Serina, a second-year high school student, has a bit of a weird problem. And that problem is her stepbrother, Kenta. At school, Kenta's a popular and cool art teacher everyone looks up to. But at home? That mask comes right off. He's still super kind most of the time... but sometimes, he gives Serina this really mean look and teases her like crazy. Sometimes in a way that's a little naughty.
At first, it was just heart-pounding fun. But it's been getting more and more intense, and now her heart
Milf cute Mother Obsessed with her step son Alot - The teacher's profile, and the anxiety I didn't want to know about.
On Saturday afternoon, Serina was sprawled out with her homework in the living room of her home.
The eighteen-mat LDK was quieter than usual on weekends when her working parents weren't around. Only the low hum of the exhaust fan over the open kitchen counter and the occasional sound of Kenta's footsteps from the second floor signaled that anyone was in the house.
Serina closed her math textbook.
(*Ugh, I can't do this. I can't focus at all.*)
The words Kenta had said to her in the art prep room after school on Friday kept swirling around in her head.
*"A student teacher's coming next week. Hope they're not a klutz like you."*
Back then, she'd snapped back, "God, that's so rude!"
(*A student teacher, huh...*)
She rested her chin on the back of the sofa and stared blankly at the TV's dark screen.
Who could it be? What kind of person were they?
Her brother was a teacher, so it was only natural for someone like that to come. So why did her chest feel so unsettled?
* * *
Monday morning.
Passing by the staff room, Serina spotted Kenta through the glass.
Standing before the vice principal, his posture was a little straighter than usual.
"The practicum period is three weeks, starting today. Her name is Mio Majima. I hear she's your *kouhai* from university."
The vice principal's voice faintly leaked out into the hallway.
"Yes."
Kenta answered curtly and accepted the documents in his hand.
—His movement stopped, just for a split second.
It was a tiny pause, barely enough time for someone to call a name. But Serina, who had watched her brother for four years, could tell.
(*His hand stopped, just for a moment.*)
Just for an instant. Definitely.
After taking the documents, Kenta immediately returned to his usual apathetic expression.
"Anyway, it's probably just another useless student teacher."
"Hey, don't say things like that."
Lightly scolded by the vice principal, Kenta shrugged.
Serina continued right past the staff room.
(*Mio Majima...*)
A name she didn't know. A person she didn't know.
And yet, her brother knew her.
A *kouhai* from his university days. Someone who had surely known her brother far longer than she had.
In the hallway leading to Class 2-C, Serina stopped.
The October sky stretching outside the window was a cloudless blue. The cherry blossom trees in the schoolyard swayed their just-turning leaves in the wind.
"...It's not like it matters to me."
She tried saying it out loud.
And yet, she found herself gripping her textbooks tightly.
(*Why does this feel so... unpleasant?*)
* * *
Even during class, Serina's mind was elsewhere.
Third period was art.
The art room was on the north side of the school's second floor, where steady natural light streamed in through the large windows. It was a space lined with plaster busts and easels, the scent of oil paints drifting softly in the air. Usually, that smell alone was enough to calm her down, but today, for some reason, she felt restless.
"Today is still life sketching. The motifs are three apples and that wine bottle over there."
Kenta proceeded with the lesson in his usual cool tone.
As Serina ran her pencil across the distributed drawing paper, she couldn't help but steal glances at Kenta's profile.
(*My brother at school really is a little scary.*)
The only gesture that overlapped with the figure she saw at home was the way he occasionally brushed back his longer, messy black hair as if it annoyed him. Other than that, he was like a completely different person. His expression was stiff, his voice low, his gaze sharp.
(*That student teacher is coming today, isn't she...*)
The tip of her pencil unconsciously stopped.
A friend in the next seat whispered, "Nanami-san, what's wrong?"
"Huh? Ah, n-nothing! It's nothing!"
She hastily moved her pencil.
"Nanami."
Before she knew it, Kenta was standing right behind Serina.
"Your pencil stopped again. What, are you dissatisfied that the motif is apples?"
"N-No, I'm not!"
Her face turned visibly red.
"Focus."
Kenta's mouth relaxed just a little, and he walked off toward the next student.
(*He even teases me a bit at school...*)
A hot flush spread deep in her chest.
But this was normal. Just the usual.
Serina steadied her breathing and gripped her pencil again.
* * *
After school.
Passing by the art prep room on the second floor of the school building, Serina suddenly stopped.
Normally, this was the time Kenta would be lazily drinking coffee by himself. But today...
"—Oh, really? So, Senpai will be guiding me, then."
A woman's voice reached her.
A soft, slightly sweet, beautiful voice.
"Yeah, I guess so."
She could hear Kenta's voice too.
Serina pressed her back flat against the wall near the art prep room door.
(*Is that... the student teacher?*)
Her heart was pounding loudly.
"Your guidance was strict back in university too, Senpai. So please, don't go easy on me this time either."
"You're as thick-skinned as ever."
"Hey, that's mean, Senpai!"
It was a cheerful conversation.
It was the first time Serina had seen her brother talking and laughing with someone like that at this school.
(*That person... has known my brother from before.*)
Since before I ever even met him.
I don't know the Kenta from his art university days.
A vague memory surfaced in Serina's mind.
The summer she was twelve, when her mother remarried, and she suddenly had a father she didn't know and a brother she didn't know. Kenta, who was cold and unfriendly at first, and wouldn't look at her at all.
They'd lived together for the four years since then.
The night her brother failed his teaching exam, she'd made him coffee late at night. She'd gotten annoyed at his constant, joking teasing. He'd taught her how to hold a brush in the art prep room, sat next to her on the swings at Tsukimi Park—
She'd thought she was the only one who knew all those sides of her brother.
But she was wrong.
There was someone who knew a version of her brother that she didn't.
Why did just that fact make her feel so painfully miserable?
Careful not to make a sound, Serina quietly left the spot.
From the window at the end of the hallway, she could see the cherry blossom trees in the schoolyard swaying in the wind. There was no one on the bench.
"...What am I even thinking?"
Her voice was hoarse.
* * *
Evening, at their home in Tsukimidai.
The October sky, with its shorter days, was already beginning to turn orange.
Serina stood in the kitchen, preparing dinner. Her parents weren't home yet. In the living room, Kenta was lounging in his usual spot on the sofa, looking at his smartphone.
Today's menu was instant curry udon. As she boiled water in a pot, Serina recalled the earlier incident.
(*Why was I so shaken up?*)
Who her brother talked to was his own business. Dealing with a student teacher was part of his job as a teacher.
She knew that.
"Hey, Onii-chan."
"Hm?"
Kenta didn't look up from his phone.
"The student teacher started today, right? What's she like?"
She tried to sound as nonchalant as possible.
Water bubbled up over the edge of the pot.
"Who knows. Her name's Mio Majima. A *kouhai* from university. Might even be younger than you."
Kenta grinned.
It was his usual teasing.
But today, those words stabbed at her chest with unusual sharpness.
(*Younger than me...*)
Someone closer to her brother than she was.
A university student, studying art, able to hold conversations with her brother—surely, she must be beautiful.
After all, her voice was so lovely.
Poking at the udon in the pot with cooking chopsticks, Serina pursed her lips.
"It's not like I care anyway!"
"Hmm."
Saying just that, Kenta returned his gaze to his phone.
Only the bubbling sound of the udon broth filled the living room.
(*Why did he just end it with "Hmm"...*)
She wanted him to say something more. But she didn't quite know herself what she wanted him to say.
She just felt a dark, murky feeling accumulating in her chest.
"Here, it's done."
"Yeah."
Kenta got up from the sofa and sat down at the dining table. Serina sat across from him. The distance between them was three meters. The usual distance in this house, from the sofa to the dining table.
But today, it somehow felt far away.
* * *
Night.
Serina lay sprawled on her bed in her second-floor room, staring at the ceiling.
A six-mat Western-style room. On the wall hung a watercolor painting Kenta had done for her back in his art university days. A seaside landscape. A gentle-hued painting capturing the moment a wave breaks against the rocks.
Her smartphone screen lit up.
It was the group LINE chat, filled with stamps from her friends.
*'Did you do the modern lit homework for tomorrow?'*
*'Not yet lol'*
*'Seriously dude—'*
Normally, Serina would reply right away, but tonight her fingers wouldn't move.
She looked outside the window. The streetlights of Tsukimidai floated sparsely in the darkness.
(*I don't care. I don't care. I don't care.*)
She repeated it three times in her heart.
But she couldn't sleep.
When she closed her eyes, the cheerful voice she'd heard from the art prep room replayed in her head.
*"You're as thick-skinned as ever."*
Kenta's voice then had been just a little gentle.
A genuine voice he'd never use at school.
(*A side of my brother I don't know.*)
Serina buried her face in her pillow.
* * *
Sometime past ten o'clock.
Serina suddenly bolted upright in bed.
"Oh crap...!"
She realized she'd left her art assignment handout at school. She had to submit it first period tomorrow.
Serina clattered down the stairs.
In the living room, Kenta was still lazing on the sofa. The laughter of a late-night variety show drifted from the TV.
"Onii-chan! I have to go to school! I forgot my assignment handout!"
"Hah? You're going now?"
Kenta scratched his head, looking annoyed.
"I have to turn it in first period tomorrow! If I forget, my grade will..."
"Jeez, you're such a klutz."
Kenta got up from the sofa and picked up the car keys lying on the table.
"I'll drive you. Can't let you walk the streets alone at night."
For a moment, her heart leaped.
But she immediately pushed the feeling down.
"I-I can go by myself!"
"Yeah, yeah. Hurry up and get ready."
Yawning, Kenta headed for the front door.
Serina hurriedly put on her shoes.
The light at the entrance cast their long shadows down the hallway.
* * *
Kenta's old kei car drove down the night slopes of Tsukimidai.
The streetlights formed bands of light at regular intervals, streaming past with the car's speed.
The car interior was cramped, bringing them unavoidably close.
The air conditioner's breeze gently ruffled Serina's bangs.
"You've been forgetting stuff a lot lately, haven't you?"
Kenta said, gripping the steering wheel.
"No, I haven't! It's just a coincidence!"
"A coincidence, huh. Didn't you forget your gym clothes last week too?"
"Ugh..."
She couldn't deny it.
Laughing, Kenta flicked the turn signal. The rhythmic clicking sound echoed inside the car.
When she opened the window just a crack, the cold night air rushed in. The scent of autumn. Somewhere, fragrant olive trees must have been blooming; a sweet fragrance was faintly mixed in.
From the passenger seat, Serina glanced at Kenta's profile.
The streetlights' glow hit his face in a steady rhythm, then vanished. His narrow, sharp eyes were fixed seriously on the road ahead.
(*Ah, he looks kind of cool right now.*)
The moment she thought that, she hastily looked forward.
"What's up?"
"N-Nothing!"
Her face was hot. She hated how pathetic her own reflection looked in the window.
Kenta just gave a light snort and didn't press further.
That silence, for some reason, felt a little lonely.
* * *
They arrived at the school.
Uminosaki High School at night showed a completely different face than in the daytime.
The school building, sunk in darkness, had only its silhouette standing out, looking like a completely different s
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