I Was Hired As A Tutor By A Cute Little Devilish Junior - Chapter 54 Preparations

It had been a day since she started studying for the final exam.
After the sleepover at Shiina’s house, it was a weekday today. I met Shiina after school at the student entrance and together we headed to her house.

Yesterday, Shiina’s father visited her house, and there was a lot going on.
I told her father about my feelings for Shiina, while she bore witness.
She also told me her feelings for me and her own thoughts.

We both opened up about our feelings, which had been vague and ambiguous until now, and Shiina made a promise.
When Shiina got first place in the final exam, she would again confess her honest feelings for me.
Regarding the contents of her confession, as expected, I knew them without her telling me.

In addition, I couldn’t hold it in anymore either. The same feelings have sprouted in my heart.
That was why I was worried about our lives until the final exams.

If she was going to put so much effort into her studies, as a tutor, I couldn’t help but support her in that.
In fact, there was not a day that went by where I didn’t tutor Shiina (except for a few), and as a matter of course, I was on my way to her house today as well.

I still hadn’t quite figured out how to treat Shiina yet.
Naturally, the best thing to do was to treat her normally and to not have any other feelings.
But since we knew each other’s feelings, it was impossible for me to stay calm.

And the reason why I cared so much was because of the girl in front of me.
Just as I was concerned about my distance from Shiina, she also seemed to be a little unsure about how to treat me.

Her smile was a little more awkward than usual, and we rarely made eye contact. I was walking next to her, and then she moved a little farther away from me than usual.
It was really a minor thing. But we cared about each other enough to know even that.

We arrived at Shiina’s house without much to talk about.
We then got ready for each other and sat side by side as usual.
The distance between us was also still a little further than usual.

“T-Then, let’s get started.”
“Y-Yeah.”

Her voice was clearly hoarse. As if caught up in it, I replied to her with a choked up voice.
I didn’t feel this way yesterday, but now that we’ve opened that door, I felt a bit embarrassed, perhaps because of how conscious we were.

If that was all, it was her study that became even more problematic.
Perhaps because of this indescribable atmosphere, she was not concentrating at all.
There were still many elementary mistakes that she would not normally make, even if they were only minor ones.

“Umm…Shiina?”
“Y-Yes…”

Unable to bear it, I called out to her.
She seemed to be aware of the situation and replied in a low tone of voice.

“Speaking from an outsider perspective, I don’t think you’ve been able to concentrate today,”
“I-I’m sorry…”
“N-No. I don’t mean to condemn you. Also, I should be the one to apologize.”

I patted her head to cheer her up.

“I am the one who should say sorry. I didn’t get a good sense of the distance between Shiina and me right now. I apologize if I offended you.”
“No, I’m sorry too. For some reason, I couldn’t get a good look at Senpai’s face today…”

Shiina apologized to me with her cheeks slightly tinted and her gaze averted to the side. While I thought it was a little cute, I also felt sad.
I boldly grabbed her hand myself. Then, I stared into her eyes as she looked at me in surprise.

Shiina and I looked at each other at close range.
She was surprised by the sudden situation, but I didn’t look away from her.
Despite what she said, she couldn’t do anything because I was so fierce, so she just stared into my eyes.

“What? You’re saying that, but you’re still making eye contact with me.”
“W-WW-What is that suddenly? Senpai just now…!”
“S-Senpai is…Ugh, Senpai, it’s not fair.”
“What’s not fair?”
“I-It’s not fair that you’re so relaxed like that!”

Shiina turned her face away from me as if she doesn’t know me anymore.
I stroked Shiina’s head again while holding back laughter in my heart.

“Do you understand a little bit of how I’ve been feeling so far?”
“T-That, I don’t know.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about”
“It’s just whatever out of this mouth~”

Shiina puffed her mouth in dismay and said.
For a moment, my attention was drawn to her lips, and I shook my head to get my thoughts off my brain.
Oh no, I’m thinking stupid things now that all sorts of things are happening. Now should be the time when we need to concentrate more.

“Let’s not be in a hurry, Shiina. There was still time before the exam. Let’s take our time and think things over.”
“Yes, understood.”

Then we took a break earlier than usual before resuming our studies.
Shiina, too, had perhaps been able to clear her mind a bit and was feeling somewhat better than before.

Over the next few days, our distance gradually returned to normal.
While during that awkwardness Shiina was nervous, now she was a pleasant stimulus.

“Senpai, I have a problem here.”
“Go with this formula, but actually you don’t need to use it. You can go there without using that, but actually we can use this theorem we did before.”
“That’s great.”

Shiina has also become much stronger in this short period of time.
First place in her entire grade…maybe not quite there yet, but she was certainly getting closer to the goal.

“So, is it okay if I don’t remember this formula for this test?”
“No, not really. If you are aiming for first place, you should think of it as aiming for a perfect score.”
“Perfect score…”
“Yeah. To do that, you have to abandon the idea of only knowing a majority and understanding the entirety. Remember that idea as an insurance policy in case you forget.”
“…I see. Senpai, aren’t you too familiar with it?”
“Eh, does it look that way to you?”
“Yes, I kind of wonder if you’ve had that experience since it seemed that way.”
“Well, I guess it did happen for a while.”

Shiina’s prediction was correct.
There was a time before she entered the school, when I was a first year in high school, where I was aiming for first place in my grade.
As it turned out, I came in a close third.

At that time, I put in a lot of effort and studied so hard that it seemed like there was nothing more I could do.
However, the results did not reach the rankings or scores I had hoped for.

Later, upon reflection, I realized that there were quite a few holes in my studies that I thought were perfect.
What the teacher told me only through oral explanations. Small annotations in the textbook. Mistakes in a range of questions that are often overlooked. These all can make a big difference.

“If I dare to say so from my experience, it is of course not easy.”
“I think I know what you’re talking about. But that’s why it’s so important.”
“Yes, I agree. If Shiina can achieve your goal, you would have surpassed me.”
“Fufu, surpassing my tutor, is it?” [TLN: 出藍の誉れ = Surpassing one’s master/teacher/etc.]
“I’m glad you remembered.”
“I will never forget what you taught me.”
“That’s the beauty of being a teacher.”

It warmed my heart to hear Shiina say such nice things.
I wanted to make Shiina achieve first place no matter what.
That might be a way for me to repay her, in a way, from my position as a tutor.

“Then, let me give Shiina a present for saying such nice things.”
“Eh, a present!?”
“Yeah, don’t be surprised when you see it, okay? Here you go.”
“…A notebook?”

Her eyes sparkled for a moment at the word “present,” but the light extinguished like a candle when she saw the rustic notebook.

“What is it? This notebook.”
“I made this exam prep notebook for Shiina this time.”
“Eh?”

As soon as Shiina heard these words, she opened the notebook and checked the content.
Although the notebook has a name like that, the actual contents were merely a compilation of the areas to be covered, important phrases, predictions based on my own experiences, and example questions.

“D-Did you make this for me?”
“I wouldn’t have made this for anyone else.”

As for the degree of completion, I would say it was just okay by myself, but surprisingly, it took a long time to produce.
Shiina herself was the one who actually worked hard, but as a tutor and as a senpai, I was obligated to do at least this much for her.

“Amazing…Senpai, I’m very happy with this.”
“I’m glad you’re happy. I hope you can make use of it.”
“Of course!”

Shiina hugged the notebook and gave me the biggest smile of the day. She hugged me with all her might.
I couldn’t shake her off, so I let her do whatever she wanted for a while as I scratched my cheeks.