Energy Spent Where It Counts
Warm weather and a comfortable classroom are the finest sleeping aids a student could ask for.
And Mitsuki, as it happened, was especially susceptible.
She swayed.
"..."
She swayed again...
I let my gaze slide very naturally away from the blackboard and toward the side.
Right next to me, Nanase Mitsuki was waging a desperate, brutal war against sleep, her face the very picture of someone about to conk out at any moment.
To be precise, there was a strong chance she was the only one who considered it a war.
Her eyes were already half closed, and her right hand was still gripping a pen—but I honestly couldn't tell you the last time that pen had moved with any real purpose.
Her head, above all, kept bobbing forward at a steady rhythm, only to jerk its way back up and begin the descent all over again.
Her head dipped down.
And then.
"...!"
Startled, apparently even by herself, she gave a small jolt through the shoulders and snapped her head back up. After that, she stared at the blackboard as if nothing had happened at all.
I saw that.
I saw it very clearly.
Forcing down the corners of my mouth as they tried to climb, I lowered my gaze back to the textbook.
It was true that today's weather was perfect for dozing off. The sunlight streaming through the window was warming my shoulders and arms to a pleasant degree, yet the classroom itself wasn't hot—the air conditioner overhead kept up a steady stream of gentle wind...
Warm sun and cool air landing on you at the same time. Sitting still under those conditions, it was only natural for the strength to drain right out of your body.
Add to that the hushed atmosphere unique to first period in the morning, plus the teacher's even, droning voice, and you had a genuinely respectable sleep environment.
Honestly, I was a little drowsy myself.
Still.
Not to that extent.
Beside me, Mitsuki's head wobbled again. This time, instead of dipping forward, it tilted slightly to the right before slowly drifting back. Her long white hair, flowing all the way down past her waist, swayed with the motion and settled back into place, and a few strands that had slipped down beside her face stayed stuck to her cheek.
Any other time she would have brushed them away in annoyance, but right now she couldn't even spare the energy for that.
"..."
I was staring again.
No.
Pay attention to class.
I faced forward once more and traced the sentences the teacher had written on the blackboard with my eyes.
One line.
Two lines.
And at some point—
My gaze had drifted right back to the seat beside me.
Am I insane?
At this point, the problem wasn't Mitsuki. It was me.
Well—no, it was true that Mitsuki drew the eye whether you liked it or not. Waist-length, snow-white hair and vivid red eyes, paired with a slightly upturned gaze that seemed to tease people even when she wasn't doing anything, plus the tufts of hair jutting out on either side of her head.
She didn't get called a fox at school for nothing.
She was also taller than most girls her age, so she caught people's attention just standing still in her uniform, and her overall silhouette was striking enough that when we walked down the hallway together, it wasn't rare for someone to turn and look back.
That wasn't just me seeing things because I liked her.
It was objective fact.
At least, that's what I wanted to believe.
But right now, the atmosphere around her was a little different from usual. The mischief that always danced in her red eyes had come loose with drowsiness, and the sharply slanted corners of her eyes had softened, giving her a far gentler look than normal. There was none of her trademark sly smile at the corner of her mouth, her shoulders hung slack, and that fox-like aura she usually carried had all but vanished.
When she's sleepy, she really is like a different person.
Not that her personality changed or anything. But her body looked ready to power down at any second, while those fox-ear tufts sticking up on either side of her head stayed mysteriously perky—which made me wonder if they weren't some independent life form, separate from the sleep entirely.
"Now, this part has a good chance of showing up on the exam, so make sure you mark it."
The instant the teacher said that, Mitsuki's eyes flew wide open.
The word exam had apparently gotten through loud and clear. She raised her pen almost by reflex and began underlining her textbook.
Swoosh.
At first, a single proper sentence.
But then—
Scriiitch.
The pen didn't stop.
It sailed past one sentence, invaded the next, and by the end there was one long, unbroken line stretching across nearly an entire paragraph.
"..."
I pressed my lips together for a moment. Don't laugh. The teacher was right in front of us, and if I made a sound now, I might get caught before Mitsuki did.
Meanwhile, Mitsuki herself, with no idea what she'd just done, was staring at her textbook with an expression of utmost seriousness.
It leaked out anyway.
"Pfft."
Mitsuki turned her head very, very slowly.
"...What."
Even her voice was already half asleep. I pointed at her textbook with my finger.
"Is all of that on the exam?"
Mitsuki looked down at her own book too. She gazed at the long, runaway underline for a while, then nodded breezily.
"Yep."
"...The teacher said one sentence."
"The parts below looked important to me."
"And not because you were asleep and missed it?"
Mitsuki glared at me. To be precise, she tried to glare, but her eyes were already half closed, so it lacked its usual menace.
"I wasn't asleep."
"Then what did the teacher just say?"
"That it's on the exam."
"Before that."
"..."
Silence. Her red eyes darted very slightly to the side.
I knew that expression. She doesn't know. One hundred percent doesn't know.
And yet a few seconds later, Mitsuki said, with perfect composure:
"That it's on the exam."
"...You already said that."
"I said it twice because it's important."
Unbelievable. Shameless. Her brain could be half shut down from sleep and her confidence would still be open for business.
I gave up and bowed my head, laughing.
"Why are you laughing?"
"Just thinking you're amazing."
"Is that a compliment?"
"It's amazing that you'd take it as one, too."
Mitsuki pouted her lips very slightly, as if registering a complaint, then looked forward again.
And that tiny little expression caught my eye all over again for no good reason.
Ah.
This was the problem lately.
Mitsuki and I had known each other since before I could even form proper memories. Open our family album and it starts with photos of us lying side by side in diapers. I've seen her crying at kindergarten while a teacher comforted her. I've seen her scrape her knee falling on the elementary school playground and get furious about how unfair it was. During middle school exam season, I watched her drag me out to study together, then face-plant onto her desk and fall asleep within thirty minutes—more times than I could count.
So by all rights, there shouldn't have been any reason for me to be looking at Mitsuki now and thinking pretty or cute. Logically, that's how it should be.
Reality was not particularly logical.
At some point, I'd started noticing the little things I'd once breezed past without a second thought. The way she tucked her hair behind her ear. The way her eyes crinkled first when she was in a good mood. The way she pouted slightly when something displeased her. And now, the way her speech slowed down when she was sleepy, softer than usual.
Once I started paying attention, there was truly no end to it.
Is this what it's like, when you fall for someone?
It wasn't exactly a question I could ask anyone. And the fact that the person I'd fallen for happened to be a childhood friend of seventeen years only made it worse.
Mitsuki still treated me exactly the way she always had. Chatted with me casually. Asked for help when she needed it. Borrowed my things so naturally it almost didn't register as borrowing.
And above all—
She had virtually no walls around me.
Not that we'd gone all the way to being that close. It was just...
Ren is Ren.
That level of familiarity.
And that, more than anything, was enough to drive a person crazy.
"Ren."
I cut off my thoughts and looked over.
"What."
Mitsuki was watching me through half-lidded eyes.
"Do I look sleepy to you?"
For a moment, I couldn't find the words.
A little?
A lot.
Enormously.
At nearly collapse-on-the-spot levels.
But my conscience nudged me to scale it back.
"...A little."
Mitsuki nodded.
"Figured."
"Figured what?"
"I thought maybe I was."
"You just noticed now?"
"I was fine until a minute ago."
With that, she covered her mouth with one hand and yawned long and deep.
"Aaahhm..."
She wiped the moisture gathered at the corners of her eyes roughly with the back of her hand, then tried to open her eyes again.
They didn't cooperate.
Blink.
They opened a beat late.
Again.
Blink.
This time even later.
Before I knew it, I was watching the whole thing.
Then Mitsuki suddenly turned her head. Our eyes met.
"...What."
I debated for a second, then just told the truth.
"I was watching to see when you'd fall asleep."
Mitsuki narrowed her eyes.
"I'm not sleeping."
"You've dozed off like, what, several times already."
"Several?"
"Three, maybe?"
"Once."
"Then what were the other two?"
Mitsuki thought about it for a moment.
"My head just went down."
"That's called dozing off."
"No, it's not."
"Did your head move all by itself, then?"
This time she thought even longer.
"...Gravity?"
I turned away and laughed, finally. Honestly. During exchanges like this, at least, nothing had changed from before. Falling for her didn't mean everything transformed overnight. Mitsuki was still Mitsuki, and I was still hanging onto every piece of nonsense that came out of her mouth. It was just that now and then, some inexplicably ticklish moment slipped in between.
"Ren."
"Now what."
Mitsuki lowered her voice a little this time.
"If I really fall asleep, wake me up."
I started to answer, then stopped.
It was such a trivial request. The kind you could make because we sat next to each other, the kind that came even easier because we were childhood friends. And yet when Mitsuki said something like that to me so casually, it made me happy for no reason at all.
Which was, frankly, unfair.
So I did what I always did and started with a joke.
"A hundred yen per wake-up."
Mitsuki's eyes widened a fraction.
"Are you insane?"
"Service fee."
"You charge your childhood friend money?"
"Childhood friend or not, a worker's a worker."
"Then friend discount."
"How much."
"Ten yen."
"That's a ninety percent markdown?"
"Seventeen years of friendship, remember?"
"Shouldn't a client that old get a loyalty premium instead?"
"You're a crooked merchant."
Mitsuki snorted a laugh.
And then—
Her red eyes curved, soft and gentle.
...Ah.
That again.
And I'd be willing to bet the very first time was that, too.
The day I first truly realized I liked Mitsuki. Thinking back on it now, there had been nothing to it. No big event. No one in danger. Just an ordinary day.
Was it the walk home from school? In front of a convenience store? The exact place has gone a little hazy by now. All I know for sure is that I'd said some throwaway remark, Mitsuki had tilted her head slightly upon hearing it, and then she'd smiled.
The corners of her mouth lifted. Her red eyes crinkled into thin crescents.
That was all.
And yet, strangely—
That day, for the first time:
She's beautiful.
That thought came first. A smiling face I'd seen countless times over a decade and a half. And of all days, that day. Of all moments, that moment. She'd looked impossibly, absurdly beautiful.
It was utterly irrational. All it took was one eye smile. That single thing, and my childhood friend of seventeen years suddenly started looking like a girl.
Come to think of it, Saegusa said something similar yesterday, didn't he. Mitsuki smiled at him once in the hallway, and that one eye smile was enough to make him fall for her.
...Annoyingly, I get it.
I had no right to say anything. If anything, I was worse. He'd only known her a month—but I'd watched her for over a decade and still tripped over the exact same spot.
"Ren."
"...Yeah?"
I snapped back to myself. Mitsuki was looking at me.
"Why are you spacing out?"
"I'm not?"
"Your eyes just went completely unfocused."
"That's your fault."
The words were out before I could stop them.
Mitsuki stared at me for a beat.
"...Me?"
Ah.
I smiled like always, smooth as anything.
"You kept dozing off, so it was distracting."
"Ah."
Mitsuki bought it without a shred of suspicion.
Yep. Zero radar for this kind of thing. At least where I was concerned.
Ding-dong-dang-dong.
Just then, the bell rang to signal the end of class. The teacher closed the textbook and wrapped things up.
"We'll stop here for today. PE is next, so don't be late getting to the gym."
The moment those words landed—
"...PE?"
Mitsuki's red eyes, half dead with sleep only moments before, flew wide open.
I laughed in disbelief.
"What, suddenly you're alive again?"
"PE is different."
"Different how?"
"Different because it's different."
Airtight logic.
Mitsuki immediately started rummaging beside her bag and pulled out a black racket case first. Inside was the carbon badminton racket she'd bought specially for herself. She was perfectly entitled to use the school equipment, but she loved badminton enough to carry her own racket around—and whenever PE rolled around to that sport, she'd be in pristine condition, to the point you'd question whether she'd really been the one dozing off minutes earlier.
"We've got badminton today, right?"
"Probably."
"Yes."
Then she reached into her bag again and pulled out her gym uniform.
And then—
with unbearable naturalness—
she grabbed the hem of her uniform shirt to change right there at her desk.
"...Hey."
I froze.
Mitsuki tilted her head.
"What?"
"What are you doing."
"Changing."
"Here?"
"Yep."
Her face was the picture of innocence. The hem of her shirt rose a few centimeters, revealing a patch of snow-white stomach, and I whipped my head away almost by reflex.
"Hey!"
"Why are you yelling?"
"Why do you think!"
Mitsuki, for her part, genuinely didn't get it.
"I'm just changing into my gym clothes."
"Then why here!"
"Everyone changes here."
"I'm not everyone!"
At that, Mitsuki paused to think.
And then she said, with the utmost, most infuriating certainty:
"...But you're Ren?"
"..."
Right. I know. I'm Ren. Childhood friend of seventeen years. Comfortable for you. Safe. Someone you don't need to think twice about.
That doesn't mean you need to prove it by undressing in front of me.
Before I could get another word out, a sharp voice erupted from behind us.
"Mitsuki!"
It was Hinako. Aoi was right on her heels. Hinako, face flushed red, grabbed Mitsuki's arm, while Aoi pressed a hand to her temple like someone who had already given up on everything.
"What do you think you're doing!"
"Changing."
"Not HERE, you're not!"
"Why not?"
"Why—?!"
Hinako nearly shrieked. Aoi exhaled quietly.
"Nanase Mitsuki."
"Yeah?"
"Where does your common sense go sometimes?"
"Why are you bringing this up out of nowhere?"
"The fact that I even have to explain is what's hopeless."
Mitsuki looked genuinely aggrieved.
"It's Ren, though."
Hinako fired back instantly.
"Ren is still a boy!"
"...I know that?"
"Your face doesn't say so!"
"No, I do know."
Mitsuki tilted her head, still thoroughly baffled.
"Ren is Ren."
I found myself staring off into the distance for no particular reason.
Was that a nice thing to hear? A sad thing? At this point, I honestly couldn't tell anymore.
"Just go."
Aoi took hold of Mitsuki's other arm.
"Where?"
"The changing room."
"I can change right here in a second, though."
"No."
"Why."
"Stop asking that."
And so Hinako and Aoi hauled Mitsuki off between the two of them. Even in the middle of it, Mitsuki somehow managed to hang onto the racket case with one hand.
She really will not let go of that thing.
Watching her retreating back, I let out a small sigh.
"...What on earth did I fall for in a girl like that."
A few minutes later.
Mitsuki came back in her gym clothes wearing a completely different face from the girl who'd been dying of drowsiness moments ago. Her red eyes were bright and wide awake, and having pulled the carbon racket from its case, she rolled her wrist loose and walked toward me.
She stopped in front of me, and—
Grin.
smiled with her eyes crinkling into crescents.
"Ren."
"...What."
Sliiide.
She pushed open the classroom door, glancing back at me over her shoulder.
"Bring it on, scrub!"
"...Hah."
There it was. So this was what she looked like.