Street Performance

“You’re maidenless!”

“No need to shout, Ken! We’re not embodying the characters like in Golden Ring, we’re just helping Yuto repeat his lines!”

“We’re forcing him, I must say. Look at him, Ryu. He just judges us and doesn’t say anything with that cold face of his!”

“Well, obviously he won’t repeat his lines while we’re not alone in the hall. We have to wait for everyone to leave and go on break, dumbass.”

“Are you finished with your ridiculous argument? Everyone’s looking at us. You don’t want them to think you’re annoying and ask you to buzz off,” Yuto said coldly, a flame of anger blazing in his gaze.

The spacious lecture hall of the college was lively as the last class of the morning had finally ended. Everyone chatted here and there, gathering their stuff and leaving in small waves. They all seemed in a rush. Mealtime was sacred here.

Yet there were three guys who didn’t seem to want to leave the hall at the moment.

Ryu Miyazaki and Ken Takahata stood in the aisle next to one of the tables, grinning from ear to ear. They were just normal guys – short black hair, loose clothes – but happiness was radiating from them at all times. As second-years in college, they didn’t seem even a bit stressed by student life.

In front of them, sitting and sighing in disappointment while trying to hide it from the eyes of his friends, was Yuto Hanamori.

He was the kind of tall guy who, even when sitting, still looked too tall.

He was wearing loose pants and some kind of band shirt, maybe from one of his favorite bands. His light brown hair was combed in a kinda messy way, and his green eyes, his soft radiant skin, and to top it all off, his athletic body could make everyone agree that he was good-looking.

As everyone left the hall, the three friends were left alone in a deep silence, and the atmosphere grew tense.

Ryu and Ken tried to rant out some excuses, thinking that they had gone too far, seemingly feeling awkward.

“But you must forgive us! We’re as excited as you for your first street representation today. First step onto a gigantic stage!” Ryu said while making wide gestures with his hands, stars sparkling in his eyes.

“I don’t need that. I know my lines and how to play them. It’ll be a piece of cake,” Yuto answered, no doubt in his voice.

He stood up, grabbed his backpack, and walked down the aisle to leave.

“Let’s go. I’ll buy you some cake for dessert. My treat,” Yuto said softly, a faint smile appearing on his face.

Hands grabbed his shoulders and stopped him mid-step. Surprised, he opened his eyes wide and turned around to see Ryu and Ken laughing.

“You really can’t hide it from us, you know? We’ve known you for a while! Did you already forget everything we went through together?” Ken said.

“You’re truly a tsundere, Yuto. You should have told us you were grateful we’re here,” Ryu added.

“How do they do that? Pierce right through me when even I can’t express things…” Yuto thought as his face was relaxing, returning to its normal and calm state with no strong emotion distorting it – only a soothing one, one that couldn’t hurt the seeming coldness of this man.

He moved their hands away from his shoulders and signaled them to follow him as he started walking out of the hall. Yet he was once again stopped by the same hands, on the same shoulders, and with the same laughs before he could take a single step.

“What… what do you guys want?” Yuto asked, his voice faltering a bit.

“Well, where do you think you’re going right now? We still have your lines to repeat!” Ryu spun Yuto around and climbed onto one of the tables.

“That’s right! Even when you think you’re prepared enough, you can push a little further and perfect it!”

Ken jumped onto another table, seized Yuto’s arm, and pulled him up as well, leaving him no real chance to resist or refuse.

Caught in their joy and in the movement, Yuto followed them and rushed across the tables from one side of the hall to the other, trying not to trip on his loose pants that were too large for him. Ryu and Ken’s laughter lightened the atmosphere around them.

“What was that for? How is it part of repeating my lines?” Yuto said after long minutes of nonsense running, hoping they hadn’t been seen.

“It’s just a warm-up, don’t worry,” Ryu replied.

“We don’t have much time left to eat. I’m leaving,” Yuto said dryly, clicking his tongue.

He turned to step down into the aisle but didn’t notice the edge of the table beneath his feet.

Carried by his weight and forward momentum, he lost his balance and crashed to the floor under his friends’ screams.

“Boys will still be boys, I see. This place is not for these kinds of things. Go outside or to your club to do this,” a feminine voice said as Yuto came back to his senses, clutching his head and pushing his body back above the ground.

“Ah damn, it’s the Racket Monster! We should go, Yuto,” Ryu said in panic.

“Give me a minute, my head...” he said weakly, gritting his teeth and lifting his head, only to meet the gaze of the girl in front of him.

She was catching everyone’s eye – that was certain. Her black hair, cut in a square bob, dark and obscure as the night sky itself, and her sparkling ice blue eyes made it hard for everyone to look away. She was wearing jeans and a large hoodie, but despite that, the athletic figure she had built with all her training was noticeable.

Yet, despite the panic in Ryu’s voice and on Ken’s face, they both blushed while looking at her, though that wasn’t the case for Yuto. Despite making eye contact with her, his heartbeat seemed normal, his breathing calm, his face unchanged. He was stoic. The two of them were more likely sizing each other up, tension hanging in the air.

“Too bad she’s not wearing a skirt, you would have been a lucky guy from where you are!” Ken laughed.

“Shut up!” Yuto and Sumire said coldly without looking away, their gazes intensely fixed on each other.

“So that’s how you spend your days, Hanamori. Ah…” Inside Sumire Yozora, panic and stress raged. Behind the cold mask on the outside was a machine working at full throttle in complete panic. “I can’t believe I talked to those boys with such superiority in my voice… I just wanted them to help me find my bag… and now I provoked this emotionless wall, Hanamori… I can’t figure him out… Ahhhhhhh… please finish me off...”

“Yozora… What is she doing here… what does a great and sportive student like her want from guys like us? I hope I didn’t scare her…” Yuto thought as he stood up.

“I’ll leave now. Go somewhere else if you want to play imbeciles again, and if you don’t want security to catch you all.”

She turned back and walked down the aisle, but before she even reached the door, she stumbled against the side of a table and fell to the floor with a great crash.

“You okay?” Ryu shouted.

“I’m… alright,” she replied in pain.

~~~¤¤¤~~~

“I just hope not to be involved with them anymore… I don’t want them to see it.”

“15-0! Yozora is taking the lead!”

“If they see it, pierce through me, I don’t know what I’ll be able to do.”

“30-0! Yozora is unstoppable!”

The scores were being shouted by the referee on the side of the tennis field.

At the end of the afternoon, it was time for the club to have its daily training.

As the ace of the club, Sumire displayed her abilities. She crushed her teammates, even if this time she wasn't doing it consciously.

Lost in thought, she still destroyed everything in her path. This type of behavior had earned her the nickname Racket Monster.

After a long exchange of shots, which was not habitual for Sumire, she poised her racket behind her back to blast the ball toward the other side of the field to win the point. But as she hit the ball, the racket moved forward, yet her opponent didn’t move.

In fact, she didn’t hit anything. She just spun on herself due to all the force, falling to the ground butt-first, but regaining full consciousness of her surroundings at the same time.

“What happened? I was… why am I sitting here?”

“Damn, she’s not trying to beat the monster allegations, look at her racket.”

“How is it even possible!? I’m sorry for her opponent if they receive a shot this powerful one day.”

All her teammates around her were talking about something that Sumire couldn’t quite understand. She tried to search for what the issue was until she found it. The answer was in her hand, so she put the racket right in front of her eyes, calmly staring at it.

“It pierced through!?” Panic rose inside her. “I really made a hole in my racket just like that!? Oh… Dad’s going to kill me…”

After the training, Sumire walked back home. She was disappointed inside but let nothing show on the outside, not knowing how to express it other than by looking at her feet.

As she turned into another street, she heard voices coming from a large square a little further away. Intrigued, she hurried over and observed from a distance what was happening.

In front of a large audience, people performed a play.

“Seems like they’re having some fun here… I should probably head back.”

She began to walk back down the street but suddenly froze as a familiar voice reached her.

“Oh what a shame! Behold the decline of this king whom you thought you would never see return!”

Sumire sneaked back and hid behind a tree. She watched the play as she saw and heard this new and elegant Yuto in medieval armor, standing in front of the non-existent stage, saying his lines with emotions she had never seen on his face before, with a passion she had never expected from him.

She was captivated. She couldn’t keep her eyes off his sweaty face, listening carefully to every one of his words.

“Oh but dear mistress… the love that I feel for you…” Yuto turned to his public, watching every spectator, even the ones trying to hide from his gaze. He saw them all. But he noticed one hiding a bit far away behind a tree – a face he knew too well – yet it didn’t disturb him. He continued and finished with the same intensity while staring at her. “Oh dear mistress… I love you!” he said loudly with his deepest and most seductive voice, perfectly embodying his character.

Under their loud cheers and exaggerated gestures of joy, Ryu and Ken encouraged Yuto from the audience, drawing a faint smile from him. He then took a few steps back and let the other actors play their parts.

Behind the tree, astonishment could be read on Sumire’s face, something she couldn’t remember the last time it had happened, which was why she tried to hide it.

“I’m going to have a stroke… my heart isn’t beating normally… It’s a mess!”

Without thinking further, and like any cartoon cat trying to escape, she started running with a startled jolt, almost falling but managing not to.

She headed back home and rushed into her bedroom, locking the door behind her and putting her back against it, trying to catch her breath after running so much and so fast.

“Why won’t he leave my mind!?” she thought, clutching her chest as if to keep her heart from beating this fast.

A strange emotion was shown on her face, materialized by something that she had never felt before.

Blushing.

For the first time, she was truly expressing what she felt deep inside… without even knowing what it was.