Chapter 1: On the Way Home

My steps feel light.

After living alone for a long time, I unexpectedly ended up with a housemate.
Today, with the month having turned and the date the same as before—it marks our one-month anniversary.

I went into a slightly stylish pastry shop I would normally just walk past.
I haven’t said that today is our one-month anniversary, so if I buy a cake and bring it home, will it surprise them?
Will they like it?
Just the other day, even sweets bought at a convenience store had them exclaiming, “I’ve never eaten anything like this before!” in pure delight.

Today, it was a proper pastry shop.
The presentation, the price, and of course the taste—all of it must be on a completely different level.

I had never imagined that thinking about something for someone else could be this much fun.

Still, everything looked so delicious that my eyes kept wandering, and I just couldn’t decide.
In the end, I asked the staff and had them select four items for me, starting with their best-sellers.

I was seized by the urge to start running, so eager was I to see what kind of reaction they would have—but if I did that, the cake would be ruined.
And when I think that it would also mean having more time to sink into my daydreams, maybe that isn’t such a bad thing.

These days, I can enjoy eating, but when I was a child—back in elementary school—I didn’t enjoy eating.

If I didn’t eat, I couldn’t survive, so it wasn’t that I didn’t eat at all, but it felt more like fulfilling an obligation, simply taking in nutrients.