Disclaimer: Hikago isn't mine.
Author's notes: Last chapter for a couple of weeks, probably. (I'm taking a summer lab class, and it's a killer. If you don't believe me, I'll gladly have you reference my 70+ page lab report.) Still, non-shounen ai, although I really do think that it's going to change.
Chapter 2: School
Akira, back in front of the goban, felt as if he were in control of his life once more. If I cut here, he thought, eyes narrowed and focused, this whole shape will be in trouble. He played with the utmost confidence that he would win. A few moves later, it was official when his opponent resigned. Although some games were stressful, they were the most enjoyable part of his day by far. Now, he had to put all of that aside and head back to high school.
"T-touya!" Hikaru called from behind him.
"What is it, Shindou?" the refined boy asked, turning to see the hopeful eyes of the other boy.
"Do you want to go play a game? I mean I finished mine, too."
"I'm going back to school," Akira replied shortly.
"You're still going to school?" Hikaru asked amazed. "I would have figured that you'd spend all of your time perfecting your go."
"I study the game sufficiently." He was growing tired of the conversation.
"I didn't mean that …" The bleach-blond boy lowered his head slightly. "But … why are you going to high school? You don't need to."
Akira looked at the other boy wondering if he should say something detached and cold as always. Surprising both of himself as well as the other boy, he replied with the truth, "I go to school still, because father always regretted not finishing high school." With that he left the building and headed for school.
---------------------------------------------------------
Once at school, Akira headed towards the bathroom to change into his uniform. Although the principal had given him permission to forgo the uniform, he thought that it would be better if he adhered to school dress codes. He stood out enough as it was. Glancing at his watch, he saw that he could still make it to part of his fifth class and for his sixth and seventh class. Math, Literature, and Chemistry, he thought, heading toward his locker, pulling books out, putting others away, and hanging the suit carefully on the hooks inside of the door of his locker.
He walked into class, late, like always. Thoughtful eyes glanced over the notes on the board. Thankfully, he hadn't missed too much material. As inconspicuously as possible, he pulled out his notebook and started copying the notes, watching his neat handwriting fill the page. Even as he concentrated on his schooling, he noticed actions of others around him.
He heard one boy whispering to another one. "He's not as late as he normally is. An easy win for him, I guess."
The other boy responded with a scoff. "A boy like him, who never loses, must piss off all of those people who are older than he is."
Lowering his head, Akira hid behind his hair, eyes burning with anger. Again, he focused on the blackboard in front of him, carefully taking notes, fingers gripping his pencil so hard that his knuckles turned white.
The bell sounded sooner than he expected it to. It had taken him the rest of the period to catch up with the notes. With a relieved sigh, he packed up his books and headed to his next class, not bothering to stop by his locker to chat with friends, unlike so many of his other classmates. It didn't matter; his next teacher was sort of a Go fanatic, so he always asked about his game.
It doesn't matter, he thought reassuring himself. I'd much rather be in the company of my teacher instead of other kids my age. Even as the train of thought was complete, the image of two toned hair and challenging olive green eyes sprang in his mind. Shindou, he recognized. As quickly as the picture formed, he forced it out of his mind. Now was not the time to be thinking about him, a person's presence that always placed some sort of pressure on him, pushing him forth but at the same time frustrating him completely.
He entered the room of his Literature teacher. With a polite nod and the proper greeting, he took his seat and waited for the question he knew would come.
"Did you win?" Mr. Yamamoto asked, stroking the white hairs on his chin.
"Yes," Akira replied, eyes focused forward.
"That's a good boy. Your father must be proud of you."
"I …" He paused, letting his sentence trail of when he discovered that really didn't know. His father rarely spoke to him due to all of his recent travels.
"I'm sure he is. You're a bright boy, and this is a tough high school to get into. You're also working a full time job too."
"Thank you," Akira replied, getting out his books and readying himself for class when he noticed other students beginning to stream in.
Boys nudged each other at the sight of him. Some he recognized from Kaiou's Junior High Go Club. He tried to smile and catch their eye, but they just turned away and sat on the other side of the room. He thought he heard one of them say, "he thinks he's so great, sitting there all smug." Another misconception that he couldn't fix. With a deep breath and a sigh, he focused his attention on the teacher as class started.
The day ended like any other with a lot of loud noise filling the halls. Akira just had to get his books and suit and head over to the Go salon to fulfill other pro-Go obligations.
"Can I get through?" he asked politely, to the guys that stood in front of his locker. When they ignored him, he tapped one of the guys on the arm.
"What is it?" the other guy asked gruffly.
"Can I please get into my locker?" he repeated. Although his voice was quiet, it held that calm authority that he was so well known for.
"You can wait until we're done," the guy responded. "Unless you're too good to wait. You think that you don't have to wait your turn because you're better than us."
"You're locker isn't even here," Akira protested.
"But my buddy's is," he snarled back. He pointed at the guy who was casually leafing through his folders in front of an open locker.
Akira wanted to protest that he was on a tight schedule, but he knew it would accomplish nothing but angering the guys further. Even as he bowed his head to acknowledge the truth in his statement, his green eyes were fixed on them, burning with his hidden message, urging them to hurry.
"Geez," the one at the locker said, "if you're going to do that, you might as well just tell us to get going. You might as well just tell us that your time is worth more than ours. Seriously, that's what you think, anyways, that nobody our age is worth more than you are." The guy looked down at Akira, practically spitting the words out as a curse.
To Akira's surprise, olive green eyes sprang into his mind, lively and challenging. Why was he thinking of Shindou at a time like this? With a sigh, he shook his head and was about to deny the guy's accusation, when he was cut off.
"Seriously," the friend agreed. "Why aren't you more outspoken? State what you want like a man, instead of being all girlish about it. You know, unless that's what you want people to think about you …" Although the guy's voice trailed off, he looked pointedly at Akira's hair.
Anger coursed through every fiber of Akira's being. It wasn't like it was his first time hearing such comments, but it infuriated him every time, made his ears and eyes burn with the emotion. He found the fact that his classmates were so quick to judge both frustrating and at times amusing. Although his first impulse was to touch the ends of his chin length hair, he ignored it and said in his coldest voice, "Fine. Please move. I'm on a tight schedule." The two guys gave him a measured look before leaving, and he was sure that they left cursing him and his arrogance.
Author's notes: I have no idea the amount of schooling Touya Meijin had, and I'm not sure the series told us. So, just assume he didn't finish High school. Also, I'm not familiar with the curriculum an Asian high school-er would be going through, so I made up Akira's schedule based off of more of an American system.
And like always, please review. It's nice to know that other people enjoy my story, think I could do something to improve, etc. (It's also good motivation, because, seriously, people wouldn't post publicly if they didn't want feedback.)