WILDFLOWER [Ryunosuke Tanaka x OC]

Chapter 22 - The Scrimmage

 "We're not even in school anymore, but finals week is still a bitch, huh?"

Seated on the front steps to the girls' gym, Nagisa looked up from her revised game plan—AKA all of the plans that didn't involve Kano—and found Keishin Ukai standing in front of her with an unlit cigarette dangling from his smirky lips. Nagisa frowned at him. "What the fuck do you want?"

"Haha, ouch," he chuckled, feigning a wound to the chest. "What did I do to deserve such a warm welcome?" He pulled out his lighter and flicked it a few times before it caught, lighting the tip of his cigarette and inhaling deeply.

"You haven't proven to deserve otherwise," she hissed, turning back to her binder and flipping through her plans.

Keishin exhaled, a cloud of noxious smoke spewing from his teeth. "One of those types, huh? No gesture of good faith? No 'innocent until proven guilty'? Well, I'm here to offer a... damn, what do you call it...? A truce?"

Nagisa raised a brow, but said nothing. Sounded sketchy.

"A scrimmage was what I was thinkin'... to take the kids' minds off of finals, maybe let 'em blow off some steam," Keishin explained, taking another draw from his cigarette before continuing, smoke spilling from his lips as he spoke. "We could take notes on each other's players. Y'know, for training before the next competition? Maybe treat 'em to some ice cream afterwards?"

His plan sounded suspiciously helpful, and Nagisa squinted up at him through the summer sun. "You know... that's not half bad," she admitted.

"I aim to please," Keishin smirked, wiggling his eyebrows.

Nagisa grimaced at him and stood. "No, no, no, don't do that."

"Do what, princess?"

"Don't call me that, for one. For two, don't make that face at me. Three, I just broke up with my girlfriend, like, a month ago. So I don't want anything serious or otherwise right now."

Keishin cocked his head to the side. He carefully said nothing about that word: girlfriend. "I didn't say a thing about your ex or your dating life, just asked a question. Didn't know that was against the law now."

"It is, and I'm calling the cops," Nagisa spat, clutching her playbook to her chest. She frantically gripped her keys, trying to unlock the gym, but the key ring was stacked full with useless ones, broken or unlabeled or to doors that didn't even exist on campus anymore.

Keishin chuckled at her obvious attempt at fleeing, and the sound made Nagisa lose her nerve. She dropped the keys. Her body quickly heated with embarrassment.

He opened his mouth to tease her, but she held up a single finger.

"Not a word," Nagisa hissed between clenched teeth. "Not a word."

When she found the mental strength to look up, he was gone.

It was just her and her fumbled keys.

❀

The rest of the week flew by in a whirlwind of stress and caffeine.

Kano and Ryu rarely had a second to themselves, nevertheless to see each other. Between volleyball and studying and final projects and family and her mom, Kano felt on the verge of collapse the entire time, and Ryu didn't fare any better with his own bullshit.

A scrimmage between the guys and girls was the last thing they needed.

But still, they plodded on. Every so often, Kano and Ryu managed to sneak a smile between classes, or pass a note without an eagle-eyed teacher noticing. Ryu left Kano a steaming hot cup of coffee in her shoe locker one morning, and Kano returned the favor with his favorite brand of melonpan the next day. But their little moments were few and far between.