Accepted

Once we got back to school, the guys took Kuma to the infirmary. When Sawatari saw the state that Kuma was in and heard from Yankumi that all 3-D had left school to do was protect Kuma, he was speechless. It didn't look like we'd get in trouble after all.

I knew that 3-D would insist on accompanying me to confront Abe, so I slipped away at the first chance. I couldn't risk them starting a fight or having teachers assume that 3-D was trying to start something when we really weren't.

"Abe, I need to talk to you," I said, throwing open the door to 3-C.

"Anything for you," he smirked as his classmates catcalled after us.

"You have your phone?" I asked him.

"Of course. I wouldn't let it out of my sight with such precious content on it."

Ugh, gross. I just wanted to get this over with.

When we got to the roof, I turned to him.

"What's your price?" I asked, arms crossed.

"Another date," he replied immediately.

"Will you cut the crap? You don't even like me."

"What? Of course I do!"

"You constantly point out the ways that I don't fit into your standard of what a girl acts like. You just want to get laid. And if you're actually as popular with the ladies as you say you are, that shouldn't even be a problem. Why do you even bother with me?"

"So you're not that dumb after all," he said, hands in his pockets. "Any guy at this school can get laid as long as they're smart enough to know how. But if it's you? Do you know how much respect is in it for the guy who manages to get in your pants first?"

I began to laugh. Now that Abe had dropped his act, this was absolutely ridiculous. He glared at me and I did my best to stop.

"Who are you even trying to impress?" I asked, biting my lip. "You're already the leader in your class."

He dropped his gaze immediately. "No one in particular," he growled.

My eyes widened. There was only be one person at this school who could make him feel threatened like that.

"Sawada?" I asked incredulously. No way…

He flinched and kicked at the ground. "No," he growled unconvincingly.

"But why would you be jealous of Sawada?" I asked.

"I'm not jealous!" he barked at me. "It's just that he's always had the respect of all of the students and all of the teachers. And for what? Beating up a teacher at his last school but still managing to have the top grades? What a joke."

"So you think that sleeping with me would top that?" I wondered out loud. Seriously, what was wrong with this guy?

"Being the first guy to conquer the only girl at an all boys' school is a pretty big deal. You must be blind if you don't know that all of the guys at this school want to get with you. They're just scared of what Sawada and 3-D will do."

"Well, I don't think you even know how this works," I said, and he looked up. "What's the point if you have the respect of all of the guys but not of the girl you hook up with?"

He stared at me blankly. "Who the hell cares if you respect me or not? All you have to do is put out."

Wow, he was seriously not even going to hide his intentions at all, was he?

I grinned. "You've never had a girl insult your skills, have you?"

He stared at my blankly, clearly not understanding.

"Well, you see…you can say what you want, but what's stopping me from telling people how terrible the experience was?"

"…It…you…that doesn't even matter," he finally spit out. "Who would believe you anyway?"

"But if I said that whatever you can do, Sawada can do better…" I said, taking a gamble.

His jaw dropped. "What?!"

"Hey, if you're going to use me to save yourself, at least tell me beforehand," a voice spoke. We both turned to see Sawada saunter onto the roof.

What…had he heard me say all that just now?

"You told him?!" Abe demanded. I didn't respond. I wasn't sure why Sawada was here and what he intended to do. Sawada simply stood there, a few feet away from us.

"Did you forget what will happen to you if this goes public?" Abe said finally as he pulled out his phone, his voice low and threatening.

"It doesn't matter," I said, staring him in the eyes. "My class will believe me."

"Your class," he scoffed. "That group of pathetic losers!"

"Says the guy who wants to be recognized by us," I spat. "You don't have the right to talk about my class like that!"

"After I treated you so nicely on that date, who do you think you are?" he hissed, grabbing my shoulders.

"I suggest you keep your hands off," Sawada said, his hand suddenly on Abe's arm.

"What, did you come to claim her?" Abe taunted, his grip tightening on my shoulders. "And all alone too?"

"Alone?" Sawada said, eyebrow raised.

Suddenly, Uchi and the rest of 3-D burst onto the roof as if on cue. Even Kuma, who should have been resting in the infirmary, was there.

"What's this?" Abe asked, taking a step back, releasing me from his death grip.

"I told you I could handle it myself!" I said, not sure what to do now that they were here. But I couldn't ignore the fact that I felt better now that they were.

"Even if you can, you shouldn't have to!" Uchi shouted at me. "You don't have to do this alone. That's what we're here for."

I bit my lip. I wasn't sure I could even begin to adequately express what I was thinking.

"What, so you guys are going to beat me up or what?" Abe sneered, but his voice sounded shaky.

3-D didn't reply. They just stood in front of us quietly, staring him down.

"Heh. Until I called dibs on you, they treated you like a guy. And now? They just think that you're a weak girl, and by this show of bravery, they're hoping to have a better chance with you," Abe scoffed. "They're the same as every guy at this school."

"Wrong!" the class shouted at him. We both stared at them.

"Kana's not just some girl," Noda said.

"And you're a fool if you think she's weak," Minami laughed.

"And she's not just one of the guys either," Kuma added.

"She's our classmate," Uchi said, the entire class nodding along.

Classmate. Not one of the guys. Not the one girl in the group of guys. Classmate.

"And if someone threatens our classmate, we protect them," Sawada said. He grabbed Abe by the collar and seemed to whisper something in his ear.

Abe stiffened and found the photo. He seemed to hesitate for a moment, his finger hovering over the screen. One tap and that photo would end up being sent to his entire contacts list. But his finger moved. Tap. Delete.

He glared at me for a second before he threw his hands in the air. "I guess you're one of them now, Kana-chan. How disappointing," he said, trying desperately to put his cool act back on before he pushed past 3-D.

"YES!" the entire class shouted.

I grinned. I couldn't help it. My victory was every much theirs too. But when the class surged forward towards me, I found myself suddenly feeling dizzy, and I ended up grabbing Sawada's arm to keep myself upright. What was happening to me?

"Are you okay?" everyone asked, as I rested my forehead against Sawada's shoulder for a brief moment, trying to pull myself together.

"What are you all doing here?" Yankumi yelled as she ran onto the roof. Everyone froze.

I didn't look up right away but what she must have seen was me doing my absolute best to remain standing while surrounded by a concerned 3-D as Abe fled the scene.

"Hold it right there!" Yankumi shouted at Abe who froze. "How dare you bully a girl? What do you have to say for yourself?!"

"What does this have to do with you?" Abe scoffed.

"I'm her homeroom teacher after all," Yankumi said through gritted teeth. "You go back there and apologize to her right now!"

"Like hell I will," Abe snarled and turned to walk past her.

"You reduce my precious student to this much discomfort and insecurity and that's the attitude you show?" she shouted, grabbing him by the collar and punching him.

Abe fell to the ground, clutching his bleeding mouth.

"Now apologize!" Yankumi demanded as we all stared in shock. Did she just…?

"Ah no, Yankumi," I said, finally finding a chance to speak. "I just don't feel well."

"What?" Yankumi gasped. "You mean, Abe didn't hurt you?"

"Well…not like that," I said, finally regaining my balance and releasing Sawada's arm.

Yankumi's expression changed to one of panic. "I am so sorry!" she said to Abe, trying to help him up.

He threw off her arm. "What the hell is wrong with this entire class?" he shouted, leaving the roof.

"Oh my goodness, what will I do? I will get in so much trouble!" Yankumi said frantically.

"Don't worry. He's smart so he won't say a word," Sawada spoke up. "There's no way that he'd admit that a female teacher managed to knock him down."

When all of us realized that this was true, I felt free to laugh guiltlessly at how fast karma managed to catch up to him. I was the first to want to land a punch on Abe myself, but knowing that my freaking homeroom teacher had done it for me felt so much better.

"Seriously, Kana, what were you thinking, taking him on by yourself?" Minami said, patting my head.

"Yeah, you have all of us here to back you up," Kuma said.

"Thank you," I said, beaming at all of the guys. What a huge weight off of my chest. Well…one of them.

I looked over at Uchi who was staring at the ground. He raised his eyes and I gave him a tentative smile. We had a lot to talk about.

And Sawada. What on earth had he said to Abe?

And I didn't feel patronized by what he said about protecting his classmates.

I felt accepted and strangely at peace.

All of a sudden, everything in my vision turned black and I felt myself falling.

When I opened my eyes, I saw my entire class crowded around me. Yankumi was supporting me as I lay there. I blinked, unsure what had happened.

"You blacked out for a second there," Sawada said.

Which meant that I basically fainted in front of my classmates. I wanted to disappear. Seriously, how could I be so weak?

"Kana, you're a girl, so you need to take it easy," Yankumi said concernedly. "Alright, someone carry Kana to the infirmary!"

"Ah, please don't carry me!" I said, but I was ushered onto Uchi's back before I could protest. I tentatively held onto Uchi's shoulders as he carefully stood up and began to head down the stairs.

"It's okay to hold on more tightly," he said softly.

I was glad he couldn't see my face. It was like he was saying something about our friendship, not just this situation, and I couldn't help but feel guilty.

Everyone else followed me all the way to the infirmary, and I was put on the bed next to Kuma's.

"Sheesh, what is with your class getting hurt today?" Kawashima asked Yankumi, who shrugged.

"They're just extremely passionate," she said.

"Kana, have you been sleeping or eating much?" Kawashima asked me.

I shook my head sheepishly. I didn't realize how quickly not eating or sleeping would affect me.

"Seriously, you need to take care of yourself," she said, making me drink a thing of juice before making me lie down. She shooed the rest of 3-D out, saying that only the sick and injured were allowed here.

Kuma fell asleep almost immediately and his soft snores made me laugh a little bit. I fell asleep soon after.

When I woke up, I saw that I had slept for a few hours. I did feel a lot better. Kawashima stepped out for a little bit for something faculty related after making sure that I was okay.

Kuma was still snoring and I smiled.

"He's always like that," a voice said. I looked over and saw Sawada standing in the doorway. "How do you feel?" he asked me.

"Umm…I guess I needed some rest," I said. I then remembered that Sawada had appeared on the roof at a really awkward time.

"Sorry for using you to help myself," I said, blushing. How embarrassing. "It just kind of came out. If rumors start going around, I'll take full responsibility."

"I don't think Abe is going to give people one more reason they should respect me over him," Sawada reasoned. "Besides, I'm not mad. Now I know why you didn't ask Yankumi for help. You thought she would have taken all of this talk out of proportion, right?"

"Her gasp at the thought of me actually sleeping with Abe," I said with a laugh. "I don't think she would have understood what it is that Abe had actually wanted from me. She's way too innocent. But watching her punch Abe felt so so good."

We both grinned, sharing in the satisfaction of that moment.

"...What did you say to Abe?" I asked.

He shrugged. "Just that I'd been recording the entire conversation, and he should delete the photo if he didn't want the recording to fall into Sawatari's hands."

I stared at him. Why hadn't I thought of that?

"Thank you," I said, not knowing what else to say. He nodded.

"Oh yeah, Uchi told me to tell you that he'll walk you home."

At the mention of Uchi, I involuntarily flinched, surprising myself. It didn't escape Sawada's notice.

"I know it doesn't excuse what Uchi did or said to you at all. But I wanted to explain what I meant by Uchi not giving his heart to just anyone," Sawada said, sticking his hands his pockets.

I nodded, asking him to continue.

"Uchi's life has been a series of people he trusts abandoning him. His dad left his family when he was seven. His mom still talks about his dad in a really positive light but Uchi has never forgiven him for hurting him and his mom like that. In middle school, his first love agreed to be his girlfriend but several months in, he found out that she was also seeing a high school student. When he went to confront the other guy, he was completely beat up and the girl didn't even care. That's why Uchi started fighting more with people around him. And then last year…a good friend of ours caused an incident and disappeared without a word from our lives. There are some other people, but those are the major ones."

I couldn't breathe. No wonder Uchi was so angry at the thought of me having completely betrayed the class. He had taken it personally as just another person he trusted throwing his trust back in his face.

"I'm not saying this because it allows Uchi to do whatever he wants," Sawada said quietly. "We all have trust issues. And it might take a long time before you guys trust each other again. But he does really care about you, so if it's not too much to ask, don't make him feel like he has to add another person to that list."

"Uchi is really important to you, huh?" I said.

"…He's the first person to talk to me when I got here," he said. He was looking away so I couldn't see his face but I imagined that he was smiling at the memory.

"I'll do my best," I promised. "Ah…but if you could be there for him…I know he feels really guilty about what he said and I don't know if I can say anything to make it go away…"

"Yeah," he said. He got up to leave but right before he exited, he turned to me. "I won't bring it up again if you won't, but I'm pretty sure what you said to Abe is true."

"Huh?"

"I can do most things better than him," he said with a smirk. I chucked the small role of bandage tape I found on Kawashima's desk at him in exasperation.

Once Sawada left, I realized what that Uchi's message meant that he expected to be able to walk me all the way home. I was sure that he wouldn't take no as an answer and that meant he would find out about Shun…

I threw back the covers and scribbled a note to Kawashima that I had gone home. I drank an extra juice can for good measure before grabbing my stuff and booking it.

I made sure to call Uchi just around the time school ended. I was already safe at home, lounging in my room when I finally racked up the courage to do it.

"Hey Uchi, I'm sorry I left without saying anything…but I asked my cousin to come pick me up."

I didn't want to say my parents because that would be a flat out lie but somehow cousin didn't seem too far off.

"Ah, okay. So you're home now?" he asked.

"Yeah…"

There was an awkward silence as we both struggled to say something.

"Look, can we talk on Monday?" I said finally. "I want to use the weekend to think a little bit but I really do want to talk things out with you."

"Yeah, same," he said. "…I'm really sorry, Kana. If I had known that Abe -"

"Uchi, if you keep feeling bad for what happened, we're never going to get past this," I said firmly. "Just think about what you want our friendship to look like from now on, okay?"

"…okay. See you Monday then."

"Monday," I promised. It would probably be one of the most awkward conversations ever, but it had to happen.

When I walked from the café to the house to grab dinner during my break, I found Sho in the kitchen making himself some food. His schedule was so irregular that it was always a pleasant surprise to see him. I found that he was often sleeping while I was at school and by the time I returned, he was usually already gone for work.

"Want to make me some too?" I said, sliding into the counter seat.

"I will if you tell me what you were doing with a boy at the batting cage on Wednesday night," Sho replied as he continued to cook.

"How do you know that?" I asked, surprised.

"Tatsuya-san saw you when you were leaving but you were too far away for him to say anything," Sho said.

"Oh. I wonder how Tatsuya-san's doing," I said, skirting the question, but Sho would have none of that.

"You're not getting one bite until you explain. Tatsuya-san said he didn't like the look of that guy you were with."

"What if he's my boyfriend?" I asked, trying to steal some of the meat from the pan but Sho whacked my hand with the spatula.

"Ha, yeah right," Sho said. "Tatsuya-san's amazing at reading people. Unlike you."

"Hey!" I protested. "That's not fair."

Sho just gave me a look and I gave a dramatic sigh.

I looked around really quick to make sure that Shun wasn't around at least before telling Sho a little bit about why I had been at the batting cages to begin with and what had happened after with Abe and 3-D. He put a plate of food in front of me as I continued to talk but the more I told him, the more he looked displeased.

"You're an idiot."

I frowned at Sho's words. "But I was able to fix everything."

"Yeah, and how much faster would it have gone if you had just told everyone from the start?" he pointed out. He continued to eat his dinner as I tried to figure out how to respond.

"Yeah but…my class would have killed Abe, and then where would I be?" I argued. "Plus now, it's not over some ownership issue over me. They actually respect me now."

Respect. All I had ever wanted from my classmates.

"I still think you're an idiot," Sho said. "Why didn't you tell someone who could have done something about Abe?"

"No one would have believed me! Abe's in a class above mine! He already gets more credibility in the teachers' eyes because of that!"

"What about your homeroom teacher? It sounds like she would have helped you out."

I fell silent. Yankumi. I hadn't even really given her a thought. I had been so caught up in judging her for her failure to keep her background a secret that I hadn't even thought of asking her for help.

"And what about me?" Sho asked. "You could have told me about Abe that one night."

"I wanted to do it by myself," I said stubbornly. "I can handle it!"

"But you almost couldn't."

"Shun would have agreed with what I did!"

"I would have agreed with what?" Shun said, walking by at that moment.

"I ran into a problem and then I handled it!" I said.

"Good for you, kid," Shun said with a smile.

I threw a triumphant smirk in Sho's direction. He scowled and kept eating.

"That group of students that were causing all those violent incidents turned themselves in today," Shun said. "Do you know anything about that?"

I nodded. He listened as I briefly explained what had happened. I omitted the detail that Yankumi was part of the Oeda Household as well as the fact that my class had been angry with me. Shun didn't need to know everything.

"Well, I guess it saved us from having to go up against high school students," Shun remarked.

I nodded, internally wincing at how differently it would have turned out for those Shinguji kids.

My phone suddenly rang and I picked up.

"Kana!" I heard Noda's cheerful voice.

"Hey, what's going on?" I asked.

He paused a bit before he blurted out his question. "Why can't I tell about your job?"

My grip on my phone tightened. I hadn't been expecting this question.

"I mean, that misunderstanding today would have never happened if you told everyone what you did after school," he rambled on. "I knew you didn't want me to tell, but it wasn't cool what they said…"

"But that doesn't change the fact that I'm a girl," I said calmly. "That misunderstanding was bound to happen anyways…Just keep it a secret until I'm ready to tell the others, okay?"

He eventually agreed, clearly not completely understanding but willing to do as I asked. And I appreciated that.

Once I hung up, I sat at the counter, brooding over how long this façade would last. The first cracks were already starting to appear, if they weren't already there to begin with.

Author's Note:

Sorry for all the typos in the last chapter. I can't believe I missed a ton of them. :(

So Abe's done and dealt with! As much as I wanted Kana to be the one to punch him in the face, I thought it wouldn't make as much sense in terms of consequences & the lessons that Yankumi is trying to teach them about fighting. But he still got punched in the face, so I hope that was satisfying!

Things are progressing a lot more slowly than I planned (both in the writing process and in terms of events in the story) and I'm finding that it's not a bad thing. This arc was pretty important, and while I'm glad it's now done, I'm also glad that I broke it up into smaller chunks and spent more time on it. Next few chapters will be new material (as in not in the drama), so I'm a little nervous but also really excited!

Thank you so much for reading! ^^