Disclaimer: I do not own Sailor Moon.
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"...I guess that's why
my marks are getting so high
I can see those tell tale signs
Telling me that I was on your mind..."
—"What I Go to School For" by Jonas Brothers
I hold my head high, sitting up straight in the passenger seat of my mom's SUV. Whatever happens, I will not vomit within the next hour.
My mom's light-blue eyes are piercing as she eyes me suspiciously, like she's reading my mind and formulating the questions she would for one of her patients. I stare forward, focusing intently on the sedan in front of us in the drop-off zone for my high school. In hopes of resolving my expression into one evincing no intestinal distress, I rehearse the key facts of this morning's Shakespeare exam. Thirty-seven plays, not including works of disputed origin. Seventeen comedies. Ten histories. Ten tragedies. I try to picture the timeline I created listing each of them in order, which of course reminds me that I've left the study guide next to the toilet in my bathroom between 2 and 3 AM. The thought brings on a new wave of nausea.
"Are you sure you're feeling okay, Ami?" Mom's voice is wary. "You look a little...off."
I check my reflection in the window. It could definitely be worse. My round glasses, which I'm only wearing because I was too sick to put in my contacts earlier this morning, do a commendable job of hiding the dark circles under my azure eyes. My skin is a little paler than usual, but nothing out of character for someone who spends most of her time indoors studying, and though I haven't had time to wash my hair, I pulled half of it back with a simple clip to get some of the shorter layers out of my face.
Mom's not wrong, I think with a grimace. There is a slick sheen of sweat on my forehead, my hair, typically a shiny pretty blue, is flat and unwashed, and my sallow cheeks don't give the strongest indication of health and well-being.
"I'm fine," I assure her. I'm lying, of course.
The drop-off line crawls forward. Our car doesn't budge. I glance over and find Mom's hand inching in my direction. Realizing what she's doing, I reach for my seatbelt.
I'm too late. Mom's hand finds my perspired forehead.
"You have a fever," she says, sounding worried.
I don't give her the chance to finish her diagnosis. Unbuckling my seatbelt, I jump out of the car. The cool morning air hits my overheated skin refreshingly, soothing the dull ache I've been fighting to ignore.
The relief is short-lived. When I grab my backpack, I catch my mother's expression. Irritation has replaced whatever motherly concern her face held moments prior. I pause, knowing not to ignore her outright.
My mom, Saeko Mizuno, is a doctor and knows sickness when she sees it. Unless she's in her white lab coat with clipboard in hand like she's done for over a decade, she's remarkably unfiltered. "We're not doing this again, Ami," she says sternly. "What is it this time? Do you have a math exam?"
"No." I fling my bag over my shoulder.
In my defense, I don't have a math exam. I have a Shakespeare exam. In half-an-hour. It's completely different.
"I feel fine, Mom, and I just want to go to school like a normal person." Despite Mom's grimace, I pack confidence into my voice.
The car behind Mom's honks, which she ignores. "You're a smart kid, Ami," she says, "but I'm not convinced you understand the concept of 'normal.'"
"Like mother, like daughter," I quip with a smile, not entirely joking. Having spent the last eighteen years of my life with her, I've learned that my mother is outspoken, easy-going, and the furthest thing possible from a helicopter parent.
"Ami Mizuno." she says, leaning over the center console. "I am not picking you up in the middle of the day."
Talk about "tough love."
"Great," I reply. "You won't have to. I'm not sick." I shut the door in one swift motion, hoping it will feel like a punctuation mark.
I immediately hear Mom rolling down the window. I wanted punctuation, and she's giving me a semicolon. "If you had your license—"
"See you later, Mom!" I interrupt her, waving behind me and heading for the white school building looming in front of me.
I know every inch of the Juban High School campus—every bench useful for last-minute studying, every shortcut so I'm never late to class, everywhere people hang out, which is helpful when I need to hunt them down to get quotes for the newspaper. I've walked up the stairs leading to the locker hall hundreds of times, and I can recite the names of the teachers in every classroom just like I can Shakespeare's seventeen comedies.
It's 6:53 AM, and there's a heavy fog that hovers over everything, coating the campus in dew. Droplets cling to the leaves of the trees and bushes just outside the front gate. It's currently zero period, and right now the only people here are those like me who need an early extra hour to fit every class they want into their schedule. The half-empty locker hall echoes with the squeak of sneakers on linoleum, the clang of closing locker doors, and the mumbled conversations of Monday mornings.
I head directly for my locker, where I unload my physics and government books and pull the plastic bottle of Tums from my backpack. I chew and swallow down four.
There is no way I'm letting the events of last night interfere with this Literature exam. If it were up to me, I wouldn't have gone out on a Sunday night. When Rei invited me to sushi with her and Yuichiro Kumada, I wanted to say no. I only went because she begged me, and because Rei is one of very few people in the universe for whom I'd forsake a few hours of important test prep (the others being Usagi, Makoto, and Minako). Yuichiro invited Rei to dinner, and she didn't know if she wanted the night to be a date. I was brought to third-wheel.
Of course, fifteen minutes in I could feel the dinner veering decidedly into date territory. While Rei flirted and probably played footsie under the table, I prodded my hamachi with chopsticks. Rei and Yuichiro shared egg rolls. Three hours later, I ended up hunched over the toilet, puking my guts out.
On the upside, I did plenty of studying between trips to the bathroom. I'm not the type to pull all-nighters before exams—I'm usually prepared by then, and I prefer to be well rested. While conditions haven't been ideal, I've made it work.
I close my locker, my stomach cramping ominously. Ignoring the pain, I head for class, rehearsing the history plays to distract myself. Henry VI. Richard III. Richard II.
Whatever happens, there is nothing I'm letting keep me from this exam. Not even explosive vomiting.
The very reason I'm not home recuperating from possible food poisoning is waiting outside of the door when I reach my Literature classroom.
"Hello, Mizuno," Taiki greets me casually. He doesn't look up.
"Kou," I reply.
I wish there's a word worse than "nemesis" I can use just for Taiki Kou. He's an un-popped blister. The splinter in your shoe from walking on woodchips. Your printer running out of toner when you're finishing your twenty-page final paper on the Hundred Years' War. If this could be the last time I ever have to look into his obnoxiously violet eyes, I'd feel like the luckiest girl on earth.
Unfortunately, it's not the last time. I have every class with Taiki, the regrettable effect of us both taking every advance placement subject that Juban High offers and the same electives. It's been this way since our first year. Every class, study group, every extracurricular event. Taiki, Taiki, Taiki. I just have to endure the rest of our final term of fourth year. Then, Taiki will be out of my life for good.
Unless, of course, we both get into Harvard. It's not a possibility I permit myself to consider. Two students from the same public school in Japan getting into Harvard would be exceedingly rare. I've studied Harvard's admissions history, and it's rare that a student from Juban High School has been accepted. Yet another reason for me to outdo him in every way that I can.
I ignore the way he's leaning nonchalantly on the wall next to the door, not glancing up, reading his phone's screen. We stand in icy silence. I would be blind not to notice—objectively, of course—how handsome and refined Taiki's features are. He is currently dressed in the standard male school uniform, though his is a vamped up version meant to come off as a "statement of fashion" with golden shiny zippers and numerous pockets. I guess being an member of a popular boy band, the Three Lights, allows you to make changes; whereas if anyone else were to do it, it would be an automatic suspension from school.
High cheekbones, sharp nose. He's rolled up the sleeves of his uniform, which, combined with the leather shoulder bag he uses instead of a backpack, gives him the look of a prep-school boy who's wandered off his high-edged campus and onto Juban High's.
I hate the effort, or lack thereof, he puts into his clothes, his obnoxiously long, yet soft-looking, auburn hair that he keeps tied back into a low ponytail at the nape of his neck. I hate how he does it to spite me, to show me he's not only prepared for this test, but he has the extra time to look "good."
Not that I'm attracted to him. His nearly constant stream of short-lived relationships proves his conventional desirability. I'm mature enough to admit it, although it gives me no personal pleasure to do so.
I resent the fact that I've had to lay eyes on him this morning while he hasn't even spared me one glance. It's an upper hand, if barely. With Taiki, every loss counts. Even the infinitesimal ones.
Consequently, it's one I'm determined to rectify. "You're going to have to work late on the paper today," I inform the top of his head while he reads something on his phone. "Your piece on the gym funding was poorly organize, per usual."
I feel a rush of victory when finally he looks up, eyebrows furrowing. Point: Ami.
His story wasn't poorly organized, truthfully. They never are. I, however, will never forgo the chance to exert the dominance I hold over Taiki on the student newspaper. I'm editor-in-chief of the Juban Chronicle, and Taiki is one of our strongest reporters, not that I'd ever tell him that. In all actuality, he's the writer most often assigned to exposés and complicated pieces. The one he is currently preparing is regarding the construction of Juban High's new gym, which I will be submitting for the National Student Press Club Awards at the end of the month. I want it to be perfect.
"Poorly organized?" he repeats. I hear the note of protest in his voice. "Honestly, Mizuno," he drawls, "your ploys to get me to spend time with you have grown thinner and thinner."
I roll my eyes. Around us, our classmates have started to congregate. Everyone's concentrated on flashcards or notebooks, hoping to fit in a little cramming in the final minutes before Mr. Watanabe opens the door. Not Taiki and me. We're the only ones who look calm and collected.
"I wish you were a good enough writer—we didn't need hours of in-person edits. I'm the victim here. You—" I clamp my mouth shut, the retort half finished. My stomach lurches. Not now.
He arches an eyebrow, no doubt surprised by my sudden silence. "D—Did you just nearly throw up on me?" Pocketing his phone, he smirks, his confusion fading. "Don't you think you're taking your revulsion act a little far?"
"It's no act," I reply, ignoring the rising wave of nausea in me. For a moment, I wonder what would happen if I just puked directly on Taiki, spattering his stupid, high-end uniform and repugnant leather oxfords. I kind of wish I could, just to watch horror fracture the impassivity in his eyes. Except then, Mr. Watanabe would definitely send me home before the exam.
Instead, I lean on the wall, hoping the posture projects confidence, not light-headedness.
Taiki scrutinizes me. "You're sick." There's no small measure of glee in his voice.
"Am not."
"Your skin is unusually blotchy, even for you," he says, smiling now. "You know, Mr. Watanabe would let you make up the exam if you need to go home." It's not a well-intentioned suggestion, I know. It's a taunt. An "I win." Which he will, if I retreat to the nurse's office now.
Taiki and I compete on every exam for the highest score. It started out informally—me peeking over his shoulder to check his grade, his intolerably smug face when he knew he did better. In our second year at Juban High, during our chemistry class, we made the competition official. Whoever scores worse on each exam does an unpleasant task of the winner's choosing, whatever comes up in the newspaper or Associate Student Government, where we're co-vice presidents. Fixing the printer in the newsroom, meeting with Principal Tanaka, picking up the work the student government president forgot or decided not to do...
If you miss a test, you forfeit on the grounds that makeup exams offer extra time for reviewing. Hence my coming to school feeling like death warmed over. Also, the many reasons why Taiki has had to postpone some events the Three Lights have had scheduled in the past. Our rivalry is just that important...to both of us.
"I'm fine," I say firmly.
"Mizuno, seriously." Taiki is faux sympathy, enjoying every minute of this. "If you have the flu, don't force yourself to be here. It's okay to forfeit. Self-care is important."
I glare. Self-care? Please.
Taiki crosses his arms, facing me. The feet separating us feels painfully insufficient for the size of his enormous ego. Pushing myself from the wall, I match his nonchalance. "You're pretty eager for me to concede. What, not feeling prepared this morning?"
"Oh, I'm prepared." Taiki doesn't flinch.
"Good," I reply. The words fly out of my mouth like vomit. "I call a blitz."
Taiki's eyes widen. Point: Ami.
"Yeah, right," he ventures. "You won't get ten minutes into the exam before blowing chucks."
My stomach rolls over. I swallow hard, willing the ominous rolling to settle. "You don't have to accept." Of course, Taiki not accepting would be as good as surrendering.
The blitz is the most extreme twist on our competition. When either of us invokes it, the contest becomes one of speed. Whoever turns their test in first wins, regardless of score. However, since neither of us would forsake even a point of our overall grade average by turning in sloppy work, we both balance accuracy with the time pressure. It has a devious beauty.
"Nice try," Taiki fires back. He's no longer smiling. With the gradual crowding of our classmates, we've ended up closer together. Only a foot between us. "I'm calling your bluff," he declares. "Blitz."
Right then, Mr. Watanabe opens his door. "You'll find your exams facedown on your desks," he says while everyone files in. He looks bored, and it's not even 7 AM. "Please have your pens and pencils ready and wait for the bell."
I push past Taiki in the doorway, not minding when my bag hits his shoulder. The room is organized with half the desks on one side of the room, facing the other half. Finding my seat, I wait while Taiki sits down in his, which is directly opposite mine.
Clammy sweat coats my forehead, and I reassure myself that I have nothing to expel. Despite my vigorous mental efforts, my stomach gurgles loudly enough for Taiki to hear. He looks straight into my eyes and winks. I vow to not give him the satisfaction, not of winning the blitz and certainly not seeing me vomit in this classroom today.
The bell rings.
A/N: I do not have any business posting another story lol. Especially a multi-chapter fic. But I've had this one typed up for a few months, unsure if I should share it or not. In case you couldn't tell, I absolutely love the Starlights: Taiki, Seiya, Yaten... They're quite possibly my favorite characters in the anime! This story is a Taiki/Ami pairing. I absolutely loved their chemistry in the anime, and after re-watching the 5th season of Sailor Moon for the nth time, I was inspired. As always, this story will be AU (as most of my stories always are). :)
Please enjoy! Also, I always look forward to hearing any feedback you may have!