Ai arrived at Ryunosuke's classroom. She was generous enough not to cause a scene in front of everyone, not wanting to embarrass her man. With a composed look, she caught his eye and tilted her head toward the door.
Ryunosuke felt genuinely grateful. His "first wife" knew how to carry herself in public. The two of them made their way to the roof.
The moment they got there, Ai couldn't hold it in any longer. With eyes beginning to glisten, she crossed the distance between them and buried herself against his chest. Ryunosuke rubbed her back slowly, at a loss for what to say. She clearly already knew he had been playing with fire across multiple fronts, and he had no defense to offer. If she decided to hit him right now, he would simply take it.
Then she looked up at him, eyes hollow and demanding all at once. "Tell me. Who else besides Sakayanagi? Be honest with me!"
"Ah..." Ryunosuke flinched at the state she was in. He gathered himself and answered. "Not that many. Maybe, five or six people."
He held up five fingers and let out a defeated sigh. He had chosen total honesty. His fate was in someone else's hands now. One had already been exposed, and if he wasn't honest now, whatever came later would be far worse.
Ai drew a long breath, released him, and spoke in the same resigned tone he had. "Bring them all. Have them come meet me. At least let them know who holds the highest position here. Whether they can accept that is their own business."
The meaning was clear. Ai could be open to accepting them, but whether those girls could accept the arrangement was up to each of them. What she wanted first was to meet them, to see exactly what caliber of women had been stealing her man.
Ryunosuke agreed with a deeply uncomfortable smile. "I'll go now."
He had no other option. He was the one at fault here. Whatever happened next, he would just have to follow where it led.
He left the roof to go gather the girls.
Ai stayed behind, standing at the railing with her fists clenched. She was willing to admit she might have come across as a little naive sometimes, but that did not mean she was going to hand her man over without a fight.
She ground her teeth.
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Back in class, Ryunosuke found Megumi first, wearing an expression like he had just bitten into something bitter. "Ai wants to meet you. You specifically, and, well, all of you."
Megumi looked at him with those deep, quiet eyes. "I had a feeling you'd get caught eventually, Ryunosuke-kun. Morishita-san finally found out, did she?"
He nodded, deflated. Without much more than that, Megumi began tidying her things, asked for the location, and headed there ahead of him.
Ryunosuke exhaled again and went to find Airi.
Airi didn't seem particularly thrown. Ever since she had confessed her feelings, she had already known he had a girlfriend. She had simply assumed the mysterious girlfriend was Arisu, without suspecting there was anyone else.
In front of their entire class, Ryunosuke took Airi's hand.
Airi looked a little dazed. Across the room, Hasebe Haruka turned her face away, unable to watch, and pressed it against her desk with an expression that was difficult to name.
Ryunosuke walked Airi out of the classroom. He had stopped caring about rumors and stares. His situation had already blown open, and there was no point hiding any of it now. He had chosen to let it all come out honestly.
Back inside the classroom, watching Ryunosuke leave hand in hand with Airi, the feelings of Karuizawa Kei, Sato Maya, Nakano Yotsuba, and Nakano Nino all became suddenly, uncomfortably complicated.
Yotsuba's green hair ribbon seemed to wilt on the spot.
Nino crossed her arms, distinctly unimpressed. "Here I thought the rumor outside was right and his girlfriend was Sakayanagi Arisu, and now he's still going around with Sakura-san on top of that. I really misjudged him."
She readied herself to throw her feelings away. Fortunately she hadn't fallen too deep. Yotsuba's situation was another matter entirely. Nino glanced at her sister, who looked like the light had gone out of her, and could only feel quietly sorry. She herself refused to play the role of a side piece; if it ever came to that, she had to be the main one.
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After walking Airi to the meeting point, Ryunosuke went to Class D to find Hiyori. She wasn't there. He headed straight for her favorite spot: the library.
She was there, reading. He sat down across from her. Without looking up from the page she was turning, Hiyori said, "I don't believe the announcement. I trust you."
She smiled softly, treating the rumor as nothing worth worrying about. After all, how could Ryunosuke be seeing someone else when they were already official?
Hiyori had chosen to run from reality.
Ryunosuke gave a smile that looked worse than crying. In a slightly unsteady voice, he said, "About that announcement, it's... all true."
Hiyori: 😐
She stayed frozen for a long moment, her expression completely blank. Ryunosuke didn't dare make a sound and kept his mouth firmly shut. Then she closed her book. Whatever she was thinking, none of it showed on her face. She let out a slow breath and asked in a very even voice:
"Tell me everything. What actually happened?"
Some time later, after he had explained it all, he walked her to the meeting location. Hiyori followed behind him in silence, book pressed to her chest. Her mood needed no explanation.
They arrived at a private karaoke room. Morishita Ai, Sakura Airi, Kato Megumi, Sakayanagi Arisu, and the newly arrived Shiina Hiyori were all gathered now, with Ryunosuke rounding out the group.
Ryunosuke could not bring himself to face any of it. Using the excuse of going to get drinks for all five girls, he bolted at full speed. Wiping cold sweat from his forehead, he thought to himself: (God. I would honestly rather be asked to overthrow the Prime Minister than deal with a catastrophe like this.)
Inside the room, the girls sized each other up. None of them spared a thought for the one who had just fled. What mattered now was establishing where each of them stood in front of the others.
Ai stepped forward and raised one small hand. "I'm the first one who was officially with Ryunosuke. I'm the head here. Anyone object?"
Megumi indicated no objection, her face as unreadable as ever. Airi nodded timidly and accepted it without question. As far as she was concerned, being with Ryunosuke at all was enough. The order didn't matter.
Arisu didn't see it that way. She opened her mouth to push back, and Ai immediately reached over and took hold of her cane, fixing her with a look that made the message perfectly clear. "Say no, and you can find your own way home."
She opened the window. The open sea stretched far below. She extended the cane out over the edge.
The threat needed no further elaboration. Arisu parted her lips, reconsidered, and quietly accepted the arrangement.
Ai looked satisfied. She closed the window and returned the cane. Then she turned her attention to the last person in the room, Hiyori.
"And what about you?"