One Hundred Is Not Enough

Ayase Eri was not brave. Even if the whole school thought that she was perfect, that nothing ever bothered her, it simply wasn't true. She was terrified of dark places, caves, foggy evenings, her own house in the middle of the night…but most of all, she was afraid of confessing to the person she loved.

She had tried to be subtle about it, because she cherished her friendship with her beloved fried, Toujou Nozomi, but she isn't very good at subtle. Eri has tried everything to deal with her emotions, distancing herself from Nozomi, brashly stating that she likes Nozomi, and even writing love letters.

Distancing herself didn't do any good at all. Nozomi refused to take the hint and continued to invade Eri's personal space at every opportunity. She eventually gave up on that plan out of sheer frustration.

Every time she told Nozomi that she likes her, Nozomi would give her this huge smile and tell her that she also adores Erichi, how happy she is that they are best friends. Eri wasn't able to continue with her 'tell Nozomi that she likes her until she gets the point' plan, because she started to feel the weight of both guilt and depression every time she saw that bright smile.

Her final hope was the love letter. However, Eri was not brave. She wrote a ton of love letters and she even managed to put them in Nozomi's locker, but she just couldn't bring herself to sign them. So here she was, filling Nozomi's locker with anonymous love letters, whispering loving words to empty air long after Nozomi has passed out of hearing range, and generally being a hopeless suitor.

Nozomi waited calmly all day, secretly looking forward to when she was able to be alone. Inside her school bag was yet another precious love letter. She absolutely couldn't wait to read it. She thought that it was absolutely adorable how her Erichi kept sending them to her 'secretly'. How Eri was dense enough to think that she wouldn't recognize her handwriting by now was one of the things that she loved about the girl. She was so cute.

Nozomi knew that she was being a bit mean, not telling Eri that she knew about the letters and was always still within hearing when Eri told her 'I love you', but she thought that maybe it would be fine to wait a little while longer to tell her that she returned her feelings. She'll definitely tell her once she's managed to collect at least one hundred of Erichi's special love love letters.