According to my childhood friend, “They say bathing together bare is about bonding, but even with the same sex, modesty is still necessary or rather, I think being all clingy in the bath is just wrong!” apparently.

Well, I agree with that too and thinking she’s oddly serious about it must be tough, I find myself thinking that from a detached perspective. Seeing how Hina and Hotaru-senpai keep pressing in on her just makes me think that even more.

So then, speaking of that childhood friend, Sakura Ayuri…

“Ayu-chan said something really good this morning, right~”

Right after dinner.

With a relaxed atmosphere after a reasonable amount of time had passed, Hina started talking to us like that.

Her face looked as cheerful as ever, but I felt like I could see a mischievous glint deep in her eyes.

“Huh, did I? I don’t really know but eheh!”

Without noticing any of that, Ayu honestly thought she’d been praised out of nowhere, happily puffed up with pride and acted smug.

She’s been with Hina for so long too, so I really think she should notice this kind of thing by now.

“Yeah yeah, good job, good job~”

“Eheheh!”

“…So, what was that thing Ayu said this morning? Did she say something weird?”

“Hey, Gin-chan? What do you mean weird, I only ever say good things, right?”

“Ah yeah, yeah, good job, good job.”

I set Ayu’s nonsense aside and urged Hina to continue.

If there’s trouble coming, it’s best to face it quickly and get it over with.

“Well, what I want to say is~ Ayu-chan said this morning, right? If we stay cooped up at home, the electricity bill is a waste!”

“She did say that.”

“And then, when Ayu-chan and I got back from going out, we took showers one by one, right?”

“And thinking about the utility costs for four people taking a bath after that, it feels kind of wasteful too~”

“…Huh.”

…I feel like this is the second day in a row my bad premonition has been spot on.

Only now does it seem like Ayu has finally realized what’s going on, her eyes visibly starting to dart around.

“So! With that said~ let’s all take a bath together~! Clap clap~”

“Clap clap~”

“S-Sumire-chan too?”

Apparently she’d been roped in at some point.

Sumire-san, who’d been observing the situation, joined in and applauded along with Hina in agreement.

Naturally, this was completely out of the blue for Ayu and I.

“N-no no… sure, Hina-chan’s bath is big, but four people is pushing it a bit, don’t you think~”

“It is big, but still…”

As we voiced our hesitation, Hina paid us no mind.

She must have expected this reaction, because with a ‘just as planned’ air, she pulled out something she’d been holding behind her back.

“I figured you’d say that~ so here!”

“What’s that, disposable chopsticks?”

“Four people would be cramped, right? So let’s draw lots and go in as pairs~”

“Draw lots…”

This is bad.

Ayu has terrible luck with draws.

On the other hand, Hina’s luck is good.

She’s probably aiming to pair up with Ayu, so if we do this normally, it’ll likely go exactly that way.

“N-no no~ that kind of thing isn’t good! A young maiden showing her skin to someone is…”

“You said that yesterday too, Ayuri-san.”

She’s panicking way too much.

But what should we do? Honestly, part of me feels like, isn’t this fine?

“Ayu-chan, do you hate bathing with other people?”

“N-no~ it’s just, showing everyone my wretched, shabby, hard-to-look-at body is kind of painful, I guess…”

“That’s not true~ there’s nothing weird about your body, Ayu-chan. If anything, you could compare it with mine~?”

That’s exactly the problem.

This was probably the moment Ayu and I were in perfect agreement.

“A-and besides! I was moving around a lot after my shower and got sweaty again! So right now I’m sweaty and smelly, so it’d be rude to bathe together~!”

“All the more reason to bathe together then~ Hair care, washing each other’s backs, doing it together is better, right~”

“Ugh!”

Ayu’s escape routes kept getting cut off one by one.

I feel a little bad for her, but maybe it’s fine to give in to Hina’s request once in a while.

That kind of thought even crossed my mind.

Hina seemed to take Ayu’s silence as consent.

She turned toward me and held out the disposable chopsticks.

“Alright, let’s draw lots~ Gin-chan, can you go first?”

“What kind of lots are these?”

“There are two with tape on the tip and two without~”

“Huh…”

As instructed, I reached for the chopsticks in Hina’s hand and then suddenly thought of something.

Come to think of it, Hina had clearly roped Sumire-san in beforehand.

“Hey, Hina.”

“What is it~”

“This is really just a pure luck thing, right?”

“Yep~”

“Then why am I first?”

“…No particular reason~”

That’s a lie. Her eyes flicked away for a moment.

“Hey, Hina… I really like watching magic tricks, remember why?”

“…Because figuring out the trick and mechanism is fun, right?”

“You remember well.”

“I don’t dislike cheating, you know. So if a friend does it to me a little, I won’t complain. But…”

“…”

“What I like the most is seeing through the trick. So if I notice it, I can’t help but point it out, even if it’s a friend. Do you remember that too?”

“…I remembered what you like, but I didn’t know that was your favorite.”

I remembered how Ayu once got into gambling manga and suggested we play anything-goes cheating card games.

Even though we were all amateurs and had prep time, our skills should’ve been clumsy… or so we thought.

Surprisingly, everyone except Ayu turned out to be meticulous.

It became a ruthless cheating battle where only Ayu got completely wrecked.

Incidentally, Hotaru-senpai was the best at it.

“…Then let’s have Sumire-san draw first. Next Ayu, then me, and Hina last.”

“…Okaaay.”

Hina obediently accepted my suggestion.

Since she’d already roped Sumire-san in, she probably planned to have Sumire-san draw the matching lot to mine and then pair herself with Ayu.

Simple but effective.

Her misfortune was running into my habit of noticing these things.

“I’ve got… tape.”

Now then, from here on, it’s up to Hina and Ayu’s luck.

Whether Hina’s luck wins or Ayu’s—

And then it hit me.

No matter who she pairs with, isn’t it basically a loss for Ayu either way?

‘Well, whatever.’

I just like seeing through tricks.

In the end, for Ayu, it’s probably all about who’s the least bad partner and who’s the worst.

That’s what I ended up thinking.

* * *

“So, why did it turn out like this?”

“Who knows~”

My lament echoed through the dressing room.

As a result of a fair and pure lottery, the person I’d be bathing with was… Ayu.

Seriously, why?

“So, what do we do? Gin-chan.”

“What do you mean, what do we do?”

“Gin-chan, you don’t want to bathe with me, right?”

“I’ll close my eyes and wait here, so do you want to go in first?”

“…I think it’s better if we don’t do that.”

“Look.”

I suddenly opened the dressing room door.

“Wah!”

“Oh!”

Figures tumbled in and someone was standing right in front of the door.

Hina and Sumire-san had been eavesdropping.

“See… what are you doing?”

“I-I was worried you two might do something weird in my house’s bath~”

“There’s no way we’d do that. Scatter, scatter.”

The two fled like spiders scattering.

With how they’re acting, they’ll probably try again if we give them time.

“Those two are like that, and if we did something, they’d definitely ask us about it later.”

“Ayu, are you good at covering that kind of thing up?”

“…Probably not.”

Right.

Ayu’s good at hiding her feelings, but bad at lying.

If we don’t go in together, it’ll look like we’re overly conscious of each other.

And that could lead them to read too much into our relationship…

Well, it is kind of a strange relationship though.

“Hmm, what should we do?”

“I’m fine as long as you don’t stare.”

“A girl who hasn’t married yet shouldn’t say things like that!”

“You too, you know.”

“I’m fine. I probably won’t get married anyway.”

“That’s not the point!”

This is how Ayu is.

If we don’t bathe together, they’ll dig into the reason later.

But if we do, Ayu’s overthinking will stall everything.

How troublesome.

I even started thinking that maybe Ayu’s bad luck took priority and led to this result because she overthinks like this.

I was starting to regret poking at Hina’s cheating when—

“Hmm… oh! I’ve got a good idea!”

Ayu, who’d been tilting her head while thinking, suddenly snapped her head up like she’d had a realization.

In an anime, there’d probably be a lightbulb popping up next to her.

“Go in first! I’ll grab something good!”

“H-hey.”

Acting immediately on her idea, before I could ask for details, Ayu quickly left the dressing room.

“…Well, whatever.”

It’s probably nothing good.

I’ve got that kind of feeling.

But still—“Let’s just get in already.”