“Let’s have a beachin’ good time, yo,” I decred to no one in particur.

  Pying the role of a gyaru came naturally to me, and it took over whenever I was nervous. That meant that I was especially annoying around Sayaka-chan. No matter what I said, I was met with the same gre that told me that I was an idiot. Strangely enough, she hadn’t called me an idiot or stupid nearly as much as she did in the past. Perhaps she was trying to be nicer since we were closer after reuniting, but it was more likely that she was just saying it in her head instead of out loud.

  “Calm down, you goof,” Sayaka-chan scolded me in her cold tone. “Let’s find a pce to set up the umbrel before you go dashing into the water.”

  “I know! Sheesh. Can’t a girl get excited anymore? This is your first time at the beach, shouldn’t you be more excited than I am?”

  “It may surprise you, but it’s possible to be excited without looking like an idiot,” she sighed.

  Ever since the previous night, Sayaka-chan had been acting strange around me. She may have pyed off seeing me shirtless like it was nothing, but she was absolutely bothered by it. The issue was that I had no clue what exactly was making her upset. Since she wasn’t interest in romance or anything physical, it would make sense if she was uncomfortable seeing someone exposed like that. However, if she was repulsed by my body, or she was grossed out by seeing a girl without clothes on, then that meant I had a lot more work to do if I wanted to be with her in the future.

  The silver lining was that she didn’t think same-sex couples were a bad thing. She took my aunt's retionship surprisingly well, which was promising that she could be open to one herself in the future. There was no need to rush, of course, but I couldn’t help but feel antsy. Waiting until college wasn’t the worst scenario, but if I had no chance until after we graduated from college, then I’d be in a tough spot.

  Once we found a good spot to y our towels down and set up the umbrel, I took the liberty of stripping my outer clothes. Sayaka-chan was busying herself with her bag, which was only a bit disappointing. It would have been nice if she snuck a few peeks while I was taking my tank top off, but she seemed to be very fascinated by her spare towel.

  “What do you think? Does it suit me,” I asked Sayaka-chan in a vain attempt to get her attention.

  She finally tore her eyes away from her things and gnced back at me. After just a second, her eyes doubled in size and her mouth dropped open for just a second. Quickly, she averted her eyes and put on her sungsses in a pointless attempt to hide her shocked expression.

  “D-don’t you think it’s a bit too revealing,” she stuttered.

  “It’s not that revealing,” I argued back at her. “You’re just a prude! I’m only going to be young once, I might as well show off my good looks while I have them.”

  “Isn’t it a bit conceited to say something like that? Aren’t you nervous about being gawked at by perverted boys?”

  “Pfft. They can look all they want, you’re the only one whose opinion I care about,” I admitted with blushing cheeks.

  “Well, my opinion is that it’s much too eye-catching.”

  The urge to tease the blushing cutie averting her eyes was too strong for me to resist. It was a bold move, especially after what had happened the night before, but I really wanted to see her even more flustered. I leaned forward until my face was only a few centimeters from hers. The position and angle were perfectly aligned so that the first thing she’d see when she turned around would be my chest.

  “Is that so,” I asked, which was met with my pnned response. “What exactly is so eye-catching about it?”

  “…Didn’t I see these enough st night,” she snarked.

  “You should keep that in mind whenever some guy looks at me. You’ve seen more of me than they ever will.”

  A wink and a chuckle were all it took for her face to become bright red. Teasing her was fun because she’d always blush whenever I talked about my body. It was understandable; she wasn’t used to a friend that had my kind of fashion or personality, no matter how fabricated it was.

  Before I could make any other jokes, Touka and Himari-chan came out of nowhere to join us. We hadn’t pnned to go to the beach together, so they must have purposely gone looking for us.

  “Hey, kiddos,” Touka shouted much louder than necessary. “Mind if we join ya?”

  “Sorry for intruding on your outing. Touka insisted on hanging out with her precious niece,” Himari said with a sigh.

  “Thank goodness you’re here, otherwise Sasaki-san would spend the whole day teasing me,” Sayaka-chan celebrated much too happily.

  “Oh? Has she been teasing you,” Touka asked suggestively. “Such a naughty niece I have.”

  “She’s exaggerating. I was just messing with her by making her embarrassed about seeing my breasts st night.”

  “She what,” Himari-chan unexpectedly interjected.

  “It was an accident,” Sayaka-chan expined. “She was sitting in the living room after taking a bath and I just so happened to leave my room before she got dressed.”

  “See, this is what happens when a young girl lives alone for the majority of her life. She never learned basic modesty,” Touka hypocritically lectured.

  “It was a one-time mistake! It’s not like I walk around my apartment without clothes on all the time!”

  “Oh, so just some of the time,” Himari-chan rebutted.

  “Okay, can we please move on from this topic!? I came here with Sayaka-chan to have fun, not to rehash our awkward moments!”

  “Too bad. I’m taking Sayaka-chan to the store because you forgot to buy water,” Himari-chan shot back. “You children have fun pying around, we’ll be the mature ones. Come on, Sayaka-chan.”

  Before I could argue with her, Himari-chan grabbed Sayaka-chan’s wrist and pulled her along towards the shops. There was a look of relief on Sayaka-chan’s face that made my heart sink for a moment, as if she was happy that she had an excuse to get away from me.

  “Pretty bold of you to fsh your crush on your second night living together,” Touka chuckled as soon as they were out of earshot.

  “Didn’t you sleep with Himari-chan the night you met? I don’t need you to lecture me about how fast to move,” I petuntly tried to argue.

  “Himari and Sayaka-chan are very different people and you know that,” Touka retorted. “You’ve told me a million times that she’s not only romance adverse, but also extremely uncomfortable with sexual topics. What makes you think she’d be fine with seeing you without a shirt?”

  “It wasn’t on purpose! If it were up to me, I would have saved her seeing me that way until we were dating, but it’s too te now. What’s to be embarrassed about though? If she’s not interested in romance, then all she’s feeling is embarrassment from seeing it, not flustered because she liked it or something.”

  “You are so dense,” Touka groaned and massaged her temples. “Look, just because she was antiromance when you met her, doesn’t mean that she’s devoid of those feelings. Think about your recent interactions with her and maybe you’ll realize that you’re missing something gringly obvious.”

  Touka seemed to be implying something, but I couldn’t figure out what she meant. The only people who know Sayaka-chan better than me were her mom and Aoi-chan, how could Touka know anything more than what I told her? It’s not like Sayaka-chan was good at emoting or expressing her feelings when talking. If anything, her actions were an enigma that took careful consideration to decipher how she actually felt.

  Our recent interactions had been strange, but that wasn’t uncommon for us. She was an odd girl, so it made sense that she would have some peculiarities. Our shopping trip was odd, but that was probably because she wasn’t used to shopping with a gyaru, nor had she looked for a proper swimsuit before. Our dinner together was a little uncomfortable, but I was really forward that night and made her feel awkward. The only occurrence that held any promise was when she held my hand while we walked on the beach, but I chalked that up to her being nervous about being away from her mom for the first time.

  There was one constant across all those occurrences; I was the one who attributed the meaning of them. If she had been any other girl, I would’ve assumed they meant something else. But Sayaka-chan wasn’t like most girls, and so I always made-up excuses in my head for why she acted the way she did. I kept telling myself not to get my hopes up and not to read into anything she does as more than just being friendly. However, it was possible that I was missing clear signs because I was too scared to make positive assumptions.

  “Are you suggesting that she might like me too,” I asked with earnest excitement.

  “How should I know? I just think you’re stupid if you think she has no feelings for you whatsoever. Think about it; you two have only known each other for a short time and she already agreed to go on a trip alone with you, agreed to live with you in the future, she chased after you, she even went out of her comfort zone and went shopping. Just as someone who hears these things from an outsider’s perspective, she clearly values you.”

  “Well, when you put it like that you make it sound like our feelings are mutual.”

  “I wouldn’t say that, but I also don’t see the difference between assuming what she doesn’t like and assuming that she does. Either way, you’re just guessing how she feels based on what you think. Instead of deciding how she feels for her, why don’t you focus on becoming the kind of person that she couldn’t resist either way? It doesn’t sound like she knows her sexuality or has given it much thought. It’s possible that she wouldn’t think twice about being with a girl.”

  Touka was almost too id-back, and her manner of speaking left a lot to be desired, but she did have a point. Sayaka-chan’s romance aversion had become an easy excuse for me to use whenever my hopes got up. That was unfair to her, and it only made me more anxious. It’s not like I could interpret everything in a way that favored me either. The best option would be to just take her words at face value and forget about looking for a deeper meaning.

  “Heho! Maybe you should act a bit faster, my dear niece. Looks like some cute boy is talking to your beloved Sayaka-chan.”

  “What!?”

  My head swivel towards the street where Sayaka-chan was talking to some shirtless guy! Not only was he talking to her, but he was, in fact, objectively attractive. It was the first time I had seen a guy talking to her that wasn’t in our css, and I was filled with a mixture of rage and anxiety. How dare some shirtless jock talk to my sweet innocent Sayaka-chan!

  Oh, so she can see him shirtless without blinking an eye, but she practically exploded when she saw me without a bra, I thought to myself angrily. Where did this dude even come from!? Why is he interested in Sayaka-chan!? Is he some kind of pervert who goes for cute girls who look unsuspecting!?

  “Touka, do you happen to have a harpoon on you,” I growled through gritted teeth.

  “Sheesh. One guy talks to your crush, and you immediately consider murder as an acceptable response. Do you know how many guys hit on Himari every day? You can’t get so worked up about it.”

  “Didn’t you beat up a guy who asked her out at a bar,” I rebutted instantly.

  “He put something in her drink, I was just protecting my future wifey,” Touka argued.

  “And you ter found out it was medicine for a stomachache she was compining to him about because he was a nurse. Tell me again how you’re the rational one?”

  “…you are definitely my sister’s child. In any case, murder shouldn’t be your first reaction.”

  “What’re you two delinquents talking about,” Himari-chan asked with an evil grin across her lips.

  “Princess Jealousy over here was worried about that boy talking to Sayaka-chan.”

  “He’s asking where she got her swimsuit because his sister liked it. You two need to grow up,” Himari-chan scolded the both of us.

  “Sorry about that. He kept asking me questions about the color selection and the sale prices at the store,” Sayaka-chan said as if to throw it in my face that I was being silly. “What’re you two doing standing around? I thought you’d be wave jumping by now.”

  “Just some good aunt-niece bonding time, y’know,” Touka lied.

  “You’re closer in age than you are to your sister, and you act like she’s your sister more than you do with your actual sister,” Himari-chan retorted.

  “While you two argue, Sayaka-chan and I are going swimming. Watch our stuff for us,” I called back as I grabbed Sayaka-chan’s hand and rushed off towards the water.

  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Sorry for the dey getting these chapters out, the next one will be on time!

  I have big pns for the beach arc that I'm sure you all will enjoy!