VOLUME 6

Chapter 2: Part 3

Now then, as Sera and Haruna made preparations for the birthday party, I took Yuu with me and was having fun shopping with her.

I would’ve liked to have researched what Yuu wanted and bought her something here, but there was going to be a surprise party later, so I decided it was best to not bring up the fact that it was her birthday. Also, I had definitely gotten something for her already. Something that I’m sure Yuu would enjoy.

“What do you want to eat today?”

I asked that question almost like we were husband and wife as I stared at the mountains of vegetables in front of me. Yuu tore off a memo from her memo pad and showed it to me.

I want nabe today. = “Yuu wants to eat nabe!”

Nabe, huh? Nabe on a birthday was a bit… and we also had cake for later… but she might get suspicious if I were to say no here, so maybe I should first ask her what kind of nabe she wants.

“What kind of nabe?”

Dark Nabe of the Seven h.e.l.ls (1)

What kind of nabe was that?! Also, it really was a bit weird to eat nabe before cake… wait. Tomonori and Orito were coming too, right? Okay, so it might be correct to do something that everyone could partic.i.p.ate in. Alright, let me at least try to make this a nabe a bit more special.

“Let’s do shabu shabu then.”

Wonderful.

Cabbage, s.h.i.+take mushrooms, konnyaku noodles… rustling sounds filled the air as Yuu and I threw anything we could get our hands on into our basket.

We shopped around until it was nine at night. We just wandered around and around the supermarket, wondering if we should make the shabushabu Korean-style, or maybe we should make it into oden instead.

When it becomes this time of year, I always think something.

As I picked out the cheap, strange things I was going to feed to Orito, I heard Yuu speak up to me.

“Something poetic about autumn or something?”

I wonder if I really should’ve been born.

Her memo stopped me cold. Yuu still didn’t have any expression on her face, but I could’ve sworn she looked a bit lonely. Trying to hide my shock, I began to move my hands again and answered her with a smile.

“Of course you should’ve. Why are you thinking about something like that?”

Today is my birthday.

Her words once again stopped me cold. I had no idea whether I should just continue to feign ignorance here while hiding my shock…

“I-It is? I didn’t know at all. So it was today… congratulations.”

Congratulations?

“Ah, I mean…” I tried to push down my shock and took a deep breath.

“Happy birthday.”

I let a full smile show on my face and put a hand on Yuu’s sparkling silver hair.

That was close. It seemed that my acting abilities had kept me safe though.

I do not feel happy at all.

Her pretty blue eyes looked up at me.

Yuu had the power to change fate. If she was happy or sad, if she showed just a bit of emotion, then bad things would happen to the people around her. That’s probably what she was saying.

Up until now, I had already died once and was forced to deal with troublesome people like Haruna and Sera.

But, Yuu, I had also met you, hadn’t I?

Those words came to me, but I thought they were way too clichéd and ended up keeping them to myself.

TRANSLATOR’S NOTES

(1) Dark Nabe is a style of nabe where people sit in the dark and just toss whatever they want into the pot (in anime, these things are not always edible).