I Drink Every Night With a Lookalike of a Popular Idol on the Riverbank
As the night air began to grow cold, Nanase and I sat on the riverbank as usual.
Nanase took two cans out of a bag. One was the usual 7% lemonade. The other was corn soup.
“Oh, two drinks today?”
“Yeah. Sometimes I just really want to drink canned corn soup. But there are always a few grains left at the bottom of the can.”
“Exactly! Is there any way to fix that? I don’t want people to see me shaking the can upside down desperately.”
“Hehe, but Yousuke will see me anyway. My embarrassing side.”
“Don’t say it like that!”
Nanase smiled slyly and opened the can of corn soup.
With a loud “shhhhh!” the corn soup spurted out, and Nanase hurriedly put it in her mouth. I handed her a handkerchief from beside her, and she nodded gratefully while wiping the corn soup that had splattered on her clothes.
Soon, it was time to tap the bottom of the can to get the corn out.
As I watched from the side, Nanase let go of the can with a “Ginya!” sound, probably because she tapped it too hard.
“What are you doing…”
“Oh, I tapped it too hard. My mouth hurts… I’m not lucky today.”
As we were talking about such trivial things, Nanase let out a small “Ah.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, I just remembered something. The fortune-telling on TV this morning.”
“Oh, yeah, I saw it too. I can’t help but watch it.”
“Yousuke, do you believe in fortune-telling?”
“Well, I don’t really believe in it, but I enjoy it as entertainment. Today, I was ranked last in the Leo zodiac sign.”
When I said that and dramatically dropped my shoulders, Nanase laughed and said, “Oh dear.”
“By the way, the lucky item was ‘potted cactus,’ and the unlucky direction was ‘northwest.’ What am I supposed to do with that? I can’t avoid the northwest while working and walk sideways with a potted plant.”
“Haha… That’s true. You should have brought a small cactus. Put it in your bag.”
“The thorns would have caused a disaster… Well, in the end, being told I’m at the bottom makes me think, ‘I should be careful today,’ so in a way, it’s a blessing.”
I smiled wryly at my convenient interpretation. Then, Nanase-san, warming her fingertips with a warm can, said with a hint of sarcasm,
“You take bad results as a lesson to be careful, and only believe in good results as ‘I knew it!’ That’s really convenient, isn’t it?”
“Well, when you put it that way, I can’t argue…”
“Because fortune-telling words are all vague, aren’t they? Like ‘a hint of a new encounter,’ ‘be careful not to forget something,‘ or ‘don’t forget to thank your loved ones.’ Those apply to everyone. If you’re told your lucky color is ‘blue,’ you can look up at the sky and think, ‘Oh, lucky me.’”
“That’s harsh…”
“But isn’t that right? It’s not predicting the future; it’s just the recipient interpreting it to suit their own convenience. It’s like handing over the steering wheel of your life to a stranger on the other side of the TV for a moment. It’s very irresponsible.”
Her words are always like that. She peels away the surface of things neatly. She points out the slightly awkward, human essence beneath it with precision. I’ve never seen the world that way.
But she continued.
I noticed that the tone of her voice had softened slightly from its earlier sharpness.
“But… there are times when you want a guideline for the day.”
She was staring at the can in her hand. The streetlight cast a faint shadow on her profile.
“When you have no idea what tomorrow will bring. When you’re so anxious about whether what you’re doing now is really right. When you feel like you’re caught up in a huge current that’s beyond your control…”
She stopped speaking there.
“In such moments, when someone says, ‘Today’s lucky item is a handkerchief,’ just putting it in my pocket makes me feel like I have a small talisman. Like finding a sturdy handrail in the midst of a storm, even if it’s just a little bit. Well, it’s just a comforting thought, I guess.”
She laughed wryly as she said this.
The future is unclear. There’s nothing I can do about it on my own. Those words weighed heavily on my heart. In her world, where she lives as a “look-alike,” there might always be storms raging that I know nothing about.
I couldn’t think of any clever words to say to her. I just imagined her standing alone in the storm, using a single handkerchief as her talisman.
“I see,” I said.
“Then, starting tomorrow, I’ll check the fortune-telling for Nanase every morning.”
“…Huh?”
“And if her fortune is better than mine, which is Leo, she can brag about it, and if it’s worse, I’ll find her a lucky item.”
“fufu.. what’s that?”
“If the lucky item is a cactus, I’ll deliver it to Nanase’s house first thing in the morning. A small one.”
When I said that with a straight face, Nanase looked puzzled for a moment, then burst out laughing as if she couldn’t hold it in anymore.
“fufu… I don’t need that. It would be a hassle to have a cactus delivered in the morning.”
“Really? I thought it was a pretty good idea.”
She muttered, “You’re such a fool,” while still laughing. But her voice sounded genuinely happy, and her smile was warm and bright, unlike the fragile one she had had earlier.
“…Nanase, what’s today’s lucky item?”
“Um, corn soup.”
“You were really into the fortune-telling, weren’t you!?”
“Hehe… Some days are like that.”
Nanase looked up again, turned the corn soup can upside down, put it to her mouth, and tapped the bottom.
“Hmm… A lot of corn came out. Lucky. Well, it was the lowest rank, though.”
“Well, that’s good… If you’re in last place, does that mean you’re a Leo too?”
“No, I’m a Virgo. Even though I’m in last place, it said, ‘Love might move.’”
“Ugh… Did it move?”
Nanase stared at me intently. She seemed emotionless, and I couldn’t tell if she had moved or not. Eventually, like a clock that had been stopped for a long time, Nanase slowly smiled.
“Hmm. Just a little. As slow as the shortest hand on a clock.”
“Huh, really…”
“Yousuke, you seem interested in the other person. Do you know who it is?”
“No, I don’t know! I’m not interested!”
“Hmm…”
To be honest, I am interested, but I can’t say that to her face.
Still, Nanase seemed to see through my true feelings and smiled slyly.
“Well, you know, this is one of the reasons why horoscopes aren’t reliable. It depends on the station, or rather… the people who create the horoscopes, so the rankings change…”
Nanase started to get heated again, passionately explaining how unreliable horoscopes are.
Maiasa