Sendai-san's worth is neither more nor less than 5,000 yen

 Episode 1

There was no particular reason it had to be Sendai-san. It could’ve just as easily been Ichio-san or Gotō-san. Honestly, I wouldn’t have minded if it had been a complete stranger.

Even so, it feels like fate that I ended up choosing Sendai-san. …It’d be nice if I could say that with conviction, but the truth is far less romantic. It was nothing more than a series of coincidences—little things piling up—and then, on a whim, I made a decision. And now, just like that, Sendai-san is in my room.

Once a week. For three hours.

I pay her 5,000 yen.

That’s the arrangement.

Not that it’s set in stone.

Sometimes it’s 5,000 yen for two hours. Other times, three and a half. Sometimes we meet once a week, sometimes twice. The duration and frequency shift, but the price never does. No matter how long or how often she’s here, I pay 5,000 yen for Sendai-san’s after-school time.

That’s the simple truth.

“Miyagi, grab the next one of this,”

Sendai-san, who was lying sprawled across my bed, said it as casually as if she were asking me to pass the salt. She tapped my shoulder with the manga she’d been reading.

When I turned from where I sat on the floor, leaning against the bed, I saw that the thing tapping me was Volume 3 of the series.

It was a bitterly cold day in December. I had the fan heater running to fend off the chill, but perhaps it had gotten too warm for her. She’d taken off her uniform blazer, loosened her tie, undone the top two buttons of her blouse, and let her skirt ride higher than school rules allowed. Her appearance was sloppier than usual. If I tried, I probably could’ve seen up her skirt.

If her classmates saw this version of Sendai-san—the one who always maintained a tidy, proper image at school—they’d probably be stunned.

“Get it yourself,” I said, pushing Volume 3 back toward her. She was sprawled out on my bed, calm and unbothered.

Upper-middle tier.

If she took off her light makeup, she might just be solidly middle-upper. Still, there was no denying Sendai-san had a pretty face. She was smart too—one of the top students in our year, I think.

Naturally, she was reasonably popular.

—or so I’ve heard. I say “heard” because I’ve never actually seen her getting hit on.

She’s what people call a riajū—someone who has their life together. One of those at the top of the school caste system.

Well, maybe not the very top. Somewhere near the bottom of the upper tier, perhaps.

Even so, she stood out in class. It wouldn’t be surprising if people liked her.

“Stingy. You could at least grab it for me,”

she muttered as she reached out and dropped Volume 3 onto my thigh.

“…What do you think I am, Sendai-san?”

“The person closest to the bookshelf.”

“Get it yourself.”

I responded flatly and placed Volume 3 back on the bed.

At school, someone like me—bottom of the hierarchy, barely clinging to the second tier—would never dream of speaking to Sendai-san this way.

But here, in this room—

Because I pay 5,000 yen for her time, I can.

I still don’t understand why she agrees to be “bought” like this. If she wanted to, she could easily earn 10,000 or even 20,000 yen for the same amount of time.

With her looks, her schoolgirl status, and the allure that comes with it, there are certainly people who would pay that.

So the fact that someone as average as me—average looks, average brains—can have this kind of arrangement with her is probably rare. Maybe even miraculous. This time we share feels oddly precious.

“Ugh, fine. I’ll get it myself.”

Grumbling, Sendai-san slid off the bed and sat down in front of the bookshelf. Still muttering to herself,

“Where’s Volume 4…”

she began sifting through the books.

It annoyed me, but even from behind, I couldn’t help but recognize her beauty.

Her long hair cascaded down her back in a half-updo, both sides neatly braided and pinned. It was more brown than black, yet the teachers never complained. Technically, it broke the rules, but she always looked neat, understated. I’d never seen anyone reprimand her. Maybe being a good student gave her a pass.

You could call it favoritism—and I wouldn’t argue. The world works like that.

I flopped onto the bed, now vacated.

It’s not that I want to be like her, but I do feel jealous sometimes.

Just today, I turned in homework from the wrong section and got scolded. If it had been Sendai-san, I doubt the teacher would’ve raised their voice.

“Hey, Miyagi. Volume 4’s not here. If you don’t have it, just say so.”

Sendai-san looked back at me, annoyance in her voice—the kind only someone breezing through life could afford.

“It’s there.”

“No, it’s not.”

“You’re lying. It has to be.”

“I told you—it’s not.”

Her sharp tone made me search my memory.

I remembered the release date. But whether I’d actually bought it…

“Volume 4 came out last week, so I thought I bought it. But… maybe I forgot.”

I murmured the words more to myself than to her. I decided I’d just pick it up tomorrow.

As I buried my face in the futon, a scent that wasn’t mine lingered there, irritating me.

“You keep track of release dates?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“You’re kind of an otaku.”

“You’re seriously annoying.”

I lifted my face and looked at Sendai-san.

Her tone hadn’t been especially harsh—just casual teasing. Still, the irritation I’d been feeling all day flared up again. I sat upright and glanced out the window. The sky had grown dim. Lights were beginning to flicker on in the apartment buildings across the way.

Evening was setting in.

I drew the curtains shut and switched on the light.

Sitting back down on the bed, I lowered my feet to the floor.

Today had been a lousy day.

My mood matched the gray clouds outside.

“Sendai-san. Come here. Sit.”

I called out to her as she stood in front of the bookshelf.

“Sit? Next to you?”

“On the floor.”

“Oh? Is it command time now?”

“Yeah.”

Whenever I have a bad day, I call Sendai-san after school and give her orders.

That was the rule I made when our arrangement began.

I sat cross-legged and looked at her.

My skirt was longer than hers, though still slightly shorter than school regulations allowed. My legs weren’t as slender as hers—but that wasn’t something I could change.

“So, what do you want me to do?”

Sendai-san sat down in front of me and asked, sounding more curious than cautious.

I uncrossed my legs and spoke quietly.

“Take it off.”

I rested my right foot on her thigh and pointed at my sock.

“Fine, fine.”

“No—just say it once.”

She replied with another flippant “Yeah, yeah.” I didn’t bother correcting her. I wasn’t particular about her tone. She removed the sock without further complaint.

Then she asked, “The left one too?”

“No, that’s fine. The one you took off—lick it.”

I nudged her lightly in the stomach with my bare foot. She looked up at me, puzzled.

“Your foot?”

“Yeah.”

I started “buying” Sendai-san’s time for 5,000 yen around the end of the rainy season. But this was the first time I’d given her an order like this. Until now, my commands had been trivial—“read me a book,” “do my homework,” things like that.

The content never mattered. What mattered was that she followed my orders for 5,000 yen.

That’s why I’d avoided anything obvious, anything suggestive.

But today wasn’t a day for meaningless commands.

I wanted her to do something she clearly wouldn’t want to.

Even so, I didn’t expect her to comply so easily. This wasn’t a game anymore.

“…Fine.”

Her response came after a pause, but it surprised me all the same. There was no emotion in her voice. Her hands moved to my ankle and heel.

She stared at my foot in silence.

A shiver crawled up my spine.

Even though I was the one who gave the order, the absurdity of the scene made me tense. My body reacted before my mind could rationalize it.

Here was Sendai-san—popular, admired, the teacher’s favorite—about to follow a humiliating command from someone utterly ordinary.

Me.

The thought alone sent a strange rush through me.

“Sendai-san, hurry up.”

She didn’t move at first. The fan heater continued its steady hum, spreading warmth through the room. She loosened her tie a little more, her blazer tossed somewhere behind her. With the top buttons of her blouse undone, her collarbone was clearly visible.

She lifted my foot gently.

Warm breath brushed against the skin.

Then, I felt it—something soft, damp.

Her tongue.

“Can I stop now?”

“No.”

I responded firmly as she began to raise her head. I used the top of my foot to tilt her chin upward.

“Just one lick’s not enough?”

She pushed my foot away and glared at me.

“Not enough.”

“Then how long do I have to keep doing it?”

“Until I’m satisfied.”

“Pervert.”

“And your role is to obey that pervert.”

The 5,000 yen I gave her at the start—

It’s what binds her here.

That’s the contract in this room.

And she honors it by following my commands.

◇◇◇

“Sendai-san, stop.”

About five minutes.

Maybe even ten minutes had passed.

I wasn’t keeping track of time, so I’m not sure, but after roughly that amount of time, Sendai-san suddenly bit my foot. I could clearly feel the sensation of her teeth on my thumb, an action different from the command to lick.

“Sendai-san!”

I said it in a stronger voice than before.

It hurt.

Ignoring my plea to stop, she bit down harder, her teeth sinking into the flesh of my toe.

“Don’t do anything other than what I ordered!”

At the edge of my vision, I could see the crown of her head.

As if to protest, I grabbed her head and shook it, and the teeth that had dug into my toe finally let go. Then, as if checking the bite mark, her tongue slid over it, leaving my finger slick with warmth. The warm tongue felt unpleasant. But I realized it wasn’t just that, and, shaking off that feeling, I spoke in a stronger voice than I had ever used with Sendai-san before.

“I told you to stop! We’re done!”

Sendai-san looked up and picked up my sock.

“Give me your foot. I’ll put it on for you.”

The sensation of a part of my body that’s supposed to be dry being wet isn’t exactly pleasant. I didn’t want her to keep licking, so I had no objection to putting the sock back on, but I had nothing but objections to her words, which made it unclear who was giving the orders.

“You don’t need to put it on. Just take this one off too.”

Saying that, I placed my left foot on Sendai-san’s thigh, and she silently complied.

“So, Miyagi. Was it fun having your foot licked?”

“Well, kind of.”

Sendai-san isn’t exactly a model from a magazine, but she has a refined face. Even so, the sensation of having my foot licked by someone like her wasn’t particularly fun. But the situation itself—Sendai-san licking my foot—was pretty amusing.

“Miyagi, you’re such a pervert.”

“The one who licks feet because they’re told to is the pervert, don’t you think?”

“If I told everyone at school that Miyagi ordered me to lick her feet, they’d probably say you’re the pervert.”

“Then I’d tell them you licked my feet because I told you to. Why don’t we let everyone decide who the real pervert is?”

“You’re the worst and the pervert, Miyagi.”

“I think it’s you, Sendai-san.”

If what I made her do today got out at school, I’d plummet from the bottom of the second-tier crowd to rock bottom. The moderately normal life I have now would definitely vanish. But the same goes for Sendai-san. If people found out she licked the feet of someone as unremarkable as me, she wouldn’t just lose her current status—she might even be ranked below me.

So, being the worst and a pervert doesn’t bother me.

After all, Sendai-san’s just as much of a lowlife pervert in this room as I am.

“Then maybe I’ll ask at school tomorrow who’s the bigger pervert, me or Miyagi… Just kidding. Talking about what happens in this room at school would break our agreement, so don’t worry, I won’t say anything.”

The rules we set at the beginning.

There are a few conditions for paying five thousand yen to have Sendai-san do whatever I want, and one of them is that we don’t talk to anyone about what happens after school.

So, what happened earlier is a secret game no one else will ever see, and neither I nor Sendai-san would ever tell anyone about it.

“Miyagi, any other orders?”

“Nope.”

I said firmly and stood up. It’s cold. The room is warm, but the floor where my bare foot touched isn’t. But her tongue, the one that licked my foot earlier, was hot and soft—

I let out a small breath.

“Want something to drink?”

Looking at the empty glass on the table, I asked, and she replied curtly, “No.”

“Wanna stay for dinner?”

She’ll say she’s going home. I know that because every time I’ve asked her this question before, she’s given the same answer. There’s no reason for her to say something different today. Besides, I’d be in trouble if she actually said yes.

Still, I asked on a whim, and for the first time, I heard the word “Sure.”

I slipped into my slippers barefoot and headed to the kitchen with Sendai-san following me. I turned on the light, switched on the air conditioner, and took a cup of instant ramen from the supermarket bag, then started boiling water. I placed two cups of ramen with their lids half-opened and a pair of disposable chopsticks in front of Sendai-san, who was sitting at the counter across from the kitchen. She looked at me with a puzzled expression.

“What’s this?”

“Cup ramen. Can’t you tell? Or maybe the rich Sendai-san has never seen cup ramen before?”

“If I were so rich I’d never seen cup ramen, I wouldn’t be going to our high school. I’d be at one of those fancy schools where people greet each other with ‘Good day,’ don’t you think?”

Sendai-san said with exasperation, but I’d heard her family is well-off.

She doesn’t exactly flaunt brand-name items, but she carries things that seem refined. There’s no way her family serves cup ramen for dinner. They probably have homemade meals.

Sendai-san, who seems loved by her family.

Sendai-san, who I probably wouldn’t even have spoken to under normal circumstances.

—I feel nauseous.

I stared at the electric kettle boiling water for two.

“Besides, I’ve eaten cup ramen before. Oh, wait, is the Miyagi household poor or something?”

“I get enough allowance to pay you five thousand yen once or twice a week without any trouble, but if that’s poor, then maybe I’m poor.”

I replied curtly to Sendai-san’s teasing tone.

My family might serve cup ramen for dinner, but it’s not because we’re short on money. Financially speaking, we’d probably be considered well-off.

“…Well, I guess you’re not poor. So, this is dinner?”

“If you’d prefer a bento, I can go buy one. Or you could just go home and eat. I’m fine either way.”

Because my mom isn’t around and I have no talent for cooking. Those are the only two reasons dinner is cup ramen.

I do have a dad who’s decent at cooking, but he’s so busy with work that he rarely comes home while I’m still awake. Maybe out of guilt for leaving his daughter in such an environment, he gives me an allowance that’s clearly excessive for a high schooler.

“I’ll eat this.”

Sendai-san said, fiddling with the ramen cup’s lid as the kettle finished boiling. I poured hot water into the cups up to the line inside. Set the kitchen timer for three minutes.

And we slurped the ramen together.

Whether I eat alone or with someone else, cup ramen is cup ramen, and the taste doesn’t change. Still, it feels a little better than eating alone.

“Thanks for the meal. It’s getting late, so I’m heading home.”

Sendai-san placed her chopsticks neatly on top of the empty cup and stood up.

“Okay.”

We don’t have much in common to talk about.

We belong to different groups at school, and our hobbies are different.

If there’s nothing to talk about, all we can do is eat in silence, and cup ramen doesn’t take long to finish. So, without really feeling like we shared a meal, Sendai-san left.

“If you buy volume four, let me borrow it.”

As we went back to the room to get Sendai-san’s blazer and coat, she said, looking at my bookshelf.

“It’ll probably be ready to read by the next time you come.”

“Then maybe next week.”

She could’ve said she’s not coming back.

Considering what I made her do today, it wouldn’t have been surprising, but it seems she has no intention of ending this arrangement.

Sendai-san is a strange person.

She doesn’t seem to be doing this for the money, so I don’t really understand what she’s thinking. If it were me, I’d never want to lick someone’s feet, and I definitely wouldn’t want to come back to the room of someone who ordered me to do that.

“I’ll walk you out.”

She put on her coat, and as usual, we left the apartment together. We took the elevator down to the first floor and walked to the entrance.

“See you.”

Sendai-san waved without stopping.

“Bye.”

I called out to her retreating figure.

There’s not much time left to be a second-year.

When winter ends, spring comes, and we become third-years in different classes, will Sendai-san still let me buy her for five thousand yen?

As I stepped into the elevator, I thought about the future of this relationship, which began in July when the rainy season ended unusually early.