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One on One

Yoshi's pose in the doorway brought to mind the image of a high diver perched at the edge of the ten-meter platform. Will she dive or won't she?

Senpai recalled the last time he spoke with Yoshi one-on-one. She was out walking her dog when their paths crossed near the park. At first, he expected her to tease or bully him, her usual routine when hanging out with her gang of four friends. Instead, Yoshi conversed with him in a friendly, quiet, and almost shy manner.

He recalled Nagatoro's recent assessment of her friend—that she was a natural follower. They clearly had one thing in common. Neither felt confident initiating and sustaining one-on-one, face-to-face conversations.

"What's up?" he asked her.

"Is it okay if I come in?"

Her request stunned him at first. Yoshi and her friends regularly barged into the clubroom as if they owned the place.

"Sure."

She stepped forward and shuffled head-down to the center of the room. "Before you get the wrong idea, I want you to know that it's okay with Hyacchi."

"What's okay?"

"That I talk to you."

Yoshi's nervousness bolstered Senpai's confidence. "At the auction, you said you might want to model." He motioned to the couch. "The way she did."

Yoshi bit her lip. "Yes, I guess I did say that." She shrugged. "Mind if I sit down?"

"You don't have to ask me that kind of thing. I don't mind that you're here at all. Just pretend you own the place like you usually do."

She sat on the couch and met his eyes. "You know, Sense, I think you and me are a lot alike in a lot of ways."

"What do you mean?"

"We're both not super comfortable around people. But our friends—or girlfriend, in your case—they help us out."

Senpai sat on the stool next to his easel. "I can't deny she's changed me a lot."

"Who in the world would have thought you'd be painting all these naked women, right?" Yoshi's face flushed. "By the way, I don't think that'll be me anytime soon." She took a deep breath. "But maybe. I don't know."

"You won't do it alone, in other words."

"Those paintings you made of Hyacchi were beautiful, and that makes a girl wonder what she'd look like if someone painted her that way. But, yeah, I guess I'd feel more comfortable if Hyacchi, Sakura, or Gamo were in the room too. Not that I don't trust you."

"I heard about your failing the test," Senpai said. "It must suck to have to stay home this weekend."

"It sucks, but actually, I'm lucky. They're letting me retake the exam on Tuesday."

"Which exam?"

"Algebra. I understand math—addition and subtraction, division and multiplication—but since when do we have to pretend that letters are numbers? It makes no sense."

"They're called variables, and they're a pretty important thing."

"Oh, really? Will I ever use variables in real life?"

"Probably not."

Yoshi groaned. "It really sucks."

"Nagatoro told me your family is going to Osaka too."

"They signed on as chaperons a long time ago and didn't want to back out because of me. Gamo-chan and I grew up in the same apartment complex. We've been best friends our whole lives and our parents are really close. I told them I could study on the bus and between events."

Senpai chuckled. "But you know how well that would go."

Yoshi shrugged. "Yeah, you're right. I should be at home studying this very second instead of hanging out after classes. Why am I even here?"

Because you need someone to talk to and all your friends are gone, he thought but didn't say. "You've got your whole house to yourself. Except for your dog, I imagine."

Her eyes teared up. "They took Odie."

"No way. Your parents took your dog to Osaka?"

She nodded. "They said if he stayed home with me, he'd be a distraction and I wouldn't get any studying done." She cupped her face in her hands.

"Are they right?"

"Yeah, probably. But they're still going to be sorry they took him."

"Odie doesn't do well when you're not around?"

"No, it's not that. Odie is fine everywhere. He's super good at making friends. Everybody loves him. He'll go up to anyone and sniff them up and bark and wag his tail like you're his favorite person in the world. The problem is he's always so full of energy, and I'm the only one who knows how to manage him. For example, they're traveling in a bus and space isn't a big problem, so they put him in the big, blue travel cage."

"Why not give him more room?"

"You'd think that, wouldn't you? The problem is he can move around too much and it drives him crazy. He spins and jumps and wants to run. Put him in the tiny cage, and it's no problem. He knows it's quiet time in his den and he's fine with it." She laughed. "I wish I could see the video of when they let him out in the hotel room."

"Let me guess. He's going to pee all over the place?"

"No, not that. Odie is actually really good about peeing. He'll let his little bladder explode before he pees indoors. We trained him out of that early. The problem is he's going to jump and run, and scratch and bite up the furniture. Then they're going to try to leash him, or they'll put him in the big cage and he'll bark nonstop till they let him out."

"You parents know your dog, don't they? Wouldn't they plan for that?"

"They think they planned for it, but they didn't. The milk trick will only work so many times."

"Milk trick?"

"If you give Odie a few tablespoons of fresh milk with a turkey baster, it'll calm him down. It reminds him of nursing on his mother. But give him too much and he'll get sick, and that's one nasty mess they'll have to clean up."

"Odie sounds like a full-time job. Don't your folks have work to do?"

"Gamo-chan's got a kid sister who's good with him." She sighed. "Sort of."

Senpai crossed his arms and nodded. I'm actually talking to this girl and enjoying myself. And I feel like I'm helping her out. "Oh, right. You used to live in the same apartment complex," he said. "So Gamo's sister must know Odie."

"Yeah. She loves Odie and used to babysit him for me." Yoshi's eyes bulged. "But she tortures the little guy every time she has him."

"Tortures?"

"Okay, not exactly tortures, but she treats Odie like a doll. She always tries to dress him up in these cute girly outfits—knit sweaters and socks, or a bonnet."

"That sounds cute. Plus, it'll keep him warm."

"I'll grant it does look cute, but Odie hates that kind of stuff. First of all, he's a dog so he doesn't need sweaters or socks to keep himself warm. Every time I get him back from her, he scratches himself for the rest of the day like the polyester fibers got tangled in with his coat or something. He hates having anything touching his body. It took me a year to get him comfortable enough with his collar so I could walk him outside. I walk him every day."

"You really love your dog, don't you?"

"I admit it. I'm a dog person. And yeah, Odie is the coolest pup in the world."

A sudden bolt of artistic inspiration struck Senpai between the eyes. They say people often resemble their pets. Senpai didn't want to compare the cute girl seated before him to a dog because of the negative connotations, but Yoshi definitely resembled a cute puppy, which wasn't so bad. Her round face and pursed lips looked very puppy-like. The pigtails jutting out from her full head of thick blonde hair resembled Odie's floppy ears.

Although she lacked Nagatoro's ability to read his mind, Yoshi seemed to sense his sizing her up. Her lips formed a shy smile, and her hand rested on the gym bag. She took a deep breath before speaking. "Okay, so I have a request. You can kick me out if you want to. I'll totally understand."

"If you're worried about Nagatoro, she told me she has no problem with you and me hanging out together."

She put her hand to her mouth to hide a giggle. "I know she met with that guy Toshi the other day. Sunglasses and a mask? What were you thinking?"

"I got jealous."

"So you want to get even?" Yoshi's eyes widened and she waved her hands. "Wait. I take that back. I'm not suggesting that we—"

"I know what you mean. No, it's fine. We're allowed to be friends. So what's in the bag?"

"You remember how Hyacchi used to model for you, um, back in the old days?"

Senpai put his finger to his chin. Yikes. It really has been a long time since I've produced any art of Nagatoro with her clothes on. He imagined his girlfriend seated in Yoshi's place, dressed in her stainless steel modeling outfit, then shook his head and blinked the image away.

"Sort of," he replied.

"You know she's a cat person and the needlecraft club made her an outfit."

"Her Toro-cat cosplay is legendary, and, as I remember it, they made lots of outfits."

"Yes, they did." She unzipped the bag. "And they made this awesome puppy cosplay costume for me."

She pulled out an outfit whose color matched that of her dog's fur, and laid the pieces on the sofa—puppy paw elbow gloves, thigh-highs, a dog-ear headdress, a v-neck top, and a skirt bottom that had a tail sewn on to it. A leather bell collar completed the ensemble.

Senpai nodded appreciatively. "That looks nice."

Yoshi stood tall and threw back her shoulders. "It looks super sexy on me too."

Though her reaction seemed out of character, Senpai understood. It's a way for her to stay close to her dog while he's away. "Want me to paint you modeling that?"

Yoshi's eyes widened as her confident demeanor shrunk like a deflating balloon.

Uh-oh. I shouldn't have been so direct. This girl isn't Nagatoro.

She hugged herself tightly. "Maybe? I don't know. It was just a thought. I wasn't really serious."

He pointed to the storage room door. "You can change in there if you want."

She scanned the clubroom and shook her head. "Maybe this isn't such a good idea."

"I totally understand."

"It's not that I'm worried you'll take advantage of me. I've been hanging out with Hyacchi long enough to know that I can trust you."

Senpai rested his hand on his easel. "You know, I screwed up the very first drawing I ever made of Nagatoro because I was afraid to draw her thighs properly. The next time I did better but only because she pretended to be sleeping."

Yoshi considered his words. "And we all know where you two are now." She collected the pieces of her costume and pulled them into her arms. Then she grabbed the blanket off the armrest, added it to the pile, and trotted toward the storage room. "Be right back."

As Yoshi changed, Senpai got his paints together and placed a fresh canvas on the easel. Ten minutes later, Yoshi shuffled out of the storage room with the blanket wrapped around her frame.

Senpai appraised the costume items he could see. "Those ears and the collar look really nice." He glanced down. "And those socks look really cool."

Yoshi's face flushed. "Stop making fun of me." She tightened her grip on the blanket.

He waved his hands. "No, no, I didn't mean it that way at all. Your outfit looks really nice. Well, the parts I can see."

"I really want to do this, Sense, but I don't think I can."

"It's fine. Why don't you sit down and relax? Sometimes it takes Nagatoro a few minutes to feel at ease."

"Okay." Yoshi trotted to the sofa, sat, and stared forward.

Senpai parked on the stool at his easel.

The two remained silent for a couple of minutes before Senpai asked, "Feeling any better?"

"Maybe. I don't know. Not really. It's not that I don't want to." She sighed. "I'm really close, okay?" She clenched her eyes shut, took a deep breath, and loosened the blanket to reveal more of her top. When it exposed her cleavage, she yanked it back up.

Senpai rested his hands in his lap. "Modeling isn't as easy as it looks."

"I know, right? And Hyacchi does this naked!"

They both laughed.

"I'm close." She glanced at the painter. "Really."

She just needs a little nudge. A light bulb lit above Senpai's head. "Hey, I've got an idea that might loosen you up. Take a look at this. It's really funny."

He pulled out his phone and started Toshi's hypnotism app.

Author's Notes: Yoshi doesn't get a lot of air time in either the anime or the manga, but she has her moments. I had no idea what to name her dog so I named it after Odie, the dog from the Garfield cartoon. I also found out Yoshi is an only child and some of you may remember it was her brother's punch that knocked Nagatoro out way back in chapter one. So I fixed that so she got the thermos from her next door neighbor.

I'm not sure when I'll post the next chapter. Since the main story has ended, I'm reverting to a more relaxed chapter posting schedule although I do seem to have a thing for Wednesdays. Thanks to all of you who keep following along and a special thanks to those who take the time to review and comment. See you all next time! — SK