It was October.
The air was cool. Leaves crunched beneath my feet. Cultural Festival banners were barely taken down.
And yet—There it was.In big, pink, aggressively sparkly font:
"Valentine's Blitz Event: Who Will lt Whose Heart?"
I stared at the poster outside the classroom.
And then I stared at the girl taping it up with a stapler gun.
Aya. Wearing cat ears.
Cat ears.
"You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?"
"Of course," she said sweetly. "The Love Arc Managent Committee decided the plot montum was sagging."
"There shouldn't be a managent committee."
She leaned in.
"So, chocolate or humiliation, Haruma?"
"I want neither. I want peace. I want grilled fish and a full night of sleep."
"Wrong answer."
She stapled a flyer directly into my soul.
By lunch, the school was a war zone.
Handmade chocolates exchanged like bribes.
Girls forming alliances.
Boys hiding in bathroom stalls.
Soone was selling "rejection-proof" perfu (it was just Febreze).
And sohow, every girl in my life was acting like it was totally normal.
Exhibit A: Kokoro.
She walked into class with a plain, rectangular box.
Dropped it on my desk.
"Here."
"...What is it?"
"Obviously a cursed object designed to test your emotional capacity."
"...It's chocolate, isn't it?"
"Yes. Shut up and eat it."
I opened it slowly.
It was perfect.
Handmade. No note. But inside the box, there was a tiny, folded line of paper.
I unfolded it.
It said, simply:
"Still chasing."
I forgot how to breathe for about five full seconds.
Exhibit B: Aya.
She didn't give anything directly.
Instead, she made sit on the floor while she painted hearts on small cookies.
"I'm not giving you any," she said.
"Then why am I here?"
"To watch ignore you with increasing fondness."
"You're the worst."
She grinned and flicked frosting on my cheek.
"You're in my heart, Haruma. But I refuse to admit it unless you beg."
"I will literally never beg."
"Mmhm. That's what they all say before Valentine's Night."
I choked on nothing.
Exhibit C: Natsuki-sensei.
Who, for the record, was supposed to be supervising this event.
Instead, she invited to the empty infirmary after school.
"This is where teachers store their chocolate," she lied, clearly not caring whether I believed her.
I followed.
There was no chocolate.
There was only her, sitting cross-legged on the bed, sipping wine from a juice box.
"You're spiraling," she said bluntly.
"Thank you for noticing."
"I can't tell if you're resisting romantic progress or just terminally dumb."
"Why can't it be both?"
She smiled.
"Take a seat."
I didn't.
But I did lean on the doorfra and ask:
"Why are you helping ?"
She tilted her head.
"Because I've seen what happens when soone like you loses the ability to pretend it's all a joke."
"...And what happens?"
"You beco honest."
That shut up.
Because that's what I feared the most.
Evening.
I returned ho with three chocolate boxes in my bag and the emotional weight of a tragic shoujo protagonist.
I opened the door.
Aya was in the living room. In a hoodie.
Watching a bad romcom and crying into a pillow.
She looked up at .
Sared mascara. Red nose. A single cookie in her hand.
"...It's not even a good movie," she sniffed.
I sat beside her.
"I know."
We watched in silence.
Then she leaned into , quietly.
And whispered:
"You have until White Day."
I blinked.
"What happens on White Day?"
She smiled.
"That's when I stop pretending I'm not serious."
And just like that—
My brain began conjuring futures.
anwhile...
In her own apartnt, Kokoro sat at her desk.
Writing.
No journal. Just a piece of paper she would probably never give .
On it, she scribbled:
"Valentine's is a trap.But I'd still fall into it for you.Even if you're the idiot who set the trap in the first place."
She folded the paper.
Tucked it under her pillow.
And whispered:
"One more Chapter."
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