Date Her Instead Vol. 6

Chapter Eighteen: A Mother's Feelings

Ever since Haruna had disappeared, Kanako had been a wreck. She tried texting and calling, but never got an answer. Eventually, she tried talking to Haruna's parents, but when Haruna's mother answered the door, she remained very tight-lipped. The best Kanako got out of her was permission to search Haruna's room for clues, which was where she found the girl's phone, along with all of Kanako's missed messages.

With no way to contact her, Kanako became even more worried, and it was really beginning to show. Her hair was getting more and more unkempt by the day, the only thing keeping it from being a completely disheveled mess being the tie for her ponytail. Her makeup, while never very noticeable in the first place, was dropping to levels of non-existence. Even her uniform suffered, with the bow becoming more and more loosely tied by the day.

The only thing Kanako cared about was finding Haruna, and she was willing to sacrifice any extra time possible to do that. Unfortunately though, no matter how much time she spent, her other resources were even more limited. Having little money and a spread-out geographical area, there wasn't much Kanako could do in terms of actual searching. She asked shop owners, restaurant servers, even people on the street if they had seen Haruna anywhere, but the answer was always the same: no.

Kanako was starting to run out of options. Without enough money, she couldn't afford transportation to get to other places that Haruna might be. To go along with that issue, Iwanai wasn't very close to other towns. Once she checked the surrounding area, any other place Kanako would want to go would be some distance away, meaning more in travel costs that she didn't have. With each passing day, the situation was looking more and more bleak.

Since the time Haruna had vanished, Kanako had also tried to enlist her friends to help, specifically Jasmine and Chiyo, but even they seemed to be at a loss. Haruna had never just up and left before, nor did she have any places she talk about frequently that she might be at. On top of that, both gals seemed to be preoccupied with other issues, so Kanako didn't want to bother them too much. "She can't have gone too far," Kanako thought. "I know I can find her!"

And yet, despite that determination, Kanako had come up dry. Sitting on the stairs during lunch, it was Thursday, April 8th. Haruna had been gone for more than a week, and Kanako was beginning to feel girlfriend withdrawal.

"Where is sheeee?" Kanako moaned. "After everything that's happened, we finally get together, and then she runs away again! It's like trying to keep a stray cat!" Next to her, Hinami giggled. "I-I never knew Endo-san was so fickle." "She can be," Kanako said with a definitive nod. Then, her expression became more somber. "But that's also another part of her I love... I love all of her... I... miss her..." "Kana-chan..." Hinami let out, seeing how depressed Kanako was getting.

"What am I going to do if I can't find her...?" Kanako said, barely audible. "Y-You keep saying that she has to be nearby, r-right?" Hinami offered, but Kanako shrugged. "Yeah, but I've looked all over the place nearby, and she wasn't there. I guess it's possible that somebody could be hiding her, but I doubt it. After all, Haruna never had many friends." "T-That's kind of mean," Hinami said. "But it's true," Kanako said. "Even when we were kids, I was the only one Haruna played with. She didn't really have any other friends until Chiyo came along."

"D-Do you think C-Chiyo or H-Hiraoka-san are helping hide Endo-san?" Hinami asked, but Kanako shook her head. "I don't know Jasmine-chan that well, but if she was helping Haruna, I feel like she would've told me. And if Chiyo was helping Haruna, it's more likely she would've found a way to get Haruna to face her issues rather than run away."

Then Hinami suggested something more worrying. "W-What if she's in t-trouble? Like, k-kidnapping?" After saying that Hinami looked at Kanako, but the girl didn't seem to have much of a reaction. "To be honest," she began. "I considered that, but I'd like to think that Iwanai isn't a place where people just get kidnapped." "B-But what if-" Hinami said, but was cut off.