A/N: Hey everyone! I wanna thank all of you for reading my story in the first place, all of your reviews and alerts. Much appreciated. I hope that you like my story and this chapter. Please read and review. Oh and yes, the whole story will be told in the first person view.
Chapter 2
It's a nice morning as I look at the school where I'll be spending my next year or so. I can just imagine what's going to happen when they all find out I'm back. They'll all run up to me start screaming my name. There's no doubt that once Kikumaru-senpai sees me, he'll probably "glomp" me as hard as he can while screaming "Ochibi". I'm so looking forward to it. Can you hear the sarcasm in my voice? Maybe I should turn around right now and head back home...no, on second thought if I do that, mom will kill me, even if she's not home, Oyaji is and he'd rat me out. At our house, Mom's word is law. Not because she's a Takeuchi or anything like that, because lets just say she's not someone you want to make angry. Besides, here comes the principle. He's late.
I sigh, as the principle comes running up to me and says "Echizen Ryoma, I'm Principle Aki pleasure to meet you. Why don't we head to my office, we'll get your schedule, fill out some forms then I'll take you down to your homeroom." I heard him say as we walked into the building. "So tell me Echizen-kun" started the Principle, "why are you attending Saigaku high when you've already completed university and your masters?" I don't really feel like explaining, but I guess I'll have to, I can't go around making enemies with the principle now can I. "Okaasan" I answered him back as we enter his office "pardon?" as he looked down at me with a questioning gaze. "My mother, she wants me to make friends, afraid I'll become a loner. Says she'd rather have me here than hold up in my room or playing tennis all day." I clarified as I take the sheet of paper that's being handed to me. "Okay," he says, "well your entering in the middle of the term, I'm sure you'll have no problem catching up with the rest of your class. However, just because you've already completed university doesn't mean you can still slack off in your classes. I still expect you to do your work and come to school. Do I make myself clear?" He said to me as I look down at the paper that was handed to me as I grunted in response. I can see that it's my schedule; I'll be in third year. I see that my first class is English, which I'm glad for because then I can sleep in. Hell, I'll probably sleep the whole day. It's not like I need to pay attention. I also have history, chemistry, math, music, which was okaa-san's idea, business, physics, and a last period spare. I put my schedule in my bag and I glance over at the other papers lined on the desk. "These are some of the forms you have to fill out. They're really simple, just formalities." Says Principle Aki, as I read and fill out each of the forms. "Well, now that that's done, why don't we head to your home room and I can introduce you to the teacher and your classmates." I heard him say as we both got up and headed out the door to the third year hall.
We are now outside my homeroom, class 3-1, the principle goes in while I stand outside. I hear the teacher speaking in English, her accent isn't so bad, it's passable, but you can still hear her Japanese accent. The principle interrupts her and makes his announcement. "Everyone, please quiet down." He says trying to gain everyone's attention. "We have a new transfer student here with us. Some of you may know him, he attended the Seigaku middle School. His name is Echizen Ryoma." I hear my name call so I step inside the classroom as all eyes turn to me and everyone gasps. I look around and I notice that none of my former senpai's are in the room. I'm not sure whether that's a good thing or not. Everyone seems to be staring at me, watching my every move. It's unnerving. I can see it in their eyes. All the girls immediately sit up straighter, primp their hair, check their mirrors and smile as wide as can be. I can see the slight blushes spread across their faces and how some of the guys begin to grow uncomfortable. The girls and even most of the guys have that look in their eyes, the look of lust, love, whatever you want to call it, but there are select few, which I'm glad for, have jealousy in their eyes, jealous that I'm getting all the attention of the girls. Why am I glad for it? It's because those are the select few who don't see me as a piece of meat. Who won't molest me or try to go out with me. Anyways, I've been spacing out for a while now, I guess I should start paying attention to what they're saying as I turn my head I hear the teacher say "...introduce yourself." Looks like I came to at just the right time.
I look up and give everybody my famous stare; a look that says that I'm bored and that I don't want to be here. My hair is perfectly styled in that messy but still good-looking, I-just-got-out-of-bed look, with the top button of my collared shirt opened and the tie hung loosely around my neck. As I start my introductions I slowly peel my dark sunglasses off of my face in an oh-so-bored way and give everyone my famous glare and say " Echizen Ryoma. 15 years old. Play Tennis." I know it's short, but why should I tell them about me, you can probably google my name and find anything you want about me, there's probably some damn wiki page about me. The teacher looks at me with a frown on her face, I guess she wanted me to say more. "Echizen-kun," she says "why don't you say more about yourself, such as, where you were before coming here, why you came to Japan, what you like, dislike." she said as she listed things off the top of her head. "America. My mother and was bored. Karupin, tennis, and music. Fans, Mary-Sues, and loud people." I said to the teacher and the class, the principle had already left shortly after introductions. She looked at me and then realization dawned on her. I had just given her the answers to the questions she had listed off. Realizing she wasn't going to get anymore than this, I heard her sigh and tell me that I could go to my seat which thankfully is at the back of the class seated right beside the window.
As I sit down I immediately lay my head down and begin to drift off to sleep, after all it's only English. From what I can tell before my brain falls asleep, the class is reading Shakespeare, Hamlet to be more precise. Five minutes. I was only able to nap for five minutes before the teacher noticed me with my head down, fast asleep. I guess she was a little pissed off, while my classmates found it amusing and began to giggle. I guess she decided that she had to set an example so she called on me to answer the homework the class had. Apparently it was to interpret the most famous speech in the play. I'm sure most have you have already heard it. She wants me to read the speech and interpret it, even though I just showed up today. Really, how many times am I going to go through this? All these teachers who feel they should try and embarrass me and teach me a lesson about sleeping in class.
"To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, . . ." (A/N: I don't really want to put in the whole thing, takes up too much space)
(A/N: don't have to read this part if you don't want to, just thought I should include this, it's just the analysis of the speech)
"Hamlet poses the problem of whether to commit suicide as a logical question: "To be, or not to be," that is, to live or not to live. He then weighs the moral ramifications of living and dying. Is it nobler to suffer life, "the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," passively or to actively seek to end one's suffering? He compares death to sleep and thinks of the end to suffering, pain, and uncertainty it might bring, "the heartache, and the thousand natural shocks / That flesh is heir to." Based on this metaphor, he decides that suicide is a desirable course of action, "a consummation / Devoutly to be wished." But, there is more to the question, namely, what will happen in the afterlife. Hamlet immediately realizes as much, and he reconfigures his metaphor of sleep to include the possibility of dreaming; he says that the dreams that may come in the sleep of death are daunting, that they "must give us pause."
He then decides that the uncertainty of the afterlife, which is intimately related to the theme of the difficulty of attaining truth in a spiritually ambiguous world, is essentially what prevents all of humanity from committing suicide to end the pain of life. He outlines a long list of the miseries of experience, ranging from lovesickness to hard work to political oppression, and asks who would choose to bear those miseries if he could bring himself peace with a knife, "when he himself might his quietus make / With a bare bodkin?" He answers himself again, saying no one would choose to live, except that "the dread of something after death" makes people submit to the suffering of their lives rather than go to another state of existence which might be even more miserable. The dread of the afterlife, Hamlet concludes, leads to excessive moral sensitivity that makes action impossible: "conscience does make cowards of us all . . . thus the native hue of resolution / Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought." In this way, this speech connects many of the play's main themes, including the idea of suicide and death, the difficulty of knowing the truth in a spiritually ambiguous universe, and the connection between thought and action. In addition to its crucial thematic content, this speech is important for what it reveals about the quality of Hamlet's mind. His deeply passionate nature is complemented by a relentlessly logical intellect, which works furiously to find a solution to his misery. He has turned to religion and found it inadequate to help him either kill himself or resolve to kill Claudius. Here, he turns to a logical philosophical inquiry and finds it equally frustrating." (A/N: Courtesy of Sparknotes )
As I finish my interpretation of the soliloquy, everybody just sweat drops and the teacher is stunned, now content with just letting me sleep through class. As I sit back down, the teacher comes out of her stupor and asks me "A-Ah Very good Echizen-kun. I see you've read Hamlet before haven't you?" "Obviously" I reply with a slight roll of my eyes as I make my way back into dreamland vaguely hearing slight chuckles emitting from the other students.
The rest of the day was pretty much the same, the same looks and the same introductions. I was called upon to answer questions in every single one of my classes and in every single one of them, the teacher was stunned and my classmates chuckled when I answered it perfectly. They're all content now to let me sleep in class if I want to. Now it's lunchtime and oddly, I haven't seen any of my former senpais. Not even a single one of them has been in any of my classes so far. I expected at least one of them to have the same class as me, but no. For lunch, I stayed on the rooftop, away from all the whispers and the glances of the student body in the cafeteria.
School is now done so I make my way to the tennis courts to see if any of my old sempai's are practicing, when I feel a hand on my shoulder. As I look up to see who the hand belongs to I see a familiar pink track suit, it's Ryuuzaki-sensei. "Aren't you supposed to be at Seigaku middle school" I say to her. "Ah, I'm teaching here at the high school now, started when Momoshiro and Kaido entered high school. Figured someone had to keep all of you in line. Anyways, it's good to see you again Echizen. You've changed quit a bit," she says, as she looks at me head to toe, leading me towards her office. "You've gotten taller, and more…what's the word…. prettier." she says as she laughs at the scowl and glare on my face. I swear that if I hear someone tell me I've gotten 'prettier' one more time I'm going to smack them upside the head. "The others are at a tennis match right now. That's why you haven't seen any of them. It's a friendly match between some of the surrounding schools. They'll all be back tomorrow." Said Ryuuzaki-sensei as she hands me a cup of tea. "So?" I ask with a questioning gaze, wondering where she's going with this and what she's planning. "So how was America, you've been doing pretty well, why quit all of a sudden?" She's changing the subject, but I'll play, for now.
"Pretty well? I've been doing great. I'm undefeated in an official match. I'm the number one player."
"So why quit?"
"Got bored."
"Bored? How can you be bored? You were at the top of the world. The best. Earning millions of dollars."
"When you've defeated everyone there is to defeat and played every tournament, there's not much else left to do. It's a boring life.
"Heh, you're just like your stupid father. At least you quit after you reached the top. So what are you planning on doing now? Now that you've quit tennis that is."
"Betsuni." I say to her as a smile adorns her face, that looks a little to similar to one of Fuji-senpai's smiles.
"Okay I get it. So what do you want?" I ask her straight out.
"Tennis practices are same as usual, morning and afternoon. If you're late, you run laps. Tezuka's …" but before she could finish I say to her "Yadda. I'm not joining the Tennis team." By the look on her face, I can guess that she's surprised. "What are you so surprised about?" I ask her "If I still wanted to compete in Tennis matches, I wouldn't have quit professional tennis, trust me there are a lot better people to play against than the ones in the high school matches." I say to her
"I knew it was too good to be true. I can't change your mind can I?" she asks as I shake my head.
"Fine. You're just as stubborn as your stupid father. But why come back here if you're not playing on the team?"
"'Kaa-san. I was bored with tennis so I quit. That's when she decided to enroll me here. She wanted me to go to high school instead of lying around the house. Plus, she thinks I'm going back to how I was before." Why am I even telling her all this?
"Before?"
"Ah…she thinks I'll become a loner again, or so oyaji puts it, that I'll become even more 'socially retarded'." I say to her putting my cup of tea down and indicating that I'd like to leave.
"I have a proposition for you." She says as I get up. "You don't want to join the team correct? Then how about becoming the teams trainer?"
"Trainer?" I repeat…hmm never thought of it before.
"It could be interesting, just the thing to cure your…boredom." She says trying to entice me into the position. "What else could be more interesting, than control over your senpais, hmm?"
"You really want me that badly on the team in any way don't you?"
"Of course" she replies with a cheery smile. "Who wouldn't want the prince of tennis on their team" she said with slightly more emphasis on the words 'prince of tennis'.
Hmm… trainer huh? That's new. I must admit I have been pretty bored lately, being a trainer might help cure my boredom. Having full control over all of my senpais. Oh just the thought of it sends an evil smirk straight to my lips, which Ryuuzaki-sensei didn't fail to notice. She takes this as my agreement as she slams her hands on the desk and says in a cheery voice. "That's great, practice is tomorrow morning, same time as usual. Come to my office first, I don't want to miss the looks on their face when they find out. I wonder how they'll react to the new Echizen." She says as she looks over my new image once again. "Hold on. On one condition." I say as she raises an eyebrow. "I get FULL control over everyone, EVEN Tezuka-buchou. I get to do whatever training I deem fit with NO interference from you," I demand to her. "Fine" she agrees, acting like it was absolutely nothing she was agreeing to. "And, no Inui juice. I cannot be forced into drinking that juice under any circumstances." She nods with a slight chuckle. She waves good-bye as I leave her office and head home. Oh this is going to be SO much fun, all the things I can do now. I guess my life won't be that boring after all. I thought to myself as a sadistic smirk appears across my face.