"Act Five Scene Three again, when Juliet wakes!" The student director shouted to the actors on stage, "Ito-chan, is there anything you see that may need to be fixed?"
"The lighting is the major problem I have. Hopefully the lighting technicians come in soon, Sora's monologue just isn't the same without that color we want. And we all know Sora needs as much help as he can get."
The boy Hitomi named shook his fist at her, center stage, "Oi! You come down here and act!"
"Just joking, Sora-kun!" Hitomi laughed along with the others, "But I'm pretty certain Romeo never hated Juliet. Less dislike, you're an actor!"
"Yeah, yeah... How could anyone be more in love with that chick?" Sora, who played Romeo, snickered with his friends while the girl who played Juliet glared from stage left.
Hitomi watched from the back of the house, or, in layman's terms, the audience, and rolled her eyes.
The current play was Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. It was first suggested that they do a fairy tale, but Hyotei's strict rules, and the complaints of some very conservative parents, didn't allow for any cross dressing roles, unless absolutely necessary. It meant that a mock Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White were immediately out of the question when boys jokingly auditioned for the roles of the prince and the princess.
This particular Shakespeare play was volunteered because one of Atobe's fangirls knew that "Atobe-sama's" favorite book was "that one book with the Shakespeare plays." Hitomi had immediately corrected the girl- The Complete Works of William Shakespeare. By that statement alone she deduced that Romeo and Juliet was probably the only Shakespeare the fangirl had ever heard of.
To be quite honest with herself, Shakespeare was a name Hitomi grew up with. His plays, and quite a few other playwrights, was all Hitomi had to distract her from her father, but keep her close to him all the same. When she was young, just starting to learn English, her father came back from a trip from England and had been given the Complete Works by a future business associate. Had he not one day thrown it across the living room Hitomi would have never picked it up. At first it took her ages to read, as she had to constantly translate and learn a new language, let alone it's older counterpart. Now she could recite the old English just as well as any Japanese story.
Despite her love for acting Hitomi never auditioned for Hyotei's plays, she rather liked being stage manager. If she were to act her father would have pulled her out of that activity immediately because of the costume fees and whatnot, and rehearsal schedules were packed in for the actors. As a stage manager, she only had to show up at certain times.
To suffice her passion Hitomi began looking for scripts and plays that she could read online, even going so far as to buy them with her own money at book stores or any stores that had a script. It was why she always carried a script around with her, because it was the one she had most recently bought. Though she loved plays, Hitomi loved reading movie transcripts even more. Which is more than enough reason as to why she hadn't auditioned for Hyotei's plays. With the help of Oshitari, Hitomi was able to contact a talent agency and audition as an upcoming actress. Most times Oshitari didn't just take her home, he took her to auditions.
"Romeo and Juliet. How...ordinary."
Hitomi looked behind her, and rolled her eyes. Atobe usually attended school plays (he mentioned to Jirou once that it was a way of showing school involvement), but to come to rehearsal was unheard of, let alone the fact that the tennis regulars accompanied him.
"You have an audition today." Oshitari reminded, "Atobe was going the same way, and he's dropping us off."
Hitomi took her eyes off of the scene onstage and to the boys in front of her. She never told anyone of her auditions, mainly because she had been better off not listing how many she had gone into. There was only one person that Hitomi bothered to tell anymore, and the blue haired tensai must have told the team. Atobe's haughty pose and Oshitari's unusually happy-yet-calm attitude could mean only one thing: this was all Oshitari's doing.
"I canceled the audition." She simply said.
Shishido crossed his arms and scoffed, "Che, quitting before you start? That's super lame."
"I didn't quit!" Hitomi glared. She didn't quit things, she had gone through some embarrassing auditions before -so embarrassing that she thought about quitting- but she pushed on anyway, "I found another role."
She had meant to tell Oshitari, but with the events of the previous week she had forgotten completely. She had gotten the role for a TV show that was premiering soon, and she was one of the lead roles. Those times after school when they thought she would be going to a Gladiator Tennis match was actually when she was filming.
"And I didn't quit." She insisted to Shishido.
God how she hated to be looked down upon for not doing something.
"Alright, alright, you didn't quit! Geesh you'd think I had killed your dog or something."
"Don't underestimate me." Hitomi huffed, "I worked too hard for anyone to criticize my work ethic."
"No matter, you can tell us about the role on the way home." Oshitari began picking her bag up for her.
"It's okay." She took her bag back and sat it down beside her, "Thank you for the offer, Atobe. I don't need a ride home."
"If you insist." Atobe turned around and walked off.
"That was... Not like him." Hitomi blinked.
Had she been too rude? Was it possible to be too rude to Atobe, and even then, when was he ever offended?
"Is he okay?"
Oshitari had no idea, to be honest. Atobe had been acting odd as of late, but most assumed it was the anticipation of playing Seigaku soon, the results of Seigaku's recent winnings had garnered the attention of Atobe; and he'd been waiting a whole year to play against Tezuka Kunimitsu.
"We leave in two minutes if you're still coming."
"But I said-"
"If you can't find a ride just tell me, I'll have Atobe turn the limousine around."
He left Hitomi sitting in her seat, leaving her to wonder about the turn of conversation. And she realized then why Atobe had agreed to back down.
She excused herself for the day from her sensei and grabbed her bag, running to catch up with the tennis team.
There was usually some banter between her and Atobe, no matter the situation. A conversation turned debate turned argument, at the least. He saw her rejection to his invitation not as a rejection to him, but to herself. Hitomi could tell when she remembered how his smirk had faded into a line of contempt when he learned that she had called off the audition, followed by an air of indifference to gather up his previous smirk again. He was always known to be disinterested in those that showed disinterest.
'The nerve of that boy, to think that I would actually be scared of getting rejected for a role- To think I was getting complacent just because I landed a huge role!'
"Hey, wait up a minute!" She called, slowing down just a bit to begin changing her shoes, "I've got an audition to catch!"
They were just approaching the limousine when Hitomi caught up, and she smiled.
"I wouldn't want to quit, now would I?"
Kamiko was comfortable in her new school, more comfortable than she'd been in a long time. St. Rudolph was a great place, and she had met one of her closest friends there, but it didn't feel as comfortable for her as Seigaku did. She felt especially at ease when she was with the Seigaku regulars, and even the non-regulars, as she and Inui decided that while he covered the regulars she would make sure the non-regulars wouldn't fall too far behind. Her eccentric nature helped her grow close to the already eccentric team, and in return the regulars had grown attached to their special trainer.
Today's practice was going well, with Inui taking excessive data and Kamiko making sure each member was taken care of. In fact, Inui ended up pushing the regulars more than normal that day when Kamiko had suspiciously asked him to take the non-regular's data.
When asked about the situation, Inui's glasses glinted in the sun and he looked down at his notes to verify.
"Kamiko's pre-regular course training has gotten some of the members to advance so far that they've caught up completely to our old intensive regular's training. And, theoretically, in the short time span it took them to catch up, they could be formidable opponents in our next inter-rankings match. According to my data, some of them would even surpass us and take our spots as regulars."
"Saa, that's very interesting indeed, Inui." Fuji noted; he glanced back at the non-regular courts in thought, and saw Kamiko correcting forms and swings.
"In order for us to better prepare ourselves against Hyotei we have to push past our limits constantly. Which, thankfully, Kamiko has managed to make a harder job with each passing day."
"I can't tell if Inui as mad at Kami-chan for that or if he's grateful." Kikumaru whispered to Oishi.
Oishi worriedly wondered the same thing, "I don't think he's mad... I think."
Kamiko's head swiveled around, as if she had heard them. Her smile was met with the regular's own looks of acknowledgement before she turned back to her hard work.
"Inui couldn't be mad at Kami-chan," Kawamura said, "Kami-chan looks up to him as a fellow trainer, and she exchanged statistics for Inui to mull over."
"And by statistics I'm sure she meant those nasty drinks." Ryoma grimaced at a jug Inui had brought out.
Kaidoh backed away as it curdled and bubbled in front of him, Kikumaru shook and hid behind a worried Oishi, Kawamura stepped back as well as Tezuka, and Fuji, being Fuji, pushed Ryoma forward.
"Saa, time to taste test, ne?"
Ryoma gulped, "I think I have lots to work on..."
Luckily Ryoma managed to slip away, being called to the library for book duties. Fifteen minutes after he had left, and just as Inui was ready to start distributing the drink around, an unfamiliar voice piped in.
"So this is Seishun Gakuen? Doesn't look so bad to me."
Kamiko could only think of one word when seeing the boy's green eyes and his dark hair, 'Seaweed...?'
Disclaimer: I do not own any characters/plot/etc., of the PoT manga/anime.