I sat in the chair beside her bed and opened an English-vocab app on my phone.
(I don’t have textbooks but a phone is enough — unlike Kano and Ayato who are natural talents, I’m normal-spec and have to grind every free moment. If I’d stayed in soccer through high school I couldn’t be getting these grades.)
“Kano-san and Ayato are broken spec.”
(Ayato grinds soccer practice and stays #1. Kano was in student council for three years of high school and still got into Sahoda regular admission. Heaven gives no two gifts is a lie.)
I was studying when something on her desk caught my eye.
“Wait — that’s…”
A faded, worn charm pouch. (I’d intended to not touch her things and immediately reached for it.) Inside — Kano-san, cheer up! in a kid’s terrible handwriting.
“She still has it.”
(The handmade charm I’d given her when she’d been bullied. Days after giving it I got beaten up fighting her bullies. Nostalgic and mortifying.)
“Lookin’?”
“Whoa!”
I jumped. Kano stood behind me.
“When did you wake up?”
“Just now.”
“You could’ve announced yourself.”
“You were rummaging — curious.”
(So she’d snuck up. I’d been so in my head I missed her.)
“I figured you were trying to retrieve the confiscated ero-manga.”
“No.”
“Hmm, really?”
(Same teasing voltage — but no longer drunk-buzzed. Sober.)
“You still have this charm.”
“Yeah. Big memory for me.”
She wore a wistful expression. (Likely remembering it too.)
“Plus this charm got me through high-school exams and Sahoda exams — can’t let go now.”
“There is no exam-success-charm property in that thing.”
“For me there is.”
(A kid’s homemade charm doesn’t have study-success power. If it did, I should switch careers. Her results are her own work.)
“Oh — not the take-home type, you’re the walk-her-home-wolf type.”
“Don’t slander me — I brought you home because you couldn’t get back alone. Gratitude would be appropriate.”
“Right — walk-her-home-wolf is your kink.”
She was laughing. (Vintage Kano teasing.)