Episode 9 – An addict lost in thoughts of a childhood friend who felt distant

I’ve Been Reincarnated as the Childhood Friend of a Doomed Heroine. Since I Don’t Want to Get Caught up in Her Bad Ending, I’ll Make Sure She Ends up Happy

That night, Hanesaki Shinori lay in bed, blankly reflecting on the day’s events.

For Shinori , her childhood friend Toyono Kyota was an unfathomable presence.

And rightly so.

Ever since kindergarten, he had possessed a calm temperament almost like an adult. Whether it was crafts, playing instruments, games, studying, or sports, he displayed a level of excellence that set him apart from other children his age.

He was always the center of everyone’s attention.

And Shinori herself was intensely curious about Kyota.

“Kyota-kun, why are you so amazing?”

Shinori asked Kyota during kindergarten’s final year.

It was during recess while he was swinging on the swings.

Beside Shinori, who was struggling to swing properly and was on the verge of tears, he was effortlessly swinging while standing.

When asked, Kyota replied in a detached tone.

“I wonder why. I don’t really know the reason either. …But I think in about ten years, you’ll be just like me.”

“…Will I be able to swing the swing?”

“Probably.”

“But I like it now. I want to swing now!”

“…Haa.”

After she threw her tantrum, Kyota got off and moved behind her.

He simply pushed Shinori’s back.

“Whoa, whoa!”

“You’re the one who said you wanted to swing now. Get used to it. First, feel the sensation of movement with your skin and learn it.”

“…Ehehe, fun.”

Shinori couldn’t understand it back then.

But she clearly felt that Kyota was playing with her gently.

And now, years later.

Shinori murmurs.

“Well, I guess you could say after ten years, he does seem like a normal person now.”

The uniqueness she once saw in him was harder to detect.
His grades were still good, but not outstanding.
She concluded he’d simply been precocious.

His tendency to isolate himself since childhood had also shifted in her perception over the years—from “Maybe he’s alone because he’s on a different level?” to “He’s just a bit of a loner.”

Recently, though, he’d started interacting with her for some reason.

At first, she couldn’t make sense of it.

She even mistakenly thought he might be part of the group bullying her.

But he was simply concerned about her.

“I thought you didn’t care about me at all.”

I’d tried talking to him many times as kids, but back then he’d either brush me off coldly or deal with me like I was a bother.

So knowing he recognized me now, that he saw me as a childhood friend, made me want to cry.

No, that’s a lie.

The day he spoke to me, I cried secretly during break.

Because I was so happy, my chest felt like it would burst.

And the final straw was today’s incident.

Kyota’s words still echo in my ears: ‘You did something pretty big to my childhood friend.’

“Haa… I’m weird.”

My childhood friend, whom I hadn’t even been conscious of lately.

Why am I thinking so much about this guy who was practically background noise?

Even though I’ve been thinking about Akito nonstop lately.

“…There’s no way I’d go to a movie. That’d be stupid, right? …But I kinda like how he doesn’t read the room.”

Akito saw Shinori looking down and tried to cheer her up by inviting her to a movie.

But Shinori wasn’t in the mood and turned him down.

In the end, she just kept searching for her pencil case alone.

And then she ran into Kyota.

“…This is weird. I keep thinking about Toyono-kun.”

Her childhood friend, whom she’d started calling by his last name without realizing it.
The childhood friend she’d distanced herself from around the lower grades of elementary school, thinking they lived in different worlds.
Yet, it was his face—definitely not handsome—that kept popping into her mind.
Seeing the screen with their earlier message exchange made her heart race even more.

Shinori let out a rough breath.

“Ugh, haaah… Wait, does that mean he likes me?”

Recalling Kyota’s words, Shinori agonized.

‘I like your happy face better’—those words were more embarrassing than a confession.

“I don’t even know anymore, o-ugh—”

Shinori let out a small sound and tried to steady her breathing.

She pulled the futon over her head, as if to hide her flushed face.

“What kind of face should I make when I see him tomorrow?”

Finally, she murmured those words before closing her eyes.

……

Incidentally, no one knew that during this time, Shinori had been mast*rbating while kneading her own breasts.

Well, perhaps players of ‘Sakuchiru’ might have guessed.