The Next Day

Waking up, I did my ususal morning routine and headed to school. On my way though, I ran into Inoo. "Watch where you're going, Yabu." He scolds me.

"Sorry..." I mutter. "I'm tired today... No thanks to you, of course."

"Of course." He smirks. "But don't blame this fully on me! Remember, it was your fault for what you did years ago. If you hadn't, maybe you would still have friends. And maybe the whole school wouldn't hate you either."

"Whatever..." I sigh, quickening my pace to get away from him. But of course, since we were heading the same way, he followed me and bugged me even more as we walked the rest of the way to school.

~ ~ ~

"Class, we have a new student today." The teacher announces to us. A new student? I thought. Great... Another person to bully me... "Please come inside and introduce yourself." We all tried to look outside the door to see who our new classmate would be. And if they were a boy or a girl, of course.

A boy who looked just a little shorter than me walks into the classroom with the accompaniment of the girls voices that were cooing at his beauty. "Hello, my name is Yaotome Hikaru. It's nice to meet you and I hope we all get along."

"Alright, thank you." The teacher smiles at Hikaru. "Please go sit down next to..." She looks around the room for an empty seat and finally sees the one beside me. "Yabu." I raise my hand so he knows who I am. He nods and comes over, taking the seat next to mine.

"Yabu, right?" Hikaru asks me. I nod at his question. "Well, I hope we can be friends."

"I..." Before I could finish, the teacher told us to be quiet so she could start the lesson for the day.

When the first class had ended, Hikaru was surprisingly talking to me. "Why are you talking to me?" I ask. He blinks at me with confusion.

"Because I want us to be friends..." He explains like it was the simpliest thing in the world.

"Don't be friends with him, cous. He'll betray you, like he did to me." Inoo came in between us.

"Cous?" I ask the younger boy and then turn to Hikaru. "Inoo is your cousin?" Hikaru nods as an answer to the question. "Well then... We can't be friends anyway..."

"What?" Hikaru asks me. "Why not?"

"We're not on good terms..." Inoo explains. "We hate each other." I nod, despite it not being true. Him hating me is true, yes. But, I never once hated him for not trusting me or giving me a chance.

"Why? What happened between you two?" Hikaru asks.

"You explain, I'll go to my next class..." With that said, I head off.

~ ~ ~

Again, not a good day for me. The next class that I had was gym and the teacher thought that we needed a break from the gym curriculum, so he suggested a game of dodgeball. Just what I need... An actual reason for the others to get an opportunity to hit me hard... With balls too! I thought, not paying attention to who would be part of my team. Then, the whistle was blown, telling us to go our sides of the gym. I looked to the other team and saw that all my old friends were conveniently there. Great... I thought bitterly. "Hey, it looks like we're on the same team." I heard a familiar voice. Looking beside me, I see Hikaru smiling at me.

"Yeah, I guess..." I nod. "But don't be so happy about it... The other team will try hard to get us out because I'm on this team..."

"Why? Do they have something against you?"

"They all hate me... Especially your cousin and his friends... My old friends." I explained, laying on my stomach with my feet to the wall of our side of the gym. Hikaru did the same beside me, looking at me with a questioning look.

"About that... What happened between you two?"

"Inoo didn't tell you?" I ask. He shakes his head, telling me that he didn't know.

"What happened." Just as he asked, the teacher blew the whistle, signalling us to start the game. I stood up with him and answered.

"I'll tell you later, lets just get this over with, okay?" With that said, I dodge a ball that was hurtling towards me at full speed. Looking to where it came from, I see Inoo glaring at me for dodging his ball.

"Okay." Hikaru agrees, picking up the ball that I had dodged to throw it back to the other team. With that throw, he got Yuri out, much to my happiness. This kid doesn't have a bad arm... I think to myself, watching as he hits Ryosuke out next.

Getting my own ball, I sent a ball flying towards Inoo, who wasn't paying attention because he was too busy dodging another ball. But of course, Daiki took that ball for him. They were always so close, so I expected him to do that. Glaring at me even more for getting Daiki out, he sent another ball flying my way, but it hit Hikaru instead, much to my surprise. "Did you just block me?" I ask him.

"Yeah. Seems like Kei has had many more wins than you, so try to win this, okay? For both of us." He smiles, going over to the bench to take a seat since he was now out. I nod, even if he couldn't see it and go back to the game.

~ ~ ~

At the very end, it was only me and Inoo left to battle. Even if everyone except Hikaru hated me, my team cheered me on. To win for them. Inoo was fast though and I had difficulty to get him. But after what seemed like hours of throwing balls at each other, I finally hit him! My team jumped up from the bench they sat on and immediately pulled me into a hug, which was the first hug I've had in years. Well, other than my family of course. "You did it." Hikaru cheered, raising up his hand to signal a high-five. I gave him one and nod.

"Yeah... Thanks for the encouragement, it really helped."

"Now you owe me something."

"Owe you something?"

"Answers." He explained. "What happened between you and Kei?"

A/N: Second chapter done~ You guys will MAYBE get an explanation of what happened in the next chapter... Or maybe I'll save it until the end... I'll think about it~ Tell me what you guys want, okay?