Sweet and Sour
Chapter 2 – Botan Hanazono Schwartz
By: Diana-Jae
The very indiscreet and obviously irritated set of curses that washed out of Hiei Jaganshi's mouth turned all heads in the gym towards him. Unembarrassed and paying no heed to the physical education instructor calling to him, most likely to give him a form of punishment for his blatant display of verbal profanity, the aggravated young man turned his head towards the direction where the shuttlecock had been smashed and, consequently, decked him in the head.
Although the physical education class was co-ed, there would be few days where the boys were put on one side of the gym doing one activity and the girls on the other side doing another. The start of the school year was one of those such days, and after the class, as a group, had run through all the stretches, the boys were free to play basketball and the girls grabbed badminton rackets, and the shuttlecocks started flying. A few minutes had not even managed to tick away before Hiei in the middle of a pass dropped the ball at the impact he felt on the side of his head.
Eyes narrowing, he picked up the tiny badminton accessory and stalked over to the girls' end of the gym. "Which of you airhead Meiou females hit me?" he barked.
At that moment, the majority of the young women who were hiding behind their badminton rackets, their eyes wide with surprise and fear, loosened up and, without looking away from Hiei, pointed in the same direction.
Casting his fire-infused gaze towards the direction of their fingers, his next line of cursing barely formed when he realized whom the culprit was. It was the same young woman he had escorted to class. The girl on the other side of the net flashed him a silly grin as she waved a hand and then squeaked out an apology that, if he was not mistaken, was in German. She did not stop there and proceeded to, as Hiei deduced, explain what happened, and once again in her German tongue before somehow reverting to her broken Japanese.
Hiei's arm quickly darted up towards his face as he tried to cover his mouth with his hand and stifle what would surely be laughter. He could not understand the reason why he found her terrible accent so humorous. Quickly turning away, he shoved the shuttlecock into the nearest girl's hands and then proceeded to go back to the boys' end of the gym when the dark, towering figure of Rio Kazunari, Meiou Academy's most popular and most difficult coach, suddenly loomed over Hiei's smaller figure.
"Jaganshi! Are you deaf?" The bigger man bellowed as he bumped the clipboard he was holding on top of Hiei's head lightly. "That mouth of yours is gonna cost you ten laps around the gym."
"What!" Hiei cried out ready to argue.
Coach Kazunari showed no remorse as he blew on his whistle though the young man being chastised was within very close proximity. "Now!"
"Fuck."
The twitching of the coach's eyebrows to show his obvious irritation did not go by unnoticed to Hiei and any other student watching the scene. "Cancel that ten, Jaganshi. Make it twenty! Get going!"
"It's only the first class of the first day of school, and the sound of giggling Meiou air-heads is already starting to irritate me," Hiei muttered to an amused Shuuichi as they walked out of the boys' locker room. "And the way they look at you," Hiei continued with a shudder. "It looks like they're trying to strip you with their eyes. It's gross, man."
Shuuichi laughed light-heartedly at his friend's discomfort and opted to explain that it wasn't so bad if you imagined those girls guilty of visually stripping him of being in nothing but their underwear.
"Actually," Hiei offered to counter, "I think your fan-club might like it if you did imagine them in their…" The two friends had rounded a corner, and upon discovering the same young lady that had unintentionally smashed the shuttlecock at his head leaning against the wall with her head bowed down, Hiei frowned and blurted, "You."
"I… uhh…," she started hesitantly, a guilty expression washed over her features, "wanted to apologize for hitting you earlier. You've been really nice to me, and I didn't want you to think that the way I wanted to show my gratitude was by smashing the birdie at you."
Hiei raised a brow in question as she laughed nervously at her confession. Girls were an unknown territory to the dark-haired individual, that is, with the exception of Yukina, but Hiei had never considered his twin as a girl anyway, so to speak. This was mainly because of his notorious aloof disposition and his hot temper. Most of the young women attending Meiou Academy, and nearby high schools for that matter, did not dare approach him and even attempt a greeting for fear of being snubbed or, worse, verbally executed. When this girl had first bumped into him, she had not known him, and she had simply been asking for directions, but after explosion in class, he hadn't expected her to come back and apologize. And he had assumed the other girls would have warned her about him.
"It was an accident," Hiei replied reluctantly, meanwhile eyeing Shuuichi through the corner of his eyes. "Don't worry about it."
The girl being addressed looked as though she was about to speak again but whatever it was that she was going to say was abruptly interrupted by the cool voice of Shuuichi, who wore a collected visage and a friendly smile. "You certainly do have an arm. Have you thought about joining the tennis team?"
For the first time since the three students had come together, the young lady broke her gaze away from Hiei's and looked over to the redhead standing beside him. There was a tiny hint of befuddlement in her lavender irises as she scrutinized him for a moment before quickly and almost uninterestedly asking, "And who are you?"
If Koto Arashiro, the head of the school gossip column and, perhaps, Shuuichi's biggest fan, had been there at that moment, she would surely have been very excited for the event that had just occurred would have been news indeed for Meiou students. No normal, breathing, red-blooded female had ever managed to resist Shuuichi Minamino's charm, but here was this girl who defied that by treating Shuuichi like any other typical male.
Hiei's eyes had widened subtly and his jaw had dropped just enough at the girl's question and the tone with which she asked it. He looked to his friend to see if the boy had possibly passed out, but to his greater surprise, Shuuichi still wore the same composed expression and complementary smile.
"Minamino. Shuuichi Minamino. Fourth year," he finished calmly before putting out his hand in a gesture for her to produce her own name. "And you, lovely wildflower, may I inquire your name?"
The girl looked at him suspiciously for a moment and then looking back and forth between him and Hiei, finally responded. "Schwartz. Botan Hanazono Schwartz. I'm a fourth year as well."
Shuuichi's smile grew and he leaned in just enough for her to be able to feel his warm breath against her lips without being too indecent and forward. "Ah. Schwartz. So you're the daughter of the famous photographer, Jackson Schwartz, and I'm assuming that your mother is model, Airi Hanazono. I had been expecting something a little different."
To Shuuichi's satisfaction, a distinctly pink hue reminiscent of a blush, suddenly colored Botan's cheeks. Stepping away, the frown resting upon her forehead was more visible than the blush across her face. "And what's that supposed to mean?"
Shuuichi chuckled much to Botan's unhidden irritation, and this almost seemed to please the redhead. "Nothing, Ms. Schwartz. May I also ask if you carry the same passion for photography as your father?"
"I don't care much for it. Photography isn't my calling," she retorted and then quickly added, "And neither is modeling so you don't need to ask."
"Getting a little defensive, are we?" Shuuichi seemed amused. "Well, your father is certainly the artist – very talented too." Shuuichi never once tore his gaze away from hers, and by this time most girls would have already succumbed to him, but Botan seemed unaffected. "So you gained no interest for the things your parents do. Hmm, well, to each his own, I suppose. You seem to have potential for tennis though, and as I've recommended earlier, you ought to join the team."
"Are you a part of the tennis team?"
"Would it be more to your interest if I said yes?" Botan did not answer producing a light laugh from Shuuichi, who then nodded. "I'm the captain of the tennis team. It's co-ed, but there seem to be more male players than female, and we'd like an even balance. Consequently, any new female members we can get to join the team would be nice."
The frown slowly but not fully faded away as she voiced her uncertain reply. "I'll have to think about it. I'm quite impartial to egotistical males."
Shuuichi laughed again, and choosing to ignore the last part of her comment, responded, "No pressure. If you are interested, try outs will be held in the gym tomorrow after school."
There was a momentary silence between the three teenagers before Botan took another step back. "Well, I should be going. I don't wanna miss my next class." She was about to turn to leave when she paused and inquired Hiei's name. "I'm sorry. I've been really rude. I didn't even ask for your name."
Hiei, who had been slightly interested, and slightly was a lot considering it was Hiei, in the conversation that had been rallied between Botan and Shuuichi tentatively answered, "Jaganshi. Hiei Jaganshi… fourth year."
"I'm glad I met you, Hiei. You're a nice guy." She flashed him a smile and turned to walk away. "I'll see you around school."
Minutes passed before Hiei croaked. "Minamino?"
"Yeah?"
"What the hell just happened here?" When his friend did not reply, he continued, "And don't you find it a little odd that she totally just blew you off?"
"I'll admit that this was out of the ordinary but something about that girl. I like that feisty flavor." He grinned, and Hiei understood that his friend was already calculating the different ways with which he could use to seduce the young lady. "I think Shuuichi Minamino has found himself a nice, little challenge," he replied a little too simply with a hint of mischief. "And I haven't had one since Maya Kitajima."
"Sometimes I think that you're a little too vain for your own damned good, Minamino," Hiei muttered. "Face it, dude. Not every girl's about ready to fall to the ground in worship at your immediate presence."
The redhead looked at his friend and allowed a grin to appear on his face while taking the first step forward towards their next class. "Not right away anyway, but they're bound to."
Hiei chuckled. He wasn't surprised at Shuuichi's response. It'd figure he'd say something like that. He was, after all, Meiou Academy's, Thief of Hearts, after all, and as such, he had yet to fail in stealing the heart of any woman he had his eyes on. "Full of yourself, jack-ass."
Author Notes: Short and just plain WEIRD chapter. Whatever. I was actually struggling to get this out this fast so I'm sorry if the chapter is retarded… like I care. Just kidding. I don't normally updates this quickly, if you hadn't already noticed. But eh, I was like what the hell… I wanna write another chapter.
If it isn't evident, it will be war between Shuuichi and Botan, but that's not the entire story. I'll shoot in plot twists here and there. Koto will definitely add to that. Haha… I hate her, but damn… I can so use her here to my advantage. And not to give anything away, but I say "to my advantage" because she had a big crush on Youko in the show. Haha. Meh, well, I can't have one of my typical AU's without those twisty things. Gotta love em twisty things.
I lost the file for Raven's half of "Fireflies," so until I get that, I can't completely write out my part. Yargh! I'll e-mail her about it, and then get to working on that before I update any other fic so yeah. Rar! This won't be updated until I write out "Fireflies" first cuz I've been procrastinating on that for a while. Not that I haven't been procrastinating on anything else, right? But I really liked "Fireflies" cuz it's cool. You should read it. Bad Diana-Jae! Falsely advertising… haha. Just kidding.
Sorry for typos and grammatical errors, blah-blah-blah. I'll fix it when I can. Hehe.
Well, hope you enjoyed. Comments, suggestions, constructive and destructive criticism are welcome. Thanks so much.
Standard disclaimers apply.
