[kirilenko]
HATE, POTENTIALLY LOVE
by yumehikouki
Kirihara was the boy, the only 2nd year, who had caught my eye the day of team tryouts.
He was the only person without fear streaked across his face, the only one with a twisted grin of cocky determination. From the moment he stepped onto the court, I remembered my heart skipping a beat with excitement each time he effortlessly gained a point, each time he violently smashed the ball.
Someone new and intriguing had appeared right in the midst of Rikkaidai. Someone different, someone unlike the other students who were cluttered around like sheep for slaughter (a slaughter for him, that was). This was someone with incontrollable potential. And all this I saw with but that first glance into that boy's eyes.
Which is why, the first order of action I took - immediately after his first win - was to consult with Yanagi.
"He has potential, that second year." I informed the data-genius, knowing well enough that Yanagi didn't need a name to understand my words.
"Kirihara Akaya, I believe." Yanagi replied, glancing down at his clipboard and writing a few words under the boy's.
"Kirihara." I said, echoing Yanagi's voice. It was a name, a name of which, at the time, meant nothing more to me than a prize, a name which I would soon be glad to have remembered. "What do you think of him, Renji?"
"He's got good form, the basics are all there too. However," He paused momentarily, and a flash of cunning analysis sprinted across his eyes. I immediately knew that Yanagi had read Kirihara completely. "He's a bit too reckless."
"How so?"
Kirihara Akaya crushed another opponent. His dancing, languid smirk stretching wider and wider with each passing second. And I smiled.
"He hits the tennis ball at the opponent with a bit more force than needed," answered Yanagi, "And, when serving, he intentionally forces an unpredictable receive for the opponent using the slant of his racket "
"Anything else?"
"Well," Yanagi paused, and his gaze followed the boy to the sidelines, where his next kill was waiting. "There is that infamous, contemptuous grimace of his that emerges every time he scores a point. And that overconfident look he always casts his opponents."
"But, other than that, he's a great player, isn't he?" I added, taking a look at Yanagi's clipboard myself.
It was no surprise. The page contained the familiar 10-point score sheet, with the usual information of name, grade and class, address, and medical conditions (to which Kirihara apparently had none). The almost exact same phrases he'd recited to me earlier were scribbled down in the comments area at the bottom of the page - with the exception of that last bit, but everyone in the club already knew Kirihara's tendency to gloat and make a fool of himself.
"Other than all that, Seiichi, he's a great player." Yanagi replied, without even needing to relook at the boy's near-perfect point score.
"Do you think he's good enough for the team?"
"That's not for me to decide," he said, "You are the captain." He flipped to the next page, recording another student's score. Not surprisingly, he didn't at all have near as many comments about this one.
It took a few more seconds for me to decide the exact way to handle this Kirihara Akaya's initiation: a final obstacle.
"Get your racket, Yanagi." I ordered, immediately stopping his flow of writing. "You're playing a match against Akaya."
The tension between Yanagi and Kirihara Akaya wasn't at all what I expected, nor was it satisfying. But however condescending Akaya's expression was as he faced Yanagi across the net just didn't seem to make up for the expected calm of his calculating opponent. I chose to match the two of them together for a reason. For the element of surprise. But apparently, that was exactly what the moment seemed to lack.
"Rough or smooth, Senpai?" His confident voice droned across the court, hands grasping the grip of his tennis racket.
Yanagi didn't seem to be paying attention, even though to everyone else in the court he was staring straight at - or through- Kirihara.
"Senpai, hello?" Kirihara stepped towards the net and waved his racket recklessly from side to side as if a massive upside down pendulum would snap Yanagi out of whatever dream he was in. "Rough or smooth?"
"It's your call, Kirihara-kun." Yanagi replied upon returning his attention to the situation at hand. He was unfazed at the previous silence.
"You sure, Senpai? Wouldn't want ya' to get an accidental handicap from me or something."
"I'll give you the benefit of the doubt."
"Whatever you say, Senpai. Don't blame me if this costs you the match." He gave another grin and twirled the racket, calling out "rough!" before stepping back to watch it fall.
And, rough it was.
The rest of the match wasn't worth much for all it was worth. A simple sequence of defeat and conquer happened necessarily and quickly.
Kirihara served first. Yanagi purposely missed a couple. Kirihara's confidence built up. And Yanagi striked it down all at once.
It was like popping a bubble.
And, before anyone could guess it, Kirihara was on his knees, hair drenched in sweat, eyes glued to the ground, body shifting up and down from his breaths. I didn't need to be up close to him to know the expression of disbelief painted across his pained face. Sanada, Yanagi, and I had seen it a thousand times, on our peers, on each other.
This does make him one of us, considering. I wouldn't have placed him against Yanagi if I knew he would've won; Yanagi himself knew that. Despite all that, Yanagi didn't walk back immediately to his clipboard as the match ended. Instead, he crossed the court, picked up Kirihara's towel, and handed it over to the crushed boy on the cement.
"Here." I overheard from behind, curious as to Yanagi's unusual actions. "You'll need this. Get up and clear the court, there's another match soon."
No response from Kirihara was heard.
"Kirihara-kun," Yanagi insisted. The people around them were beginning to divert their attention to the frozen scene on the court. "Here's your towel."
Silence resonated in their court, right between Yanagi and Kirihara. It was pierced in a moment by the shriek that followed.
"Rematch!" the boy yowled. Kirihara had spoken his first response since the end of the match, snatching his towel away from Yanagi's hand and swinging it angrily over his shoulders.
He just stood there; his eyes, red and piercing, glaring right into Yanagi's calm ones. He was huffing and panting and cursing under his breath and his demeanor seemed to be close to that of a very large nuclear explosion.
Yanagi didn't give an immediate response. He merely assumed the role of another spectator of the fool that was the heated Kirihara. Now that the match was over, Yanagi simply had no motive to treat him as an opponent.
Kirihara inhaled deeply, his fists balled up and fingers curled deep into his sweaty palm, and repeated, "rematch, Senpai."
I expected him to realize at one point in time that Yanagi was not a man to approach with screaming, nor nonsense. And, now was a better time than any. I expected Yanagi to give a detailed, logical lecture to the boy about the perils of over-reaction and red eye. And, now was a better time than any.
However, the latter did not happen; Yanagi opened his mouth, and instead of saying the words I was accustomed to hear, a new string of sounds crossed the air.
"We can have a rematch anytime you'd like." He replied, voice not a bit altered throughout the whole procession. "Focus on getting onto the team, and we can have a rematch anytime you'd like.
The next few words, the mass of murmurs I couldn't catch from Kirihara, were a mystery to me. Whatever meaning they had, whatever rash statements the boy had decided to make, had Yanagi, at last, walking away.
"So, tell me," I inquired as soon as he picked up his clipboard once more. "What did that boy say?"
There's an immediate flash, gone as fast as it had arrived, that disturbed the tranquility in Yanagi's eyes. But both he and I ignored the fact of its existence, allowing it to only sever a moment in time from our conversation.
"He said," He took a deep breath, somewhat similar to the breath that Kirihara had taken. "he said that he'll get on this team and he'll make sure to beat me. And you. And anybody else that'd dare stand in his way.
"Those are his exacts words? You're not paraphrasing, are you?" Kirihara's unconscious declaration of war caused my heart to again skip a couple of beats.
"His exact words, Yukimura." Yanagi nonchalantly flipped back to Kirihara's score sheet. .
"Do you believe them?" I glanced in the direction of Kirihara now and smiled as I caught him taking vengeance on the wall, as if it had some fault in his loss. "His words and intentions, I mean."
"I'll believe them for as long as he does."
He paused. Then, he looked at me.
"Or, for as long as you intend to make him believe."
I noticed the sly comment he manages to slide in, a Yanagi-like joke, I suppose. Backed with the morbid truth, it was something only Yanagi himself could pull off with such certainty.
I looked at him, but before I'm able to respond, he placed the clipboard into my hands, gave me the nod to begin my elimination, and headed back for the locker room.
On the clipboard, drawn in Yanagi's own handwriting, was a star next to Kirihara Akaya's name.
What a naïve, prideful, foolish, inexperienced boy. He doesn't have a chance. I know he doesn't have a chance. I told him he doesn't have a chance. Yanagi told him, "You don't have a chance." He should very well know by now that he doesn't have a chance. And yet, by some flaw of the universe, he's unaware of all of it. Unheeding to Yanagi's continued warnings of "why don't you play against me first, Kirihara?" Arrogant to Sanada's obvious grunt, retort, of "if you dare." In denial of the obvious truth both God and everyone else in the club is aware of.
Yet, he doesn't give up. Kirihara Akaya continues to pester me day by day, asking to play against me.
Monday. "Yukimura-buchou! Do you have time for a match against me today?" I refuse, saying I'm busy today. Tuesday. "How about today? You don't seem to be busy." I shake my head, reply that I have some previous engagement to attend to. Wednesday. "Okay, Yukimura-buchou. I asked Yanagi today, and he said you didn't have anything on your schedule." I chuckle at him, asking him if Yanagi had said anything else.
"Not really…well…kind of, but not really." Kirihara avoids my gaze, voice mumbling.
"What else did Yanagi say, Kirihara?" I smile at him, causing an instant twitch in his eyebrows.
"E-eh…that I'm - well, I personally don't think it's true, Buchou but-…he said I'm not ready yet?" He looks up at me with the best puppy face he can manage, trying to dissuade me from my usual trust of Yanagi's words.
"Listen to Yanagi." Another reassuring smile, and I'm on my way, leaving Kirihara in the background, the continuous sound of his sneakers stabbing the ground and the low, yet distinct, stream of curses as his farewell to me.
The same daily ritual of greeting occurred for the next week. I stand at the courts right now, watching a couple of third-years playing a match. And Kirihara marches up to me now, eyes more fiery and determined than usual.
"I don't care what Yanagi says, I want a match with you, Yukimura-buchou. A match. Today. Right now."
"Ah, but I care about what Yanagi says." I reply suavely, raising my eyebrows at him. Perhaps he had a bad day at school?
"Screw what Yanagi says. He keeps telling me that I'm 'not ready,' whatever the hell that means. I think I'm ready. Way past ready. And you shouldn't deny me a match, Buchou."
I consider his proposal for a moment, looking into his frustrated face, and then said, "you don't trust Yanagi's words?"
Kirihara shakes his head. "It's not that I don't trust them, just they're a bit touchy-feely, if you know what I mean. Something about how I'd get all my hopes crushed if I played against you, something about going into mental trauma, rehabilitation, that kind of stuff." He grins at me. "A bit overrated, don't you think?"
Just like Yanagi to refer to far-fetched situations when logic fails to work on Kirihara - as it usually does fail.
"So, against Yanagi's words, against Sanada's words, and against mine as well, you challenge me to a match?" I ask again, for reassurance this time. No more joking around.
"Exactly. Now you're catching the drift, Yukimura-buchou." He grabs the racket in his hand tighter, in anxiety of the moment that has finally come. "Which court are we playing on?"
I give the foolish boy a smile - the one my unfortunate opponent always receives - and point towards the first court. "Let's not waste a second then, shall we?"
We played. If you could even call it playing.
A matter of a couple of minutes, and the match was over. Simple, child play.
Kirihara lays faced up on the ground, a familiar image of his first match against Yanagi. Parts of his arms and legs are scratched, just a bit bloody from trying to return the unreachable balls, from trying desperately to win a point. He doesn't get up for the next five minutes, maybe more, just lays there on the ground, as if realizing finally just where he stands in my team.
I told him. Sanada told him. Renji- most importantly - told him. But he doesn't listen. Never does. This is his price to pay, the lesson that should've been taught to him after that very first match against Yanagi.
What turns into a ridiculous match for me would soon turn into an unforgettable beating for the little Kirihara Akaya. There's nothing worth noting for me, other than his weak state that I know he is in - the ridiculous carrion of a living being that is him.
It's not until later, that I realize what was missing from the surreal match.
Out of all the spectators, Yanagi was nowhere to be seen.
"Shut the hell up," I overhear as I round a corner of the locker room; a voice, coarse and harsh in its delivery, seems to be shouting at something. "Just shut up. I hate your advice."
I had wandered into the locker room to take a quick shower, to get the disgraceful air of Kirihara's lost off my skin, but apparently, I'm about to receive more than I bargained for.
"How can you hate my advice, Kirihara, if you never listened to it in the first place?" A much more controlled, yet somewhat quivering tone, replies back.
I stop my steps, realizing that this is where Yanagi had probably been during Kirihara's match - waiting here in the locker room, somewhere he knows Kirihara would eventually come sprawling back to. This is where Kirihara, unwantingly and unknowingly, wanders right into Yanagi's trap.
Something is changed in the boy - something I expect to appear once he'd face me in a match and lose. It's just unfortunate of Yanagi to be right there, to decide, that he's the one to receive Kirihara's anger, the one to keep the flaming candle from burning itself out. I kneel down on one of the benches, hiding myself three locker rows behind the two of them, a good distance for a watcher, a bystander, a coach.
"Fuck you, senpai." Kirihara's voice drones on, hisses. A bang resounds as something's thrown harshly into a locker. "Didn't I tell you to shut up?"
A pause. Silence.
"You did," Yanagi continues, voice leveled, much in the same way a pressured water tank has to be kept under control. "Yet, you didn't listen to my advice. There shouldn't be any reason for me to listen to yours."
Thud. Another object is tossed into the locker. Kirihara then shouts, "What're you trying to get at?"
"Why did you challenge Yukimura?"
"I can challenge whoever the hell I want. You're not my mother, you know. As hard as it is to believe." His voice is biting, snapping at the cords that hold Yanagi's patience intact.
"Why did you challenge him?" Yanagi repeats, emphasize on his question. Kirihara hadn't properly answered the question at all.
"Some data collector you are." Kirihara scoffs. "Yukimura- buchou's the best, right? The best of the best. I came to Rikkai to be the best. Who else would I challenge but the best of the best?"
"And you thought that would be a just enough reason to ignore all other protests?" Yanagi's voice raises, slightly, the change probably unnoticed by Kirihara.
"What other protests? There's no other protests that matter but my own. So just fucking leave me alone, Yanagi." Feet begin shuffling, signifying Kirihara's leave.
"You didn't even hear my protests, Akaya?" Yanagi's voice hovers above all other sounds -louder than Kirihara's previous screams- even despite its low tone.
The sound of footsteps cease, delay in their departure. I wonder what caused it: fortune, luck? Or, maybe just the wavering emotion in Yanagi's voice. Could the boy have caught that?
"No, Yanagi. I didn't." Kirihara states, enunciating his words, his proclamation.
"Why didn't you?" He insists. Yanagi might have been just playing for time now, knowing if Kirihara left now, things would forever be in disharmony.
"Even if I tried to listen, I wouldn't have fucking heard your protests anyway."
"And," There's a break in Yanagi's fluency, as if for once in his life, he isn't sure at all how things will turn out. "Why is that? Why can you not hear me?"
"Why, why, why, why. Stop asking why and just take things as they are. I'm never going to hear you, nor anybody. And that's just the way I am. So fucking deal with it."
There are times when I know that the amount of cussing Kirihara uses in his speech is directly proportional to his anger. And yet, regardless of the continuously pausing Yanagi, voice more uncertain and slow in response than ever, regardless of the obvious passion in Kirihara's voice, the situation has no explosive value - the match to light the bomb is nowhere to be seen or felt.
Kirihara's footsteps commence again, and I expect them to completely disappear away this time; Yanagi speaks once again.
"That's not the way you are, Akaya. I know." Yanagi's voice stops the footsteps, in much the same way as before.
A desperation has sunken into his voice. I question myself, not sure if a situation that provokes so much change in Yanagi is a situation I should be eavesdropping on. Regardless, I'm captain. That gives me some sort of exception, ethically and morally.
"How the hell do you know what I'm like?" Kirihara retorts for rhetorical effect, until realizing that of course, Yanagi knows almost everything about everyone. "Oh, right. You're a fucking stalker, that's why."
Ignoring the boy's obvious insult, Yanagi continues, "do you still remember what you promised me the first time we played?" He slows his voice down from the statement before, attempting - yet, failing - to regain composure. Two personalities driven by pure impulse - two Kirihara Akayas - in the room wouldn't bring any sort of closure.
"Yeah, I do." Kirihara seems to regain the slightest bit of patience, curious as to what Yanagi plans to reveal. "That I'm going to pummel you to the ground. That I'm going to crush Sanada and Yukimura and anyone else that stands in my way."
Regret and frustration marks itself in Kirihara's voice. How the thought of being unable to fulfill his promise to himself must have bothered him day and night. The boy does cleave to his promises, if not anything else.
"What about it?" Kirihara asks impatiently, not understanding.
"Then, according to your promise," Yanagi pauses - the harbinger to his upcoming revelation. "Shouldn't I be your first concern?"
There's no answer from Kirihara, an obvious sign that the boy doesn't see Yanagi's point at all. He speaks, irritated, "stop speaking in fucking riddles. What are you trying to say?"
"Then, tell me, Kirihara Akaya," He regains some of his previous confidence, the calm - an everlasting one, that is - before the storm. "Why haven't you challenged me? Why haven't you slipped out one word about me, about wanting to pummel me into the ground?"
"You can't hear me cussing out at you?" Kirihara snarls, or, at least, his voice sounds near close to a beast, finally and fatally agitated.
"Cussing me out and challenging me are two different actions, Kirihara." There is no doubt that Yanagi has completely regained his dominance in the conversation. "Now, tell me."
The logic Yanagi presents, set in front of Kirihara, who as hard as he will try to deny it, reverses their roles. No response from the boy is heard.
"You're a real pain in the ass, you know that, Yanagi?" Kirihara responds after an ample pause.
"I may be. But you have yet to answer my question."
"And there's something seriously screwed up in your head, you know that?"
"That may be true as well. Just answer the question, Kirihara."
"Well - I …what if I don't want to answer it?" He challenges. Yanagi's wanted answer is still allusive by all means - Kirihara refuses to tell him directly.
"Everyone knows there's nothing you could possibly hide. You wear your emotions like a kid wears his reward stickers from the dentist. So, just say it."
"I do not wear my emotions like a kid!" Kirihara diverts away from the subject, voice still a bit heated and raged, but nevertheless calmed down.
"Why haven't you challenged me, Kirihara?" Yanagi doesn't seem to waste a second once Kirihara steers away from the point; there's some more shuffling of feet (Yanagi's footsteps, I presume) and then silence befalls once again.
I'm not able to see their actual faces, nor any light or looks of their eyes, but even I can tell Kirihara is all but eager to answer the question. Yanagi has uncovered something prized, something even Kirihara hasn't realized until now. Something possibly worth more than Kirihara himself.
"I- well, there's really nothing to it, really. Just - just, well," Kirihara's speech stutters; the boy attempts to find the best way to convey his words to Yanagi. Whether he's afraid of embarrasing himself, or whether he just holds no trust to Yanagi all together, I don't know. "I, uhh- well, I didn't want you to lose to me so bad. Seeing as how good I've got and you haven't."
The condescending tone in his voice is fake, counterfeited, and it's not enough to pass Yanagi unnoticed.
"This is coming from the same person who just lost to Yukimura 6-0? Kirihara, I need the truth." His voice is firm, determined. "The real truth. Not the truth you assume it to be, the truth you try to sell to me."
"I wasn't - well, maybe, I…" Another pause colors the air, and neither speaks nor moves. But then, Kirihara talks, rashly and hotly. "Why the hell does it matter, Yanagi?"
Then, footsteps, faster than the ones before. The harsh opening of the door and the loud pound of its closing. Finally, the buzzing of the fluorescent lights overhead.
I hear the slightest of a sigh, and then the faint, weakened voice of Yanagi saying, "you can come out now, Yukimura."
He knows that I've been here the whole time - yet he did not compromise my position at all. He allows me to hear the conversation, and when it ended, he then chooses to reveal me. Did Yanagi permit me to listen because he thought nothing important would've happened between Kirihara and him? Or, did he permit me to listen only because he thought something important would happen, and that I'd be the only person to hear him out?
Strange, how up till now, I have always thought of Yanagi as predictable as he is skilled at prediction. Yet, as captain, as coach, how much do I know about Yanagi? About Kirihara? About the two of them?
"What did you think of that, Yukimura?" He speaks again, even though I have yet to move into his view.
I step out of my hiding place, and walk towards Yanagi, an all-occasion smile on my face, unsure of what might soon be in store. "It was interesting, at the least. I didn't know our little Akaya had it in him."
"Had the ability to challenge you, you mean?" He inquires me, returning my smile with another. I can't read Yanagi right now.
"The ability to challenge you, actually. I expected him to challenge me one day or another. Not you, though." I sit down on the nearest bench, my eyes searching Yanagi's for the feeling I'm hoping to find.
"But he didn't challenge me. You heard him. He refused me on both occasions - the reason and the challenge itself."
"What sort of courage do you think Kirihara had to have to challenge me, Yanagi?"
"A mighty one. A suicidal one too, if that's what you want to call it."
I crack a small grin at his sarcasm, aimed at the realism of the situation, and say, "And, what sort of courage do you think Kirihara had to hold such trust in you?"
"Trust, Yukimura? Did any of that seem like trust to you?"
"All of it, Yanagi." I nod. "Trust in Kirihara's own devilish, demented, childish way. The fact that he never once asks you for a match. That's his type of trust."
"I'm not sure I understand, Yukimura. If he trusts in me so much, why does he not listen to anything I say?"
"Just because he trusts you doesn't mean he's not foolish."
"Kirihara Akaya comes in here, screams at me - more than he usually does -, refuses to answer my one real question, and then stomps out. You don't call that trust." He returns my statement, anger, caused partially by confusion, ruffling his air of calmness. "In fact, last time I checked, Yukimura, I believe it was called hate."
"That boy," I remotely smile, wondering if what I'm about to say is entirely true. "He's kind of like a little kindergartner, isn't he?"
Yanagi gives me a fake look of surprise, and allows me to continue.
"He just seems to tease and make whoever he likes angry, doesn't he?"
Yanagi's attention focuses on me, finally catching the hint in my words. His eyes narrow, unsure of why exactly he's even bothering to listen.
"Just like a little boy insults and annoys the little girl he likes, before asking her out. Don't you think?"
Alright, so I'm just playing around with him now. I can't be blamed for wanting to mess with the sort of man who never lets down his guard, can I?
"Yukimura," He slows down his speech, for the second time today. Yanagi holds his glance at me for several seconds, before speaking again. "You were right."
"About what?" I ask back, partially unbelieving that perhaps my guesses are indeed correct.
"He does have potential, that second year, that Kirihara Akaya."
by yumehikouki
Kirihara was the boy, the only 2nd year, who had caught my eye the day of team tryouts.
He was the only person without fear streaked across his face, the only one with a twisted grin of cocky determination. From the moment he stepped onto the court, I remembered my heart skipping a beat with excitement each time he effortlessly gained a point, each time he violently smashed the ball.
Someone new and intriguing had appeared right in the midst of Rikkaidai. Someone different, someone unlike the other students who were cluttered around like sheep for slaughter (a slaughter for him, that was). This was someone with incontrollable potential. And all this I saw with but that first glance into that boy's eyes.
Which is why, the first order of action I took - immediately after his first win - was to consult with Yanagi.
"He has potential, that second year." I informed the data-genius, knowing well enough that Yanagi didn't need a name to understand my words.
"Kirihara Akaya, I believe." Yanagi replied, glancing down at his clipboard and writing a few words under the boy's.
"Kirihara." I said, echoing Yanagi's voice. It was a name, a name of which, at the time, meant nothing more to me than a prize, a name which I would soon be glad to have remembered. "What do you think of him, Renji?"
"He's got good form, the basics are all there too. However," He paused momentarily, and a flash of cunning analysis sprinted across his eyes. I immediately knew that Yanagi had read Kirihara completely. "He's a bit too reckless."
"How so?"
Kirihara Akaya crushed another opponent. His dancing, languid smirk stretching wider and wider with each passing second. And I smiled.
"He hits the tennis ball at the opponent with a bit more force than needed," answered Yanagi, "And, when serving, he intentionally forces an unpredictable receive for the opponent using the slant of his racket "
"Anything else?"
"Well," Yanagi paused, and his gaze followed the boy to the sidelines, where his next kill was waiting. "There is that infamous, contemptuous grimace of his that emerges every time he scores a point. And that overconfident look he always casts his opponents."
"But, other than that, he's a great player, isn't he?" I added, taking a look at Yanagi's clipboard myself.
It was no surprise. The page contained the familiar 10-point score sheet, with the usual information of name, grade and class, address, and medical conditions (to which Kirihara apparently had none). The almost exact same phrases he'd recited to me earlier were scribbled down in the comments area at the bottom of the page - with the exception of that last bit, but everyone in the club already knew Kirihara's tendency to gloat and make a fool of himself.
"Other than all that, Seiichi, he's a great player." Yanagi replied, without even needing to relook at the boy's near-perfect point score.
"Do you think he's good enough for the team?"
"That's not for me to decide," he said, "You are the captain." He flipped to the next page, recording another student's score. Not surprisingly, he didn't at all have near as many comments about this one.
It took a few more seconds for me to decide the exact way to handle this Kirihara Akaya's initiation: a final obstacle.
"Get your racket, Yanagi." I ordered, immediately stopping his flow of writing. "You're playing a match against Akaya."
The tension between Yanagi and Kirihara Akaya wasn't at all what I expected, nor was it satisfying. But however condescending Akaya's expression was as he faced Yanagi across the net just didn't seem to make up for the expected calm of his calculating opponent. I chose to match the two of them together for a reason. For the element of surprise. But apparently, that was exactly what the moment seemed to lack.
"Rough or smooth, Senpai?" His confident voice droned across the court, hands grasping the grip of his tennis racket.
Yanagi didn't seem to be paying attention, even though to everyone else in the court he was staring straight at - or through- Kirihara.
"Senpai, hello?" Kirihara stepped towards the net and waved his racket recklessly from side to side as if a massive upside down pendulum would snap Yanagi out of whatever dream he was in. "Rough or smooth?"
"It's your call, Kirihara-kun." Yanagi replied upon returning his attention to the situation at hand. He was unfazed at the previous silence.
"You sure, Senpai? Wouldn't want ya' to get an accidental handicap from me or something."
"I'll give you the benefit of the doubt."
"Whatever you say, Senpai. Don't blame me if this costs you the match." He gave another grin and twirled the racket, calling out "rough!" before stepping back to watch it fall.
And, rough it was.
The rest of the match wasn't worth much for all it was worth. A simple sequence of defeat and conquer happened necessarily and quickly.
Kirihara served first. Yanagi purposely missed a couple. Kirihara's confidence built up. And Yanagi striked it down all at once.
It was like popping a bubble.
And, before anyone could guess it, Kirihara was on his knees, hair drenched in sweat, eyes glued to the ground, body shifting up and down from his breaths. I didn't need to be up close to him to know the expression of disbelief painted across his pained face. Sanada, Yanagi, and I had seen it a thousand times, on our peers, on each other.
This does make him one of us, considering. I wouldn't have placed him against Yanagi if I knew he would've won; Yanagi himself knew that. Despite all that, Yanagi didn't walk back immediately to his clipboard as the match ended. Instead, he crossed the court, picked up Kirihara's towel, and handed it over to the crushed boy on the cement.
"Here." I overheard from behind, curious as to Yanagi's unusual actions. "You'll need this. Get up and clear the court, there's another match soon."
No response from Kirihara was heard.
"Kirihara-kun," Yanagi insisted. The people around them were beginning to divert their attention to the frozen scene on the court. "Here's your towel."
Silence resonated in their court, right between Yanagi and Kirihara. It was pierced in a moment by the shriek that followed.
"Rematch!" the boy yowled. Kirihara had spoken his first response since the end of the match, snatching his towel away from Yanagi's hand and swinging it angrily over his shoulders.
He just stood there; his eyes, red and piercing, glaring right into Yanagi's calm ones. He was huffing and panting and cursing under his breath and his demeanor seemed to be close to that of a very large nuclear explosion.
Yanagi didn't give an immediate response. He merely assumed the role of another spectator of the fool that was the heated Kirihara. Now that the match was over, Yanagi simply had no motive to treat him as an opponent.
Kirihara inhaled deeply, his fists balled up and fingers curled deep into his sweaty palm, and repeated, "rematch, Senpai."
I expected him to realize at one point in time that Yanagi was not a man to approach with screaming, nor nonsense. And, now was a better time than any. I expected Yanagi to give a detailed, logical lecture to the boy about the perils of over-reaction and red eye. And, now was a better time than any.
However, the latter did not happen; Yanagi opened his mouth, and instead of saying the words I was accustomed to hear, a new string of sounds crossed the air.
"We can have a rematch anytime you'd like." He replied, voice not a bit altered throughout the whole procession. "Focus on getting onto the team, and we can have a rematch anytime you'd like.
The next few words, the mass of murmurs I couldn't catch from Kirihara, were a mystery to me. Whatever meaning they had, whatever rash statements the boy had decided to make, had Yanagi, at last, walking away.
"So, tell me," I inquired as soon as he picked up his clipboard once more. "What did that boy say?"
There's an immediate flash, gone as fast as it had arrived, that disturbed the tranquility in Yanagi's eyes. But both he and I ignored the fact of its existence, allowing it to only sever a moment in time from our conversation.
"He said," He took a deep breath, somewhat similar to the breath that Kirihara had taken. "he said that he'll get on this team and he'll make sure to beat me. And you. And anybody else that'd dare stand in his way.
"Those are his exacts words? You're not paraphrasing, are you?" Kirihara's unconscious declaration of war caused my heart to again skip a couple of beats.
"His exact words, Yukimura." Yanagi nonchalantly flipped back to Kirihara's score sheet. .
"Do you believe them?" I glanced in the direction of Kirihara now and smiled as I caught him taking vengeance on the wall, as if it had some fault in his loss. "His words and intentions, I mean."
"I'll believe them for as long as he does."
He paused. Then, he looked at me.
"Or, for as long as you intend to make him believe."
I noticed the sly comment he manages to slide in, a Yanagi-like joke, I suppose. Backed with the morbid truth, it was something only Yanagi himself could pull off with such certainty.
I looked at him, but before I'm able to respond, he placed the clipboard into my hands, gave me the nod to begin my elimination, and headed back for the locker room.
On the clipboard, drawn in Yanagi's own handwriting, was a star next to Kirihara Akaya's name.
What a naïve, prideful, foolish, inexperienced boy. He doesn't have a chance. I know he doesn't have a chance. I told him he doesn't have a chance. Yanagi told him, "You don't have a chance." He should very well know by now that he doesn't have a chance. And yet, by some flaw of the universe, he's unaware of all of it. Unheeding to Yanagi's continued warnings of "why don't you play against me first, Kirihara?" Arrogant to Sanada's obvious grunt, retort, of "if you dare." In denial of the obvious truth both God and everyone else in the club is aware of.
Yet, he doesn't give up. Kirihara Akaya continues to pester me day by day, asking to play against me.
Monday. "Yukimura-buchou! Do you have time for a match against me today?" I refuse, saying I'm busy today. Tuesday. "How about today? You don't seem to be busy." I shake my head, reply that I have some previous engagement to attend to. Wednesday. "Okay, Yukimura-buchou. I asked Yanagi today, and he said you didn't have anything on your schedule." I chuckle at him, asking him if Yanagi had said anything else.
"Not really…well…kind of, but not really." Kirihara avoids my gaze, voice mumbling.
"What else did Yanagi say, Kirihara?" I smile at him, causing an instant twitch in his eyebrows.
"E-eh…that I'm - well, I personally don't think it's true, Buchou but-…he said I'm not ready yet?" He looks up at me with the best puppy face he can manage, trying to dissuade me from my usual trust of Yanagi's words.
"Listen to Yanagi." Another reassuring smile, and I'm on my way, leaving Kirihara in the background, the continuous sound of his sneakers stabbing the ground and the low, yet distinct, stream of curses as his farewell to me.
The same daily ritual of greeting occurred for the next week. I stand at the courts right now, watching a couple of third-years playing a match. And Kirihara marches up to me now, eyes more fiery and determined than usual.
"I don't care what Yanagi says, I want a match with you, Yukimura-buchou. A match. Today. Right now."
"Ah, but I care about what Yanagi says." I reply suavely, raising my eyebrows at him. Perhaps he had a bad day at school?
"Screw what Yanagi says. He keeps telling me that I'm 'not ready,' whatever the hell that means. I think I'm ready. Way past ready. And you shouldn't deny me a match, Buchou."
I consider his proposal for a moment, looking into his frustrated face, and then said, "you don't trust Yanagi's words?"
Kirihara shakes his head. "It's not that I don't trust them, just they're a bit touchy-feely, if you know what I mean. Something about how I'd get all my hopes crushed if I played against you, something about going into mental trauma, rehabilitation, that kind of stuff." He grins at me. "A bit overrated, don't you think?"
Just like Yanagi to refer to far-fetched situations when logic fails to work on Kirihara - as it usually does fail.
"So, against Yanagi's words, against Sanada's words, and against mine as well, you challenge me to a match?" I ask again, for reassurance this time. No more joking around.
"Exactly. Now you're catching the drift, Yukimura-buchou." He grabs the racket in his hand tighter, in anxiety of the moment that has finally come. "Which court are we playing on?"
I give the foolish boy a smile - the one my unfortunate opponent always receives - and point towards the first court. "Let's not waste a second then, shall we?"
We played. If you could even call it playing.
A matter of a couple of minutes, and the match was over. Simple, child play.
Kirihara lays faced up on the ground, a familiar image of his first match against Yanagi. Parts of his arms and legs are scratched, just a bit bloody from trying to return the unreachable balls, from trying desperately to win a point. He doesn't get up for the next five minutes, maybe more, just lays there on the ground, as if realizing finally just where he stands in my team.
I told him. Sanada told him. Renji- most importantly - told him. But he doesn't listen. Never does. This is his price to pay, the lesson that should've been taught to him after that very first match against Yanagi.
What turns into a ridiculous match for me would soon turn into an unforgettable beating for the little Kirihara Akaya. There's nothing worth noting for me, other than his weak state that I know he is in - the ridiculous carrion of a living being that is him.
It's not until later, that I realize what was missing from the surreal match.
Out of all the spectators, Yanagi was nowhere to be seen.
"Shut the hell up," I overhear as I round a corner of the locker room; a voice, coarse and harsh in its delivery, seems to be shouting at something. "Just shut up. I hate your advice."
I had wandered into the locker room to take a quick shower, to get the disgraceful air of Kirihara's lost off my skin, but apparently, I'm about to receive more than I bargained for.
"How can you hate my advice, Kirihara, if you never listened to it in the first place?" A much more controlled, yet somewhat quivering tone, replies back.
I stop my steps, realizing that this is where Yanagi had probably been during Kirihara's match - waiting here in the locker room, somewhere he knows Kirihara would eventually come sprawling back to. This is where Kirihara, unwantingly and unknowingly, wanders right into Yanagi's trap.
Something is changed in the boy - something I expect to appear once he'd face me in a match and lose. It's just unfortunate of Yanagi to be right there, to decide, that he's the one to receive Kirihara's anger, the one to keep the flaming candle from burning itself out. I kneel down on one of the benches, hiding myself three locker rows behind the two of them, a good distance for a watcher, a bystander, a coach.
"Fuck you, senpai." Kirihara's voice drones on, hisses. A bang resounds as something's thrown harshly into a locker. "Didn't I tell you to shut up?"
A pause. Silence.
"You did," Yanagi continues, voice leveled, much in the same way a pressured water tank has to be kept under control. "Yet, you didn't listen to my advice. There shouldn't be any reason for me to listen to yours."
Thud. Another object is tossed into the locker. Kirihara then shouts, "What're you trying to get at?"
"Why did you challenge Yukimura?"
"I can challenge whoever the hell I want. You're not my mother, you know. As hard as it is to believe." His voice is biting, snapping at the cords that hold Yanagi's patience intact.
"Why did you challenge him?" Yanagi repeats, emphasize on his question. Kirihara hadn't properly answered the question at all.
"Some data collector you are." Kirihara scoffs. "Yukimura- buchou's the best, right? The best of the best. I came to Rikkai to be the best. Who else would I challenge but the best of the best?"
"And you thought that would be a just enough reason to ignore all other protests?" Yanagi's voice raises, slightly, the change probably unnoticed by Kirihara.
"What other protests? There's no other protests that matter but my own. So just fucking leave me alone, Yanagi." Feet begin shuffling, signifying Kirihara's leave.
"You didn't even hear my protests, Akaya?" Yanagi's voice hovers above all other sounds -louder than Kirihara's previous screams- even despite its low tone.
The sound of footsteps cease, delay in their departure. I wonder what caused it: fortune, luck? Or, maybe just the wavering emotion in Yanagi's voice. Could the boy have caught that?
"No, Yanagi. I didn't." Kirihara states, enunciating his words, his proclamation.
"Why didn't you?" He insists. Yanagi might have been just playing for time now, knowing if Kirihara left now, things would forever be in disharmony.
"Even if I tried to listen, I wouldn't have fucking heard your protests anyway."
"And," There's a break in Yanagi's fluency, as if for once in his life, he isn't sure at all how things will turn out. "Why is that? Why can you not hear me?"
"Why, why, why, why. Stop asking why and just take things as they are. I'm never going to hear you, nor anybody. And that's just the way I am. So fucking deal with it."
There are times when I know that the amount of cussing Kirihara uses in his speech is directly proportional to his anger. And yet, regardless of the continuously pausing Yanagi, voice more uncertain and slow in response than ever, regardless of the obvious passion in Kirihara's voice, the situation has no explosive value - the match to light the bomb is nowhere to be seen or felt.
Kirihara's footsteps commence again, and I expect them to completely disappear away this time; Yanagi speaks once again.
"That's not the way you are, Akaya. I know." Yanagi's voice stops the footsteps, in much the same way as before.
A desperation has sunken into his voice. I question myself, not sure if a situation that provokes so much change in Yanagi is a situation I should be eavesdropping on. Regardless, I'm captain. That gives me some sort of exception, ethically and morally.
"How the hell do you know what I'm like?" Kirihara retorts for rhetorical effect, until realizing that of course, Yanagi knows almost everything about everyone. "Oh, right. You're a fucking stalker, that's why."
Ignoring the boy's obvious insult, Yanagi continues, "do you still remember what you promised me the first time we played?" He slows his voice down from the statement before, attempting - yet, failing - to regain composure. Two personalities driven by pure impulse - two Kirihara Akayas - in the room wouldn't bring any sort of closure.
"Yeah, I do." Kirihara seems to regain the slightest bit of patience, curious as to what Yanagi plans to reveal. "That I'm going to pummel you to the ground. That I'm going to crush Sanada and Yukimura and anyone else that stands in my way."
Regret and frustration marks itself in Kirihara's voice. How the thought of being unable to fulfill his promise to himself must have bothered him day and night. The boy does cleave to his promises, if not anything else.
"What about it?" Kirihara asks impatiently, not understanding.
"Then, according to your promise," Yanagi pauses - the harbinger to his upcoming revelation. "Shouldn't I be your first concern?"
There's no answer from Kirihara, an obvious sign that the boy doesn't see Yanagi's point at all. He speaks, irritated, "stop speaking in fucking riddles. What are you trying to say?"
"Then, tell me, Kirihara Akaya," He regains some of his previous confidence, the calm - an everlasting one, that is - before the storm. "Why haven't you challenged me? Why haven't you slipped out one word about me, about wanting to pummel me into the ground?"
"You can't hear me cussing out at you?" Kirihara snarls, or, at least, his voice sounds near close to a beast, finally and fatally agitated.
"Cussing me out and challenging me are two different actions, Kirihara." There is no doubt that Yanagi has completely regained his dominance in the conversation. "Now, tell me."
The logic Yanagi presents, set in front of Kirihara, who as hard as he will try to deny it, reverses their roles. No response from the boy is heard.
"You're a real pain in the ass, you know that, Yanagi?" Kirihara responds after an ample pause.
"I may be. But you have yet to answer my question."
"And there's something seriously screwed up in your head, you know that?"
"That may be true as well. Just answer the question, Kirihara."
"Well - I …what if I don't want to answer it?" He challenges. Yanagi's wanted answer is still allusive by all means - Kirihara refuses to tell him directly.
"Everyone knows there's nothing you could possibly hide. You wear your emotions like a kid wears his reward stickers from the dentist. So, just say it."
"I do not wear my emotions like a kid!" Kirihara diverts away from the subject, voice still a bit heated and raged, but nevertheless calmed down.
"Why haven't you challenged me, Kirihara?" Yanagi doesn't seem to waste a second once Kirihara steers away from the point; there's some more shuffling of feet (Yanagi's footsteps, I presume) and then silence befalls once again.
I'm not able to see their actual faces, nor any light or looks of their eyes, but even I can tell Kirihara is all but eager to answer the question. Yanagi has uncovered something prized, something even Kirihara hasn't realized until now. Something possibly worth more than Kirihara himself.
"I- well, there's really nothing to it, really. Just - just, well," Kirihara's speech stutters; the boy attempts to find the best way to convey his words to Yanagi. Whether he's afraid of embarrasing himself, or whether he just holds no trust to Yanagi all together, I don't know. "I, uhh- well, I didn't want you to lose to me so bad. Seeing as how good I've got and you haven't."
The condescending tone in his voice is fake, counterfeited, and it's not enough to pass Yanagi unnoticed.
"This is coming from the same person who just lost to Yukimura 6-0? Kirihara, I need the truth." His voice is firm, determined. "The real truth. Not the truth you assume it to be, the truth you try to sell to me."
"I wasn't - well, maybe, I…" Another pause colors the air, and neither speaks nor moves. But then, Kirihara talks, rashly and hotly. "Why the hell does it matter, Yanagi?"
Then, footsteps, faster than the ones before. The harsh opening of the door and the loud pound of its closing. Finally, the buzzing of the fluorescent lights overhead.
I hear the slightest of a sigh, and then the faint, weakened voice of Yanagi saying, "you can come out now, Yukimura."
He knows that I've been here the whole time - yet he did not compromise my position at all. He allows me to hear the conversation, and when it ended, he then chooses to reveal me. Did Yanagi permit me to listen because he thought nothing important would've happened between Kirihara and him? Or, did he permit me to listen only because he thought something important would happen, and that I'd be the only person to hear him out?
Strange, how up till now, I have always thought of Yanagi as predictable as he is skilled at prediction. Yet, as captain, as coach, how much do I know about Yanagi? About Kirihara? About the two of them?
"What did you think of that, Yukimura?" He speaks again, even though I have yet to move into his view.
I step out of my hiding place, and walk towards Yanagi, an all-occasion smile on my face, unsure of what might soon be in store. "It was interesting, at the least. I didn't know our little Akaya had it in him."
"Had the ability to challenge you, you mean?" He inquires me, returning my smile with another. I can't read Yanagi right now.
"The ability to challenge you, actually. I expected him to challenge me one day or another. Not you, though." I sit down on the nearest bench, my eyes searching Yanagi's for the feeling I'm hoping to find.
"But he didn't challenge me. You heard him. He refused me on both occasions - the reason and the challenge itself."
"What sort of courage do you think Kirihara had to have to challenge me, Yanagi?"
"A mighty one. A suicidal one too, if that's what you want to call it."
I crack a small grin at his sarcasm, aimed at the realism of the situation, and say, "And, what sort of courage do you think Kirihara had to hold such trust in you?"
"Trust, Yukimura? Did any of that seem like trust to you?"
"All of it, Yanagi." I nod. "Trust in Kirihara's own devilish, demented, childish way. The fact that he never once asks you for a match. That's his type of trust."
"I'm not sure I understand, Yukimura. If he trusts in me so much, why does he not listen to anything I say?"
"Just because he trusts you doesn't mean he's not foolish."
"Kirihara Akaya comes in here, screams at me - more than he usually does -, refuses to answer my one real question, and then stomps out. You don't call that trust." He returns my statement, anger, caused partially by confusion, ruffling his air of calmness. "In fact, last time I checked, Yukimura, I believe it was called hate."
"That boy," I remotely smile, wondering if what I'm about to say is entirely true. "He's kind of like a little kindergartner, isn't he?"
Yanagi gives me a fake look of surprise, and allows me to continue.
"He just seems to tease and make whoever he likes angry, doesn't he?"
Yanagi's attention focuses on me, finally catching the hint in my words. His eyes narrow, unsure of why exactly he's even bothering to listen.
"Just like a little boy insults and annoys the little girl he likes, before asking her out. Don't you think?"
Alright, so I'm just playing around with him now. I can't be blamed for wanting to mess with the sort of man who never lets down his guard, can I?
"Yukimura," He slows down his speech, for the second time today. Yanagi holds his glance at me for several seconds, before speaking again. "You were right."
"About what?" I ask back, partially unbelieving that perhaps my guesses are indeed correct.
"He does have potential, that second year, that Kirihara Akaya."