Chapter 3 (1/2)

Picture Book of My First Love (Chapter 3)

This is beyond late, but here it is!

Here’s the third chapter of the novel adaption of HoneyWorks’ “Hatsukoi no Ehon (Picture Book of My First Love)“

about the president of the Art Club, Miou, and the Film Club’s star,

Haruki. The two third years from Sakuragaoka High School walk home

together every day, but Miou is too shy to tell him her feelings. While

helping with his movie, Miou asks him, “Do you have a crush on anyone?”

and to her great surprise, Haruki answers, “I do.” And what’s more,

Haruki confesses to Natsuki, his childhood friend?!

Masterpost with links to all the translated chapters can be found .

You can find the masterpost with all the Confession Executive Committee/Sound of Confession series-related translations .

＊If you can, I highly encourage supporting the creators by buying the book for yourself at !

——

Chapter 3

Summer was nearing its end, and the autumn bugs were starting to make themselves heard amongst the cries of the cicadas at sunset.

Feeling a cool breeze brush against his neck, Haruki looked up from his laptop.

The lights in the room were on, but he hadn’t noticed them come on, and Souta, who should have been sitting next to him editing the script, was nowhere to be seen. Maybe he’d turned the lights on his way out, since Haruki was still staying behind to work.

“….c.r.a.p, what time is it now?”

“Almost time for the school to be locked up for the day.”

Having not expected to hear a reply, Haruki startled in his seat on his folding chair.

Akechi Saku, his homeroom teacher, as well as the Film Club advisor, peered in from the doorway. Although he was in charge of teaching Cla.s.sical j.a.panese, he always wore a white labcoat as part of his uniform for some reason, and even now, it stood out in the dim light.

“Just you? Where’s Setoguchi and Mochizuki?”

Akechi came inside, his sandals making slapping sounds against the tile floor.

Haruki had been startled by Akechi’s sudden appearance, but that ridiculous sound, paired with that monotone voice, made him let out a sigh.

“Yuu has prep school, and Mochita…. probably went home.”

“Probably? Ah, I see…. You didn’t even notice when he told you he was heading home, huh?”

As a teacher, Akechi didn’t bother with touching on the fact that Haruki, as usual, spoke so casually towards him.

They were well-acquainted due to Akechi being a friend of Haruki’s older brother, but more than anything, it was mostly because Haruki didn’t care. Akechi had to go as far as telling him, “Call me ‘Sensei’ when we’re at school.”

‘In the first place, he hardly even seems like a teacher.’

As Akechi peered over at the laptop screen with great interest, both his hands stuffed into the pockets of his lab coat, he didn’t look all that different from Haruki and the others. At best, he might pa.s.s for a graduate student, but he hardly seemed like an adult at all.

It wasn’t because he had a baby face or anything, but perhaps because he gave off the impression of being aloof and unworldly.

‘Although to put it in one word, I’d say he looks downright shady.’

“Huh? What, so you were just checking over your movie?”

‘….I want to say, ‘What did you think I was looking at?’ but that’d be like admitting defeat.’

As Haruki started to put away his laptop in silence, Akechi, who must have found his reaction boring, reached over to place a hand on his shoulder.

Before Haruki could shrug his off, Akechi lowered his voice to say,

“When a high school boy is staring intently at something in a dark room all alone, it’s usually…. You know what I mean, right?”

“No one asked!”

As Haruki made that retort while actually shaking him off this time, Akechi moved away with a light laugh.

“If you’re making rounds, hurry up and get going already.”

“My turn to do that isn’t until tomorrow.”

“What? Then seriously, what’d you even come here for?”

“Why, to do my job as an advisor, of course.”

Noticing that Akechi’ had suddenly lowered his tone, Haruki paused and turned around.

As Haruki stared back at him, Akechi gave a small nod.

“You made it through the preliminaries for the contest.”

“….Cool.”

“Hopefully, you’ll be able to keep this up and win.”

“….Yeah.”

“You don’t sound very enthusiastic. What, aren’t you happy about that?”

“…..”

Having run out of curt, one-word responses, Haruki fell into an awkward silence.

The contest that he’d pa.s.sed the preliminaries for this time had a prize that he wanted more than anything.

The winner would be given the chance to study abroad.

‘Although, even if I don’t win, I still plan on studying abroad.’

Still, he’d prefer to keep any conflict with those around him to a minimum if possible.

If his movie gained recognition, and a university from overseas recruited him—

If that happened, both the school and his parents would be sure to understand.

At the very least, it would go a whole lot smoother than simply proposing that he wanted to go study at a film school overseas.

‘Then…. why am I suddenly hesitating now….?’

“You still have something holding you back here, don’t you?”

Haruki startled. The timing with which Akechi said this made it seem as if he’d read his mind.

Akechi was smirking again, and staring in his direction.

“….I thought I told you to quit watching people like that.”

Haruki glared back at him, but Akechi’s grin only widened.

Haruki didn’t have to ask to know why. He was smiling as if to say, “I guessed right, didn’t I?”

‘It’s frustrating that I only realized after having Saku-nii point it out, but….’

Haruki had figured out that he did indeed have something holding him back, and also what that something was.

At the same time, seeing as how he’d needed someone to point it out, he realized that he had been unconsciously trying to deny it.

“A wise man once said, ‘What is done cannot be undone.’ And also, ‘You never know what you have until it’s gone.’”

Hearing him say this so clearly made Haruki look up, but Saku was already at the door.

He turned around, and for once, he wore an expression that actually made him look like a teacher.

“With that said, do your best to enjoy your youth.”

How does what you said have anything to do with that?

Haruki wanted to make that retort, but in the end, he just silently watched him go.

Now that he was all alone, the room was almost disturbingly quiet.

❀　❁　❀　❁　❀

When he stopped to think about it, summer had gone by so quickly this year.

By the time they’d finished shooting the extra scenes, and started to compile everything together, the new term was already beginning.

Students were starting to adjust their school uniforms for the changing seasons, with short sleeves being swapped out for long ones.

‘d.a.m.n, I feel like time just keeps slipping by….’

Haruki tousled the hair on the back of his head as he walked down the empty hallway.

It was a habit of his to walk around the school when he was stuck on ideas.

For some strange reason, he found he was able to think better only after forcefully emptying his mind.

“I mean, it’s the same with computers, too. They run better if you free up more s.p.a.ce.”

“Now, if only you had a function to come back on your own, it’d be perfect.”

Souta nodded in agreement while Yuu smiled, but the smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.

As soon as Haruki came up with an idea, he would start taking notes on the spot to make sure he wouldn’t forget, so often times, he wouldn’t come back for close to an hour. Whenever that happened, the other two would come looking for him.

‘Honestly, they’re such good sports~’

Maybe it was because of the ventilation, or the fact that the window was open a crack, but he could the voices of the Baseball Club from outside.

‘….Sounds like there’s even less of them running around out there.’

With all the third years retiring from the sports clubs, it made sense that there were only the first and second years left behind.

Due to the fact that the Film Club was a culture club, Haruki and the others planned to keep going with their club activities up until graduation, though they had already given up their positions of president and vice president to their juniors.

‘Graduation, huh….? It still hasn’t sunk in….’

The film that he was in the midst of working on right now also doubled as his graduation project.

Haruki didn’t really pay attention to the theme of “graduation,” but it was different for Yuu and Souta.

Once they’d reaffirmed the importance of their roles, and the significance of the three of them creating something together, they worked actively for that goal. Souta, who was in charge of the script, had worked particularly hard in writing a touching love story about a first year heroine who was in love with a graduating uppercla.s.sman.

‘….I’m positive that this film will be a turning point for me.’

Lately, every time he picked up the camera, and every time he received an award, his feeling of impatience would grow stronger.

Isn’t this just a rehash of what I did last time? Is there even any point to what I’m filming?

It felt like his focus was blurring the more he thought about it, which only made him panic even more. And the more he panicked, the less confidence he had in his decisions. Before he knew it, he was stuck in a vicious cycle.

But if he was with those two, he just might be able to break free from this cycle.

He’d be able to exceed the limits that he’d placed on himself, and reach a new domain.

‘More importantly, I want to meet their standards….’

That was how he felt, but lately, things were starting to feel uneasy between the three of them.

In particular, something must have happened with Yuu over summer vacation, because he was a lot quicker to anger now.

During yesterday’s meeting, as well, they had started out talking about how Akari was progressing with the artwork, and somehow the conversation had s.h.i.+fted to their love lives.

Haruki had been the first one to bring it up.

But, after hearing Souta say that Akari was his first love, Haruki had only said, “Yuu, like you’re one to talk when you can’t even face your first love,” without any special meaning behind his words.

‘….No, that isn’t true.’

To be honest, he had been trying to shake him up a bit.

If Yuu was going to torture himself by playing along with Natsuki’s confession rehearsals without even confirming her feelings first, he might as well be honest about his own feelings for her.

“Speaking of which.… Haruki, how are things between you and Aida?”

“Same as usual? Or, well actually, she said she can’t walk home with me for a while.”

Yuu must have wanted to get back at him by bringing up Miou.

That’s why Haruki had told him the truth. He’d actually received that text from Miou before summer vacation had started, but he saw no reason to go into that much detail.

“….Actually, Haruki and Aida aren’t even going out with each other, right?”

“Ah, I wanted to ask about that, too.”

Contrary to his expectations, Yuu refused to back down, and Souta had joined in, as well.

He knew full well that no harm would come from answering that question.

In the first place, there was nothing going on between him and Miou, so there was nothing to hide.

He was certain that Yuu and Souta were already aware of Haruki’s feelings towards Miou. Just like how Haruki had figured out their crushes, it was just something obvious after spending so much time with each other.

It was a good opportunity to make things clear.

But another part of him immediately objected.

The reason that Yuu asked about Miou was because he’d been misunderstanding something.

After Natsuki had told him about her confession “rehearsals,” Yuu thought that she planned to confess to someone other than him.

And it would seem that Haruki was being treated as being one of the possible candidates.

‘I wondered why he thinks it’s me, but for Natsuki, it must be hard just to find someone she’d confess to.’

While it was obviously because the one Natsuki liked was none other than Yuu, there wasn’t any gossip of her being around other guys. Even if she hung out with Haruki and the others, everyone knew that they were childhood friends, so there was nothing surprising about that.

But Yuu knew better than anyone that childhood friends were no exception.

That was probably why he saw Haruki as a rival.

‘Anyway, isn’t he being a bit too narrow minded?’

If Haruki wanted to be indifferent about this, it really didn’t matter to him what misunderstandings Yuu had.

But to be honest, he didn’t like the way Yuu just went around collecting information to rea.s.sure himself instead of just telling Natsuki how he felt.

‘Although, Natsuki backed out at the last minute too, calling it a rehearsal and all….’

Still, there was no denying that she’d taken a small step forward, and would probably go for the real thing in the near future.

That’s why Haruki didn’t want Yuu taking the easy way out.

“And what would be the point in asking? If I told you that I was going out with Aida…. No, that’s not right. If I said that I liked anyone other than Natsuki, would you feel relieved? And then what?”

What’ll you do once you know that I’m not the one Natsuki likes?

Go and confess to her yourself. If you don’t, nothing’s going to change.

Haruki stared at Yuu without saying another word.

On the other hand, Yuu was at a loss for words, and could only stare blankly back at Haruki.

The silence continued for a while, and a tense atmosphere enveloped the club room.

It was only due to Souta being there that a definite rift didn’t open up between them.

Souta, who had been quietly observing the situation, didn’t blame Haruki for his provocation, but he didn’t try to smooth things over, either.

He just gave them a chance to change the subject by saying, “Aren’t you guys hungry?”

‘And after this, apparently Ayase hit him with a counter punch….’

At the ramen shop they’d gone to, for some reason, Koyuki had joined them to make a table of four.

It was due to Souta calling out to him that had made this unlikely gathering a reality.

“Yukki! Wait no, I mean, Ayase-kun! Are you free right now? Wanna come eat ramen with us?”

“Ahaha, you can call me Yukki if you’d like. Ramen? Sure, I’d love to.”

Souta was fascinated with the way Koyuki had transformed himself, so he probably couldn’t help but call out to him when recognizing him from afar.

Koyuki had seemed surprised about the sudden invitation, but he accepted with a smile on his face.

Haruki just saw it as their party size increasing by one, and wasn’t particularly affected.

Yuu, however, had an unusually sour look on his face.

Haruki guessed that meant something really had taken place between him and Koyuki over the summer break, and feeling that this was the perfect opportunity, he patted Yuu smartly on the back.

“Well isn’t this a great opportunity? To have a nice man-to-man talk, that is.”

And just as Haruki had predicted, Yuu and Haruki had a one-to-one confrontation.

After they’d finished eating and left the ramen shop, Koyuki had pulled Yuu aside to talk about something.

‘Well, it’s probably about Natsuki…. I wonder what they’ve got planned.’

The fastest way would be for Natsuki to move on from her confession rehearsals and move forward with the real thing.

But Haruki knew it wasn’t very reasonable to expect that of her.

Natsuki was one of his precious childhood friends. He would support her, but he couldn’t force her to do anything.

Koyuki was free to confess his feelings to her if he wanted to. He could already see the outcome, but who could have the heart to tell him to keep them to himself just because it would make things complicated?

Thunk.

The sudden noise made Haruki stop in his tracks.

He was so lost in thought, for a moment, he had no idea where he was.

Looking around, he caught sight of the sign with the cla.s.sroom number.

‘Huh, isn’t this Yuu’s cla.s.s….?’

Casually peeking inside, Haruki spotted a familiar bun-shaped hairstyle.

He immediately felt something was out of place, seeing that Natsuki was sitting in Yuu’s seat.

Natsuki had her face down on the desk, and wasn’t moving an inch.

/‘Wait, hold up, she’s not crying or anything, is she?’

He considered just walking away, but his curiosity led him to enter the cla.s.sroom.

“Natsuki? What’re you doing?”

Suddenly having someone call her name must have given her a scare, making her jump up from the seat with a startled scream.

Haruki casually checked Natsuki’s face, but it showed no signs of any crying.

He felt relief, just as his agitated childhood friend addressed him.

“H-Haruki? What’s up? Did you forget something? Wait, this isn’t even your cla.s.s.”

“Wow, good job on delivering your own punchline. So Natsuki, what are you doing at Yuu’s desk?”

Haruki knew that it was a rather insensitive question to ask, but he still came out and said it.

And just as he’d expected, Natsuki turned beet red.

She probably hadn’t expected him to know it was Yuu’s desk, seeing how they were in different cla.s.ses. Natsuki waved her hands around defensively, and only managed to stutter out, “No, um, this isn’t…”

‘I see, so that means she was sitting at Yuu’s desk on purpose.’

If not, she wouldn’t be overreacting like this right now.

Since she could have just replied with something like, “I was just borrowing his seat,” or “Oh, I didn’t know this was Yuu’s desk,” there could only be one reason why she was so fl.u.s.tered.

‘Well, not that I plan on pointing out every little thing.’

Deciding that he’d retrieve his dictionary now that he was already here, Haruki walked up to Yuu’s desk.

Yuu was supposed to return it once their club activities were over, but he probably wouldn’t mind giving it back a little earlier than that.

‘And it’ll give me an excuse for having come to this cla.s.sroom.’

Haruki motioned for Natsuki to make room, seeing how she was just standing there awkwardly.

“Well, I just came to take back something I let him borrow. Excuse me.”

“Ah, right….”

The inside of Yuu’s desk was as tidy as usual, and he found the dictionary he was looking for right away.

The cover of the dictionary that his brother had handed down to him was all worn out, clearly showing that it had been used a lot. After the owners.h.i.+p had been pa.s.sed to Haruki, it had been stuck full of sticky notes and memos between its pages, increasing its thickness.

“….An English dictionary?”

“Mm, yeah. We got an extra a.s.signment to do.”

“Ahh! Right, Haruki, you’ve always been terrible at English, huh?”

“Shut up. I’m telling ya, I’ll be totally fluent one of these days.”

He heard Natsuki let out a sigh at his usual joking reply.

It would be easy to keep pretending he didn’t know anything, but he suddenly recalled Yuu and Koyuki from the day before.

It didn’t make sense for Natsuki’s timing to confess be affected by their situation.

He’d only just been thinking about not getting so involved a moment ago, but in the end, it still bothered him.

‘It’s fine if I just give her a little push, right….?’

“And what about you? Those confession rehearsals… Still not ready for the real deal yet?”

“….W-Well…. about that….”

Natsuki’s shoulders gave a jolt at having the conversation suddenly focused on her, and she looked visibly fl.u.s.tered.

He had heard that she’d been busy with the art contest since the beginning of July, and the confession rehearsals had been put on hold. But now that she was only waiting for the results to come out, she couldn’t keep using that excuse.

He was certain that Natsuki knew full well of that herself.

“….Sorry to disappoint you.”

Seeing Natsuki’s shoulders slump dejectedly, Haruki felt a little bad for asking.

‘There’s probably two reasons she’s apologizing….’

One was because she’d let the confession end as a rehearsal, and the other was because she still couldn’t move forward with the real thing.

Perhaps it was the fact that Haruki had helped her with the confession that day before summer vacation that she felt he was justified in bringing up things she really had no reason to apologize for.

‘That’s right, this is how Natsuki’s always been….’

She was an honest and “good” person, and hardly ever doubted others.

She might deny it, but from an outsider’s point of view, it was like she never even considered the possibility that there might be some hidden agenda behind a person’s actions.

Even just now, he was sure that she realized he’d asked her about the confession because he was worried about himself.

‘….Well, not that I’m not worried about Natsuki, too.’

Not wanting Natsuki to keep apologizing for the wrong reasons, Haruki grinned at her.

He wanted her to know that he’d only asked her that question earlier to tease her.

“Nah, don’t worry about it. It just means that you have your own timing, right? I’ll be rooting for you, so hurry up and confess like your life depends on it! Well, maybe I shouldn’t make that joke.”

“Haruki, that’s not funny,”

Natsuki replied in a serious tone, but the air around her was a lot lighter compared to earlier.

Feeling relieved, Haruki let himself burst into laughter.

“….Just kidding. I shouldn’t be chastising others when I’m not much better.”

Haruki was surprised at the unexpected bitterness that came out in his voice.

Natsuki blinked several times, surprised by the sudden confession.

“Wait, I didn’t know that you had a crush on someone too!”

“Sure I do. Something wrong with that?”

“Of course not! I’m rooting for you too!”

“Well that was a quick response.”

Haruki let a laugh escape, but Natsuki didn’t laugh along with him, and merely stared back.

Feeling a bit uncomfortable by how hard she was staring, he urged her to speak up.

“Yes?”

“How come you haven’t confessed to her, then?”

“….I want to focus on finis.h.i.+ng the movie, first.”

The words flowed out smoothly, as if he had rehea.r.s.ed them beforehand.

Since Natsuki was also postponing her confession for a similar reason, it looked like she couldn’t say anything. She tilted her head and made a humming noise, as if contemplating over Haruki’s words.

And then, as if she’d come up with the answer, her face suddenly lit up.

After knowing her for so long, Haruki knew she was about to say something outrageous.

He could only brace himself to take the explosive statements to follow.

“In that case, why not try doing a confession rehearsal?”

Just as he’d expected, a completely unpredictable proposal had come hurling at him from some impossible angle.

He had no idea how she’d even come to that conclusion.

It was a pretty big jump to suggest a confession rehearsal just because he couldn’t confess.