Even though her lips moved, no sound came out. She almost looked like a group of carps mouthing above the water surface, but she eventually managed to squeeze out a word.

“That…!” She was trying to scream out something along the lines of ‘That’s not it!’ to deny Marilyn’s claim. Yet, Marilyn blocked her attempt.

“There’s no need for you to be that embarrassed about it, Lyla. Liking another person is a common occurrence. Just look at me. How confidently do I express my feelings?”

“…At the very least, I know that your actions don’t represent common human behavior.”

Marilyn pouted. “Everyone expresses their love differently. There are a hundred different types of love for a hundred different people. There ought to be people like me who express their love a bit more actively.”

“A bit more?” That was such an understatement—same for the word, ‘actively’. It would be more fitting if the words ‘a bit’ were changed to ‘excessively’ while ‘actively’ was replaced by ‘aggressively’. Yet, Marilyn didn’t seem to have an ounce of embarrassment about her love. She nodded with...