Yana turned to face the owner of the voice. Much to her dismay it was Oikawa. Captain of the volleyball team. The person she least wanted to see.
"I didn't expect someone as pretty as you to be here." He grinned roguishly and winked as if he totally didn't plan on coming early to see if Iwa-chan brought this 'Yana' with him. The brunette ran his fingers through his swept-out hair as his chocolate brown eyes met hers. "I don't believe we've formally met, you look like you'd be a fan of mine."
There wasn't any mockery in his tone but something about him just rubbed her the wrong way. It definitely wasn't his face -he was a very fine specimen. She just couldn't put her finger on it. Perhaps it was all the ranting that Yana was exposed to by Hajime. As far as she was aware, he was not at all like how the fangirls described him. "Oikawa, good morning!" She chirped pleasantly. "I wasn't expecting to see you here so early in the morning.."
His smile didn't falter. "Well, it's only natural. I am the captain of the volleyball team. I am supposed to come in this early. How about you?"
"I'm sure you know by now, I'm Iwaizumi Yana. Cousin of your childhood friend." She added politely. They hadn't exchanged many words, but Oikawa was already tiring to be around. "Unfortunately, I'm not here to see you, I don't really consider myself a fan of yours."
He ignored her last stinging comment. Oikawa said her name a few times as if he was testing the way it sounded on his tongue. "Yana-chan. That's a very cute name." Of course, he knew beforehand who she was. He had to pry it out of Iwa-chan, but it was worth it. He examined the girl in front of him. Now that he thought about it, there was a transfer student in his class. Oikawa was surprised he didn't notice her right away; he would have certainly remembered honey amber eyes like hers. "Hopefully Iwa-chan has said all good things about me."
"Hm, he talks about you quite a lot actually." The conversation's tone remained polite, but the tension was thick enough to cut with a knife. They were sizing each other up to see how much either of them knew about each other. "Mostly about how a certain 'Trashykawa' gets on his nerves."
Oikawa gasped dramatically. Immediately the tension in the air dropped from a ten to a zero. "Iwa-chan is so mean! I'd only say nice things about him." He pouted childishly. Oikawa was the first to put down the metaphorical weapons, so it was only fair that Yana did the same. "So, what class are you in?"
Yana felt her ego take a small hit by that question. She tried to reassure herself saying that the only reason why he didn't know was because he came late. "Third year, Class six. Same as you."
Oikawa gaped, she was in the same class as him and he didn't notice?! "Oh!" He mussed the back of his neck bashfully. "Sorry. I was late on the first day and didn't notice we had the Tokyo transfer. That was my bad. I should have paid more attention."
"It's alright. Like you said, you were late and missed my introduction." Yana shrugged, acting nonchalant. Oikawa didn't seem as bad as Hajime made him out to be, but he didn't seem quite as dreamy as how Rini described him. He seemed like a pretty nice guy though, if you ignored the whole flirty aura he had going.
"Do you maybe want a photo with me as an apology?" Oikawa offered as he flashed his signature grin.
Yana was thrown off once more and she didn't have time to properly formulate a decent response. "Um...not really" She wasn't exactly sure how to follow up.
Oikawa changed the subject faster than he started it, he wasn't expecting her to reject his offer though looking back he should have seen it coming. Yana wasn't his fangirl. She was just Iwa-chan's cousin, which automatically gave her friend status. His usual response wouldn't affect her. Hold on. A brilliant idea came to mind.
"You should be the volleyball team's manager!" He exclaimed, excited at his genius. Since she wasn't an overly obsessed fangirl, or fangirl at all for that matter then she would actually do what a manager should be doing instead of undressing the team with her eyes. The last manager they had crossed a few too many lines that she ended up getting kicked out by the coach.
"No. Not really interested" Yana replied without a second of hesitation.
Of course, it wouldn't be that easy. "Why not? You come to school this early anyway with Iwa-chan. Plus if you want to, I'm sure the team would be happy to teach you how to play."
Yana shrugged. "I don't want to have anything to do with volleyball. I don't need to learn how to play either. I appreciate the offer, but I must strongly refuse."
Oikawa pouted in an annoyingly cute way. He knew how to use his expressions that's for sure. If it wasn't about volleyball, she might have caved to his puppy dog eyes. "Alright. I'll just have to find a way to convince you till you do join." He winked; if he could convince Iwa-chan then Yana-chan would be no problem at all. If he was anything, it was persistent.
Before Yana could say anything, Oikawa blew a kiss in her direction. "Bye Bye! I should be heading to the gym now. Talk to you later, Yana-chan!"
As soon as he was out of sight Yana groaned and plopped down on a nearby bench, if it wasn't for the cold air, Oikawa might have seen the pink dusting on her cheeks.
-----
"Good morning!" Aiko took his seat on Yana's left. "Are you excited for the senior project? Apparently, they are trying something new this year!"
"Something new, huh? Well I can't say I know what kind of project to expect but I'll keep that in mind."
"Psst! Yana-Chan!" Oikawa whisper shouted from a few seats in front of Aiko. "Hi"
Yana did consider not saying anything and pretend like their eyes totally didn't meet, but her friendlier side won out. "Hi."
Oikawa beamed like she had given him the sun; she could have sworn she saw his eyes sparkle. Yana gave a weak smile in return before the teacher called the class to attention.
"Today, we will be giving you third years, time for your senior projects. As the rumors say we are going to change a few things. The first change is that we, the faculty have decided to broaden the range of activities we will allow you to do. The second change is that you will be working in randomly assigned pairs in the class. The pairings are final and will not be changed. Regardless of if you like your partner or not you have to learn how to get along with them. You will have till the last month of school to finish your chosen project." The teacher narrowed his eyes at the class. "Just because you have the rest of the school year for the project does not mean you can procrastinate. This is a big portion of your final grade so take it seriously."
Partners? PARTNERS? Why? Yana didn't know anyone in class -barring Oikawa and Aiko. But she really, really didn't want to be paired up with Oikawa. If she could help it, she would want to be paired up with Aiko. There were twenty students in class six, herself included. That meant there was a one in nineteen chance to be paired up with Aiko and a one in nineteen chance to be paired with Oikawa. The odds weren't looking so great.
The teacher held up a bright yellow box and instructed the class to form a line and pull out one of the folded ballots. Yana was the second to pick a number, she closed her eyes, swallowed, then hoped for the best. She opened the paper and read the number out. "Who has number one?"
"That's me~!"
Yana knew that voice belonged to a particularly energetic person. "Aha... of course." She cursed her luck then walked over to Oikawa with faux excitement.
"It must be fate that we're together again!" Oikawa barely hid a smirk and bent down to whisper in her ear. "I look forward to our time together, Yana-chan."
Yana felt his breath tickle her ear and cause shivers to go down her spine. This fucker is toying with me. She refused to take a step back and instead waited for him to back away. "I can't say the same, but I appreciate the sentiment." Yana smiled sweetly returning his challenge.
- ----SOME TIME LATER-----
Their teacher had allowed the students to sit in their pairs. He made it very clear that today was the one and only day he would allow project work in class. Oikawa and Yana had been bouncing ideas around for a while only to come up blank.
"Podcast? Vlogs?"
"No" Oikawa waved his hand to dismiss yet another idea.
"Play?"
"Nah"
"Organizing a charity event? Presentation?"
"No and no" He dismissed, faster than the last idea.
Yana was frustrated at this point. This guy had the audacity to shut down all of her ideas without even offering his own. "Then what do you want?" She huffed as she sat back on her chair, arms crossed.
A slick grin spread on his features dimpling his cheeks. It was the kind of smile that seemed both endearing and concerning at once. "I thought you'd never ask"
Yana pursed her lips. She had officially met Oikawa only a few hours ago but even she could tell that sentence meant something very bad was about to happen -or good- depending on the person's perspective.
"I have an idea, a beautiful idea. Why don't we..."