"You."

"That's fucking useless."

"There is not just a single thing that's love. It changes for everyone."

"Hm."

"But what do you feel if you imagine losing him?"

Inori flinches without meaning to then glares at Subaru again.

"And now imagine that you read all of those manga and you reach the conclusion that you don't like him. What are you going to feel then? Are you gonna say 'well I guess that's that, it's been a good run'?"

"No!"

"So you have your answer."

"That makes no sense."

"Love never does."

Stab stab stab and eat. "That doesn't help."

"You choose what to call it, then, but the fact is that you're terrified of losing him—"

"I'm not scared of anything!"

"—you would be really upset and angry if you lost him, then. And you want to spend more time with him and you want him to be near you even if you're not really talking or doing anything, and you like to touch him and when you wake up in the morning next to him you wanna cry."

"I never cry. ...also I told him all of that and it didn't matter."

"Tōkan is a sucker for narratives, Yamada. A bit too much, and a bit too deep. Calling it 'feelings' matters to him. But you're clearly head over heels for him already and I'm so fucking jealous," and he accidentally crushes his ice cream cone when he says that and has to use a napkin to clean the mess. "...I'm so jealous that you get to have him and I don't. But you're something else, I get that now. So at least... let me live vicariously through you. Love him for me, okay? ...and maybe tell me what it feels like, after."

"...you sound like him."

"Huh?"

"It's like you wrote a whole speech or somethin'. Posh shitty alphas."

Subaru smiles a bit. "Yeah, we are that."