[Drabble Series] Mimosa / Run Baby Run / Untitled
FIRST OF ALL. I haven't updated in months because I kind of fell out of fandom :( So guys, this place is going to be pretty much dead apart from my occasional fanfics. No more translations, no more regular updates. I'm dumping some fics that I wrote on Twitter here... but that's about it :(
Thank you all so so much for your support over these few years, I had a ton of fun writing and translating, but life has changed quite a bit and I've changed quite a bit so... Yeah. Maybe a good long break from overspending a flailing would be good w
Enjoy these few pieces anyway, I hope. They're set in the Bakaleya verse, Maya / Sayuri which is my ultimate ship from this show because I love Kaoru and I love Taiga and I just think their story could have been built on so much more T^T
Title: Mimosa
Pairing: Maya / Sayuri
Genre: Romance
4 floors.
12 meters? 15?
She dangles her uwabaki from the tip of her toes while sitting on the edge of the roof.
It'll take them just slightly over a second to hit the ground below.
The chilly air of late autumn blasts him in the face as he steps out of the stairwell onto the rooftop. Surely enough, he spots her again by the edge, short head of hair tossed everywhere by the wind.
He is 4 steps away when she speaks up, back facing him.
"I calculated it-" she says in an almost amused voice. "-assuming the building is 12 meters high, it'll take things 1.5 seconds to hit the ground."
He stays silent, watching her carefully until she continued.
"Why are you here?"
"..."
He stands as still as he can, but ready to reach out and grab her if anything--
She turns and smiles at him crookedly
"Ne, race with me?"
At the track, she unceremoniously strips off her white blazer and tosses it onto the patch of withering mimosa by the side of rubber terrain. He follows as she stretches, still bewildered as to why they were doing this at all, but goes along with it quietly anyway. There wasn't any one else around that she could do this with.
"Ready?" The same crooked smile flashes, and before he could respond--
"Go!"
He chases after her, thinking it would be easy to overtake her but the small distance never seems to close. Soon enough - as a gentlemanly gesture, he'd like to think it was - he falls into a comfortable pace behind her, not falling back but not quite catching up either, to let her have her moment of glory. The weather made breathing difficult - with every breath came the overwhelming urge to cough as the cold air attacked his throat - but he keeps it up. The wind picks up her skirt and he catches a few glances of her boyshorts before reminding himself to look away
He slows to a stop right at the finishing line, but she rockets down the track for a good few meters before stopping and coming back to where he is.
"Well," he pants, not used to running this much in the cold. "You win."
The look she gives him is one he couldn't read, and she seems almost frustrated as she pushes back her fringe.
"No, you weren't even trying. We'll go again. This time, /try/."
"Wait--"
And she's off, speeding down the straight stretch without so much as a pause to take a breath and he has no choice - he kicks off from the line again and this time he does try. If she doesn't want him to play nice then he wouldn't. He grits his teeth and a with a yell he pumps everything into a quick burst that puts him in front of her, and he sprints through the rest of the course with his fixed on the ground
He doesn't slow towards the finishing line this time and runs right past it, placing his hands on his knees after he stopped to catch his breath and calm his pulse. He is burning from the blood pumping through his veins and he wipes the sweat off his face hastily as she finally reaches him.
"That..." she takes in a few gulps of air with her hand over her chest. The sweat staining it made it just slightly possible for him to make out the color of her bra. "That's what I'm talking about."
"I won," he replies rather stupidly, tearing his eyes away from her... hand.
She laughs soundlessly.
"First boy to, in fact."
"What?"
He looks up at her tucking her hair behind her ears with the biggest, brightest smile on her face that he has ever seen - and it looks prettier on her than all the practiced smiles she usually wore. Maybe this is the first time someone had actually taken her seriously. Not regarded her as the pampered daughter of a rich family. Treated her like just another classmate
"Thank--"
He cuts her off, holding her skinny shoulders and forcing his lips on hers with blood still pounding in his ears and his breath still not quite back. And as quickly as that moment came - with barely a breath exchanged between their lips - it is gone, and he pulls back to catch his breath, his forehead still on hers.
Her breathes hit his face. He smells a hint of grape from whatever candy she must have been sucking on and it snaps him back to his senses. He steps back slowly and goes to pick up their clothes, expecting her to follow. When he turns he finds her still rooted to the ground, staring blankly downwards
He dusts off her white blazer and drapes it over her shoulders.
"We can do this again. Every time I win I'll get a kiss from you."
Without waiting for a reply he starts walking towards the gate to the tracks, blazer slung over his shoulder.
"What if I win?" she shouts.
He doesn't turn around and simply shrugs, all the while hiding the smile tugging at the corners of his lips - and moments later a blur of white and grey rushes past him and she is ahead of him again, making a beeline for gate with her blazer crumpled in one hand
She turns around for just enough time to flash him a grin and it is all the encouragement he needs. He returns the grin and accepts the challenge.
Title Run Baby Run, Don't Ever Look Back
"Hey guys I don't know how to tell you this but--" Soichi swallows his overly big mouthful of anpan painfully before continuing. "I think... I think Maya is really up to something."
Tatsuya snorts. Tetsuya raises an amused eyebrow, and Makoto leans in with a frown.
"What do you mean?"
"Well... you know how he's been disappearing a lot lately, doing stuff on his own?"
"Yeah?"
"...don't you think that's suspicious?"
Yuki and Makoto almost fall forward at the same time, but Shohei frowns and nods.
"Extremely. I wonder what he's been up to."
"I thought you had some actual information, idiot," Tatsuya reaches over and hits Soichi over his head. "But honestly, I'm curious too."
"Actually..."
All eyes turn to Tetsuya, and he leans back in his chair from all the intense attention.
"Actually, Fumie told me that Sayuri has been skipping out on some meetings of theirs. She's kinda worried but she said that Sayuri looked happy and not... you know..."
Glances are exchanged, and the slow change in their expressions results in Tetsuya sighing rather exasperatedly at his friends. No words are needed when they are making plans like this - which he still thinks is a bad idea but he has no other choice but to go along with it anyway.
And so begins what Tatsuya named their "Super Secret Figure-Out-What-Maya-Is-Up-To-And-Whether-Or-Not-He-Is-Going-Out-With-Sayuri By Stalking Them After School And Catching Them Red Handed" plan, which they realize after just an hour or two isn't really the most effective of plans as they meet back at the foot of the hill with nothing to report on.
"I don't know man," Soichi whines. "I'm tired, can we get something to eat--"
Tatsuya smacks him over the head again.
"More important things are at stake here. Let's go."
Tetsuya sighs.
It is Shohei who spots the "couple" first as they are walking along the train tracks to the game center, and he shouts out excitedly before being gagged by Yuki and Makoto and the whole bunch of them ducks behind the shrubs just in time. Tetsuya peeks out from between the leaves, and surely enough the bandana and short hair are iconic enough for the figures running around the track to be identified.
"What are they /doing/?" Tatsuya whispers (rather loudly).
"...running?"
"I can see that, idiot, but why?"
"I think they're racing each other," Makoto frowns. "That's boring. I wanted to catch them in the middle of something romantic~"
"Like a kiss~" Yuki chides.
"Or an embrace~"
"Or~" The duo looks at each other devilishly before getting promptly nudged in the ribs by Tetsuya.
"Shut up."
"You know," Maya says while trying to catch his breath after their 4th time around the track that afternoon. "They're in the bush watching us..."
Sayuri nods and dries her forehead with the back of her hand, similarly out of breath. "I saw them just now. What should we do?"
"Run."
"They're starting again," Soichi wails. "Aren't they hungry at all?"
"Wait---wait wait wait WAIT they're headed for the gate!"
True to Shohei's words, instead of rounding the last bend the pair takes off through the metal gates and disappears into the residential area in the blink of an eye.
"EMERGENCY. GO."
They duck into an alleyway just as they hear the gang turning the corner and run past where they are hiding ("THEY WENT THAT WAY." "SHIT MAN I CAN'T SEE THEM." "WAIT WE JUST PAST A CREPE STORE--GUYS!! ARGH.), behind a few vending machines. She grins up at him mischievously and he returns it.
"Do I win this round?"
"That doesn't count."
He cups her face anyway--
"AHA!"
He takes one look at Tatsuya standing in the opening of the alleyway, pointing a finger at them with the most scandalized expression on his face, and grabs Sayuri's hand and darts off in the opposite direction.
He doesn't let go of her hand even when they have reached the river bank and they continue running alongside the river, ruining their shoes in the dirt but he doesn't quite care as long as he continue to listen to her laughter - carefree and almost hysterically so. Without realizing it he finds himself laughing too, and moments later he decides to let his friends have it at him. He stops and crashes into the soft grasses, rolling over to look up at late afternoon sky that is slowly turning orange.
The last thing he sees before she throws her blazer over his head is her smiling face. He allows himself a minute to block out the shouts from their pursuers and just take in the light floral, clean scent of her blazer (probably washed and softened and scented by 3 different house staff at home), He has just enough time to hand it back to her before getting dragged up and held in a headlock by Tatsuya.
"You little bastard--"
In the midst of getting noogied and mock punched and poked and shouted at, he looks up at her. She holds her blazer in crossed arms in front of her chest and watches the boys bicker while obviously trying not to double over with laughter. He finds it mildly unfair that he's getting all the beating while she gets out of this without a single tease thrown her way.
She catches his eye, and almost as if to taunt him she turns on her heel, not before sticking out her tongue at him.
"Oi--"
"I'll see you guys in school tomorrow~ Gokigenyo~"
He fights off his captors but doesn't run after her. He has plenty of time to do that tomorrow. And the day after. And after all the training he is sure that he no longer has a problem winning her in a race.
"You're... smiling."
He scoffs at Makoto and picks up his blazer from the ground, dusting it off.
"And blushing," says Yuki.
Tetsuya only offers a reassuring (threatening) pat on his back, and Maya worries just slightly if he would get out of this with his pride intact.
Who was he kidding.
Title: Untitled
As autumn fades into winter, the temperature only continues to fall, and soon enough all that he can look at on his way to the track and field are barren trees and his own breath before him. It doesn't make it any better that she hasn't been around much. Rich girl stuff, he called them jokingly once, when she showed up late for their "dates" at the running track.
She laughed it off and beat him in their race that day, resulting in him running after her to try to get his kiss (which he did eventually, in a rare fit of her giggles and some mild shivering in his sweat soaked shirt with the chilly wind on his back).
But that was a week or two ago, or maybe three, or more, he hasn't been keeping track. He counts himself lucky if she texts him once a day now. Since they can't talk much in school the only time they had was at the track but she has been busy. Something about her father's company falling into deficit. Something about attending events along with her father. Networking.
Rich girl stuff.
He pushes open the rusted gates and heads for the single stone bench under the barren tree, throwing his school bag down there before strolling to the starting line to warm up.
Maybe she'd show up today. As a surprise. Since tomorrow is his birthday.
In her absence he would make sure that he levels up so much that she can never beat him again.
When he goes to check his phone on one of his breaks, there is a text from her on his phone. Said that she'll be here by 7.
He sits under the tree and waits.
He doesn't bother looking up when he hears hurried footsteps approaching. No one else would be at the track at this hour.
"I-I'm sorry, the event--"
"It's 9.41," he says blankly, finally looking up. "You'd be here by 7, you said?"
She's too dolled up, he thinks as he fights the urge to scrunch his nose at her expensive looking peacoat and perfectly done makeup and hair and everything. Pretty. But it's not her. The Sayuri he knows--
"Yeah but--" She stops to catch her breath. "I-I couldn't get out early."
"You could have called."
"My phone ran out of battery."
"..."
"I'm not lying."
He pushes himself off the bench, and stands up straight in front of her.
"I'm not going to race you when you're in those shoes."
She simply hands him a delicately wrapped box in her hands. He takes it and it weighs down heavily in his hands.
"What is it?"
"It's for your birthday."
"It's tomorrow."
She chews on her bottom lip and casts her eyes downwards. Without her saying anything he knows what is about to come, and all the anger he's been keeping in check for the past few week explodes and before he knows it - the box is making a perfect parabola in the air before landing with a sickening crash a good distance away.
"I don't want your expensive presents. If you think you can just... look down on me like that," he snaps, and it just doesn't register that she's backing up with the same broken expression he had seen on her face months ago on the rooftop. "You are wrong. Go back to your ojou-sama life. I don't want anything to do with you."
The butler is usually a quiet, old man. As he opens the door for the young mistress of the house to get into the car, he only smiles gently before making his way back to the driver's seat. From the empty look on her face and the cracked snow globe in her hands from one of her trips to Switzerland, he can guess what has happened. Not that it is her fault entirely, but he quietly sighs at the circumstances.
"Back to the house, Miss?"
She nods blankly back at him.
"He just beat me at the batting game. He just /beat/ /me/," Tatsuya wails as he looks between his scoreboard and Maya's. "You aren't even good at baseball, why--"
Maya presses the reset button and prepares his bat without so much as a look at Tatsuya.
"Birthday boy has all the luck," Satoshi whispers quietly to Tetsuya at the back, and Tetsuya just smiles amusedly to himself.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knows he is being unreasonable, but he is beyond logic at the moment. He is certain she never wants to speak to him ever again after his tantrum in the field. As the days drag on and winter break approaches, he hasn't spoken a word to her and his friends have been quiet too, as if they had been threatened by someone to keep out of his business. Just a gut feeling. Especially since he would catch Tetsuya glaring at Satoshi whenever Satoshi remotely mentioned the word "girls" in his sentences.
(Somewhere between birthday celebration and the next school day Tetsuya had rallied up the rest and warned them sternly. Not that Maya knew, but it did happen.)
He did, however, develop the habit of glancing up at the edge of the roof every time he passed under it. Thankfully he never had to catch another falling shoe. But it threw him off balance now that he couldn't keep track of her.
Occasionally he catches a glance or two from her, but their eye contact never lasts for more than a fraction of a second.
He doesn't care.
Really, he doesn't.
Really.
As with all plans there will come a time of failure, and in this case it came in the form of Satoshi and him being assigned to clean the grounds. Without the threatening presence of Tetsuya, Satoshi's brain-mouth filter is never in function, and as the girls walked past them on their way out of school - Maya promptly ignoring Sayuri and presumably she does the same - Satoshi pops the question while using his broom as a support.
"Oi, Maya, I've been meaning to ask this for the longest time. Did something happen between you and Sayuri?"
He chooses not to answer, praying that the girls are far enough out of earshot now for them to catch Satoshi's question.
"Maya I'm asking you something here!"
"...shut up."
"What? Wait, I asked if something happened between you and--"
Bam.
Before he could register the situation, he finds himself with his fist raised and Satoshi stumbling back, clutching his bruised cheek.
"I told you to /shut up/."
He flings the broom aside and storms out of the gates, smashing each and every angry thought towards her, towards himself, towards his stupid friends into the ground with every step.
On Christmas day (3 weeks without contact, he thinks he's fine now, he thinks he can handle it because... he just thinks he can), he hangs at the arcade playing billiards with the rest - or rather, what is left of "the rest". Shohei has a date with Momo, naturally, and Tetsuya has taken Fumie to the city area to look at the illumination. Satoshi is working overtime at the restaurant, which leaves him with Tatsuya, Yuuki and Makoto (as a friend he hated to admit it, but Makoto was terrible at billiards).
After his third loss in a row while being paired with Makoto, he sets his cue stick down.
"I'm bored. Can we play something else?"
"I dunno, racing?"
"You always win that, Tatsuya."
"I always win everything."
His phone buzzes in his pocket amidst the banter and he pulls it out to see her number flashing on the screen. It feels nostalgic and unfamiliar the same time, and he walks off to a quieter corner to take her call.
"Hello?" He thinks he sounds like a dying chicken, so he clears his throat and tries again. "Hello?"
"I'm outside the arcade. Can you come out?"
He frowns, but follows her instructions anyway. Outside he finds her standing under the streetlamp in a knitted poncho, holding a more irregularly shaped package in her hands. She smiles gingerly at him as he approaches.
"Merry Christmas. I at least wanted to give you this--"
The package is nearly stuffed into his hands.
"--As a Christmas present. And a... belated birthday present, maybe. Just that."
"Oh."
"...I guess I'll go now."
"See you then--" he watches her turn, and quickly adds. "--and thanks."
"Don't mention it," she smiles back and heads down the small road towards the junction.
When he stumbles back into the arcade, Tatsuya is the first to react - jumping out from his seat and grabbing Maya by the shoulders.
"Why are you here?! Man I didn't risk my life telling her that you are here just to watch you come back in here."
"W-What?! She just came to give me this--" he waves the package around. "What is your problem?!"
"It's Christmas!" Tatsuya practically wails. "Why are you with us dudes when you should be walking her home?!"
"She's not going to let me!"
"Oh you little bastard, get out."
And he is unceremoniously dragged and pulled and thrown out of the arcade by his best friends. There really isn't much time for him to feel betrayed though, as he darts down the direction that she headed, catching up with her just as he spots her poncho disappearing behind the door of an expensive looking car.
"W-Wait!"
The old man holding the door looks up, startled, and her face reappears.
"C-Can I walk you home instead?"
She looks to the old man, probably her butler, he assumes, as if asking for permission, and the old man smiles back at her, and then at him, and then at her again.
"I will be at the playground 2 blocks away from the house, Miss. It would be best if Sir and Madam saw you going back in the car."
"Arigatou, Yoshida."
He bows and drives away, leaving Maya standing alone with her on the sidewalk. He coughs and points to the direction where the car is headed.
"That way?"
She shakes her head at points in the opposite direction, grinning.
"It's a one-way road. If we are walking, it's this way."
"Oh. Okay."
He takes a few steps forward, waiting for her to fall in with his strides. She opens up first.
"Have you looked at your present yet?"
"No. Do you want me to open it now?"
"You can."
He clumsily rips the wrapping paper apart with frozen fingers and uncovers an obviously hand-knitted headband. The knit pattern is a simple mix of maroon and gold and the stitching isn't the cleanest, but his insides warm up as he rubs the material between his fingers.
"You made this?"
"Yeah, took me a while," she replies a little shyly. "I had never tried knitting before. It's messy."
"I love it."
"Can I put it on for you?"
He swiftly tugs off his old one, eliciting a burst of laughter from her as he shakes his hair out. She slides the new one in place and tugs on bits of his hair to rearrange it, and though it's a little tight, he thinks he can live with it. Her fingers graze his cheek as she pulls back and he shivers at the iciness of her fingertips.
"How do I look?"
"...Usual," she replies with a soft laugh. "I hope you like it."
"I... I didn't get you anything."
"You can owe me that then."
She sticks her tongue out at him and continues on, her free hands now swinging at her side. He takes this as his cue to jog up to her and - well, it seems perfectly normal for the mood of the moment - he takes her hand in his and stuffs it in the pocket of his jacket.
"Your hands are freezing."
"So are yours..."
His fingers run over a bandage on her forefinger, and he pulls out her otherwise perfectly soft and delicate hand with a frown.
"You're hurt."
"The knitting needle. The constant rubbing just gave me a small blister. It's no big deal."
"...Oh."
He slips her hand back into his pocket. They continue through the rest of the journey, mostly in silence, with occasional comments made about decorations and whatnot, until she stops abruptly before rounding a corner on the hill overlooking the area.
"Yoshida will be waiting round this corner," she explains. "It's where I meet him when I'm out but don't want to get into trouble."
"I see."
"I'm--"
"I'm sorry too. Don't. Just. We should put this behind us. We should put... other circumstances away as well."
"...Yeah. New year. We can start over."
He smiles a little to himself before stepping in to kiss her on the forehead, but somehow she tilts her head at the last moment and he lands on her lips instead. He squeezes her hands lightly while his hear pumps in his ears after a month of not having her physically around, and she pulls back with the mischievous glint back in her eyes.
"Goodnight. Thanks for walking me home."
"I'll see you. Tomorrow. Same time."
Same place.
"Un."
"I'll er, I'll give you your special present tomorrow."
She laughs, almost halfway around the corner now.
"I'll be looking forward to that~"
He'd be there with... something.
He'll figure that out. He had time.
Thank you all so so much for your support over these few years, I had a ton of fun writing and translating, but life has changed quite a bit and I've changed quite a bit so... Yeah. Maybe a good long break from overspending a flailing would be good w
Enjoy these few pieces anyway, I hope. They're set in the Bakaleya verse, Maya / Sayuri which is my ultimate ship from this show because I love Kaoru and I love Taiga and I just think their story could have been built on so much more T^T
Title: Mimosa
Pairing: Maya / Sayuri
Genre: Romance
4 floors.
12 meters? 15?
She dangles her uwabaki from the tip of her toes while sitting on the edge of the roof.
It'll take them just slightly over a second to hit the ground below.
The chilly air of late autumn blasts him in the face as he steps out of the stairwell onto the rooftop. Surely enough, he spots her again by the edge, short head of hair tossed everywhere by the wind.
He is 4 steps away when she speaks up, back facing him.
"I calculated it-" she says in an almost amused voice. "-assuming the building is 12 meters high, it'll take things 1.5 seconds to hit the ground."
He stays silent, watching her carefully until she continued.
"Why are you here?"
"..."
He stands as still as he can, but ready to reach out and grab her if anything--
She turns and smiles at him crookedly
"Ne, race with me?"
At the track, she unceremoniously strips off her white blazer and tosses it onto the patch of withering mimosa by the side of rubber terrain. He follows as she stretches, still bewildered as to why they were doing this at all, but goes along with it quietly anyway. There wasn't any one else around that she could do this with.
"Ready?" The same crooked smile flashes, and before he could respond--
"Go!"
He chases after her, thinking it would be easy to overtake her but the small distance never seems to close. Soon enough - as a gentlemanly gesture, he'd like to think it was - he falls into a comfortable pace behind her, not falling back but not quite catching up either, to let her have her moment of glory. The weather made breathing difficult - with every breath came the overwhelming urge to cough as the cold air attacked his throat - but he keeps it up. The wind picks up her skirt and he catches a few glances of her boyshorts before reminding himself to look away
He slows to a stop right at the finishing line, but she rockets down the track for a good few meters before stopping and coming back to where he is.
"Well," he pants, not used to running this much in the cold. "You win."
The look she gives him is one he couldn't read, and she seems almost frustrated as she pushes back her fringe.
"No, you weren't even trying. We'll go again. This time, /try/."
"Wait--"
And she's off, speeding down the straight stretch without so much as a pause to take a breath and he has no choice - he kicks off from the line again and this time he does try. If she doesn't want him to play nice then he wouldn't. He grits his teeth and a with a yell he pumps everything into a quick burst that puts him in front of her, and he sprints through the rest of the course with his fixed on the ground
He doesn't slow towards the finishing line this time and runs right past it, placing his hands on his knees after he stopped to catch his breath and calm his pulse. He is burning from the blood pumping through his veins and he wipes the sweat off his face hastily as she finally reaches him.
"That..." she takes in a few gulps of air with her hand over her chest. The sweat staining it made it just slightly possible for him to make out the color of her bra. "That's what I'm talking about."
"I won," he replies rather stupidly, tearing his eyes away from her... hand.
She laughs soundlessly.
"First boy to, in fact."
"What?"
He looks up at her tucking her hair behind her ears with the biggest, brightest smile on her face that he has ever seen - and it looks prettier on her than all the practiced smiles she usually wore. Maybe this is the first time someone had actually taken her seriously. Not regarded her as the pampered daughter of a rich family. Treated her like just another classmate
"Thank--"
He cuts her off, holding her skinny shoulders and forcing his lips on hers with blood still pounding in his ears and his breath still not quite back. And as quickly as that moment came - with barely a breath exchanged between their lips - it is gone, and he pulls back to catch his breath, his forehead still on hers.
Her breathes hit his face. He smells a hint of grape from whatever candy she must have been sucking on and it snaps him back to his senses. He steps back slowly and goes to pick up their clothes, expecting her to follow. When he turns he finds her still rooted to the ground, staring blankly downwards
He dusts off her white blazer and drapes it over her shoulders.
"We can do this again. Every time I win I'll get a kiss from you."
Without waiting for a reply he starts walking towards the gate to the tracks, blazer slung over his shoulder.
"What if I win?" she shouts.
He doesn't turn around and simply shrugs, all the while hiding the smile tugging at the corners of his lips - and moments later a blur of white and grey rushes past him and she is ahead of him again, making a beeline for gate with her blazer crumpled in one hand
She turns around for just enough time to flash him a grin and it is all the encouragement he needs. He returns the grin and accepts the challenge.
Title Run Baby Run, Don't Ever Look Back
"Hey guys I don't know how to tell you this but--" Soichi swallows his overly big mouthful of anpan painfully before continuing. "I think... I think Maya is really up to something."
Tatsuya snorts. Tetsuya raises an amused eyebrow, and Makoto leans in with a frown.
"What do you mean?"
"Well... you know how he's been disappearing a lot lately, doing stuff on his own?"
"Yeah?"
"...don't you think that's suspicious?"
Yuki and Makoto almost fall forward at the same time, but Shohei frowns and nods.
"Extremely. I wonder what he's been up to."
"I thought you had some actual information, idiot," Tatsuya reaches over and hits Soichi over his head. "But honestly, I'm curious too."
"Actually..."
All eyes turn to Tetsuya, and he leans back in his chair from all the intense attention.
"Actually, Fumie told me that Sayuri has been skipping out on some meetings of theirs. She's kinda worried but she said that Sayuri looked happy and not... you know..."
Glances are exchanged, and the slow change in their expressions results in Tetsuya sighing rather exasperatedly at his friends. No words are needed when they are making plans like this - which he still thinks is a bad idea but he has no other choice but to go along with it anyway.
And so begins what Tatsuya named their "Super Secret Figure-Out-What-Maya-Is-Up-To-And-Whether-Or-Not-He-Is-Going-Out-With-Sayuri By Stalking Them After School And Catching Them Red Handed" plan, which they realize after just an hour or two isn't really the most effective of plans as they meet back at the foot of the hill with nothing to report on.
"I don't know man," Soichi whines. "I'm tired, can we get something to eat--"
Tatsuya smacks him over the head again.
"More important things are at stake here. Let's go."
Tetsuya sighs.
It is Shohei who spots the "couple" first as they are walking along the train tracks to the game center, and he shouts out excitedly before being gagged by Yuki and Makoto and the whole bunch of them ducks behind the shrubs just in time. Tetsuya peeks out from between the leaves, and surely enough the bandana and short hair are iconic enough for the figures running around the track to be identified.
"What are they /doing/?" Tatsuya whispers (rather loudly).
"...running?"
"I can see that, idiot, but why?"
"I think they're racing each other," Makoto frowns. "That's boring. I wanted to catch them in the middle of something romantic~"
"Like a kiss~" Yuki chides.
"Or an embrace~"
"Or~" The duo looks at each other devilishly before getting promptly nudged in the ribs by Tetsuya.
"Shut up."
"You know," Maya says while trying to catch his breath after their 4th time around the track that afternoon. "They're in the bush watching us..."
Sayuri nods and dries her forehead with the back of her hand, similarly out of breath. "I saw them just now. What should we do?"
"Run."
"They're starting again," Soichi wails. "Aren't they hungry at all?"
"Wait---wait wait wait WAIT they're headed for the gate!"
True to Shohei's words, instead of rounding the last bend the pair takes off through the metal gates and disappears into the residential area in the blink of an eye.
"EMERGENCY. GO."
They duck into an alleyway just as they hear the gang turning the corner and run past where they are hiding ("THEY WENT THAT WAY." "SHIT MAN I CAN'T SEE THEM." "WAIT WE JUST PAST A CREPE STORE--GUYS!! ARGH.), behind a few vending machines. She grins up at him mischievously and he returns it.
"Do I win this round?"
"That doesn't count."
He cups her face anyway--
"AHA!"
He takes one look at Tatsuya standing in the opening of the alleyway, pointing a finger at them with the most scandalized expression on his face, and grabs Sayuri's hand and darts off in the opposite direction.
He doesn't let go of her hand even when they have reached the river bank and they continue running alongside the river, ruining their shoes in the dirt but he doesn't quite care as long as he continue to listen to her laughter - carefree and almost hysterically so. Without realizing it he finds himself laughing too, and moments later he decides to let his friends have it at him. He stops and crashes into the soft grasses, rolling over to look up at late afternoon sky that is slowly turning orange.
The last thing he sees before she throws her blazer over his head is her smiling face. He allows himself a minute to block out the shouts from their pursuers and just take in the light floral, clean scent of her blazer (probably washed and softened and scented by 3 different house staff at home), He has just enough time to hand it back to her before getting dragged up and held in a headlock by Tatsuya.
"You little bastard--"
In the midst of getting noogied and mock punched and poked and shouted at, he looks up at her. She holds her blazer in crossed arms in front of her chest and watches the boys bicker while obviously trying not to double over with laughter. He finds it mildly unfair that he's getting all the beating while she gets out of this without a single tease thrown her way.
She catches his eye, and almost as if to taunt him she turns on her heel, not before sticking out her tongue at him.
"Oi--"
"I'll see you guys in school tomorrow~ Gokigenyo~"
He fights off his captors but doesn't run after her. He has plenty of time to do that tomorrow. And the day after. And after all the training he is sure that he no longer has a problem winning her in a race.
"You're... smiling."
He scoffs at Makoto and picks up his blazer from the ground, dusting it off.
"And blushing," says Yuki.
Tetsuya only offers a reassuring (threatening) pat on his back, and Maya worries just slightly if he would get out of this with his pride intact.
Who was he kidding.
Title: Untitled
As autumn fades into winter, the temperature only continues to fall, and soon enough all that he can look at on his way to the track and field are barren trees and his own breath before him. It doesn't make it any better that she hasn't been around much. Rich girl stuff, he called them jokingly once, when she showed up late for their "dates" at the running track.
She laughed it off and beat him in their race that day, resulting in him running after her to try to get his kiss (which he did eventually, in a rare fit of her giggles and some mild shivering in his sweat soaked shirt with the chilly wind on his back).
But that was a week or two ago, or maybe three, or more, he hasn't been keeping track. He counts himself lucky if she texts him once a day now. Since they can't talk much in school the only time they had was at the track but she has been busy. Something about her father's company falling into deficit. Something about attending events along with her father. Networking.
Rich girl stuff.
He pushes open the rusted gates and heads for the single stone bench under the barren tree, throwing his school bag down there before strolling to the starting line to warm up.
Maybe she'd show up today. As a surprise. Since tomorrow is his birthday.
In her absence he would make sure that he levels up so much that she can never beat him again.
When he goes to check his phone on one of his breaks, there is a text from her on his phone. Said that she'll be here by 7.
He sits under the tree and waits.
He doesn't bother looking up when he hears hurried footsteps approaching. No one else would be at the track at this hour.
"I-I'm sorry, the event--"
"It's 9.41," he says blankly, finally looking up. "You'd be here by 7, you said?"
She's too dolled up, he thinks as he fights the urge to scrunch his nose at her expensive looking peacoat and perfectly done makeup and hair and everything. Pretty. But it's not her. The Sayuri he knows--
"Yeah but--" She stops to catch her breath. "I-I couldn't get out early."
"You could have called."
"My phone ran out of battery."
"..."
"I'm not lying."
He pushes himself off the bench, and stands up straight in front of her.
"I'm not going to race you when you're in those shoes."
She simply hands him a delicately wrapped box in her hands. He takes it and it weighs down heavily in his hands.
"What is it?"
"It's for your birthday."
"It's tomorrow."
She chews on her bottom lip and casts her eyes downwards. Without her saying anything he knows what is about to come, and all the anger he's been keeping in check for the past few week explodes and before he knows it - the box is making a perfect parabola in the air before landing with a sickening crash a good distance away.
"I don't want your expensive presents. If you think you can just... look down on me like that," he snaps, and it just doesn't register that she's backing up with the same broken expression he had seen on her face months ago on the rooftop. "You are wrong. Go back to your ojou-sama life. I don't want anything to do with you."
The butler is usually a quiet, old man. As he opens the door for the young mistress of the house to get into the car, he only smiles gently before making his way back to the driver's seat. From the empty look on her face and the cracked snow globe in her hands from one of her trips to Switzerland, he can guess what has happened. Not that it is her fault entirely, but he quietly sighs at the circumstances.
"Back to the house, Miss?"
She nods blankly back at him.
"He just beat me at the batting game. He just /beat/ /me/," Tatsuya wails as he looks between his scoreboard and Maya's. "You aren't even good at baseball, why--"
Maya presses the reset button and prepares his bat without so much as a look at Tatsuya.
"Birthday boy has all the luck," Satoshi whispers quietly to Tetsuya at the back, and Tetsuya just smiles amusedly to himself.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knows he is being unreasonable, but he is beyond logic at the moment. He is certain she never wants to speak to him ever again after his tantrum in the field. As the days drag on and winter break approaches, he hasn't spoken a word to her and his friends have been quiet too, as if they had been threatened by someone to keep out of his business. Just a gut feeling. Especially since he would catch Tetsuya glaring at Satoshi whenever Satoshi remotely mentioned the word "girls" in his sentences.
(Somewhere between birthday celebration and the next school day Tetsuya had rallied up the rest and warned them sternly. Not that Maya knew, but it did happen.)
He did, however, develop the habit of glancing up at the edge of the roof every time he passed under it. Thankfully he never had to catch another falling shoe. But it threw him off balance now that he couldn't keep track of her.
Occasionally he catches a glance or two from her, but their eye contact never lasts for more than a fraction of a second.
He doesn't care.
Really, he doesn't.
Really.
As with all plans there will come a time of failure, and in this case it came in the form of Satoshi and him being assigned to clean the grounds. Without the threatening presence of Tetsuya, Satoshi's brain-mouth filter is never in function, and as the girls walked past them on their way out of school - Maya promptly ignoring Sayuri and presumably she does the same - Satoshi pops the question while using his broom as a support.
"Oi, Maya, I've been meaning to ask this for the longest time. Did something happen between you and Sayuri?"
He chooses not to answer, praying that the girls are far enough out of earshot now for them to catch Satoshi's question.
"Maya I'm asking you something here!"
"...shut up."
"What? Wait, I asked if something happened between you and--"
Bam.
Before he could register the situation, he finds himself with his fist raised and Satoshi stumbling back, clutching his bruised cheek.
"I told you to /shut up/."
He flings the broom aside and storms out of the gates, smashing each and every angry thought towards her, towards himself, towards his stupid friends into the ground with every step.
On Christmas day (3 weeks without contact, he thinks he's fine now, he thinks he can handle it because... he just thinks he can), he hangs at the arcade playing billiards with the rest - or rather, what is left of "the rest". Shohei has a date with Momo, naturally, and Tetsuya has taken Fumie to the city area to look at the illumination. Satoshi is working overtime at the restaurant, which leaves him with Tatsuya, Yuuki and Makoto (as a friend he hated to admit it, but Makoto was terrible at billiards).
After his third loss in a row while being paired with Makoto, he sets his cue stick down.
"I'm bored. Can we play something else?"
"I dunno, racing?"
"You always win that, Tatsuya."
"I always win everything."
His phone buzzes in his pocket amidst the banter and he pulls it out to see her number flashing on the screen. It feels nostalgic and unfamiliar the same time, and he walks off to a quieter corner to take her call.
"Hello?" He thinks he sounds like a dying chicken, so he clears his throat and tries again. "Hello?"
"I'm outside the arcade. Can you come out?"
He frowns, but follows her instructions anyway. Outside he finds her standing under the streetlamp in a knitted poncho, holding a more irregularly shaped package in her hands. She smiles gingerly at him as he approaches.
"Merry Christmas. I at least wanted to give you this--"
The package is nearly stuffed into his hands.
"--As a Christmas present. And a... belated birthday present, maybe. Just that."
"Oh."
"...I guess I'll go now."
"See you then--" he watches her turn, and quickly adds. "--and thanks."
"Don't mention it," she smiles back and heads down the small road towards the junction.
When he stumbles back into the arcade, Tatsuya is the first to react - jumping out from his seat and grabbing Maya by the shoulders.
"Why are you here?! Man I didn't risk my life telling her that you are here just to watch you come back in here."
"W-What?! She just came to give me this--" he waves the package around. "What is your problem?!"
"It's Christmas!" Tatsuya practically wails. "Why are you with us dudes when you should be walking her home?!"
"She's not going to let me!"
"Oh you little bastard, get out."
And he is unceremoniously dragged and pulled and thrown out of the arcade by his best friends. There really isn't much time for him to feel betrayed though, as he darts down the direction that she headed, catching up with her just as he spots her poncho disappearing behind the door of an expensive looking car.
"W-Wait!"
The old man holding the door looks up, startled, and her face reappears.
"C-Can I walk you home instead?"
She looks to the old man, probably her butler, he assumes, as if asking for permission, and the old man smiles back at her, and then at him, and then at her again.
"I will be at the playground 2 blocks away from the house, Miss. It would be best if Sir and Madam saw you going back in the car."
"Arigatou, Yoshida."
He bows and drives away, leaving Maya standing alone with her on the sidewalk. He coughs and points to the direction where the car is headed.
"That way?"
She shakes her head at points in the opposite direction, grinning.
"It's a one-way road. If we are walking, it's this way."
"Oh. Okay."
He takes a few steps forward, waiting for her to fall in with his strides. She opens up first.
"Have you looked at your present yet?"
"No. Do you want me to open it now?"
"You can."
He clumsily rips the wrapping paper apart with frozen fingers and uncovers an obviously hand-knitted headband. The knit pattern is a simple mix of maroon and gold and the stitching isn't the cleanest, but his insides warm up as he rubs the material between his fingers.
"You made this?"
"Yeah, took me a while," she replies a little shyly. "I had never tried knitting before. It's messy."
"I love it."
"Can I put it on for you?"
He swiftly tugs off his old one, eliciting a burst of laughter from her as he shakes his hair out. She slides the new one in place and tugs on bits of his hair to rearrange it, and though it's a little tight, he thinks he can live with it. Her fingers graze his cheek as she pulls back and he shivers at the iciness of her fingertips.
"How do I look?"
"...Usual," she replies with a soft laugh. "I hope you like it."
"I... I didn't get you anything."
"You can owe me that then."
She sticks her tongue out at him and continues on, her free hands now swinging at her side. He takes this as his cue to jog up to her and - well, it seems perfectly normal for the mood of the moment - he takes her hand in his and stuffs it in the pocket of his jacket.
"Your hands are freezing."
"So are yours..."
His fingers run over a bandage on her forefinger, and he pulls out her otherwise perfectly soft and delicate hand with a frown.
"You're hurt."
"The knitting needle. The constant rubbing just gave me a small blister. It's no big deal."
"...Oh."
He slips her hand back into his pocket. They continue through the rest of the journey, mostly in silence, with occasional comments made about decorations and whatnot, until she stops abruptly before rounding a corner on the hill overlooking the area.
"Yoshida will be waiting round this corner," she explains. "It's where I meet him when I'm out but don't want to get into trouble."
"I see."
"I'm--"
"I'm sorry too. Don't. Just. We should put this behind us. We should put... other circumstances away as well."
"...Yeah. New year. We can start over."
He smiles a little to himself before stepping in to kiss her on the forehead, but somehow she tilts her head at the last moment and he lands on her lips instead. He squeezes her hands lightly while his hear pumps in his ears after a month of not having her physically around, and she pulls back with the mischievous glint back in her eyes.
"Goodnight. Thanks for walking me home."
"I'll see you. Tomorrow. Same time."
Same place.
"Un."
"I'll er, I'll give you your special present tomorrow."
She laughs, almost halfway around the corner now.
"I'll be looking forward to that~"
He'd be there with... something.
He'll figure that out. He had time.