POV Midorima
Later in the week, Quentin invites all of our group to his home for dinner. When we arrive, Elizabeth hardly gives me a chance to take off my shoes before she takes my hand and drags me into the living room to sit on pillows in front of the TV.
"Cartoons," she exclaims, "Ni Hai Kai-lan!"
The words of the cartoon are slow and deliberate, as it is for young children, but part of the dialogue is in Chinese. Elizabeth is only nine years old, too old for this cartoon, even though she is short for her age.
"Is it just like home?" she asks.
"No," I shake my head. "Chinese." I point at the TV. "Japanese." I point to my chest.
Elizabeth is confused. She takes her index fingers to the corner of her eyes and pulls until her skin stretches.
"Chinese, Japanese, dirty knees, look at these," she sings while changing the position of her fingers.
"Elizabeth! Who in the world taught you that racist junk," Roxanne demands. She is furious, and neither Elizabeth nor I understand why. I'm not sure what she has said, and she doesn't understand what's wrong with it.
"How would you like it if someone made fun of your heritage?"
"I think she meant to do good," I say.
"You shut up," she snaps at me. I close my mouth immediately. "Elizabeth, go to your room now. I will be right there."
Elizabeth gives me one long guilty look before she slinks away. She's not sure why she feels bad, but she does nonetheless.
Once she is gone, Quentin lets go off the laughter he's been holding back. Madrid and Mexico are conversing in Spanish and laughing as well. London takes a long slug of his beer and ignores us.
"I don't understand," I say, ashamed.
"It woulda been hilarious if she knew what she said," Quentin laughed. "She was singing an old racist Asian song thing. I'm so sorry."
"If you think it's so funny, you can punish her," Roxannne glares.
POV Takao
"Twink, look ahead when you run. You know where your feet are," Aida-sama snapped. I pulled my head up, and looked straight ahead to where Aida-chan was studying me.
"Your shoulders are too tight, keep them away from you ears. Loosen those fists," Aida-chan suggested.
"Yoga, Riko?"
"I think he could benefit from it greatly, and besides I'm sure Midorima-kun will appreciate the added flexibility."
I stumbled.
"Oi, I don't to hear about anyone's sex life."
I pitched forward and my foot got caught under me. I fell into the console and dropped onto the treads, face first.
"Twink!" Aida-sama ran to turn off the machine while Aida-chan helped pull me away. There was pain, lots of it.
"Black eyes are painful, but they look worse than they really are, Twink. Don't worry about it. You'll still be pretty for your boy in a few days. Scars give us character," he said.
I called him, instead of initiating the Skype conversation we had formerly agree upon.
"I don't have minutes for this," he said, "I will not have time to purchase more minutes tomorrow, and I rely on being able to text. I'm hanging up now. Meet me on the computer." He tone was grumpy and tired, and I almost chuckled thinking about our early days.
"Ok, ok," I respond, knowing my voice sounded strained.
The Skype call connected, but I blocked the webcam so that it was audio only.
"Why don't you want me to see you, Takao?" he was more annoyed than before.
"I had an accident today, and I wanted to tell you before you saw me and panicked."
"What happened?" I heard his voice unstiffen.
"I tripped while running, and slammed my face, it hurts but Otousan says it will be ok in a few days. Ok, I'll take the tape off the cam now, but don't freak out."
Shin-chan saw my face and closed him eyes, pinching his nose between two fingers.
The next day I clocked out for lunch at the usually time, but when I arrived in the break room, Aida-sama was there eating a protein bar.
"Riko's holding the yoga class for you. Get changed, and go to class," he told me around a mouthful of granola.
"I haven't eaten lunch yet. I think maybe –" he chucked a protein bar at my face. With a swollen shut eye, my depth of field was awful, and I fumbled it.
"Eat that on the way, it's better than the shit you usually bring."
"But, I…" I started to say, but his glare silenced me.
"Do you complain this much to your boyfriend? Go. To. Yoga."
Aida-chan waved me to a green mat once I appeared in the studio doorway. It is halfway back in the room and off to the left. The rest of the class was made up of elite athlete clients.
After only a few minutes, it was apparent to me that she was very good at this, her voice was calming ,and her pace slow. Shin-chan would have appreciated her technique.
We went through a serious of movements, starting with The Child's Pose and moving through Downward Facing Dog, forward folds and back bends, Sun Salutation, Warriors 1 & 2, and something called an Eagle before moving to the floor.
With the souls of our feet together and our legs bent into a diamond, Riko encouraged the entire class to do a forward fold with the goal of resting our foreheads against the instep of our feet. It hurt, but when she suggested I round my back more, it was tolerable. I groaned as she finally let us free of the position.
"If it hurts, Takao-kun, you're doing it wrong, back off until you can feel it, but aren't in pain," Riko scolded me. With that bit of wisdom, the rest of the class was less painful. The second time I did the fold, I couldn't get as low without pain, but it did feel better.
After the torture, she directed us onto our backs and took us through a serious of contractions and relaxation exercises. She lowered the lights.
"Close your eyes and feel the way your body settles into the mat. Tilt your chin down, don't let the ceiling look into your nostrils," she said, pacing around the room. Her voice was quiet, barely loud enough to hear above the music pulsing in the background. "Make a cave in the back of your mouth, breath in and out, like a tide rolling over your tongue. Form the sound 'ga,' and hear the sounds of the tide…"
When I opened my eyes again, the studio was dark and quiet. I was alone and the door was closed. I checked my watch ,and saw that it was close to 4pm. I groaned and put my head back on the mat. After a few moments, I stood and staggered out of the room. Aida-sama was there working with a client.
"Go ahead and clock in, Twink, there are towels to be folded, and machines to wipe down."
I couldn't bring myself to answer, but Aida-chan was sitting at her desk near the time clock and I couldn't avoid her as well.
"Why didn't you wake me up?" I asked, feeling the flush creep up my neck.
"I tried, but you were totally out. Have you been sleeping poorly?"
"Yeah," I admitted, scratching at the back of my neck. "I roll over... and he's not there. It's awful."
"Then it's a good thing we let you sleep. Dad's not mad, if that's what you're worried about. Out of everyone, he knows that sometimes an athlete just needs to stop for a while."
"Ok," I said.
"Hyūga, Kioyshi, and I are all going out for drinks tonight, are you interested in joining us?"
"I won't be uh…ah fourth wheel?"
"No, Kiyoshi never gets the hint that Hyūga and I want to be alone, so you can be, like our wingman right?"
"Sure, I'm great with oblivious boys."
Both Hyūga and Kiyoshi ordered foreign beers, while Aida-chan and I picked sodas. The club was noisy and the dance floor was packed. I spotted Aida-sama spying on us from behind a potted plant.
"Does your Dad always stalk you," I yelled into her ear.
"What?" she shouted back.
"Three o'clock, behind the palm," I directed her eyes.
"That's...," she growled.
"I got you covered. Kiyoshi, come on, we're going to provide a distraction while Hyūga and Aida-chan make a break for it," I said as I dragged the former Center out onto the dance floor.
"What are we doing?" he asked as he stumbled after me. I put my lips to his ear.
"We need to distract Aida-Sama so that Aida-chan can get away."
I made sure that Kiyoshi was positioned directly in Aida-sama's line of sight, and then began dancing with him.
Kiyoshi laughed, but played along until Aida-sama came from behind the plant and dashed passed us onto the dance floor. He looked around, and seeing that his precious daughter was gone, he swore and slunk off.
Kiyoshi finished his drink, and then the two of us went outside. He looked at his phone and was disappointed to find no messages. As he began to dial, I pushed his phone down.
"What?"
"Let's give then some privacy. Now that we've thwarted the cock-blocker, who knows what wonderful things may occur."
"Wonderful things..."
"They're a cute couple, neh?" I asked, watching the cogs slid past each other in his head. He wasn't stupid, the big dumb lunk schtick was a carefully crafted act and nothing more.
"She's picked him over me, hasn't she?"
"I'm sorry man, I really am. You want to shoot some hoops?"
"Yeah," he said, looking at his feet.