I Don’t Want to be There (1)

Since then, the days went by quietly.

I went to school, participated in the futsal circle, and so on. I think I’m getting back to my usual routine. Even just a little bit.

My sleep was still short and my body still felt sluggish, but it wasn’t as bad as before.

Maybe I’ve lost some weight, but that could also be caused by the summer heat fatigue or something like that.

It’s been almost twenty days since I turned off the app.

The fact that I was still counting the days must mean I still couldn’t get over it.

Today was the day of my bi-monthly checkup.

“…It’s hard to get in.”

Dr. Kazuki, who was also my brother-in-law, would examine me after clinic hours. Normally, I’d be very grateful for that, but only for this time, I couldn’t feel that way.

It was Dr. Kazuki who recommended the Virtual Alpha app to me. After that, we haven’t talked again.

That means, he’d definitely ask me about it today. He’d ask “How was it?”

There was nothing I could answer even if he asked me. Because there were only things that I didn’t want to tell him.

If it hadn’t been for that incident, I could’ve answered lightly that the app was pretty good… But, I didn’t think I could say things like that even as a lie right now.

“—Should I just say that I didn’t try the app?”

Or maybe pretend that I forgot about it?

If Dr. Kazuki couldn’t see the record of me using the app, I could get away with that somehow.

But If I were to do that, there’s one problem. The optional items.

At that time I threw them away at the spur of the moment, but those items are a rental.

But, no matter how I think about it, it was weird to return something that you had inserted into your butt once. No… then he’d find out that I’ve used those items.

Ahh, enough. It’s like there was no way out for me.

“Why are you making that face?”

“Whoa!”

It was Dr. Kazuki himself who appeared suddenly from behind me.

In his hand, he was holding a convenience store plastic bag that was filled to the brim. Judging from the large amount of ice cream in the bag, it must have been a treat for the staff.

It was unfair to suddenly see someone I’m not comfortable meeting appear from behind me.

Dr. Kazuki didn’t seem to think anything of it even when he saw me being so shocked, he just smiled like usual.

“Ah, could it be that I locked the door?”

“Huh… Ah, no… I think- it’s fine.”

As I fumbled on my answer unnaturally, I pushed the clinic’s door with my hand behind my back.

A cool breeze drifted in through the opening, softly caressing my skin.

*

“Hmm… Did something happen? Your pheromone levels are a little out of balance. That’s rare. Even though usually there’s nothing wrong on this examination.”

The machine in Dr. Kazaki’s hand was for measuring the pheromones.

He placed it on the back of my neck, pressed a button, and then it measured the number of pheromones in a few seconds.

After the electronic beeping sound, Dr. Kazuki tilted his head. True, I’ve never said anything like that during the examinations up until now.

“…Is that a bad thing?”

“No. It’s not that bad. It can be caused by stress or lack of sleep, among others. Do you have anything in mind that might cause this?”

I have a guess what might have caused it.

If anything, I could only think of one thing.

“…Your exams ended a while ago, right? I heard from Ayane that you did really well this time. Did you study hard for the exam?”

Ayane is my sister who got married to Dr. Kazuki. She’s the only one in my family that I frequently keep in touch with.

Well, even if I said ‘keep in touch‘, we only exchange messages once a week.

My sister was also the only one I’ve talked to directly about my exam results. The other family members probably weren’t really interested in that kind of thing.

I even thought it would be fine as long as I showed them my report card at the end of the school year.

“Maybe it’s because you push yourself a bit too hard for it?”

“…Maybe?”

“Well, studying is important, but don’t forget to take care of your health too. Hmm— then your next heat might deviate from the usual cycle.”

“Deviate for how much?”

“I wonder. Maybe around three days to one week. I think it’s about that much. There are differences between each person after all. Well, I think you’ll be fine as long as you have the medicine with you.

“Okay.”

I didn’t think my heat would be coming late because of something like this.

This was the first for me.

It wasn’t like I didn’t have any worries up until now. I guess that means my worry was more intense this time.

I was completely oblivious about this until Ryuuji pointed it out to me, but it must have been quite serious for it to affect my health like this.

No wonder everyone got worried about me.