Chapter 10

Let's Go To The Beach!

Everyone was waiting at the school already. Today was the trip to the training camp at the beach. The regulars were kind of excited. They were going to the beach, which was fun. And training was kind of fun too, but going with each other was not fun. It was true that the regulars got along better now. But it was kind of an act that they all put on when they were in front of their captains.

"Where is Sakuno-chan and Tomoka-chan?" Ayumi asked, getting restless.

"I don't know. Sakuno-chan usually gets lost, but Tomoka-chan is with her, so it should be no problem," Miki stated.

"Maybe it was a bad idea to ask them to come along with us," Aine sighed.

Everyone had decided that it would be easier if they brought along some people to help them. The guys had said that when they were training up in the mountains, they brought Sakuno, Tomoka, Kachiro, Katsuo, and Horio. The five of them had helped a lot with the cooking and the cleaning. They would probably come in handy during this trip too.

"We'll go look for them!" Katsuo exclaimed, dragging Kachiro and Horio away with him.

The regulars were just standing around, not knowing what to do. Without the freshmen things became more awkward. They all just hung out yesterday, but they didn't really talk much. The guys liked to tease the girls for some reason. They were actually just trying to piss them off though.

There were some people in the boys' group that thought about all of the funny things they could do at the beach. There were also some people in the girls' group that thought that they could do some things too. Revenge. It was the ultimate adrenaline filler. The girls wanted to be better than the boys, and they would do (almost) anything.

"If they all don't come in five minutes, we'll be forced to leave without them," Ryuzaki-sensei announced.

Right after Ryuzaki-sensei said that, the five freshmen came bursting around the corner, out of breath, and a little more than dirty.

"I'm so sorry for the trouble I caused!" Sakuno said, bowing her head. "If it wasn't for me we would've been here already."

"It's not your fault, Sakuno," Tomoka said. "She fell down a ditch, and we couldn't get her out. It was really deep. There's some construction going on and we didn't see the sign."

"It's okay, it wasn't your fault," Tsubaki comforted.

"Everyone! Into the bus! We don't want to be late!" Ryuzaki-sensei said through a bullhorn.

All of the regulars and the freshmen climbed into the bus. The bus was really divided. Sitting on the whole right side of the bus was the girls' team, and sitting on the whole left side of the bus was the boys' team. The freshmen that weren't regulars were all sitting in the back rows together.

The conversations were divided too. The girls only talked to the girls, and the boys only talked to the boys. Tsubaki and Tezuka would occasionally say something to each other about the training sessions at the beach, but other that that, nothing.

The trip to the beach was an hour long, and when everyone finally reached the beach, they didn't feel like doing anything. The bus ride was long and tiring. But when everyone saw the ocean, the expressions on all of their faces changed. The sand was practically white, and it looked like soft powder. The ocean was a clear blue that seemed to have giant, golden sparkles in it because of the Sun's reflection off of it.

Tezuka coughed a bit until everyone looked at him. "Okay, as you all know, there will also be two other teams here. But we just found out that the other two teams didn't just bring the boys' regulars, they also brought the girls' regulars, like we did. So please get along with both the boys and girls of Hyotei and Rikkai Dai."

"Where will we be staying?" Eiji asked.

There were three big beach houses on this beach. Each were different colors; there was a white one, a cream one, and a white-blue one. Most of the regulars already guessed where they were staying: one of the big beach houses. But which one?

"We'll be staying in the white beach house. Hyotei will be staying in the white-blue one, and Rikkai will be staying in the cream one. Atobe-san owns all of the beach houses and offered to let us stay in one of them. He also gave the same offer to Rikkai and they accepted also."

The regulars either all shrugged or nodded and followed Tsubaki and Tezuka to the beach house that was bigger than most of their houses. Tezuka produced a key from his pocket and opened the door to the house.

Gasps arose from everyone—except from Kumiko, Ayumi, Tsubaki, and Tezuka—as they saw the interior of the house. There were orchids and hibiscuses everywhere. All over the entryway were white candles in glass jars, flowers were wrapped around all of the candles. Everyone walked in deeper, admiring the decorations. There was a living room that had two wicker couches and some wicker chairs with white padding on them. There was also a wide screen TV and a fireplace, above the fireplace was a picture of a different beach. The house had a kitchen, a game room, and eleven bedrooms upstairs with two beds in it each. The kitchen had the newest appliances and the bedrooms had the most comfortable beds and two big wardrobes in each room. The game room had a mini bowling alley, a pool table, some arcade games, and a classic pinball machine.

Tsubaki put a piece of paper on the fridge with a magnet. "Here are your room assignments. Atobe-san said that there is a different colored candle outside of each room. That is how you'll figure out which room is yours. There's also a different flower hung on each door. It'll be easier to find your rooms since there are no room numbers. As soon as you all get settles a little bit, get down here again and we'll discuss what we'll be doing here."

Everyone crowded around the fridge to see who there roommates were. The list looked something like this:

Room Assignments

Girls:

White/Morning Glory: Oguri Tsubaki & Eto Ayumi

Red/Poppy: Toyama Saori & Izumi Miki

Blue/Tulip: Faye Morgan & Ishimaru Kumiko

Purple/Geranium: Yoshikuni Koizumi & Ikezawa Aine

Pink/Rose: Ryuzaki Sakuno & Osakada Tomoka

Boys:

Green/Petunia: Oishi Shuichiro & Tezuka Kunimitsu

Orange/Carnation: Fuji Shusuke & Kikumaru Eiji

Yellow/Daffodil: Kawamura Takashi & Inui Sadaharu

Black/Hollyhock: Kaido Kaoru & Echizen Ryoma

Beige/Zinnia: Momoshiro Takeshi & Horio Satoshi

Gray/Pansy: Mizuno Katsuo & Katou Kachiro

"Where will Ryuzaki-sensei be?" Kachiro asked.

"She'll be staying at a cabin a ways off from here," Tsubaki answered.

Everyone ran upstairs to unpack what they had brought. Some of them were even jumping on the bed from excitement. The rooms were bigger than the rooms that most of them had. The sheets, blankets, and pillow cases were all made from silk.

Tsubaki and Tezuka were waiting downstairs patiently for everyone else to come down. They both unpacked quickly and went to the entryway. Soon, all of the others were downstairs too.

"We'll be here for a week. But we'll only be training for six days," Tezuka said.

"What do you mean buchou?" Momo asked.

"Since we just arrived today, you must all be tired. Today is Sunday, so today is a free day. You get to do whatever you want to today. Tomorrow will be the first real day of training. So, just go and do whatever you want today. But I still expect you all to be polite and well-behaved to everyone on the beach."

"Is today the 'off day' for the other teams too?"

"It could be. But don't get your hopes up. Their rest day might be the last day."

"Enjoy this freedom while it lasts. Who knows what will happen tomorrow. Just listen to koitsu[1]." Tsubaki said pointing to Tezuka.

"Huh?!" all of the girls gasped. That was not what their captain usually said. Maybe the beach was bringing out her yakuza side. Her speech was changing and she was getting informal. She was talking like how she talked when she was at her home.

"Ha ha!" Koizumi said awkwardly. Her laugh was really fake. "You've been watching too many shows Tsubaki-buchou! Let's go upstairs and change into our bathing suits!" Koizumi grabbed Tsubaki's arm and dragged her up the stairs quickly.

"Okay! I'm gonna go upstairs to change too!" Ayumi shouted, pointing weirdly to the staircase before running up.

All of the other girls agreed with an awkward expression and ran up the stairs too. They didn't want anyone to learn about Tsubaki's background, especially after Tsubaki had hid it for so long. If anyone knew, Tsubaki might get kicked out of school. And if she didn't, she would be known as the scum of the school. For some reason, yakuza weren't respected. The girls didn't care what Tsubaki's background was though, they liked her for her. That's why they knew about her.

There was a loud scream of excitement before everyone burst out of the door and ran to get good spots. Ayumi and Miki were setting up beach umbrellas and beach blankets. The others just went around and had fun.

Koizumi was sitting off somewhere with her guitar when a girl with brown crimps came up to her. "Hey, my name is Satomi Kyuri. I play singles three in Hyotei."

"Um, hi. My name is Yoshikuni Koizumi. I'm from Seigaku," Koizumi replied. She was wondering why this girl wanted to talk to her.

"You want to hang out? All of the girls on my team are too busy screaming over how hot the regulars are in their trunks. I love the guitar."

"Um, sure?"

Kyuri grabbed Koizumi's arm and pulled her to where the Hyotei regulars were. And the girl regulars were drooling over the boy regulars, exactly like how Kyuri told her.

"Look! A Seigaku regular!" Kyuri announced to the people.

Koizumi's mouth fell open. She was shocked at how the regulars were acting. She cleared her throat before she said, "I have to go put my guitar away, okay Satomi-san?"

"Please, call me by my first name! Won't you play something for us?"

"I really can't my teammates are looking for me."

Atobe came up and said, "Why don't you play a song for Ore-sama? Ore-sama would love to hear one, especially from such a pretty girl."

"Sorry, I don't play for spoiled heirs that think they can get any girl," Koizumi said before running off to her own team.

"Ore-sama will have to have a talk with the Seigaku Girls' Team."

"I can't believe she said that to Atobe-sama!" a girl with a black bob said.

"Calm down, Hibiki. She's okay with me," Kyuri said.

"Yes, Kyuri-buchou. You lied to her about being singles three, right?"

"We can become good friends with them."

Most of the girls were just hanging out around their beach umbrellas and were talking. Aine was building a sand castle, it was a replica of the Taj Mahal. Aine was awesome at building sand castles, and could win the national sand castle building contest if she wanted to.

Momoshiro came by, and without looking at where he was going, stepped directly on Aine's sand castle and kept on walking.

"Momoshiro-kun!" Aine stood up yelling.

"Huh?" Momo asked turning around.

"Look at what you did!!!" Aine was pointing at her destroyed Taj Mahal.

"Oh, sorry."

"Don't just say sorry!"

"Fine." Momo sat down right next to Aine and started to help her rebuild it.

"You're doing it wrong! How about you get me buckets of sand and I build it."

"Whatever you say..."

Just then a short girl with short blond curls and fair skin came by. Momoshiro's eyebrows rose up into his hair. It was the cutest girl he had ever seen. She looked like a summer fairy. Maybe she was the perfect girl to make Momo forget about Aine. Aine had already rejected him, so why not try to date another girl?

Momoshiro stood up and ran his hand through his hair a couple of times. He walked up to her and said, "Hey, my name is Momoshiro Takeshi. I'm from Seigaku."

"Hello, my name is Tenma Mei. Call me Mei-chan! I'm from the tennis team from Rikkai!"

"Would you like to hang out tonight? There's a big bonfire going on."

"Sure! It seems like fun!" Mei blushed a shade of pink and batted her eyelashes at Momo.

Momoshiro was officially over Ikezawa Aine. Or...that's what he was thinking. He would go to the bonfire tonight, fall in love with Mei, and live happily ever after. Momo had the most simple plans. He thought that at least the sight of him and Mei would make Aine a little jealous.

Aine saw the two and came up to them. "You two are a pair? How cute! I hope you have a fun time!"

Aine didn't even seem to mind that Momo was with someone else. Aine was truly happy for Momo. She couldn't feel sad at all. She was already thinking about how to get the two closer together.

"Data. Data. Data. Data," Inui was murmuring those words as he watched all of the regulars hang around.

Nothing was going on. Inui was disappointed by the lack of action between the boys and the girls. His only good data so far was that Ayumi had come up with a plan to get revenge on the boys. He didn't know what the plan was though.

Inui decided to go and find Ayumi.

'God! What is wrong with me?' Tsubaki was angry at herself. She was losing her cool, she already made a slip up today. She should've never said anything in the first place. How was she going to face the boys' team? The girls' team already knew all about her, but no one else knew anything.

Tsubaki was walking around the beach, trying to stay away from her team. It wouldn't be good to confront them too soon. She went farther down the beach, she couldn't even see her teammates anymore.

"Are you okay? You seem as if you're thinking about something serious," a blue-haired boy said. His hair was kind of wavy and it was chin length. He was definitely a bishounen, but Tsubaki could tell he was a boy, even though he looked like a girl. His voice was gentle.

"I'm fine. Excuse me," Tsubaki said, trying to get past him.

"My name is Yukimura Seiichi. I'm the captain of the Rikkai Dai Boys' Tennis Team."

"Oh! I'm sorry."

"It's okay. Is there anything I can do to help you? You look … as if you're alone."

"I'm fine, honestly. I just made a mistake and I can't talk to my teammates now."

"Hm? Did you do something to make them angry or sad?"

"No, but they might know something more about me."

"If there's anything I can do to help, just ask me. I'll be over by the cream beach house. But you already knew that, didn't you?"

"Excuse me?"

"You're the captain of the Seigaku's Girls' Tennis Team, Oguri Tsubaki, right?"

"How do you know who I am?"

"Who doesn't know who you are? You were amazing in the girls' kantou tournament. The captain of the girls' tennis team is wanted for other schools. But, you really don't get any justice at your school, do you?"

"True, I don't. But I do the best for my teammates, and it doesn't matter to me if I get attention or not like the boys' team. It's also true that the girls' team gets zero attention while the boys' get all of the attention. But I just want my team to do good."

"Your team is one of the best in Japan, is what I heard. But I still don't see how you still don't get any attention. The girls' team in Rikkai gets the same amount of attention as the boys'. The girls have even more fans, most of them boys."

"I have to get going. I have to help with the bonfire tonight. Good-bye Yukimura-san. Genkidena[2]."

Yukimura waved good-bye and shouted out, "Watch the bonfire with me tonight, Tsubaki-san! I would love to get to know you more!"

Girls were swooning all over the place at the sight of the boys' regulars from Seigaku, Hyotei, and Rikkai Dai. The three schools had all met and were talking about the upcoming tournaments.

"Someone from your school was very rude to me today, Tezuka-san," Atone Keigo stated.

"Who was it?" Tezuka asked.

"Some blond girl. I don't know who she is. All I know is that she plays the guitar."

"Speaking of which," Eiji said. "where are all of the girls?"

"We're here!" Hibiki shouted as the Hyotei girl regulars ran towards them.

"We're here too!" Mei yelled out. The Rikkai Dai girl regulars came too.

Everyone waited for fifteen minutes before it started raining, hard. Thunder was rumbling and lightening struck the sky. It didn't count as a slight rain anymore, it was a storm. The three teams ran to the nearest beach house—which was the Seigaku beach house—and got towels to dry off with.

"Where's the girls' tennis team?!" Oishi shouted. His motherly side showing. "We have to get them!"

1. Koitsu: Vulgar way of saying "this guy"

2. Genkidena: Take care in Japanese

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