The Reincarnation of a Commoner Couple - Episode 12

“Alright, Keita. Explain yourself. What is the meaning of this?”

Yikes. Mom is absolutely furious, smoke practically coming out of her ears.

Why is she so mad? Let me backtrack to when I got home.

I was studying at Azusa’s place today and came home when it started getting dark. Mom wasn’t back from work yet, so I whipped up a simple dinner. With time to spare, I figured I’d clean the bath so it was ready to be filled later and headed to the bathroom.

After finishing the bath, Mom still wasn’t home. So, I ended up having a smoke under the kitchen vent fan. It was just habit – I’d completely forgotten I was only a middle schooler.

And that’s when Mom walked in.

I should have apologized immediately, but forgetting I was a student, I just casually said “Welcome home” and kept right on smoking. My brain, usually rocking a 70 in academics, suddenly turned to total mush. Naturally, Mom blew her top.

Which brings us back to the beginning.

“Um, well…”

“How old are you right now?”

“Almost 15.”

“And how old do you have to be to smoke?”

“Twenty.”

“So you do know. Then why on earth were you smoking?”

“Sorry.”

The interrogation was calm and relentless. Seriously scary.

Then came 30 minutes of nothing but this calm, continuous scolding. All that effort to get good test scores to impress Mom… and I had to go and make this colossal blunder.

“Not that I’m one to talk, since I smoke too… But cigarettes are bad for you, you know?”

“I am painfully aware.”

“What? Did you suddenly get some rebellious phase? Wannabe delinquent? Trust me, that stuff is just embarrassing when you grow up. Why start smoking now?”

I wanted to say: ‘Because I was a heavy smoker in the future and couldn’t help it.’ Now she probably thinks I’m going through some chuunibyou phase or something.

“Sigh, fine. I’ll look the other way if you do it at home. But if you get caught outside and the police or the school calls… you know what’ll happen, right?”

“Yes.”

Unbelievably, I’d just gotten permission to smoke… at home. What would actually happen if I got picked up by the police? I had no idea, but I decided to act like I did. I really didn’t want this lecture to go on any longer.

“Alright. Conversation over. Let’s eat. Looks like you already made something.”

She gave me a light thwack on the head, and the lecture was finally over. Phew. I thought I was in for it way longer.

After that, we ate dinner while watching M-TV. I can only make simple stuff; tonight it was fried rice. It turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself. Not as good as Azusa’s, though.

“Thanks for the meal.” / “Thanks for the meal.”

“Oh, right! Didn’t you get your tests back today? How’d you do?”

Oh yeah. The scolding had made me completely forget. I’d meant to talk to Mom about my future plans today too.

“Got them all back today. Hang on a sec.”

I handed the test papers to Mom, who was washing dishes at the sink. And lit up a smoke right next to her. Puff.

“You… have some nerve…”

Mom looked utterly dumbfounded watching me smoke so brazenly. Guess she didn’t expect me to puff away so shamelessly right after the lecture. My apologies. A post-meal smoke is pure bliss.

“If you’d brought back lousy scores after all this, you’d have been in big troub… le…?”

Mom, done with the dishes, looked at the test papers… and her eyes went wide. Well, duh. I used to barely scrape above average, and suddenly my papers were covered in high scores.

“Did you cheat?”

Her first words were suspicion of cheating. Looks like Keita-kun’s credibility is in the gutter.

“Nope. I picked a target school, so Azusa and I have been seriously hitting the books.”

“Hard to imagine that from how you look right now.”

Well, yeah. An eighth-grader brazenly smoking in front of his mom? Definitely hard to picture.

“Huh. Guess you are smart, Keita. English is 100? Seriously?”

Hehehe. Well, I did invest some serious cash. Sank a pretty hefty sum into it. Gotta get results to make it worth it, right?

“And? You said you picked a target school? Where? Oh, and no private schools! Mom would die.”

Mom started smoking, laughing as she spoke. That joke isn’t funny. Seriously. Stop it.

“Chiba High. The public school with the highest entrance exam score requirements.”

“Pffft! You’re aiming for there?!”

Mom choked on her smoke, genuinely shocked. Well, yeah, suddenly declaring you’re aiming for the toughest school in the prefecture? That’ll do it. But I won’t budge on this. To become a streamer and flex with my academic cred, I have to work hard now. We’ll study our butts off for that academic clout!!

“Of course, I’ll keep studying like this. If I keep getting scores like this, I think I can make it.”

“Well, if Keita’s gonna work hard, I’ll support you… But don’t fail and end up at some backup private school, okay? Mom would die.”

I said stop with that joke. I won’t let you die, so relax.

“Is Azusa-chan aiming for the same place? Will she be okay?”

“Azusa got scores like mine this time too.”

“Wow, impressive. Welp, do your best.”

She handed the test papers back and patted my head pom pom. It’s just an ordinary family moment, so why does it make me so stupidly happy?

“Alright. Future plans discussed. Time to get serious about exam prep!”