Chapter 2: Yui Yuigahama’s Cookies are Still Terrible

The door opens, and he walks in, his eyes as cloudy and rotten as ever. Hikigaya-kun, visiting the Service Club room for the first time since yesterday, glanced at me for a split second as I looked down at my paperback, before averted his gaze and giving a small, awkward nod. …It feels like I’m looking at my past self.

Seeing this, I didn’t respond and returned my gaze to the page. Then, I heard Hikigaya-kun’s exasperated voice.

“You’re seriously gonna give me the cold shoulder from this distance…?”

“Oh? Was that a greeting used in some foreign country? At the very least, I’m not familiar with it.”

“…Hello.”

“Yes, hello.”

After that perfect provocation, Hikigaya-kun greeted me with a twitching smile. Yeah, this definitely feels like Yukino Yukinoshita.

“You came today, too. I’m surprised.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t have a choice.”

"Ara, could it be that you’ve fallen for me?"

“Wrong. What’s with that? You’re way too full of yourself.”

"Oh, I was mistaken, then."

As I gave my disinterested reply, Hikigaya-kun’s eyebrows twitched as he took his seat. This arrogant, cold attitude—it’s exactly like the early-volume Yukino Yukinoshita! While I was busy praising myself internally, Hikigaya-kun spoke up again.

"Hey, I thought this yesterday too, but is there anything you can do about that twisted personality of yours? Maybe you should join a monastery or something."

“No, I don't find it particularly inconvenient. If anything, wouldn't it be better if you shaved your head and sought the path of enlightenment? Bonnougaya-kun.”

“Don’t talk about me like I’m some worldly-desire-filled degenerate.”

“Ara, But you’re looking at my chest with those vulgar eyes, aren't you?”

“I—I am not!”

Hikigaya-kun looked away sharply. Yeah, I get it. You’re too embarrassed to look at my face, so your gaze drops and happens to stop around the chest area. I get it. The "man" inside me sympathized with him.

“…Hey, with a personality like that, do you actually have any friends?”

Hikigaya-kun, looking up again, suddenly asked a painful question. This time, it was my turn to look away.

“…Well, first, I’d like you to provide a formal definition of ‘friend.’”

“Yeah, forget it. That’s the classic line of someone who doesn't have any.”

The look Hikigaya-kun gave me turned somewhat lukewarm. Urgh, if I actually tried, I could make a friend or two…!

“…Well, this might be an unpleasant topic for you.”

“I’m already plenty miserable from everything we’ve talked about so far.”

“Since I am very cute and excellent, I am very popular with the opposite sex.”

"…Now that is extremely unpleasant. More than anything so far."

“—Therefore, I am disliked by those of my own gender. …Put that way, can even someone like you, who has no friends, understand?”

“It pisses me off hearing that from you. …But yeah, I get it.”

Hikigaya-kun looked at me with exasperated eyes, but to me, being liked by the opposite sex was nothing but a nuisance. My internal identity is male, yet I’m subjected to eyes full of lust from other men. It was far more unpleasant and mentally taxing than I had imagined.

“—Don’t you think that’s... wrong? A world where superior people are dragged down. A world ruled by the jealousy of ugly people. That’s just nonsensical. That’s why I will change it—the world, and the people in it.”

That ideal didn't belong to me; it belonged to Yukino Yukinoshita. An ideal held by a girl who hated everything crooked and strove to remain "right." I, a fake, was reciting it. Ah, how wrong, how ugly this is. And yet, I continue to play the role of Yukino Yukinoshita. Believing that a happy ending lies ahead.

A brief silence dominated the room. Eventually, Hikigaya-kun, who had fallen silent as if pondering my words, opened his mouth hesitantly. His eyes were more serious than usual.

“—Hey, Yukinoshita. If that’s the case, I’ll be your frie—”

That murmur, which contained empathy, envy, jealousy, and various other emotions, I—

“I decline.”

With a freezing smile, I cut him down ruthlessly.

That night. At home.

“Waaaaahhh! Why did I say that!? I wanted to be friends, tooooo!”

Roll, roll, roll. There was the sight of a high school girl rolling around continuously on her bed. Or rather, it was me.

The slightly hurt expression on Hikigaya-kun’s face when I rejected him flashed back in my mind. The merciless rejection I spat out kept repeating in my head.

I’m sorry, Hikigaya-kun. You were a victim of my roleplay…!

After exposing my unsightly self for a few minutes to an empty room, I sat up on the bed.

“Sigh… I want to stop being Yukino Yukinoshita…”

If I were just a ‘nobody’ carrying no burdens, I surely could have become friends with him. My lamentation reached no one’s ears.

A few days have passed since he joined the Service Club. Since then, we’ve met in the clubroom almost every day, but there isn’t much conversation between us. After all, the first impression was the worst. A foul-mouthed woman—that must be the impression he has of me.

Days continued where no clients visited, and I just kept flipping the pages of my paperback in my separate seat.

I wonder what he thought of that time? Was it boring? Or did he find comfort in the silence? His dark eyes never revealed his inner thoughts.

However, our quiet peace for two was about to end. It was about time for her to arrive. Just as I thought that, a weak knock echoed through the quiet classroom. Suppressing the racing of my heart, I spoke in a calm voice.

“Come in.”

Looking around as if checking to see if anyone was watching, she quickly entered the classroom and turned her gaze toward me.

“E-excuse me!”

It was a face I had seen countless times on the other side of a screen. A well-featured, somewhat baby-faced look. A loosely worn uniform. The "odango" hair bun perched atop her bright hair suited her perfectly.

“Welcome to the Service Club. Please, have a seat.”

Finally, Yui Yuigahama had come to this classroom. The most important figures of the story were now gathered here.

“W-why is Hikki here!?”

Ah, she really is the Yui Yuigahama I know.

“You want help making cookies? What’s that about? Shouldn’t you just ask the people you usually hang out with?”

“Well, yeah, but those guys don’t really fit this kind of... serious vibe, I guess…?”

"…Well, I understand the situation. I should be able to help with that. Shall we get started then?—Of course, you too, Hikigaya-kun."

When I pinned down Hikigaya-kun, who was acting like he had nothing to do with this, his face distorted visibly. His eyes said, Is this woman for real? …If she makes terrible cookies, I’m definitely making him eat them.

The scene changed to the home economics room. I was teaching her about making sweets.

“Please stop trying to add strange ‘arrangements.’ Those are for people who have already mastered the basics.”

“Eh, but it seems like it would make them tastier?”

“I’m telling you it won’t. Could you please just follow the recipe?”

Yuigahama-san’s lack of cooking skill was beyond my imagination.

Honestly, I thought if I were the one teaching, it would work out somehow. Unlike the real Yukino, I’m an ordinary person, so I understand the mindset of people who can't do things. Therefore, I shouldn't be bad at teaching. I secretly thought that was the only point where I could surpass the "real" Yukino.

However, even I couldn't manage the unrestrained Yuigahama-san.

In front of us, where cookies were supposed to be, sat blackened objects. To borrow Hikigaya-kun’s words: charcoal. In my style: Dark Matter.

“…You think these are edible?”

Hikigaya-kun asked, looking terrified. His gloomy eyes had lost even more of their light than usual.

“Hikigaya-kun, I shall give you the reward of eating a girl's home cooking.”

“Home cooking? For Yukinoshita, that’s a pretty bad joke. This is… what even is this?”

“Anyway, we’re eating this charcoal. Come on, Yuigahama-san, you too.”

“Uu… Do I really have to eat it?”

“If you don’t eat it, who will!? I’ll join you, so here.”

The moment I put the blackened mass into my mouth, bitterness pillaged my oral cavity.

“Gah! Cough, cough!”

I covered my mouth and coughed. That was dangerous. I almost made a sound completely unlike Yukino Yukinoshita. Something like “Ugh” or “Blegh.”

“Your reaction is literally that of someone who ate poison… are you really okay?”

“Stop complaining and eat yours. I’ve specially prepared tea for you.”

I watched the two of them looking bewildered. Seeing their expressions change so rapidly, I was overcome with the realization that they are real people existing right here. Not characters on the other side of a screen or on a page, but living, breathing human beings.

By the time we finished, the tea in the cups was completely gone. Yuigahama-san, who had finished the cookies (?), had a dark expression.

“Maybe I’m just not cut out for this. I don't have talent like you, Yukinoshita-san. Maybe working hard is just useless for me.”

She voiced her weakness. It was my role to respond to this line.

“How about you put in the appropriate effort before discussing whether you're ‘cut out’ for it? The same goes for talent. That is a word you are only allowed to use once you have put in blood-soaked effort and still failed to reach your goal. What you’re saying is just a pathetic excuse from a weak-willed person.”

I was surprised myself by how much harsher the words came out than I had originally intended.

Regret and self-loathing hit me immediately. It seems my feelings were more shaken by her words than I thought. The fact that an ordinary person like me worked desperately to become "her." The fact that the abilities I gained through effort—approaching the level of the real thing—were dismissed as "talent" by someone who knew nothing.

The person that is "Me"—not "Her," and far from perfect—had overreacted. I took a breath to calm down.

Did Yuigahama-san hate me now? Fearfully, I tried to offer an apology.

“I’m sorry. I said too mu—”

“So cool…!”

““Huh?””

Yuigahama-san’s eyes were sparkling with emotion, seemingly moved by my words.

In the end, things proceeded mostly according to the plot I knew. Yuigahama-san was drawn to the way Yukino Yukinoshita lived her life. The cookie issue was settled by Hikigaya-kun’s decisive remark: "It’s not the taste that matters, it’s the feelings, right?" At least for Yuigahama-san, if Hikigaya-kun said it, it was the right answer.

Yuigahama-san left, acting huffy to hide her embarrassment.

In the quiet cooking room after the storm had passed, Hikigaya-kun and I were cleaning up the utensils together. He had tried to slip away unnoticed, so I treated him to my specialty: the Yukino Yukinoshita-style "absolute zero" smile. He helped while grumbling, "Why do I have to do this..."

“Ah—Yukinoshita.”

“What is it?”

Hikigaya-kun called my name, looking like he found it hard to speak.

“Back when we first met, when I said that not changing isn’t a bad thing… if that offended you, my bad. I didn't mean to deny someone else's effort.”

“…No, you don’t need to worry about it.”

It seems he saw right through what had made me angry back then. Ah, how embarrassing. And yet, at the same time, I felt a little happy, as if for the first time in this life, someone had actually seen me.

The cleanup was mostly finished. Hikigaya-kun, who had been cleaning with a bothered look, was now fidgeting, signaling his desire to go home.

However, I’ll have him stay for just a little longer.

“Hikigaya-kun, there are some cookies I made as a sample left over. Won't you eat some before you go?”

“…Fine.”

With a slightly dejected attitude, he sat on a nearby chair. I placed the cookies on a plate and set them before him. Even if I say so myself, they turned out quite well. As a bonus, I poured tea again and placed the cup next to the cookies.

“…This is some high-class service.”

"Yes. It’s good enough that I could charge you for it."

Hikigaya-kun gave me a suspicious look at my sudden show of kindness. He hesitated to take a bite.

“…You don’t have to be so guarded. I didn't put anything inedible in them.”

“Did you put something edible in them then?”

Does he really see me as the type of person who would put habaneros in cookies?

I picked up a cookie myself and washed it down with tea to show him; only then did he finally turn his attention to the cookies.

While I was absorbed in teaching Yuigahama-san, a considerable amount of time must have passed. Before I knew it, the setting sun was streaming into the room. The energetic shouts of the sports clubs could no longer be heard.

There was a reason I initiated this event that didn't exist in the original story. Being alone with him and having him eat my handmade cookies. I wanted to know how my own heart would move through such an event.

I watched Hikigaya-kun as he ate the cookies I made. Hesitantly at first. Then, after the first bite, he began eating one after another. His face, illuminated by the sunset, relaxed just a little. I wonder if he thought my cookies were delicious?

—Ah, I knew it. My heart beat a little faster, and my face felt a little warm. Whether this emotion was love, or simply the excitement of meeting the protagonist of a story I loved,, I couldn't find the answer.

Silent time flowed through the room where only the two of us remained. The clink of a cup on a saucer. The small crunch of a cookie. They melted into the crimson space, brushing against my ears. Being in this incredibly quiet space made me almost forget I was inside a school.

I looked back and drank the tea I had poured. The taste I should have been used to felt just a little bit bittersweet.

The day after the cookie request was technically completed, Yuigahama-san was in the clubroom. For me, it was a relief. Since the "real" Yukino Yukinoshita didn't exist here, I thought there was a possibility she might not join the club.

I responded to Yuigahama-san’s energetic “Yahallo!” I made sure to act suspicious of her presence, as Yukino Yukinoshita would.

“Wait, do I feel unwelcome here!? …Oh, right. Yukinon, sorry for saying that weird stuff yesterday. There’s no way someone who can do everything like you hasn’t put in the effort. I was being insensitive.”

"No, don't worry about it. I was the one who went too far."

She saw right through me too. Just like yesterday, I was hit with shame, and yet, involuntarily, I felt a sense of happiness.

It seems I cannot completely become a performer. To become the "Solitary Queen," I have kept my interactions with others to a minimum. That is why my mask has never wavered until now.

But now… now that I am spending time with the boy and girl I once admired… I cannot truly become her.