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A Schoolhouse Confession: loosely on school rumble Ep 16 season 1 anime version

The rain had certainly done a good job of getting things wet, Harima noted as he put a nearby stick into the little fire that he'd made for Tenma to warm up by. "Here, warm yourself up." He then turned and walked over to the far interior wall and frowned, his shades were really not any help in the shadows. He tugged a board loose from the ceiling to add more fuel to the fire.

Tenma herself went ahead and sat down about a meter from the fire, watching her classmate through the flames. "Tonight turned out to be a real mess, sorry." She grumped a bit, her arms accross the tops of her knees.

"Don't be, it's not your fault." Harima replied, bringing a stick [the board was too large for the fire] back to toss into the firebox.

A few feet away, beyond a wall. Eri Sawachika and Yakumo Tsukamoto were huddling, or more precisely, Eri was actively keeping an eye on things while the crimson eyed girl had her ear halfheartedly pressed against the wall. "He just sat down." Eri quietly relayed while Yakumo looked down at the floor.

"I still think we shouldn't..." Her quiet voice trailed off as she looked up to find the blonde looking sourly at her.

"Quiet... Wait!" The pigtailed blonde reattatched her eye to the hole in the wall. "Tenma is crawling toward him."

"What?! Oh sorry."

Eri concentrated on Tenma's voice, "Listen up, when you love someone there are rules to follow...." Eri smiled slightly as Tenma gave Harima a stern talking to. Then she frowned as Tenma complimented him. "...I don't want anyone's feeling to get hurt. I think you're a really sweet guy, in fact I know you are..." Eri tuned Tenma out and waited for Harima's response.

"Yes," Came Kenji's voice drifting through the air, "I understand. I promise I'll follow the rules." Eri relaxed and withdrew from the knothole to face her scavenger hunt partner.

"You don't need to worry, Tenma's got him in line." Eri smiled slightly as the two of them quietly sat in the darkness with only a small amount of firelight coming from the room beyond the wall.

Then Eri heard a tiny "Chff." sound and looked through the knothole again.

On the lit side of the wall, Harima had a problem, make that 2 main problems. Tenma was shivering and needed to change clothes, but... He looked around the room and spotted the grungy curtains. "Guess those will have to do... Now for the hard part..." He suddenly stood, the movement drawing not only Tenma's undivided attention, but the blonde's peeping from the other room. "Get your clothes off right now." He said in a tone that pretty much forbade arguement, after he himself had taken his shirt off.

Tenma blinked a bit and shrank from her classmate a bit.

In the other room, Eri gasped and nudged the flashlight out of her lap as she hurriedly looked through the hole to see Harima's bare back, and withdrew to look at Yakumo in shock. She mime-whispered to Yakuno, since it was far too risky for a real conversation due to Harima possibly hearing them. "We should go over and stop this-"

Yakumo shook her head a bit, then hearing Tenma's voice, went silent.

"You can't be serious."

Eri nodded slowly, "I'm sure he's dead serious. Harima is nothing but a filthy minded two timing perverted sleeze-" She growled darkly, seeing Yakumo's doubt, she explained further. "I've never told anyone, but he made a pass at me back at the beachclub and he wasn't wearing any pants."

"That's awful." Yakumo replied. "I'll go stop him."

Eri grabbed Yakumo's arm, "Wait a second. Tenma's smart enough to see through that creep. She'll likely punch him and give him a swift kick in the pants."

Tenma proved Eri wrong however, "I've got them off Harima."

"What!?" Eri pressed her face against the wall as her eye saw disbelievingly as Tenma had indeed done the unthinkable and followed what Eri thought was a very perverted request from Harima. "Is she crazy?!"

Harima's voice again floated through the wall to them, "Pretty lucky I found these old curtains eh? Granted they don't smell too good, but they will keep us warm until our clothes dry out."

Eri's face went crimson in embarrassment, sitting back from the wall she looked at Yakumo. "This doesn't prove anything, He still can't be trusted."

Then Tenma's voice followed on the heals of Eri's comment. "You know, we do look pretty goofy in these things, but if it will keep us from getting sick..."

"You really think so?" Yakumo asked, just before both girls sneezed.

In the other room, Tenma decided to ask a question of Harima. "So, who's the girl that you like? Come on, don't be shy, you can tell me."

[From here on this diverges a bit]

Kenji Harima gazed over the fire at the girl who'd pretty much single-handedly inspired him to go back to school nervously, "Oh, the girl I like, right." He chuckled a bit, attempting to stall for time.

In the watcher's room, the girls, now changed into curtains, watched and listened. "Stop laughing and get to the point."

Within Kenji's head, there was a battle going on between the "Tell her now" side and the "Some other time"ers. "What should I do? We're alone now, no distractions..." Externally, he made nearly nonsensical sentences that were pretty much nervous giberish. "Uh, well I uh..."

"Hey, please tell me, stop beating around the bush and tell me who you are in love with!"

On the other side of the wall, Eri was upset enough that she had dug her nails into the wall and slowly sank down to the floor her nails leaving deep imprints in the wood. "She's acting like a nine year old!"

At the firelit room, Harima finally broke and said in a small shivering voice, "..Its you Tenma..."

He frowned at himself, "Aw crap..."

Tenma knew she'd heard an answer somewhere in there, but couldn't quite make it out. "Whaaat?" She asked in a childlike voice. "I couldn't hear you! Its ok, just whisper it in my ear then." Tenma made to get up, but Harima's voice cleared up.

"No, w-wait Tenma." Kenji had finally decided to bite the bullet and be it. His face firmed up and he straightened up his back as he gazed over the fire at her. "I'll tell you who I love Tenma. Just promise me you'll listen to the entire story."

Tenma sat back down after she'd come around to his side of the fire. "Ok, I promise."

On the other side of the wall, Eri and Yakumo each looked at the floor, ears glued to the sounds of next door. Although the two probably never would admit it, hearing who an attractive guy loved was certainly important information.

Harima took a deep breath and looked at Tenma as he started speaking. "As I said earlier, I love you Tenma Tsukamoto. First let me explain something to you. I was walking one day and I saw a girl surrounded by some guys. Long story short, I rescued you that day. I stayed by your side as you slept, watching over you until you woke up. It was that day I first fell for you." Harima looked to the one he loved and saw she was puzzled, "Yes?"

"I don't seem to remember you..." Her eyes turned back to him.

He nodded, "I guess that's only to be expected." He took a deep breath, "I hope this doesn't blow up on me." "When you woke up, well, after we parted ways that day. I decided to start wearing shades and grew a beard." Kenji looked directly in her eyes. "Tenma, I've loved you ever since that day-"

Tenma glanced down momentarily, then looked back up. "M-may I see your eyes Harima?"

Kenji slowly lifted a hand to his shades, the prized shades that he'd worn everywhere, and slowly slid them down his nose and off his head. "Alright Tenma." He watched her face as he also removed the hairpiece he used.

Tenma put her hand under chin, "You seem familiar... You look like that Vega guy on tv..."

Harima was taken back by this, "You mean Vegeta?"

"Yeah! Thats the one!" She giggled before settling down and looking up at him. "I'm touched by how you feel about me Harima, but I love Karasuma. I still enjoy having your friendship though." She paused and tilted her head a bit, "Kenji, if I may call you that,-"

"Sure."

"-You aren't going to school just because of me are you?"

"Um..." "What the, how'd she figure that out?"

Her voice took on a small bit of disappointment, "Cause if you are, I'm going to be very disappointed in you. There are others out there besides me Harima, Mikoto and Eri for instance."

In the other room, Eri could be comparable to a stopsign with a small difference. Stop signs could not talk. "That.... Tenmaaa!" The blonde growled.

Harima blinked and noticed the fire was dying. He looked outside and saw that it was still raining. "Got to get more wood."

At that point, Eri and Yakumo moved away from the wall.

"Tenma, it hurts." He muttered loud enough for her to hear, moving around the room, his shades on the top of his head as he looked for wood to no avail. "Guess I'll need to take a chunk out of that wall."

Tenma watched as Harima kicked a hole in the nearby wall, thinking about his face. It would take her a while.

The two jumped as a large piece of wood flew out from the wall, unfortunately, this action put a section of the curtain that Eri was wearing in sight of the deliquent turned temporary woodsman.

Harima grabbed the fallen cloth before Eri could pull it back, "Hey, something else that burns, Alright!" He tugged on it. "Hmm, looks like its a mouse, a big one."

Eri started as she felt the tug on her current forced wardrobe, "Hold my feet the best you can-Ack!"

Harima tugged harder, "Gotta be a rat, a really big rat." He braced against the wall and pulled hard.

A squeak of suprise from Yakumo issued as she was pulled off her feet and onto the floor.

Harima looked at the unexpected passenger that had come along with the cloth and swallowed, reading the blonde's eyes "So, I'm a rat now am I?" He stood up, then bent and pushed her back into the hole in the wall, neatly rolled up the loose portion of curtain, placing that by Eri. Then took a couple loose boards and nailed them over the hole.

Eri slowly sat up with a healthy blush still adorning her face. Yakumo came up beside her, "You really shouldn't have been eavesdropping like that, that was karma getting you back-"

"Its not fair! You were listening too!"

E.4.N

I might continue this, because Eri has not confessed yet. But will Harima's accidental confession to Eri come back to haunt him? How will his classmates react to this former deliquent wearing no shades? For that matter, how will the females react? Suggestions and feedback are definately appreciated and encouraged.