Just Be Friends

"Hey! Hey, hey! Do you think it's possible to be friends with a girl?" asked Hayama.

He, the other two Crownless Kings, and Akashi were all in the basketball club's clubroom during lunch. As were a couple of other people who weren't regulars and therefore didn't count. Every single one of them stared at Hayama with expressions that clearly said they thought he was an idiot.

"No. I'm fairly sure it's impossible, Kotarou. Now shut up, I'm eating," said Nebuya.

"Aw, Nebuya. I don't mean like being friends with girl-girls. I know that's impossible. I mean girls who, you know, you could be friends with," Hayama tried to explain but only ended up making the topic more confusing.

"The term 'girlfriend' exists for a reason," Mibuchi said with a sniff.

"I don't mean that kind of friends with a girl," Hayama said quickly.

"Yes, you do," Akashi stated.

Hayama stopped to consider.

"Alright. So maybe I do. But with this girl I'm fairly sure you'd have to start off just being, you know, regular friends. So, do you think it's possible?" he asked.

"There will be no fraternizing amongst members of this basketball team. Chihiro is off limits," said Akashi.

"I didn't mean Mayuzumi –"

"Yes, you did."

"Ok, so I did. So . . . what does fraternizing mean again?"

"Trying to hook up with someone. You're fraternizing with them, you're trying to get into their pants," Nebuya clarified.

"Did you have to phrase it like that?" asked Mibuchi.

"That's the dictionary definition!"

"I highly doubt that."

"But what do you mean I can't try hooking up with her? Not that I was planning to, not really. Or maybe I was. I don't know. But why, Akashi?" asked Hayama.

"Because that is what our coach has decided, in light of the locker room incident."

"Hey, that was all on you, not us! Why do I have to be penalized for that?" demanded Hayama.

Akashi turned a glare so intense on him that Hayama immediately backtracked.

"Er, not that it was completely your fault. It could have happened to anyone. Or something. But Akashi –"

"The situation is not up for debate."

"But –"

"No."

"You don't even know what I was going to ask!" Hayama complained.

"Doubtlessly something else about wanting to date Chihiro."

"No, I was going to ask if you thought it was possible to be friends with her!" said Hayama stubbornly.

Akashi regarded him like he had the intelligence of an insect for several seconds that stretched on before answering.

"Not for you, no."

(five minutes later, on the roof)

"Doesn't think I can be friends with a girl. I'll show him I can be friends with a girl! We're allowed to be friends with girls in the basketball club. Even if those girls are in the basketball club. Right? We have to be allowed to. We're allowed to be friends with guys in the basketball club. It would be discrimination if we weren't allowed to be friends with girls in the basketball club. I think that would be one of those lawsuit things," Hayama muttered darkly as he stormed across the roof.

"Hey. Will you shut up?" asked a familiar disembodied voice.

"Ya! Oh! Mayuzumi! I didn't see you there," said Hayama, brightening once he spotted her.

Mayuzumi had a meager lunch set out beside her and a light novel on her lap. And, Hayama noticed, she was wearing pants. So naturally, he had to point this out.

"You're wearing pants!"

"I am," said Mayuzumi, not sounding very friendly. The attempt, so far, wasn't going great.

"But you're a girl."

"And girls can wear pants. They have been doing so for decades now. But no one ever accused you of being observant."

"But for our uniform girls wear skirts," Hayama protested.

"It's lunch time. Pants are more comfortable, so I changed into them before coming up here. I'll change back before my next class."

"Oh. Ok." Hayama tried to think of what else to say.

Mayuzumi looked at him with blank eyes then went back to reading her light novel.

"What are you reading?" asked Hayama.

She held the book up so that he could see the cover.

"Oh. Is it any good?"

"That's what I'm trying to find out."

"Oh. I don't read."

Mayuzumi ignored him. That didn't seem like a good sign. Then Hayama realized his slip.

"I can read! I just don't read much. But I do know how!"

"Good for you," said Mayuzumi tonelessly.

"But I don't actually remember the last time I read a book. Come to think of it, I don't think I ever read a book. I only pretended to for classes and just BS'ed my way through the quizzes about them," said Hayama.

"Impressive."

"Did you mean that sarcastically? I can't tell," said Hayama.

"Yes, I meant it sarcastically. I see nothing impressive about being ignorant, illiterate, or unobservant," said Mayuzumi. The look in her eyes had shifted from blank to cutting. It was pretty, but at the same time, like her words, kind of stung.

"I'm not illiterate. I just can't . . . I'm not good at sitting still. I can't sit still and just stare at a piece of paper. Things stop making sense then everything starts buzzing and I feel like I'm going to explode!"

"I see." Mayuzumi's voice had changed suddenly. Hayama couldn't begin to decipher what her tone now meant, or what the look she was giving him meant. He didn't think it was pity. But it might have been something close. And she kind of looked like maybe she had just understood something, or so Hayama thought. So he decided to tell her.

"You look like you just understood something. What did you just understand?"

The look was gone, replaced by cool aloofness.

"You're imagining things."

Well that was possible. But there was something else worth noting.

"That's the best particular reaction I've ever gotten to telling someone why I can't do bookwork well. Usually people just tell me to stop being stupid, or that it's all in my head."

"My opinion of other peoples' intelligence has never been high," Mayuzumi deadpanned.

"You're including me in that, aren't you?" Hayama asked with a forced laugh.

"No."

Hayama stopped laughing and stared. When he didn't say anything for nearly ten seconds, Mayuzumi looked up from her book at him. Then, with a sigh, she explained.

"You're wired differently. That's not the same as being stupid."

Hayama kept staring at her.

"What?" she finally demanded.

"Nothing."

Mayuzumi gave him a look then returned to reading her light novel. But she glanced up after several seconds to see if he was still watching her. He was. So she scowled back down at the pages.

Hayama continued watching and trying to figure out just what this girl had done to him. What he was feeling right now wasn't like the buzzing that he always heard when he was forced to sit still, but it made him feel like he was out of control in a different way. Kind of like how he'd been when he saw her standing almost naked in the locker room. That had made his breathing go all out of whack and his heart start hammering uncontrollably. His heart was hammering uncontrollably now, come to think of it. But his breathing seemed ok. He wasn't going to hyperventilate, he didn't think.

"Hey, Mayuzumi-san? Er, Mayuzumi-senpai?"

"That sounds really weird coming from you. Just plain Mayuzumi's fine," she said. She didn't look up from her book this time.

"You seem pretty smart. So I was wondering -"

"I'm not smart enough to tutor anyone," Mayuzumi said.

"That's not what I was going to ask. I just wanted your opinion on something," Hayama said quickly.

Mayuzumi looked up and looked slightly curious.

"Do you think it's possible to be friends with a girl?"

(My theory is that Hayama's ADHD. Mayuzumi has just theorized this too.)

(Pairings are still undecided for Kuroko and Mayuzumi. But Hayama's falling hard for Mayuzumi. Thoughts on this pairing?)

(hint, hint, please review!)