Chapter 56

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So When Is Totomo-chan Appearing? (2)

Even after that, people kept asking when Totomo-chan would appear again, or if she was right there beside me.
Do they really want to hear Yeoreum’s voice that badly?
Even though Totomo-chan doesn’t even have a separate moving avatar or anything like that.

“Listeners tend to get really excited about a VTuber’s friends or family.”
“Is that so?”
“I don’t have any family, so I never really had much to talk about in that regard.”
“Ah…”

I fell silent at Yeoreum’s casual remark.
I wondered if she was really okay.
Her background—no, it wasn’t even enough to call it a “background.”
Just because she could easily say she grew up in an orphanage didn’t mean it wasn’t a wound.
Maybe she had said it so many times that she became numb to it.

“I’m really okay. Because now, Toya, you’re my family.”
“…Yeoreum, you’re seriously an angel.”

She turned her head shyly at the word “angel.” That, too, was incredibly adorable.
Family, huh.
I had family, too—though we’d become estranged.
Back when I was a kid, I think we were like any other normal family. But ever since I said I wanted to pursue music, everything fell apart.

‘Didn’t I tell you not to do something like music? Vocal cord nodules? Maybe it’s for the best. From now on—’
Enough.
Let’s stop thinking about that.
I barely had enough attention to give Yeoreum—there was no time to waste on things like that.
Alright, first things first: let’s see if Yeoreum has gotten any heavier.

They say her weight is normal for her height, but honestly, she feels too light.
Seriously, isn’t 20kg too light for a human body?
‘…Actually, I’m not even sure she’s 20kg.’

I compared the weight of Yeoreum in my arms to the dumbbells I usually lifted.
…Hmm, doesn’t feel all that different.
My usual dumbbells were 15kg, so Yeoreum was maybe just a little heavier than that.
Maybe I should feed her more, yeah.

“Yeoreum, want a snack?”
“Snack? What kind of snack?”
“We’ve got red bean buns at home. They’re not too sweet and super tasty—you’d love them.”
“…Okay.”

Her stomach was small, so she didn’t eat a lot at once, but if you looked at her daily intake, it wasn’t that little.
She just ate a little bit, often.
They said her body burned calories constantly to protect her fragile health, but even with all that food, her weight never seemed to go up. It hurt to think about.
Would she ever weigh more than twice my dumbbells someday?
If that day ever came, I’d have no more wishes left…

“Then—let me split this in half… Here, your half, Yeoreum.”
“Isn’t mine bigger?”
“Well, you see, Yeoreum—”
“—just watching me eat makes you full?”

When I tore off a bit more than half of the red bean bun and handed it to her, she grumbled in a tiny voice.
Apparently, she didn’t like that I was eating less than her.
But honestly, Yeoreum… I’d feel a little bad too if you ate less than me.
Yeoreum’s philosophy was something like, “It only makes sense for the bigger person to eat more,” but for me, I just wanted the person I cared about to eat plenty.

“Thanks for the food, Toya.”

Nom—she bit into the red bean bun.
She looked just like a white kitten nibbling on a treat. I couldn’t help but giggle and snap a photo.
At first, Yeoreum really hated getting her picture taken, but maybe because I kept doing it, she seemed to have gotten used to it.
Lately, she even asked me to show her the photos in my gallery, so I’d been taking more than ever.

“…Toya, can I ask you something?”
“Sure, anything.”
“Um…”

When I nodded at her question, Yeoreum hesitated.
Must’ve been a bit of an awkward thing to ask.
Not that I could think of anything Yeoreum would have trouble asking me—
Ah. Could it be that?

Something she’d told me easily before, but found hard to ask herself.
If that was the case, there was one thing that came to mind.

“Are you curious about my family?”
“Yeah… Not in a weird way! I just… you take such good care of me, I wondered if you had a younger sibling or something.”
“I see.”

A younger sibling, huh…
Maybe I had been treating her that way, subconsciously.
But one thing was certain: not once had I thought of Yeoreum as a replacement for my sibling.
A sibling was a sibling, Yeoreum was Yeoreum.
It was just an old habit, that’s all.

“I do have a younger sibling. Haven’t seen them in a while, though.”
“Oh, that makes sense. You’re so good at taking care of people.”
“Of course, Yeoreum’s the only one I care about this much, you know?”
“Ugh…”

Yeoreum blushed at my words, making me laugh.
Seriously, she gets embarrassed way too easily.
She always reacted like that when I said anything remotely flirty.
Guess it’s true she never had any dating experience.
Me neither, really—but I’d at least watched my share of dramas and played dating sims.
Yeoreum didn’t even like dramas and barely touched games like that.

“…I wonder what it’s like to have a sibling. I kinda get it, but I kinda don’t.”
“It’s hard to explain.”

We were close when we were kids, grew distant as we got older, and now we don’t even talk.
We didn’t have some big blow-up, but we did drift apart.
So maybe Yeoreum’s just curious about what having a sibling is like?

I tilted my head, remembering that Yeoreum was a twin.
She’d never even seen her twin’s face, which probably made her even more curious.

“Is it because of your twin?”
“N-not really…”

She mumbled and turned her head away, so I pulled her into a hug.
It’s natural to have lots of thoughts. I’d be super overwhelmed too if someone suddenly told me I had a twin.
Maybe she was thinking, “What if I get to meet them someday?”

Even though the doctor said there was little chance her twin survived, you never know.

“I was just wondering… If my twin had lived, would they look just like me?”

It seemed like Yeoreum didn’t see her current appearance as her own—
but as her twin’s.
Maybe that’s why she looked at the photos I took.
Or maybe it was those very photos that made her think that way.

Her phone was full of the photos I’d taken of her.
…Maybe I should hold back a little on the pictures.
It’s normal to be curious about a twin, but I wanted her to be emotionally stable first.

“It’s silly, right? The doctor said they probably didn’t survive. Honestly, I’m like this because of them, so—uh, forget I said that.”

When we first met, she used to sound like she resented her twin.
But lately, her tone had changed.
I could only imagine how complicated her feelings were.

She’s more stable now, but when we first met, her mental and physical health were both a mess.

“That’s why I’m glad Toya’s here with me.”
“And I’m so glad Yeoreum’s here with me.”

If, by some miracle, we ever found Yeoreum’s twin—
what would she feel?
Would she be happy? Upset?

Judging by how she is now, she’d probably have a conflicted reaction—like biting into a sour persimmon.
Not good, not bad.
But I was sure that, given time, they’d get along.
Yeoreum was a good kid. Even if she acted cold at first, she’d end up being kind.

“Oh, right. By the way, Toya—your stream clip got a ton of views.”
“Huh? That?”

I didn’t know who made it, but recently there was this clipper obsessed with Totomo-chan.
They gathered all the brief Totomo-chan moments into one video, even drawing short animations to match.
They even synced the lip movements perfectly to her voice—it was insane dedication.
The comments were full of people asking when Totomo-chan would appear again.

Even though Natsu’s debut was a huge success, plenty of people wanted to see Toya’s friend, Totomo-chan.

“…At this point, maybe I could appear once in a while.”

Yeoreum murmured quietly as she looked at the clip that had nearly 100,000 views in just two days.
It made me realize—Yeoreum really was a natural-born streamer.

Fables