2A swift hand passes a small note to Azumane Himari's desk and without breaking eye contact with the teacher, she unfolded the note that both she and Nakamura had been using to communicate through the entire lesson. It had mostly been about how angry Nakamura was about her old ex-boyfriend, whom she had immediately broken up with when she found out that the extremely hot boy had been cheating on her. Of course, it was hard for Nakamura to be mad at him, especially with that handsome face, but when she was around Himari, Nakamura tended to rage with expressive language about her ex, Tokomiya.
Himari managed a small glance at the note. It said: The next time I see him I'm going to shove that stupid ring he gave me, up his fat, chubby, ass. Then, I'll punch his face so hard that he'll need plastic surgery. Reading this, Himari snorted and burst out laughing and then stopped abruptly when she remembered that she was in the middle of class.
Biting her lip innocently, like she always did when she was slightly embarrassed, Himari met her classmate's curious looks. "Ah... Gomen. Please continue, miss," Himari apologised out loud before the teacher finally gave in and went on with her lesson.
From beside her, a boy leaned into her ear. "Snorting is so unladylike of you, Azumane. It's no wonder you've got no boyfriends yet," he smirked at her. Ikeda had been in her class ever since she started middle school and their platonic relationship mostly involved a lot of trash talking and mild violence to the other person.
Glaring at him, Himari elbowed him hard in the ribs. "Aw come on, don't be so upset that you weren't included in our inside joke. Maybe you should go find some friends to make jokes with instead. Not that anyone would want to be friends with you."
Grinning, Ikeda replied. "I have more friends than you. As well as a girlfriend." Himari scowled, knowing that she could say nothing more. Ikeda - and basically their entire class - knew that she had a massive crush on the boys' volleyball captain of their school, Daichi, as well as the fact that she could barely manage a simple greeting to him.
A soft snort came from behind the arguing pair and Himari instantly recognised it as Kiku, one of her more distant friends in the class. Still good friends regardless. "You should try harder Azumane..." Kiku whispered as the teacher kept talking.
"Oh shut up, you guys," Azumane only muttered and started to actually focus in class. If she listened to the teacher, perhaps her friends would stop harassing her about her impossible crush.
"Oh. My. Gosh. Stop it. I'm totally over him, Himari. Don't you even joke about us getting back together," Nakamura complained immediately after Himari pointed out Tokomiya staring at her for the second time that day. "You're really annoying sometimes."
As Himari snorted and started to toy with Nakamura about her ex, her shoulder bumped a random figure and sent both rebounding against each other. "I'm so sorry!" Himari immediately apologised as she reached out a helping hand to the girl she bumped into. Her eyes recognised the brunette girl as Michimiya from the class opposite her own. "Michimiya, right? I'm Azumane Himari from class 3-5. I'm so sorry about that."
"No please! Don't be, it was totally my fault anyway! It's nice to meet you, Azumane-san," Michimiya's eyes suddenly brighten and she opened her mouth. "You're Azumane-san's twin sister, right? Like Azumane from the volleyball team?"
Himari nodded brightly, always proud when people remembered him. People were often used to remembering her face as the representation of the Azumane twins, instead of Asahi, her brother, who was actually the older twin. Himari had started to suspect that perhaps it was because Asahi was such quiet person, compared to her own extroverted personality. "Yeah, how do you know him?"
"Oh," Michimiya's face blushes slightly, "I'm pretty good friends with Daichi and we have occasional practices with the boys anyway."
Himari took a second to understand. "I almost forgot, you're the girls' volleyball captain! No wonder you know them." That's what she told herself at least. Michimiya, this sweet girl who could possibly be her new friend, could not be her rival for Daichi. Even if that were to happen, Himari would never be able to blame Michimiya anyway. That wouldn't be fair.
Beside her, Nakamura tugged on her sleeve. "I really need to go, Himari." Remembering about Nakamura's basketball game, the girls said a quick farewell and parted before they could get to know each other more, but Himari made it her mission to talk to Michimiya more. She was a nice person that she wanted to know better, and she could get her closer to Daichi too.
After dropping Nakamura off at her basketball game, Himari turned around and made her way back to school to pick her up Asahi from his volleyball practice game. From what she heard, the boys were facing off Dateko and their intense Iron Wall. As tall as her brother was, Himari knew that he used to get scared by their intensity, but her angry counseling had paid off when he finally overcame his fears in that one game in the volleyball tournament.
Himari never paid much attention to Asahi's volleyball life unless he actually told her stuff about it, and apart from going to their important games, she didn't know about their progresses at practice either. But she still went to pick her brother up from practice, so she knew the volleyball boys well enough to have a good conversation with them if she saw them in the hallway.
Finally, she arrived. Himari stepped out of her car and headed to the school gym, still in her school uniform. When she opened the door, Himari was unexpectedly met with the hot body of what she realised was Daichi. The one person she could not talk to normally even if her life depended on it.
"Oh, Azumane-san! Hey," Daichi grinned at her warmly. "Are you here to pick up your coward of a brother again?" he joked.
Himari was too nervous to react properly, much less make a joke back. "Ahaha, yeah... Is he here?" How stupid was that? Himari had asked that when both of them knew he was most definitely here. Asahi was spiking those colourful volleyballs, right in front of her for goodness' sake.
"Uh yes. Right there," he looked to the court where Asahi had finally stopped his spiking and was looking their way. "We were just finishing up with some repetitive practice after the game was done. They have already left."
"I-I see... So repetitive practice, it must, like, keep repeating, right? What's the point of that?" Himari said then immediately regretted it. Not only had she been especially dumb, 'So repetitive practice, it must, like, keep repeating, right?', but she had also directly criticised their practice efforts. "I mean, I'm sorry- I didn't mean it like that- I just-"
Daichi chuckled. "It's fine. Yeah repeated practice just helps us king of drill the movements into our brain. I think it helps," Daichi said looked at her, "Don't be so embarrassed about it."
Himari's face only reddened at that. Daichi was sure that she was embarrased about what she said, and yes that was true, but her face just naturally blushed whenever Daichi was in the radius of one mile. "O-ok." Finally, Asahi came to the rescue and Himari was able to finally escape into the comfort zone of her car. "That was so stupid," Himari finally said when they were on their way home. "I must look like a moron in front of him." She gripped the steering wheel harder and gritted her teeth.
"Ah..." Asahi obviously didn't want to answer. "I think it's fine. I mean, I do the same. To everyone else."
"Shut up Asahi. This isn't about you," Himari hissed at him.
"Right, right, sorry. But I think you might want to hear this next bit I'm going to say..."
Himari sighed, "Go on."
"Michimiya asked him out today."
The car stopped abruptly and the tires screeched against the road angrily. Himari blinked at the empty road in front of her, before she realised and started the car again. "What?" her lips uttered, almost inaudibly. "I... was too late, wasn't I?"
"Th-" Asahi was cut off immediately as Himari smacked him in the face with one hand, the other hand still driving.
"I really DO NOT want you to talk right now," Himari said and Asahi stayed quiet obediently.
When they finally arrived home, Himari slammed the car door, unlocked their front door and stormed all the way up to her room and locked the bedroom door. Asahi trailed behind her, locking the front door, and sighed. He knew that his sister would get like this, but there had been no point in hiding the truth from her. Perhaps it would've given her false hope for a while, but that never lasted long. Plus, Asahi believed in honesty and so did his sister.
Asahi decided to leave her alone for a while before he went back in as he went into the bathroom for a shower. After he was done with that, he couldn't stand waiting any longer and charged into her bedroom. "Himari?" Asahi's twin sister was in the furthest corner of the room, hunched up into a small ball. Himari was significantly slimmer than Asahi as well as being shorter than him by one whole head, so it was hard for Asahi to squeeze into the spot she had squirreled away in. Sometimes people thought he was her young dad instead of her twin brother.
"Come on... Talk to me," Asahi said softly.
Himari let out a soft hiccup which indicated that she had been crying for the past half an hour. "So... he accepted, right? I mean, Michimiya is such a nice girl. And pretty as well. So much better than me."
Asahi hesitated before he answered. Sighing, "Yeah. He accepted."
"So Daichi has a girlfriend now."
"Yes."
"I always knew it wouldn't work."
"Himari... don't be like that."
"I'm not good enough," her voice had gone down to a soft squeak and tears trickled down her fair cheeks like a waterfall. "I really, really liked him."
"I know," Asahi didn't know what else to say. "If it makes you any better, Daichi considers you a good friend. He's always asking how you're doing."
"That's... good enough for me, I guess." Asahi looked for more positive words to say, in hopes of cheering his sister up, but before he could even try, Himari had already began cheering herself up. "It's fine, you know," Himari started saying. "If Daichi is happy then that's all I ask for. I can always wait for someone else who likes me. There's gonna be someone else in this world who loves me more than I could ever love Daichi. He's happy now and that's all that matters. There's no reason for me to be crying."
Asahi grinned. This was just exactly like his twin sister; Himari always made a big fuss about something and then would return back to herself before anyone could even try. Himari was good like that. She was almost too positive sometimes. "You good, then?"
"Of course I'm good," Himari smiled and punched him lightly in the arm. "Also, if you want to ask out Nakamura... she broke up with her boyfriend recently."
Asahi blushed considerably red. "Is that right...?"
MWUAHAHAH they never got together XD