Click click!
"Excuse me, I have a question.", a petite young lady sitting in the middle of the crowd raises her hand. Another journalist.
I've been sitting here in front of all these people for a good three hours now, answering as many questions as I can whilst trying to keep a smile on my face despite losing patience.
Fans and journalists filled the room, each carrying a notebook or some sort of item that they would probably want signed later on. I politely smiled at the red-headed journalist before me,
"Yes?"
"What can you say about Sir Akashi?"
Well, this isn't the first time I've had to answer this question, in fact, I have something prepared for it. I gave a soft chuckle and lowered my hand slightly beneath the table, I subtly looked at the note scribbled at the palm of my hand and took the microphone sitting in front of me,
"He is a very interesting man to say the least."
I was responded with a smile from the journalist as she nodded and sat down.
A few more minutes went by and the manager signaled the start of a one-hour break, gesturing everybody to vacate the room and come back when the conference reopens.
I remained seated in my chair and began to think, what do I think of Akashi?
Well, back in high school, he wasn't just Rakuzan's prized player. He was also the school's best student; he was dubbed the Rakuzan Prince. As generic and cringe-worthy as it sounds, it carried quite a bit of weight in his overall reputation.
Though he was popular with the ladies, as well as the gentlemen, he never really bothered to associate himself with them on a personal level. As the team captain, he was always pretty hard on his subordinates. As the student council president, he was always strict about the rules. Perhaps the reason why he wasn't a part of the elite circle of friends was the fact that everybody in the entire student body feared his existence. No one would even dare go near him, much less anger him in any way.
Now that I think about it, I never really feared him I that much back then. Maybe it"s because of the fact that I didn't quite catch his attention. Those people who were deathly terrified of him at the time were those people who he has nearly killed. The rest of us were somewhat invisible to him.
It felt so much better that way, not having to worry for dear life every single day. It"s amazing how I didn't register in his radar, considering he was my classmate, and that we practically sat almost right next to each other.
"Hana! Aren't you going to come eat yet?", the voice of the manager rang my ears, as I snapped out of my little expositional daydream.
"Yeah, sure. I'll join you in a bit."
I started taking the pieces of paper scattered on the table and placed them to one side before standing up and taking my purse.
Bark Bark!
"Yes, yes, we're going. Sorry about that Nigou.", I smiled at my dog which was sitting next to me, waiting this entire time.
I've had Nigou for well over 10 years now, I remember when he used to be a puppy. I always kept him hidden in the storage room in the school rooftop. I lived alone at the time, and I just couldn't leave Nigou alone at the flower shop. I never really had that much friends, so I would always go and hang around with Nigou in the rooftop whenever I had the chance.
Nigou was a parting gift from my parents before I decided to run the flower shop in Kyoto when I qualified for Rakuzan High. My father owned a company in Hokkaido, and so he couldn't really leave. He also need to keep constant watch of my mother who was bedridden at the time. As much as my parents wanted me to live a luxurious life despite being apart from them, I didn't want to be a financial burden. My father already had enough to pay for: My tuition, my mother's medical bills, and Akashi's sponsorship.
There are over 50 companies in Japan which sponsor Akashi in his games, and my father's company was one of them.
I remember every detail of the different occurrences in my life since I moved to Rakuzan High, not necessarily because they were very enjoyable, but simply because it was those next few years which changed the course of my life.
It was also because of those next few years that I'm sitting in this press conference.
11/20/XXXX
Dear Diary,
Today wasn't exactly a very good day. I'm no longer invisible. I think I finally registered myself into his radar, and not in a good way too.
We'll get to that; you're going to need a little bit of background on how I messed up.
It started as I was walking up to the school rooftop, as usual, to go see Nigou. I opened the janitor's closet to find Nigou sleeping behind the mop, beside what seemed like a blue stuffed bear.
"Nigou?", I called out whispering, waking him instantly.
His tail wagged as he barked playfully, he walked towards me as he carried the blue bear in his mouth.
"What's this?", I inspected the small toy and smiled at the bright-eyed dog in front of me.
I took out some food from my bag and placed in in the food bowl across the small room, at the same time replacing his old water as well.
You could hear the rattling of the food bowl as Nigou munched all his food away.
I took the time to inspect the bear some more. It was a small blue bear wearing a white shirt. I chuckled at the cute face it made, it resembled that of a curious child in a way.
I looked at my watch, and realized that I'm going to have to get going if I want to make it to class in time.
I breathed a deep sigh, "Well, I guess I'll pick you up later then." I petted the whining ball of fur as I stood up and left the room, closing the door behind me.
I walked down a couple of flights of stairs before eventually reaching our hallway, from there you could see our class president, Akashi, checking for uniforms and IDs.
"Speaking of IDs, wasn't I wearing one just now?", I asked myself as I patted around my uniform looking for it. A wave of relief rushed over me when I felt my card sitting inside my skirt pocket. I then took a quick turn towards the bathroom to check for any other errors I may have.
Once I made sure everything looked ship-shape, I exited the bathroom and proceeded to walk towards the classroom. I held my breath as I walked passed Akashi who was eyeing me from head to toe as I went through. He stopped me for a moment, eyed my uniform once more, before nodding –signaling me to go on ahead.
I sat on my chair and proceeded to review for today's assessment. Though I'm not exactly failing per se, I'm just not excelling all that much. Perhaps I'm between average and just slightly above average.
"Good Afternoon, class.", a voice snapped me back to reality. I looked up to find Ms. Chi smiling at the class as she placed her things on the table.
"Alright, everybody, please prepare your textbooks. We will be having a short quiz in a few minutes as promised yesterday."
As everybody did as she asked, her expression changed as she looked around the room.
I took my textbook out of my bag before looking up to find Ms. Chi smiling and pointing at my direction, "Ms. Hazukashii, may I have a word with you outside please?"
I stood up reluctantly and stepped out of the room, eyes following me as I did so.
I looked up at Ms. Chi who seemed quite nervous as well, "Is there something wrong?"
"I, uh…", she cleared her throat before continuing, "I have a favor to ask of you, Hana."
"What is it?"
"I need some flow –bouquets for a dinner party I'm holding tonight", her voice trailed off as if to withhold something.
"Bouquets? Yes, of course, no problem! How may do you need?", I smiled and crossed my arms, relieved. I was almost sure I was going to get reprimanded for bring a dog into the school premises.
Ms. Chi twiddled her thumbs, looked to the side, and mumbled the answer to my question.
"I'm sorry?" I leaned in closer to hear her better.
She sighed and looked at me, "A hundred."
I could almost swear I felt my soul leave my body for a bit there. The thing is, I work and maintain the flower shop by myself. My most recent helper left to tend to some personal matters, and since then, I've learn to somehow manage things by myself.
"A hundred…" I mumbled, "…And you need this tonight?"
"Yes. White and red roses with pink carnations."
"Well…"
"Don't worry dear, I know you're going to need some time so how about this; I'll be excusing you from the rest of your classes. I have your excuse slip right here." She gave a cheeky smile as she handed me the slip.
'Class 3-8: Hazukashii Hana
Fever
Recommendation: Home rest for 1-2 days
Signed,
Tenshi Shurui, School Nurse'
I stared at the excuse letter, it's almost like God wanted an ex-machina to get me out of school so early.
"There's a catch, though.", she sighed, "You can't leave till after lunch."
"Why is that?"
"The nurse wanted to make the excuse as believable as possible. Leaving right away would seem too suspicious since you don't look sick at all.", she grinned at the nurse's logic, "Basically, she wants to have some sort of build-up for your 'fever'. Your next class is Physical Ed., followed by Swimming right? That should do the trick."
'Definite ex-machina', I thought to myself.
She patted me on the head as she took the slip from my hands, "Do you best with those bouquets, okay? I'm going to need them by seven."
With a final 'thank you', she re-entered the classroom and I did the same, walking back to my chair as I continued to review.
An hour later, the assessment was done, and everyone stood up and left for the locker rooms. Everyone but me and some other girl frantically going through her bag.
"Hey, are you looking for something?" I ask as I approach her," Maybe I can help."
She looked up at me with big, teary, purple orbs, "I took my uniform home to wash it, and I didn't seem to bring it with me today. Though I could've sworn I placed it here!", she hiccupped as she tried not to get too emotional as she went through her stuff.
"If you want, I can lend you an extra uniform I have." I muttered, earning a quick change in mood from the grey-haired girl.
"You'd do that?!" She held my shoulders with a big smile and shook me when I nodded 'yes'.
We walked to the locker room, and I handed her m extra uniform sitting in my cabinet.
She held the clothes in her arms, "So, you're Hazukashii, right? Hazukashii Hana?", she smiled.
I nodded, "And you are, Tanoshi?"
She giggled, "Call me Itsumo! Well, we better go get changed, class starts in two minutes."
"You don't seem all that rattled about it." I remarked.
"It can't hurt to be late once, right?"
"It seems you have forgotten that we are classmates with Akashi.", I sighed.
She laughed, "He's not that bad, come on. I'm sure he'll let us go just this one time."
"Oh? How are you so sure about that?"
I couldn't help but smile at her carefree attitude.
"We're childhood friends! We'll be fine!" She winked and turned around, "Now, let go change! We wouldn't want to be too late!", she said as she started to hum a merry tune.
I didn't think I'd ever see myself frolicking towards class twenty minutes late. Fortunately, our teacher was still wasting time with his sermon about wasting time. Funny.
"See, What'd I tell you, huh?" She elbowed me lightly, winking, "We're fine, right?"
"Tanoshi!", our instructor yelled out.
Itsumo responded with a chirpy voice, "Yes sir?"
"Come up here and lead the warm up session, it's your lead this week!"
"Alright! No problem!", she yelled back smiling and looked back at me, "Well, let's get on with class then!"
I smiled and gestured for her to go on up front.
The class continued. After running 50 laps around the field, we were all almost on the brink of collapsing. Itsumo and I walked towards the bleachers and took a bottle of water sitting on the table beside it.
"Are we seriously going to be late again?" I asked her chuckling.
"It's swimming! I promise you, no one will even notice a thing!"
I giggled as I took a sip of water, "If you say so."
"So, are you ready to go yet?" She asked, jumping of the bleacher seat and jogging in place.
I smiled and nodded, "Sure, let's go!"
"Race you there!", she laughed and rushed off.
'Well, she's a fast one.'
I shook my head and stretched.
"Yep, I wonder where she gets all that energy from.", I mumbled to myself and chuckled.
I was about to stand up when I felt a heavy hand resting on my shoulder, keeping me seated. My eyes widened and I looked up to see who it was, finding a red-headed guy sitting by the stair right behind me. He furrowed his eyebrows and focused his eyes on mine, he leaned in close and whispered in a low, husky voice, "You're late."
That was the day that I was discovered by his radar.