Izumi wasn’t specially aware that the request was for him to be rude in order to toughen up the other boy. He was as oblivious as one could be. He just happened to be rough spoken to everyone all the time. He just wanted people around him to be though enough to deal with anything. In a way, it could be said he really was ideal for this job.
Even so, he wasn’t used to people reacting by immediately crying and apologizing more. Was this guy for real? Would he be ok living on this rough universitary world if that was the only thing needed to get him crying?
“O-oi… wait! Stop crying, it’s so annoying!” he splurted, not sure of how to react to this situation.
The place wasn’t exactly private, so now there was a lot of people looking at them. Some assuming Izumi had just rejected the other’s love confession. The others thinking he might have bullied him until making him cry. He had just said two sentences!
“Stop already, it makes it look like I’m bullying you!”
“W-well, if you’d-hic!” Kyouhei had to stop and start over when the hiccups interrupted him, giving him a chance to wipe his face one more time, even though it was hopeless - more tears just kept coming. It was probably the “annoying” comment that did it.
“If y-y-you’d waited b-before be-being-g so mean,” he gulped and tried to regain control of his voice one last time, feeling something thick build up in the back of his throat - a feeling that usually accompanied his crying fits - and finally found a moment of calm within himself, though his eyes were still shiny with tears.
“Then I would’ve taken you to the place I talked about in the ad!” Ah, that was a bit snappish. Kyouhei looked a bit sheepish, but at least it distracted him from his crying. “Didn’t you read it?”