Chapter 4: If He Says He’s Fine

—I see that dream again.

A bright, sunny day. I’m playing happily with my best friend. Then, my parents pull me away, and the world turns gray. Then, as darkness falls, rain begins, and the world is stained completely black.

I wake up drenched in sweat, the same nightmare as always, leaving me with the worst possible start to the day.

—But this time, it didn’t end there.

I couldn’t even tell if my eyes were open or closed. A pitch-black world, filled with silence, continued around me.

I couldn’t see anything. Couldn’t hear anything. I wasn’t even sure I was really there.

In this world drowned in black, I shook my head, trying to look around.

I couldn’t tell if I was actually moving, or seeing anything at all.

Then, far off—maybe?—I saw something like a bright speck of light.

It was tiny, the size of a grain, so small that if I lost focus, I’d lose sight of it completely. In this darkness, I couldn’t even tell whether it was far away, or right in front of me.

But before I knew it, I was running toward that light.

I kept running, desperately, not taking my eyes off that small speck.

How long did I run? I don’t know. I just kept going, until the speck of light grew large enough that I could tell—it was a person.

Once I’d gotten that far, it felt close. Almost within reach.

I kept running, until I was maybe ten meters away from that figure.

And I recognized it.

That figure, radiating warm light from its body, was the familiar silhouette of my childhood friend.

I started to reach out to run to them—then stopped.

I hadn’t noticed it, not in this darkness. But now, with my friend’s light shining there, I understood.

My hand, my legs, my body—everything was dyed pitch black.

I rubbed at my skin, trying to wipe away the blackness, but it didn’t come off.

It wasn’t dirt. I was what was black.

Looking down at my body, then back up at my friend…

—To someone stained in black like me, my friend was simply too bright.

I didn’t belong near them.

But I didn’t have the courage to go closer, or to turn away.

All I could do was sit there, in the dark, watching the only source of light: my childhood friend.

—Even the continuation of the nightmare was still a nightmare. Honestly, I felt awful.

～～～～～～～～～

Before I realized it—or rather, as an inevitable result—break time had become where I sat beside Murakumo.

Every break, without fail, Murakumo would call my name out loud, “Haru,” leaving me no choice but to go sit next to him. No choice. That’s all it was.

Naturally, though, that meant the girls who liked Murakumo—the ones who seriously had crushes on him—weren’t happy about it. If I’d been sitting next to him as a guy, maybe they could have ignored it. But now, with me looking like a girl, constantly being by his side, they couldn’t just brush it off.

Whether I had feelings for him or not didn’t matter.

Besides, from what I’d heard, Murakumo used to be the type who didn’t turn anyone away. He’d be perfectly dry and casual about it, making it clear that whatever connection he had with a girl was just temporary. Apparently, he’d had that kind of relationship with several girls in class.

From their side, even that temporary connection seemed to make them happy. I’d seen it myself before—Murakumo getting called out by a girl, her blushing but looking genuinely happy about it.

But according to Aokuu, Murakumo had never once been the one to start a conversation himself.

Come to think of it, ever since Murakumo started calling me over, I hadn’t seen him talking to any other girls at all.

Not that I think having flings with multiple people is something to be praised.

In other words, from the perspective of the girls who liked Murakumo, I was a real eyesore. Murakumo called out to me, I didn’t even seem happy about it, yet I was always with him. To them, I must have looked seriously annoying.

And on top of that, the person always sitting beside him—was a girl… who until recently had been a guy. Just imagine how that felt. Even I could understand that losing to a former guy wasn’t exactly pleasant.

That day, we had PE class.

At my school, PE classes were separated by gender but combined between classes. So Class A and my Class B were together.

The girls who didn’t like me were waiting for their chance.

Normally, they couldn’t do anything, since their beloved Murakumo was always calling that “girly boy” over and sticking with me. They couldn’t even call me out or mess with me.

But today, PE was boys and girls separate. Which meant…

It was the perfect chance.

Honestly, I’d braced myself. I’d been feeling the sharp glares from a certain group of girls for a while now.

After changing alone in an empty classroom, I steeled myself and headed for the gym, determined to get through the class somehow.

Now that I think about it, someone had actually thrown fuel on the fire just before PE started. That idiot Murakumo.

While I was heading to the empty classroom to change, he’d said, “Want to change together?”

I turned him down, obviously. But he just said, “You’re used to it by now, aren’t you?”

That one line said everything. The whole class went silent, then… yeah. That’s what I thought.

The girls’ stares after that? Terrifying.

They liked Murakumo, but even after all their efforts, the best they’d managed was a brief, casual relationship—never even reaching a level where they could chat comfortably with him.

But me? This random girl-boy was apparently someone Murakumo liked, maybe even someone he’d gotten close to. To those girls, I was someone they envied and resented.

Well… whether what Murakumo felt was actually affection, I wasn’t sure. But at least I knew for certain he didn’t hate me.

So yeah. Their resentment toward me was probably at its peak right now.

Seriously, Murakumo… you didn’t have to say that.

And when I arrived at the gym, I was the last one there.

The sight of only girls in that space made me a bit nervous. Even if I look like this now, my mind’s still that of a guy. Being in a girls-only space… this was a first for me.

And worse, the girls from my Class B—quite a number of them—were glaring at me.

I’d heard girls’ bullying could get nasty, so honestly, I was hoping they’d go easy on me.

Soon after, the teacher arrived and class began.

At the start of the lesson, the teacher briefly introduced me to Class A, and I gave a polite greeting: “Nice to meet you.”

Then came the voice from Class B’s girls. “We don’t want to take PE class with a boy.”

The teacher tried to explain: “She’s fully a girl now, not a boy anymore.” But the girls of Class B didn’t look convinced.

Their voices gradually got louder, their numbers grew, and eventually even some of the girls from Class A started chiming in with, “Yeah, they’ve got a point.”

So that’s how they were going to play it… I thought.

For them, rejecting me was easy. All they had to do was insist: “That’s a boy. No way.” Just saying that would let them push me out of the group without dragging anyone else into it.

And it all came down to personal feelings. No matter how much I insisted I was a girl, if they felt, emotionally, that they didn’t want me around, there was no arguing against that.

Even if I proved I had a girl’s body, showed them everything… if they still said, “Yeah, but I just don’t like it,” there’d be no countering that.

—Maybe that’s what they’re aiming for.

If we were dealing with adults, they’d probably say outright discrimination isn’t allowed. But this was school. In reality, those rules barely existed here.

Their approach was even more direct than I’d expected, and completely unanswerable. I was already thinking: if they could at least set me aside for some sort of solo PE lesson, that’d be lucky… when suddenly, an unexpected voice came to my defense.

“We don’t mind. If Class B doesn’t want her, she can join Class A instead.”

I turned instinctively toward the voice.

I recognized her.

The one who spoke was Kazuhi Wabi-san. Aokuu’s girlfriend.

She gave off a kind, dependable vibe. And judging by the atmosphere, she seemed to hold a high rank in the class social hierarchy.

“Amari-san, let’s get along, okay?”

She came up to me, held out her hand, and smiled.

In Class B, the girls openly avoided me. If we so much as brushed hands, they’d act like they’d touched something dirtier than a boy, wiping themselves off with a handkerchief or brushing their hands frantically.

But Wabi-san… she offered her hand to someone like me. She wanted to shake hands.

Happy, but nervous, I reached out slowly. Then Wabi-san clasped my hand herself.

“Thank you.”

The words just slipped out.

Before I could think, they came naturally, spilling straight from my feelings.

And then tears followed.

“A-ah… huh? Sorry, I’m just… happy…”

“It’s okay. It’s been hard, hasn’t it? You’re okay now. You’re safe.”

She said that, then gently pulled me into a hug, as if wrapping me up.

The teacher started clapping. And then, the girls from Class A joined in.

That sight… forced the girls from Class B into silence.

In this atmosphere, in this moment, saying “I just don’t like it” would make them the bad guys.

Wabi-san had created that atmosphere.

Class finally started.

Just to be safe, the teacher placed me with Class A, and specifically paired me up with Wabi-san whenever possible.

Kazuhi Wabi-san, Koharu. She’s Aokuu’s girlfriend, who’s also friends with Murakumo. Her long, slightly wavy brown hair softened her entire image.

She seemed calm, with gentle expressions and movements that gave off a sense of warmth and patience. But when she talked, she showed glimpses of a typical girl her age. That gap might be part of her charm.

“Don’t you have a hair tie? Here, use this.”

Noticing that I hadn’t even tried to tie back my long black hair, Wabi-san offered me a red hair tie.

Ah… right. For PE, long hair would get in the way. You tie it up.

Realizing I hadn’t even known something that basic, I accepted the hair tie, feeling both grateful and a little embarrassed at myself.

I tied back my long black hair and looped it through the hair tie. Oh… this really did help. It wasn’t in the way anymore.

And somehow, the back of my neck felt cooler too.

After that, I exchanged words with Wabi-san many times, and slowly came to understand what kind of person she was.

Just like Aokuu had said, she was kind, warm, and easy to talk to—a genuinely good person.

By the end of class, we’d gotten along surprisingly well.

“Nozomu asked me to look after you, Amari-chan. After hearing everything from him, I just felt bad for you. But once we talked, I realized you’re actually really sweet. So, from now on, we’re friends.”

Ah… so that’s what happened. Aokuu had asked Wabi-san to help me, expecting this might happen.

I couldn’t feel anything but grateful for that. Thanks, Aokuu.

“So call me Koharu, okay? I’ll call you Haru-chan too.”

“Ah… then… Koharu-san?”

“No, no, not Koharu-san. Koharu-chan. Got it?”

“Th-then… Koharu-chan.”

“Yup! Nice to meet you, Haru-chan!”

She even joked, saying something like, “We’re the Haru-Haru duo now, Koharu and Haru.” It made me genuinely happy.

Then Koharu-chan added,

“Nozomu and Murakumo-kun are a great combo too. Maybe we’ll make a pretty good pair ourselves.”

I was so happy.

Even though I wasn’t Murakumo’s girlfriend—not that anyone around us would believe that, probably.

And so, PE class came to a happy end. No, not just happy—I’d made my first friend since becoming a girl. It felt… really, really good.