My memory now jumps to the nineteenth of March, Saturday.

Today's the date.

I slowly sat up from my futon, letting out a huge yawn feeling like my lips would rip open and extend to my cheeks.

Huff puff.

Then I stood up from the futon and actually went the extra mile to actually fold it neatly and stash it exquisitely in the closet just beside me.

Lousily and whineily walking to the kitchen part of my room, I slowly grasped for my cellphone which was on my pocket.

"Five thirty..." I mumbled.

I'm kind of used to waking up so early or what would you call an early riser or an early bird, and I'm a day person for one. What surprises me is that I haven't even set an alarm just to wake up this early-look even the sun isn't even out yet!

After checking the time, I noticed there was an unread on my inbox, read:

I forgot Akkin, we'll be meeting each other at the train station at 11.

It came from Tomo, which was sent two hours ago.

"She sure is a night owl."

Between the both of us, it just doesn't stop at how black and white our chemistry is, but rather the gap of our circadian rhythms. I'm pretty sure she was playing HeroTom the entire midnight while I was in my slumber.

I guess that explains her fast pace at the game.

Opposites attract huh?

If it's around five thirty right now then our scheduled meetup is at eleven, I have a whopping six hours to kill time. What worries me however is how do I spend the remaining six hours because I'm pretty much an inactive person who has a sheer lack of activities and hobbies to spare. It is to the point that I seriously need to decide what to do on a typical day rather than be carefree about it and freely watch some TV or something.

"Okay, I need to cook some rice."

I grabbed the container for the rice cooker that was placed on the drying rack just beside the sink, pouring in like two cups from the rice sack that I dropped off between the refrigerator and the front door (yeah I know I'm lazy to pour the whole sack into a container of some sorts), washing the rice with water in the sink twice, pouring in two plus a cup of water, setting it on the rice cooker then finally flipping the lever.

Ladies and gentlemen, that's how you cook rice.

I wiped my forehead like I had some serious elbow grease. Yeah I know, even a basic task is already a kilowatt utility.

The next thing I knew was that I decided to walk outside and of course, lock the door. I usually take a bath first thing in the morning, but today's an exception. Not sure, I feel vigorous by the clock.

Glancing around here at the second floor, there's barely any people around here-maybe one or two walking, jogging, or biking around. The thing is, this apartment is located on a mini complex of businesses and small shops, so all of the buildings in my vicinity have a shut door.

After some streetgazing, I walked to my right then knocked at the door beside mine.

The door opened after some audible footsteps, revealing a figure in her messy pajamas and red long hair that has some of the worst bedheads and curls, maybe beating Ala-chan by a shot.

"O-oh..." they yawned upon establishing eye contact with me, "Why it's you kid, good morning."

"Yo. Morning Aka."

Admittingly, this is probably the first time Aka and I met early in the morning. It's shocking to see her vulnerable and casual in spite of her womanly and bold demeanor.

"What's up kid, something good happen to 'ya?"

"Yeah, I'm heading out for a walk. Just saying."

"Ah, understood... enjoy."

Yeah I sound like a well-mannered son telling his mother where to go before taking his leave.

I'm not kidding when I say that we had some sort of joint agreement when I moved into this apartment that I'll be telling her where I'm going that's "unusual" for me to do. Not that it's creepy or malicious to me, I guess it's a precaution for Aka to look after me.

I've never considered taking a morning or night walk outside, which is even an unusual thing for me to do because for one, I'm a lazybone. Starting my morning walk by going down the stairs and turning to the right, it's actually not that bad as I thought it would be.

Challenging against my laziness, it's quite a breeze to take a walk by yourself. Physically, all you do is walk, but deep inside is as if a colony of worker ants are organizing your thoughts-like what I'll be doing today and some light brainstorming.

"This is relaxing..."

Clocking at around six, the sun slowly dawns from the horizon with sunlight gradually seeping out. The wind remained calm and breezy-really cold for me considering I haven't taken a bath and still had that sticky muddy feeling from not taking one. Taking another turn to the left, it was even more of an utopian experience once I walked around Autumn Street.

The street is reminiscent of blooming cherry blossoms, except that these are huge trees.

I love to live here even by the road. If only we had enough money to move in here.

Anyway as you might've guessed from the directions, I stopped by the City Square then continued my walk until I turned left-the way to Ala-chan's neighborhood and the rear entrance of the campus. There are people around the City Square albeit quite a few; chatting, jogging, biking, and walking with each other. Looking from the road, it actually has a park vibe to it.

As I walk, there are things that you don't usually see on a bustling day, like roaming garbage trucks, newspaper boys—or newsies?—delivering a roll of newspapers to various houses (is that still a thing?) and community workers sweeping the streets. That's to name a few. Seeing them is like that awesome feeling of getting to know behind-the-scenes of something.

I mean it's the same thing as seeing things at midnight you don't usually see in the day, perhaps like drunkards roaming around?

Anyway, I continued straight until I reached the rear entrance of uni, which is of course closed. Here's the catch, the entire campus is encircled by a road, so I turned left hoping to see the front entrance. And I did. Then I just walked on my way back just like I always get back home from uni.

Yup, that's all there is to it about my morning walk. Underwhelming that I only walked through the roads that I know-my walk from the rear to the front entrance of uni was the biggest heap of my version of geolocation. I wouldn't risk my life getting lost in the morning though.

On my way back to the apartment, it still looked the same except the sky was way more illuminated than when I left.

Checking the time on my phone as I entered back into my room, it's already six-thirty, so a generous thirty... forty-ish minutes of walking. Finally I achieved the recommended daily exercise of one hour!

Situating myself back to the kitchen, obviously the rice cooker was done minutes ago. Looking into my recent groceries, I figured about cooking that can of corned beef because I lied; I'm fed up with luncheon meat paired with rice.

...

Not bad for a change of taste.

Afterwards, that's where I finally took a bath and got rid of the oily and sweaty clothes from taking a morning walk. If getting to cook rice was a kilowatt-equivalent in my metabolism, then the sun simply shining on my skin plus an entire walk was a megawatt worth of utility.

As for my clothes, I know I failed on my fashion when we attended that reunion, but I'm confident that this time, Tomo wouldn't get mad at me.

Yes, I'm going to wear again the clothes she picked for me way way back.

Clever huh?

I scanned for the black-and-white striped shirt and gray shorts in my closet after taking a bath, then since it's going to be a date outside for the most part, I'll finally wear the white bucket hat.

"I wonder if she'll even recognize me with this wear," I mumbled as I looked through the wall mirror.

This is already too avant-garde for me.

Seven quarter.

Shoot, time's dragging slowly this time.

I'm the type of person who hates wasting time, even when I slack off.

Walking to the little bookshelf next to my closet, I stumbled across the latest volume of A Witch's Last Tour that I bought from the library a couple of days ago. It's still in its pristine plastic wrap since I have a serious habit of keeping it sealed even after I bought it-like it'll take me weeks or months before I actually start reading what I just bought.

That alone ate a good chunk of time. I however fatigued while I was reading, so I stopped. Bookmarking and looking through the side of the book, I'm impressed that I've made it halfway through the volume. That alone is a remarkable achievement because I'm not the type to read a lot.

Me having a deep hate for books that I use at school, yet I'm fond of reading literature that I actually pick out myself. I wonder if it's normal for me to feel uneasy and regretful about that.

Checking the time on my cellphone, it is a minute to eight.

Why did time just drag now? I can't believe that mundane morning walk earlier actually chomped a lot of time.

Sigh. I stood up and walked out of my room once more. I didn't even bother locking my room this time since I would be back in a hitch.

Curious as I am, I went downstairs. Coincidentally, Aka and I met once again the moment I took a turn towards the front of the mochi store. She's way more groomed now with her messy long red hair now tied in a long ponytail once again, but her getup is still the same white blouse, jeans, and a brown apron. I literally just saw her opening the store by moving up the metal folding door gates.

"Hey kid, mind if you help me open up the store?"

I nodded. I was finding some more things to kill time anyway.

After tidying up her mochi store and having it open, we sat at one of the tables inside. The sun really strikes us down with its harsh rays of light, but it gives off a professional business ambience as it couples that with the running A/C of the store, plus we're having coffee together.

"Apologies for that unmaidenly sight earlier, that was me who just woke up and prepping some breakfast." She sipped her mug after.

"Ah it's no problem, there's no reason for you to apologize after having a nice sleep and a warm morning."

"Hah, I'm just as apologetic as you are then kid. Anyway, what's with you waking up early on a Saturday? 'Thought you're the type to sleep in more through the morning."

"Oh I forgot to tell you. Well... I have a date with Tomo today."

She clicked her tongue with a smirk, "Hey, that's reinvigorating the youth right there, heh." but then her mood suddenly weighed a lot, "Beats me on why she still doesn't have some way to meet me though."

"I don't know either—maybe her parents being too strict, or she's just way too shy to begin with—either way I don't know until I really ask her, but that would be awkward of me." Plus I don't want to see her getting her day ruined or worse, getting me immersed in that awful deadly silence.

Aka sighed. "Well, if you guys ever end up in my store, just keep on encouraging her to introduce her to me."

"I'll see about that."

After just that, I went back to my room upstairs. It's still eight-thirty when I checked my phone.

"Man, how else I'm going to kill time?"

I can't just kill time with Ala-chan—she's probably having the time of her life as Sleeping Beauty on a Saturday morning. I have an unknown chance with Miko however since we haven't called each other and hadn't known her time schedule yet.

As for Tomo, well...

Active 5 hours ago, read the text just below her name on my inbox.

Yeah, it's also out of the question.

But then, I recall my morning walk experience earlier, it seems like time just ticks faster when I'm doing something, whether it be mundane or something that I really enjoy.

"Ah, good idea." I somewhat gestured my fist on to my open palm.

And no, I'm not going to take another morning walk because it's considerably hotter than it was earlier.

Reaching for and busting my laptop open, I decided to kill the remaining time playing HeroTom.

⁂

Ten fifty-five in the morning.

Here I am just arrived at Merumeru's stop.

I arrived back at our train station there just before ten thirty since I thought maybe there are trains that actually arrive and depart early. It's certainly against the drivers to arrive at each stop early or late, it should be on time.

But I still figured there are some who would do that, especially that it's a weekend where there's not much workers and employees to be angry-mobbed about.

Theoretically, I should've arrived here at Merumeru at eleven o'clock sharp, but it seems like I'm five minutes early.

I don't know if it's just me, but damn these trains could be the only infrastructure in the world where it's strictly time-bounded. I can recall these were not that strict back home.

After scanning my card at the turnstiles which, by the way, has just the exact remaining balance when I get back home, I walked out of the train station then sat at the benches just around the humongous analog clock standing tall at the center.

Sigh.

Looking around admiring once again at the Venetian architecture, it's objectively a downgrade compared to the surroundings of Ruruteru. A relaxing downgrade actually-it's soothing just glancing around from the brick sidewalks to the antique-like buildings themselves.

I looked at the big analog clock that's above me.

A minute before eleven and I can't see Tomo around my vicinity.

Speaking of which, almost everyone I know doesn't really conform to fixed meeting times—I mean have you ever met someone who would really show up on or before the meetup? They'd always show up late and come up with a reason. That's why I hate society.

If you're looking for Tomo for the past hour, she's still inactive when I checked her status on my contacts and surprisingly, no texts ever since.

Now it's a minute past eleven.

"Oh well." I stood up—

"Akko, wait, I'm here~"

Panning a bit, Tomo's running towards this direction while I simply just stood up and watched her go this way.

"I'm... ha... on-time!" she was panting really hard, her hands on both of her knees.

She reminds me of when Ala-chan visited my room on my first hangout. Tomo's getup consists of a flax-colored blazer with a white camisole, paired with also a flax-colored skirt up to her knees. On top of that, she has a brim hat with a cute purple ribbon encircling it. The hat doesn't match her businessy look, but I think she looks cute from clashing two contrasting styles.

But the thing that stands out the most is her hair, which is not tied into her usually fluffy twintails because of her hat. Instead, she just let her long hair flow up to just above her elbow which looks twice the fluff. I have to admit, she's cute when she has her hair down without ties or something.

My mind's going around the bush if she has a knack for blazers since she also wore a blazer last time.

"Oh my god—wait Akkochii..!" Something occurred to her which raised both of her eyes locked-on to me, "Wait—you're wearing the clothes that I picked for you! Wow!" She exclaimed wholesomely at the sight of my getup.

I was quite worried about wearing the same thing over and over, especially that fiasco back at our reunion, but I guess she didn't complain this time. I told you, every move we do is an emotional cause, not an objective one.

I held on to my arm, stared to my side to hide my facial expression.

"Well, well, well~" after she recovered from sprinting, she turned around in place, "How do I look?"

"Great, now let's get going."

I started to walk towards the direction where we had some Italian lunch last time, then I suddenly felt a tight tug from my left arm.

"Ehe~" Tomo caught up with me and hugged my arm as if there's no tomorrow.

"So Akkochii, where are you planning to go to?"

"What?"

"Don't 'what' me!" She looked in this direction with a pout, "You're the one who wanted to go on a date-the one who planned to have it here in my hometown, so I thought you already had some places to go in mind."

"Ahah... of course... not." I looked away and broke eye contact with her. Truth be told, I haven't thought about opening up Maps in my laptop then researching some cool places around Merumeru. Also, I literally have no idea what's at stake for me around these parts-like Tomo's house, the Train Station, and the Italian restaurant are the only places that I know around Merumeru. If you were to compare my geography exploration to Ferdinand Magellan's, it's akin to his landing at the Canary Islands, which was just a mere five percent of his overall expedition.

I wonder if Tomo ever got the news either from me or Ala-chan that I lack knowledge around the parts of Ruruteru.

After quite a stretch of walking, we arrived at some very open space of brick pavement to the point you might mistake this area for a park. I'd say it's quadruple the size of the City Square back in Ruruteru. It may look like a roundabout in plain hindsight, but I'd say it's pill-shaped than a circle (so it's a pillabout?).

The Venetian architecture around here screams a lot, with the Merumeru City Hall in front and humongous buildings surrounding the entire roundabout-pillabout. If you want to impress your friends that (as if) you're having a vacation at the Vatican, this is the perfect spot to do so.

Enough admiring, we stopped ourselves right at the dead center of this open space, staring at a big map of the entire Merumeru ward. Beside this giant slab of a map are thin-shaped shelves of pamphlets that look like a traveler's guide.

You've guessed it, the text embossed on top of the map reads .

Tomo and I are currently having a timely detour as we're scouring some places to solidify our date.

"Akkochii-Akkochii!" she pointed to various places in the map, "We can have our time at the Mall Premier! Or wait-maybe at the Merumeru Park? The beachside? Or maybe go outside of Merumeru?"

"Or me?" She added with a chuckle.

Woah, pull the brakes young woman—second, also don't attempt to make it look like I'm going to be accused of sexual harassment! Third, Ms. Omoe would definitely get mad if she knew we're outside your hometown!

On a side note, Tomo might actually rival Ala-chan's hyper-mania attitude, but I'd say she's in a happy-go-lucky state, a mile before going hyper-mania which is just the tip of the iceberg though.

"Uh... eh..."

Unshocking, I was flustered all over the place, not really knowing where to go. With a little tick of an idea in mind, I said, "Maybe some delicious food and great scenery..?"

"Food and scenery... Hmm..." Tomo pondered about it for a moment, "Either the Mall Premier or the park, then the beachside!"

"I'm an indoor kind of person, so I'd say the mall and the beachside, whatever you wish where you want to go with me."

"Then it's settled, come on!"