At any rate, Riona was awake, and the long-anticipated dinner was on. The four of us sat down at the dining table.
“Onii-chan, you took a while to come down — were you detouring?”
“Oh, that—”
I was about to explain the difficulty waking Riona when Reona and Riona spoke up first.
“Ryouya was begging me for it, so I was responding to his request — that’s why we were late.”
“Mm-hmm. Didn’t even care that I was there, honestly shocked me.”
“Wha—!?”
“Stop fabricating things!?”
Mio and I both responded incoherently. Yes — I had ended up draped over Riona — but that had been an accident and Reona’s fault.
”…The instinct to make a move on someone as beautiful as Riona-san is understandable, but I do not want to be an aunt at this age, so please be careful, Onii-chan.”
“I did not make a move on her.”
“After how intensely we needed each other earlier, you’re really going to scrub that whole event?”
“Wow — Ryouya-kun, that’s the kind of guy you are?”
“Please give me a break…”
The three of them were piling on. My HP had hit zero. Mio probably didn’t seriously believe I’d made a move on Riona, but —
since the birthday party, I knew Mio had taken to quietly referring to Reona and Riona as “onee-chan,” so the future implications were genuinely worrying. I changed the topic.
“Anyway — Reona being good at cooking was a surprise.”
“Do I look that bad at cooking?”
“Honestly? Yeah.”
“True, lots of people assume I’m better at this than Nee-chan.”
It might be rude to admit, but I had associated Riona — the serious type — with competence at things like this, and Reona — who reads goofier — with incompetence. The reality was inverted.
“Right, so let me amp up the homemaker energy in self-promotion.”
“You don’t need to, I am thoroughly convinced.”
Reona smirked at my words.
“Aw — but I never said I was promoting it to you.”
“Wait — did Ryouya think we were talking about him?”
“Onii-chan, that’s a touch self-centered.”
Additional psychic damage took me into the negatives. Please let me suffer in peace. Eventually dinner wrapped and I walked Reona and Riona home.
The two of them tried floating a we could stay over trial balloon, but letting them sleep at a boy’s house overnight and return in the morning would have been very rude to their parents, so I refused firmly.
“Coming up — homeroom about the school trip. Excited.”
“Oh — free-day destinations, I’m letting you guys pick. Whatever you want.”
“Nothing you want to see, Ryouya?”
“Not really, I only know the obvious Kyoto landmarks.”
And the obvious landmarks were already in the group-activity itinerary.
“Right, Riona and I will research.”
“Will pick places Ryouya would like.”
“Yeah, thanks.”
The first day after summer break wrapped, having been exhausting and event-packed.
———
End of Chapter 1. Thank you for reading.
Chapter 2 will be the prep arc; Chapter 3 will be the actual school trip arc.
I’d love to clear 1,000 stars before the print version drops, so if you haven’t already, please consider leaving a ★★★ rating. Written reviews are also extremely welcome.