Chapter 138: The Momoi Family is Seriously Something Else!!

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Translator: Soafp

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The field was so hot it made you sweat just by standing there, and voices echoed back and forth across it. That place had once been everything to him—and he had thought that was enough.

A practice match before the big tournament. Bottom of the 7th, last inning, two outs, no runners, and they were up by one. Just one more out and they'd win. He called for a two-seamer—his catcher's most confident pitch. That would end it. That would be the final pitch.

“…Ha!”

Ginji opened his eyes and saw the ceiling of his room. Realizing he had been dreaming, he sat up and looked at his left hand.

“Man, can't believe I'm even dreaming about it now.”

He laughed wryly at himself and went to shower off the sweat.

After changing clothes and heading to the living room, he saw Tetsuya already making breakfast.

“Morning, Aniki.”

“Morning. Guess you're already up.”

When he stepped into the kitchen, the miso soup and pickles were already set. The last dish was grilled salted salmon. Ginji scooped rice into two bowls from the rice cooker.

“I woke up when you started the shower. Thanks for helping with the volunteer thing today.”

“No problem.”

Carrying the large rice bowl, Ginji replied energetically. After breakfast, the brothers—dressed in jerseys and T-shirts—left the house and headed to meet Sora. Sure enough, she was already standing in front of the shopping street.

“…We're way early, aren't we?”

“She's always like this. But… what is she even carrying?”

Sora waved her arms excitedly when she spotted the Momoi brothers. She had a huge bundle wrapped in a cloth and a backpack on her back. She was wearing a striped shirt, a light pink hoodie to block the sun, and girlish shorts.

“Morning, Ginji, Tetsu-kun. Nice weather today.”

“Morning, Sora. What's all that?”

“Good morning. Sora-senpai, you're early.”

Sora puffed up her chest proudly when Ginji asked.

“It's lunch and my recommended cleaning supplies. We're working outside and on the first floor, right? I brought tools that'll help with the fine details too.”

Plenty of thoughts came to mind like “You didn't have to go that far” and “What time did you wake up to make all that food?”—but Ginji figured it'd be rude to say anything and tried to thank her, but he was beaten to the punch.

“As expected from Sora! By the way, I've already talked to the shopping street folks. We're picking up a ton of menchi-katsu and leftover cloth scraps for cleaning. Perfect for the job!”

“Wow, that's just like you, Ginji!”

Both of them were capable but slightly off in their own ways, and their full-on effort was clearly different from what you’d expect from regular students or their parents. Anyone who cared too much about how others viewed them might've held back—but watching these two made that feel irrelevant. Inspired, Tetsuya renewed his resolve: if they were going all out, he would too.

“Thanks, Aniki. Thanks, Sora-senpai.”

“Huh? What are you saying? We're the ones who owe you all the time.”

“Yup yup, let's give it our best today!”

The two of them headed into the shopping street without hesitation. Tetsuya thought to himself that even though they were just a year older, his brother and the girl he liked felt so far ahead. He hurried after them.

After picking up snacks and supplies from the shopping street, the three of them headed to the middle school.

They arrived early, and there were only a few people around. Led by Tetsuya, they entered the school through the entrance near the custodian's office and headed for the student council room.

“Today's led by the current student council president… but there are still some details to sort out.”

“Tetsu-kun, you used to be the student council president, right? That's amazing.”

To Sora, who wasn't good at being in the spotlight, just the idea of being student council president seemed impressive.

“Right? My brother's awesome.”

“Did you ever join the student council, Ginji?”

“Not my style. Besides, I was busy with club stuff.”

“Oh yeah? What club were you in?”

“Didn't I say? Baseball. It was the soft type, though.”

“…Oh yeah, you and Saitou-kun were always delivering snacks to the baseball team. And you seemed to like batting cages too. Did you…”

She almost asked, “Did you not continue baseball in high school?” but held back. She remembered the sad look on Ginji's face the day before.

“We're here. This is the student council room.”

“Huh?”

Sora looked surprised. The student council room here was way smaller than the one at their high school, which was built to receive guests and had a luxurious design and adjoining archive rooms.

“I think our high school's the weird one.”

“My middle school's council room was big too.”

“Yeah… but you and Shiki went to a fancy all-girls private school. Pretty elite, actually.”

“Really?”

Sora had gone to a private girls' middle school that was well-known in the prefecture as a prestigious institution.

As the two chatted, Tetsuya opened the door. Inside, two students were rushing around. One was drenched in sweat checking a booklet, the other was frantically moving items.

Sora, feeling shy, hid behind Ginji.

“…What's going on?”

“Ah, Tetsu-senpai. And behind you… Momoi-senpai?”

“That's my brother's girlfriend. So, why are you checking that booklet now of all times?”

Seeing Tetsuya, the two students' faces lit up. They were apparently the current president and vice president, and they launched into an explanation. It turned out there was a mistake in the drink prep for the volunteers. When they started checking that, they found more errors—like the group assignments.

“Did you go over everything beforehand?”

“Uh, no… The teacher said they would handle it…”

Tetsuya's expression didn't change, but the pressure made them nervous. In truth, he was just trying to figure out what to do.

Ginji clapped his shoulder.

“Don't worry, we'll help as former members.”

A thin pale hand stretched out from behind Ginji.

“Just tell us the problems, and I'll fix them right away.”

“Uh… w-we don't have time to explain from the beginning…”

The middle schoolers were thrown off by Sora's elegant but awkward demeanor. Tetsuya handed her the booklet. Sora flipped through the 10 or so pages.

“Got it. It's just that the group numbers and drink counts are mismatched. No time to redo the booklet, so let's fix it by making an announcement.”

“You… memorized it? Seriously?”

“Alright then, let's just split up the drinks by group now based on the correct info. Tetsu, make a script for the announcement. I'll carry the supplies. Also, we should make the gathering spot more obvious—be right back.”

“Okay. For the drinks, we should borrow some boxes from the custodian's room to sort them.”

“Good idea. Haven't said hi in a while anyway.”

While they were talking, Sora already finished writing the corrected drink numbers on paper, and Tetsuya turned it into an announcement script. Then she moved on to fixing the group assignments the teacher had messed up.

“There's just one place that's wrong. The rest of the mistakes come from that, so we're fine.”

At this point, Sora wasn't even looking at the booklet.

“Wha—where?”

“Page 4. The third and fourth groups in the chart are swapped. Once you realize that, the rest makes sense.”

It was a simple mix-up in one spot that caused everything else. The president and VP finally relaxed, now that they could see how to fix things. They looked at Sora in awe.

“Um… you're amazing.”

“Tetsu-senpai's brother's girlfriend is something else…”

“Not really! I'm gonna go help Ginji!”

Sora dashed out of the room to chase after Ginji. To her, who had nearly been crushed under work assignments from Aika in high school, this was nothing. The same went for Ginji, who regularly handled more complex manufacturing tasks at his part-time job.

“Aniki and Sora-senpai are really something else. For the morning assembly, make sure to announce these corrections. Like she said, don't worry about fixing the booklets. Also, maybe send a heads-up to the other student council members on social media.”

Tetsuya calmly finished the script. The president took it and bowed deeply, looking ashamed.

“Tetsu-senpai, we're really sorry. You took time during summer break to help us, and now we're a mess on the day itself…”

“We didn't think the teacher could be wrong… even though you told us to double-check…”

Almost in tears, the two boys were met with a silent offering: a couple of menchi-katsu. Confused, they accepted.

“You two came early and checked things. That's why we could fix it before everyone got here. You're doing great. These are from Aniki. Eat and take a breather, President, Vice President.”

With that, Tetsuya went back to work without changing expression. Watching him silently get to it, the president and VP munched on their menchi-katsu, holding back tears—then promptly posted on the student council social media:

“The Momoi family is seriously something else.”