pertwk Page 234
Page 234
"There will be some, but it's something we can't help. Other schools started practicing when the theme song was announced last year, while we've only had six months."
“Oh, speaking of which, where’s Shinomiya-sensei? I haven’t seen her lately,” Akamatsu Sayaka said.
Kitahara Hakuba said:
"Her music store has been quite busy lately, and the temporary contract she signed with the school only lasts until after the National Tournament."
"Are Kitahara-sensei and Shinomiya-sensei dating?" Akamatsu Sayaka asked bluntly, without any hesitation.
"Ah."
There was nothing to hide from Kitahara Hakuba about this; some of his club members probably already knew.
"I'm so envious..."
"What's there to envy?" he smiled.
"Shinomiya-sensei has such a great figure, and Kitahara-sensei is so talented. They are a perfect match. Unlike me, I married a scumbag."
Sakurako Yukawa stared at her in surprise, her eyes wide, and said:
"Sayaka, do you have a boyfriend?!"
"Yes, I have."
Sayaka Akamatsu, as if stating a fact already established, propped herself up on the podium and spoke.
"Not only that, I also gave him my first kiss."
"Alas!!"
Sakurako's face flushed bright red. She had never met Akamatsu's boyfriend, nor had she ever heard of this.
"When did you start dating? Why didn't I know? And you're always in the brass band, I've never seen any boys come to see you."
Could it be...?
The type who only dares to confirm a relationship online, but then doesn't dare to say a word in real life, only daring to stalk the other person?
"What do you mean no boys are coming to me? That's so rude."
Sayaka Akamatsu proudly raised her head and said...
"When I was eighteen, I had a passionate love affair with him, but his family gave me thirty million dollars."
He demanded that I leave him.
"What is this outrageous...? Listen, wait..."
Sakurako Yukawa narrowed her eyes slightly, looking at Sayaka Akamatsu with a puzzled expression, and said...
How old are you now?
Sayaka Akamatsu pretended to widen her eyes and pursed her lower lip, saying, "Seventeen years old, a true beauty of Hokkaido."
"You're not even eighteen yet..."
"I'm just full of confidence for next year!"
Sakurako grabbed her wrist, looking annoyed, and said:
"I won't bother Kitahara-sensei any longer, let's go."
"Goodbye, Kitahara-sensei~~!"
“Minister Yukawa.” Kitahara Hakuba remembered something and handed her a stack of sheet music from his bag. “This is the arrangement of the second piece for the cultural festival. Distribute it sometime.”
Sakurako Kawa took the sheet music, and her mouth moved reflexively.
Although her thoughts had wandered off somewhere else, her body still followed its usual habit, bowing deeply to Kitahara Hakuba.
After the two left, Kitahara Hakuba, sitting in the music classroom, could faintly hear the sounds of trumpets, oboes, and euphoniums.
Interspersed among the sounds were the shouts of the baseball club, and the sunlight streaming in from the window was excessively soft, lacking any warmth whatsoever.
I don't know how much time passed, but then I could hear the trumpet and oboe playing Soli.
Even he needed to calm down and take some time to find out who it was.
Kuno and Kirishima, two people.
>
At the elevated walkway.
The oboe is delicately inserted, then slowly lifted from the weakest point, while the trumpet lingers beside the woodwind at the right moment.
As he played his instrument, Kuno Tachibana kept an eye on Kirishima Mai out of the corner of his eye.
Her eyelashes fluttered, and the oboe's tone was as delicate and beautiful as a wind chime vibrating in the air.
This kind of beauty is definitely comparable to that of Eri Kanzaki; Kitahara-sensei absolutely understands the depth of this timbre.
"Pfft"
After Soli finished playing, Kuno Tachibana's slender body emitted childlike breaths, and a faint blush appeared on her pale face.
"Playing sheet music after the exam feels so good." Kuno Tachibana's voice sounded innocent and naive, and the wind made her short skirt sway from side to side.
Kirishima Mai nodded, the silver keys shimmering in the sunlight.
“Actually, if we played here, there’s a high chance that people from other clubs would say something,” Kuno Tachibana said with a smile. “But club activities are prohibited today, so it shouldn’t be a big deal.”
Kirishima Mai relaxed her lips and said gently:
"I feel that Lihua, you have improved a lot."
Kuno Tachibana smiled confidently, his fingertips gliding over the slightly cool surface of the trumpet, and said without hesitation:
"Of course! Mr. Kitahara came all the way to my home to point out my shortcomings. If I don't improve at all, I really don't know how I'll explain it to him. This time, I'm going to try and take the top spot."
"You can definitely do it this time."
Kirishima Mai, who is a head taller than her, had her gaze fixed on Kirishima's shoulder-length short hair, and could vaguely glimpse her small ears hidden in the strands of hair.
"Makoto, do you really think that way?"
Kuno Tachibana's retort was unusually calm. There wasn't a single person in the elevated corridor; the shadows extending from the walls swallowed everything.
On Kirishima Mayi's soft and slender legs, there was a faint layer of reddish sunset, and the girl's white stockings and shadows in the corridor complemented each other.
"This is what I'm thinking this time." She glanced at Kuno while pressing the keys with her fingertips.
Kuno Tachibana took a deep breath, his lowered voice carrying a hint of pressure:
“Mai, for people like us, practicing and growing is as easy as breathing. Take Isogen-senpai for example. She must be very envious of people like us in private. Even though she practices every day, she can never compare to us.”
This is a fact, and there is no way to refute it.
Kirishima Mai raised her hand and brushed away a strand of hair that was stuck to her lips:
"I don't think I'm the same kind of person as Tachibana, and compared to everyone else, I—"Do you think you're not strong? Do you think Kitahara-sensei and I would misjudge you?
Kuno Tachibana abruptly interrupted her, bringing up Kitahara-sensei to deprive the girl of any chance to refute.
"And what's wrong with you?!"
The girl beside her suddenly became agitated, which startled Kirishima Mai so much that she shrugged and widened her eyes.
"You were lying to me during your solo performance at the last training camp. You deliberately lost to Kanzaki-senpai, weren't you?"
Kuno Tachibana turned around, and the light reflected from the trumpet in his arms dazzled Kirishima Mai's eyes.
"How could you do something like this? Don't you and Kanzaki-senpai understand what competitive spirit is?"
Kirishima Mai's slender fingers gripped the oboe, her fair neck undulating slightly.
"Compared to Kanzaki-senpai, I'm already..."
"I have a headache."
Kuno Tachibana's gaze turned toward the corridor outside, where members of the horticulture department were emptying the soil from the potted plants and turning it over to dry.
"What's there to worry about?"
"This national audition will also be a selection process. If nothing unexpected happens, we will continue to use Mr. Kitahara's selection model next year and the year after, right?"
"Mm." Kirishima Mai nodded.
She doesn't deny Kitahara's status, and if they really win gold at the national championships, this model will probably continue.
"Next year we'll be second-year students, and the year after that we'll be third-year students. Do you really think you'll give up your spot to someone else then? For three years in a row?"
"..." Kirishima Mai lowered her eyes, her gaze flickering.
Kuno Tachibana took a deep breath, his gaze fixed firmly on her beautiful yet seemingly unassuming face, and said:
"I don't want my relationship with Mai to become as strained as those third-year students. You should have noticed Nagase-senpai and the others. I don't want things to develop to that point with you."
Kirishima Mai blinked in surprise; she had naturally noticed that the relationships among the third-year students seemed to be in trouble.
But this was not within her scope of concern.
"This... is important to Tachibana?" Kirishima Mai asked, tilting her head in confusion.
“It’s very important, it’s very important to me.”
Kuno Tachibana spoke calmly, yet with a hint of guilt in his voice, which gripped the girl's heart.
"I was so stupid. I kept encouraging you, but in the end I was the one who didn't get the solo performance and even dragged you down."
Kirishima Mai seemed unsure of what to say, and simply raised her hand to pinch her eyelashes.
Kuno Tachibana didn't bother with beating around the bush and said directly:
“Mai, being modest might be useful in other clubs, but it’s completely useless in the brass band club. On the contrary, it will cause the whole club to fall apart. If you can’t even manage interpersonal relationships, how can the club achieve anything?”
Her tone was too serious, quite different from her usual impression.
Kirishima Mai lowered the oboe she was holding, bringing her lower body together from her toes to her thighs:
"But the brass band has now qualified for the national competition."
Kuno Tachibana had anticipated her words, and stared intently at the girl's beautiful face as he said:
"That's because of Kitahara-sensei. If Kitahara-sensei hadn't been involved in guiding us this year, the brass band definitely wouldn't have made it to the national championships. Then Kanzaki-senpai and Eto-senpai would have been the subject of everyone's complaints behind their backs for a whole year."
What she meant was that it was precisely because of Kitahara-sensei's presence that the conditions for "winning gold" were created, allowing those who were modest and accommodating to each other to avoid being blamed by their teammates.