Her name was Amamiya Iori, the same girl who had recently experienced a tumultuous series of events, including a knife threat and memories of a past timeline.
Since she was small, she had a childhood friend named Kondo Yuuichi, whose relationship with her had become increasingly complex due to her mother's expectations and her own growing resentment. He was a little boy who always ran after her.
Because their mothers were very close, Iori and Kondo Yuuichi soon became good friends too.
"Iori! Let's play together!" he said.
"Mm, sure," she answered.
At that time, Iori thought Yuuichi was cute when he ran after her, and she felt like an older sister taking care of a little brother.
She did not mind looking after him at first, but as time passed, the constant pressure to prioritize him over her own desires began to weigh heavily on her.
However, her mother's increasing control over her life and the expectations placed on her friendship with Yuuichi began to suffocate her.
"Where are you going? No, you can't. I already told Yuuichi's mother that you will visit today," her mother said.
"Huh? But I already said I would play with my friends..." Iori said.
"You can do that next time. Your childhood friend Yuuichi is more important, right?" her mother said.
"But..."
"Do you understand?"
"...Okay."
Because she had no special plan, Iori had made a promise to play with her friends.
But her mother told her to cancel it and go to Yuuichi's house instead.
In the end, Iori could not go against her mother's wishes.
Luckily, her friends understood she had something important to do, but she still felt very sorry.
"What is a childhood friend, really?"
From that day, Iori began to have this question.
Day after day, no matter what she did, she spent it at Yuuichi's house, staying with him and his family, then going home. The day ended like that.
On school days, Iori went to Yuuichi's house to wake him, then they walked to school together.
But when she thought about it, she noticed it was not her own will. It was her mother's requirement.
"It's so nice that Iori is here. Will you marry me one day?" Yuuichi said.
"Yeah, yeah! Marry my big brother!" his sister added.
"Yes, be Yuuichi's bride! I would love a daughter-in-law like you!" Yuuichi's mother said.
They all smiled like a happy family, and then Iori's mother joined them. Iori herself only watched with a cold feeling.
Her mother kept saying Yuuichi's name, again and again, and Iori slowly grew tired of it.
She once thought Yuuichi was cute, but now the constant pressure to be with him and the lack of autonomy in their relationship made him feel like a burden.
Yuuichi's mother and sister praised Iori in ways she did not understand, as if she must care for Yuuichi. It made her feel very uncomfortable.
Little by little, she began to feel sick of everyone around her.
Just because they were childhood friends, her mother and Yuuichi's family believed they must always stay together, leaving Iori with no room to express her own desires.
"Then what am I... what am I, really?"
Who was she?
Iori wanted to shout this at someone.
She had always been pushed to stay by Yuuichi's side. If she said she did not like it, she was scolded. If she said no, she was slapped.
Was she only there to make Yuuichi look good?
Was she just a label that people could stick on him?
She wanted someone to tell her... what did it mean that she existed as Amamiya Iori?
But she was only a child, so she kept everything inside. Without noticing, she put on a mask called a "smile".
When she was with others, she began to see herself as someone else. Thinking this way made life easier.
She did not need to think too much. She only had to play the "Amamiya Iori" they wanted.
As long as she followed what they asked and did not go against them, no one would complain.
Whatever she did, if she only nodded, no one would question her.
So, with that mask, she built a wall between her heart and her face. This was how she kept her small world safe.
She was still a young girl, and she also dreamed about the stories in shoujo manga.
The love between childhood friends in those stories was always so sweet. Her friends at school talked about it with sparkling eyes, but Iori felt nothing.
Maybe it was just her own thought, but giving everything to a childhood friend felt like being a puppet, moved by others, with no will of your own.
When she read these stories, she even had a dark thought... maybe the characters were brainwashed when they were small to love their childhood friends.
"What is a childhood friend, really?"
Iori kept this question in her heart.
But there was one thing she knew for sure. For her, the word "childhood friend" was a curse.
From small to now, she lived with that "childhood friend" label stuck on her.
However, one day came when she could not hold it anymore.
"Iori, today you also need to go to Yuuichi's—" her mother began.
"No! I don't want to listen to you anymore!" she shouted.
"Iori?" her mother said.
Iori tried to stay cold. She thought she could keep her wall and live like that.
But her heart was not as strong as she hoped. For the first time, she fought back. She did not care if her mother got angry. She did not go to Yuuichi's house. Instead, she ran away to a place far from there.
It was called running away, but she did not go very far.
She went to a nearby park. Maybe she was scared to go too far alone.
"Uu... I... I hate this... I hate myself like this!" she cried.
She sat alone on the swing and cried.
But even if she cried, she knew she must go back. Her small rebellion only existed in that moment. After that, she would return to the same life.
Thinking that made her heart sink again.
"What are you doing here alone? Your eyes are so red... were you crying?" a voice asked.
But that day was not like the others.
For Iori, that day became the turning point that changed her life and stayed with her forever.
"Uh... what should I even do now?" the voice said.
In the world where Iori believed nothing would ever change, a bright light suddenly entered her life.
A boy stood there with a bamboo sword for practice on his shoulder. Sweat covered his forehead, so he was likely just done with kendo training at school, a detail that would later resonate with Iori's newfound interest in exercise.
"You're... uuu!" she cried again.
"Don't cry! Um... sigh, girls are really hard to handle!" he said.
This was Iori's first meeting with Shimizu Ken.
In that empty park, he had spoken to her because he saw a girl crying alone. But after he spoke, she cried even harder.
She still thinks she must have troubled him a lot.
"I really don't know what to do with you..." he said.
"Ah..."
Ken slowly reached out and touched her head, trying to calm her. He did not know what to do, so he used the only idea he could think of.
His warm care reached Iori, and to her surprise, she stopped crying.
"What happened?" he asked.
"Well..."
Iori told Shimizu Ken everything with an open heart.
After listening, Ken folded his arms and said "Mm, mm," with a troubled face.
"That's really hard to fix..." he said.
It was a very difficult problem for him too. They were only in primary school. Asking someone her age to deal with something like this felt cruel, Iori later thought.
When she looks back now, she can smile about it, but back then she was still a child and almost cried again.
Seeing her eyes fill with tears again, Ken looked around in panic, trying to find something he could do.
"I might not be much help, but when you feel sad or worried, you can try some exercise," he said.
"Exercise?" she asked.
"Yes. Like kendo, um... but that may be too hard for you. Maybe start with something easy, like running," he suggested.
Later, Iori realised that outside of Yuuichi, this was the first time she had spoken so much with a boy.
Feelings she could not name filled her heart, as if a new world had opened.
"Oh right, I need to go somewhere after this. Want to come with me?" Ken asked.
"Yes!" she answered at once.
At that moment, she did not think about Yuuichi or her mother anymore.
Ken took her to many places, showing her a world beyond her confined existence, but the one she remembered the most was the playground, where she felt a sense of freedom and joy she had never known before.
"There are so many different things here!" she said.
For Iori back then, the playground felt like a new world.
There were many things she did not know, but Ken taught her how to play, and they had fun for almost an hour.
However, even happy time must end.
Iori looked at the clock on the wall and felt it was time to go, so she told Ken.
The sky grew dark, and because he had taken her around so much, Ken said he would walk her home.
"So warm," she whispered.
Ken held her hand again, and the warmth he gave made her not want to let go.
"Mm..."
Only then did Iori notice her heart was beating fast because of that warm touch. She did not want to let go of his hand.
When they reached her house, both her mother and Yuuichi's mother were waiting at the door, looking worried, their faces a mix of concern and anger.
They must have been searching for her. If she went to them now, she would surely be scolded even more than before.
Iori could not take a step, so Ken gently held her hand again.
"Don't worry. Let's go," he said.
"...Okay."
Ken smiled at her and told her not to worry. She nodded and walked with him toward the mothers.
Yuuichi and his sister ran to Iori the moment they saw her, and the mothers followed at once.
"Sorry, I took Iori everywhere with me. I had so much fun that I forgot the time," Ken said, slow and calm.
The mothers seemed to think he was the reason Iori had not come home, so they glared at him.
Because Ken took all the blame, their looks grew even more cold, but Iori felt a deep gratitude toward him for shielding her from further scolding.
Iori tried to speak up and say it was all her fault, but Ken stopped her.
"No, it's not like that... I..." she tried to say.
Ken softly told her again not to worry, then faced the older mothers without fear.
Maybe the mothers did not want to scold a primary school boy too much, so they said nothing.
But once Iori was home, her mother scolded her for a long time. She told Iori never to see Shimizu Ken again or play with him.
"Shimizu-kun was so cool..." Iori thought.
When Ken stood up for her in front of the mothers, she truly thought he looked cool.
As she remembered their meeting, Yuuichi and his sister were saying something beside her, but her heart did not freeze like before. Instead, it was full of hope. She wanted to know when she would see Shimizu Ken again.
"Shimizu-kun, when will we meet again?" she whispered.
They had not said when or where they would meet. They simply went separate ways that day.
Notes:
• Amamiya Iori - JK heroine; targeted; her mother is the hostage. Long-haired and busty.
• Kondo Yuuichi - Original main protagonist; timid; Iori’s childhood friend; freezes despite push.