I woke up early in the morning, just a bit earlier than usual.
Since I was out playing at the airport with Kanade until late yesterday, I was worried that I might not be able to get up in the morning due to fatigue, but it seems that was a groundless fear.
“It's a good morning.”
In fact, my condition this morning is better than usual. Despite moving so energetically the previous day, I feel no fatigue at all... instead, my whole body is overflowing with passion. When I thought about the reason why, the answer naturally narrowed down to one.
“...This is also thanks to Kanade.”
Our conversation at the airport yesterday. And above all, our conversation on the train ride home.
Until the day before yesterday, I just wanted to achieve my goals as quickly as possible. That awareness took such a priority that it created impatience, and my field of vision had become quite narrow.
...But now that a night has passed, a subtle change has occurred in that feeling.
It’s not that my desire to achieve my goals as quickly as possible has changed. It’s also not that a desire to lower my goals and take it easy has sprouted.
It’s just that the motivation for achieving those goals, which I had held onto for several years and had begun to rust before I knew it, was successfully renewed thanks to my conversation with Kanade yesterday. I was able to re-recognize why I aspired to become a doctor in the first place.
It was obvious that this was having a major impact on my state of mind.
“I'll thank Kanade later.”
At school... or, given the recent trend, would I meet her at the station? Anyway, I want to thank Kanade as soon as possible.
“Good morning.”
Suppressing my rushing heart, I headed to the living room.
“Good morning, Ak-kun.”
And there, in our living room... Kanade was eating the breakfast my mother had prepared.
“Man, it's a great morning today.”
“...”
“Ak-kun?”
“I wanted to see you, Kanade.”
“...Eh.”
“Eh.”
How strange. I only spoke my honest feelings, yet Kanade... and my mother too, for that matter, were looking at me with wide eyes.
“What's wrong? Both of you.”
“...You.”
“...A-Ak-kun. You wanted to see me?”
Kanade asked me, sounding somewhat bewildered.
“Hmm? Yeah. I wanted to see you. Every minute and every second sooner.”
“...I-I see.”
“Haa. How passionate.”
Kanade kept holding her freshly toasted bread, looking down and fidgeting restlessly.
“Kanade, is something wrong?”
“Eh?”
“You’ve been looking down this whole time, you look like you might be feeling unwell.”
“...Ueeh.”
I approached Kanade and touched her forehead. Suddenly, Kanade's face turned bright red right before my eyes.
“...You don't seem to have a fever.”
However, contrary to the redness of her face, the temperature of her forehead wasn't that high. If anything, it felt a little cool and pleasant.
“...A-Ak-kun. It's embarrassing here, so shall we go to school?”
“Eh? Oh, yeah, you're right.”
“T-Then, Auntie. We're heading out.”
“We're heading out.”
My mother only showed an exasperated face and didn't give us a reply to our greeting. During the walk to the station, Kanade kept her head down for a while.
Kanade, is your condition really okay? My anxiety was only growing.
“...Ak-kun.”
By the time the station building came into view, Kanade spoke up.
“What is it?”
“...Um. Was what you said earlier true?”
“...Earlier?”
“You said you wanted to see me even a minute or a second sooner, right?”
I felt the tone of Kanade's voice drop slightly.
“I also... wanted to see Ak-kun. I wanted to see you so much, so much. While Ak-kun was sleeping, I took the liberty of visiting your house.”
“Is that so?”
“Yeah. ...I don't want to leave Ak-kun's side.”
Kanade quickened her pace and suddenly closed the distance to me.
“Ak-kun, you'll stay by my side forever, right?”
Then, with the light gone from her eyes, she questioned me.
“No, forever is impossible. Ahaha!”
I laughed. Kanade really says some interesting jokes. I mean, wanting to be together forever... if taken literally, that's something that couldn't be achieved unless our wrists were joined by handcuffs, right? If that happened, daily life would be nothing but constant struggle.
Kanade wasn't laughing.
“...Now, will you listen to what I have to say?”
I decided to get to the main point.
“I told you earlier, didn't I? That I wanted to see you quickly.”
“...”
“...Thank you.”
“...”
“Thank you, Kanade.”
I bowed my head.
“Because of you, I feel like I can keep working hard for a bit longer.”
“...”
“To be honest, I felt like my heart was about to break a little bit.”
“...!”
“But... you helped me re-confirm why I wanted to aim to be a doctor.”
“...?”
“I think I'm probably no good without you anymore.”
“...E-Eh.”
“So, while 'forever' is impossible, I'd be happy if you stayed with me as much as possible.”
...A moment of silence.
“M-Geez! Ak-kun, you're hopeless!”
After the silence, Kanade began skipping in high spirits.
I thought the time had finally come to escape from the psycho-horror developments, but perhaps this itself is also a type of psycho-horror. How scary.