"Here, use this, Hayashi."
After we finished dinner, I handed the device over to her. Since she didn't have a phone and was part of a generation that generally didn't watch TV (myself included), I’d prepared this for her as a little consideration.
"……What is it?"
"My old tablet."
I actually owned two tablets in addition to my smartphone. One was my daily driver. The other was an older model that had been gathering dust ever since I bought the latest version. The battery life was starting to fade, but it was still perfectly functional, so I decided to let Hayashi have it.
"Are you sure? Is it really okay?"
"It’s fine. I’ve still got my main one, after all."
"A phone and a tablet? You’re going to ruin your eyes staring at screens that much."
"What are you, my mother?"
The retort slipped out instinctively. The fact that Hayashi sounded genuinely worried about me only made my urge to play the straight man even stronger. She was a dangerous woman.
"Wow, thank you. Though, I guess I should probably hold off on contacting my friends for now."
"Probably for the best. You said you don't watch TV, so why not try some video sites or games? Just don't go spending money on microtransactions. Those things are a total swamp. My phone bill would skyrocket."
"Don't worry. I’m not good at games or anything that requires precise movements."
"See? Total mom."
It was a classic trope—moms aren't great with electronics, so every time they get a new phone or tablet, they make their sons set everything up. I wasn’t sure if that was a universal rule, but it made me wonder: was this girl really nineteen? I had my doubts.
"I might watch some videos, though. I like those quite a bit."
I didn't think it was much different from watching TV, except for the fact that you could actually choose what you wanted to see.
"What kind of videos do you watch?"
"Vindication Video compilations."
"You’re such a mom!"
Moms who have reached adulthood and weathered the absurdities of society tend to gravitate toward those kinds of videos. I suppose because they can’t find satisfaction in their real lives, they want to see it happen on screen. It’s the same appeal as old Poetic Justice stories like Mito Komon.
Personally, I wasn't a fan. It’s not that I hated Poetic Justice, but I felt it required a certain level of quality. The compilation videos uploaded by people who churn them out daily just to make ends meet were all identical, and the characters were always incredibly stupid. I couldn't stand them because they felt so detached from reality.
"……Well, I don't care if you watch those, but just so you know, the account is synced with my phone."
"What does that mean?"
"It means I can see your watch history. And you can see mine."
Usually, the knowledge that someone is watching is enough to make a person behave themselves.
"Heh. So that means I can see everything you’ve been watching, too."
"That’s right."
I maintained a calm exterior, but a cold sweat was breaking out down my spine. I had just dug my own grave.
The reason I hadn't given the tablet to Hayashi immediately was that I needed to wipe the data first. Behind the scenes, I had busily transferred my... "necessary" videos to my current tablet, and only after a meticulous check did I finally hand the old one over.
However!
The history! The history was the problem!
I tried my best to avoid watching anything sensitive on regular video sites, but... lately, those short-form clips of girls dancing had been everywhere. Sometimes, deep into the night, I’d mindlessly click on one, only to find myself falling down a rabbit hole for hours!
In other words, this was bad. Extremely bad.
"You know, your face is easier to read right now than it's ever been."
"It's not your imagination."
"It's not my imagination, huh."
"I thought I'd taken a backup."
"You thought you'd taken a backup."
"I was sure it was fine because I formatted it!"
"You were sure it was fine because you formatted it."
Dammit!
In my state of panic, I had just confessed the entire sequence of events with zero resistance!
Hayashi narrowed her eyes in exasperation, eventually letting out a long sigh.
"I don't really intend to judge your private habits. I am the one staying in your home, after all."
"……Don't you feel like you're in danger?"
She had just escaped a situation involving Domestic Violence, yet here she was, under the same roof as a man with a functioning sex drive. Usually, that would be cause for concern.
"Are you going to attack me?"
"As if."
"I see."
Hayashi sighed again.
"I guess I’m just not that attractive, then."
I went silent. It wasn't that she wasn't attractive. I had never once thought that, nor had I ever said it. I just hadn't said the opposite out loud, either.
……I didn't know what to do.
What was the correct answer here?
If I denied it, it would be the same as admitting I found her sexually appealing. From her perspective, that would only make her feel unsafe.
But saying the opposite would wound her pride as a woman.
Damn it! Why would she ask something like that?
A surge of hopeless frustration began to bubble up inside me. From her perspective, it was an anger she couldn't possibly understand.
"……Can we just drop this?"
"I don't know. Teasing you is actually pretty fun."
"Give me a break."
"You’re just so easy to mess with."
Well, as long as she could laugh at me like I was some clown without feeling any unnecessary anxiety, I suppose it was fine.
"……Thank you. For the tablet."
"Yeah."
That night, Hayashi didn't put the tablet down once. She’d mentioned that her phone had been destroyed while she was living with her ex-boyfriend, so this was likely the first time she’d touched a piece of modern technology in months. She was absolutely captivated by this pinnacle of human wisdom.
The rapid-fire, high-pitched AI voices characteristic of those compilation videos droned out from the tablet at a considerable volume.
It goes without saying that the story developments—fueled by nothing but a petty desire to see someone get their comeuppance—kept me from getting any sleep that night.