She said those words without thinking. Even Maru, who was listening, almost replied ‘okay’ without thinking. Those words contained her purest emotions, so Maru reached out to his cup of water in order to buy some time to organize his thoughts. When the cold sensation of his cup climbed up his fingers, Yuna, who was sitting in front of him, abruptly stood up. She sprang up and leaned sideways so that she could escape at any time, but she did not move her legs. Whether it was her reason that held her back or it was her body that just froze up, he did not know, but he did know that he had to talk to her right now.

“You’ll fall over. Sit down for now.”

Yuna’s gaze was on the exit. A suitable excuse, no, just a touch of his finger might make her sprint towards the exit. Maru did not want to embrace the silence, the confusion, and the lump of emotions that would replace Yuna by himself. That would be mentally exhausting. It was obvious that doing that would be even more tiring than listening to her worries.

“Sit down. You know that you’ll put me in a tight spot if you just go like that, right? And you’ll probably regret it a lot afterwards. Sit down so that both of us won’t get embarrassed. Please.”

The distance between Yuna’s nose and upper lip shrunk in an instant. Her expression...