Once I left Miyama at her apartment, my usual walk home felt suddenly quiet, tinged with a faint sense of loneliness. She was a natural chatterbox, but her cheerful, mascot-like energy made her presence strangely soothing.
She’s even nice to a loner like me. She really is a good girl.
Lost in those thoughts about Miyama, I found myself back at my front door before I knew it.
"I’m home."
I walked from the entryway into the living room, where my sister was sprawled out on the sofa in nothing but a shirt and panties, lounging around like a total slob.
I sighed. Compared to Miyama, her chest was truly meager.
"Oh, Ryouta? By the way, I ate your ice cream."
"W-Wait, you’re kidding! I was really looking forward to that limited-edition Haaden. Dammit! You stupid sister."
"Also..."
"What now?!"
"Tanaka-chan stopped by earlier."
Tanaka was at my house? I wondered what she wanted.
Now that I think about it, I haven’t even messaged Tanaka on LIME since that talk we had on the rooftop.
Lately, I had been spending so much time with the Beautiful Girl Trio that I hadn’t even had a spare moment to geek out with Tanaka.
"She said she just 'happened to be in the neighborhood,' but if she went out of her way to come here, she probably had something to tell you, don't you think?"
"I guess... so."
"Make sure you ask her on LIME, okay?"
"I—I know."
I sent a LIME to Tanaka asking, "Want to talk on the phone for a bit?" and headed back to my room.
While waiting for her reply, a message from Kuroki popped up. It was today's image.
"Gwah...! Twintails today?!"
The photo was a selfie of Kuroki in her school uniform, her hair tied in low twintails, lying across her bed.
『Kuroki: Here's a photo to help you do your best for the play ♡ A school uniform and twintails... this is the kind of thing you like, isn't it, Ryouta-kun?』
This girl... she knew an otaku's fetishes all too well. Twintails on a beauty like Kuroki was simply foul play. The added value of the gap moe gave it a thousand times more destructive power than when a "cute-type" girl did it.
While I was busy saving Kuroki’s photo to my hidden folder, a reply finally came from Tanaka.
『Tanaka: Understood. I can talk now.』
Seeing the message, I dialed her number.
"Tanaka, it's been a while."
『Oh, it has been a long time, Ryouta-kun.』
"It sounds like you came by my place earlier. Did you need something?"
『Umm, it’s not that I particularly needed anything, but I heard a strange rumor regarding the Cultural Festival.』
"A strange rumor?"
I had a very, very bad feeling about this.
『Something about Ryouta-kun playing Snow White at the Cultural Festival, while Ichinose-san and Kuroki-san from the Beautiful Girl Trio play the Prince... or something like that.』
Tanaka, that’s not a rumor. That is the cold, hard reality.
『The genders are reversed, so it’s clearly nonsense. It’s just a hoax, right?』
"...I'm doing it."
『Huh?』
"I'm... playing Snow White, Tanaka."
『...Um, Ryouta-kun, has your head finally gone a bit strange lately?』
Tanaka’s voice, thick with pure disgust, pierced my eardrum and pulverized my spirit.
Stop it already, Tanaka! My life points are at zero!
『Are you seriously going to play Snow White? In other words, you’re going to cross-dress?』
"Shut up! I ended up stuck with the role! I didn't have a choice!"
『I see. You were steamrolled by the extroverts.』
Because Tanaka understood the plight of a loner, she grasped my situation instantly. As expected of a fellow gloomy girl.
『Well, setting that aside, do you even understand the story of Snow White properly?』
"O-Of course I do. I’m pretty sure there was a picture book on my shelf that I used to read all the time when I was a kid."
『That’s a surprisingly fairy-tale-like anecdote for someone like you.』
"What’s that supposed to mean?"
While retorting to Tanaka, I stood up and walked over to my bookshelf.
"Come to think of it, I wonder where that book ended up."
『Since you’re there, why don't you look for it? If you're playing the lead, you should actually read the source material.』
"I suppose you're right."
My bookshelf was currently crammed with manga from top to bottom, so I couldn't find it at a glance. I hadn't touched a picture book in years, so I figured it was probably buried near the bottom.
"Snow White, Snow White... hm?"
When I checked the bottom shelf, a nostalgic series caught my eye. It was a manga from a shonen magazine I used to read back in elementary school titled Lucky & H.
This manga had quite a few lewd scenes for a shonen magazine. I remember reading it while hiding from my parents.
Wait, that’s weird... even though the series has eighteen volumes, for some reason, the very first volume was missing.
"...Well, whatever."
『What's wrong, Ryouta-kun?』
"No, it's nothing."
I went back to searching for Snow White.