"Is this the place?"
Kato Megumi looked down at the address Mio had sent her, then looked up at the towering apartment building.
Just as she was wondering whether she should give Mio a call, the door downstairs suddenly opened and Mio walked out, smiling and waving at her.
"Long time no see, Megumi. I missed you so much~" Mio looked ready to go in for a big hug.
But Kato Megumi seemed to have already read Mio's intent. The instant Mio leaned in, she sidestepped, putting distance between them, and said flatly, "Didn't we just see each other a few days ago?"
"A single day apart feels like three autumns."
Seeing that Kato Megumi had no particular reaction, Mio let out a helpless sigh. Whenever she teased other girls, she'd at least get some kind of special reaction out of them.
Only Kato Megumi stayed perfectly composed from start to finish. She really did live up to the name Saint Megumi, huh?
Not that Mio minded. Or rather, she was already used to it.
Following Mio inside, Kato Megumi looked around curiously, then asked, "A place this big, and you live here all by yourself?"
Mio gave a small nod, then shook her head. "Originally I lived here alone, but Chihiro-sensei went off traveling yesterday, so her cousin's staying over here now too. She's just not up yet."
"Chihiro-sensei's cousin... is that Shiina-san?"
Into Kato Megumi's mind drifted the image of a blonde beauty. She'd only heard the name, and often seen Mio coming and going from school with her.
She hadn't expected the girl lived here a lot of the time too.
"That's right. You know her?"
Kato Megumi gave a small shake of her head. "I've only heard of her."
After getting Kato Megumi seated, Mio brewed her a cup of tea. By the time she came back to the living room with it, she found Kato Megumi crouched on the floor, fussing over Cake.
On that perpetually expressionless face, a rare, faint smile had surfaced.
Seeming to hear Mio's footsteps, Kato Megumi turned and glanced at her. "Shirai-san, you keep a cat here too?"
"Did I never mention it?"
Setting down the snacks and tea, Mio said, "We ran into it on the street a while back, and Mashiro wanted to keep it, so we did. And besides, weren't you just calling me by my name? Why've you switched back to the old way of addressing me?"
"Probably just habit, I guess."
Cake, who'd been rubbing back and forth against Kato Megumi's legs, abandoned her the moment it heard Mio's voice and made straight for Mio's side, rubbing against her and letting out a few meows.
"I know, I know. I'll get you something to eat in a minute."
Watching Mio cradle the cat and talk to it, even Kato Megumi found the word cute popping into her mind.
If the boys in class who pined after Mio could see this scene, they'd probably let out a whole chorus of "awsl."
Someone this dazzling. Why would she ever want to be friends with a plain, unremarkable person like her?
That was something Kato Megumi still couldn't make sense of, even now.
Catching Kato Megumi's gaze, Mio gave a soft laugh. "Megumi, have you finally noticed how good-looking I am?"
"I noticed that the first time I laid eyes on you, so there's no need to point it out."
"You're gonna make me blush~"
Mio tried to put on a bashful little act to liven up the mood, but her performance fell completely flat in front of Kato Megumi.
Just as she was thinking about what to do next, the door to her own room suddenly opened, and a freshly woken Shiina Mashiro pushed her way out.
Bleary-eyed, she looked at Mio and mumbled, "Morning, Mio."
But as she finished her greeting and made to head into the bathroom to wash up, she finally noticed that there was someone else in the living room besides Mio.
A girl she didn't recognize.
Seeing that Shiina Mashiro had finally noticed Kato Megumi, Mio didn't drag it out. She introduced the two of them to each other right away.
Maybe it was just Kato Megumi's imagination, but for one brief moment just now, she'd thought she caught a hint of wariness in the way Shiina Mashiro looked at her.
The two of them had never even met before. Surely there was nothing about her worth being wary of?
How strange.
By the time Kato Megumi pulled herself back together, she found that the table in front of her had already accumulated a stack of discs, movies of every genre imaginable.
These were the discs Mio had just pulled out of the cabinet, to help pass the time.
"Megumi, see if any of these movies catches your interest."
"A movie, huh?" Kato Megumi flipped idly through the discs. After a while, her expression turned subtly odd.
Noticing that rare change in Kato Megumi's expression, Mio leaned over, curious, and took a glance at the disc case in the other girl's hand. Mio's smile froze solid on her face.
It was an 18+ film. It was one Mio had inadvertently picked up along with a batch of discs back when she'd borrowed them from Sengoku Chihiro. At the time she'd figured she could find a moment to appreciate the artistry, so she hadn't returned it right away.
Since she rarely watched movies to begin with, she'd soon forgotten all about it for one reason or another.
She never imagined Kato Megumi would be the one to dig that particular disc back up.
Even though Kato Megumi had obviously already seen it, Mio still nervously plucked the disc out of her hand, then put on a smile that was awkward yet not impolite and said, "Um, that disc isn't mine. I just accidentally picked it up along with some others when I was borrowing discs from a certain someone."
"Is that so?" There wasn't much of a change in Kato Megumi's expression, leaving it impossible to tell whether she actually believed what Mio had said.
Still, to keep the mood from sinking into total awkwardness, Kato Megumi pulled a disc at random from the stack and said, "Let's watch this one, then."
"Sure."
Still flustered, Mio took just one glance at the cover of the case before shoving the disc into the player.
It was only once the movie started that Mio realized this one seemed to be a horror film.
Why would a horror movie's cover give off such a warm, wholesome vibe?!
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