“…Kuu…ch…n…” A soft voice whispered in the darkness.

A girl stepped out of the darkness and spoke to the one where it was pitch black. “Are you worried?”

“…Un…” The soft voice’s owner followed out, she seemed nearly see through and she wore a penguin hoodie. Her large eyes were hidden slightly behind the hood and her bangs, but they seemed to reflect a worry.

“…something bad…is going to happen…?” The girl asked.

“……” The only response that came was silence.

“…I don’t like her…making you worry.”

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I sneezed for some reason. The first episode has finished and been wrapped up. While it may seem shocking that someone my age has an actual house, I’m sitting in my house’s living room watching TV. Showing is that strange drama.

Despite being part of the production, I felt the urge to change the channel. I reached for the remote, but stopped. The show was starting. The opening was a song sung by the idol group that Kimoto is in.

Up until the point that Yuria doesn’t show up, I watched it. Her cute awkward smiles and her round face as well as her large doggy eyes were all so cute. To be blunt, I must be a bad AD for this, but I’m not so interested in watching the drama for now especially since I’ve enjoyed the story a few times through while reading the scripts.

Right now, it’s quite late at night or rather extremely early in the morning might be the right way to say it. The drama was a late night drama, so what would one expect? It was a surprise that I actually bothered to watch it.

I’m tired. Today…is Saturday. That meant that I had two more days of rest. Because, it’s basically a few minutes after Saturday started. And this was quite unhealthy, to stay up so late.

Feeling tired, I rolled around on the carpet. The fact of the matter was that I wasn’t able to fall asleep. I turned off the TV. I yawned and stretched out my arms. But, the thing is that I’m tired yet can’t fall asleep.

I got up and put on a light jacket and some sneakers and headed out. Nearby was a convenience store and considering the fact that I had nothing else to do and don’t keep snacks in the house most of the time--meaning I don’t have anything to munch on and get fat on when I’m bored, I went out (of course after turning off all the lights and locking the door).

The night was somewhat cool. The sky was blue-ish and the moon was bright and round. Most people don’t seem to be awake right now. I jogged along, breathing in the fresh air. This was so much better than the stuffy indoors, but at the same time weather just didn’t agree with me.

All of a sudden, it started to rain. Okay, so the weather forecast said that it’d be partly cloudy and a 20% chance of precipitation. Rain is equivalent to I’m to be drenched and that’s equal to a cold. Before I was completely drenched I ran and ran and ran to the convenience store and went under the little roof.

My jacket was soaked and my hair was considerably wet. This is cold. I shivered as I took off the jacket. Finding that taking a soaking wet jacket around would be bad, I squeezed out the water I could squeeze out a held in draping over one arm. Then, like a dog, I shook my hair and got some of the water out.

I looked towards the bright light from the convenience store. Considering that I was here, I decided that I might as well do what I planned and maybe get a new umbrella.

Roaming around, I found myself where the manga and new books were. I automatically moved my gaze over to the new manga magazine that had been released. I picked it up and began browsing through, reading the next chapter of a certain manga that I had recently fallen for.

Someone else had come over and picked up a manga, One Piece to be exact, while I was burying my head in the magazine. The two of us were immersed in the manga reading for quite a bit. After a bit of time, I finished.

Raising my head up and putting the magazine down, I looked towards the other reader. She finished as well. Slightly tanned skin, round cheeks, large eyes, it was Yuria.

“Yuria-san?” “Kumi-san?”

“You live around here?” We both asked at the same time. That probably meant that we both did live in this area. I giggled and she grinned.

“Well, I’m going to buy some snacks…” I paused and looked out the window, “and probably an umbrella.”

She nodded and stated, “I guess I’ll follow you.”

Thus, I walked around the store with a cute Yuria following behind me. In the end, I got some cookies and chips as well as some strange gummies that she had convinced me to buy.

When we went over to the umbrella area, there was surprisingly only one left. It was a small black umbrella and when I picked it up, it was quite heavy.

I looked at Yuria; she didn’t seem to have an umbrella either. Her hair was slightly wet and I could see the shine coming from the reflecting lights and the water. There were chances that she did have an umbrella and just left it in the umbrella rack outside though, so I left that topic at that.

The two of us headed to the cash register. There weren’t many people considering the time and the cashier seemed somewhat sleepy. Checking out with a few setbacks--me struggling to find my wallet and the cashier falling asleep--the two of us headed out of the convenience store.

“Yuria…you don’t have an umbrella do you?”

“…urm…”

“…Seriously… Okay, let’s share this one…Where’s your house?”

“It’s…” She ended up telling me the address and it turned out that the place was quite far away from my place. This was an unlucky situation. The rain wasn’t letting up and actually it seemed to be getting heavier.

“Okay, I’ll first send you home.” Considering the fact that I was the older one as well as the one with the umbrella, I should do at least this much.

“Ah… Thanks.”

“No problem.”

That led to the two of us heading towards her house. Yuria led the way as I held the umbrella. The heavy rain was pitter-pattering like the end of the world. A number of large puddles had already formed and they were going down the drain.

I noticed that our shoulders were getting slightly wet. Of course, that’d happen. This umbrella was only made for one person. Plus, it was pretty cheap.

Noticing that we were getting wet, Yuria looked up to me questioningly. Did she wonder if I didn’t want to send her home? I have nothing against it at least.

“…Kumi-san…Since we’re getting wet like this, should we huddle together under this umbrella a bit closer together?” Yuria shyly fidgeted like a small animal…kawaii.

Without a second thought, I agreed. “Okay.” I mean, what’s so bad about not getting soaked?

Well, of course I figured out why one would be shy about that the next moment. Okay, normal people wouldn’t really notice, but then again, who was a normal person in this world?

Yuria pressed against my shoulder. I could feel her warmth from just this. We huddled closer together and it felt so soft. Urm…soft…yes. I attempted to ignore the bad omens. Luck was here this time around. I could feel Yuria pressing against me, trying to avoid the rain.

Well…this is life isn’t it? (Kumi, this isn’t life. In the end, you have a lack of awareness in this subject.)

The two of us walked along. Our feet splashed water where puddles had formed and with luck, no cars ran by meaning that we wouldn’t have to suffer being splashed by such a situation.

I could hear a hard beating against the umbrella. The rain was really raining hard. As I held the umbrella, I felt my arms gradually get tired, but just kept on going. With a few minutes or so, we reached a somewhat large house with a nice metal fence if it didn’t seem so dark in the weather.

I looked towards Yuria. This was the address that she said. “Is this it?”

She bobbed her head up and down like a squirrel, “Yea.”

The two of us went up to the doorstep. Getting wet after coming all this way with an umbrella was kind of stupid after all. The doorstep did have a roof, so I closed up the umbrella for a tiny bit. She knocked on the door and the next moment I could hear footsteps.

A kind looking middle aged woman opened the door; she was probably Yuria’s mother. With a smile, she welcomed us in, “Yuri~a, you’re back…and it looks like you have a friend accompanying you.”

“Mom… yea, yea. I just went out for a short bit you know?”

“Uh-huh… well, come on in.” Kizaki-mama grinned and motioned for us to come in. “You too, um…”

“Kumi, Yagami Kumi…But actually…I wouldn’t want to intrude…I planned to head back after sending Yuria-san over anyways…”

“…Hmm…okay then. But…the weather’s not looking too good…”

“Thanks for the concern, but I think I’ll pro-” I was cut off right there by a sudden large boom of thunder and a bright flash of lightning. That wasn’t the worst part, but a loose branch from somewhere flew into the back of my head. “-bably…be fine…”

That hurt you know!? My luck just ran out right there. I sighed as the two looked at me worriedly. Then another large branch came flying to the same target. Really…isn’t this dangerous to be hit in the head like this? (Luckily, this Kumi-san has a 99.99% chance of not actually being injured.)

“…Are you okay…Kumi-san…?”

“…On second thought…Could I take shelter here until the rain stops…?”

“Yagami-chan, come on in.” The mother welcomed me in. Without any choices, I gratefully stepped in and took off my shoes. “Let me take the umbrella and put it somewhere.”

“Ah, thanks.”

“There’s no problem. Now Yuria will accompany you~ Well, it’s somewhat late at night so she’ll probably have to set out a futon or something…” Then, Kizaki-mama walked away like a joyful young girl, leaving me to Yuria it seemed.

Yuria looked at me awkwardly. I returned that gaze. With an awkward silence, the two of us headed upstairs to what seemed to be her room.

She seemed somewhat red. “…Yuria-san, you should make sure that you’re dried…” Don’t catch a cold, I tried to say indirectly.

“…Kumi-san, you should worry about that more so than me…” She mumbled.

We walked into her room. It was filled with a number of interesting things that I was not able to in when Kizaki-mama came in and said, “I checked the weather report and it’s going to continue raining until noon. Yagami-chan, you can stay over tonight.”

Yuria pushed me out and forcefully said, “I have spare pajamas… it’d be bad if you stayed in that wet clothing…” Then she handed me a full body wolf pajama.

Then she locked me out of her room. Kizaki-mama saw and giggled, “Hehe…that girl’s being shy… Well, Yagami-chan, take good care of Yuria for me.” I could see the eyes of a caring mother.

“Eh? I will…”

“You don’t understand…but you will. Now go ahead and change out of that wet clothes, there’s a bathroom right next to you.”

They’re such nice and homely people. Kizaki-mama’s warmer than my parents combined. “Ah…thanks…”

Then she came over and whispered, “Yuria doesn’t actually have that many friends…Yagami-chan…I know that you’re a reliable and kind girl…So, take care of her when I’m not there…” Yups, Kizaki-mama is a wonderful mother.

A flash of lightning and thunder stormed.

I changed into the warm and soft wolf pajama and Yuria was just dressed in normal pajamas actually. “…There aren’t any spare futons…so we’ll have to share a bed…” She fidgeted.

“Uh-huh…” It’s just going to be a little cramped.

“You’re a baka you know?” Yuria pouted.

“…eh….” I moaned.

“Hrmph~”

“Well…let’s sleep now?”

We shut off the lights and were about to get into bed when thunder rumbled once again with a flash of lightning. Yuria whimpered and jumped into the bed. Not knowing what to do, I just simply hugged her with my furry wolf arms.

“Oyasumi…”

And…somehow, the two of us managed to fall asleep peacefully…Even though it was so late--early. Yuria’s sweet scent and her warmth lulled me to sleep with a smile on my face.

~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~

Elsewhere, there was a phone call being made. The storm wasn’t that bad in that place and it was at most just a light drizzle. Unfortunately for the two young girls, it wasn’t so, but the phone call’s origin was just drizzling lightly.

“Yagami-san, I’d like to report that your daughter is…”