Chapter Fifty Three: Downside of a Brilliant Mind

Disclaimer: I do not own Eyeshield 21.

Song Playing: Bad Girlfriend

Theme 10: think

When they started going out there wasn't much of a change in their relationship. They still fought. He still shot at the players. She still scolded him when she thought he was being too harsh, which was almost always. Only now she made him lunch and didn't try to upset his authority in front of the other players. He walked her home from after practice and held back on pointing out her love of eating in public because it bothered her.

What surprised him about their new relationship with the lack of physicality to it. He had actually been dreading the hugs and stuff he was sure she'd be doing now that they were officially dating. After all she did it with everyone else. He had been mentally preparing himself for the onslaught of hand holding and nuzzling and other affectionate crap that public television had taught him to expect from teenage girls. Especially ones as physical and opinionated as his fucking manager was prone to be.

So when days turned into weeks and nothing out of the ordinary had happened he started to relax a little. It seemed like she wasn't going to be excessively touching him like he had been anticipating.

And if he had dwelled on it he would have come to the conclusion that it bothered him.

A lot.

Not doing all the touchy feely girly crap he thought she would do.

As it was, it didn't really start bugging him until he started noticing how affectionate he was with other people. Even people she had known for less time than she had been dating him. Then it started grating on his nerves. It was also making him question why this was.

The reasons he was coming up with only served to agitate him further.

They continued to build and boil inside until he just couldn't take it anymore. The two of them were conducting an interview with Kumabukuro, who they had met on and off again throughout their football career. He was just getting ready to leave when she had pulled him into one of her famous goodbye hugs. She was waving the reporter off and he was getting ready to explode.

He could almost hear something inside him break. The door had barely closed behind 'Bomberhead', as he had been known before his retirement from professional football, before he was confronting his girlfriend. In his normal charming way of course. "Why do you avoid touching me when you're practically all over a complete stranger?"

Her mouth dropped in shock at his accusation. "I was not all over him!"

"Well he's gotten more from you than I fucking have." He glared. "Why don't you fucking do shit like that with me? Why do you avoid me?"

"I don't-" Then she got this expression like she realized that she wasn't going to get out of this one through denial. That's about when she got really fidgety. Her fingers fiddled with the hem of her shirt; her eyes found the floor fascinating. And to complete it all a blush dusted her cheeks. "Okay. Fine I do avoid hugging you and stuff."

He looked like he was ready to snap somebody in half. "I already knew that. What I want to know is why you fucking do it!"

"It's just- It's not-" Taking a deep breath and looked at him straight in the eye. "You're bony, okay?"

He had spent the last several weeks driving himself nuts over this and this is the answer she gave him? He couldn't wrap his mind around what she just said. "I'm what?"

"Bony." She was in full flustered mode now, complete with nervous chatter. "You're so tall and lanky that when I do try to rest my head on your shoulder it's not comfortable at all. It's like leaning against a rock. Or if I try to get close to you on the couch your elbows dig into my ribs. Then when we hug my nose gets squished and there's just no soft places for me to rest my head even if-"

"What?" For the first time in his life Hiruma Yoichi was at a complete loss. His very affectionate girlfriend wasn't affectionate with him because he was bony. Not because she didn't like him or any of the other millions of reasons he had come up with over the last few days. Just because it was actually physically uncomfortable for do the touchy feely stuff.

He felt like an idiot.

He also felt like bashing his head against the nearest solid surface.

The pitfall of being a person with a high level of intellect?

Over-thinking.