Watashi Tachi no Tamura kun:Volume1 Chapter1

Chapter 1: Homesick Rabbit of the Moon

Part 1

Everyone used to call me the reincarnation of Jean-Henri Fabre, the father of modern entomology.

When I was in third grade, my cicada life-cycle observation diary won the town fair’s top prize. I think that was the time when I was the most popular in my life. Everyone called me the "Insect Professor," and I was the center of everyone's attention.

The reason that I got such a fantastic nickname was because of my family.

That’s right! The Tamura family has three sons.

Everyone in my town knows about the genius eldest son, the athletic all-rounder youngest son, and the ordinary middle son. That ordinary middle son is indeed me.

My smart and bright older brother is the pride of my parents; my active and cheerful younger brother is everyone’s darling. Of course, with these two attention-catching sons, my family was always bustling with excitement.

Whenever our family became that lively, the ordinary me was always pushed aside. No matter which photo albums you opened, you would find me with my arms crossed at my chest or my finger resting on my chin, observing my brothers and my parents (who had their heads spinning from my brothers) from the sidelines.

Now that I think about this carefully, the one thing that I developed from being in the Tamura family is my keen observation skills… I think.

Unfortunately, time is cruel. As the years passed, one by one my friends outgrew insect-loving hobbies. Instead of trading beetles, they traded monsters in video games. Instead of sharing news about where one could catch grasshoppers, they now shared news on which bookstores had the newest manga and magazines. Finally, field guides to insects were replaced with 《The Mysteries of Human Body: A Guide to Identifying Male and Female Body Parts》…

I lost my only medal.

It probably started around that time! I don’t know if my relatives were doing this out of kindness to comfort me or what, but I increasingly began to hear things like this:

“Yukisada will definitely grow up to be a very impressive man!”

The Auntie next door also said:

“You are definitely going to be very successful one day!”

Even my homeroom teacher was no exception.

“Yukisada, I know very well that you have potential…”

…in other words, she meant, “even though you don't amount to much right now…”

Ahem! I don’t need you people to tell me that. I know the truth myself. Thus right now, after studying insects, my second hobby became studying ancient folk stories and customs.

By the way, I'm very interested in the social customs of the Kamakura period at the moment — things like dyed dark-brown hitatares and samurai-eboshi. And you can’t discuss this topic without mentioning the armor, helmet, white toodoshi, and red toodoshi … these garments are beautiful, extravagant yet majestic, and decorated with indescribable subtlety. The true spirit of the Japanese man can be found in this clothing style.

Ah ah, hmmm … Hmm?!

I was about to take action—

But then, tragedy struck.

It happened last night.

At first, I was only flipping through an ancient customs fact book. As I was reading it, I became nostalgic about that time period. A character. Wandering and visiting Kamakura. Before I realized it, I was holding my older brother’s bamboo sword in front of my room’s mirror, and posing like a samurai in the middle of the night—

I pulled out the bamboo word in my hand:

“I am indeed Tamura Yukisada. Come, let us duel!”

I uttered under my breath.

Just at that moment, my room door suddenly opened in response. The owner of the bamboo stick—my elder brother—appeared at the door!

“Hey! Do you have my dictionary? …what are you doing?”

Kya—

Last night, I almost screamed then.

Whenever I think about that incident, my face becomes red hot. I get so embarrassed that I act like a girl and cover my face with my hands. I could only comfort myself by thinking: I'm already lucky. I've done things even more shameful than that… ahh… but….

“Hey, Tamura. Were you listening to my question?”

Someone shook my shoulders a few times and pulled me back to reality. When I lifted my head, I saw an unremarkable yet familiar face. This was my good friend ever since the days I was called the "Insect Professor" His name is Takaura.

“Hey, Takaura.”

“…Haa? You weren't listening to my question at all!”

Takaura sighed exasperatedly, and then pointed his finger towards my nose.

“I'll say it again, so listen to me this time. Hmm— Do you know what “time” it is?”

Takaura looked dubious with his hesitant expression and head titled slightly sideways. It was a mystery to me what he was trying to accomplish. But I didn't want others to think I had Alzheimer's disease or something, so I tried to answer the question:

“Right now, it’s the second half of lunch break.”

“I'm not asking you that! Can you think… like… calendar-wise?”

“Calendar-wise? Then it's July?”

By the way, the final exam was in two weeks. After final exams was summer vacation. From the perspective of a student taking exams, you could say that right now was the crucial moment.

“No! You really are dumb! You don’t understand at all, do you? The correct answer is, “The last summer of junior high school life”!”

“…mu~n…”

I fell into a daze and habitually started to chew my pencil. I moved my gaze towards the windows.

The last summer of junior high school life? In this world, there isn't a person who is sentimental enough to have that marked on their calendar.

Outside the window, the high-noon summer sky was boundlessly clear. The dazzling bright, light blue sky made me feel refreshed. The sound of cicadas could be heard near and far … oh, what a scene! The symphony of crickets and cicadas.

As I listened to their summer symphony, my hand started to play around with my pencil. On my desk was a half-finished school survey form. Today was the deadline to hand it in.

When I was halfway through filling out the form, the scene from last night suddenly appeared in my mind. Because it was too embarrassing, I stopped writing.

I had already written down my first-choice potential high school. My class year, class name, seat number, and my signature were left to be filled in.

Ta - mura - Yuki - sada!

…Not that I'm boosting, but I have to say this is an impressive name! Even though no one's ever told me this, I always think to myself: this name sounds a bit like a samurai’s name.

After I filled in everything, I gave my form to Takaura. To be honest, he's always wanted to be the class representative (who knew he'd actually end up becoming a candidate for the job?). He's a pervert who can even enjoy boring work like collecting survey forms.

“Ok, Tamura handed in his form, let’s check his name off. Hmm, it looks like there are still some people who haven't turned theirs in … no, no, no, that’s not important. Back to the topic! The last summer of junior high school life!”

This truly perverted kid winked his eyes and leaned towards me. Even if you wanted me to say something more, but—

“…So what? I can only answer you with this phrase. If that’s an acceptable answer, then please by all mean continue on!”

Rather than continuing this discussion, I would rather pick my nose. As a matter of fact, I'll go do that.

“Agghh, you don’t understand at all, do you! Don’t give me lame answers like “so what?”. You should have noticed, right? If you keep on spacing out like this, you'll be completely left behind!”

Takaura suddenly grabbed my hands. They were passionately hot hands. For a moment, the two of us gazed at each other… sparks were glinting in our eyes… huh?

“I'll be… left behind?”

“You've never even noticed you were left behind! Look at this!”

Takaura pulled a piece of paper folded three times out of his shirt pocket. When he opened it up, I saw it was an A4-size contact list. In the list were the names, phone numbers, and addresses of the students in this class. I backed up a bit.

“…wow, you actually carry this thing around everywhere? You are way too dangerous…”

“Look again closely. The main focus is these lines!”

Takaura pointed at the lines he probably drew himself. The pencil lines connected the neatly spaced names together.

“First up is this couple. Here, Suzuki Chikato and… here, Nomura. Listen, you'll be shocked by this. These two people have been dating since last month!”

“Wh-what?!”

Upon hearing this mortifying news, my upper body naturally straightened itself and leaned forward. You mean this actually happened?! That “Old Hag” Suzuki Chikato with “33B Alley Cat” Nomura? These two people are having lovey-dovey sticky smoochy moments with each other?

“Un-unimaginable!”

“Unacceptable, right?”

While ignoring the awestruck me, Takaura’s mechanical pencil kept on producing uncomfortable scratching sounds as Takaura darkened the line connecting Suzuki and Nomura together.

“It’s too early to be surprised. Hayashi and Kobayashi, Amano and Ishioka—even shocking couplings like these appeared! I think these two over here became a couple right at the start of this month. And then you have him with her… her with him… this one is together with Yokoyama from the class next door… and… those two broke up already. These two broke up as well… and these two are are together… something like that.

The class contact list… no, calling this sheet of paper a “Relationship Map” was closer to the truth. My eyes followed the mechanical pencil’s movements, and I almost become dizzy just by watching. Most of the lines connected two names together. Some lines stopped halfway through, some lines advanced in zigzag movements, others lead to multiple names, and some were unidirectional only. All these lines went in all sorts of random directions.

They avoided a few specific names, however.

“Wh-when did the situation degenerate to this point?”

I could not help but lift my shaking finger, put it on the paper, and softly touch the empty and awkward area around my name (and Takaura's). This was a very very crushing truth. Along with a few scarce others, my name (and Takaura's) had been completely isolated from that tangled mess of complex black lines. Our names stood out so much that I couldn't help but feel depressed. So that was why! Now, I couldn't disagree with the truth. I (and Takaura) have indeed been left behind. While I had been picking my nose moronically, these complex lines had already interconnected my fellow classmates.

“’This is our last summer vacation in junior high school! If we don’t leave ourselves some wonderful memories to reminisce over later in life, this would be horrible!’ — I heard the girls saying this. Most of them started to vigorously search for sweethearts at the end of last month, the rest did so at the beginning of this month… In other words, a confession craze is spreading all around us.”

Confession!

“Craze?”

“Don’t show that strange look. Haven’t you felt it? The mood: ‘If now is my only chance to be successful, then this is the time to do it.’ Even if you get rejected, once you graduate you won’t see each other anymore. On the other hand, if they say yes, you'll have a wonderful summer waiting for you. Moreover, regardless of how long the relationship lasts—according to the female students, you get assigned into different groups based on whether you've had love experience.”

“…what groups?”

“Well I know exactly what the girls meant! When you look at this contact list, don’t you feel like we've already been separated into two different camps?”

I looked at the relationship map, and I instantly understood what this kid was saying. The first group was those who had their names buried in the whirlpool of black lines. The other group was people like Takaura and myself. The space around our names was totally clear and far away from the mess.

In other words…

“One side has good luck with relationships, and the other side has no luck at all…”

“Exactly! In other words, it's the popular and the unpopular. You and I have extremely unremarkable looks and personalities, so we're the kind of nobodies that nobody will notice…”

“Obviously we are on the unpopular side…”

Sa….sa….

“Oh, it sucks to be on ‘this side’ of the camp, right? You won't accept this, right? If we continue the way we are, by the time we're 20 we'll still be virgins, by 30 we'll still be single, by 40 our heads will go bald, by 50, eh, hmm…”

I gasped. How would my future turn out? By the time I reached 50, what kind of tragedy would await me?!

“Forget it. Anyway, I definitely don't want to reach that sorry state! Therefore, I will board this fashion trend and get a girlfriend! Then, right before getting into high school and starting the next stage of my life, I will join ‘the other side’! This is my plan!”

—At that moment, my body almost collapsed.

“You know…”

“Tamura! Are you willing to be like this forever?”

“It is true that I don’t want to be like this…”

No matter how unremarkable I was, I was still a normal puberty-driven male student. If I could to choose between being “in a relationship” and being “isolated from relationships”, of course I would prefer the former category. I'd lift my head high and walk down that sunny road known as “life”.

But!

“…Takaura, our world is actually very small. To us, this town…no, this classroom is basically our whole world, right?”

“Ha? Yeah, something like that… why'd you ask that all of a sudden?”

I answered Takaura with a nod and slowly stood up. And then:

“You just said that you wanted to get a girlfriend, right? Why don’t you open your eyes and look carefully. In our world, these are your potential girlfriend candidates! Look at them!”

We looked around the familiar square classroom.

“Really, that’s really disgusting… as your friend… I recommend that you go to the hospital… Do you hunger for things from time to time?”

See…

“Yesterday I went to Shizuka-senpai's home (she's one year older than me). I met a guy… he was driving a toreeraa (trailer truck)… he drank a bottle of miruku (powder milk) all in one go…”

As I said…

“I feel so energetic right now I think I am going to break down (*laugh*). If my other personalities (Kurenai - Seiryuu - Choya ) came out right now, you girls would be dead (*laugh*). You girls better not make me angry (*laugh*). My smiling face is very scary~~ that’s what everyone says (*laugh*).”

…do you understand now?

“How’s that, Takaura. This is—”

“Ha?! Was that Tamura just staring at us?”

“No way?! What are you looking at? You need to pay money to look at us!”

—This was the true face of our female classmates.

I couldn't even finish my sentence. I just collapsed onto my desk silently. What’s going on? Was this a zoo? How was I supposed to become attracted to these people, fall in love, and confess to them? Where was my true ‘soul mate’? Could someone tell me where she is—?

“Ta-Tamura, pull yourself together! This is only a light wound!”

“…I can’t go on any further… you can go on alone to the 'other side'… don’t worry about me… I'll stay on ‘this side’ for the rest… of my life…”

“Tamura! Don’t die on me!”

“……Fare… well……”

Ahhh, what a short life. I slowly closed my eyes as darkness began to consume my solitary heart—

“Bu-fuu?!”

Panic!

Out of nowhere, an unidentified flying object suddenly covered my whole face. I was so surprised that I snatched at it by reflex.

“What the heck is this?!”

I stood up from my seat.

“Fu~a”

Suddenly there was a strange sound.

It was as if time became suspended.

The distance was so close that I could vaguely feel the warmth of a body.

About 10 centimeters in front of my nose—

That person was standing there.

And then.

“……sorry”

Our eyes levels were almost even.

Her lips, which were so small that one couldn't help but doubt oneself, were opened slightly. The sound that came from her mouth was so soft that one couldn't feel any emotion from it.

Sorry, she said.

“…That… Excuse me?”

That… Excuse me?

“I… that… that's my form. The wind blew it here.”

I… that… that's my form. The wind… eh?

“Ah?! My-my gosh!”

By the time I realized it, it was too late. The unknown object that covered my face— it only took one glance to know that the paper was the school survey form. The form was currently being crushed in my hand into a crumbled ball of paper.

“I am so sorry—"

What’s her name—oh yeah, her name is…

“S-Sorry… Matsuzawa.”

…That’s the right name, right? Matsuzawa… really… what a strange name… indeed.

Matsuzawa Komaki.

On her pale and small face, her brown eyes were glittering strangely. Those two eyes were staring straight at me. I couldn't help but stare back at those glass-marble-like pupils.

“I'll straighten up this form right away.”

Before I realized what was going on, I had already begun to unravel that crumbled ball of a survey form—

“……It’s okay.”

She took away the form. No, the form was hers to begin with. She took back the form.

Without hesitation, Matsuzawa handed the almost scrap-paper-like crumbled form to Takaura and walked back to her seat next to the windows. She moved through through the narrow gaps between the desks. Her hips under her skirt were as small as a child’s. Her ankles, dressed in the socks of the school uniform, looked just like the legs of an antelope. Her thin shoulders, her delicate back and… could a small body like hers actually have organs in it? Does she even have to go to the bathroom?

“……Wait wait. Tamura? When will you snap out of it?”

Her shoulder-length hair, softy afloat on the light wind and shimmering under the sunny sky, looked amazing. I think this hairstyle is called a Bob Cut. As Matsuzawa returned to her seat, her fabulous hair drifted behind her. Afterwards, she looked out the windows with disinterest.

“Tamura— Hey— Tamuraaa!”

She never spoke loudly, and she never hung around those rude people. Matsuzawa always just sat there alone, gazing up towards the sky. Even when the light wind disheveled her hair, she remained indifferent; she looked just like a clay doll.

Wait....

Wait wait wait!

She's here!

Matsuzawa Komaki.

After entering ninth grade, this was the first time she was in my class. Before that, I never even knew she existed. From what I heard, she moved to our town when she entered junior high school. She was a mysterious girl with an unknown past. Actually, her grades were amazingly good—I knew this because after starting ninth grade, our grade’s mock exam results were always posted.

There was someone like Matsuzawa is in this class?

This was the first time I spoke to her.

This was the first time I looked at her from such a short distance.

What was it? Those brilliant eyes, that pale and smooth skin so clear and flawless that it seemed like her skin glowed. Was the light so bright that I dared not move my eyes away?

When I finally come about:

“It is my fault.”

I apologized.

“Until today, I've never noticed you before.”

“Tamura— wake up— your eyes are goggling—“

“I never knew that you were such a perfect girl… Hey, Takaura, Matsuzawa is really cute!”

“…Eh. Are you serious?”

I finally turned my head around and looked at Takaura’s unremarkable face that I had completely ignored earlier.

“Of course I am serious! What would I gain from lying? She's really cute. Look, just her delicate movements set her apart from anyone else!”

As I was about to point my finger towards her:

“!”

Matsuzawa sneezed intensely.

“Wow, what a powerful sneeze. She's covering her nose……a runny nose? Just as what I'd expect from Matsuzawa, her handkerchief is pink.”

“Tamura, you haven’t…”

“I will change that ‘you haven’t’ into reality! I will step into the 'Other Side’ with her!”

I half giggled, and unhesitantly announced this declaration. Even though I heard a strange sound coming from Takaura’s throat, who cared about him! Matsuzawa was just too perfect! I was really sorry that I've never noticed her until today… wait a second?!

“Damn it! Let me see that relationship map!”

I suddenly realized something. I hurriedly snatched the map away from Takaura’s hands. For such a perfect girl, don’t tell me that some other male student had already tainted her with his dirty hands?!

“Very good… safe!”

The name “Matsuzawa Komaki” didn't have any offensive black lines around it. I relaxed instantly. I was very nervous earlier. Now all I had to do was connect her name and my name together—with a thick, thick line!

“Tamura, you know… Matsuzawa isn't as ‘safe’ as you think she is…”

“Aggghhh, shut up! Stop bothering Matsuzawa and me!”

“Think about it… Matsuzawa is really cute, that’s true. But, why is she on the ‘unpopular’ side of the camp? Don’t you think that’s very strange?”

“What strange luck!”

“Don’t you think that there must be some sort of logic behind it? We're unpopular because we don’t stand out. But what about Matsuzawa? What do you think it is for her?”

“Destiny!”

“I'm being very serious here. I advise that you give up on her while you can. Matsuzawa is not a character you can go for. At most, she's a weirdo who is there just to push the plot forward. Even if you can get into dialogue mode with her, there won't be any event CGs. She doesn’t even have moving facial sprites. There's no way of getting to her ending because right from the start, her plot route doesn’t exist.”

“…You sure are fluent with this game jargon.’

“Be quiet. Hm, I will show you. I really shouldn’t do this, but…”

While trying to shield his actions with his body, Takaura unfolded the crumbled sheet of paper—which was Matsuzawa’s survey form—then, he showed it to me. Just as I was about to complain to this rouge class representative about how immoral his actions were, I stopped—

“Hmmm?”

In that instant, Matsuzawa’s private personal information was leaked.

Before I could comprehend the meaning of the words on the form, Takaura took the form away. He lowered his voice and asked me whether I understood. But, what I just saw was not something one could understand the first time reading it.

I started to think back to what was written in the entry box for one's first-choice school.

The phase, “Return to my home planet high school”—no, wait a second. The words, “High School”, were already printed on the form. Therefore… what?

“Return to my home planet?”

I slightly tilted my head as I tried my best to comprehend the meaning of that phase. Takaura, with his already lowered voice, lightly poked my arm:

“…Let me tell you something beforehand. That girl has written the same thing on her forms multiple times already. No matter how harshly the homeroom teacher lectures her, she still does the same thing every time. The incident even turned into gossip in our grade. Everyone knows about this.”

“…Home… planet…”

“To be frank, this is why people stay away from Matsuzawa. So you better give up. She—”

Stop, Takaura. I made a hushing sound to stop Takaura from continuing.

“Say no more. I com~pletely understand now. So that was why.”

“…Sigh. Normal girls can be found everywhere, so why don’t you...”

“Matsuzawa has such a funny sense of humor!”

Takaura just tripped in a classic fashion. But, I didn't have time to care about his lame performance. ‘Return to my home planet’. How romantic, how affectionate, and how lovely Matsuzawa was! If even Takaura was trying to talk me out of going after her, that meant I didn't have to worry about having a huge group of competitors! Yes, Matsuzawa! This was the best!

“Sigh…”

Takaura sighed deeply and lowered his head. Sorry man, while you waste your time sighing, I'll go ahead and join the 'other side' first.

Because, no matter how much you try to argue, now really was “the last summer of junior high school life”!