Under the Misunderstood

Tuesday afternoon found Inui walking down the halls of Seishun Gakuen with the usual notebook in his hand and a pencil behind his ear. There was no tennis practice for the afternoon, but he'd forgotten his other notebook in the gym earlier during the day, and the data he'd been able to scrape from his recent observations was too essential, too important to leave behind in the gym, where anyone was able to pick it up and read.

Inui nudged his glasses higher up on his nose and reached out with the same hand to push the doors of the gymnasium open.

He stopped.

There were voices.

Two of them, Inui supposed, but the voices were too muffled behind the door to be heard clearly, and even though Inui's ears had gone through much, much training, he wasn't able to determine whose voices they were.

And then, a sudden cry rang from inside.

This is bad.

But before Inui could think of worst-case scenarios, he pushed the door open.

"Ow, ow, ow…"

"Stop complaining."

This was far, far beyond Inui's expectations.

Horio, he believes the first-year's name to be, was lying on his stomach on one of the mats, legs spread wide apart and flushing a shade of red that Inui had never imagined to appear on his face.

However, it was what was sitting on top of him that left him speechless.

Tezuka Kunimitsu, the prestigious captain of the Seishun Gakuen tennis club, was sitting in between Horio's legs with one hand cupping the back of Horio's left knee, and also with the usual impassive look on his face.

The two of them looked up upon hearing the doors open.

"A-ah, I-Inui-senpai…" Horio stammered, sweat sliding down his neck and his face growing redder. "It… this… uh…"

"Inui," Tezuka acknowledged, glasses gleaming.

Inui stood and stared.

"I-it's not what it looks like," Horio blubbered, covering his face with his hands. "I-I…"

"Inui, if you're looking for your data notebook, it's sitting over there," Tezuka informed, nodding his head in the direction of the dark, green notebook. "Rest assured, nobody looked inside."

Inui opened and closed his mouth.

Tezuka stared back at him.

Inui moved to the side, almost skittishly, and grabbed his notebook, even though it was the last thing on Earth he was thinking about at the moment.

"E-excuse me for my…uh, interruption," was the only thing he could say before backing out of the gym slowly, and then closing the gym doors almost robotically.

Pushing his glasses up higher on his nose in a more frantic gesture, he flipped his second notebook open and grabbed his pencil from where it sat behind his ear.

"This is illogical," he muttered, all the while scribbling more data.


"U-um, Tezuka-buchou?"

"Hm?"

"I-I think Inui-senpai misunderstood the…erm… position we were in."

"Nonsense. Even someone like Inui would not mistake a stretching procedure to be anything else," Tezuka reasoned. "Now. Bend your knee."


Owari

2010.04.03