My Childhood Friend And The Rainy Season And An Umbrella

According to my childhood friend, “Lately a lady down the street told me the rainy season and autumn have vanished and now it just jumps straight to summer or winter… but I think climate change has only shifted the rainy season and autumn away from the old baseline temperatures — it’s not like they’ve actually disappeared.”

…apparently. Long, isn’t it? Is it like how, for older folks, a thousand-yen bill still means Natsume Sōseki? Or is it just that adults have their rainy season and we have ours?

Anyway, that’s my childhood friend all over: someone who talks in ways you can sort of follow and sort of can’t. Sakura Ayuri, that is.

“Ugh, it’s getting hot out~”
“It’s still only June, though.”
“It’s already June, huh~”

On the morning walk to school, in weather warm enough to make me waver over switching to my summer uniform, she was heading in beside me to carry out our proper duty as students.

“Ayu, when are you switching to summer clothes?”
“Mmh, I’d rather not wear them if I can help it… but sweating is even worse…”
“You hate sweating and you hate dealing with the sweat, huh, Ayu.”

This senior, Kazufuku Hotaru, is here with us too. …Well, we’re neighbors, so there’s nothing strange about that, but knowing her, I can’t help sensing a faint ulterior motive behind the way she’s pushing the summer uniform, like she’s angling for a chance to take pictures.

“No, I do deal with it? Or else Hotaru and Hina get so nag— …so enthusiastic about doing all kinds of things for me.”
“Actually, there’s a new product I’d really recommend that I want you to try~…”
“There it is. I’m perfectly fine with the same cheap one every year, you know…”
“This scent, you just might love it, Ayu! And it matches mine!”

The tacked-on part is her real motive, that senior. Year in and year out she competes with Hina to run this borderline scent-marking routine on Ayu; you’d think she’d have gotten sick of it by now.

And so, more or less like this, June arrived.

Honestly, I’m not big on the heat myself, and knowing the temperature is only going to climb from here, the school days ahead already feel like an absolute slog. Summer break, hurry up and get here.

◆◆◆

“Huh?! It’s going to rain today?!”
“Why so formal all of a sudden…?”
“Yep, it is~”
“What did you think I was carrying an umbrella for?”

Three separate retorts landed on the flabbergasted Ayu. Lunch break had rolled around, and the four of us were eating with our desks pushed together when the talk drifted to the weather.

“I figured the thing Gin had was a parasol~”
“Think about the season. Early summer or not, it’s June.”
“It’s the rainy season, after all~”

Come to think of it, it was surprising Hotaru had walked in with us without saying a word about it; she lives for this kind of meddling.

“I see… so it was my chance to break out my favorite umbrella charm, huh…”
“What kind of thing were you planning to put on it?”
“Um… this one, the one I got out of a gachapon machine. It’s clear material, really pretty.”
“That’s the one you hunted like crazy for and finally won a while back, isn’t it? It looks like it’d get stolen — don’t.”
“My old umbrella broke, so next time I’ll put it on my backup vinyl umbrella!”
“That’s a combo that looks like it’d get walked off with, umbrella and all~”

The prizes from the machine Ayu won are seriously popular, after all. Besides, isn’t the whole point of a charm to keep your umbrella from being taken by mistake? Hanging that one on it would only invite the opposite. How does that even work?

◆◆◆

“So, after school has arrived.”
“It’s really coming down~”

At the entrance hall we survey the great outdoors… or rather, Ayu stands rooted to the spot. It’s a solid downpour, the kind that guarantees a soaking if you make a run for home.

“Mmh~ okay then, according to plan: up to the station, it’s me, Momozono Hina. From there, Gin and Ayu go the rest of the way sharing an umbrella — let’s do it like that~”
“Huh? But I don’t want to — I’ll get wet.”
“Oh dear, she’s cool, but she treats people just as cold.”

It’s already hot enough as it is, so why do I have to go getting all clingy on top of it? They say fools don’t catch colds, so Ayu of all people will be fine.

Waiting isn’t going to stop the rain, so the second I moved to step outside…

“Waaait! A~yu! Everyone~!”

…a voice I’d already heard once that morning came ringing down the hallway.

“Huh… Hotaru? What’s wrong?”
“Phew~ I made it~… Club’s off today, so I thought I’d walk home with you and the others, Ayu.”

Doesn’t she usually walk home with her own classmates? Does this person even have any frie—

“I do have friends, you know? When I mentioned I might get to walk home with Ayu, they happily sent me off.”

…She just casually read my mind. This person is terrifying.

“Ayu didn’t bring an umbrella this morning, right? So I figured she’d be in a bind~ I really ought to let her share mine, I thought — so, here!”
“…That’s a folding umbrella, Hotaru. It’s tiny — we’ll be sticking out of it.”
“You’re right, so we’ll just have to snuggle up close.”

This senior is absolutely doing it on purpose. The fact that she didn’t breathe a word about the umbrella this morning makes it a premeditated crime.

“Se~ni~or, Ayu’s already covered, so please, do head home with your classmates~”
“Hina, you split off around the station, don’t you? After that, I figure I’ll be the one she needs~”
“Gin will be here, so it’s all good~ she’s covered~”
“Ginko… this is what they call a showdown, isn’t it…!”
“It sure is.”

For me, though, it’s a showdown I’ve been watching since elementary school. And judging by the oddly gleaming look in Sumire’s eyes, she’s got quite a personality of her own.

Ayu, incidentally, tends to freeze up into a statue in situations like this, exactly as she’s doing now. She used to play peacemaker, once upon a time.

◆◆◆

“Honestly, Hina’s just unfair. It’s already enviable that she’s in the same year and class as Ayu, and here she is trying to cut into my time with Ayu on top of it.”
“Maybe so~”
“Everyone’s so lucky… getting to spend their youth with Ayu. And me, I was thinking ‘at least let me be in the same club,’ but Ayu won’t even join one…”
“Maybe so~”
“Do you think so too, Ayu? We really are what they call mutually in love, aren’t we~”
“It’s so hot~”

Isn’t this supposed to be the part where two hearts share an unspoken understanding? Either way, it sure doesn’t look that way from where I’m standing.

In the end, Hina walked Ayu under a shared umbrella as far as the station, and Hotaru took over from there. She did, but since Hina had spent the whole way flaunting just how clingy she was being, the moment it became her turn the senior got every bit as clingy with Ayu, refusing to be outdone.

“There, there~”
“Sto~o~op~”

(So slow…)

At the station, Hina peeled off with a deeply sour look and Sumire with a somehow satisfied one. Hina knew perfectly well this was how her needling would play out; if she was going to pull a face like that, she shouldn’t have gotten so clingy in the first place.

That said, it had been bad enough during Hina’s turn, but once the senior took over, the pace only crawled slower still. Between doing the shared-umbrella routine under a tiny folding umbrella and moving at a snail’s pace on top of it, I really wished she’d spare a thought for the person stuck keeping her company.

“…Oops. As reluctant as I am, I’d better say goodbye around here.”
“Finally…”

In the end, the sluggish trudge home dragged on right up to the last possible moment before we parted with the senior. That was a long haul…

“Well then, Ginko, I’ll leave the rest of Ayu to you~”
“Huh?”
“Whoa there—”

Just as I was psyching myself up that home was only a little farther, the senior’s umbrella swung in close, and the next instant, with a light tonk, Ayu got bumped out from under it and tipped over into mine. I ended up catching her in my arms, and by the time I lifted my head, the senior had already backed well away from us.

“H-hey, Senior! You could’ve just lent Ayu your umbrella!”
“Because it’s going to rain from the morning tomorrow~!”
“Then I’ll be using it in the morning too, so it comes out the same either way!”
“You two live closer than I do, so it’s fine, right~? Well then, bye-bye, you two!”

She shows up out of nowhere, stirs everything into chaos, and blows off like the wind. This senior is basically a walking typhoon. Even so…

“Um… Gin… is this okay?”
“…Well, it’s fine.”

I can hardly tell her to walk the rest of the way home in the rain, not after we’ve come this far. So, resigned, I decide to grant her the shared umbrella.

“…”
“Hey, Ayu, you’re too far. You’re getting soaked.”
“B-but…”
“It’s fine, I don’t mind.”

Even when I keep tilting the umbrella her way, she drifts off again for some reason, and there’s just no end to it. I hate the heat, but if she actually caught a cold it would weigh on me, so I grab her slightly damp shoulder as she dithers and pull her in closer.

“…Those two act like that because they don’t know about that thing, but you know, right, Gin? Doesn’t it ever cross your mind that I might be thinking something improper?”
“That thing… ah, the whole ‘Ayu’s a reincarnator’ business?”

It’s not as though those two would treat you any differently even if they knew, believe it or not.

Well, none of that matters right now. What matters is how I actually feel about it.

“Not really. I mean, it’s not that I don’t believe you, but it’s only you saying it. And you — that time I told you they use bugs to make strawberry milk, you just went ‘huh’ and drank it anyway, remember? It’s the same as that.”
“My secret is on par with bugs?”

After I said it, a thought hit me: the part where some people, once they learn the truth, might be startled or put off? That’s the same too.

And I’ve decided, at the very least, not to let it get to me. Odds are Hina and Hotaru, heck, even Sumire wouldn’t be bothered either, though saying so out loud would never convince Ayu.

“…We’re almost at your place, Gin.”

As we talk, we’re already standing in front of my house. Well, even Hotaru’s place is only far from ours in relative terms; by any normal standard it’s close, so we get there in no time.

“Yeah… here.”
“…Gin?”
“Senior Hotaru said so herself just now. It’s going to rain from the morning tomorrow, so you, Ayu, are going to get up early and return my umbrella to me. Got it?”

I force the umbrella into Ayu’s hand. They say fools don’t catch colds, but really they just don’t notice they’ve caught one. And trailing all the way to Ayu’s place myself would be a pain.

“See you, then.”
“…Gin!”
“…What?”

When I turned around under the eaves of my front door, there was Ayu, holding my umbrella and looking my way.

“Um… well…”
“I’d kind of like to get inside soon.”
“…Well… thank you, Gin! See you tomorrow! Make sure you change out of those clothes!”
“…Yeah, you too, Ayu.”

All that dithering over what to say, making me wait, only to land on that. Thinking as much, I watched Ayu run off.

“…Time to change.”

My shoulder had gotten a little wet, and if I of all people ended up catching a cold from this, there’s no telling what Ayu would say.

After my eyes met Ayu’s just once, with her heading into her own house and my umbrella in hand, I opened my front door.

The next day, Ayu really did get up early and come to my house. And not just that: she came right into my room where I lay sleeping and woke me up in person, no less.

I didn’t tell her to go quite that far.