37: Make sure to take him out to play more
After completing the notes and dealing with Kazato Kyosuke, Jiang Xia intended to go home. On the way back, passing by the shopping street, Xiaobai stared at the TV in the shop window, looking dazed.
It tugged on Jiang Xia's ear.
Jiang Xia paused, thinking there might be something significant.
To his surprise, when he stopped and turned expectantly, he found that this time, what caught Xiaobai's attention wasn't a murderous aura.
It was a variety show on TV.
On the screen, Yoko Okino was promoting her new album.
Xiaobai looked at the screen eagerly, showing a longing expression at the album.
Jiang Xia: "..."
Since picking up the ghost baby, he had already bought several magazines and albums related to Yoko Okino, much like preparing little toys when raising a cat.
However, these latest albums usually required queuing up to buy...
Jiang Xia glanced at the rebroadcast time shown on the TV and said to the ghost in advance, "We can go check it out, but there's no guarantee they have it in stock."
*****
The rain stopped for a while, then started again.
Jiang Xia held an umbrella and found a place where the album could be bought.
Seeing the muddy ground at the entrance of the audio-visual store, he had a bad feeling.
Upon entering, he found that the new album had indeed sold out.
"..." Only at times like this could Jiang Xia directly feel, "Yoko Okino is really quite popular."
Xiaobai looked at the empty shelves, pressed its eyes, and whimpered.
Jiang Xia: "..." Raising a ghost is really troublesome.
He checked a few other stores, making a token effort.
As expected, the other stores also had no stock.
After checking the last store, Jiang Xia placated the ghost and sighed with relief, ready to leave.
But just then, someone hesitantly called out to him from behind, "Jiang Xia?"
Jiang Xia turned around at the sound.
There was no one behind him, just a row of bookshelves.
Looking closer, he saw a pair of eyes peeking through the gaps in the shelves, staring straight at him.
Jiang Xia was startled, and the term "bookshelf corpse hiding case" flashed through his mind.
...No relevant cases found.
"..." It seemed there was no such case...
Just as he was puzzled, the eyes between the bookshelves blinked gently.
Bling-bling, they looked not only alive but exceptionally lively.
"..." At this moment, Jiang Xia immediately recognized them.
——Sonoko Suzuki?
*****
Across the bookshelf.
Seeing Jiang Xia turn around, Sonoko Suzuki excitedly said to someone next to her, "See, I told you it looked like him!" and then disappeared with a swish.
A second later, Jiang Xia watched as Sonoko Suzuki appeared in front of him at a speed akin to teleportation. He quietly took a half-step back, startled by her speed.
"Didn't expect you to be a fan too." Sonoko Suzuki didn't notice Jiang Xia's subtle fear, simply happy to have discovered their "shared interest."
Then, as if remembering something, she lowered her voice and invited him mysteriously, "By the way, the day after tomorrow, Ran and I are going to a celebration party for Tatsuya's band. Do you want to come along?"
The Suzuki conglomerate invested widely and had considerable influence in the entertainment industry. Sonoko Suzuki had access to many celebrities, making her fangirling very convenient.
Jiang Xia: "...Tatsuya?" The name sounded somewhat unfamiliar.
But soon, his gaze shifted slightly, and he saw a poster in the store.
——On the poster was a man passionately singing into a microphone. The man's hair was extremely spiky, standing straight up like a hedgehog.
In the corner of the poster was the singer's signature, "Tatsuya Kimura."
With that unique hairstyle and name...
Jiang Xia quickly recalled something and was immediately intrigued.
He chatted amicably with Sonoko about "Tatsuya Kimura."
During the conversation, although Sonoko faintly felt that Jiang Xia might be a fake fan, she didn't care at all.
Whether he was a fake fan or not didn't matter.
What mattered was having a meal and karaoke with Jiang Xia, plus Tatsuya Kimura—double the happiness!
*****
A minute later, Sonoko Suzuki, surrounded by imaginary little flowers, smiled and waved as she watched Jiang Xia leave the store.
After a while, she gradually snapped out of it.
“...Wait, did I actually just get him to agree?” Sonoko Suzuki suspiciously touched her chin and turned to grab Ran Mouri. “I didn’t mishear, right? He did agree, didn’t he?”
Ran Mouri also nodded dazedly.
Jiang Xia never bullied his classmates and didn’t seem particularly aloof, but there was always a strong sense of distance between him and everyone else.
...Of course, a large part of this was due to Jiang Xia skipping classes too often, leaving little opportunity for everyone to get close.
But it was also related to Jiang Xia’s usual behavior—he never participated in small private gatherings or liked to hang out with classmates.
*****
When Sonoko Suzuki invited him earlier, she didn’t actually expect him to agree. She just wanted to use the conversation as an opportunity to get a close look at the handsome guy, to make up for not being able to buy the album.
However, unexpectedly, after a few sentences, she managed to get him to agree.
“...” Sonoko Suzuki held her face in her hands for a while, suddenly having a guess. “Did he encounter something that made him happy?”
...If she could figure out what that was, then wouldn’t it be possible to repeat the good thing and make Jiang Xia happy, thus getting him to agree to hang out any time?
Sonoko Suzuki’s eyes sparkled, feeling she had firmly grasped the secret to getting the handsome guy.
*****
Conan, standing quietly by their legs, also felt that Jiang Xia was acting a bit strange.
—Earlier, Conan had been playing with the kids in the park. But as they played, it suddenly started raining again, so the four of them had to go home.
On the way home, Conan spotted Ran Mouri among the crowd.
Using the fact that he was just a kid, he nonchalantly joined the girls’ shopping trip.
At this moment, seeing Sonoko Suzuki’s eyes gradually turning heart-shaped, Conan felt she was misunderstanding something.
So he quickly tried to nip his classmate’s strange thoughts in the bud: “Actually, this morning, when we went to the police station together, we happened to see Jiang Xia's attending doctor committing a murder in broad daylight. The doctor was arrested on the spot, so...”
Sonoko Suzuki: “...”
This, this level of difficulty in replicating the situation, seems a bit high?
“...” Conan saw her strange expression and felt that his thought process still didn’t match that of his lovestruck classmate—Jiang Xia agreeing to the invitation was definitely not because “the doctor was arrested, and he was in a good mood.”
Because Conan thought that the relationship between Jiang Xia and Dr. Kazato seemed pretty good.
After all, normally no one could stop Jiang Xia once he started beating someone up. But today, as soon as he recognized the doctor, he immediately stopped.
Moreover, despite Jiang Xia rarely going to the hospital, the fact that someone who disliked hospitals so much actually went for a check-up... even though he left halfway, was quite telling.
...In short, regarding why Sonoko Suzuki could successfully invite him, Conan had already formed a more scientific explanation in his mind.
******
Conan looked up and saw that both Ran Mouri and Sonoko Suzuki were looking at him, clearly interested in the case he had just mentioned. They wanted more details.
So Conan briefly explained the situation.
Then, facing two listeners, he couldn’t resist turning on his deduction mode, using the half-baked amateur psychology he learned in Hawaii:
“Before the doctor was taken away, he showed clear animosity towards Jiang Xia.”
Conan referred to the moment when Dr. Kazato, unable to stand up after being kicked, yelled in desperation:
“If Jiang Xia had established a relatively stable relationship with the doctor during his treatment, he might be affected by this."
“Everyone has a self-preservation instinct. Now that the connection between Jiang Xia and the doctor has been forcibly severed, his subconscious might try to establish new connections with others to hold himself together—your invitation probably made him feel the kindness in you...”
Halfway through his explanation, Conan suddenly realized there were many flaws in his reasoning.
He not only forgot to add “brother” when mentioning Jiang Xia but also inadvertently revealed some of Sonoko Suzuki’s past behavior… Would this expose his identity as “Shinichi Kudo”?
Thinking of this, Conan broke into a cold sweat, regretting a bit.
Unexpectedly, when he cautiously looked up, he didn’t meet Ran Mouri’s scrutinizing gaze.
Instead, he saw Ran Mouri and Sonoko Suzuki with teary eyes, each taking out a handkerchief to wipe their tears.
Conan: “...?”
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