After being settled in her new apartment two weeks later, on a lovely Friday afternoon, Kimiko stood alone in front of the gates of Sainō no Kōkō. She had left her friends at Sainō no Shōgakkō who were waiting for Tora to finish her entrance exams. She still had to turn in her remaining transfer papers and scout the school buildings. More specifically, she was going to check the conditions of the tennis courts and the instruments in the concert orchestra room.
After Kimiko gave the papers to the school secretary, she politely asked her to point her to the tennis courts. Bewildered, the secretary hesitantly gave her the directions. Kimiko thanked her nicely before setting off to the courts. Once she got there, she silently approached the fence that surrounded the entire tennis courts. She observed all the freshman, second-years, and seniors.
Most of the members of the tennis club were average. There were a couple of seniors and second-years that caught her eye. A few freshmen were rookies at the sport. Kimiko nodded her head to herself, but could not help but somewhat feel displeased.
"It's not up to my standards." she thought. "They need a tougher training menu..."
"So that is your opinion." A voice behind her said. "Truly interesting indeed."
Kimiko turned around. She saw a woman in her early forties dressed in a white and blue tennis jacket with a light blue collared shirt and black tennis skirt. Her black hair was tied up in a ponytail while her navy blue eyes shimmered. Kimiko narrowed her eyes. "Who are you?"
The woman laughed. "I'm the mathematics teacher of this school, or otherwise known as Sainōkō's boys' division tennis coach, Akagi Ran. My boys are the best tennis players of all of Tokyo. There's no school that could compete with my boys. Here, I'll introduce you to some of my star players."
"Takyuza, Imai, Iwai, come over here!" the woman yelled to several boys. Pretty soon three fit boys ran over to them. They all wore similar tennis outfits, the only difference was their colors. One wore red, another wore green, and the last one wore gray.
"What do you need, Coach?" the one in red asked.
"I want to introduce you three to this girl," Akagi replied cheerfully. She walked over to the three boys. "These are my star players. This one in red is Iwai Sota, a third-year and the tennis club's treasurer."
"Good afternoon," Iwai greeted.
"The one in green is Imai Hitoshi, a second-year and the vice-captain..."
Imai gave Kimiko a small smile.
"...and the one in gray is a second-year and our captain, Takyuza Akihiko."
Takyuza just stood there silently.
Kimiko gave each of them a nod of acknowledgement.
"Now tell me why they need a tough training menu," the coach bugged Kimiko.
Kimiko sighed after a few minutes as Akagi continued to bug her. She gave in and briefly scanned the three boys in front of her.
"They're good enough for local competitions, but could make it to nationals with more practice, Akagi-san," she told the boys' tennis coach. "Have them and their club members wear weights around their wrists and ankles everyday and do double the regular training menu. They'll get stronger than they are now, and be closer to the national level."
"What do you mean we're not national level?" One of Iwai's eyebrows twitched as he asked arrogantly.
"Half of your regulars' forms are sloppy, their knees are way too bent, and they need more flexibility. The only problem you three have is stamina. Adding an extra lap each day to your individual training menu each day for twenty-five days while wearing five pounds in each of your wrists and ankles will up it. Not to mention that freshman in white, he could be on par with you if he had some more training."
Kimiko turned to the coach and bowed slightly. "Please excuse me. I cannot stand people who are very arrogant, especially those who cannot accept the reality that they are not good as they thought. Thank you for taking the time to introduce several of your players. I do hope that you will consider my suggestion. If you wish to know my name, wait until Monday, where I could formally introduce myself. I will be transferring to this school with several others. I will see you then." Then she left.
"Interesting girl, eh Takyuza?" Akagi spoke to her student. "She caught on who's good and needs work at one glance. Especially on what the entire club needs to work on. That girl didn't even fall for your charm as other girls normally do!"
Takyuza simply nodded his head.
"Coach, you're not really going to follow her suggestion?" asked Imai nervously, scratching his neck.
"Who knows?" Akagi gave him a scary smile. "Imai, Iwai, go take some irregulars and get several boxes marked '5 lb arm weights' and '5 lb leg weights' from the gym storage. Then give everyone a pair of each. The entire tennis club is going to wear them the whole weekend!" The coach 'cheerfully' whistled away as she went to correct the stances of some students.
"Oh man." thought Imai and Iwai. "We're doomed!"
Tezyuka just stood there in indifference.
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"So, how's the tennis courts, Jin asked as Kimiko met up with her in the kitchen of the bakery they worked at. Jin was wearing an apron, keeping the messy flour that was on the table off her clothes. Kimiko grabbed her own apron and put her hair up in a bonnet.
"You don't want to know! They were so--AUGH!" Kimiko complained to her.
"What's got you so worked up?" Jin kneaded the dough she was working on.
"The coach and her so-called 'star' players!" Kimiko groaned. She took a bowl from a cabinet. She proceeded to take several cups of flour, eggs, water and other ingredients out. Then she carefully measured each ingredient and dumped them into the bowl.
"Really?" Jin replied, molding her dough into a loaf. "What happened?"
"I was scouting the tennis club when I was caught by the coach, Akagi Ran-san. She's the mathematics teacher at Sainōkō. When she saw me, she commented on my 'opinion,' which I accidentally thought out loud. That lead her to introducing herself and three boys, Imai-san, Iwai-san, and Takyuza-san. " Kimiko pulled out a drawer and took out a wooden spoon. She went to the sink and rinsed it. Kimiko went back to the counter and stirred the cake batter she was making.
"Interesting. What's next, Miko?"
Kimiko sighed. "Akagi-san asked me my opinion. I told her what I thought. Imai-san arrogantly demanded me why I didn't believe that they were 'national level.' You should have seen them! Their forms were so sloppy! I told him what was wrong and said to the coach that I needed to leave."
"Ah..." Jin nodded. "There's the problem. Arrograncy really gets to you, doesn't it? I can't believe it happened when you went scouting though. You're normally calm and collected."
"Is any thing wrong back here, girls?" a voice called from the front. The girls turned to the owner of the voice. An old woman stood in the doorway that led to the front of the bakery.
"Nothing's wrong, Yamada-san," the girls replied together.
"Just a few boy troubles popping up." Jin added. "But nothing we couldn't handle."
"Ah. I got a few of those back in my days." Yamada nodded. "It was troublesome too. So many boys were chasing after me and Ami, Kimi-chan. Your grandfather was the lucky fish of the sea to get your grandmother. My husband had to get through my father to get me. Those boys better watch out. Knowing your grandfather, Hiashi will probably make them plant all the rice paddies around the Davis estate by themselves."
Kimiko's cheeks turned cherry red.
"I-I-It's not that kind of boy trouble." Kimiko stuttered. "I was dealing with boy who thinks he is better than he actually is. I cannot deal with such people."
"Whatever you say." Yamada waved her answer off. "Your grandfather was arrogant as well, until your grandmother beat him in chess, his number one specialty. He humbled down pretty much after that."
Kimiko sighed as she saw that her words were not getting through. She looked at Jin who just gave her a shrug.
"Just deal with it."
"Next time I am going to scout, you are going with me. I do not want to deal with this so-called 'boy's trouble.'"
Kimiko put her cake batter into two circle pans, took out several finished cake, and put the unbaked cake batter in the oven. She set the finished pans on a cooling rack. Then she suddenly turned to Jin and looked at her seriously.
"I think I forgot to check out the instruments in the orchestra room.."