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misiwrites · 2 years ago

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Mayblade Days 1 & 2

i got a questionable idea of trying to write a fic for @may-blade where each daily prompt makes up one chapter… will i be actually able to keep up with it? idk. i have to write really fast if i want this all done and posted on time, so this is very first draft tier writing

high school AU, a focus on hiromi and tyhil, set in a culturally ambiguous setting of a "bey town". this will be a bit different from what i usually do because i decided to throw in as many ships as i can fit (for high school shenanigans) and many are stuff i've never posted before, tyhil included. it felt like a fitting ship for a school AU and goes well with a side dish of reimax (and all this other stuff i'll sprinkle in) so here goes nothing. just gonna go bonkers with it. may clean this up later for posting on AO3, may not if i don't manage to even finish it, which is possible

and i flipped days 1 and 2 so i'm posting both at the same time. it felt sensible not at all because i ran out of time on monday

prompts: school, unpopular character characters: hiromi focus; see each chapter for who's included bc even i don't really know yet pairings: hiromi/takao; same as above

Hiromi is a first-year in Bey Town High where the majority of students engage in afterschool club activities. When her only friend in school quits their club with no other members, she's forced to venture outside her comfort zone and try to make more friends.

CHAPTER 1 prompt: school characters: hiromi, emily, mentions of others pairings: --

“So, what now? Are you going to quit the club for good?”

Emily’s chin dropped. “Well…”

“So you are.”

“I’m sorry, Hiromi – but you know how much I need the scholarship. Prioritizing the tennis club is the only sensible thing to do. It’s okay if you’re angry with me.”

“I’m not angry,” Hiromi said, though she was a little. She stared down at her fidgeting leg.

“It’s not like we really need a club to keep meeting like this, anyway. I mean…” Emily’s hand gestured vaguely around the space they were in, the lousy excuse for a clubroom they didn’t have; since its foundation in the beginning of the school year, their astrology club had been holding its meetings at the end of a musky corridor in the cellar floor of the school, next to some rusty pipes and other unfitting backdrops, where a perpetual waft of paint and some cleaning agent lingered in the air.

Alright, so maybe their astrology club didn’t have a clubroom. And maybe it had only two members, which were Hiromi and Emily. And, just maybe, they could as well have done their astrology-related geeky stuff literally anywhere else, such as either the Tachibana residence or the Watsons’, but. But but but.

“And, you know,” Emily then decided to put into words what Hiromi precisely didn’t want to hear, “maybe you could go check out some other clubs, too. It would be a good way to meet new people…”

The fidgeting intensified. Em, don’t do this to me.

“…and maybe even make new friends,” the ginger finished, tentatively.

“I don’t want to join other clubs.” Hiromi preoccupied herself with picking stray lumps of lint off her hoodie while talking. “Everyone’s got their own cliques already. It would be awkward. Nobody wants a random weirdo forcing herself into their group in the middle of the year.”

“I’m sure that’s not true. The people in this school aren’t as bad as you think, Hiromi. And you’re not a weirdo.”

That was easy for Emily, fairly popular and a rising youth tennis star, to say. Hiromi, on the other hand, was an unathletic tomboy with few redeeming social qualities; she was studious and quite enjoyed school, had never been the out-going type, and preferred putting an effort in homework over partying or whatever it was that others did in their free time; she had no impressive hobbies to speak of, as her main interests were geeking out about all things spiritual or supernatural and collecting old books; she had plain brown hair and brown eyes and had never been the type to pour copious amounts of time and money into her hair, make-up, or clothes.

Her personality was on the serious side, she wasn’t a playful jokester or a vending machine for clever one-liners like all the popular girls seemed to be. She had never been the bestie that someone would choose first for anything, she’d never been part of a tight-knit group, and she’d never had a real relationship with anyone. No, it would be awkward to the extreme to squeeze herself into some club now – not to mention that she wasn’t terribly interested in, well, almost anything mainstream. She wasn’t very artistic or good at games or well-versed with popular culture other than the couple of shows she religiously followed (and even then, she wouldn’t have joined a club for those because the extent of her nerdiness was definitely embarrassing).

She was, simply put, just a normal girl. Just a Hiromi. She couldn’t become something she was not.

For a minute longer, Emily tried to persuade her to come check out the tennis club, or maybe the rest of the sports clubs. Hiromi gave her a tentative “maybe later” while harboring feelings of intense disinterest.

No, she thought, I’m not giving up on the astrology club that fast.

The following morning was the first time in months that a nervous sweat threatened to dampen her palms as she walked the short way to school. She had so perfectly adapted to her role of being invisible in class already, now she’d have to actually start a conversation with someone new for the first time in weeks. It made her heart thrum uncomfortably. She’d even forgotten to properly prepare for the morning group class. Very uncharacteristic of her.

She took her usual seat by the window near the back of the room, set her backpack to the side, and turned to look at her class. A critical thought. Who in here could I in any sensible way imagine at least consider joining the astrology club?

And there it was: her group, 1-A. Stitched together from wildly different types of people by the infallible hand of the one and only Bey Town High.

Emily, who sat next to her, had yet to arrive. The few other girls she’d done as much as talked to before sat near the front of the classroom, including Ayaka whom she didn’t know much about – apart from the fact that she had a jerk of an older brother who was part of the school’s most notorious bully squad, which effectively kept anyone from starting any shit with her – and Salima, the school council president. Salima seemed alright, always cool and collected; she had a mature air to her that alleviated the intimidation factor. Next to Salima, as always, sat Kane – the two were inseparable, for all Hiromi had seen so far. Even now, as she ogled the pair from her seat in the back, the two were engaged in looking at something together from a shared phone screen. Hiromi wasn’t sure if they were a romantic item or not, but if they weren’t, they sure were a close set of friends.

Two desks over, usually behind the now-absent Emily sat Zeo, a dainty sort of boy from a rich family; behind him, another boy of the same rich sort but infinitely worse in personality, Olivier Bohringer (who insisted on being referred to by his full name by his “pleb classmates”) whom Hiromi was surprised to see present in the first place, the snob had a habit of being chronically late with very little regard to how it might inconvenience others. Olivier had the repugnant aura of do not associate with me, whereas Zeo was lively, friendly, if not a little pushy, as if he always had something to prove. Always trying, mostly in vain, to show off to the boy whose desk he now, too, was leaning back towards in his seat with the expression of an obedient dog – yes, right there, behind Zeo, sat the boy that Hiromi had been actively avoiding making eye contact with for the past few months. Kinomiya Takao.

Not daring to look at him for too long, she stole a deliberate glance at Takao as if in passing. As if her gaze was simply wandering. He was sitting back in his chair, relaxed, laid-back as always, wearing a cap of red and blue and white with the lid facing back, engaged in conversation with some classmates, some guys called Brooklyn and Garland, Hiromi hardly knew them, as she hardly knew anyone to begin with; Zeo was eagerly trying to join the conversation that he hadn’t been included in, he never was yet always tried, wanted to be one of the cool boys and their cool circle.

Hiromi let the words float by. She could hear Takao talking but didn’t want to listen, pretended not to hear his vivid voice that carried over the sea of classroom clatter like it always did. She swiftly fixed her posture and decidedly set her eyes on the back of the person sitting in front of her. It was this short boy called Ivan who only ever read comic books in class, some weird nerd she knew absolutely nothing about.

She was oh-so-annoyed by the way her heart had chosen to leap in anticipation. It was stupid, the way she riled herself up for doing as much as looking at Takao for a bit. She crouched to grab a notebook from her backpack; it felt safe, hiding behind the excuse of urgently and thoroughly needing to check something in her notes.

While making sure that nobody could see her writing, she scribbled the names in the corner of the notebook page:

Kane, Zeo – maybe?

LITERALLY ALL OTHER BOYS – NO.

Ayaka – maybe? don’t know what she’s like

Salima – ok.

So the decision had been made.

CHAPTER 2 prompt: the past characters: hiromi, takao pairings: hiromi/takao

Hiromi and Takao had been childhood friends.

Their houses had been right across from each other on a long, long street in the eastern district of Bey Town. To young Hiromi, this street had been her entire world. The old, wooden house like a jewelry box across the street had been so fascinating to her child’s mind, the large Kinomiya residence with its traditional dojo and yard full of unusual trees. She’d started visiting the family regularly and befriended their younger son, a boy of her own age, Takao. Everything had been so effortless back then, and they’d become friends with the ease and sincerity that only children possessed.

They had built a beautiful tree house with help from Takao’s older brother and held secret meetings; they’d gone to the corner shop of that long, long street to buy candy with the first pocket money of their lives; Takao dug out bugs with a stick from the ground and proudly presented them to her. Innumerable wonderful childhood memories had stuck close to Hiromi’s heart all through her life.

They had only been children. Silly and unassuming, copying what they saw adults do, turning it into just another game. After visiting some family to attend her aunt’s wedding, Hiromi had wanted to play it out. Let’s get married! Just like that. And Kinomiya Yoshie, Takao’s beautiful mother who always wore flowers in her hair, had sewn her a little white dress because she’d asked for one.

Hiromi’s understanding of “getting married” had been to hold Takao’s hand a lot. Parroting cheesy lines about how they would be together forever and taking oaths that were comically solemn for children of their age. She had told him he needed to get her a ring because a boy was supposed to get one for the girl he married, so he’d made one of some twigs he'd picked from the ground. It had been big enough for two of her fingers to fit through. She hadn’t minded, because it had been a gift from him; she’d been so grateful that she’d given him the smallest of kisses on the cheek, just a peck.

Then she proceeded to never forget about that peck. Not for one minute of her life.

Eventually, the Tachibana family had moved to a different house, to a plain flat in a plain apartment building where the only view was the wall of an equally plain neighboring building and a parking lot. She’d been as heartbroken as a child could be – for about three weeks. Then she’d started attending elementary school right next door.

She’d sworn to visit him at least once a week, but it was quickly forgotten. In her new school, she’d begun to notice that girls and boys did not play together – that it was, in fact, embarrassing to play with boys because they were stupid and messy and stinky. The next time the Tachibanas and Kinomiyas held a get-together, Hiromi had hid behind her mother and avoided Takao’s attention all day. The whole pretend marriage thing had started feeling thoroughly humiliating and she didn’t want it addressed ever again.

And she didn’t want to know if Takao still remembered that peck on his cheek now, in high school where they had been put in the same class to her absolute mortification. He had tried to talk to her in the first couple of days of the semester. She’d greeted him politely, then proceeded to pretend she didn’t know him. She prayed to gods that he hadn’t told anyone else in their class about their shared past – but he probably hadn’t, as it didn’t seem like the kind of thing guys would talk about.

Not that she really knew what guys were talking about. After all, she hardly spoke to anyone.

#mayblade 2023 #my writing #fic post #god hel p me

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