128 Vol. 2 pt. 65 Patch 11.0: The Not-So-Delusional Princess (2/2)

The autocar comes to a screeching stop on its own, and the children are left unharmed with wide eyes when they realize what just almost happened.

Ryouta feels his hands shaking and sweat dripping from his forehead. He's gotten better about vehicles lately, but of course this happens as soon as he's getting over his fear.

The children's mother runs out and grabs the children while waving in apology to Ryouta.

”My, such unruly children. Hopefully they have learned their lesson and will not do something like that again!” Alice exclaims.

”I'm sure they did,” Ryouta says.

Serra leans between the two front seats to plop her chin onto Ryouta's shoulder while her hands go for his right one, holding it between them. Serra knows the story of what happened to him as a child, but Alice doesn't.

”Are you alright, my hero?” Alice asks, looking at his face through the rear-view mirror.

”Yeah. Just, remember when I told you about how I've got some leg problems myself? Only difference between these kids and me is that the autotruck that hit me couldn't stop in time. Not a fan of vehicles because of that, so for that to just happen… not exactly helping my phobia out,” Ryouta explains. She is one of his girlfriends now, so he may as well explain the situation to her. He wouldn't want her to be in the dark about something the other two already know.

”I – I am sorry, my hero. I do not know what to say at times like this, but I am sorry that you had to go through such a thing.”

”Don't worry about it. Oh, wait, I forgot to include the part about how my parents died in an autocar accident,” he says in a much more casual tone than before. He already feels better after telling her that first part, and she's been teasing him ever since she landed, so he figures that talking about something so casually and matter of fact might be a good way of throwing her off balance.

Instead, when he looks through the rear-view mirror, he sees her eyes welling up with tears as she covers her mouth with her hands.

He took it a bit too far even if he was just telling the truth.

”My – my hero, I am – I am so sorry to,” Alice sniffs, ”your life has been so tragic!”

”D-don't worry about it, it's not a big deal anymore. I'm over it, promise. I just wanted to—” he stops himself from saying anything else when he realizes that saying ”oh, I just said that to get revenge for the teasing,” would make him sound like an ass.

Serra peeks at the rear-view mirror, flicks Ryouta in the cheek, and then leans back into her seat to comfort Alice.

”Sorry, didn't mean to upset you,” Ryouta apologizes.

”It is nothing to apologize for, my hero. It is just that hearing such tales always makes me emotional,” Alice explains, still sniffling while Serra pats her head. ”I cannot even watch romantic comedies anymore because the romantic parts always get me so worked up that I just end up crying most of the time.”

”So, you love tragedy and fantasize about being involved in tragedies, but you can't actually watch or hear about them because you just cry the whole time?”

Alice nods her head, eyes still watery from his story.

She really is something else.

It is a rush out of the autocar when they reach his apartment building. The first thing that Ryouta does is take out Alice's wheelchair, unfold it, and help Alice into it. Then, all of her luggage is quickly but carefully brought out onto the sidewalk with Serra's help. Finally, with just a minute left on the autocar's timer, Ryouta swipes his card in front of it to finalize the ride and pay.

”Thank you for riding with us!” pops up on the autocar's dashboard screen. As soon as Ryouta closes the door, the autocar waits for a moment to pull out from its temporary parking spot and returns to the airport.

Now there's the problem of taking all this luggage up to his apartment.

”Would you like to place it on my lap, my hero?” Alice asks.

Ryouta picks up two suitcases by their handles in each of his hands to carry in on his own. He just ends up having to make a few trips to the elevator and back to the sidewalk to get everything inside.

He isn't falling for her teasing again.