How We Met Again

Chapter 31: A Query in the Cold (Part One)

When I arose the next morning, it was cold.

A sudden drop of temperature had struck overnight, plunging the night air merely a handful of degrees above freezing. The insulation in our apartment was far from perfect, and I shivered as a draft allowed the frigidity of the outside world to infiltrate our home. With a murmur, Raiha turned over in her sleep and curled further into her futon, and I glanced down at her face as I got up to begin my day.

Things are simpler when you're in elementary school.

Somehow, that thought made me laugh to myself. My own problems weren't quite the end of the world either -- even if they had felt like it the previous night. While I still wasn't happy about the situation, I had eventually decided to try and avoid catastrophizing. In the end, the ones who controlled how much time we spent together were Yotsuba and me.

Eventually, Raiha and my dad woke up, and we had a nice breakfast together. As we ate, Raiha rambled about the anime she'd been watching, a monologue I'd tried to follow despite having no idea what she was talking about. The most recent episode of 'Five Piece:Re', the sequel series to Five Piece which had begun coming out after the movie's theatrical run, had apparently ended on a dramatic cliff-hanger, something Raiha was explicating on in a suitably melodramatic fashion over her meal.

I made a mental note to ask Yotsuba about it when I saw her next. If I remember...

After finishing our food, my dad took Raiha to school, and I departed on my own after waving goodbye. November had come in full force, and I was shivering on my way, my uniform jacket drawn close against my skin in a desperate attempt to cling to my body's warmth. A ward against the cold.

Arriving at the school gate, I was grateful to hurry across the grounds and step through the front door. While the air inside of the school wasn't all that much warmer, at least the wind was kept off by the thick walls. Opening my footlocker, I changed my footwear, my sock-bound feet having all their warmth leached away by the cool floor.

As I closed the locker, the sound of the school door opening again rang out across the room, and I glanced over to see the Nakano quintuplets entering the school.

Yotsuba was the first to notice me, and waved as she came up to me, a gesture I returned with a smile. The rest greeted me in their own ways, save Nino, who distinctly turned her nose up with a hmph. As she walked by, I narrowed my eyes at her, a gesture she no-doubt saw -- but, to my surprise, she simply turned and walked away instead of prolonging the confrontation.

Shaking my head, I turned to Yotsuba, who had a frustrated look on her face. There was a strange anxiety to the way she was standing, shifting her weight from foot to foot with her eyes locked onto me.

Is... something wrong?

"Morning. Are we still good for tomorrow?" I asked, an acidic, coiling feeling slithering in my gut -- a feeling I'd come to recognize quite well as anxiety.

Oh no. It's contagious.

Yotsuba hesitated... and then nodded, a frustrated look on her face.

"I should be, I think. I tried asking Eba-san about adjusting the schedule, and she mentioned something about Saturdays in passing, but she hasn't gotten back to me about it -- so I'm going to assume I'm free. I'm hopeful that we can move the Tuesday session to Sundays moving forward, so that I have Tuesdays free after school..."

She trailed off, an awkward look on her face -- but a sense of warmth passed through my chest at her words, and I couldn't help but smile.

"I'm just glad you're trying. Thank you."