I Drink Every Night With a Lookalike of a Popular Idol on the Riverbank
That night, the air was unusually warm.
The clinging humidity seemed to trap the heat of the day. Nanase and I were sitting side by side on the riverbank as usual.
“The weather is strange, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. The wind has completely stopped, like the calm before a storm…”
Nanase said with a smile, joking around, at that moment.
Plop.
A cold drop fell onto my cheek.
Looking up, the pitch-black clouds that had been lazily hiding the stars just moments ago were now hanging so low they seemed ready to crash down on us.
“…This looks bad.”
“Yeah, this is really bad.”
The next moment, the cute sound of “drip, drip” suddenly turned into a thunderous roar of “ZAAH!”
It wasn’t just a light shower. It was a torrential downpour, as if a hole had opened up in the sky and an entire river was pouring down from it.
“Wow, really?”
“Kyaa!”
In an instant, both I and Nanase were drenched by the heavy rain, our clothes becoming dotted with water spots. There was no place nearby to take shelter from the rain.
“The weather forecast didn’t say anything about this!”
Nanase let out a scream.
“Over there! Let’s run to the bridge!”
Nanase reached out her hand toward me, probably without thinking.
I hesitated for a moment, wondering if I should take her hand, but then I told myself it was to prevent her from slipping and took her hand to guide her.
The two of us ran up the embankment, soaking wet. Our feet got stuck in the muddy grass, but we ran frantically toward the bridge.
For some reason, I felt like laughing. Nanase, running beside me, didn’t care that her hair was stuck to her face and was smiling happily for some reason.
The moment we slid under the bridge, Nanase said, “It’s like the rain has disappeared from the world.”
“Thanks for your hand. It would have been trouble if I had fallen. It’s my tool of the trade, after all.”
Nanase let go of the hand she was holding and smiled.
“Your hand?”
Is she an artist or something like that?
“Well, not just my hand… my whole body?”
“…Construction worker?”
“Hehe… Well, what do you think?”
Nanase smiled mysteriously and looked up.
“The sound of the rain has changed.”
Guided by Nanase’s gaze, the two looked up at the bridge girder that was protecting them from the rain.
“About 30 tatami mats?” Nanase said. Realizing that she was referring to the area of the bridge girder that had become the ceiling, I replied, “About 40 tatami mats?”
“Then… 34 tatami mats.”
Nanase-san tries to find a compromise, but brings up a number slightly closer to her own.
“No, no, 36.”
“Hmm…”
The two face each other, silent, wondering who should propose the compromise of 35.
“30…”
And we both made the suggestion at the same time. We both held back our words and smiled.
Even as they passed the time sheltering from the rain, a low rumbling sound continued to echo overhead. The sound of countless raindrops hitting the concrete bridge. It sounded like the snoring of a giant creature.
“…It’s a heavy rain, isn’t it?”
“Hmm. Maybe it’s a sudden downpour.”
She pushed back her wet bangs and stared blankly at the other side of the rain curtain.
Her profile looked more vulnerable than usual, and I looked away for a moment.
“…Ah.”
Nanase peered into the plastic bag she was holding.
“The canned chu-hi is safe.”
“Mine too.”
We looked at each other and burst out laughing.
“…Want to drink? There’s nothing else to do until the rain stops.”
“Yeah, let’s drink.”
We sat down side by side on the cold concrete ground. We felt a little excited, like children who had found a secret base.
The sound of rain echoed unusually loudly under the bridge.
It was supposed to be the same lemon flavor as usual, but mixed with the smell of rain and the exhilaration of running, it felt like a completely different drink.
The sound of rain echoed, “Gooooo.”
There was no conversation.
But it wasn’t awkward.
Rather, the space filled only with the sound of rain felt comfortable.
“That’s a loud sound, isn’t it? The rain.”
After a while, Nanase muttered quietly.
“Yeah. It’s like we’re the only two people in the world.”
After saying it, I regretted sounding a bit too cheesy. But she neither denied nor affirmed it, just nodded quietly.
“…This is nice.”
“Huh?”
“It’s like the rain is hiding everything—our voices, our figures. And since everyone is walking with umbrellas, we can’t see anyone’s faces. So it’s like no one can find us. It’s like a rain-hiding technique.”
Nanase made a sharp gesture like a stereotypical ninja.
And her voice reached my ears clearly, as loud as the sound of the rain. I can’t even imagine how much pressure she must feel, being stared at as a “look-alike.”
But in this moment, perhaps the thicker-than-usual wall allows her to be just “Nanase-san.”
Thinking that, the loud sound of the rain suddenly felt incredibly gentle.
◆
“…The rain is stopping, isn’t it?”
How long had we been like that? Nanase-san said, sounding a little reluctant to leave.
The thunderous sound above our heads had somehow changed to a gentle patter.
“Yeah… I feel a little sad about it.”
When I said that, she looked at me in surprise.
Then, as if she had guessed what I was thinking, she smiled softly.
That smile was as beautiful as a rainbow after the rain.
“Hehe… Are you going to get sick because it stopped?”
Nanase said jokingly.
“Not that bad!”
We stayed in that secret base for a while after the rain stopped, drinking alcohol.
Maiasa