The next morning progressed much as yesterday had, with Sena knocking softly on the doorframe to announce his presence before gently sliding the door shut behind him. Yoichi glanced up from where he was seated in the built in window seat and thought if he ever wanted to dispel the rumors that he actually lived in the American Football Club (he didn't), he was really going to have to stop getting here so obnoxiously early. Sena didn't seem surprised though, but he did look a little nervous, which, Yoichi knew, could only mean terrible, terrible events were about to happen. Yoichi returned his gaze to the laptop and prayed that today, at least, he would be able to get some work done. He was not expecting anything to come out of the prayers.
"Yo…Yoichi, uh…" Sena started, still not able to say Yoichi's name without wincing. It amused Yoichi more than it probably should have, and, for now at least, outweighed the annoyance of having his name stuttered through several times a day. Yoichi could see out of the corner of his eye that Sena's eyes were starting to go wide and he was crouching in on himself, so with an almost silent sigh, Yoichi snapped the laptop shut and focused his attention on Sena, who straightened almost immediately.
"Yes?" Yoichi finally pressed when Sena did not continue. Sena flailed his arms, went through an extremely amusing range of facial contortions, and then ran over to stand directly in front of Yoichi, with maybe four feet of space between them.
"My mom heard that I was dating someone and now she wants to meet you, I'm so sorry." Sena blurted out, before bowing deeply so he did not have to look Yoichi in the eyes. Yoichi raised an eyebrow. He was not a moron by any stretch; he'd seen this coming from the moment Mamori had asked him to start dating Sena. Yoichi was actually more surprised that Sena was apologizing to him, and not to Sena's mom. He hadn't winced at all while asking Yoichi to go to his house either, which was probably the stupidest thing the fucking shrimp had ever done, and Yoichi had been watching the entire Musashi fiasco. Anyone else would die before allowing Yoichi within twenty yards of their house, not that Yoichi had ever allowed that to stop him before. It was kind of nice, in a completely idiotic, this boy is going to get himself murdered one day, way.
Yoichi was just about to torment Sena about his stupidity and also ask whether it was genetic, because there were very few people in this city who did not run screaming upon hearing the surname Hiruma, when the door slammed open and the second annoyance of his day came rolling in. "Sena!" Suzuna trilled as she skated over to where Sena was still bowed over. She blinked twice at the sight, looked between Yoichi and Sena and grinned like a maniac. "I'm not interrupting anything am I?" She asked, managing to make the question laced with innuendo so there was no way to answer it without sounding guilty. Yoichi was so very proud. Sena was flailing again, spluttering nonsense words and blushing to the roots of his hair.
"We'll talk later." Yoichi said firmly, before mentally thanking every deity and picking up his laptop again. Suzuna took that as the dismissal it was and focused her attention back on Sena, though she did raise an eyebrow and very obviously only managed to stop herself from asking by a small margin.
"I heard about your dilemma." She said, instead, and Yoichi could hear the eyebrow wriggle in her voice. Sena did not respond; still too busy choking on his words. "So I made a list!" Suzuna exclaimed, and indeed there was the sound of crinkling paper as she pulled something out of one of her pockets. How did she even get here? Yoichi wondered belatedly, one would think whatever school she was going to would recognize her absence as she was always here. Then again, Yoichi couldn't find any records of her at any school, so maybe she didn't go to school at all, because there was very little he was not capable of finding when he put his mind to it.
"Suzuna, what is this?" Sena finally managed, though his voice was several octaves higher than it normally was. Yoichi cursed his incessant need to know everything about anything and glanced up from his laptop. He had been so close to actual work too. Sena was flailing again, piece of paper gripped loosely, and Suzuna hadn't moved the conversation away from the window Yoichi was sitting in, so he reached over and plucked the paper out of Sena's hands. Then he blinked.
The list was arranged in two columns: names and Suzuna's opinion of the person. The list included Gaou, Agon, Suzuna, and Yoichi himself, along with countless other names; it went on for what looked like three taped together pages in cramped writing. The opinions of the four names that really drew Yoichi's attention were, in order, 'He's big, like really big, imagine him in bed. Actually, don't, do you mind if I field this one', '? He has nice hair, I guess, I'm not really sure what I was thinking, I wrote this list at 2 am, he might actually kill you. Don't talk to him', 'This is the pity option, like I said before, I'm already fielding all your rejects so keep it up', and 'You're already dating him plus he can blackmail literally everyone. Best date ever.' Yoichi was trying to decide whether he was proud or angry at his self-proclaimed student's actions when Sena snatched the paper back.
"Do any of these people even like me?" He demanded, brandishing the paper in Suzuna's face. Yoichi went back to his laptop; he actually was done paying attention to either of them this time. Maybe if he said it enough it would become true. Suzuna cocked her head to the side and considered this.
"Maybe?" She hedged. "Like I said, it was like two am when I wrote this. I still think it's a good reference point though." Then Yoichi could hear her smacking a fist against her palm and exclaiming as she remembered something and Sena made noises not unlike a kicked puppy. "I forgot. This is Mamori's list. It's for You-nii." And another piece of paper, entirely too long and folded several times, was slid in front of his laptop's screen. Yoichi looked up and glared at Suzuna, who was, sadly, unaffected and kept staring at him. So Yoichi sighed and took the paper. This list, too, was organized into name and comment columns.
"Hey, if that's about me, shouldn't I read it?" Sena asked grouchily. Yoichi turned to him with a pleasant smile and a raised eyebrow. Sena put up his hands and backed down and Yoichi allowed himself a moment of vindictive pleasure. He hadn't lost his terrifying mojo after all, though it was amusing to see Sena attempting to stand up to Yoichi, as pathetic and short-lived as the attempt was. Yoichi looked at the list, ignoring Sena grouching and Suzuna patting his shoulder comfortingly.
The list seemed to be ranked from greatest to least threat levels as judged by Mamori. Agon, unsurprisingly, was at the very top, though she had commented it shouldn't be a problem as he was a well known womanizer, no what was surprising was the Yoichi found his name, almost at the very bottom of the paper. 'If' the fucking manager had written 'he chooses you and you agree, and you hurt him, I know that you know I will destroy you.' Yoichi was not threatened by that, he did the threatening, thank you very much.
"So can I see the list or not?" Sena restated his earlier question as Yoichi looked away from the paper. Yoichi bared his teeth and stuck the paper in his laptop bag to look at closer when Sena was elsewhere.
"Shouldn't you be getting ready for morning practice?" He asked instead of answering Sena. Sena twisted his mouth into an unhappy line but he went into the changing rooms anyway. Yoichi went back to his laptop, this time, this time he would get work done. The repetition was beginning to lose effectiveness.
"So… You-nii and Sena huh?" Suzuna asked, grinning in a manner that Yoichi immediately recognized as his own grin. She was leaning on his shoulder, completely unafraid of retribution. He felt a moment of absurd pride before he shoved it down to focus back on the cheerleader who was attempting to use his own lessons against him.
"So, middle school sleepovers, hmm?" He returned, without looking at her, and Suzuna clicked her tongue before straightening and raising her hands.
"Alright, alright. Sorry I brought it up, it's just a favor to Mamori-neechan, I get it." Suzuna relented, though her tone suggested that this was not the end of this conversation. Yoichi really hated that tone, but either way Suzuna left to arrange the cheerleader's meeting and Yoichi was finally, blessedly, alone. For fifteen minutes until he had to start practice. Yoichi sighed in acceptance.
Practice proceeded much as it did every day, with the obvious exception that Juumonji had almost reverted back to last year's belligerence. It was slightly amusing watching the shrimp tiptoe around the team's hurt feelings and Yoichi was not ashamed to admit he acted out the part of Sena's boyfriend a little more than was strictly necessary. Or, a lot more, maybe. He ruffled Sena's hair every time he passed and squeezed his should twice. Sena smiled hesitantly at the actions and Juumonji scowled harder each time.
It was hilarious, and Yoichi was once again glad he had agreed to this. He could put up with Sena's stuttering, inability to deal with any kind of romantic overtures, whether they were meant to come off that way or not, and slowly disappearing fear of Yoichi, which would mean seriously problems if Yoichi ever had to blackmail him in the future, just to see the look on people's faces. It was priceless, Kurita kept sneaking him these dopey happy looks, like one of his romance novels was coming true right before his eyes, most of the rest of the team just looked lost, and Juumonji was probably going to die from rage before the week was over. Beautiful.
But practice ended all too soon and Sena's face had set in a manner that could only mean trouble for Yoichi. After the team had changed and most had trickled out, only Sena, Yoichi, Juumonji, and Kurita, hovering nervously, remained, Sena planted himself directly in front of Yoichi. He was shaking, just a little, but his head was up and Yoichi blinked at him.
"Please come to my house after school today." He said, and Yoichi was full of pride or possibly annoyance towards his running back, in two days he'd gone from mildly to all encompassing fear of Yoichi to barely having a tremor in his voice as he requested something Yoichi was sure Sena thought was brazen. On one hand, Yoichi was hoping Sena had forgotten about their earlier conversation because if Yoichi met Sena's parents Yoichi's mom was going to pitch a fit until he brought Sena home, but on the other…
Yoichi nodded, pushing Sena gently to the side as he passed. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Sena shrink in relief and Juumonji light up in apocalyptic rage. It was a thing of beauty. Juumonji's face contorted in many ugly formations as he clenched his fists to keep silent and not terrify Sena. Yoichi grinned sharply at him as he exited the club, Kurita trailing behind, pressing his pointer fingers together.
Yoichi turned on Kurita as they entered their first hour class, raising an eyebrow. The class was, as always, full of very annoying, yet exploitable, and very loud eighteen year olds who only cared about gossip or schoolwork, depending on their personality. Kurita started and smiled guiltily. "I just wanted to say congratulations on your new relationship." Kurita said, and then he swept Yoichi up and spun him around twice, which is all he managed before Yoichi shot his gun off to signify that Kurita had better put him down two minutes ago. The class had gone completely silent.
"What." One idiot finally managed and Yoichi grinned like the demon everyone thought he was. What better way to get out to all of Sena's suitors that didn't go to Deimon that they had better act fast than to announce it to a bunch of idiots that babbled on to anyone who would sit still for more than three seconds about literally everything.
"Don't you know?" Yoichi asked, leaning into the idiot's face. The child had gone as pale as a ghost and appeared to be struggling to breath. Yoichi loved his reputation, he really did. "Kobayakawa Sena is fucking mine." And then he smiled, a polite, normal smile, which caused literally half the class to faint. Yoichi really, really loved being him. "Spread the news, because I'm not leaving." He cackled, and relishing in the feeling of a job well done, brought out his laptop, already writing off this class as a waste of his time.
Alright so I'm sorry about the time it took to get this up, thanks to everyone who is reading I've gotten like 30 e-mails about people favoriting or reviewing or setting alerts for this story which was sweet of all of you. Anyway, at this rate I think this might end of having 3 more chapters, though that's not a sure fire number, and next chapter should hopefully have more characters that everyone knows and loves/hates/doesn't actually have an opinion about.