Train Ride

Wait, did she just… No, that couldn’t be right. I was actually being followed around? After school? How I did not notice until summer break was beyond me.

Unless…

“Tanase-chan, are you following me because you’re wondering what I’m like outside of school?”

If it wasn’t obvious by now that something was up, I sure didn’t expect her to actually obsess over the private side of my life.

“Well, I didn’t want to startle you so I just hid away a lot. I actually relate to how you feel. What you said to our 8th grade teacher was really interesting. It’s exactly how I feel but I’m not able to be myself around other people. I’m always covering up that part of myself.”

This made me very curious. I could understand her feelings there. Maybe all she needed was someone to help her see that in herself.

As I was about to explain what I meant, I heard a loud train whistle and a dog barking.

Wait a second… Oh no… While I was talking about something so personal with Izusaki, I forgot about Lilac!

I looked over at the train in the distance as Lilac was barking at the noise it made. I started to run as fast as I could toward Lilac. She must’ve thought that I was playing the ‘chase game’ with her though because soon after, she jumped into one of those empty carts.

As the train eventually stopped, I approached the cart Lilac was sitting all the way inside of while begging her to come down. Unfortunately, she wouldn’t budge.

I started to feel hopeless until Izusaki ran up right beside me to ask what was going on. When I told her the situation, what happened next nearly scared me half to death.

Izusaki grabbed my hand and we ran into the cart which started to move again before we could say goodbye to our hometown after the train crossed a bridge.