As soon as the performance ended and we got in the car, I started to incoherently say what I’d wanted to tell Liam.
“I don’t want to take your feelings lightly. But as you know, I really recently asked someone who wasn’t you out on a date and got rejected… And the person closest to me likes you.”
“Right. The relationships are quite complicated.”
Liam said with a faint smile on his lips. There was even a bit of leisure in his voice. This is kind of funny. He’s the one who confessed, not me, so why does it seem like I’m the only one flustered?
“…Then when you held my hand, should I have stopped you?”
Liam answered “I guess so” and slyly held my hand, laughing as if enjoying this situation. This time too, I couldn’t strongly shake off his hand. I did let go by moving my fingers here and there though.
“To be honest, I think I’m paying attention to you. I can’t say specifically what kind of emotion this is. I’m sorry. I really don’t know. But yesterday and today too, it might just be a slump, but I was thinking about you and ruined practice so the coach told me to go home early, and even during my part-time work I was thinking about you and made mistakes so I got chewed out by the manager. I’m absolutely not blaming you. I’m the one who did the stupid things. Anyway, what I want to say is…”
“You don’t have to say more.”
It’s okay, Liam said, then grabbed my collar. Then he kissed me lightly, stepped back, and laughed like someone who’d lost their mind.
“Haha, dude, your mouth tastes like cream soda.”
“……That taste is in your mouth too.”
“You bought it for me too! I only used to eat vanilla cream soda, but from now on I’ll only eat cherry flavor even if it kills me.”
Liam said that and laughed again.
I rejected Liam just last night. I definitely did, yet I didn’t shake off his hand when he held it, and stayed still when he kissed me. What position am I even in?
“Can you give me a little time to organize my thoughts? It doesn’t need to be long. This way, you’ll be confused too, right? About how I’ll…… treat you from now on.”
“Okay. How much time do you need to think?”
At Liam’s question, I said I’d have an answer if I thought about it until Monday morning. Liam nodded readily and promised he wouldn’t confuse me until at least then.
“Am I rushing too much right now?”
Liam asked while looking at the car ceiling, which wasn’t particularly worth looking at.
“Well, it is hard to keep up with your pace.”
“You have to dash at any offensive chance.”
In short, I’m like the end zone to him right now, Liam explained, then asked if I remembered a conversation we had in this car once.
“We talked about the Backstreet Boys then.”
“I remember.”
“I promised to play you a song I like someday, but I realized I never did.”
Liam said that, then played ‘As Long As You Love Me,’ a hit song by the Backstreet Boys, through his smartphone. Then he explained why he liked this song.
“I like the lyrics that say… you don’t care who I am, where I came from, what I did before.”
“The chorus?”
“The way I felt it, you seemed like that kind of person. Someone who doesn’t care who I am, where I came from, what I did before.”
Isn’t that not because I’m such a great guy, but because there wasn’t anything particularly problematic about Liam? As I was harboring doubts inwardly, I stopped thinking when I saw Liam’s face smiling at me.
He always smiled at me like this. He smiles well at other times and toward other people too, but I only now realize belatedly that it felt completely different when he smiled at me.
“I had fun today.”
Just before parting in front of the trailer, Liam looked at me and said. I also thanked him for asking me to go to the concert together.
“I’m glad I worked up the courage. When I asked you to go see the concert together, I was really nervous.”
“I thought you didn’t get nervous about things like that.”
“As if! Even before talking to you on the day Leda threw the party, I probably took 100 deep breaths.”
Liam confessed he was always in a state of extreme tension when with me. Then, with the moonlight coming through the car window as a backdrop, he smiled dazzlingly and entered the trailer. Even after he’d completely gone in, I stayed in front of the trailer for a moment before hurrying home.
When I got home and checked my smartphone, there was a new post on Liam’s social media. It was a post where he’d tagged me under a photo of us wearing concert bracelets—neither of our faces showed, just our hands wearing bracelets holding cream soda bottles.
**Alice** I heard you had someone to go with. I thought it was a date. When did you two get so close?
* * *
There were many comments on Liam’s post, but the one at the very top caught my eye. It was left by Alice, and she said date. Thinking about what Liam and I did, it really was like a date. Going to see a concert together, holding hands, kissing, taking him home.
**Cheick** Did you tell Alice you were going to the concert?
I wanted to strike up a conversation but couldn’t find an excuse, so though I felt sorry for Alice, I used her as a pretext to send Liam a DM.
**Liam** She asked me to go together. But I didn’t specifically say I was going with you.
Alice had asked Liam to go see the concert together. As soon as I got this information, I recalled what Nathan once speculated about Alice. That the reason Alice, who wasn’t even directly involved, badmouthed Liam only by Leda’s side right after Leda and Liam broke up might be because Alice liked Liam.
If Alice also liked Liam like Sophia, the complexity of this relationship would truly reach an indescribable level. I like Leda, Leda likes someone whose identity hasn’t been revealed yet, and meanwhile I got rejected by Leda, Liam said he likes me, there’s something between Liam and me, but my friend Sophia likes Liam, and Virgil likes that Sophia, and on top of that Alice likes Liam……?
Alice Miller. One of the names that would inevitably be mentioned if you were to pick the most attractive girl in school. Liam already came out to me as gay, but you never know. Liam might date Alice just like he did with Leda.
**Liam** Anyway, did you get home safely:->?
Since you’re sending DMs it seems like you got home safely lol
Reading the message that felt like I could hear Liam’s voice, I recalled what he said today.
‘You’re the person I’ve been dreaming of all along.’
Looking back, right before or after being rejected by Leda, I thought about Liam more than her. Worried about what Liam tried to say but didn’t, and that kid getting scolded by that vicious coach kept coming to mind, so I wasted precious training time. I kept worrying about how he darkened when it came to his father, and even got scolded by the manager during my part-time work.
I even just stood there when he held my hand or kissed me.
I still don’t know a lot about him, but it’s fun being with him. Being honest about everything and being passionate can be a bit burdensome sometimes, but ultimately I like it.
His smiling face is wonderful.
When it seems like something bad has happened to him, my mind becomes scattered. Like when he’s having lunch with just a chocolate bar.
I recall the first day I was alone with Liam. Perhaps I’d been concerned all along from that day we met in front of the vending machine. From the very first day we met.
* * *
Monday morning. Arriving in front of the trailer earlier than usual, I played ‘As Long As You Love Me’ timed for when Liam got in the car. Liam looked at me bewildered, and I just watched him without saying or doing anything until the song ended.
“You said you’d tell me by Monday.”
It would be nice if I could say something more plausible, but this is my limit.
“Don’t eat chocolate bars during lunch break from now on. Unless you really want to eat them.”
What would happen if an athlete had meals like that, I said something like nagging to Liam, who was still in a daze, then immediately fell into self-loathing.
“Wow, I just really sounded like my mom or dad. What’s with this sudden nagging.”
“That’s okay. But right now, you basically said YES to me, right?”
Liam asked with an expression of disbelief.
“I think there might be some trust issues between us because of me asking Leda out on a date, but I’ll try to resolve that part gradually.”
“I don’t really care. But…… are you really okay?”
What reason would there be for me not to be okay, I asked Liam back, then started the car. Then, before leaving the trailer village, I gave him a quick, awkward side glance before driving silently.
“I kept thinking at home. I had all kinds of thoughts, and I even imagined what it would have been like if you’d gone to the concert with Alice instead of me.”
Just before getting out of the car after arriving in front of school, I spoke to Liam.
“But it was kind of, yeah. Should I say it made me feel a bit bad? So I switched it to Sophia and imagined again. I’m less close with Alice anyway, and I’m much closer with Sophia, so I thought maybe it would be okay. But I felt equally bad.”
“Cheicky.”
“At the end, I imagined the same thing with Leda, and it was also not great. But whether it was because I was jealous of you or jealous of Leda…… after thinking carefully, I came to a conclusion.”
I grabbed Liam’s wrist, smiled at him once, then let go of his wrist. And I said.
“I’m not as fast as you, but I’m pretty fast. So if you rush, I’ll try to match your pace to some extent.”
“……I like people who nag a lot!”
Liam suddenly grabbed my hand tightly and said. His speaking voice was louder than when shouting cadence during a game, so my ears rang for a moment, but I could feel just how sincere Liam was toward me.
“No. If the nagging seems too much, tell me.”
After awkwardly requesting that, I waited until Liam got out of the car. He kissed my cheek and got out of the car, and I needlessly touched the part where his lips had touched before hurriedly driving the car to the parking lot.
**Episode 3+**
The entire time I was separating from Cheick and entering the schoolyard, my head was unbearably noisy with all kinds of thoughts. The things that had swept through like a storm over the past few days, and what Cheick said there…… It just happened, but I can’t believe it. Is it really true that he accepted my feelings?
“Look at you. Your mind is completely elsewhere.”
While my mind was elsewhere, long, slender fingers stretched out from below and poked my cheek.
“Well, it’s Monday.”
Lightly brushing away Leda’s finger that was pressing hard enough to pierce my cheek, I asked her if she had a good weekend. Then I also greeted the people around her, like Alice and Sophia.
“Was the concert fun?”
When Alice asked, I answered as nonchalantly as possible that it was fun. I don’t remember at all what songs Passport sang at that concert or what performances they did. That day I was too busy watching Cheick next to me, and my mouth just kept itching because I wanted to tell him my true feelings.
“So, how did you end up going to the concert with Cheick? He usually tries not to go to crowded places.”
Sophia cautiously spoke to me while glancing around.
“I asked him to go. Just, I thought it would be fun to go together.”
“Ah.”
