Cool off

"Hey Youna." Ishi greeted her as they made their return.

"Ishi, you're back!" She responded, sounding much more excited than she was trying to let off. Things had been lonely for her after he left. All the girl did to pass the time was count the seagulls soaring in the sky. "And I guess Ryugi's here to join us too." That latter part was a little bit on the disappointing side for her.

"Well, you're still holding onto my cash, right?"

"Mmhmm." She nodded to affirmed that she remained diligent in her responsibility. "I kept it all safe in my bag." Youna produced the money, which had been neatly clipped together for safety.

"Wow." Ryugi was astounded by how much he had available to him. There had to be at least 10,000 yen in that small clip. "You're loaded, what's up with that?" He never gave off an air that his family was particularly wealthy. The way he looked and acted made it sound like they were on the poorer side, but his parents really trusted him with all that cash for today?

"My dad's a pretty successful photographer." That man had even won awards for some of the images he captured in his work. Though most of his income came from freelancing with major news companies and occasional filmmakers. "Not that we're rich or anything. We just don't know what to spend with our money." Ishi wasn't helping them in that either, so he figured that they must've passed that gene down to him.

"That's not fair." She whined. "You were totally going to ditch me when you found out I couldn't pay."

"I don't like spending more money then I need to." He replied. "And you shouldn't be freeloading from people too much either. Now let's go get some ice cream." Youna handed him the money and him and Ryugi began to walk towards the shop she had recommended. However, Ishi stopped them when he realized something, or rather someone, was missing. "Uh, Youna?" That girl had remained on her beach towel.

"What's wrong?" She asked, ignorant to the problem he was having here.

"Aren't you going to come with us?"

"What? Oh, well you didn't say anything to me." Youna was not used to people expecting her to join them unless asked. So she usually just awkwardly watched them leave after announcing what their plans were going to be.

"It'd be kind of weird to come to you just to leave again, don't you think?" He replied.

"Oh, maybe it'll just be the two of us." Ryugi laughed at her joke suggestion.

"I'll come, sorry about that." Youna got up and followed the pair to their destination. She lagged a bit behind, feeling a bit embarrassed to have caused that misunderstanding between them. Despite knowing each other for this long, she still wasn't sure on how to handle the situations between them when he seemed to be a master.

Walking behind them for a bit, she was jealous of how close Ryugi could be close to him, like it was no big deal. In terms of how long either of them knew him, Youna had the advantage being a classmate to him during their junior high days. However, the gyaru had the clear power over her in the ability to be able to live life without feeling uncomfortable with her actions. She was extremely envious of her way of carefree living.

"Here it is." Ryugi pointed out the nice ice cream shop that was set along the beach's boardwalk. There were dozens of stores lined along with it to attract business from the youth enjoying the Summer fun.

On the inside, it was a colorful and bright room. There were dozens of flavors of ice cream available that were nearly impossible to chose from. Not only that, but they also had a section for shaved ice where people could ask to stack it as high as they dreamed of.

"Seeing as they haven't kicked us out yet. I take it this place is fine with no shirts or shoes." Ishi commented as he scanned on what frozen treat was going to grace his tongue. Ryugi had already knew exactly what she wanted as she rushed up to the shaved ice and asked for a mix of blueberry and strawberry. It was little surprise that was what she asked, considering the patterns of her blueberry top and strawberry bottoms.

Meanwhile Youna was struggling with the wide array of options to just pick one. Perhaps she could get a mix, but then that would lead to the problem of having to actually describe to the worker on what she wanted. This was about as hard as trying to go to that one sandwich place and asking them to customize her order.

"What are you going to get?" She asked Ishi. His choice might help her make a final decision.

"Probably just going to get a bowl of vanilla."

"Bor~ing." Ryugi made fun of his idea as she already got her snow cone. "Of course you'd be the lame one."

"How'd you already get that?" He asked. "You don't have any money."

"I just told them that you had me covered." He sighed upon hearing her say that. Ishi was hoping to hand her some of his cash so she could pay for herself. Now there was going to be a misunderstanding.

"Yeah, now that your girlfriend's taken care of, what would you like?" That was exactly what he knew was going to happen now that it looked like he was paying for a girl's treat. At the very least, those people were going to think they were on a date.

This was also a rather negative thing for Youna to think of while she was here. If everyone thought it was Ishi and Ryugi, then what would that make her right now? Some type of third wheel who was getting in the way?

"I'll take some rocky road then." He glared over to Ryugi, giving his annoyed response to her, though she was the one to influence his choice. Some chocolate wasn't bad in his mind either.

"And I'll have… The one with peanut butter cups." It was something Youna really enjoyed in her ice cream. When they said that chocolate and peanut butter was a good combination, they left out mentioning that it was phenomenal with vanilla ice cream.

Now that their orders were taken care of. There was only the matter of sitting down at a table to enjoy their frozen delights. Ishi wasn't one to care too much about seating arrangements, but for the girls, this was to be the moment of truth of what he thought about them.

For Youna and Ryugi, it was a twist when he sat down next to the latter at the table. The former was very sad to see that he apparently preferred to sit next to a gyaru. What neither of them realized was that Ishi preferred to sit across from the person he wanted to talk to. So not only did they completely misunderstand his intentions, he also didn't notices their feelings on the matter.

"You like your ice cream?" He asked her while they munched on their desserts.

"Mmhmm." She answered without saying a word. The peanut butter was a nice match with her frozen confection as it melted in her mouth. It was no surprise that he also was enjoying his own choice as the chocolate chunks mixed with the vanilla.

"That's looking real nice." Ryugi had her eyes set on his dessert. "Wanted make an even trade?" She offered a bite of her cone for one bite of his. Ishi didn't see any problem with it, so he handed her a spoon as she leaned the cone towards him.

However, Youna had a small problem with it as she saw him take some of her shaved ice. This was cruel of them to do in front of her. The way he just put his mouth right over the melting ice where her lips were just at.

"You certainly know how to pick some good flavors." He complimented after getting a taste. The boy had a bit of a pained expression after doing so, as there was a bit of a brain freeze to go along with the ice.

"You too." She replied while getting a nice big bite of ice cream from the spoon that he was just using. Ryugi made sure to lick it clean before returning it to him. After which the boy had no qualms about using for himself once more. There was no way that Youna could ever imagine herself sharing a utensil with Ishi. The girl would explode from anxiety if she was ever put in a situation like that. Yet these two just did it like it was no big deal.

"Hmm?" Once again, she felt the dread of being caught staring at him yet again today. There was no reason she could come up with to explain why it was happening so much now. Perhaps it was due to the Summer heat or the salt from the ocean. Fortunately, this time he wasn't talking about her looking off into space when thinking about him. "What's up with that?"

Instead, Ishi's attention was focused on the crowd they could see just in front of the ice cream shop. There was a lot of people gathered there, and it seemed that they were about to enter. Though with all the numerous faces there, only a part of them really got him to take notice.

A pair of idols he knew had entered the building.