Even during class, I kept thinking about the lover rules.
In contrast to Sumire’s “one kiss a day” rule, I was allowed to make one rule of my own.
First period, second period… Not only did the lessons refuse to enter my head, but I couldn’t think of anything at all.
Instead of thinking about rules, the kisses I shared with Sumire kept flickering through my mind.
Does she really plan to do that every day?
Well, it’s not like I hate it or anything, but…
It makes me nervous, and it takes a lot of energy.
Even today, Sumire’s turn is still left.
When our eyes meet during break, Sumire flashes a meaningful, knowing grin.
She could just do it already, but she’s totally making me wait on purpose.
She doesn’t plan to pull something in the classroom while taking advantage of a blind spot, does she…?
I find myself doubting her.
The rule itself is shady, and it feels like she’s going to twist it to suit her convenience.
And Sumire is having fun watching me like this.
So, I probably should come up with a rule so I don’t just keep getting played with, but…
“Hey hey Sumire-cchi, did you do that? The Golden Week homework.”
Hearing voices from the seat behind me brought me back to reality.
Riko Aisaka.
That is the classmate who has been hanging around Sumire a lot lately. When break time rolls around, she goes out of her way to come over from a distant seat just to talk.
This is already the second time today.
She was messing around and making a fuss right at the start of morning greetings, too.
Her seat is at the very front of the second row from the classroom entrance.
She was in the front seat even before they rearranged the seats. Even after the shuffle, it hardly changed at all. She just makes a joke out of it, saying she’s seriously cursed.
As I strained my ears to listen, I heard Sumire’s voice.
“What homework?”
“You know, the math workbook. The one due after school today.”
“I have no idea, but I didn’t do it.”
“Seriously? As expected of Sumire-cchi, we’re in the same boat!”
Why didn’t you do it?
She said her trip got abruptly canceled over GW, but what on earth did she do instead?
「I wonder if Fujii-kun did it? Should we ask him to let us copy it if he did? Should we ask?”
Riko Aisaka whispered.
Stop meddling with the boy next to you.
He’s definitely the type of person who is bad at that kind of thing. It sounds like they are whispering, but since I can hear it, the person in the next seat probably can too.
“Hey hey, Fujii-kuuun.”
“H-Huh, yes?”
“Riko-rin wants to see your math homework if you’ve done it.”
“R-Riko-rin?”
“Her.”
“Don’t call me ‘her’, hey!” Riko Aisaka snaps at Sumire. I can vividly picture that boy’s troubled face.
“Then how about this, let’s split the work! If the two of us do it, we’ll barely make it in time.”
“Isn’t it fine even if we don’t do it~?”
“Ah, it’s fine, I see… Wait no, we’ll get caught!”
Their laughter stings my back. They look like they’re having a lot of fun.
With that exchange just now, the distance between them has changed before I even noticed.
Also, why aren’t they asking me?
I actually did my homework properly, so I would totally let them copy it. That said, it would feel weird for me to bring it up first.
After messing around with Sumire for a bit, Riko Aisaka went over to another girl’s seat.
That girl looks serious and quiet. They clearly don’t match types.
As expected, that girl stands out in a different way.
Even though she looks trendy, it’s like she hasn’t quite made it into the class’s top clique.
Speaking of which, Sumire leans toward standing out too. But the vector is different.
I sometimes think she might actually manage to hold her own against the flashy kids in class.
…No, wait.
None of that matters right now.
“Hey, I thought of a rule.”
I turned around to face the seat behind me, which had finally quieted down.
Sumire, who had been fiddling with her smartphone, abruptly raised her head.
“Eh, you thought of a rule? What? What kind?”
Her voice lifts with excitement.
I flatly announced right to Sumire’s face:
“Can you stop talking in the classroom?”
“Ha?”
“In the back seat. You’re too loud.”
The smiling expression on Sumire’s face froze into a blank stare.
“…What do you mean?”
“What do I mean, exactly what I just said.”
We stared at each other in silence.
Now that we’re dating, we do couple-like things. Dating means respecting each other’s opinions, and to do that, we should put the rules we need to follow into writing.
I just proposed one of them.
“That’s not a lover rule at all. Are you trying to destroy my school life?”
No, I didn’t mean to… Huh? What did I just say?
“…Ah, you don’t mean like, ‘Don’t talk to anyone except me’ or something? Um, Aoi-san, doing that all of a sudden is a bit…”
“W-Wrong, wrong! That was a gag! It was a joke!”
“A gag~? That wasn’t even funny, it was actually kind of scary?”
I’m getting confused myself just from saying it.
I’m scared of myself, too.
“Besides, are you still thinking? Hurry up and decide! I thought of my ‘one kiss a day’ rule in like ten seconds, you know?”
Is it really okay for her to push a rule she thought of in ten seconds onto me?
It’s not like I couldn’t think of anything either. I have ideas. It’s just that I wasn’t sure about them, so I hadn’t brought them up.
“Well then, um…”