"Well, this is... it's already too late to say anything now."
Mori Minami couldn't help but say as she watched the two leave the room.
"Forget the Togawa family; at this point, no matter who comes, I'm afraid no one can change that child's mind."
Although the situation had developed completely beyond her control, there was no annoyance of being defied on her face.
The reason she had opposed Sakiko's choice was, in essence, a rejection of the judgment Sakiko possessed at her age. In the end, it was only to prevent her from making an irresponsible choice regarding her own life. But in the current situation, if she were to still try and obstruct her on her own, not only would she be unable to pull Sakiko back to the "right path," but she might even force her toward the worst possible ending...
That would be putting the cart before the horse. Even the most old-fashioned and arbitrary parent's goal is to make their child obey them, not to completely destroy them.
"..."
On the other side, Wakaba Mutsumi stared blankly at the doorway, her eyes filled with an indescribable emotion.
"...It seems I've really shot myself in the foot this time."
Seeing her daughter's expression, Minami sighed softly.
"Chihaya Tetsuya... that name. I suspect that even if I try to avoid it in the future, I'll probably hear it again."
Right. It's probably best not to tell the Togawa family just yet.
Both for Sakiko's sake, and for...
"Sigh..."
Realizing that she might have accidentally opened a certain "Pandora's box," Minami shook her head heavily.
...
"Speaking of which, why did you suddenly start calling me Sakiko?"
"Because... if I kept calling you Togawa, there was a high chance Minami-san would have looked down on our relationship..."
"In other words, it was to seem closer to me, right?"
"...Mhm."
"I see..."
The smile on Togawa Sakiko's face grew a little brighter.
"Then, it should be fine for me to call you Tetsuya-kun, right?"
"No problem..."
Compared to the lively Sakiko, Chihaya Tetsuya's reaction was very sluggish.
Clearly, he had not yet recovered from the series of declarations she had just made.
But in any case, there was one thing he could be clearly aware of—
"Sakiko."
"Hm?"
"You... when did you start to like me..."
Although she hadn't explicitly said the word, he wasn't so dense that he couldn't understand those words, which were far more sincere than any confession.
Sakiko, having had her feelings pointed out so directly, showed no shyness at all. Instead, she admitted it frankly.
"From the first time we met."
"...Eh?"
He couldn't help but be taken aback. He then stammered.
"W-wait, from the first time we met? But... eh?"
Tetsuya, whose mind only contained the concept of "feelings developing over time," fell into a state of incomprehensible confusion.
Seeing his completely clueless and dumbfounded state, Sakiko couldn't help but laugh and explain.
"Lending a hand to a girl at her wit's end is more fatal than you might imagine, Tetsuya-kun. Even if, in your eyes, you were just normally hiring a reasonably bright apprentice, for me, that night was more fantastical than any fairy tale. Of course, you don't need to try and understand my feelings. You just need to know that it was love at first sight for me."
"Even if you say that..."
He felt extremely troubled.
Having already been explicitly confessed to by two girls, he was already at a loss about his future romantic entanglements. Now, Sakiko's forceful intrusion and her life-staking declaration had turned this already intractable problem into a complete mess.
Sakiko had already anticipated that the emotionally late-blooming Tetsuya would be perplexed by her words. So, just before they were about to return to where Chihaya Anon and Nagasaki Soyo were, she said:
"It's okay, Tetsuya-kun. You don't need to think about how to respond to me now. Or rather, I don't want you to respond now. Both of us still have things we must do. You still have to work hard for [StarrySky], and I have a new goal as well."
Her tone was quite carefree, not at all like a young girl who had fallen in love for the first time.
"It won't be too late for us to talk about these things after we've both achieved the futures we desire."
"..."
Sakiko's feelings for him were completely different from the fiery passion of Ai or the gentle softness of Anon.
Her goal was not to possess him, nor was she hoping to become closer to him. It was a longing based solely on her own principles, with an eye toward the future.
Just as she herself had said, her goal was to change his way of life and give him a completely different future.
As for what she would gain in the process, and after she achieved that goal, he had no way of knowing yet. At this moment, he only understood one thing: this proud and dignified girl was unwilling to share even the slightest bit of her burden or pressure with him.
Ah, right.
"...Um, Sakiko, you said just now that I wanted to share your responsibilities because I needed to maintain my own reason for living. But... even setting that aside, I do genuinely need you."
He decided to clear up this fallacy.
"Whether it was the help you provided when I first designed clothes for Ai, or the design sketch you drew for Soyo, they are all proof of your talent and value. So, even if you don't intend to let me get involved in your affairs, I will still consider you my first employee. That is something that will never change, no matter what."
He didn't want her to misunderstand his motives as purely emotional. At the same time, he hoped his explanation could give a little encouragement to this girl who was determined to carry everything herself.
The frank and straightforward Tetsuya could not tolerate even the slightest misunderstanding between himself and those he cared about.
But... for Sakiko, who had just made a confession heavier than a marriage proposal, the timing of this explanation was a little inappropriate.
"Tetsuya-kun, I've actually wanted to tell you this for a long time... Don't say things that make a girl's heart flutter right when she's trying so hard to create some distance from you."
She replied with great seriousness.
"It's already hard enough for us to restrain ourselves from pouncing on a clueless idiot like you under the constraints of morality. I hope you'll consider our feelings a little more in the future."
"Eh? No, that's not it. I just wanted to clear up the misunderstanding between us..."
"And then? This explanation has no other effect than to make me even more infatuated with you. Besides, I never thought of you as that kind of person in the first place."
"I-is that so..."
Faced with a somewhat "displeased" Sakiko, Tetsuya became even more determined to go over the entire day's events with Misumi Uika when he got back tonight.
(Girls... are really too hard to understand.)
Looking at her deliberately stern side profile, he couldn't help but think to himself.