On a Summer Festival Night, Still in a Yukata | Episode 1

How many years has it been since I last came to the local summer festival? Surrounded by the lights of the food stalls and the scent of yakisoba, I wandered down the shrine approach all by myself.

Suddenly, amidst the crowd of people in yukatas, I spotted a familiar back.

Supple black
hair, a navy blue yukata with a morning glory pattern.

Thinking it couldn't be, I closed the distance just a little.

“...Aoi?”

She turned around.

“Oh, it really is you... It's been a while. Have you been well?”

—There was no mistake. My junior high classmate, Aoi Saeki. Back then, she was supposed to be a bit plain and the quiet type.

But the girl standing in front of me now had a different aura. Her thin, well-groomed eyebrows, pale lipstick, and the nape of her neck peeking out from her yukata drew my gaze before I could help it.

“Huh, you're alone? Me too.”

She laughed and held out the takoyaki from a stall. “I can't finish this by myself, so let's share it.”

I found myself nodding at her natural gesture.

Rather than feeling happy about our reunion, it was a strangely comforting time. We ate grilled corn together, tried goldfish scooping, and walked side by side.

Fireworks went off.

With a boom that shook the night sky, large circles of light spread out. Each time they did, her profile flickered in the light.

“...Hey.”

“Yeah?”

“Why don't we go somewhere a little quieter?”

Saying that, she pointed toward the back of the shrine. Past the stone steps where there was no foot traffic, near a small shrine building.

The sound of cicadas and the distant noise of fireworks. That was all that enveloped the two of them.

"Do you remember this place? We used to skip class behind here all the time back in middle school."

"…I remember. Like the days we ate lunch together, just the two of us."

She smiled just a little. Then, she sat down on the grass with a soft thud.

"You know, today… I was so happy to see you after such a long time."

"Me too."

"Unlike back then… I can actually look you in the face and talk now."

Was her flushed cheek because of the fireworks, or something else?

"…The breeze is starting to get a little cool, isn't it?"

As she said that, she spread the sleeves of her yukata out softly. The undergarment inside was faintly translucent, and sweat glistened below her collarbone.

──I noticed it, and caught my breath.

The sound of her sandals brushing against the grass. That alone lingered in my ears, intensely.