New Year’s Shrine Visit For Passing Exams.

The first Sunday of the new year.

The six of us were walking through streets where the holiday mood still lingered.

Our destination was Yushima Tenjin in Bunkyo Ward.

With Sugawara no Michizane enshrined as the god of learning, it’s a highly popular shrine for students taking entrance exams in Tokyo.

We walked along the straight path from Okachimachi Station toward the shrine.

Yes, there were six of us here.

Me, Asuka, Isshiki-san, and my sister.

Along with Asuka’s older brother, Youta Ishida-san, and his girlfriend, who also happens to be my sister’s best friend, Kazumi Kano-san.

How did this random crowd end up going to a New Year’s shrine visit together to pray for exam success?

Well… it actually started with me.

It was the final day of tutoring for the year, right at the very end of December.

“Ah~, being an exam student is so incredibly boring~. We couldn’t even have a proper Christmas party this year.”

I interlocked both hands behind my head and stretched out wide.

Of course, there was a specific intent behind this behavior.

First, I raised flag number one.

But Isshiki-san didn’t pay any attention to my flag as he spoke.

“Every exam student goes through that. The Common Test is right after the new year, and private university exams start immediately after that.”

Hmph, I already knew a minor flag like this wouldn’t register with him.

Without losing heart, I laid down my next piece on the board.

“But come on, you only get three Christmases during high school. It’s my very last one as a high school girl, so naturally, I wanted a proper Christmas event.”

“Didn’t you enjoy plenty of them up until last year? I’m sure you had more fun in one of yours than I did during all three years of my high school Christmases combined.”

Gack, the conversation is shifting that way?

Does Isshiki-san still view me as nothing more than a high school girl who does nothing but play around?

Lumping a single-minded beautiful girl like me into that category is just plain cruel, isn’t it?

“Don’t talk about me like I’m some wild party girl. I’m actually pretty conservative! I told you right at the start that I’m still a virgin!”

But Isshiki-san didn’t offer a single reply to that.

He had been staring down at past exams and math workbooks this entire time.

Looking at him made a surge of irritation rise inside me.

“I assume you had a proper Christmas date with my sister this year, Isshiki-san?”

As expected, he didn’t answer.

But there was absolutely no doubt about it.

He refused to schedule any tutoring for December 24th, and my sister wasn’t home either.

Granted, given how uptight my sister is, she returned home well before midnight, but it was still undeniable that the two of them spent it together.

Must be nice, a proper Christmas date…

I could vividly picture the scene of Isshiki-san and my sister walking side-by-side through the festive Christmas illuminations.

Will I ever be able to take my sister’s place beside him?

Anxiety cast a shadow over my chest.

And to make matters worse… the tutoring sessions I had requested from Isshiki-san would officially end in just two months.

The amount of time I had left to monopolize him all to myself was slipping away rapidly.

I have to take action, even if it’s just a little bit…

Mulling over that thought, I decided to stop throwing subtle flags and state my desires directly.

“Can you at least take me to a New Year’s shrine visit to pray for my exams?”

“Wouldn’t it be better to spend that time studying for the Common Test instead?”

I had fully anticipated that he would say that.

But I was running out of time.

Just staying as tutor and student wasn’t going to close the distance between us!

If we change locations and head out into the city together, maybe something will shift.

I held onto that faint glimmer of hope.

And honestly… I just wanted to experience even a tiny bit of a date-like atmosphere with Isshiki-san.

“My sister went to pray for exam success right before her exams too! So it makes total sense for me to go! If a god sees one person who came to pray and another who didn’t, obviously they’re going to help the one who actually showed up!”

Hearing my passionate argument, he finally lifted his eyes from the reference book.

“Well, I guess going to pray for exam success is harmless enough…”

Yes! This meant I’d get to go on a date with just the two of us!

I was absolutely walking on air, imagining myself walking through streets filled with a holiday mood alongside Isshiki-san.

“I actually happened to be talking with Toko-san about going for a New Year’s shrine visit. It might be a good idea if you just tag along with us then.”

Hearing that, I felt like I had suddenly slipped right at the peak of the mountain and tumbled all the way down to the base in a single second.

From there, through some bizarre twist of fate, the couple of Ishida-san and Kazumi-san ended up joining the trip as well.

So it was going to be two couples, with a completely single me stuck right in the middle?

That is way too tragic!

There was no way on earth I could endure a setup like that!

And that’s exactly why I begged my best friend, Asuka, to come along.

“Huh~, but my big brother is going to be there too… No way, that’s awkward.”

Asuka resisted and grumbled at first, but she eventually gave in to my frantic pleading.

And that is how we ended up as an utterly incomprehensible six-person group consisting of two couples and two high school girls…

“Toko, your family didn’t go to Hawaii this year?” Kazumi-san asked my sister.

“Since Honoka has her entrance exams this year, we decided to skip it. The family is just relaxing at home.”

“Relaxing at home? So you haven’t gone on any dates with Isshiki-kun?”

“Yeah, today is actually the first time we’ve seen each other since the new year started.”

“Ah, so you haven’t done your himehajime yet.”

Kazumi-san casually blurted out something incredibly scandalous.

“My himehajime?”

My sister apparently had absolutely no idea what that word meant.

She asked back with a completely blank, clueless expression.

Come on, sister, you’re already twenty-one, right?

You should at least know that much. It’s common knowledge! Common knowledge!

I mean, even your younger sister knows it, so how does an older sister like you not have a clue?!

“Ah~, it went right over Toko’s head, huh. It means the very first time you have sex in the new year.”

Kazumi-san explained the meaning of himehajime without a single shred of filters.

Hearing that, my sister—and even Isshiki-san standing right beside her—stared down at the ground with faces flushed bright red with embarrassment.

“I guess since you haven’t even had your first time in life yet, Toko, asking about a himehajime was a waste of breath. My bad.”

Kazumi-san burst into a hearty laugh.

What are you, some kind of old-school anime character?

“Kazumi-san, is today also the first time you’ve seen Ishida since the new year?” Isshiki-san spoke up.

He was clearly trying to toss out a lifeline to my sister by changing the subject.

But that question had the exact opposite effect.

When it comes to stuff like this, Isshiki-san is catastrophically terrible at reading the room.

“Nope, we’ve met tons of times. We were literally together at a hotel from New Year’s Eve all the way through New Year’s Day afternoon. Right, Ishida-kun?!”

“Haha, yeah. Kazumi-san has an insane amount of stamina, after all.”

Ishida-san answered with a thoroughly infatuated, goofy smirk.

What an idiot couple… I cursed silently in my mind.

Normally, I didn’t dislike Kazumi-san’s blunt, uninhibited personality.

If anything, I liked her because she felt like a reliable older sister figure you could talk about anything with. She was way better than my late-blooming sister who completely shied away from that kind of talk.

But hearing that kind of talk right in front of the guy I’m in love with made me incredibly self-conscious.

Even though it had absolutely nothing to do with me, for some reason my cheeks started burning.

Glancing over, Asuka’s face was bright red too.

In her case, since the primary subject of the conversation was her own flesh-and-blood brother, the sheer embarrassment must have been multiplied tenfold.

Going to pray for exam success with these people… I feel like the god of learning is going to completely abandon us.

With that thought, I walked ahead with Asuka, deliberately opening up a distance from the two couples.

As expected of the New Year season right before university exams, Yushima Tenjin was completely packed.

The path leading up to the shrine was already congested, and the crowd in front of the steep stone steps looked exactly like a packed commuter train.

“The stone steps are pretty steep. It’s dangerous, so let’s walk while holding hands.”

Isshiki-san said so and firmly took hold of my sister’s hand.

“Thank you, Yuu-kun,” my sister replied, turning a radiant, happy smile toward him.

Tch, stop acting all lovey-dovey in a place like this! I grumbled inwardly.

Besides, if you’re holding hands because it’s dangerous, shouldn’t you be holding mine?

I’m the one taking the exams here.

What if I trip, fall, and end up injured?!

Squeezing through the dense crowd, we finally managed to reach the front of the main shrine building.

Please let me pass the Joto University entrance exam! And please let me commute to campus alongside Isshiki-san starting this spring!

It was a highly impure motive, making it highly debatable whether the god of learning would actually grant it, but I still offered up a powerful prayer with all my might.

After that, leaving behind the two pairs—the late-blooming couple and the idiot couple who were currently making a fuss over fortune slips—Asuka and I went to write on ema wishing plaques.

Naturally, I wrote “Pass Joto University” in massive letters right at the very top.

Asuka… predictably, wrote safe choices like “Meio University, East Japan Women’s University.”

With her brains, she’d undoubtedly pass both.

Once our prayers were finished, the six of us headed into a family restaurant to grab lunch.

Since everyone was already getting tired of traditional New Year food, a standard family restaurant meal was a welcome change.

We split up at the tables, with Asuka and me sitting together, while the two couples sat at an adjacent table.

The neighboring table looked incredibly lively.

They were talking about their university circles, making extensive travel plans for the long spring break, and cycling through a barrage of classic couples’ topics.

Seeing them like that made me painfully feel the massive gulf between an exam student and a college student all over again.

Sigh… if I knew it was going to be like this, I never should have asked to go for a New Year’s shrine visit.

“If it was going to turn out like this, maybe we shouldn’t have come for a New Year’s shrine visit after all,” Asuka muttered, perfectly giving voice to my inner thoughts.

But admitting that felt like conceding defeat, and I hated that idea.

“Hmph, come spring, the two of us are going to be on that exact same side.”

I gave the answer, glaring out of the corner of my eye at the neighboring table which was currently radiating a bright pink aura.

On the train ride back.

We were incredibly lucky that everyone managed to snag a seat.

Perhaps because they were exhausted, the idiot couple of Kazumi-san and Ishida-san were completely out cold, snoring like a pair of drunkards.

My sister was drifting off to sleep as well, nodding off right next to Isshiki-san who was tapping away on his smartphone.

I didn’t get to experience a single shred of a date-like atmosphere. If anything, it felt like I was just forced to watch a demo of how close my sister and Isshiki-san are.

Mulling over that frustrating thought, I stared down at the Yushima Tenjin amulet resting in my hands. This was something my sister had bought for me.

If only this was something Isshiki-san had given me instead…

“Honoka.”

Being called out of nowhere made me jump.

Before I knew it, Isshiki-san had stood up from his seat and was standing right in front of me.

“W-what is it?”

Partly because he had startled me, and partly because I had been left completely out in the cold the entire day, my tone came out a bit sharp and defensive.

“Toko-san bought that amulet for you, right?”

“Yeah, she did.”

“In that case, here’s something from me.”

Saying that, he reached out and handed me a set of academic success pencils that were sold alongside the amulets at Yushima Tenjin.

“Wait… for me?”

When I blurted out the question in disbelief, he smiled and answered, “Ishida already bought a set for Asuka-chan, after all.”

“T-thank you.”

I mumbled my thanks as I accepted the pencil set from his hand.

“People don’t really use pencils much these days, but when it comes to filling out the optical scan sheets for the Common Test, I think standard pencils work best. Consider it a good luck charm.”

Leaving only those words behind, he turned around and walked right back to his seat beside my sleeping sister.

It’s not that I don’t use pencils… it’s that it feels like a total waste to actually use these. Because this is something Isshiki-san bought specifically for my sake.

With that thought racing through my mind, I stared down intently at the pencil set resting in my hands.

As I sat there, I could feel a tiny pocket of warmth gently filling my heart…