~~~ Shizuka Minamoto ~~~

Geez!

What did just come out from my mouth?

I didn't think much of it before saying that I would be fine alone with Nobita-san in the hotel room.

What happened to me?

As a matter of fact, what has happened to me ever since I came back from Osaka?

Was there something that I had experienced in Osaka that caused me to suddenly see Nobita-san so differently?

I tried my best to keep my composure as straight as possible, but at this point, it's too hard to even act normally.

All of this was going on in my mind, while also thinking and regretting my decision to turn down Nonko-san's offer.

Okay, maybe this was actually a good idea, since Nobita-san would be lonely if I chose to stay with Nonko-san and Suzume-san in their room.

However, as if it wasn't so obvious, a girl staying with a boy in one room alone is enough to make our parents angry. Maybe even a restraining order too.

I do understand the reasoning behind our parents being angry if they found out, but I don't know what they mean by 'doing something weird'.

But anyways, we headed towards the place where our rooms should be located. It's not too far away from the lobby. All we had to do is take the stairs towards the second floor and our room was right next to the staircase.

Suneo-san might be onto something here because he didn't book us a normal room. But instead, he booked three president suites that were in one area.

Our room were located across where Suneo-san and Nonko-san were staying. I find it relieving after knowing that I can just walk a few steps to the girl's room so I can join Nonko-san and Suzume-san without leaving Nobita-san alone.

"Alright, take a good rest, guys! And make sure to be ready for tonight!"

That was the last thing Suneo-san said to us before we entered each of our rooms.

Entering the room, we were greeted with a quite spacious interior. Probably even the term 'quite spaci­­­­ous' wasn't suitable to describe the size of the room.

It felt rather like a hotel room that has more rooms inside. I know it's a weird way to describe it, but the room has its own separate rooms. It felt more like a house!

The living room was the first thing we entered. It was a large room complete with a kotatsu, a TV, and a porcelain set (for some reason). All that were placed on top of a bright green tatami floorings.

There were a huge shoji door and 2 smaller ones on each side. The one on the right led to the large bedroom with a pair of neatly folded futons in the corner. A pair of robes, each for males and females were hung on the southern side of the bedroom right next to the wardrobe.

Moving on to the left side of the room through the doorway, there was another room complete with a small kitchen, a fridge, and a bathroom that appeared to have a large bathtub, which I saw as an absolute win.

"Wow, I like this room..." My bespectacled friend remarked.

"Yeah, I never expected our hotel room to be this big though. I've also never seen one this big."

"Let's take a look at the view outside!"

Nobita-san headed straight to the large shoji wall in the living room and opened it. As soon as the walls were opened, a breeze of frigid and humid air entered our room.

I walked outside and stood in the balcony right next to where he was standing at that time. The gusts of wind carried a small number of water droplets into our faces. It wasn't much that it drenched our faces though, it's just a mere droplet of water, enough for us to feel its presence in our face.

"There isn't really much to see here..."

I agree with his remark, the view wasn't all that interesting... because everything was covered in a thick layer of fog, so nothing was visible to begin with. However, despite the fog and the rain, I can still make out a slight silhouette from our hotel of a ridge, separated by a small gorge.

"We should be able to catch the glimpse of the city of Sendai from here, apparently. But we won't be able to see it until the rain has finally come to a stop." I remarked.

Nobita-san was seemed to be disappointed too, but he does seem to understand that we would not be able to see much of the panorama outside until the rain and the fog has dissipated.

"Yeah, we should wait for it..." Nobita-san finished off, before returning back to the room, I followed suit not long after.

"I guess, we'll have to relax for a bit now..."

Inside the room, I tried to be as relax as possible. I sat down in front of the kotatsu table and released both of my pigtails and tied it again to a ponytail. My hair has gotten a little longer ever since I graduated elementary school, and I've since decided not to cut it short again.

Nobita-san did the same as I did, he sat down across from where I was sitting at the kotatsu, messing around with his phone before turning on the TV and putting on some anime.

Still, I mustn't let my guard down, especially during this time. I'm staying alone with a boy, in a hotel room. This is something that many sane people would be cross about.

We're not in a relationship, and we're both underage teenagers. We shouldn't have stayed alone in a hotel room, unaccompanied.

Nobita-san, a certified pervert in the gang, doesn't seem to be a threat to me, yet. He hasn't given me a look that a pervert would give.

I would like to ignite a conversation with him though, but I don't know what to talk about. If I'm honest, he's not the type of boy whom I can speak of anything that require any basic common sense. I can't have the same topic of discussion that I usually have with Dekisugi-san...

As of late though, our relationship has gotten a little better, after all the malarkey and clashes that we got because of him not wanting to join a club. It's a weird cause, I'll admit. But I started to look down on him after our argument.

Because of that, it created some sort of weird and awkward atmosphere between us in that room.

I could have taken my phone out and played on it, but I just don't feel like doing it. Or perhaps, watch anime with him in the TV... no I have no interest in anime he is watching right now (Which were some anime about battle robots...).

But then, Nobita-san broke the silence.

"Oh yeah, do you want to use the.... Bathtub?"

Bathtub? Oh yeah!

"Y-yeah, why?" I replied, stammering a little at the beginning, which will sound weird to him. But he's too oblivious to notice, which I was glad to see.

"I'm just asking... Because I'm gonna use the bathtub if you aren't."

Wait what? Nobita using the bathtub??

What kind of witchcraft has Doraemon done to him?

"Oh... that's something I don't hear very often."

"Eh... I just want to have a good warm bath in this frigid air, that's all."

Well, that's understandable. To be fair, it's rather cold here despite it was in the middle of summer. Because of that, we decided to set the air conditioner to max temp and turn it into a sort of makeshift heater.

Well then, I guess I'll use the bathtub, I guess...

~~~ Suzume Tokugawa ~~~

I was waving goodbye to some of my hiking friends as I got onto the blue intercity bus. There weren't a lot of them present there at that time, as most of them had already left the site earlier.

"Take care, Tokugawa-san!"

It was the last thing one of my friends said to me before the bus set off from the bus station heading to where our next stop was.

If you're wondering on what I was doing while the rest of the gang were going on to the apparent ski resort that Suneku-kun had booked a few + days prior, well... I was doing some hiking activities together with the members of the Adventuring club (It's actually a real pseudo-active club) at my school.

I was planning on catching up to them after I was done with the hiking and camping activities.

As the bus was leaving the hiking area, I was wondering if everything was going okay at the resort. The hiking area was no mobile phone signal so I couldn't exactly call to check in on things there. Then again, I could always care less about that Sunekku moron's antics, even if he did pay for everything.

As the bus kept going, the sky began to darken further from the oncoming clouds, this ended up turning into rain. This wasn't good – the one thing I hadn't packed with me was an umbrella! C'mon Suzume Tokugama, you don't pack that but instead bring sunscreen?!

Eventually, however, the bus arrived at the resort. It looked like a very traditional 4-story building, albeit with one heck of a packed parking lot. I'm surprised Suneo even managed to get rooms here for all of us if there's this many people staying here. Nevertheless, it looked like a very relaxing place to stay.

After grabbing my stuff and thanking the elderly bus driver, I got off the bus and into the rain, without an umbrella. The hotel was only a walking distance away from where I was at the bus stop, but why couldn't they make the hotel itself the stop instead? Oh well, looks like I'm goin-

"Hey, wait up!"

A voice called from behind me. An all too familiar voice. No, not him!

"Suzy-chan! You didn't pack an umbrella this time?" Suneo asked in his usual tone.

"What, do you honestly think I like walking in the rain?" I asked.

"Well, if you're gonna act like that, you probably would." He replied. I would've decked him in an instant, but I decided against it.

Seeing that all we were doing was standing around in the rain arguing, I tried to get a move on. "Anyways, should we go inside?"

Suneo nodded in agreement, and we started to walk back to the hotel. However, as we were walking, something felt really..off.

"Hey, why aren't you using that umbrella? Can't you share that umbrella with me? I'm soaked!" I asked, making my annoyance known. Seriously, how rude can you be to someone you're supposed to be meeting up with? Let alone a girl?

"Erm, I don't know, Suzy-chan..." Suneo replied.

Okay, now I have had enough. Is he a complete idiot? I grabbed the closed umbrella from his hand.

"Since you've been so rude to me this entire time, I might as well have it!" I exclaimed.

"Suzume, the wind..."

As I opened the umbrella, the strongest gust of wind imaginable pulled on it like a rope in a game of tug of war. The opened umbrella, now with its ribs turned inside out, then lost its canopy as yet another gust of wind violently ripped it off and blew it away.

I was now even more cold, drenched in rain, and stuck with a broken umbrella that looked to have more use as a rake. This doesn't happen by pure luck, who the hell did this? Oh right, him.

As a looked over to where Suneo was standing, he wasn't there. That's because, despite the rain, he was on the ground laughing himself to death by my experience with that umbrella. He was so hysterical, it looked like either he was in tears, or the rain had flooded his eyes.

"That was the funniest thing I've ever seen!" he remarked as he tried to stop crying from laugher. "You look like a farmer!"

Okay, I'm getting really annoyed now. I dragged him up onto his feet and proceeded to slap his face the hardest I ever had.

"You moron! You planned all of this, didn't you?!" I shouted at him.

"Hey, that wasn't my fault! Blame Aries again, not me!" he replied.

"Cut the crap, stupid Sunekku!"

Still holding his arm, I pulled him inside the resort's lobby, where a male receptionist was apparently waiting for us.

"Excuse me, but what on earth was happening out there?" he asked.

I shot Suneo a death glare to cover things. Fortunately, it seemed like he understood what I meant.

"Sorry for troubling you sir, my friend here accidently tripped and fell on her face... poor thing, I thought she was dead at first."

Wait, what?! That didn't happen!

"Are you quite sure, sir? The young lady looks drenched, but not as like you described."

"Oh no, she just needs some rest in her room, that's -"

Suneo was then interrupted by me kicking him in the crotch.

As the now very-much-in-pain Suneo doubled down onto the floor holding his crotch area, all the receptionist did was watch as the chaos unfolded before his eyes.

"...I see. I will leave you two to your needs." He replied before returning to the reception desk.

I then turned my attention back to Suneo, who was still on the floor reeling from the immense pain I dealt him. Seeing as he didn't look like he would be getting up soon, I grabbed his hand and stood him up. I then held his balance steady as I walked him towards the nearby hallway to our rooms.

"Never do that again, got it baka?!" I hissed at him.

"...sorry...gorilla girl..."

"Oi! Keep that up and I'm gonna kick you so hard your ancestors are gonna feel it a hundred years from now!!"

Man, why do I always get paired up with him?

~~~ Shizuka Minamoto ~~~

Now, we were spending most of our time without much interaction. Nobita-san was busy watching his early evening superhero shows and I spent my time on my phone.

Despite us sitting quite close, there haven't been any conversations in any real capacity whatsoever. I was keen on starting a conversation with him, but I don't know what I want to talk about.

I mean, he is a boy, a sucker for the kind of movies that has some sort of mechanical robots fighting over a city or some kind... He was what I would consider to be a future otaku. He wouldn't understand anything about drama movies, or something like that.

Here's the thing, I wished I can talk with him about a drama movie so inspiring, wholesome, and heart-warming; that it made Suzume-san, and Nonko-san swoon over the male protagonists.

I glanced over my phone to see his face with his eyes fixated on the TV. He reminds me of the main character that played in the drama movie that I have mentioned before.

The more I see him though, the more I felt something so familiar with that face. It seems like I've had seen him somewhere else. I couldn't think much else about that though, but despite that... I can feel my heart saying otherwise.

I don't understand anything about it, is it because my thoughts about him being similar to the drama show that I was talking about before? Or perhaps there is something significant somewhere in my memory that I couldn't manage to remember.

As seconds pass by, my fingers were frozen on top of my flip phone's keypad. This silence was agonizing, and I can't stand it. I need to talk something with him, but I'm not sure what.

"Nobita-san... Can I ask you something really quick?"

He took his glance off from the TV screen and faced me. "Yeah?"

At this point, I don't really have a question that I would want to ask him with. I knew I shouldn't have called his name...

"A-ah... No, nevermind." I replied, rather awkwardly.

He doesn't seem to send me back with a reply. Instead, he returned his focus to the show he's been watching as it has come back from the advertisement break. Or so I thought.

"Shizuka-chan... can I ask you something?"

"Hm? What is it?"

He paused for a bit, before continuing with his question.

"What do you think about Jaiko?"

What? Why is he suddenly asking about Jaiko-san?

"Well, she's a good girl, the complete opposite of her big brother Takeshi-san. Not only is she a gifted artist, she's also quite smart and clever, she had asked me to help her study ever since we graduated elementary school."

"I see..."

The fact that he was suddenly asking me that question bothered me a lot. It's not like I was irritated by it, mind you... It's just I feel something not quite right was unfolding right inside his heart.

Nobita developing a crush on her was unheard of. He has been quite vocal that he was trying to avoid being around her, with reasons that I was yet to hear from him. I thought that he might just be afraid if he were to get too close to her, Takeshi-san would simply do some 'precautionary measures' at him.

Nobita continued. "I mean, Jaiko-san and I aren't very close, so there might be missing details in my simple description of her. Even then, she's not too far from what I can describe though."

"Yeah, I know that."

Then I asked him something. "Why did you ask that question all of a sudden? Is something bothering you?"

"No, it's nothing." Nobita-san sighed, as he glanced away from the TV.

I know very well that his answer was a blatant lie. Him sighing was a clear sign that he has something weighing in his head.

I mean, if he really does change his mind about Jaiko-san, then as a friend of his... I will always have his back and help him. Jaiko-san is not a bad girl after all, she has more decency than most of what her brother had ever since the start of elementary school.

"Oh, come on... You can open up to me. No need to be nervous." I said.

He paused for a minute, before resuming,

"I'm asking you that question, because I was afraid if she were to be the girl..."

Huh? What did he mean by 'she were to be the girl'? He was being so vague that I couldn't interpret anything from him.

So, I thought about answering as much as I could interpret from his answer.

"So, you're afraid of Jaiko-san being destined to be your future partner?"

"More or less, yeah... I mean I know that y- I mean I know clearly that someone will be my future partner... And I'm comfortable with her already. However, just like what Doraemon has said to me. 'Your future can change drastically based on your current actions!'."

Immediately, my head went into overdrive mode, hearing about his future wife or sort. I wonder who this girl is going to be. It might be Non-chan, might be Suzume-san, or still....

It might be... Me?

Putting my troublesome thoughts about who is going to be his princess aside, he did sound nervous about it.

"What Doraemon said was true, anyways. You can shift the future drastically with just a small thing you do in the present."

"Yeah, I agree with you."

"Anyways, I think you shouldn't worry too much about Jaiko-san being your future wife. Nobody knows how she'll look like in the future, and how she lives her life in the future. Never judge someone's future just by their current looks, their family background or else. Because, she might be the best wife you could ever have."

It should do the trick to answer his anxiety, even with my heart racing faster than it ever had.

I glanced to him, but he still didn't look relieved or amused.

"Shizuka-chan... I have something to ask you. What do you think about a theory, in which a dream could have some meaning?"

"Well, most dreams have a meaning, but not all of them. That's what I believe."

"Then, what if for some reason, God is trying to convey something about clues to your future to you through some sort of dream. Does that make sense to you?"

"Well, it kind of depends. But if you ask me, it does sound like the tropes you can find in movies and TV shows. There are some cases in real life though, but it's pretty rare. From what I've seen, usually after someone had those kinds of dreams, they will get an extreme feeling of it being so real as if it had truly happened somewhere in their life."

"I see..."

Nobita-san rested his head on both of his clenched palms, as he seemingly tried to process everything that I said. There was something about a 'dream' that was bothering him so much.

"Shizuka-chan... I have one more question for you..."

The tone in which he asked his question sent shivers down my spine. He sounded rather tense and serious. I can feel my heartbeat starting to get more and more intense.

"Yeah?" I asked.

"Have you ever dreamed about confessing to a boy?"

At this point, I was a bit relieved after an unnecessary tense atmosphere which turned out to be him trying to ask that question.

But despite all that, his question piqued my interest. Confessing to a boy? I've never even thought about confessing my feelings to anyone, let alone ever dreaming about it!

However, I can feel something in my head...

Far-far away in a fog within my memory, I can remember something so vague about a particular dream in which I see a boy... a boy in which I can't remember about at all...

And to my knowledge at the time, I didn't do any confession at all...

But I have dreamed so many things, and there were so many wondrous dreams that I have experienced.

It might have happened at one point in the not-so-distant past, but I might have forgotten most about it.

So, I replied.

"I don't think I've ever dreamed about something about that..."

The moment I replied to him, his tense face slowly turned into more of a disappointed face. I don't know what he was expecting from me, but it made me feel quite bad for him.

"I see..." he replied in disappointment.

But if he does want to hear some truth, then he got what he wanted... At least truth to my knowledge.

No matter how much I tried to recall if I've ever had the dream similar of what he has described, nothing much came up. The only detail of a dream that I've ever had was just me talking to a boy in which I had completely forgotten about.

"S-sorry if I didn't give you the answer that you wanted to hear from me..."

"N-no, it's fine really..."

Still, something felt...off.

~~~ Nobita Nobi ~~~

Shizuka revealing that she might be sharing the same kind of dream as me really felt like she was dealing the final coup de grace to all hope of finding the answer to my question.

I was completely stumped, and all my optimistic thoughts about her going to be the one fell apart in an instant. It even brought down my optimistic thoughts about accepting Jaiko as my future partner.

I was speechless. My 'I see' answer that I had given was the only thing that I could let out from my mouth. And the 'it's fine' bit was a complete lie.

I guess Doraemon was right all along, it's just some meaningless dream that I might be trying to waste my time searching for its truth.

But...

She was my crush...

As much as I knew that she was the girl and woman that I would marry in the future, it bothers me that the dream said otherwise.

And now, the fact that my dream might not say that she was the girl in my dream... Crushed all my hopes to continue tracing the dream.

Now, rather than to face the reality of 'No, she wasn't the girl', I preferred my very existence to be completely obliterated by a huge piece of space boulder falling on top of my head.

I can't accept this...

I can't...

At all...

I feel like I wanted to let it all out with one single scream into the heavens...

But I resisted, nevertheless.

Now, an inevitable awkward atmosphere started to engulf the entire room, as I forced myself to continue watching the TV while being continuously harassed by my own wild thoughts that I didn't like at all.

So far, I think we've spent 2 hours sitting side by side, not talking about anything... Nor did we exchange any gazes whatsoever.

Eventually, I decided to go take a short nap right beside the kotatsu, because I felt so tired after watching 2 rounds of those superhero movie marathons. Man, I think they're starting to get all samey nowadays...

More importantly, however, I don't know if I've still had the spirit to continue our assignments here in the resort. I just want to go home and scream right into my futon's pillow until my vocal cords gave.

Just as they say, reality will never match your expectations. I knew I shouldn't have set my expectations too high, and being optimistic is just stupid in my opinion.

Despite having many thoughts ran through my head, I fell asleep, nonetheless. The cold breeze coming from the outside of the room really made me drowsy. I just want to bring my head to rest and hopefully wake up with a whole new and renewed vigour.

.

.

I woke up from my nap, greeted by the distinct typical sounds of classic Japanese game shows on the TV. I could make out a faint silhouette of a person which I assumed was Shizuka-chan sitting across the kotatsu to my left while taking the liberty to watch the TV while I was asleep.

A jar of chocolate biscuits that was mostly full was the only thing that kept her in company while watching the TV. I was quite surprised that the jar was now were no longer halfway full.

How many did she eat?

"Oh hey, Nobita-san... You finally woke up!" She greeted me with a rather exciting tone in her voice, which told me that she had, in fact, noticed me waking up.

"What time is it?" I asked, still resting my head on my arms which has now turned a little numb.

"It's 10 to 5," she replied. That explains the game show airing...

Seeing the blurry silhouette of Shizuka-chan won't help much with my effort to forget what her answer to my question was. It seems like I can't get it out of my head.

Shizuka-chan stood up. "I will head into the room to charge my phone up."

She then went into the main bedroom to charge her phone up. I nodded while trying to stretch both of my arms.

Glancing outside, it seems like the rain had stopped and the thick fog is now slowly dissipating. I could see a blanket of clouds in between the valley of the mountains, which made for a beautiful and refreshing view.

Suddenly, I could hear that Shizuka-chan had come back from the bedroom and gave her remarks to the view outside.

"What a beautiful view... We're lucky that we got this room."

"What do you mean 'lucky'? What do the other guys get?" I asked.

"It was not as great as the view that we have. Their view is just the inside of this resort looking up towards the mountain itself." She explained.

"Oh, alright..."

As the soft wind blew across the balcony, I glanced again at the girl that stood beside me. Shizuka-chan looked really stunning for some reason, which soon made my heart flutter. She wasn't even in her usual attire; she was just wearing her casual clothing like it was nothing special.

No wonder I've always wanted her to be mine and be a good partner that always sat by her side. But I don't know whether I could do such a thing. I'm no match for Dekisugi, which was probably the boy that she truly adored in her heart.

Suddenly, whilst brushing her hair, she spoke up. "Nobita-san... I have something to tell you..."

"Yeah?" I said while resting on the balcony's fence.

"I don't know about why you look so disappointed before. But if anything, don't ever give up on something if it isn't going as you thought it would be. Just find a way around that and you'll eventually get something that you want."

Wait a minute? Did she know about my dream?

I mean, Doraemon and I did notice her acting a little bit suspicious a few weeks ago at the empty lot. So that might explain her guilt imbued dialogue.

It might just be the good common sense that she has, probably from seeing my disappointed looking face after she gave the response.

But she had a point nonetheless, I shouldn't probably give up on my search after all.

I guess, I could still trace my dream, even faced with the fact that Shizuka-chan had no similar dreams. It doesn't have to be shared dream or sort, and I do truly agree that it sounds like those fantasy stories.

But there is still chance that the girl in my dream was Minamoto Shizuka, the girl whom my future self was rooting and devoting his life upon.

I guess, hope isn't lost already...

"Y-you're probably right..." I replied.

"What did you have in mind though? What kind of thing that you want to look for?"

After she said so, I thought that she might not have any clues about my dream. So that tells me that she was in fact, a terrible eavesdropper.

"Ah it's just some kind of thoughts that I've been having... Nothing much."

Shizuka looked concerned. "Why did you look so disappointed though...?"

"I said it's nothing."

"Alright then, I won't pry into anything you personally have."

After that, we just kept looking at the scenery for a while. It was beautiful. Shizuka also looked beautiful. Why did I even have this dream?