door.



“……I’m home.”



My voice was tinged with fatigue.



I was tired from the conversation with Mary.



I was feeling a little thirsty, probably because I had lost some of my nervousness. I went to the kitchen to get something to drink, but on the way, Azusa, who was in the living room, called out to me.



“Onii-chan, welcome back.”



“Ah, un…… I’m home.”



That’s unusual. She usually doesn’t welcome me back when I come home.



Although I was fiddling with my phone, my consciousness was fully focused on this.



“How was it at Shimotsuki-san’s house?”



“… Do you care?”



She didn’t want to go, but to ask questions as soon as I got home, I wonder if …… Azusa really wanted to go too?



“Well, it’s not like that. …… It’s just that the food looked so good.”



Saying that, she shows me the screen of her phone she was holding.



What is it? I looked at it and there was a picture of the food I had just eaten at Shiho’s house.



“Shimotsuki-san bragged to me …… ugh, if she showed me something like this, of course I’d regret it. I should have ignored the self-proclaimed Onee-chan and just gone to eat dinner …….”



Oh, that reminds me, Azusa and Shiho have each other’s contact information.



The two must be pretty much on the same page. They seemed to message each other frequently, and their message conversation seemed to have a large amount of history lined up.



Whatever the case may be, they are good friends.



Their touching, humorous relationship was comforting to me.



I feel like their interactions are filled with tender emotions.



It was not a frivolous conversation like the one Mary and I had.



(I knew it. So cute.)



Maybe it was because I was talking to a twisted person with a twisted personality earlier.



Thinking about the two of them, I felt as if my tainted mind was being purified…