X-Day Decided!

The following Monday, 3:00 PM.

A coffee shop at a station far from the university.

This was the same place where I had first told Toko-senpai about everything.
I arrived ten minutes before our scheduled time.

Toko-senpai arrived five minutes early.

“Early as usual, I see,” she said, taking a seat as soon as she spotted me.

“I can’t exactly keep you waiting, Senpai.”

When I replied, she gave a wry smile. “You don’t need to be so formal about that.”

I felt a small sense of relief. She was the same Toko-senpai as always.

On Saturday night, she had sobbed as if pouring out all her pent-up emotions. That was the first time I had seen her vulnerable side, and ever since, I felt like her presence in my heart had shifted. I had been afraid that if she also felt something had changed between us, we wouldn’t be able to meet like we used to.

“So, about the plan going forward…”

After ordering a lemon tea, Toko-senpai cut straight to the chase.

“Now that it’s clear Tetsuya and Karen-san are having an affair, I have no intention of dating him indefinitely.”

“Right. I feel the same way.”

I had been thinking about that too. I couldn’t keep dating Karen while pretending to be her fool forever.

“Regarding the timing I mentioned at the start—‘dumping them when they’re most in love with us and spending the night with someone else’…”

I waited nervously for her next words.

“I’ve decided on Christmas Eve.”

“What?”

I blurted out in surprise. Isn’t Christmas Eve a bit soon? It’s late October now, so we only have about two months. Granted, a “cruel breakup” on the holy night that lovers spend together would deal a massive blow to the other person, but still.

“What? Is there a problem?”

Toko-senpai looked at me with searching eyes.

“No, it’s not exactly a ‘problem,’ but… I’m just wondering if I can make Karen love me enough to not want to let go by then.”

After all, it currently feels like Karen’s feelings are drifting away from me.

“Are you saying you don’t have the confidence to make Karen-san head-over-heels for you in two months?”

“Well, like I told you over the phone yesterday, right now it feels like her heart is leaning toward Kamokura-senpai.”

“Still so timid, aren’t you?” Toko-senpai said, sounding a bit disappointed.

“That’s exactly why it has to be ‘now.’ The three-month mark in a relationship is the crossroads where a couple either burns brighter or cools down and fades away.”

“Is that so?”

“At least as far as I know. People tend to reconsider their relationships at one month, three months, six months, one year, and three years.”

Whoa, I thought. That’s a lot of checkpoints.

“Couples who break up at one month are usually those who ‘dated on a whim but realized it wasn’t a fit.’ Many don’t even count those as real relationships.”

On a whim, huh. Still, “don’t even count them” sounds a bit harsh, doesn’t it?

“Three months is the period where, if the chemistry is good, you start seeing the best in each other and the love deepens. Conversely, if the chemistry is bad, the flaws start to grate on you, and you cool off thinking, ‘I don’t belong with this person.’”

Well, put that way, it made sense.

“You and Karen-san are at that three-month mark right now, aren’t you? How have you felt about her until now? Before finding out about this?”

Before the affair came to light, huh?

“Let’s see. I think I was pretty crazy about her. She’s my first girlfriend, after all. I did feel like ‘maybe she’s different from what I expected’ occasionally while dating, but it wasn’t a huge sense of wrongness.”

As I spoke, the fun days I spent with Karen flashed back to me. My heart began to throb with pain. But then…

“I see. A ‘first’ is always special…”

Those sad words from Toko-senpai struck my heart like a physical blow—thump! It was a shock many times greater than the pain of losing Karen.

…I knew it. Toko-senpai still feels that way about Kamokura…

Thinking that made my chest feel tight, as if the oxygen had been sucked out of my lungs.

“But if you were feeling that something was off, Karen-san might have been feeling it even more. If you can’t manage to ‘make her love you’ at this timing, do you think you’ll have the confidence to do it further down the line?”

The end of her sentence was laced with a sharp edge.

She was right. This wasn’t a problem that time alone would solve. In fact, the more time passed, the more disadvantaged I might become. But…

“I understand what you’re saying, Senpai. It’s true that procrastinating won’t improve the situation.”

Toko-senpai nodded silently.

“But I don’t think it’ll be easy to pull her heart back when it’s already drifting away.”

“It might not be easy. But given the current situation, I think it’s still entirely possible.”

As I looked at her with a puzzled expression, she explained.

“Karen-san is still hiding her thing with Tetsuya from you, right? That means, even now, Karen-san thinks ‘Isshiki-kun is my primary partner.’”

I suppose that’s true.

“Her feelings might be leaning significantly toward Tetsuya. However, I don’t think Tetsuya is that serious about Karen-san yet.”

I looked at Toko-senpai again. This wasn’t just overconfidence. Just looking at outward appearances, Karen couldn’t compete with her. Not even if Karen wore her “cute girl mask” every single day.

“I can judge this from Tetsuya’s usual attitude, but this ‘trip’ confirms it. Karen-san talked to you as if the trip was a ‘done deal.’ But Tetsuya was only at the ‘maybe’ level. In other words, the trip plans could fall through depending on my attitude.”

It’s true. If Toko-senpai told Kamokura “Don’t go on that trip!” right now, the whole plan would be ruined.

“How does a woman feel when a trip she’s looking forward to is canceled last minute by the man? I can control that.”

Toko-senpai said it as if it were nothing.

She’s incredible. More than just impressed, I was starting to find her a little terrifying.