Koharu Minami returned to school like a hurricane in reverse—no warning, no explanation, just a gust of energy that blew through the halls and reminded everyone why peace was temporary.
"Minami's back!"
"Did she seriously apply for seven clubs in two weeks again?"
"I heard she punched the Occult Club mascot…"
"She's starting a play now?!"
Yeah. Word spread fast.
I had barely finished my morning math test when I found her standing in front of the class's whiteboard, scribbling in bright pink marker:
"School Festival Special: A Love Story Across Time and Panty-Dimensional Boundaries!!"
The chalk screeched as I stared.
"That's not even grammatically correct," I muttered.
"Exactly!" Koharu beamed, tapping the board like a proud toddler who just invented calculus. "It's emotionally correct."
"…What does 'panty-dimensional' mean?"
"Don't think too hard about it. Just feel it."
The entire class watched in stunned silence as she plopped a script onto my desk, dusted with glitter and maybe loose cookie crumbs.
"There! You're the male lead."
I blinked.
"…Sorry, what?"
She smiled. "You're the protagonist."
---
Rewind twenty minutes earlier.
I had just opened my shoe locker to find a letter taped to the inside.
"Roof. Lunch. No excuses. Bring melon soda. —K"
Being the responsible NPC I was, I brought grape instead, because that was all the vending machine had. She glared at me like I had committed treason.
"This is your first test as a leading man," she said, sipping the wrong soda anyway.
"Failing with pride," I replied.
The wind blew gently across the roof, carrying cherry blossom petals leftover from the season. She leaned back against the railing, arms stretched.
"I signed us up for the stage play," she said casually.
"You… what?"
"Don't look so shocked. You've already been emotionally compromised. This is the next step."
I stared at her.
"Minami, I'm a background character. I have no stage presence. I don't even have a cool backstory. My most dramatic trait is lactose intolerance."
"That's tragic," she nodded solemnly. "We'll work with it."
"You're not listening—"
"I am!" she insisted. "Look, you're always blending in. You don't want to be seen. But when you are—when you stand there, deadpan, surrounded by chaos? That's when people actually notice you. It's like your anti-charisma loops into charisma."
I was silent.
She crouched beside me.
"Senpai," she said softly. "You saved me, remember? When I skipped school? You came to that manga café, told me I wasn't just some dropout trying to play heroine. You made that stupid flyer."
"It was so stupid."
"But it made me want to keep going."
I looked away. "That's different."
"Why?"
"Because that was you."
She tilted her head. "What if it's your turn now?"
---
Flash-forward again.
Now I was sitting at my desk, blinking down at a glittery, typo-riddled script titled:
"NPC Love: I Woke Up in a Girl's Dating Sim But All the Flags Lead to ME?!"
Scene 1 involved time travel. Scene 2 involved a jealous robot maid. Scene 3 had a "bathhouse accident" under a shooting star.
Koharu clapped her hands in front of the class.
"We need volunteers! Tech crew, costume designers, backup dancers, probably an exorcist—"
A few hands shot up.
Most were curious.
Some were terrified.
But all eyes slowly drifted toward me.
"Is Senpai really going to be the lead?"
"Wasn't he, like, invisible last year?"
"I thought he was an exchange student because no one knew his name."
"…I thought he was a teacher's aide."
Koharu grinned like she had planted this chaos on purpose.
And I was officially trapped.
---
The first rehearsal was a disaster.
The theater club gave us the dusty old stage for two hours after classes. Half the cast was made of bored classmates. The other half were club-hoppers dragged in by Koharu's "mysterious candy bribes."
"Places, everyone!" she called out cheerfully. "Senpai, you're up!"
I stepped forward like a man walking to the gallows.
Scene 1: I was supposed to fall through a time portal, land on top of the female lead (Koharu), and accidentally kiss her.
We never even made it past the fall.
I tripped over the fog machine cord, took down two cardboard trees, and crashed into the prop table like a human meteor.
Koharu burst out laughing.
"You're too method! Save some of that chaos for the bathhouse scene!"
I groaned from the floor. "I'm quitting."
"Nope."
"I'm bleeding."
"Adds realism."
"Your script is actual madness."
"Artistic madness."
And yet.
Everyone was laughing. Smiling.
Watching.
Even me.
Even her.
---
After rehearsal, we stayed behind to clean the stage. Koharu was still humming the play's theme song—which she claimed was "inspired by 90s magical girl anime and my mom's ringtone."
I stood at the edge of the stage, staring at the seats.
"So this is what it feels like," I muttered.
She looked up. "What does?"
"To be seen."
She stopped humming.
For a second, everything quieted. The smell of dust, the soft creak of the old stage, the fading gold of sunset through the windows.
"You were always there, Senpai," she said softly. "It just took the right kind of chaos."
I turned to her.
She leaned against the broom, hair falling across her cheek.
"…You really believe in this story, huh?"
"I believe in us telling it."
I laughed. "Even if it flops?"
"Then we flop together. Comedically. Heroically. Maybe while landing in each other's arms, bathhouse-style."
I snorted.
She smiled.
"…This really is my fault, huh?" I said, shaking my head.
"Blame the vending machine," she teased. "It all started with that grape soda."
I looked at the script one last time.
Still full of typos. Still ridiculous.
But maybe—just maybe—kind of ours.
I held it in my hands.
Heavy. Glittery. Real.
And I thought:
What if she's right?
---