Oneshot: There was no reciprocation, so I gave up

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Translator: Soafp

---

From a young age, I had always been honest about my feelings and said that I liked her out loud, but it seemed that it was all just wasted effort.

She told me she had found another guy she was interested in, so I put a period on my ten-year-long first love and decided to give up.

Now then, what should I do first?

Delete her phone number?

Looking at my memories and call history, it seems she had never once called me.

In other words, it was completely one-sided. Maybe I had done nothing but bother her.

Thinking back on it now, I really was the worst.

Back then, I genuinely believed I could change both my life and her feelings.

---

There's a girl I like.

She's Nishikawa Sakura, who lives nearby—my childhood friend.

Ever since we became close in kindergarten, I couldn't stop thinking about Sakura, whether I was awake or asleep. Back then, she was shy and didn't have many friends, so she often played with me since I actively talked to her. We were still at an age where there wasn't much distinction between boys and girls, so no one said anything even if we played together all the time, which was nice.

But as we entered elementary school and grew older, boys and girls stopped playing together as much, and little by little, some distance formed between us.

She didn't refuse when I walked her to school in the mornings, but we stopped walking home together after school, and we stopped hanging out. She said it was embarrassing to play with a boy.

Then, when we entered middle school, we stopped spending time together on weekends as well.

By then, we had become nothing more than childhood acquaintances who used to play together.

Even so, I couldn't give up, so I kept telling her that I liked her.

That is, until that moment――

I knew that even though she turned down my invitations every time, she had gone out into town with our classmate Tatsukawa the previous weekend.

I accepted it, telling myself that things like that happen.

When I went to Sakura's classroom after school to ask her to walk home together, I heard the voices of Sakura and her friend, Tachibana Michiru, coming from inside the classroom.

“How was your date with Tatsukawa?”

“It wasn't a date or anything! Don't tease me!”

“Sure, sure. But you did go out together, right?”

“He just helped me with some class shopping. On the way back, we had tea together, that's all.”

I quietly moved closer so I wouldn't be noticed. There were only the two of them in the classroom, so their voices carried clearly.

“I'm glad you had fun. You should hang out with your childhood friend Kurokawa too once in a while. He's been trying so hard. If you don't have any interest, it'd be kinder to just turn him down properly.”

“But it's embarrassing now…”

Because I was hiding, neither of us could see each other. I could only hear their voices.

“Besides, Akihito is short, and—”

It was just a fact. Normally, I would've brushed it off without caring. Sakura often said things like that when people teased her about our relationship.

But that day was different.

The moment I heard those words, it felt like something possessing my heart fell away.

Like a balloon swollen with air being pierced by a needle, bursting and disappearing.

It was just about appearance. She wasn't insulting my personality or anything.

But when I thought about it, most of the times I praised Sakura, it was about her looks, her appearance.

Why didn't I praise her inner self?

The Sakura who was kind. The Sakura who always stayed by my side.

Before I realized it, distance had formed between us, and it became a one-sided relationship where I chased after her――

“Wouldn't it be pitiful if people mistook you for her little brother when you're together?”

Sakura's voice gradually faded away, until I couldn't hear it anymore.

In the complete silence, all I could hear was my own breathing.

Sakura is 155 cm tall, and I'm only 150 cm despite being in my third year of middle school. Standing side by side, it wouldn't be strange if I looked like her younger brother.

It was probably a comment born out of her kindness. But in reality, those words pierced my heart like a blade, leaving a wound.

I, who only praised her looks, was hurt because my looks were criticized.

How ridiculous.

“Look at my inner self”? Do I even have the right to say that, when I never praised hers――

But I don't have the right to criticize anyone.

Thinking that, I felt strangely calm.

Why had I been so obsessed with Sakura?

Did I really like her at all――

Or maybe I didn't actually care that much――

I don't know. I couldn't find an answer――

Because right now, I truly felt nothing.

Even being thought of as short by Sakura didn't bother me. It was true, and it wasn't wrong.

She was simply stating her feelings honestly, that short guys weren't her type. There was nothing there to get angry about――nothing at all.

All that remained was the fact that she hadn't chosen me.

That reality alone kept pushing at my feelings, telling me that I didn't want to be here anymore――

Wasn't there something else I should've been doing?

Had I been using Sakura as an excuse to run away from that?

Ten years by her side, and I couldn't change anything.

What effort had I even made?

Maybe she had even found me annoying.

Maybe she looked down on me.

Thinking that, I could no longer do anything.

It was time to honestly accept that we should return to being just ordinary childhood friends.

Cinderella's magic had worn off before she ever met the prince.

I realized there wasn't even a fragment of lingering attachment to Sakura left in my heart.

My first love was over.

The next morning, when I woke up, my heart felt strangely light.

I changed my usual routine, didn't go to pick Sakura up, and took the opposite route to school.

It was quite a detour, but I encountered new scenery I had never seen before.

I realized how narrow my perspective had been, passing by such beautiful views without noticing them.

For ten years, I had walked the same road and nothing else.

A week later, I passed Sakura in the hallway.

She looked surprised for a moment.

“Huh? I haven't seen you around lately. What's up?”

“I've been focusing on studying.”

“Oh? That's rare. Do your best.”

That was all we said.

And I realized that it had been over from the start.

We had always been “just childhood friends.”

With nothing left to do, I used my position as a third-year middle school student preparing for entrance exams as an excuse to escape into studying.

As long as I focused on studying, I didn't have to think about anything else.

And since I had done nothing but focus on Sakura all this time, everything felt like starting from scratch, and it was all fresh to me.

I never imagined I'd have to go back to first-grade elementary school problems, but even so, it was new, fun, and rewarding.

It's better to aim high.

I devoted myself entirely to studying, aiming for the top high school in the region.

Before I knew it, I had forgotten about Sakura too.

Even when we passed each other in the hallway, we stopped greeting each other altogether.

Goodbye, my first love.

Goodbye――

I won't forget the tight pain you gave my chest.

---

[Sakura Pov from here on]

You were so persistent that I decided to go out with you once.

I've been told “I like you, I like you” nonstop by my childhood friend since we were little.

What do you even know about me?

If I date him once and break up, will he finally stop?

That's what I thought when I decided to go out with him――

---

“Sakura, good morning! You're cute today too.”

“Good morning, Akihito. You're early as always.”

When I opened the front door, my childhood friend Kurokawa Akihito was standing there.

Standing there might not be the right phrase—it was closer to lying in wait.

We live nearby and go to the same school district, so we've been together since kindergarten and elementary school. I think it's about time this rotten bond was cut, but Akihito doesn't seem to have any intention of letting go.

He's always pushing himself on me. He comes to pick me up in the mornings without us even agreeing to it.

“Of course. If I don't see your smile first thing in the morning, my day doesn't start.”

Please don't treat me like your personal alarm clock.

At school, people often misunderstand and think we're dating, and I have a hard time correcting that. If I had a boyfriend, the misunderstandings would stop, but sadly, I don't. So for now, I just have to endure the unfairness of being treated as a set with Akihito.

I don't dislike Akihito.

But if you ask me whether I like him romantically, I can only say “neither.”

To me, he's nothing more than a little brother.

“If you're free this weekend, want to go hang out in town together?”

“On Saturday I'm going out with Mi-chan, and on Sunday I'm going out with my family, so invite me again some other time.”

“I see, that's a shame. Then, it's a bit later, but if you're free, want to go to a fireworks festival or summer festival together?”

“Fireworks or a summer festival? Hmm… okay, I'll think about it.”

I avoided answering directly and parted ways at the shoe lockers. Akihito is in Class 3, and I'm in Class 1. If we were in the same class too, I might've gone crazy without a moment of peace.

Being pushed constantly like that is exhausting. I want time to relax alone too.

---

“You two are as close as ever.”

When I entered the classroom, my best friend, Tachibana Michiru—Mi-chan—called out to me.

“How does it look like that, no matter how you see it? I've told you so many times already.”

“Yes, yes. That he's just attached to you, like a little brother?”

“Exactly. Don't make me say it again.”

“And you're not entirely unhappy about it?”

“Hey!”

I raised my fist to show I was serious.

“Then, if I introduce someone and play matchmaker, would you go out with them if they're nice?”

Honestly, I'd love that.

“Of course. What kind of person? Hey, what kind?”

“It's not really an introduction, but you know there's class shopping for the school festival, right? The one where you go with a boy. I've got something to do, so I want you to go in my place.”

“What is that? That's totally a scam!”

And we enjoyed those trivial, harmless conversations together.

---

A week later, after school, I was again chatting aimlessly with Mi-chan in the classroom.

“How was your date with Tatsukawa?”

“It wasn't a date or anything! Stop teasing me already.”

“Yeah, yeah, but you did go out together, right?”

“He just helped me with some class shopping. We only had tea together on the way back.”

Talking with a boy was rare for me, so it felt fresh. As for my childhood friend Akihito, I didn't even count him as a boy in my mind. It couldn't be helped—he was my childhood friend, after all.

“I'm glad you had fun. You should hang out with your childhood friend Kurokawa once in a while too. He's been making his feelings so obvious. Why don't you try going out with him just once? And if there's really no chance, then rejecting him properly is the kind thing to do.”

“But it'd be embarrassing now.”

Even normally, people teased us for being too close. If we actually went on a date, who knows what everyone would say.

“And besides, Akihito is short—”

That's right. Akihito is a fair bit smaller than me. It's not something worth worrying about. But—

“—wouldn't it be pitiful if people mistook him for your little brother when you're together?”

Actually, it was the opposite. I hated it when people thought I was the bigger one.

Clatter.

Something fell over behind us. It sounded like a cleaning broom. Probably a boy had put it away carelessly.

The sudden noise startled both of us, and then we looked at each other and laughed. Maybe it was our age—everything felt funny for no real reason.

---

Strangely enough, from the very next day, Akihito's annoying, intrusive behavior stopped.

He stopped coming to my house in the mornings to walk to school together. He stopped asking about my plans. More than that, he stopped coming near me at all.

I felt a strange sense of discomfort.

Then, a week later, I passed Akihito in the hallway.

At first, he didn't even notice me and was about to walk past, so I had no choice but to call out to him myself.

“Huh? I haven't seen you around lately. What's up?”

“I've been focusing on studying.”

“Oh? That's rare. Do your best.”

Since Akihito didn't reply, the conversation ended there.

After that, until we graduated from middle school, I never spoke to Akihito again, since we were in different classes.

---

I ran into Akihito again after entering high school. I hadn't heard where he was going, so I'd assumed he'd gone to a different school.

I never imagined that Akihito, who had been near the bottom of the grade, could get into the same high school as me. It was a school said to be one of the top academic schools in the area. If he'd gotten in by sheer luck, that alone was impressive. Whether he could keep up with the classes was another matter—but that was Akihito's problem, not mine.

“It's been a while. Have you been doing well?”

“Yeah, I've been doing fine. How about you, Nishikawa?”

Something about Akihito's words felt deeply off. Why was that?

“Yeah, I'm good. Come to think of it, I hadn't seen you for a while. Did something happen?”

“Yeah, I was seriously studying for the entrance exams. I was busy.”

“Really? Could it be—”

This might just be me being overly self-conscious, but it was safer to ask.

“Was it to go to the same school as me?”

For a brief moment, I heard Akihito's breathing stop.

“Ah—yeah. I guess so. It's an honor to attend the same school as you, Nishikawa. If you've got time sometime, feel free to call out to me. Well then.”

As if fleeing, Akihito disappeared from in front of me. At least he seemed aware that his past behavior bordered on stalking.

---

Around the time summer vacation ended and the new term began, Akihito's reputation among the girls started to rise.

Strangely enough, they were calling him “cool.”

Certainly, since entering high school, Akihito had shot up in height and was already close to 170 cm. Growing 20 cm in half a year made no sense at all.

But being tall and being cool are different things.

They said he was kind, that he was considerate—but wasn't that just another way of saying he was annoying and persistent? The Akihito I knew was definitely like that. They must be talking about some other Kurokawa-kun. Misunderstanding him like that would just be a nuisance for Akihito. I wouldn't make that mistake.

---

In autumn, we ended up working together as members of the cultural festival committee.

It was true—Akihito had become good-looking. Since I'd known him since we were little, maybe that was just my bias as a childhood friend.

Akihito, too, seemed conscious of me and acted a little awkward.

[You should hang out with your childhood friend Kurokawa once in a while. He's been making his feelings so obvious. Why don't you try going out with him just once?]

For some reason, Mi-chan's words kept floating up in my mind and wouldn't disappear.

I couldn't go out with someone I didn't like. But if that would make him give up—

I made up my mind and said it to Akihito.

“Will you go out with me?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Then—”

“Have you finished listing all the materials we're missing? Which stores are we going to visit, and in what order? We need to be efficient.”

As always, Akihito was hopelessly dense, and the mood I'd worked up was completely ruined.

“That's not what I mean!”

“What's not?”

The eyes Akihito turned toward me were completely calm. The heat I was so used to seeing in them was gone—

“I mean, will you go out with me?”

“—Oh, that's what you meant. Can I ask you one thing? How do you feel about me, Nishikawa?”

How do I feel about Akihito? That's obvious.

“A childhood friend from way back. Right?”

“—Yeah, that's right. That's not wrong. I feel the same way. So—”

After wearing a troubled expression for a moment, Akihito finally spoke.

“I can't go out with you. Even if we did, when neither of us really feels that way, we'd only end up unhappy. I'm sorry. I can't go out with you.”

For some reason, I had been rejected by Akihito.

Rejected—by Akihito?

What did that even mean?

I couldn't suppress my shock and confusion for a while.

---

Even after I got home, the unsettled feeling in my chest wouldn't go away.

I was rejected by Akihito.

By Akihito, of all people.

After all that obsession he had with me—this sudden about-face.

I couldn't understand it at all, and I found myself thinking about Akihito constantly.

Before I knew it, every time I spotted him at school, my eyes followed him.

No—I realized I was actually looking for him.

Looking for that Akihito?

I couldn't believe my own behavior.

Akihito was my childhood friend, like a little brother. I didn't feel anything for him.

No—he was annoying, persistent, and never left me alone—

or rather, he used to.

At some point, he'd pulled away.

That Akihito—of all people.

---

And then I learned the truth.

No—I saw it with my own eyes.

I saw Akihito being confessed to by another girl.

“Sorry. I don't intend to go out with you.”

That was all he said. A clean, simple rejection.

The girl who confessed replied,

“Okay. Thank you. It's disappointing, but I feel like I can finally move on now.”

With that, she left with a bright, refreshed expression.

Were confessions really supposed to be that refreshing?

The reality was so different from my image of it that my brain glitched.

And it didn't just happen once.

I saw it three times or more—each time with a different girl.

During lunch breaks or after school, I followed Akihito when he went to the courtyard or the rooftop, and ended up witnessing those confession scenes.

Why was this happening?

Wasn't Akihito supposed to be mine?

He just leaves on his own, then almost gets together with other girls?

I couldn't quite understand it.

So I decided to check things one by one.

First: Akihito liked me.

Second: He followed me around.

Up to that point, there was no mistake.

And yet now, he'd distanced himself from me, and other girls were confessing to him.

No matter how I looked at it, it felt like betrayal.

On top of that, he even turned down my invitation to go out.

That Akihito—of all people.

So then—how do I feel about Akihito now?

Childhood friend. Like a little brother. Annoying. Persistent—

Those were all in the past.

Then what about now?

Do I like him? No.

Am I a little curious? Something like that.

If he asked me to go out, would I? I might be willing to.

But there was no approach from Akihito—

Yes, none at all now.

Ever since the high school entrance exams, a gap had formed between us.

I hated to admit it, but that was reality.

So what should I do—?

Make a move myself?

No, that's—

Then just wait like this?

What if Akihito gets a girlfriend?

I hate that!

Then what do I do?

Exhausted by the endless loop with no answer, I fell asleep.

---

The next day, after school, I called Akihito up to the rooftop.

Since three people had already confessed to him here, he probably understood the situation the moment I called him.

I had made up my mind too.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, Nishikawa.”

Akihito appeared as he opened the door.

“So, what did you want to talk about?”

Standing in front of me, Akihito was now a full head taller than I was—someone I had to look up at.

All the girls who had confessed to him here had looked straight into his eyes.

I couldn't look away just because I was embarrassed.

Desperately, I met Akihito's gaze.

But still, I couldn't feel the warmth that used to be there when he looked at me.

“Um… Akihito. I like you. I know it's late to say this, but would you go out with me?”

“Thank you. I'm happy you feel that way.”

“Then—”

“But I can't.”

“Why? You stayed by my side all the way through middle school. Didn't you like me?”

“Yeah, I did. I thought I loved you. But now—”

Akihito cut himself off.

I had a bad feeling.

I wanted to run away.

No—Please stop!

“I don't love you anymore. And because I don't want to forget that old, painfully earnest first love, you're the one person I can't go out with. I'm sorry. I know I'm being selfish. But I really am sorry. I can't go out with you.

I don’t want to betray my old self.”

With that, Akihito left without looking back.

I was left there alone with my head in a mess.