ajisai | s. shinichiro

九

🗀 Rejection: 9

Airi couldn't help but get lost in her thoughts that caused her to be unaware of her surroundings - unaware of how her schoolmates would pass by the classroom she's in, unaware of how loud or low their voices are or how she failed to see Shinichiro enter her classroom and sitting down in front of her desk. 

Who could you blame, Airi kept zoning out. Would she take up going to cram school or not? Was it a good idea to go to a cram school or not? If she went to cram school, she'd completely not see her father. But, that would mean Takashi would be alone with Luna.

"Hello?" A voice and a hand waving in front of her face suddenly snapped her out, lifting her head up to see who it is, blinking twice. "You were so lost in your head that you didn't hear me call your name three times...or maybe four." It was Shinichiro, sitting with the backrest on his chest. "What's going on inside your pretty little head?"

Heaving a sigh, she leaned down to her side to take out her pencil case. "Nothing." Airi responded plainly. Placing her pencil case on top of her desk and followed by her sketchbook.

"What...you aren't hungry?" He asks, his eyes slightly wide. "It's like lunchtime. Just how deep have you gone into your head?" He asks again, his eyebrows furrowed at her.

The girl shook her head, flipping through the pages of her sketchbook until she lands on the next clear page. "I'm just too lazy to eat right now." Was all she could say, taking out her mechanical pencil.

A sigh then escapes Shinichiro's lips before he extends his hand out to her, motioning his hand up and down. "Give it to me."

The girl leaned down to her side again to pick up her lunch box inside her backpack, handing it to him afterwards. But as the tip of her lead stick and paper meet did she realize - what was she going to draw anyway?

"Here" Shinichiro spoke to her again, holding onto a chopstick that carried a piece of sliced egg roll. Immediately, Airi's face flustered at the idea of him feeding her. But since she wondered that she was taking too long to eat it and making his arm hurt, she leaned in and ate it.

"Thanks" She responded while chewing.

"Thought you'd let my arm fall first or something!" He tells her, a smile painting on his face as he watches her chew, to which he extended his hand out to feed her again.

"Aren't you going to eat too?" Airi asks before taking a second bite.

"How can I eat when I'm taking care of you?" Shinichiro replies. "If you want to pursue art, at least don't forget yourself." He adds.

And because of that, the feeling of guilt suddenly sank into her. She thought, he could be anywhere by now - could be with his friends having fun at school or probably asking out another girl who would immediately say yes to him. But why

Why

Why

Why

Why

Why

Why did he pick her instead?

Slowly extending her hand out to take a hold of the food stick that's stabbed a cherry tomato, she raised her hand up and leaned it close to his lips.

"If I'm going to eat, you should too." She says, looking away while her cheeks flared red.

Shinichiro could only blink his eyes while he looked at Airi. His cheeks too flared red in color while his heart thumped inside his chest. He believes he's making progress again!

"You're so cute, Airi chan!" He tells her, happily eating the cherry tomato off the stick.

"I'm just embarrassed that I'm the only one eating alone!"

"But still means you were thinking of me right? Are you finally falling for me too?"

"The only thing that's falling here is the food in the chopsticks."

"Ah!"

The following day, later that afternoon, on her way to her destination, Airi couldn't help but admire how the afternoon sun made everything around her glow in golden orange. The sun descending down on the vast horizon in the west, the houses and roads bathed in warm, glittering light - though it was bright and glaring, it is getting ready to give way for the moon.

Yesterday, their homeroom teacher decided that it was best to merge all the five sections of their class, be grouped by pair to prepare themselves for the national mock exams. And as almost one hundred students gathered, it still so happened that she was paired by none other than Shinichiro.

"I'm wondering if I did something good or bad in the past to deserve this" Airi couldn't help but mutter to herself, a hand holding onto a watermelon carrier on her way to the Sano residence.

As she stopped and knocked on their gate, she patiently waited outside for Shinichiro. And all the while she is waiting, she fixed her hair and her skirt, wondering if she'd bump into his mother again in the case she's discharged from the hospital.

"May I help you?" It was a small, old man that opened the gates.

"Ah- I'm a classmate of Shinichiro kun!" Airi beams, failing to notice the surprised look of the elderly man in front of her. "Is he home? Were actually going through a pair work and study together!"

"I see." Spoke the elderly man. "But please come in! Shin's at home." He smiled to her, opening the gate more widely for her to enter.

"Thank you so much!" Airi beams again, entering their home premise. "Oh, I also brought a watermelon on my way here!"

"You didn't have to!"

"But I insist!"

. . . . . . . . . . ♡

While waiting for Shinichiro to come out of the shower, Airi sat down on their open patio. She couldn't believe at how big their house is. Sure he did have three younger siblings after him, the house still looked too big to shelter five people. But nevertheless, she admired how homey their house feels.

Feeling the soft grass underneath her the pads of her bare feet, she swung her dangling legs forward and backward. Spring season would eventually pass them by and soon the summer season would be coming. The glaring sun and the humid air just around the corner. Unconsciously, Airi leaned the side of her head against a wooden pillar as her eyelids suddenly grew heavy on her, causing her to fall asleep.

By the time she opened her eyes again, she felt embarrassed how she had fallen asleep. But though she did fall asleep, she was greeted by six children standing before her with curious faces, their eyes wide in curiosity, staring at her as she too stared right back at them.