Kyoko looked around when her name was called out. What now?
It was the class representative, Okada-san. A girl about her own length with short hair and glasses. She didn't belong to Ryu-kun's fan-club, and she most definitely didn't belong to Kuri-chan's. She was one of the girls who openly disliked the blond foreigner.
Kyoko could understand her to a degree. Kuri-chan was visible, very much so and she talked too much despite her poor Japanese. Which was a problem because by now Kuri-chan's Japanese had become good enough for her to put her foot in her mouth from time to time.
"Okada-san?"
"Takeida-san, we're preparing for swimming lessons."
Pool opening, yes that should be about now.
"We first years are assigned the duty to clean the pool."
Kyoko could see where this was going.
"Each class has to contribute two students the coming Saturday. Those who are not yet members of a club or are members of a culturally oriented club are less likely to have a full schedule that weekday."
Which was correct. The reasoning was perfectly sound, Kyoko admitted. That didn't make the prospect of cleaning out the pool any more appealing.
"Our PE teacher will oversee the work. From our class I have assigned you and Ageruman-san."
There were more students in their class who could have been chosen given Okada-san's earlier reasoning but there was nothing improper Kyoko could complain about.
"I understand, Okada-san. Time?" Kyoko asked curtly.
"Saturday. Ten am. Do you know where I can find Ageruman-san?"
"I'll tell her myself. We have club hours after this anyway."
"Thank you."
Wednesday the first of June. The midterms were behind them and Kyoko was grateful Himekaizen had them a week later than most schools. She had needed that week.
This year it looked like the long weeks when you befriended your umbrella had already started, so the pool would already be moist when it was time for cleaning it out. That was a plus. The downside was that the cleaners would also already be moist when it was time for cleaning.
But secretly she was happy to have been picked out by Okada-san. After a prior run in with his English teacher Urufu-kun had been picked from 6:1 and Yu-kun had received the other spot due to guilt by association.
Kuri-chan wouldn't mind neither. She threw far too many glances in the direction of the left wing during breaks. Whenever it rained during lunch she ate her food in their classroom with destitution written all over her face, but if the weather allowed. Well she certainly had the legs to compete with Ryu-kun sprinting down the stairs.
In short Kuri-chan behaved more like a lovestruck middle schooler than the second time high schooler she was.
Like I'm behaving all grown up. Gah! I know Yu-kun likes me. Not even I could be blind enough not to see that but I just can't bring it up after what I did to him.
Kyoko left their classroom and headed through the main building to their club room. They were planning Urufu-kun's insane outdoor dinner and bouncing ideas for a summer break field trip.
Soon they would have to wave goodbye to their Skype friends. Some of them forever but most of them just for the long summer ahead.
***
The pool was indeed moist as was she. To her right an equally moist Kuri-chan scrubbed the bottom with a brush. Urufu-kun was hanging precariously over the edge scrubbing one side of the pool together with Yu-kun and the two delinquents from 2:1.
5:1 and 4:1 were pouring in clean water from one end while 3:1, that would be her and Kuri-chan, and 1:1 scrubbed frenetically. 8:1 mopped up the wet and dirty results and 7:1 carried the residue away from the pool.
Normally Kyoko wasn't one to pay too much attention to clothes. But there were two obvious exceptions. Two Swedish exceptions. She might be uninterested in fashion but you just didn't make best friends with the tall bombshell without learning something. And that covered the female part of high school fashion.
Probably covers a lot more that just high school fashion, Kyoko thought wryly.
She put some weight to her brush and watched brown pool bottom become blue and clean water become brown.
"Dive, dive, dive!"
Urufu-kun vaulted clumsily but exactly over the edge and landed on the bottom. He took up scrubbing the sides again.
"There he goes!"
And that was the other exception. He wore, well how should she put it... strange clothes. If she wanted to be kind. Outright harmful to the eyes was probably a better description.
The worst part was that he considered it fashionable casuals from back home. Which she might have believed if it hadn't been for Kuri-chan. In a fit of frustration she had opened up a computer and shown Kyoko what was considered fashionable among teenagers in Sweden. While foreign and a bit rustic it wasn't hurtful to your eyes.
Kyoko transformed some more pool bottom with her brush and looked at her friend. She was busy following Kyoko's example and made an obvious attempt not to throw too many glances at her boyfriend. Whenever she failed she shook her head.
Did he have to mix neon orange with olive green? I mean, really!
For once she followed Kuri-chan's example and shook her head.
Both friends took a stare at each other and laughed.
And rain started pouring down.
Moist, you bet!
***
There was a lot of giggling from where the girls finally emerged. Yukio looked at them with embarrassed apprehension. In their swimsuits they looked, well different. He suddenly felt very self-aware. All the girls were staring at his skinny body with disapproval.
For his part he made an utterly failed attempt at not staring at breasts and the small part where back and front of their swimsuits came together between the legs. He shouldn't, but he also couldn't avoid it.
"Nice view, and there's nothing wrong in enjoying it," Urufu said and slapped him on his back.
To put his money where his words were he rose and stretched lazily. He twisted one foot slightly in a way Yukio had seen him doing during their Saturday bouts but was unable to copy. That move slid him half a metre across the poolside and he ended up in front of Kojima-san, the most beautiful girl in their class by a wide margin.
Yukio stared transfixed at how Urufu caught her eyes and let his gaze slide down her entire body and up again. When she started blushing furiously he gave her a thumbs up sign and returned to Yukio. "Well this is where all that training pays off I guess," Urufu said and sat down beside him.
"Huh?"
"Don't worry. Gets more fun when you're fully grown." Urufu stretched lazily again and grinned. "You're just not used to summers at the beach. The girls are feeling just as embarrassed as you do. Besides shouldn't you be watching Kyoko?"
That made him blush. How can you be so comfortable? And when did you grow that body? And I didn't expect you to do that. But somewhere inside him Yukio understood that Urufu's blatant leering had partially been a display to remove some of the discomfort Yukio felt.
"I thought you were shy with girls," he said.
"Yukio, I'm not really a high school kid you know," Urufu said in a voice that didn't carry to their classmates. "I was. Shy that is." Then he grinned and leaned back on his hands. "University took care of that problem. I learned that leering is a lot less embarrassing than pretending not to look. Especially when I'm not really interested in the girl."
Yukio thought about what he had just heard. Something still didn't make sense. When he saw some of the girls gathering around Kojima-san to whisper and point at Urufu he realised what it was.
"That show of yours, why?"
Urufu glanced at the gossiping girls before he answered. "Kids. She's nice to look at and all that," he glanced at the girls again, "but in my eyes she's a kid. That's why I'm so attracted to Christina."
"Explain," Yukio said hiding his face behind his towel. He didn't want the others to guess they were talking girls right now.
"She looks like a kid, just like I do." Urufu sighed and stared into the sky. "But we're both adults you know. We're the same. With her I don't feel ashamed."
"I don't understand."
"I didn't expect you to." Urufu smiled, a sad smile that made him look a world away. "You'll understand one day, but I can't teach you." Then he was back again in the here and now and his face split in the daredevil grin Yukio had learned came just prior to some childish prank. "We're supposed to test our swimming ability today, aren't we?"
Urufu stood up in the blazing sun as if the prospect of a deep sun-tan didn't bother him in the least. Then he moved to the poolside, and Yukio could see how long years of training had taught him to defy the fact that he really wasn't all that naturally athletic.
The girls closest to them giggled and a few of them gasped as Urufu moved around showing off stringy muscles in places Yukio didn't know you could get muscles in the first place.
Easy for you to say. You've already been an adult once. But wasn't that what you tried to tell me?
Urufu jumped into the water with the grace of a log and began swimming. Breast strokes like a child.
So he can swim, but not well. He just makes up for it with that absurd stamina of his.
Yukio watched as Urufu methodically carved out length after length. He was oblivious to the jokes that were thrown after him and finished whatever goal he had set up for himself.
"He's like a brick in the water but a pretty good looking brick."
"Pretty good looking? Did you see that body of his? Wow! Just wow!"
"I wonder about that geek show. Must have been some kind of stupid bet."
He attracted way too much attention before.
"Matsumoto-kun," did you two make a bet or what?
And now it's spilling over to me. Damn! Yukio looked up. It was Kubo-san, one of his former classmates from Red Rose. He hadn't known her that well back then and he still really hadn't gotten to know her.
"Eh no. He went to a really strict place after he was expelled. Maybe just took him some time to get used to our new class," Yukio lied.
Now he could look at the girls without getting as flustered as earlier. Some of Urufu's blunt words must have stuck. Just as he had said. Nice to look at, but none of them were Kyoko-chan.
"He looks better out of the water," Kojima-san noted. She still looked a bit flustered from what Urufu had done earlier. One of the left wing's two beauties, she would have garnered a lot more attention if it hadn't been for 3:1. She was also one of the girls who showed interest in any guy who rose in popularity.
Damn it Urufu, you could apply to become the prince of the poolside. As long as you stay out of the water that is. Yukio shook his head. If Urufu had known what he would grow into it wasn't so strange how he could bounce jokes so self confidently with older girls in the city last winter. But you really shouldn't do that any longer now when you have Kuri-chan.
The sun hid behind a passing cloud and the pool had filled up with students trying out the water for the first time in the year. From the other side of the pool their PE-teacher was shouting out instructions and taking notes of how well they swam.
Yukio let his mind wander. A lot of his thoughts concerned Urufu, and most of those were reflections on how much his friend had changed since he met Kuri-chan. Some of the frantic need to find a way back home to that other world seemed to have gone. Maybe she was enough for him to think more about the life he lived here.
He saw Urufu climb out of the pool and receive a fair amount of back slapping. They were probably followed by insinuating questions about Kuri-chan.
That couple. Three weeks and the school still talks about it as the most unexpected event of spring term. Yukio however, was less interested in the surprise couple that existed than in the one that didn't. Half of that problem shared a classroom with Kuri-chan.
3:1 comes after us. Now that will be a circus. Kuri-chan and Noriko-chan. And Kyoko-chan of course. Thinking of her had him turn around to hide the heat in his face. The girls present would surely misunderstand. And left wing is the best. We can see half the pool from there.
Yukio sauntered over to the pool. He needed to cool down a bit.
***
It's a circus! She had heard how bad the classrooms in the left wing could be. Had experienced it first hand as well. But this was a circus.
The pool was divided in two halves. Those who wanted to be seen and those who didn't. Kyoko kept with the latter and so did Nori-chan. And to her surprise, so did Kuri-chan even if she had walked over to the other end to gaze along the left wing building. Something, or rather someone hadn't been there to be seen and she came back.
There was something downtrodden about her when she returned.
I see. All that talk about love and heart, but this is what the real you looks like when you're in love. I wonder what I look like.
Bad, bad idea. Kyoko could feel colour rising in her face. She slid into the pool and submerged. When she came back up again both Kuri-chan and Nori-chan were in the water. Nori-chan had apparent problems swimming and received help from their PE-teacher but Kuri-chan stretched out in a lazy and eye-catching medley. Most of the boys were whistling and shouting and even a few of the girls stared in admiration.
Of course she moves like a goddess in the water as well. She's not human that girl. She didn't swim that well last winter when we trained together.
Kuri-chan wasn't just good-looking. She ate the lengths with a speed that would have made her an interesting recruit for the swim team.
What was is she had said? "Two clicks three times per week keeps you in shape." Clicks? Kyoko watched Kuri-chan eat away another 25 metres. Oh, kilometres! Yu-kun had said something about that when referring to one of his games. She swims two kilometres at a time? Three times per week? She can have that body.
Kyoko climbed out of the pool and sat down beside it. Drying in the sun felt good but it quickly got hot.
She saw most of the boys leering while pretending not to, and to balance it out most of the girls were giggling and pointing while pretending not to. If Nori-chan hadn't been so busy in the pool she'd offered half a dozen scathing remarks by now.
Then there was some commotion a bit away. The boys were shouting louder than usual.
And there he was, the cannonball prince. Water splattered all over the poolside when he landed and Kyoko had to make a hasty retreat.
Ryu-kun! Grow up sometime!
She moved into the shade under the roof. The sun was baking them and it was uncomfortably hot despite her being so close to the pool. Maybe she should have let him soak her.
"I'm the bomb! I'm the bombest of bombs!"
No wonder Nori-chan calls him her idiot brother. How can someone that childish be so popular?
Or maybe it was because he was so childish. He radiated a carefree lack of worries and for some people maybe that was the very reason they were attracted to him. Kyoko couldn't tell. She was part of the gang around Kuri-chan and as such hadn't understood that she was supposed to have a crush on Ryu-kun.
She walked poolside and slid into the water. Her eyes sought in vain for her minds wishes.
Her interests lay elsewhere and elsewhere wasn't here. He was back in his classroom in the wing turned circus. 6:1, the second source of rumours. The monopoly held by 3:1 had been thoroughly broken even if nowhere close to overtaken. Ryu-kun was still Ryu-kun and Kuri-chan was still Kuri-chan. Nothing would change that. Not even Urufu-kun.
You are, she guessed, mostly famous for being Kuri-chan's unexpected boyfriend. Good! The last remnants of bullying had ceased when she chose the geek over the prince. Geek, right! They were perfect for each other from the start. They just didn't know it.
On second thought Kyoko suspected that the tall, Japanese looking Swede had no interest in being the centre of rumours. On third thought she wasn't all that certain.