a bunny's heart | karma akabane

017: wipped baseball captain

"Yeah," mina smiled understandingly "I know shindo, we had a project in PE once. He's pretty good."

Silence fell over the class before Rio was the first to speak up, smiling mischievously.

"You know their captain?" She asked slowly, wiggling her eyebrows at fuwa. Mina only nodded.

"Then I think I know how to help us win, sugino."

Mina only raised her eyebrows at her smirking friends as koro-sensei's face turned into a pink circle. The red-headed boy only leaned back on his chair boredly. What the hell?
___

Later that day, Rio and Fuwa had dragged her away from Karma before they could walk home together as usual. He only shrugged, but maybe this whole thing did bother him a little bit. Even when he'd never admit it.

Rio pinned the girl against a wall weirdly close to the baseball field, where the baseball team seemed to have just finished practice.

"Rio, fuwa, seriously, what are we doing here?" The brunette scoffed as she stood against the wall, looking into her friend's eyes.

"Well," fuwa laughed mischievously, holding her chin as the blonde started speaking with a small smirk.

"Don't worry, mina. You need to trust us, okay?"

The brunette sighed before nodding. "I trust you, now what are we doing here?"

"You said you know shindo. So, the only thing we need from you is you going to him and wishing him good luck for the upcoming game against us, alright?" She explained, letting go off her wall-pinned friend as Fuwa pointed at the exhausted shindo, who was sitting on one of the benches and drinking from a water bottle.

Mina shifted uncomfortably, walking towards the two girls. "I don't know guys.. we haven't talked in a while. Why do you need me to do that, anyway?"

"We need to test a theory I read in a shoujo manga once. 'love and croissants' is the name actually. It's about this baker girl and her super hot boss-" Fuwa started ranting, her cheeks turning bright red. She was the otaku of the class, that was well-known. She often told mina about a new shogagukan publishing, mainly because she was the only one who actually listened. Mina didn't mind- she found it adorable.
However, they were interrupted by Rio.
"Look!"

Shindo stood up now, walking towards the changing rooms as Fuwa and rio pushed her forwards.

Whisper-yelling a quick "just do it!"

Mina shook her head before sighing again. She walked towards shindo, who was chatting with a teammate as she awkwardly waved her hand, smiling a little.
"H-Hey, um, hey shindo."

The boy's eyes widened at the voice behind him as he shoo-ed his teammate away. He went through his hair once, gulped, went through his hair again and turned around, nervously looking at the girl with a tint of pink on his cheeks.

Rio had this theory beforehand, but she had to proof it. And boy, did it proof itself. It was painfully obvious that Kunugigaoka's baseball captain was in love with Mina Hayashi. Painfully obvious to everyone but mina Hayashi herself, as Rio and Hinata smirked from afar. Perfect.

"H-hi," the usually stoic boy said as he rubbed his neck, looking away while his face was heating even more.
"Mina.. what- I mean, w-what's up?"

The brunette smiled gently, not bothered by the boys appearance.
"Well, I kinda got dragged here," she smiled sheepishly before shaking her head "but i wanted to wish you good luck for the upcoming tournament!"

His cheeks grew redder, as he watched her smile grow bigger. "Huh..? Me..?"

"Yep!" She answered before looking back at Rio and turning around, "anyways, I gotta run..but yes, good luck. You will need it." She winked jokingly before running back towards a laughing Rio and a maniacally laughing Hinata, glaring them down.
____

The day of the tournament had arrived, and Rio along with the others had made some master plan in which mina wasn't involved in. She was just told to, quote, 'look pretty' to which she jokingly responded that she'd try.
She still didn't know what they were trying, but anyways.

They had finished their game against the basketball team before the boys in her class would start playing. And they lost, of course, but it was still pretty fun playing with her friends. Marie also left her alone, which was good.

"And now he threw it! The centre catched it without a problem, people, the game is over! Our marvelous heros won!" Araki's loud voice came through the speakers around the main building's baseball field. The whole school was surrounding the players, everyone cheering and having a good time while watching the games. Just now, Class-A had won and mina, next to all her classmates, had watched gakushu fiercely.

She thought cheering him on as loud as everyone else would be weird. For one, her new friends wouldn't feel comfortable seeing her cheer on their bully, Mina still hadn't got past that feeling that she owed everyone something. For two, gakushu hadn't even looked at her.

"Mina,come on!" Rio's excited voice made her break apart from the fence that she grabbed onto, shaking her head before running towards them. Rio took her to a spot where she'd see the game better, at least that's what her blonde friend had said. Weirdly enough, that was also the spot with the best natural lighting on the girls face.

"Yo," Mina raised her hand, calling out to her friends in the field "Good luck, guys!" She finished with a bright smile, winking once and making nagisa wave back and everyone else grateful at the reassurance.

The brunette turned around, walking after Rio as she heard another voice.

"You should have kissed me good luck!" Karma shouted back, a grin creeping up his face.

"Shut up and win, Akabane!" She turned sideways, yelling as they began walking further way to the spot, only half able to surpress her smile.

She ran on to catch Rio, who was one of the last and who silently smirked at her as she arrived next to herself.

"What?" Mina stopped smiling, raising her eyebrows while crossing her arms.

"What?" Rio repeated, her smile growing more mischievous before getting interrupted by karasuma Sensei.

"They're starting."

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1666 WORDS
FRIDAY, 5TH OF JANUARY
@MIRAI