A Story About a Handsome Girl Having Her First Kiss Stolen by an Equally Handsome Classmate - Episode 17

Friday, April 22

After school on Friday.

Wakamatsu was lying on the bed in Mizuhara Shizuku’s room.

“Hey, why don’t you tell me at school?”

“I’m talking.”

“No, no! We only talked about the bare minimum!”

Wakamatsu called out to his classmate, who was hunched over his desk.

I hardly ever talk to Mizuhara in the classroom. Unless Wakamatsu speaks to me, it’s just to collect papers and give administrative notices.

“No, we’re having normal conversations too.”

“That’s only when we’re together.”

“Hmm,” Mizuhara Shizuku sighed, looking bored.

Wakamatsu lay on his back and looked up at the white ceiling. After he had been daydreaming for a while, he was suddenly called out, “Hey.” He got up from the bed and approached his desk, where Mizuhara showed him the exam paper.

“I don’t understand this.”

The final essay question.

This is a question that summarizes what the author wants to say. Mizuhara stood up and urged Wakamatsu to sit down in his place.

After reading a page and a half of A4 paper, Mizuhara thinks about the answer to the problem he’s stuck on. When he verbally states that it might be something like this, Mizuhara compares Wakamatsu’s answer with the model answer. Mizuhara stands next to Wakamatsu and points to a sentence in the model answer, asking a new question: “Why would you lose points if you don’t include this in the answer?”

“You see, this is written separately from the other main points, but it’s one of the main points.”

“But there’s no word nearby to emphasize it.”

“It may be hard to understand, but there’s an example here. It’s important enough to me that I have to use an analogy.”

I see, Mizuhara said, as if it all made sense.

“Wakamatsu is understanding.”

“Is that so? Well, her Japanese grades are the best, though.”

“Yeah, I can get the hang of anything. Maybe that’s the secret to being able to do anything?”

I’m glad to receive your kind words.

“I’m not good at putting together sentences like this. Are there any tips?”

“Maybe I should mark the important points. I’ve never really thought about it that much.”

“Oh, well, never mind. I’ll ask my teacher about that.”

This time it didn’t seem to make sense to her. She took a picture of the answer sheet with her tablet in hand.

“Okay, submission complete.”

“Is that a past question from somewhere?”

“This is a cram school assignment. I’ve been catching up on the work I did while I wasn’t at school since spring break.”

Well, it’s true that when it comes to high school classes, some aspects can be difficult to study on your own.

The high school that Wakamatsu and the others attend is a well-known preparatory school in the local area, with over 90% of students going on to prestigious universities. No matter how much Mizuhara Shizuku has studied on her own, the first six months of high school will be a big challenge.SakugaokaSakugaoka

“Well, let’s go.”

“Oh, where? Aren’t we going to chill out together today?”

“I’ll take it easy, but I have to go buy some ingredients.”

“Ingredients…?”

Mizuhara puts the small eco bag in her pocket and packs her wallet and handkerchief into her shoulder bag.

“Let’s make aroma candles together.”

“Aroma candles? Is that something you can make yourself?”

“These days, you can make them with just tools from a 100 yen shop. Let’s go shopping.”

He took my hand and we went to a shop inside the station.

Mizuhara had written down what he wanted to buy beforehand, and while looking at his shopping list, he went around each section in order. The small store stocked just what he needed, in the quantities he needed.

Since returning home, I stepped into the kitchen for the first time and helped her as I was told. I poured water into a saucepan, heated it, and melted the chocolate in a double boiler. We crushed the crayons we had bought earlier and colored them however we wanted. While Mizuhara was able to color them beautifully, Wakamatsu ended up with a dull color, despite being an art major.

“You told me to bring perfume. Give it to me.”

“Oh, so that’s why I told you to bring the whole case.”

Wakamatsu dripped her favorite perfume into the wax. Mizuhara also dripped her own perfume into the candles to give them a scent. With the exhaust fan running at full blast, they continued their work.

Prepare a paper cup and use chopsticks to hold the wick melted from the candle in the center. Pour the melted candle wax into it and you’re done. Leave it at room temperature until it cools and hardens, and then you can take it out.

I chat with Mizuhara while waiting for it to cool down in the living room.

“Mizuhara is so stylish, this is the first time I’ve made something like this.”

“I heard that smells have a relaxing effect. So I thought I’d try making one.”

“Oh, I see.”

While drinking the tea that my classmate made for me, I thought about where to display the candle in my room. If it has a relaxing effect, I might put it on my bed or desk. It’s a bit of an eerie color, but it should look pretty nice when lit.

Once the wax had hardened, I cut a slit in the paper cup with a cutter and removed the contents. The finished candle was a bit clumsy, but well-made.

“Hey, let’s exchange.”

“Exchange?”

Will he exchange this candle with this eerie color scheme for the beautiful one that Mizuhara has?

Wakamatsu feels sorry for the extremely unfair trade.

“It’s okay, don’t worry. I can love you even if you’re clumsy.”

“What are you talking about? Young pine smells nice.”

“Picture?”

I am flustered by Mizuhara’s words.

“They say smells are directly linked to memories. So, please remember me at home too.”

In other words, Mizuhara Shizuku also remembers Wakamatsu.

“But Wakamatsu’s smell isn’t the usual one.”

“Yeah, on weekdays. Mizuhara smells just like the usual Mizuhara.”

“Yeah, I wanted Wakamatsu to remember.”

“What’s that?” Wakamatsu said, smiling shyly. She also seemed to enjoy it and showed me an innocent smile.

“How about a kiss on the way home?”

“Of course not. See you later, Mizuhara.”

On his way home, Wakamatsu went outside while being teased by Mizuhara.