Dry Spell

Ichiro had never felt the urge to kick the bench in the dugout before, but at this exact moment, he wanted to do nothing more.

It was the last game of the regular season, and they were currently getting their butts handed to them. The match had been a disaster from the very beginning.

On the first pitch, which almost no one swung at, it was unexpectedly hit out to right field, catching everyone off guard. The outfielders, though ready, were not quite prepared for the first pitch, and they sprang into action to chase down the ball. In their pursuit, The right fielder nearly collided with the barriers at the back of the field as he chased after the high flying ball. With great effort, he almost caught the ball but missed, allowing the runner to reach first base. Doubling around to grab it off the ground, he threw it as hard as he could to the shortstop while the runner rounded first base. Moving quickly, the shortstop just missed getting it to the second baseman before the runner reached the base. "Safe!" the ref called as the players hoped they would fare better on that play.

The first pitch of the game, and they already had a man on second. And things did not improve from there.

Almost every player managed to get at least one solid hit off of Ichiro's pitches. Although most of them were handled by the fielders, the continuous plays were slowly wearing on them. Even when they were up to bat, things were not moving smoothly. Their hits were not good enough, resulting in only singles, which weren't sufficient to score runs before the strikeouts took their toll.

Ichiro wasn't faring any better than the rest of his team at bat either. Not that anyone expected much from him there, as like most pitchers, he wasn't a good batter. But in the end, the best he got was a curveball slamming into his arm, bruising him badly and walking him to first. If he didn't know better, he would have thought the pitcher was trying to get him out of the game with that one.

It wasn't long afterward that he was back in the dugout without running home as his team struck out once again. As he was getting ready to pitch again, his coach caught him before he could make it out of the dugout.

"Ishii, sit your ass down and rest that arm. You got hit good. Let it heal up," the coach said, grabbing Ichiro hard by the shoulder and forcefully sitting him back down on the bench. "Ishida, take over."

He froze on those words. The only movement he made was watching as Ishida got his glove on and ran onto the mound. His mouth was left open as he watched his junior take his place.

A rage was burning inside him. He wanted to kick something. Unfortunately, the only thing nearby was the bench. So instead, he obstinately crossed his arms and watched the game proceed without him as dark clouds gathered overhead.

It was a quick inning after Ishida started pitching. Though they were already down 3, he didn't allow a batter to hit a single pitch of his, as they were cleanly missed with wide swings. Now, with them beginning to bat again in the bottom of the inning, it seemed as if Ichiro's chances to shine were limited to batting.

That was until the heavens opened up, and the rains came down hard and fast. Everyone scattered to find dry shelter as they waited for a call. After a conversation amongst the coaches, they decided to call off the game. There was no sign of the rain ending anytime soon, and this game would not make any difference in the two teams' standing before Koshien.

So instead of rescheduling, the game was called a tie.

This upset Ichiro further, driving him closer to kicking the bench again. But instead, he rested his head against one of the uprights in the dugout and stared out onto the slowly flooding field. Out in the middle of it all stood Ishida, who only stared up at the falling rain unmoving.

Ichiro couldn't pull his eyes away as he watched his underclassman's motionless state in the rain.

"Hey!" a voice called out behind him, causing him to flinch and turn to find where it was coming from. It was Izumi, leaning in from the side of the dugout. Behind her was Mizuki, holding up a large umbrella barely enough to cover the two of them. "Aren't you leaving? I mean, everyone else has?"

"Uh, yeah, I guess," he sighed after a long moment and began walking towards the two girls after giving one last glance out at Ishida. But as he was looking out onto the field, his phone began to ring in his ball bag. Curiously moving towards it, he wondered who would be calling him now.

“Hello?”

"Oh, Ichiro, I didn't know if I was going to get through to you," his mother breathed a sigh of relief after he answered. "I was worried they would make you play in the rain."

"No, Mom," he laughed, looking out at the pouring rain again, "They canceled the game. I was going to head home, actually."

"Oh, good," his mother chirped up upon hearing him say that, "coincidentally, I wanted to talk to you about that."

“Huh?”

Not knowing if he made the right decision or not, Ichiro still proceeded into the family diner nearby his school.

As he entered, he shook the rain off the coat he had on. He glanced around after the hostess offered to seat him but turned her down once he found his parents sitting in a rounded booth at the far end of the restaurant.

They had invited him out to make up for missing his game, even if it had been canceled. Moving across the room, he approached his family, "Sorry about the wait. The train station was packed. Had a hard time making it to the right platform in time."

"Not to worry, dear," his mother waved off his worries by scooting over and making room for him to sit next to her. His father next to her on the other side only looked up from his phone, where he was probably typing out a business email, to see why his wife was pushing him to move over.

"Actually," Ichiro nervously laughed before sitting down, "I hope there is enough room for all of us."

Both of his parents shot confused glances at each other while he motioned towards the front of the diner. Around the corner came Izumi and Mizuki after closing up the large umbrella they used to shield themselves from the falling rain, both looking incredibly nervous as they approached the booth.

"So Mom and Dad," he started not knowing what to say at that moment, "This is Izumi and Mizuki Nakagawa." The two girls bowed as they were introduced but continued to wear confused and stressed faces amongst them.

"Pleasure to meet the two of you," his mother began as she scooted further over, pushing her husband to the end of the table to make room for the others, "I assume they are friends of yours. In your class, correct?"

The youths exchanged slightly confused glances between each other before Ichiro answered, “Izumi and I are in the same class. Mizuki is her younger sister.”

“Yes,” Mizuki nearly cut in as Ichiro finished his sentence, “I am in the middle school down the road from their high school.”

At this point, only he gave her a sideways glance, and she shot one back at him, with a message reading, “I know I am short, but how young did you think I was?”

Feeling bad about his misrepresenting her mentally, he nervously looked back at his parents, but that caused his stomach to plummet beneath him. Their faces were polite, holding soft smiles as they watched over the teens who were piling into the booth, besides Izumi who stayed in her chair at the end of the booth.

But Ichiro could tell. Their courteous smiles belied the emotions they were holding back. He raised a brow in confusion as he wondered what the issue they were having.

“So, Nakagawa was it?” His father began, seemingly unsure where to go, “You are a classmate with my son, correct?” He paused to allow Izumi to nervously nod back, “Are you perhaps more than just classmates with him?”

All at once, the three teens did a spit take, or at least they would have if they were drinking at that time. “Dad!? What are you asking her?” Ichiro sputtered once his breath came back to him.

“I was asking if you were friends!” His father shot back, trying his best to calm the situation, but his fiery eyes only caused everyone to sink into their seats in fear. “But I guess you are, since you were together after your game got canceled.”

He didn’t know how to respond to that. His gut instinct was to deny it the best he could. But his brain was telling him that it was true what his father said. If they were hanging out like they were, it would be normal to consider them friends at that point. Also, he knew he wouldn’t be able to lie to his parents. Whatever power they had as parents, always at least one of them caught him in a lie every time.

So he did his best to answer his father’s question. He suppressed his currently reddening face and darted his gaze as far away from any prying eyes as he could and quietly spoke, “I guess, we are… friends…”

As he answered, he wished for death as the silence that fell upon the table was slowly crushing him.

“Well, it's good to meet your friends,” his mother chirped up again, trying to break the awkward silence, “Though I wish you had said something earlier. We didn’t know we were going to have guests, or we would have asked for accommodations.”

“Yeah sorry, my bad.” He responded, glancing back over at Izumi, who had her head down and a hand raised to her face, shielding it from his sight.

“Either way, let’s enjoy the time we have together, right?” his mother shook her head at her son’s half-hearted remarks and turned her attention to Izumi, “Do you need any help, dear? We could ask for a better seat or-?”

But she was cut off by Izumi suddenly backing up from the table. “Umm, sorry,” she started her speech a bit rushed as she awkwardly tried to navigate away through the restaurant. “I think we actually have someplace to be right now. Come on, Mizuki, let's go.”

And with that, she hurriedly pushed her chair down the walkway leading out into the rain without looking back for a second. Mizuki was left there for a second before it seemed she realized her sister was truly leaving her behind at that moment. She quickly sprang to her feet and made a quick bow, “Please excuse us,” and hurriedly ran after her sister, calling her name the entire way.

Ichiro tried to reach out and grab one of them to ask what they were doing, but they were both long gone by the time he was able to react to their sudden departure. He stood confused at the edge of the booth, slowly glancing back at his parents, who were also giving him the same worried look back.

“That isn’t normal, is it?” his mother softly asked.