Take Me Home (Tendou x Reader)

Chapter 02

The first weeks at the academy were very busy. You tried your best to keep up with your studies right from the bat, not wanting to give your parents trouble and wanting to prove that you were not a delinquent just because you went to a middle school that had a bad reputation.

It was crazy how fast everyone had learned that little fact about you. A few people had made fun of you on the first days, but once you had gotten some tests and they saw your results they suddenly quieted down quite a bit.

Once you had properly dismissed the prejudices about you, the other students seemed more inclined to include you in their little groups. The same could not be said for Tendou though, even though by observing him it seemed that he was more at the root of the problem than the other students.

A few of them had tried to start a conversation with him during one break or the other, but he had been utterly disinterested. You knew that if this kept up for the rest of the year that he'd be a lonely outcast again by the end of it.

You wanted to at least try and prevent that from happening, but how were you supposed to do that without seeming like you were pitying him? You still had to even figure out what it actually meant.

Is feeling sorry for someone, pitying them? Is wanting to help someone be happy, pitying them?

There were so many questions that you had no answers to, but one thing you knew for sure was that you wanted to at least try. 

One night you went to bed and started thinking about why you had these strong feelings of wanting to help Tendou specifically. You had witnessed other kids being bullied after going to middle school, and while you were repulsed by the act, none of the victims had ignited the same feelings of protectivity as Tendou had.

After breaking your head over it for a little while, you drifted off to sleep being none the wiser.

-

You had joined the cooking club in your second week of high school. In junior high you were home alone a lot, so you more often than not ate ready-made meals that you bought at the nearest convenience stores. You were tired of them and had decided to learn how to cook for yourself as soon as you went to high school.

The club met three times a week to prepare lunch and dinner, which meant that you only had to eat at the cafeteria two times a week. Granted, what you made was often worse than what they served there, but at least you could say you were trying to learn a new skill.

Apart from learning the recipes and how to make them, your club also spent quite a lot of time learning about nutrition and certain diets.

Even though you had told yourself that you would sit with Tendou during meals often, being in the cooking club meant that you didn't really have time for that. You had two days, and you wanted to sit with Akari as well. So that's what you did the first week, determined to sit with Tendou the week after.

It was on Thursday of your second week of high school that you found yourself unable to sleep again. You sneaked out of your room once more and made your way out into the cool April air.

Compared to the first time you snuck out at night, you were a little less careful. You were more at ease at the campus now and knew where you could hide if you noticed a teacher approaching.

"You again?" Someone called out to you when you approached the archery range. From the sound of his unemotional, detached voice you knew immediately that it was Tendou.

You stopped in your tracks to find out where he was standing this time and when you spotted him you walked over.

"Are you out here often?" You asked him as you looked around the archery range curiously. It was the first time you had seen something like it and you came to understand more and more just how big this school actually was.