Chapter 1
"Enough." Says Ogawa suddenly and fiercely.
"This has to come to an end now.
We need to talk."
He uses his most serious tone and that's how Arai knows that there's a giant bullshit coming.
This and the fact that Kusano is sitting right behind Ogawa with his arms crossed, flexing his muscles like a damn bodyguard.
Arai knows their antics all too well, so he groans in misery.
He should have known that they were up to something when they politely requested to join Harada and Arai's secret lunch meeting.
Why were Harada and Arai having a secret lunch meeting, you ask?
The thing is:
Harada can never have lunch on their classroom or on the roof, because these places are too common and filled with fan girls laughing annoyingly loud and pestering Harada to taste their homemade lunch, as if they thought that Harada would want to date one of them if their cooking skills were impressive enough.
He would not, but he could never say no to them and it ruined Harada's appetite, so he started to have lunch in the clubroom and, of course, he had to drag Arai with him because having lunch by himself would be "too boring".
The bright side is that the clubroom is a pleasant place to be in and it is completely free of fan girls.
The bad side is that no place in the world is safe from Ogawa and Kusano.
"I don't know what you're talking about..." Arai grumbles.
"But I haven't slept last night, so don't talk.
At all."
He's tired.
So damn tired.
Arai had been working himself to exhaustion because he knows that it's a matter of time until some good university puts their eyes on Harada and scout him.
Good universities usually have high standards and thus Arai can't afford to let his grades go down if he wants to follow his best friend – and he will.
Because, no matter what, Harada can
survive college without Arai.
"You are telling us that you're going to sleep now?
There?" Kusano asks, raising an eyebrow.
"What does it look like, that I am getting ready to play volleyball?" Arai barks.
A few seconds ago, he simply said "lap" and Harada immediately understood, shifting his position on the floor so Arai could use his legs as a pillow.
Arai just laid down, ready for a very much needed nap.
It's true that Harada's legs are too muscular, but Arai never quite liked pillows that were too soft, so sleeping on Harada's lap was something he was used to.
"Come on, Arai." Ogawa deadpans.
"It's important for the whole team that we have this conversation ASAP."
Arai groans again.
He knows it isn't, there is some serious nonsense coming, but, of course, Harada had to give in. He takes everything seriously when they use the magic words "It's important for the team."
"Shoot." Harada says and Arai has no option other than sitting up again, but not without complaining a lot.
"Here's the thing." Kusano starts.
"You and Arai... this is getting out of hand.
I mean, we are really happy for you; it's wonderful that you like each other so much that you can't keep your hands from each other.
But you have to refrain from public demonstrations of affection."
There it is.
Arai freaking knew it.
Harada, on other hand, frowns:
"You see...
As much as we appreciate that you guys get along well, you two look like a couple." Ogawa clarifies.
"And currently the whole team feels like you guys are our parents our something."
"And have you ever had your parents making out in front of you?" Kusano shakes his head solemnly.
"Not cool, guys.
Not cool."
"We...
We didn't make out in front of anyone!" Harada protests.
"You could as well have done it." Ogawa shrugs.
"You guys come to school together and you go home together and you talk like some old married couple and you touch each other a lot and, honestly, we wouldn't be surprised if you two showed up holding hands someday."
"This is
bullshit
!" Arai snarls.
"Easy there, tiger." Kusano holds his hands up on a gesture of surrender.
"We're just saying that this whole married parents vibe is freaking everyone out.
We gotta do something about it."
Everyone thinks I'm married to Ara-chan?" There is a brief pause.
"Am I the mother or the father?"
Oi, Shittyada!
"Ow, ow,
owowow
- Geez, calm down, Ara-chan!" He pouts.
"Whatever, guys.
It's just that Ara-chan and I are too used to each other, ok?
If it's bothering everyone so much, we'll do something about it."
Arai wants to hit them, but instead he lets Harada deals with it.
God knows that Harada has way more patience than Arai does.
But they should know that they couldn't get off the hook so easily.
Not when it was Ogawa speaking along with Kusano.
"That's the spirit, captain." Ogawa begins.
"Although...
We would like to put a little more of commitment."
"That's why we..." Kusano gets up and picks up a glass jar from one of the shelves.
"Bought you this."
It's a simple jar with a metallic lid, like many of the ones Arai's mother has at home.
It doesn't belong to the clubroom, but he didn't notice it there until Kusano displayed it as some kind of prize.
Arai doesn't want to know what that jar is for nor why the hell Kusano and Ogawa think a jar will solve any of their problems.
He only wants to be able to lie down and get some sleep, really.
But Harada, that gullible fucker, has to ask:
"What is that thing for?"
"I'm glad you asked, captain.
This... is the Public Display of Affection jar.
Or PDA jar for short."."
"The PDA jar." Harada and Arai parrot at the same time, incredulous.
"Now whenever you do something that may hurt our children's innocence, you'll have to put money in the jar.
Like 100 yen, for example."
"Yeah, and we agreed that by the end of the tournament, we'll take the money to pay everyone's dinner at somewhere nice."
Arai is about to tell them to go eat a dick – something that he probably wouldn't do so easily if he weren't so sleep deprived or if he actually knew what Ogawa and Kusano were talking about, because...
PDA?
Between him and Harada?
What the hell was that supposed to mean?
– however Harada was faster.
With a frown on his beautiful face, he asks:
"What do you mean 'we agreed'?
The whole team?
When?
How?" There was an implied
When did my own team turn against me?
by the end of the sentence and Arai doesn't need to be well rested to know that it bothers Harada.
The one thing he hates the most is when stuff is out of his control.
"Well, it wasn't
It started with Kusano and me, and then we asked the second years."
"Takano just said 'Sure, why not?' and Matsuda grumbled something.
We just assumed he agrees."
"Fujii just thinks it's damn hilarious, so he also agreed."
"We did, though, leave the first years out of this, since they are the children we are trying to protect."
"And because we know Shindo wouldn't do anything to annoy the two of you."
"And honestly Mizuno is kind of scary.
Have you seen him?
That kid terrifies me."
"So." Arai interrupts them.
"Long story short, you guys want us to put 100 yen in that stupid jar whenever we do something that you arbitrarily decided it's inappropriate for friends to do."
We're glad you understood."
fucking
"Okay." Harada cuts him of.
"Wait, what?" Arai glares at his best friend "Tell me I'm insane,
Trashada
, because I can swear that I heard you agreeing with this nonsense?"
"Ah, c'mon, Ara-chan.
We don't do anything embarrassing that often and we're going to prove it."
And Arai buries his face on his own hands, because that's
Harada.
He would never do anything that the team doesn't like or back off in front of a challenge.
Of course that he'll agree if the whole team joined up to request something.
Hell, if only one single player had asked, he would do his best to grant the wish.
Harada likes to keep his teammates satisfied, so as long as it doesn't harm any other player, of course he'll agree with any damn thing.
"And if we seem too close...
Well, it's just because we know each other since we were kids." Harada guarantees.
"It's no big deal.
We accept your terms.
You guys will never need to use that jar."
"You're going to regret this so bad, Harada." Arai scowls.
"No, I'm not!
You have my word that I will follow your terms for the team and it's going to be easy.
Don't worry, Ara-chan."
No one replies out loud, but Kusano's and Ogawa's smug smirks are already enough of an answer.