TL: Furby
ED: DannY
I imagined the sight of it.
Kamokura clinging to Touko-senpai as he bawls his eyes out.
In spite of it, she would push him away without batting an eye.
And the one beside Touko-senpai would be me…
… If we managed to make this into reality, wouldn’t it be the greatest revenge?
Seeing me immersed in my daydream, Touko-senpai hurriedly waved her hands in a fluster.
“No, wait! I didn’t mean it like ‘cheating’!
What I meant was that if I were to do what you proposed, Isshiki-kun, I wouldn’t do it right now. Don’t misunderstand me!”
She spoke with a flushed face, denying her previous words.
Ohh, so it was only a hypothetical situation…
So there are times when even Touko-senpai will get this agitated and speak this much and quickly at that.
“Anyways, for now we should wait and see. Whether Tetsuya and Karen-san are cheating or not, the first thing we need to do is find some hard evidence.”
“Wait and see… And what exactly does that entail? Are we just going to leave the two of them to themselves like this?”
Still somewhat skeptical, I asked.
I did not think my heart could take any more if we left it like that.
“It’s not that we’ll literally do nothing. We’ll start by carefully watching both of them without making a fuss or pressing them with questions. The matter of getting our hands on some definitive proof of their affair takes priority.”
“What is this ‘definite proof of their affair’ that you speak of, Touko-senpai?”
I thought that the image of their message exchanges would have been more than enough proof already…
“Yes, you’re right. Normally, for a trial to determine that an ‘adultery’ has taken place, you’d need evidence along the lines of them having entered a hotel alone together or that the accused entered the house of a member of the opposite s*x and spent the night alone with them…”
After pondering for a bit, I voiced my opinion.
“Then isn’t it a given that the place where they’re having their affair is Kamokura-senpai’s apartment? The two of us are commuting to university from our own houses, but if I remember correctly, Kamokura-senpai is leasing an apartment in the city, no?”
“I don’t think that’s it.”
Touko-senpai rejected my idea in an instant.
“Tetsuya is renting a room together with his older brother who’s a company employee. That’s why he can’t easily take along a girl there. Also, to do something like taking a girl to his apartment; I can’t imagine Tetsuya would do something so risky and with chances of me finding out.”
{TL/N: “兄さん” can mean Older Brother or a middle-aged man so I had a look at the WN raws and I decided on going with a middle-aged older brother}
I see. If that’s what Touko-senpai, who was Kamokura’s girlfriend, says, that must be how it is.
“That means that the two of them are meeting somewhere outside then, right?”
“Yes. That also makes pinpointing their love nest a difficult task.”
“It makes me wonder, how long have the two of them been doing this?”
After I spoke with a sigh, Touko-senpai looked at me in surprise.
“Didn’t you see their messages?”
“There’s no way I could calmly look at and analyze something like their secret love messages!”
I expressed my emotions with that line, to which she simply muttered, ‘How weak hearted’.
Not paying any heed to my angered self, she continued on.
“Based on the contents of the SNS you showed me just now, I would say it’s only been the third or fourth time they do it? Under that assumption, I guess it would be around the time when summer vacations finished.”
“What made you think that?”
“There was this part where they said ‘once a week’, right? Next, looking at the dates when the two of them met, they were the nights of either Monday or Thursday. I can also assert that I didn’t spend those days with Tetsuya either.”
“Same for me. On the days they appear to have met, I did not see Karen either.”
“Mondays and Thursdays are the days on which I have laboratories and practical classes. That’s why there are many times when my lectures end late. Isshiki-kun, don’t you also have some appointments you can’t miss on Mondays and Thursdays?”
Now that she mentioned it, that’s precisely how it is. I also have mandatory classes up to fifth period on Mondays and Thursdays.
On the other hand, because Karen is in the Literature Department, the number of classes she has to take is less than ours, while Kamokura-senpai, being a senior, can arrange his own class schedule to a certain degree.
“Moreover, it was only until after this summer vacation that I started having to have classes this late on Mondays and Thursdays. That’s why I thought that it’s only been around 3 times that they have gone as far as having a love affair.”
“But there’s still the possibility of them having cheated on us during the summer vacations. There was loads of time for them to do so.”
In response to my supposition, Touko-senpai tilted her head slightly.
“I wonder about that. I think the chances of that are somewhat slim. We know that the two of them didn’t meet during weekends, no? That means that, at that point in time, they were properly prioritizing their de facto boyfriend and girlfriend, that is, us. Add to that that if they were to go out on a day off, any normal lover would ask them where they went that day as soon as they found out. Wouldn’t they have tried to avoid running that risk?”
Thinking back on it, it is true that Karen’s behaviour has apparently gotten weird only after September started.
At the same time, I could not help being flabbergasted at Touko-senpai’s deducting prowess, seeing how she had already arrived in such a short time at the days and number of times the two of them had met.
“With this, what we have to do is be especially vigilant of the two of them during Mondays and Thursdays, correct?”
“Yes. However, please be very careful if you intend to investigate Karen-san’s actions. Any kind of actions or questions that directly touch the subject are strictly forbidden. The risk of her finding out about it is at least ten times higher than if I were to look into Tetsuya.”
“That much?”
“In the cases of infidelity between married couples, the husband doesn’t immediately notice if his wife has been unfaithful to him, but the wife can see through her spouse and tell at a glance if he has cheated or not. That’s how sensible women are to changes in their daily lives. A difference in but a small gesture or word can make us feel that something is wrong.”
Is that so? Listening to Touko-senpai’s calm and extensive reasoning, I found myself fairly convinced of the fact. It’s the kind of small details I tend not to notice. If THE Touko-senpai said it, then it must be true.
“That’s why, there’s no need for you to force yourself and look into Karen-san. You mustn’t, under any circumstances, ask her something like, ‘What did you do today?’. All you have to do is pay close attention to her small gestures and speech. Places that she hasn’t gone to together with you, stores whose names you haven’t heard, or places where she seems excessively adamant of you not going there. Those are what I would like you to inform me of.”
“Understood.”
“Also, let’s create a separate SNS account to discuss and contact each other from now on. Next, we will create an encrypted folder in the cloud to which we both have access to, where we will save all evidence we collect, such as photos.”
“Got it. I’ll upload the photo with Karen’s messages in said folder as soon as possible.”
While talking with Touko-senpai, at some point, I started to feel optimistic about this.
Sakurajima Touko. I believed that as long as I was together with her, the two of us would be able to greet those two with a most crushing counterstrike.
However, at the end, with a sad expression on her face, she said.
“I know I recently said some arrogant things to you, but the truth is this is heart-rending for me too. Frankly speaking, I’m thinking to myself, ‘What if this is a lie?’, ‘What if this is someone’s sick joke?’. I want to believe in Tetsuya too. But the proof that you showed me isn’t something that we can brush aside so easily. That’s why I first want to ascertain it with my own two eyes first, whether those two are actually cheating on us or not.”
It was the first show of weakness from Touko-senpai today.
That’s only natural. There’s no person who could remain unfazed after having their lover’s affair exposed to them out of nowhere.
All that your lover had given to you up till then; the smiles they shared with you, the kind words they spoke to you, their compassionate and thoughtful acts, and most of all, all the innumerable memories…
Having had our unspoken promise of being the only ones loved by them suddenly broken, just what should we believe in now?
Even so, Touko-senpai had remained stoic all this way, without uttering a single complaint, without allowing herself to lose her composure. She continued to explain our future course of action with level-headedness.
This when even me, as a man, was shaken up to this extent.
… How could that damn Kamokura cheat despite having such a marvelous girlfriend…?
I once again felt a smoldering anger towards Kamokura Tetsuya.
And at the same time, I also felt that I wanted to continue supporting Touko-senpai.
“Touko-senpai, thank you very much for today. I feel like I finally opened my eyes thanks to you. Also, I look forward to working together as fellow comrades-in-arms in what follows.”
I extended my right hand to her.
Touko-senpai lifted her face.
“ ‘Comrades-in-arms’, huh. That’s a nice word. You’re right, let’s both give it our all.”
Touko-senpai extended her right hand too and shook my hand.
