Kenkyo, Kenjitsu o Motto ni Ikite Orimasu

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This is my Christmas present to you, and I’d be really glad if you gifted me back with a review on novelupdates! Incidentally, Reika graduates from primary school soon, so let’s have one chapter every 15 minutes until she does.

Oniisama graduated from high school and entered university, while I entered Year 6. Once I considered that I wouldn’t see Oniisama in uniform anymore, I felt a little lonely, so I took a few photos of him. The Suiran high school uniform really is so cool! I asked him to wear it occasionally at home, but he refused… Isn’t it fine if it’s just in the house~?

*imouto*

Yurie-sama and Aira-sama also graduated from middle school and entered the high school section, and Emperor Kaburagi got depressed that he was stuck in primary and the gap was even wider now. I mean, a love between a primary schooler and high schooler is just impossible, right~? I think he should just give up already, but this first love of his is supposed to continue until high school, so I guess there’s no reason he’ll give up now. According to Aira-sama Intelligence, Kaburagi isn’t stalking Yurie-sama, but because they don’t get to meet often, he’s expressing his feelings by letter. It worked last time, so it looks like he’s encouraged because of it.

*imouto*

Since I also became a 6th Grader, next year I’ll be riding the escalator system into middle school. Having said that though, I’m preparing for our internal examinations, so I ended up getting a home tutor. My home teacher is Ousaka Karin-sensei and she goes to a national university. She comes over twice a week. In my cram school exams, I rose in the rankings from upper-middle to lower-upper. I thought I made a good effort amongst all these kids from prep schools, but I really do wonder how I’m supposed to feel when I can’t even get first place amongst primary schoolers. Once I enter middle school, maths and arithmetic are going to turn into a monster. I need to try hard while I still can.

Karin-sensei’s explanations are easy to understand and I make progress studying with her. Even if I don’t get it the first time when I see it at cram school, it really helps that I can have her follow up. For a while now, sometimes Oniisama teaches me as well, but the feeling of tension is different. I just keep spoiling myself with him since he’s family.

“You learn quickly, don’t you, Reika-san. Really, well done for getting this far.” Karin-sensei often says stuff like that to praise me. Apparently she’s the type who praises people to get them to try harder. And I’m the type that gets fired up when I’m praised or flattered, so we have pretty good compatibility, I think.

*imouto*

*imouto*

Ever since that day in winter, I’ve been sitting with Akizawa-kun and Fukioka-san in my Maths and Japanese cram classes. Fukioka-san sits right in the middle, with Akizawa-kun and I to her sides. Fukioka-san wouldn’t let Akizawa-kun sit in the middle, you see. I also exchanged mail addresses with Fukioka-san, and we’ve gotten quite a bit closer.

Contrary to her appearance as a Japanese-style beauty, Fukioka-san has quite the venomous tongue.

On Valentines Day that year, I gave my hand-made chocolates to Aoi-chan and Fukioka-san. At Suiran we expect that Valentines chocolates are better quality than even high-class stores, so it’s my first time giving hand-made chocolates to anybody but my family. Last year Aira-sama taught me how to make them, and Otousama even said “This is the best one you’ve made so far.”, but this year Aira-sama was also busy with exam prep, so I tried using the recipe that she taught me last year to make it. Oniisama also said “Making one like last year would taste good.” So I handed them over to them filled with confidence.

Aoi-chan told me “It was yummy.” but Fukioka-san said “It’s not very good.”… “It’s not bad, but the taste is kind of lacking. Did you use cheap chocolate to make this?” she said. So rude! I used chocolate from Belgium! When I told her that in complaint, she ended up replying “Apologise to Belgium”… Fukioka-san, the gap between your appearance and inside is too huge…

Incidentally, I didn’t give one to Akizawa-kun. Whether it’s a friendship chocolate or a courtesy chocolate, Fukioka-san would probably get mad regardless. In my mind, Fukioka-san is under the ‘cannot make into an enemy’ category. Apparently she’s learning to cook to prepare for her future as Akizawa-kun’s wife. How amazing. She’s got a much better idea of her future than I do. She’s actually planned so much that it’s even a little scary. And you know, Akizawa-kun, it’s impossible for you to escape now. I’m scared of Fukioka-san too, so I’m afraid I can’t help you. Forgive your cowardly friend!

And so, Fukioka-san asked me, “What if you learnt as well?” but I’ll probably be busy with the internal exams this year, so I turned her invitation down. When I got home, I told Oniisama “My friend told me the taste was lacking.” and he replied “The person’s feelings are more important than the taste in situations like this.” and I wasn’t sure how to feel about that. When I get into middle school, maybe I really should start learning…

*imouto*

*imouto*

Right now, Aoi-chan is my Soothing Friend. She’s docile and seems withdrawn, but once you’re closer with her, she starts laughing a lot. She would definitely never say something like “the taste is lacking”. What a good girl. And what’s more, shockingly! Aoi-chan told me that she went to visit her grandpa on New Years! She got me a Tarow the Taro plush keychain! I’m so happy! When I got home, I immediately put house keys on it. There’s always a maid around and somebody chauffeurs me places and back, so to begin with I’ve never used a key before. But I do carry one around just in case. And my keys were now hanging from Tarow. His pathetic face is really cute.

Aoi-chan has amazing sense for souvenirs. She totally knew what I wanted. And shocking! For the holidays in spring, she got me region-exclusive potato chips! Aoi-chan said stuff like “Although I’m not sure if you would even eat this sort of stuff…” in embarrassment, but I’ll eat it, you know! Or rather, it’s my favourite! I’ve wanted to eat potato chips for six years now, you know! The potato chips were in a souvenir bag, and I carefully snuck it into my room so that Okaasama wouldn’t see. It was late at night when I sneakily ate it. So nostalgic. My body trembled from the cheap taste. It would be a shame to eat it all in one go, so I decided to treasure it and eat it little by little, but the next day I cried when I found it soggy.

Incidentally, I call Aoi-chan ‘Aoi-chan’ in my mind, but in front of the girl herself it’s “Yorino-san”. I don’t have the courage to use her first name. I mean, I’d hate it if she went “Eh-? What’s with that all of a sudden?”. It’s hard to find a chance to start things like this, isn’t it?

*imouto*

*imouto*

My homeroom teacher wanted me to be class rep. It sounded troublesome so I said that I sucked at management and refused, but they pressed me and said that vice rep was fine, and in the end I became vice rep… or rather I got stuck with it. That was probably the plan from the beginning. After all, the position of class rep went to this boy who had done it a bunch of times already. Teacher swindled me using that ‘ask big first, then go for small’ trick. I got totally fooled. In the end, I was stuck as the odd job girl again. Though it’s true that my thimbles still lie sleeping in my pencilcase though.

But this time it’s just within my class, so without my natural enemies here, things went smoothly. Collecting forms was easy too, since the scary army of girls behind me made everybody cooperative. Class Rep even said, “As expected of Kisshouin-san”. I don’t think he was praising me though. It was like I was the bodyguard of some debt collector. This is weird. This isn’t how things were supposed to be. I get the feeling that recently I’ve been losing my elegance.

 

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