My Lie in October

Chapter 20

"Are you serious?"

Kousei told Watari about what happened, and that was his friend's first response.

Tsubaki came over to Kousei's house as quickly as she could, where the other two already were. Once they were all gathered, Watari brought up all his knowledge on the subject with Tsubaki to translate and discard the unreasonable courses of action.

"The waiting period is hard, but it's just like baking a cake," Tsubaki said. "You can't just walk away while it is baking. You have to stay close for when it is ready."

"There are two things you can do right now," said Watari. "Give her space and rarely talk to her, or stay really close friends so she experiences what it's like to be constantly around you."

"I recommend the last one. She'll come to a decision much faster, and if she feels good around Kousei, then she'll be more confident with her decision as well."

"But if Kousei reveals something about himself that she doesn't like, she could back away! Since she's already close to being with Kousei, it's better not to risk anything!"

"She'll find out everything about him sooner or later! Plus relationships are built on trust, and once they have a good trust established, they will be more in love and less likely to break up! Give her all the terms up front and let her make the decision."

Kousei just watched these two go back and forth until finally he asked, "So what should I do?"

Everyone was silent for a bit until his dad poked his head in the room for a second. "Text her," he said.

They all turned around in time to see his head disappear back again.

Watari was the first to get the conversation resumed. "Yes! Text her! Just ask if it's ok to still be friends for now."

Tsubaki nodded. "I agree. Make sure she knows you want things to be how they used to."

Kousei was already getting out his phone. Hey. If you're ok with it, I was hoping we could still be really good friends until you come to a decision. It might help you decide faster.

"Ok, I sent it."

They talked for a bit after that conversation, mostly about what it was going to be like in a relationship. Tsubaki was getting close to the confession stage with Satoshi. Watari already got together with Akari then got dumped, but he's working on someone else right now.

After a while, Kousei's phone made a chirp signaling an incoming text message. When he picked it up, he stated, "It's from Sakura."

Watari and Tsubaki stared at him in anticipation, waiting for Kousei to read the message out loud. Kousei cleared his throat and read: Yeah, totally! I was actually gonna text you myself first asking the same thing! Funny how that works.

Watari and Tsubaki both squealed in excitement, which made Kousei chuckle with them.