Chapter 26

In reality, student council elections in previous years seemed more like an insider's party. The outgoing president would set the odds, the seniors would place their bets on promising juniors, and the juniors would just cheer them on. Most of the time, it lacked the fiery, winner-takes-all atmosphere. That was the case in middle school, and last year's public debate in high school was even more amicable. The two sides even made peace before the debate ended, and the vote count wasn't even released.

However, Sanada and I dutifully completed the entire process, and with the support of the judo and tennis clubs, the battle gradually escalated, showing a trend of intensification. Naturally, we were elevated to a high position by the crowd, and were also labeled with many tags, as if those standing on that stage were not Okada Sanae and Sanada Genichiro, but rather embodiments of two different collective opinions.

During that period, the girls in the judo club and the boys in the tennis club would often bicker during sports committee meetings, and they would exchange unfriendly glances when they bumped into each other in the corridor.

Yagyu avoided such conflicts thanks to his excellent personal charm. After all, he would come to the judo club every day after training to wait for me to discuss the election. If it were anyone else, they wouldn't even make it to the entrance of the judo hall; they would probably be chased away by my juniors.

Having already learned his lesson, Niou vowed never to relay messages for Yagyu again.

Looking back on this period now that I'm older, I find everyone's earnestness endearing. But upon reflection, I realize I had no idea when things escalated to this point. From beginning to end, I naively believed I had simply written a decent campaign speech, relying on my status as a top student to satisfy my most inhuman vanity, as always.

However, that "must-win" mentality gradually evolved into "must-win." Perhaps at the moment I thought I could control the situation, I was the one being controlled by it.

The friendly relationship that Sanada and I had built during the school trip gradually soured from then on. Everyone lost the distinction between competition and hostility, and since our supporters disliked each other, neither of us gave each other a friendly look.

The election was coming to an end soon. Voting ended when the school bell rang that evening, but the president would not announce the ballots until after our final speech the next day. The secrecy measures were extremely strict. I begged Liu Sheng to sacrifice himself and ask the senior in the office, but I couldn't get a word out of him.

"Do you think we should rephrase this?" I asked Liu Sheng, who was sitting at the table reading a book, as I paced anxiously by the window and opened my speech manuscript again.

"This is the sixth edition, Sanae Okada." Yagyu glanced at me and, unusually, called me by my full name.

"I'm afraid I won't be able to sleep tonight." I sighed, pulled out a chair, sat down, and covered my face with my notes.

As I closed my eyes, I heard him chuckle softly, then heard the sound of a chair being moved. Liu Sheng removed the papers, took out a bottle of black tea from his pocket—a bottle I don't know when he bought—and pressed the warm can against my cheek.

The sudden temperature change made me instinctively open my eyes, meeting his eyes as he looked down. Even through his glasses, I could see a smile. We stood there for a few seconds before I remembered to take the can from him.

"You brought your four-dimensional pocket again?" I tried to break the ice with a few jokes.

"What a mistake, you caught me." Yagyu took out another can of hot drink, unzipped it, and gently touched it to mine.

"You're Yagyu, right?" It had been a long time since I'd seen them play role-playing games, and my ability to tell them apart had become a bit rusty. As I spoke, I reached out and lifted his bangs. "Ah—real hair, it's a real person."

"Role-playing games have been permanently banned, and the restricted area is the entire Rikkai region." Yagyu gently squeezed my wrist and removed my hand, patting the back of my hand as he spoke.

"Let me guess, is the rule-maker Sanada?" I took a sip of black tea.

Liu Sheng did not reply, leaving everything unsaid.

At the same moment, the school bell rang, and I stood up as if on cue. It was already dark, and looking out the window, I could only see the streetlights on the road in front of the school gate, their lights stretching into the distance.

I silently picked up my backpack, and Liu Sheng followed me out of the office.

In the dim light of the corridor, I heard him say to me again:

"We will win."

After parting ways at the bus stop, Yagyu bumped into Sanada, who was walking out of the school gate. Sanada must have also waited until the voting deadline to leave the school. They exchanged a brief greeting, and just then, the bus he needed to take pulled into the station. Yagyu couldn't help but think to himself how lucky he was.

Sanada slowly turned around, looking in the direction of "Hechuan", then lowered his head. He was surprised that he was neither anxious nor nervous. He just realized that everything was about to end, which gave him an indescribable feeling. It was as if he would never have such an opportunity again, never be valued by someone, cared for by someone, or have someone hold him in their heart.

The next afternoon, instead of going to the auditorium to prepare, I took a detour to the abandoned swimming pool. The fallen leaves in it had been cleared out a while ago, and a "No Entry" sign had been put up again at the entrance. I heard that a multi-purpose building was going to be rebuilt here, and the activity rooms for the art department and the wind band would be moved here in the future.

I glanced around furtively. The school janitor had just walked away. I tiptoed and quickly climbed over the iron gate, standing on the edge of the pool and staring at the bottom. There was indeed nothing there. It had rained a couple of days ago, and the mud and sand on the tiles had been wetted and dried.

Like those memories that will eventually be forgotten long afterward, they leave only faint traces in people's minds.

At this moment, two stray cats nimbly jumped down, leaving cat paw prints on the light blue bricks.

They all looked over, and I quickly shook my head: "The handrail has been removed; if I jump down, I won't be able to get back up."

I don't know if they understood what I said, but the stray cats turned their heads and wagged their butts and tails. I felt like they were laughing at me.

After teasing him for a while, I hurriedly ran to the auditorium. Liu Sheng was waiting for me at the back door with his speech notes. He pushed up his glasses and his lips turned down, seemingly dissatisfied with my lack of explanation.

"I've gotten away with the rehearsal; the actual speech starts in two minutes." He said as he opened the door and let me in first.

"Sorry, I was just arguing with two cats." I put my hands together in apology.

"You never argue with anyone." Liu Sheng tucked his speech under his arm, straightened my bow tie, and then casually tidied my hair.

"That's why I argued with the cat." I smiled wryly to appear weak, then reached for my speech notes, took three deep breaths, and said, "Alright, I'm going on stage now."

Liu Sheng lifted the curtain and gently pushed my back.

I can't remember a single word of what was written in the manuscript, nor do I have any recollection of what Sanada said in his speech. All I remember is that the auditorium was divided into two groups, one calling out "Okada" and the other calling out "Sanada." Since the last two vowels of our surnames were the same, we gradually lost track of whose name they were calling.

The president pushed a whiteboard onto the stage, tapped the microphone to signal the audience to be quiet, and after counting down three, two, one, he flipped the whiteboard over, on which were written the names and vote counts of two people.

"A total of 1,634 people participated in the vote. Okada received 915 votes, and Sanada received 719 votes. Therefore, the new student council president is..."

The judo club members cheered from below the stage, interrupting the president's speech, with juniors shouting, "Long live President Okada!"

I gave the president a helpless look. He didn't care about such formalities. He put down the microphone, clapped, and congratulated me on my election. Just as I turned around to say something to Sanada to express my pride, he had already walked back to the backstage.

That's incredibly rude of me; at least shake my hand.

At that time, I certainly wouldn't have tried to understand Sanada's feelings, because I just thought it was an ordinary competition with him. It wasn't any more significant than when I got more reward stars in elementary school. I might even ask myself if he thought I was good enough, although it didn't seem to matter whether he admitted it or not.

After the change of president, each department immediately elected a new department head. The position of vice president was vacant for a while because the usual practice is for the second-place candidate to take over. However, Sanada rejected his senior's suggestion and stayed in his original department. So I could only refer to the second usual practice, which is to elect the current president's running mate.

When he proposed this idea to Yagyu, he gave him a knowing smile.

"Being my deputy will be tough," I nudged his elbow.

After hearing this reminder, he looked down at me and said, "Aye, Captain."

As Christmas approached, the seaside walkway was decorated with colorful lights in advance this year. After two weeks of warm-up, it finally lit up. We walked side by side on the road. His smile, his words and his figure formed a halo in the festive atmosphere, layer upon layer. For the first time, I realized that Liu Sheng was actually very far away from me.

Everyone spent the last day of the semester looking forward to Christmas Eve. As usual, the final exam results were posted on the most conspicuous bulletin board, signaling the imminent start of winter break.

Because I interspersed my review with various student council matters this month, and even relaxed a little on my best subjects to save time, my overall ranking unexpectedly dropped to tenth place, only three points away from eleventh place, and a full fourteen points away from eighth-place Sanada.

Ms. Yamada, the homeroom teacher for Group B in the Science stream, went home to prepare for childbirth, so our class teacher called students from both classes to the common classroom for a class meeting.

My grades slipped, which was a big blow to me. I stood in front of the bulletin board for a long time. Even after everyone had gone back to the teaching building, I was still staring at the scores of each subject and thinking to myself, "This shouldn't be happening." I arrived at the classroom quite late. Niou, who was sitting in the last row, pointed to the empty seat next to him. I then crouched down and sneaked over from the side by the window.

"I thought you went straight home, Piyo." Niou pushed the pile of winter break homework in front of me. "Your share."

"I still have to submit documents to the student council later. Skipping class and going home? No way." Still feeling down, I sighed and slumped onto my workbook.

"The chairman must be working really hard." Niou's exclamation sounded a bit gloating.

I rolled my eyes at him and casually asked, "Did Yagyu tell you he wanted to go out together on Christmas Eve?"

"Puri," Niou said, resting his chin on his hand, "didn't he tell you I wouldn't be in Fujisawa for winter break?"

I paused for a moment, scratched my head, and gave a dry "ah." Then I looked down at the Line message that Liu Sheng had sent me last night, and it seemed more and more like a date invitation.

While I was on the chat screen, a new notification popped up.

"Sanae, I bought a plane ticket to Tokyo for tomorrow. I expect to arrive at 6 p.m. on the 24th."