Crash Course—The first time the fatty teaches Kazuki a lineman's stance, he feels like a goddamn idiot.
A/N: Referring to Juumonji as Kazuki here because it's third-person but from his point of view. The phrasing is his, and since I assume he thinks of himself as Kazuki, so he is. Sorry if it's jarring. :)
Kazuki's really starting to hate this red jersey. He's had his eye on the game for a while now from the bench, and anyone who plays this sport voluntarily has to be out of their damn mind. And he's really starting to hate the gear that comes along with it. He gets tired enough just scrapping in his school uniform; doing it in a load of stiff, clacking plastic armor is just plain hellish.
He, Koji, and Toga are all hanging out on the bench (hanging out in this instance meaning sleeping, reading Jump, and feeling generally furious with the world in general) when the fatty comes jogging over and motions for them to stand up and come along.
They don't, at first. Then someone (one guess who) fires a round of bullets into the sky and shouts, "F—king Hah-hah Brothers! Photos!"
"We're not brothers," grumbles Kazuki.
They get up.
"F—king Brothers, go on the second hut!" shouts the blonde, foul-mouthed bastard. "Play clock's winding down, F—king Fatass! You going to give them a rundown in twenty seconds or do I have to call a time out?!"
Kazuki wonders why this damn game has to use so much English. Hatto, Kuattabakku, Tacchidaun… (He doesn't give a shit whether it's an American sport-they couldn't bother to translate the terms?)
"I'll explain it!" says the fatty hurriedly, and gestures again to the three reluctant recruits. "Come on over here, guys! I'm Kurita Ryokan, pleased to meet you, again, I mean, sorry about Hiruma, he just really likes playing football! 'Kay, we're on offense now, so you stand like this, see?"
They sidle awkwardly over to observe.
"You look like a dumbass," says Koji.
"I was in the middle of Naruto," says Toga.
Kazuki says nothing, but no way in hell he's—
"Ten seconds! PHOTOS!"
One hand on the ground, the other on your leg. Got it. Kazuki hunkers down next to the fatass, glaring at the bastard in front of him. He's pretty sure he's seen that face before, possibly on the heavy end of a baseball bat.
Kazuki sneers. The Zokugaku player scowls back.
"Get ready after Hiruma says 'set', then go after he says the number of 'hut's he said he told you before!" says Kurita, and the three delinquents share a look that means, Do you remember how many? I don't remember how many.
In the end, it doesn't matter because the Zokugaku bastards across from them don't seem to care much about playing by the rules either. And Kazuki is just fine outside of the rules.
Still, in between "plays" (more English), the fatass keeps badgering them—keep your hips low, that leg back, lean forward, push with your legs, put your hands in his armpits! Head up!
Kazuki tries, in a kind of half-assed way, to heed these directions. But the more parts of his body he tries to pay attention to, the less it seems to work. And the Zokugaku guys are running all over them now, which only makes it worse, because Kazuki hates losing. He especially hates losing at something he didn't want to do in the first place, which basically sums up his life.
He hates the fat freak.
He hates this red jersey.
He hates this sport.
A lot has happened by the time they play the Aliens. When Kazuki crouches down before they start the sweep, he's suddenly surprised by how natural the stance feels now. After a thousand reps in practice, his body finally remembers on its own—head up, hips low, this is offense, this is defense, wait for the snap count—
And when everyone collides for a group chest bump after Sena's first touchdown, Kazuki knows on a subconscious level that this is a family. It's a family he' still getting used to, but they accept him. And more importantly, they accept Koji and Toga—Kazuki barely notices the crowd chanting his own name when there are voices acknowledging his brothers on the line.
(No, they're not related. But by now they can't deny they're brothers.)
The first time he brings the jersey home, it's pouring rain. Sometime before the start of the Fall Tournament, a freak shower turns into the mother of all thunderstorms…just in time for evening practice.
You haven't pushed a blocking sled until you've pushed it in the rain. It's not nearly as heavy as the damn truck, but at least the American highway didn't turn to thick, clinging mud under rainfall. By the time they finish, Kazuki barely has the energy to lift his shoulder pads over his head, let alone change into his school uniform. He wears his jersey and sweatpants instead, because the uniform would only get soaked, even with an umbrella.
The umbrella is actually a high school relic of his father's, with three broken spokes and a catch that usually refuses to open without some degree of violence. Kazuki waits until Koji and Toga have staggered off in the direction of their own houses to open the beastly device, purely because he hates to be seen with anything belonging to his old man.
Even climbing the stairs makes his thighs burn, and the pain and fatigue combined are so distracting that Kazuki forgets how late it is.
Which is to say, he forgets when the old man comes home from work.
Juumonji Erito actually opens the door before Kazuki can even reach for the doorknob, and their eyes meet with the usual animosity.
"…What are you wearing?"
"None of your business," says Kazuki curtly, dropping the umbrella carelessly on the concrete of the porch—don't need you, don't need your old things, get off my case.
"You're filthy and soaking... I know better than to ask what you were doing by now. Change into something else before you leave the mud room."
"The hell I'm changing there."
"You'll do as I tell you. And throw that shirt in the trash, too. I can't even tell what color it's supposed to be."
"Red," says Kazuki.
"It's brown," says Erito.
"I'm going to wash it," says Kazuki, with maybe a little bit more ire than is warranted by such a petty argument. "Maybe you can get your damn glasses fixed while I'm doing that, huh? It's red."
And that's it. The longest conversation they've had in two months. Kazuki leaves a trail of mud and dripped water all the way up the stairs and into the bathroom, where he digs his gloves and pants out of his bag as well. He fills the bathtub halfway and scrubs at them with a hand towel and the unscented bath soap his father buys. Most of the grime comes off, staining the plastic around the drain with murky water. Equipment cleanliness is Anezaki's area of expertise, but he's so damn angry right now that he doesn't care. She works hard enough as it is.
He scrapes and rinses and twists for as long as the furious monologue in his head continues.
What would you know? Have you even noticed how much better my grades have gotten since the Summer? How I don't smell like cigarettes anymore? I'll bet you haven't. But if you had, I'll bet you wouldn't know why.
I'll bet you wouldn't know how much this jersey has to do with it.
He doesn't remember hanging up his gear on the curtain rod, but when he wakes up at two in the morning on the bathroom floor, it's because his still-damp jersey has slipped off the bar and onto his head. Kazuki stuffs the gloves and pants back into his duffel bag, but when he falls ungracefully onto his futon, that damned red jersey is still over one arm.