Maria-sama ga Miteru:Volume5 Chapter5 10

St. Valentine's prank. Part 10.

"Thanks for waiting…"

Yumi found Sachiko-sama sitting alone at the second-floor room's table reading a book.

"Oh, Yumi."

She raised her head and smiled softly. Ahh, what a wonderful smile, Yumi thought. If she could, she'd freeze time so she could stare at it forever. It was that wonderful.

"Did you have something to talk about?"

Sachiko-sama closed her book and stood up from her chair. Yumi, in turn, rushed toward her, and they ended up standing across from each other, the table between them.

"Yes, um. I have something to give you…"

As she spoke, Yumi reached into her bag.

"What is it? I do hope it's not the rosary."

"R-rosary!?"

"I'm glad I'm wrong."

Sachiko-sama smiled at Yumi's startled reaction. She was just teasing her. Sachiko-sama was becoming more and more like the Roses.

But Yumi would prefer it if Sachiko-sama toned down on such heart-stopping words. Her heart was already racing as she tried to maintain composure in front of her onee-sama.

"Though, come to think of it, I would never have chosen someone to be my sister if they'd return the rosary after such a trite happening."

With that mumble, Sachiko-sama tossed her straight hair over her shoulder. "Uhh."

A prickle.

The cynicism stabbed at her, like one of Rosa Gigantea's specialties. Truth be told, Sachiko-sama described it as "a trite happening," but Yumi felt she'd tossed and turned over it. Of course, returning the rosary had never even remotely crossed her mind, but she did panic over what she'd do if Sachiko-sama had asked, "Can you give it back?" Because she felt like she wasn't living up to onee-sama's expectations.

"When I was a first-year, I felt like the current Rosa Chinensis saw through me all the time."

Like God himself, Sachiko-sama glanced around the room, like she was looking for bits of nostalgia from a year ago.

"But then. I don't really know what you're thinking. I guess that made me lose confidence."

As she spoke, Sachiko-sama seemed to be sorting through her thoughts.

"I may have been too harsh yesterday…"

"Not at all."

Replied Yumi, but she silently felt it was pretty harsh. Sachiko-sama's voice was already so clear and powerful that it was ominous (?) on its own, so if she put any degree of extra power behind it, it'd become extremely overwhelming.

"That was because it felt like you were avoiding me, so I started to panic. But I must have misunderstood things?"

"Yes. Umm, that's-"

Now! thought Yumi as she took a box from her bag and held it out.

"What's this?"

"Chocolate. I tried making it with Rei-sama's advice. I wanted to keep it a secret from onee-sama, and that's why I was sneaking about. So of course onee-sama would feel like I was avoiding you. I'm so bad at arranging things properly, but I still ran around feeling excited on my own. I didn't even think about stopping to wonder what onee-sama would feel about it. And when you asked, I couldn't even explain it…"

"… Yumi."

"I know. I know onee-sama doesn't like Valentine's chocolate. But I wanted to show my gratitude anyways, so…"

"Yumi!"

With a harsher tone, Sachiko-sama cut her off.

"… When did I ever say I don't like it?"

"Huh?"

"Really, you're always lacking on words, and yet when you begin talking, it's like the floodgates have been opened. I don't understand you, after all."

"Umm…"

"I'm irritated by everyone using me as a way of letting out their desire to send Valentine's Chocolate to someone."

"Uh…"

"So, if you made it for me, of course I'll accept it, happily. Isn't that obvious?"

Sachiko-sama placed a hand on Yumi's box.

"May I?"

Yes, began Yumi, before she stopped, realizing that the box was, for some reason, brown.

"W-wait, no. Give it back, onee-sama."

She tried to pull the box back. But Sachiko-sama was gripping it tightly.

"It's unsightly to wish a gift be returned."

"That's not it."

The box Sachiko-sama was gripping with five fingers, that was the box Yumi intended to give to Rosa Gigantea. Even though they were all Yumi's handmade chocolate truffles, and they all used to same ingredients, they tasted wildly different. She'd forgotten she'd taken it back from Rosa Gigantea, so she'd assumed the box she'd touched in her bag was the ivory one.

"Let go, Yumi."

"Onee-sama, umm, actually this one-"

When Yumi pulled out the other box from her bag, in an unnatural posture, it happened.

First, the brown box neither of them was letting go of exploded (or so it seemed).

Then, the ivory box Yumi was holding out exploded (or so it seemed).

And the next moment, black, circular bullets (or things that looked like them, anyways) fell and scattered on the table.

"Ah—"

As a result of the two of them pulling on the box with all their might, the chocolate inside fell out. That was what happened. As for the second box, Sachiko-sama lost her balance when the first one ripped, so she grabbed hold of that box, and it went the way of the first box.

However.

The one fortunate thing was that neither of them had chocolate rain onto their head. Even if they were the size of dried plums, they were still chocolate – being hit by them would hurt.

The two of them stared, stunned, at the chocolate rolling about on the table, as well as some that had rolled off it.

"… What performance is this?"

Eventually Sachiko-sama laughed.

"Yes. Surprise chocolate."

"Surprise chocolate?"

"Some really bad chocolate is mixed in. That's the surprise."

"How foolish."

Sachiko-sama didn't seem to take her seriously, laughing and then plucking one off the table and tossing it into her mouth.

"Ah!"

It happened too quickly to stop.

"Don't worry, it was on the table."

"Umm.'

Well, Sachiko-sama eating something that had fallen was a surprise, but Yumi was more terrified and curious about which sort of chocolate Sachiko-sama had found.

"… How is it?"

Yumi fearfully asked.

Sachiko-sama closed her eyes, rolled the chocolate around in her mouth for a bit, then opened her eyes and answered.

"Delicious."

Phew, Yumi sighed, relieved.

"Thank goodness. That was a hit, then."

Even Yumi, who'd made them, would have to look very carefully to distinguish between the two batches of chocolate.

It was 50-50. How like Sachiko-sama. Luck was on her side.

To make sure Sachiko-sama wouldn't choose a miss chocolate, Yumi quickly picked up the ones left on the table. And as she picked them up, she quickly, but carefully, looked at them and sorted them. If Sachiko-sama wanted to eat another one, she'd be able to pick up one of the relatively better-looking ones.

There was twenty chocolate in all, and fifteen had remained on the table.

"What happens for winning?"

"Umm."

Shoot, she hadn't thought about that. –Or rather, she'd just named it "Surprise Chocolate" out of whim. But hit and miss was like a lottery. And lotteries come with prizes.

As she went on her knees to pick up the chocolate on the ground, she thought about it. Technically the delicious chocolate was the prize, but she didn't think of that.

The remaining chocolate had rolled under the seat, or behind the doors, or other such random places. They cleaned the room almost daily, but that didn't prevent the rolling chocolate from losing its chocolate powder somewhere and picking up sand and dust. It hardly resembled what it used to be – in fact it almost looked like a sesame-sprinkled dango from a collection of Japanese confectionary.

She blew on the chocolate to clean it. Of course, there was no thought of eating it, but she wanted to know if it was a hit or miss, to keep track of numbers.

She found three somewhat easily, but she couldn't find the last one. Right now, there were nine hits and nine misses. Sachiko-sama had eaten a hit, so there was one miss somewhere.

Yumi looked at the table again, just to make sure.

And that's where she found the last one. In the corner of the box that'd been tragically torn rested, miraculously, one truffle.

"Onee-sama."

Yumi plucked it out of the box, marveling at it, and said.

"A hit comes with a half-day date with me-"

The last one, for some reason, had come out of the "hit" box.

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