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What was it, exactly?
Was it the way the light outside shone through the frost on the windowpane, past the wisps of her gently-curving bangs, and danced upon her supple skin?
Or the way the twilit sky's dull blue glow mixed with the pink of her hair, tinting it that perfectly-purple hue?
Or maybe—the way her cheek rested on her palm, curving around it just so?
The way she'd let out a bored sigh every so often,
and its warmth would catch in the classroom's cold air
and show its outline for but a moment?
Was it just that look in her eyes?
Tomori couldn't find an answer. Every time she thought she had it—another popped into her head, making just as much sense as the last. And so she went on and on, thinking in circles until her head began to spin, like a paper pinwheel caught in the late-autumn wind.
All she could really say is that she couldn't look away.
It was a familiar feeling, this captivation. She was practically on intimate terms with it. It would always start in her stomach—a warm, tugging sensation, which then traveled towards her back and turned brisk and chilly as it went up her spine. And at that point, it had fully taken over; her attention was entirely seized, and it was as if everything else in the world, even her very own self, had suddenly and completely ceased to exist, and all that remained and all that she could see was the object of her fascination. And she would stay that way for god knows how long until something would break her out of it.
Usually, though, she could at least explain why she got that way. Perhaps because usually, it wasn't a person causing it.
After all, lovely though they may be, there are only so many ways one can describe a rock, a dried leaf, or a fallen branch. Even a wriggling pillbug, so full of life and motion, can only summon up a certain level of vocabulary. But people—people are so... complicated. You could spend hours looking at them and not get any closer to understanding them.
Normally this made Tomori quite nervous. It's why she had such a hard time looking people in the eyes. The sheer, overwhelming, unexplainable humanity hidden behind them was simply too much to process; she was convinced that if she tried, that if she looked too closely and for too long, she would be swallowed up by it as if by some great tidal wave, and drown in its dizzying rapids.
...So what was it, then?
What made it different this time, and today, of all days? What made it click, made it burrow its way into her mind, refusing to let go?
What supernatural force compelled her to steal every glance she could find at the girl sitting behind her?
As the day's final period drew to a lumbering close, Tomori found herself no closer to an answer. With class over and the teacher gone, she had shifted over in her seat so she could watch, uninterrupted, as Chihaya Anon packed away her school supplies.
And as Tomori wasted time sorting through the murk of her thoughts, the moment finally came—the moment she had been dreading all day, in the back of her mind. One she knew would come, yet whose arrival she could hardly fathom.
Anon zipped her bookbag closed and began to stand up.
To leave.
This was catastrophic. If Anon left; if she walked through those classroom doors and exited the school and took her train home; then Tomori couldn't look at her anymore. She'd be gone for so, so many hours, somewhere far away, out of sight. The sheer anxiety would be unbearable. She couldn't even picture it; it felt just as if the world would end the instant she stepped over that threshold.
In an attempt to stop her, she meekly raised her hand towards Anon. At the same time, a noise escaped her mouth, one strange, distorted and inhuman, and probably louder than she'd expected.
Actually, it was unclear if she was conscious of making it at all. Still, Anon heard it.
"Hm? Tomorin?" She turned to face Tomori. "Something up?"
"E-eh? Yes. I-I mean, no? Ah..."
Tomori fumbled for a way to explain her predicament. But her words failed her. She simply stared dumbfoundedly at Anon.
Anon tilted her head askance. "Well... if it's nothing, then... there's some shopping I wanna get done today, so, I'm gonna head out! See ya tomorrow, Tomorin!"
Anon hoisted her bag onto her shoulder and started towards the exit. And as she walked past—as she grew farther and farther away—some manner of pure, primeval terror seized Tomori's nerves. A sense of imminent, irreparable loss which her conscious mind could not suppress. And—
"A-Ano-chan!!"
Before she could even realize it, her hand had grabbed onto Anon's sleeve, stopping her in her tracks.
"...Tomorin? ...Hey, if something's wrong, you gotta tell me, alright?" Anon's usual smile had by now contorted into a look of concern, though not so much of surprise. Through the haze of her desperation, Tomori caught herself thinking she liked looking at this kind of face, too.
But this wasn't the time to sit and watch, no. The gears in her mind began to turn once again. She had to figure out how to get Anon to stay. She simply had to.
So she searched through her memories.
One week earlier—
"Aaah, man!" Anon threw herself backwards in her seat, smartphone in hand. Her voice was laced with ignoble defeat.
Tomori turned from her notebook to face her. "Ano-chan? I-is everything okay...?"
"Tch... Um, yeah, it's no big deal!" Anon looked up from her screen. "It's just, preorders finally went up for the limited-edition Nyamuchi x Sommes les Fillettes collab Eau de Parfum, y'see..."
"O-Odepafu...?"
"Yeah, and, I was kinda expecting it, but it's waa~ay too expensive! It'd cost me my whole allowance for the month!"
"Is that like... a parfait?," Tomori asked, innocently.
"Hm? No, no, it's a perfume! Like, y'know, spritz-spritz!"
Anon mimed spraying something onto her wrist and neckline. Tomori looked on, still seemingly lost.
"Man... I was looking forward to it, too," Anon continued—"maybe I should get a part time job? Nah, I'm a busy girl. I couldn't stick to it..."
"E-eh? Eeeh?!"
Anon's head craned left and right, scanning the classroom. To her relief, everyone else had already left for the day.
She couldn't imagine trying to explain the circumstances she found herself in: the girl in front of her—Takamatsu Tomori—handing her a 5,000 yen bill. Tomori herself seemed a little shy about the whole affair, but was nevertheless bravely pushing through, clearly trying her hardest to do... whatever on earth she was doing.
"Tomorin? Hey, wh-what's the idea, here...?"
"I'm... paying you," Tomori answered.
"Paying me?! For what? That's... that's kind of a lot of money, y'know!"
(It was all of Tomori's allowance for the month, as Anon would later find out. It was the first day of December, and she had gotten that bill from her father that very morning.)
"I want you to stay," she said. Her face grew sterner and filled with determination, as if she was talking herself into it in real-time.
"...Stay?" Anon was only growing more and more bewildered. Her eyes kept darting around the room; her heart rate grew faster. She knew at any moment, some kids on the way to their club might walk past and catch sight of this rather dubious situation. "But—but why—"
"—Because. Because I want to look at you, Ano-chan."
"Eh? L-Look at me...?"
Tomori gave her one firm, resolute nod in response.
Now, this was far from the first time Tomori had come to Anon with fire in her eyes, making of her some objectively unreasonable request, giving her the sinking feeling that if she were to say no, she would immediately shrink into that dejected kicked-puppy look of hers that always and without fail made Anon feel like history's greatest monster.
But... it had never been quite so... personal.
Frankly, it made Anon just the slightest bit curious, the slightest bit tempted to play along. To find out what rabbit-hole this girl would lead her down this time. Just as she had felt so many times before.
Tomori's odd nature; the way she never went in the direction you'd expect; it had... a certain appeal. It was refreshing. It was... a change of pace.
But... was this kind of thing really okay?
Just as Anon began to feel a strange warmth building in her cheeks, Tomori pushed the bill even closer to her.
"Y-you said you wanted that... perfume, right? So, I thought... it'd be a sort of, um... quid pro quo..." She averted her gaze as she spoke.
Anon did not know what quid pro quo meant.
But Tomori was right. She did really want that perfume.
And this bill—this crisp, freshly-minted bill—would be just about enough to cover the cost.
Of course. Her mind turned on a dime.
All she had to do was listen to her friend's simple request, and she could have it all. She would be the talk of the school. Perhaps of the whole town. She would walk past a group of girls in the hallway, and they would all turn around and ask "oh, what is that fragrance, Chihaya-san?", and she would tilt her head backwards and respond in perfect French with a perfect smile and they would all swoon and fawn about how cool and refined she is. All this and more could be hers.
"...Ano-chan?"
Tomori's expression had turned to one of concern and confusion, though her eyes were still firmly fixed on Anon. "You're... drooling," she said—"um, n-not that I... mind."
Anon quickly dabbed the side of her mouth with her sleeve. And then she swiped the 5,000 yen bill from Tomori's hand. "Okay, Tomorin," she said, with renewed confidence. "I'm down. Let's do this squid pro cow thing of yours."
Watching Tomori's eyes light up with glee, Anon sat back down at her desk. "So, you said you wanna... look at me, right? How long for?"
She realized again how bizarre this situation was once she described it out loud. Still, she reassured herself—she knew by now Tomori couldn't hurt a fly, after all. Whatever her intentions were, they could only be pure.
"Um... I hadn't thought about that." Tomori raised a finger to her chin. "How about... three hours? Oh, or four."
"T-three?! Four?!"
"Is that... too much...?"
"It's... kind of a lot," Anon hesitated. Though in her head, she was already doing the math. She was performing a cost-benefit analysis. Calculating a fair, equitable price for her time. "...Can I like, be on my phone, or is this a Mona Lisa sort of situation...?"
"Oh. N-no... that's fine."
"Then... how about... two? Two hours."
At this, Tomori seemed somewhat dejected. But, after a moment's hesitation, she agreed to the terms.
Still... it really was pretty awkward, as she'd expected.
Tomori had turned her desk towards her, and for the past forty-five minutes, she really had done nothing but stare dutifully at Anon. Her gaze was broken only by the occasional blink. It was impressive, honestly. Anon silently chastised herself for underestimating her.
For her part, Anon whiled away the allotted time, checking her socials, texting a friend or two, even playing that weird game with the green and yellow cubes (which she lost) but, soon enough, she was well and truly bored. She was not the type of girl to sit still. Her leg grew restless, and naturally her eyes wandered towards Tomori.
"Hey, so... how come you're doing this?," she finally asked.
Tomori blinked like a deer in headlights, as if she had been snapped out of some deep trance. She tilted her head in response.
"Like, looking at me. What's the deal...? Um, just curious."
By now, Anon had a personal rule of sorts to not get too caught up prying into Tomori's motivations. She was a unique girl, with unique wants and needs. Making her explain herself mostly seemed to stress her out as she struggled to find the words for it. Anon had long ago decided to accept her as she is. If she wanted to understand her better, well, she had plenty of lyrics to pore through.
...But… she was really, really bored. So, for conversation's sake, if nothing else, she cautiously broached the subject.
"I'm... not sure myself," Tomori said. Her countenance darkened slightly in contemplation. "I've been trying to... figure that out. But... if I had to answer, it's sort of like... I don't want to look at anything else."
"...Eh?" Anon recoiled, then shook her head, wondering if she'd heard Tomori right.
"Um... S-sorry if that's... weird," Tomori shrank.
"N-no, it's not weird, but... it's pretty bold, Tomorin." Anon felt her temperature rising just a little. She tugged on her shirt collar.
"Bold...?"
"Ah, y'know... nevermind," Anon said, now looking out the window.
Tomori had this habit of getting ridiculously, unbelievably honest at the weirdest of times; saying things out loud which would make Anon blush if she so much as thought them. It was kind of like a superpower, though she didn't seem to have much control over it. Or any consciousness of it, or of how it felt to be on the receiving end of it.
It always threw Anon off, but she didn't... hate it.
It was... a change of pace.
"A-Ano-chan," Tomori blurted out, after another long, awkward silence.
Anon was still partway through recovering from Tomori's sudden audaciousness. She turned and gave a half-hearted "yeah?" in response, her mind still elsewhere.
"Can I... get closer?"
The question hit Anon like a slap on the cheek, sending her thoughts into overdrive.
Most of her wanted to say no. She was already rather flustered—who wouldn't be, after being silently stared at for nearly an hour, right?—and she wasn't sure how much more her nerves could take. She might even faint, at this rate.
But, on the other hand, she was being paid for her time.
And, well, who was she to deny Tomori the spectacle she had paid so dearly for? Their agreement stipulated no maximum distance. To refuse her would be a grave sin against the principles of free-market liberalism that had so miraculously rescued Japan from the post-war devastation. Yes, of course. She was contractually bound. She simply had no choice.
So she blurted out a clumsy "mhm", and sat there as Tomori pulled her chair closer to her, and leaned in until their foreheads were very nearly touching.
...It really was too close, after all.
Not that she could do anything about it, at this point. She knew that it would break Tomori's heart. She couldn't bring herself to be so cruel, so cold, to her dear friend.
Still... was Tomori really okay with this distance? Anon could sense the faint warmth of her body radiating through the cold air, could feel and smell her breath (which wasn't bad, mind you, but it was distressingly... characteristic?), could hear every little idle fidgeting noise she made with her mouth and her teeth and her nose. And her eyes—they were sharp like a pair of knives, and frighteningly unmoving. Where had the girl who could hardly keep eye contact with her run off to...?
As she deftly moved to avoid Tomori's piercing gaze, Anon felt her temperature rising once again. She was really hitting her limit, now.
"A-Ano-chan," Tomori said, now in a low whisper.
"Y-yes?"
"...You have something on your... cheek," Tomori said, and slowly raised one hand towards Anon's face. Anon stiffened in response, as Tomori gently stroked her skin, still staring right into her eyes, peering at her with such clarity of purpose that Anon could not help but feel as if the room around them had melted away into nothingness, and nothing remained save for the two of them—
And just as she found herself thinking she might not hate the feeling—the alarm she'd set on her phone started blaring.
She found that odd; she could have sworn the seconds were dragging on like molasses just a moment ago.
"Okay, we're up, Tomorin!," Anon said as she backed away, reeling in confusion, trying to regain her composure. "I'll be on my way now, 'kay?"
"A-ah. Yeah. ...Thanks, Ano-chan."
Tomori examined the piece of lint she had just taken from Anon's cheek. She looked... sullen, resigned. Unsatisfied? Anon couldn't help but steal one final look back at her as she stepped out of the classroom. And Tomori was still looking in her direction. Caught off guard, Anon gave her a hurried wink-and-wave before leaving.
Then she took a long, deep breath once she was out of sight. Man, just what got into her today?, she wondered. But she was surprised to find herself, once it was all said and done, feeling strangely... forlorn.
When was the last time she'd gotten this much attention? And for so little effort?
Anon didn't have an answer.
She shook her head and went on her way, starting down the stairs to the main hall. Best not to think about it too much, she told herself. It was bound to be a one-time thing; Tomori's whims came and went like the wind, after all. She'd probably be over it once she woke up in the morning.
Plus, she certainly wouldn't have the funds to keep this up for more than a day.
"Wait. Wait. YOU got a PART-TIME JOB?! ...In RETAIL?"
Tomori blinked innocently, another 5,000 yen bill clasped between her fingers, as Anon positively lost her mind in front of her. It was about a week later, after school on a Wednesday; Tomori had walked over to Anon's seat the second the last period ended, timidly requesting another transaction.
"Sorry, sorry. Saying it like that was pretty insensitive," Anon continued, catching her breath. "It's just... it really doesn't seem like your style, y'know?"
"W-well... I don't like working the till, so I mostly just stock the shelves... But, the owner says I'm really good at that," Tomori explained. "S-she said sales have gone up ever since I started. Something about... the way I arrange the displays."
She looked Anon in the eyes as she continued. "Besides... I really wanted... the money, and... it was the only job I could find in time..."
Anon felt a tinge of almost maternal pride welling up inside as she listened. But her attention quickly returned to the matter at hand—to the service being requested of her.
...Truth be told, she'd been thinking about this all week.
Those two hours they spent together in silence; the memory had lodged herself in her head. At least once a day since, Anon had caught herself reminiscing whenever her mind had time to wander. It had made her slip up more than once during that week's practice, and she found herself unusually ill-prepared for Taki's admonishment.
The way Tomori had looked at her, so earnestly and diligently; simply looked, without asking or expecting anything of her. And the things she'd said; every time she remembered them she reflexively shook her head and fanned herself with one hand.
Anon wasn't used to getting anything for free. Let alone for a profit.
She was used to waking up every morning bright and early, with a good hour to spare before breakfast was ready; spending fifteen minutes on her carefully-crafted skincare and makeup routines (always subtle enough to dodge disciplinary action, of course), then thirty minutes more styling her hair with a flat iron, making sure every curl on every lock looked just right; snapping a picture or two for the 'gram before rushing through her food and heading to school. Used to greeting everyone in her class with bright eyes and a perfect grin. To taking painstakingly detailed and lovingly-highlit notes for every class to keep her grades from dropping. To heading home and spending all the remaining energy she could muster on studying for school and practicing her guitar (and she never felt happy with either, by the time the day was over.)
It was the only way she knew how to live: giving it her all at every possible moment. It was like running on a treadmill. She couldn't possibly stop.
On a good day, she'd tell you she liked it that way.
But sometimes, just sometimes, she would accidentally sleep in and have to rush through her routine; she would be too tired to want to smile and say hi~ to every single person she saw, too fatigued to want to listen to the teacher's incessant rambling; too done after class to want to think about school or her grades or about barre chords and arpeggios. And then the crushing weight of the expectations she had built up would begin pressing down on her back. She would feel her balance fraying and her knees giving in. But she would never quite let herself fall.
That's why she couldn't get that time spent with Tomori out of her head. It was embarrassing, yes. Excruciatingly, interminably embarrassing. Her gaze was inescapable, overwhelming; her eyes made Anon feel at times like a piece of meat and at others like some kind of freak show.
But... there was also something... liberating about the whole affair.
Or something like that.
Anon sighed to herself, admitting defeat. Once again, she was letting Tomori lead her around by the nose.
"...D-did you buy it?"
Tomori was way too close, once again. She had only waited ten or so minutes from the start of the allotted time before pulling her chair over and venturing deep into Anon's personal space, and Anon had been doing her best to bear with it for another twenty or so, when Tomori finally spoke up.
They had moved to the Astronomy clubroom. That had been Anon's idea. If she was going to keep this up, she at least had to make sure she didn't get walked in on by a teacher or a classmate. She couldn't survive the reputational hit. Let alone the MyGO fan drama it would stir up on the socials.
"Buy what?," Anon said, in a meek, hesitant voice. She was tilting her body ever-so-slightly backwards, trying to claw back at least a half-inch of breathing room.
"The... the perfume."
"Oh. Yeah, I did. Um, thanks. I guess?"
Upon hearing this, Tomori leaned even further in. Anon felt her body heat beginning to envelop her. And then—she felt Tomori's hands on her shoulders.
"Um—Tomori—"
Anon's protests went unheard. All she could really do was sit and find out whatever it was Tomori was doing. The girl had clearly switched on.
Her grip on Anon's shoulders tightened—just shy of squeezing too hard—and she leaned past Anon's head. A second passed, then two, and then before Anon could even process Tomori's nose brushing against the hair by her right ear, she heard a sudden sniff, sniff that made every hair on her back stand on end.
And then another.
"...It, smells nice," Tomori finally whispered, directly into Anon's ear. Her voice, so well-tempered and trained, yet still somehow fragile and unsteady, cut through Anon's thoughts and left her mind utterly blank.
".........Thanks," Anon said, automatically.
"But... I-I like your real smell better, Ano-chan," she added.
Anon prayed to every god she'd ever learned of for the energy and the willpower to brush this outrageously bold act off like it was nothing, and to throw out a casual tsukkomi line like "Hahaha, you're so silly, Tomorin~!," but all she could muster in response was a pathetic, high-pitched whimper, which escaped her in fits and starts like the throes of a dying animal.
Tomori slowly backed off, then let go of Anon's shoulders. But she kept on looking. Free from Tomori's clutches, Anon gave a sharp exhale.
"...Ano-chan?"
As she watched Anon clutch a hand to her chest and catch her breath, Tomori grew anxious.
"W-was that... too much?," she asked.
"...Too much?" Anon regained her composure and shot Tomori a look of affectionate disbelief. "You're something else, you know that, Tomorin?"
Tomori could only respond with a hesitant little noise and a look of bemusement.
"...Hey."
With a mumble, Anon broke the long, awkward silence that had hung over the two of them for the past few minutes.
"W-what's up, Ano-chan?"
"Can you... um... do more of that?"
Anon was dodging Tomori's eyes, looking out the window into the schoolyard below. She was forcing every word out with an uncharacteristic clumsiness.
Tomori pondered for a second. "...Y-you mean... smell you?"
"N-no!! Ugh!" Anon's face immediately turned beet-red. "Compliment me, you dummy!"
Tomori's eyes slowly widened, as if Anon's words had made her stumble into an unexpected realization, some kind of eureka moment.
"O-oh. Oh! S-sure!"
And there was that sparkle in her eyes again. Anon might have regretted asking if she'd had the time.
"Then..." Tomori began, pulling her chair forward again, "I like... I like the way you blink."
"P-pardon?"
"The rhythm. And the way your eyelashes flitter. It's... it's really nice to look at. And," she lifted a finger and gently rested it on Anon's cheekbone, "I like... this part of your skin. This little... mark, with the makeup pooling around it, it's really pretty... ah,"—her eyes flitted around—"T-the shape of your chin. And... the way your chest moves as you breathe in and out. And, and, the way your shirt's collar hugs your neck—"
"Tomorin! Stop, stop!"
Anon made a cross with her arms as she begged for mercy.
"...S-sorry." Tomori shrank into herself. "Did I... compliment you wrong...?"
"...No," Anon said, twirling a lock of her hair around her finger. "But... you gotta pace yourself, okay? This type of thing has a rhythm to it! If you go full-auto on me like that, I'm gonna faint!!"
Tomori nodded dutifully at Anon's instructions. She even pulled out one of her notebooks and began to write something down on it.
And then she began pacing herself.
It was so obvious, in hindsight.
As she finished stocking the instant ramen shelf at her convenience-store job, Tomori wondered why it had taken her so long to realize it.
It wasn't any one thing, not one single trait or tendency that captured her so.
What it was was—expectation.
Seeing what she would do next. The way her skin tingled and her chest tightened whenever she saw Anon move, or open her mouth as if to speak, or when she got to see a new angle on her face she'd never been before; when the light hit her in a way it never had.
It must be the same kind of feeling her classmates get when they watch a TV show they really like, Tomori figured. It was that sort of thing.
Satisfied with this answer, she walked into the staff room, to collect her weekly pay. She smiled to herself, wondering what kind of spectacle she would get a front-row seat to next.