「Ah, that’s right, Owner, let’s exchange email addresses.」

 

We had been contacting each other by telephone until now, but I think email would be better for more detailed communication.

The Owner seemed to have a disagreeable expression, but he searched his pockets.

As for his disagreeable expression, I’m used to it, so I didn’t mind it.

 

He took out a black folding phone.

 

「Ah, a Gala phone is it? That’s rare.」

「Just quickly tell me your address.」

「Can you infrared to a smartphone from a Gala phone? Or rather, do you have a smartphone with infrared?」

 

The Owner looked away in a different direction.

Since I had no choice, I asked him to show me his email address. I took a picture of it in order to add it later.

The Owner opened his profile scree and showed it to me.

 

yohko.s-＊＊0728＊＊@＊＊＊＊＊.＊＊jp

 

Seeing the email address, I was surprised.

The Owner used his girlfriend’s (?) name as his address.

 

「Ah, um~」

「What?」

「Can we really go out there together?」

「Why?」

 

Well, because of your girlfriend. Although he may be guiding a young girl around, to go out with other girls, I thought it might be a bit awkward.

Since I had never had a relationship with any guys, I didn’t know what to feel about it.

 

「That address, it’s your girlfriend’s name isn’t it?」

「!?」

 

The moment I said that, the Owner folded his phone up with a grumpy expression and put it back into his pocket. Instead, he took out a smartphone from another pocket.

 

「T-This one is for work……!」

「Ah, you have a smartphone for work.」

「No……well……that’s right.」

 

Maybe the Owner didn’t want his girlfriend to know about it, he started mumbling some words I couldn’t hear.

I asked if it was really okay, but I was told I shouldn’t worry about it.

The smartphone’s email address used the Owner’s name as it was for work.

 

◇◇◇

 

It’s sunny today! It’s wonderful weather for the pottery market.

I arrived at the ticket machine at the train station five minutes before the meeting time.

Owner had already arrived.

Looking at him, he felt a bit hard to approach.

 

As for why, it was because he was looking very stylish.

He was wearing a cardigan on top of a shirt and a simple pair of pants, but I felt he had a very handsome aura.

Passengers passing by seemed to chatter about the Owner’s appearance.

 

That sort of appearance, it didn’t look like he was going to a pottery market.

 

On the other hand, I was going to the pottery market in casual clothes I had found suggested on the net.

Jeans, a thin parka, a backpack and sneakers. I also brought some cotton gloves.

I chose these because it suggested clothes for easy movement within crowds in the pottery market.

 

Because of that, I couldn’t come close to the stylish, handsome Owner.

When I was despairing over what to do, he found me.

I unintentionally turned my back to the Owner, who was quickly coming over.

Even so, I think he could still see me in the crowd.Well, I might have stood out for being too unfashionable.

 

「Hey, you’re late.」

「S-Sorry~~!!」

 

As the train was leaving soon, he dragged me over to the ticket gate.

This treatment is too cruel, I wish I could die.

Taking out his IC card to pay the fare, the Owner handed me a ticket.

It seems he bought his ticket before I came.

 

「Ah, I’m sorry, I’ll pay later.」

「I don’t need it.」

「Thank you, thank you very much?」

「There’s no particular reason, today is not for leisure but for work, that is why.」

「I-I see!」

 

Because I wanted to buy some tableware to use at the cafe he said to ignore the costs as it could be treated as shop expenses.

Apparently the Owner had some goal in mind.

I had thought it was a private outing but it seems my consideration for his girlfriend the other day wasn’t necessary. Feeling that I had misunderstood, I was a little ashamed.

 

「Don’t be absentminded.」

「Ah, yes.」

 

I pulled myself together and boarded the train.

 

◇◇◇

 

The train that went to the station nearest to the pottery market in Hasami was the coastal train (Seaside Liner) . It goes from Nagasaki to Isahaya and then along the coast to Omura

As I lived in the city, I hardly ever saw trains running near the ocean.

I was fascinated by the sparkling ocean that was spread outside the window.

Seeing me like that, the Owner muttered ‘You’re not a kid anymore’.

 

I’m still in my teens, so it’s okay to be a kid~.

 

Taking the express train from Nagasaki station to the station nearest to the pottery market took about an hour.

From there, we took a bus. While we were stuck in a traffic jam, we still arrived at the location in about 30 minutes.

 

「–Oh!」

 

The pottery market had a festive atmosphere

Besides stalls selling pottery, there were also stalls selling takoyaki, candied apples, ice cream and yakitori.

Looking at the surroundings, it seems there were more customers in their forties and fifties. There were also families with young children.

 

I decided to start treasure hunting right away.

 

Pottery was sold under tents.

There were various displays from items stacked on wagons like a mountain to carefully arranged items on rugs.

Although it was only the second day of the market, tags such as “All half price” and “Discount” were already placed everywhere.

Speaking of Nagasaki’s ceramics, I thought that there would only be elegant patterns like the ones found in the Owner’s store, but unexpectedly there were also a lot of pretty patterned ceramics.

Many pieces of ceramics with birds and cats on them could be seen.

 

「Everything is so cute.」

 

The Owner also seems to have come to the Hasami pottery market for the first time and was surprised that there were ceramics made for young people.

 

「But, speaking of Nagasaki ceramics, don’t you think of Chinese patterns? Porcelain would cost quite a bit right?」

「They are hand painted piece by piece, what do you think?」

「Hmm.」

 

The total budget for this trip is about 3,000 yen. I think it would be nice to buy three pieces, a tea cup, bowl and plate.

 

「What to say, do you have any recommendations? Like a distinctive feature of Hasami?」

「When speaking of Hasami, it should be white porcelain with indigo blue patterns, you should buy those.」

「I see! Certainly, blue patterns on white porcelain is very beautiful.」

 

I bought a bowl with an arabesque pattern, a plate with a ginkgo pattern, a tea cup with bird a print and a plate with a dotted pattern.

Because I examined each piece, it took quite a long time.

Although I suggest the Owner and I split up to look around, he accompanied me because I looked like I would get lost.

 

Finally, the Owner’s purchasing began.

Maybe he was looking around while I was doing my shopping, he decided on items very fast.

Seeing the nice items among them, I felt a little envious. However, such items were usually priced very expensively.

 

Our shopping ended at 1pm.

 

「I’m a little hungry.」

「If we had come by car, I would have taken you to a burger restaurant.」

「S-Sorry!」

 

I had heard that there was a shop here famous for stew pies and burgers. It was a fascinating menu. Regrets.

Even so, there was very heavy traffic all the way here, so I still felt that coming by train was the correct idea.

He said that there were no restaurants around here. But I didn’t give up and kept looking around to find something.

 

「Ah, Owner, let’s eat udon.」

「Udon?」

 

In a corner of the pottery market, there was a place selling food like curry and udon. I saw a flag with Goto udon written on it over there and invited the Owner to eat there.

 

Goto udon is one of the specialties of the Goto islands. It is a remote set of islands in the Nagasaki prefecture and is made up of 140 large and small islands.

I had friends from Goto who had recommended the udon from there.

 

「I’ve always been interested in it.」

「In this hot weather, udon……」

「I think it’s okay?」

 

Even though it was May, it was quite hot as the sun was shining. However, I pulled the Owner over without caring about it and bought two seaweed udon noodles.

It seems to be a self service system and we were given a tray with the udon immediately after ordering.

I sat down and decided to eat it right away.

 

「Uwa~, the soup is thin!」

 

The udon soup stock was clear. When I usually ate udon, the stock was usually a dark colour that made the noodles stand out, I was surprised. The Owner said that Kanto soup stock was too dark.

I sipped the soup.

 

「Ah, interesting.」

 

Even though it looked dilute, the soup stock was rich. It was made using flying fish. So delicious.

The noodles were much thinner than ordinary udon and had a smooth texture. It would also smoothly slide down my throat.

To describe it simply, it was something between udon and somen?

 

「How to put it, the udon has a refined taste.」

「It seems they used Camellia oil when making it by hand, so it might feel that way.」

「Oh, that’s right.」

 

They were so tasty that I bought some dry noodles to take home.

After returning home, it might be good to eat udon with the ceramics I bought.

 

Right when I was in such an excited mood, the Owner said something.

 

「Eating only carbohydrates, you’ll get fat.」

「!?」

 

At this moment, I glared as much as I could at the Owner.

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