Beside a large tree.
Chiaki had apparently been waiting for some time. She threw a handful of photographs directly at Ryunosuke's face.
He picked them up. They were photos of him with various girls. There was even one from his outing with Itsuki the day before.
(So Matsushita Chiaki has been tailing me.) He didn't deny it, just held up the photos.
"You've been following me?"
Chiaki clenched her fist, stepped up close, and looked him dead in the eyes.
"I was going to give Kei to you. But I've changed my mind. You don't deserve her."
She lifted her shoulder bag and started hitting him with it. Ryunosuke didn't dodge. He stood there and took it, letting her work through whatever she needed to.
After a while, Chiaki was breathing a little harder. She picked up her school bag and turned to leave.
Ryunosuke caught her wrist. "You hit me and then you just walk away?"
She turned back. "What do you want? I've gotten it out of my system. What's the point of staying?"
Ryunosuke scratched his cheek.
"I heard you study psychology. Is there any chance you could hypnotize me? I've lost some of my memories."
Chiaki stared at him like she was looking at an idiot, as though this was some kind of game he was playing.
Ryunosuke sighed and tapped the side of his head with one finger.
"Someone hit me with a brick. I lost a portion of my memories. And as bad luck would have it, everything I lost was related to women."
"About the photo you took of me with Itsuki yesterday, I'm not going to argue that it happened. She's someone I knew when I was a child, but I have no memory of her. She wanted to try going on a date and doing the kinds of things we used to do together, hoping it might bring something back."
"It didn't work. I didn't remember a single thing."
Chiaki looked at him strangely.
"You're saying you lost your memory? And the part that happened to disappear was specifically everything to do with women? Are you serious right now?"
(I'm completely serious. Believe me or don't,) He thought.
(What matters is getting those memories back. Without them, I have no idea how to approach the quintuplets. I'll be on the back foot indefinitely.)
Ryunosuke had started thinking more deliberately about how to connect with the girls around him. Where before it had happened without thought, now he was doing it consciously. Where that would lead, he couldn't say.
Chiaki still seemed uncertain. If he was genuinely amnesiac, then the outing with one of the quintuplets could be forgiven as innocent. But if he was playing games with her, she would not be handing Kei over to someone like that.
So far the only evidence she had was the photograph of Itsuki. She hadn't yet seen anything about the others. From what she could observe openly, she only knew about Airi. So if Ryunosuke was telling the truth, she could forgive the rest as unknowing mistakes.
She didn't deliberate long before making up her mind.
"Fine. I'll try. But don't expect miracles from me. I'm only a student."
Ryunosuke thanked her.
A little while later, they were in her dormitory room. Ryunosuke lay back in a reclining chair while Chiaki changed into a white medical coat, paired with a black pencil skirt and stockings.
Ryunosuke's eyebrow twitched. "Is all this really necessary just for a session?"
Chiaki produced a syringe filled with a clear liquid and moved toward him with it. Ryunosuke jumped to his feet and pressed himself against the wall, nowhere left to retreat, sweat beading at his forehead.
"Could you explain to me what that is, Chiaki?"
She didn't seem to notice he had just used her first name.
"It's a propofol emulsion injection. It keeps the patient still and puts them to sleep quickly."
If anything, the explanation made him more tense, not less.
"Usually a psychologist talks the patient through things, doesn't she? Is the injection really necessary?"
Chiaki paused.
"Do you want this done or not? If not, you can leave."
That was her method, and she wasn't changing it to suit him. Ryunosuke eventually gave in and submitted to the injection. He was asleep within minutes.
Chiaki let her guard down slightly once he was under. Bringing a man into her private room had required a fair amount of nerve. She lifted one of his eyelids and checked the pupil, unfocused and unresponsive. He was genuinely out. She exhaled and began guiding him through his subconscious with words.
Before long she had her answer. He hadn't been lying. The amnesia was real. She had done this not out of suspicion but as a precaution against being deceived, and he had passed.
Since he was honest, she got to work properly, attempting to guide him through his subconscious to see if the missing memories could be reached. After a long time trying, nothing came of it.
She snapped her fingers, and Ryunosuke came awake. He asked immediately, full of hope.
"Well? Did anything come back?"
Chiaki shook her head and said with a trace of genuine regret.
"Nothing. I tried many times. You should see a real doctor. There may be structural damage in your brain."
On reflex, Ryunosuke said, "Aren't you the doctor?"
"I'm a psychologist!" she shot back, irritated.
The atmosphere between them had loosened a little. Chiaki took off the white coat and changed back into her ordinary clothes, fidgeting with the hem of her sleeve.
"Let's go out for a walk. There's something I want to talk to you about."
She had decided to let Kei go to him after all. Since the incident had only been a misunderstanding, her hesitation was gone. As for Arisu being his official girlfriend, Chiaki wasn't particularly bothered. The way she saw it, Arisu was a competitor with a physical limitation, a weak leg, and she had no doubt Kei could outpace her.
And this, of course, was exactly what Ryunosuke had been working toward. By this approach he had lowered Chiaki's guard until she was willing to offer up her closest friend entirely of her own accord. The plan had worked.
As had been said before, even operating on pure instinct Ryunosuke had drawn in six people without realizing it. Now that he was doing it deliberately, the results were only going to compound. Without quite intending to, he had already begun to turn a small measure of that attention toward Chiaki herself.
He followed her out toward a restaurant for dinner first.