Kaho woke up to an empty shared room. She took advantage of it, of course, and jumped in a quick shower and got freshened up, changing into the alien shirt Ryota had thrust onto her the previous morning, with her leggings. She tied her hair up into a high ponytail and swilled her mouth out before breakfast.
It was seven-thirty by the time she was ready and there was still no sign Fumiko had even slept in their room. She must have followed through with her threat to drag Omura and Tomohiro with her and Konoishi for her sunrise yoga session.
She found them under a gazebo in the morning sun, gazing out at a nearby creek. Fumiko looked like a picture, the poster girl for yoga, her thin torso was bare, exposing a little birthmark by her belly button, and to Kaho's surprise, a few faint almost iridescent stretch marks by her hips, mostly obscured by the waistband of her tight workout trousers. She was in just a sports bra, a grey one with black elastic on the back, the straps and under the cups. She had her hair tied up in a messy bun and her head craned up like a sunflower, chasing daybreak for the smallest caress of light. Konoishi beside her was also in stretchy trousers, like Fumiko, but he was wearing a white t-shirt with the sleeves cut off, it depicted the sun on the back to make the sleeves plunging. There was a faint sheen of sweat on his arms. In contrast, Omura and Tomohiro were wearing gym shorts and baggy shirts. Like what they'd wear to basketball practice.
The water glistened in the light, and while Konoishi and Fumiko were in fantastic form, holding their poses, both Omura and Tomohiro had relegated themselves to the corpse pose, laying flat on their backs and refusing to move, even as their friends went from the triangle pose to the half moon pose.
Both Fumiko and Konoishi were proficient, their muscles firm and steady even as they flexed and contorted. There were four fresh fruit smoothies in mason jars on a nearby bench. Omura looked up at Kaho and made a grunting sound, reaching his arm out and grasping at air.
Kaho raised a brow, an amused smirk on her lips, "Which one's yours?"
"Pink one," Omura said, like each breath was going to be his last. He was sprawled out like a starfish on his yoga mat. Tomohiro reached his foot out and kicked him with the tips of his toes.
"This is all your fault," Tomohiro said.
"Morning, Kaho!" Konoishi said, grinning as he and Fumiko moved back from the half-moon to the triangle and into the warrior II pose.
"Morning, Konoishi, Morning Fumiko. Want some smoothie? I'm assuming these are yours."
They shrugged and broke from their poses. They proceeded to wriggle, shimmying like they were made of fabric in the wind, shaking out any tension and stiffness. Konoishi beckoned the group to the bench where the smoothies were.
They slumped into position on the bench. Omura and Tomohiro gulped down the remnants of their smoothies, then flopped forward onto the table, their long limbs taking up more than their fair share of space on the table. Fumiko perched on the outer edge of the bench, her long, slim legs pointed outwards instead of under the table. She leaned back and put her head on Konoishi's shoulder. He flicked her.
"Do you want one, Kaho?" Fumiko asked, changing the subject, shaking her mason jar and sending the smoothie swirling in the glass, "If you go through those double doors there," she gestured to a pair of French doors with gossamer curtains. They were wide open, greeting the world with open arms.
"There are three different blends of smoothie – there's mango and orange, strawberry and banana, and a mixed berry one," Fumiko said, "If you're going, could you top me up, this is going to be gone in seconds."
Kaho nodded and made her way over to the doors. Inside was a vast dining hall, filled with random patrons, mostly filling up on continental breakfast items. Three massive machines brimming with fresh fruit smoothies sat in the far corner. Kaho grabbed two mason jars and filled the first one up with the mango and orange smoothie, what Fumiko had been drinking, and the second, she filled with the mixed berries. She turned to head back out to the others and almost walked smack bang into none other than Naseru. He wiped his brow.
"Hot and bothered already? Want a smoothie?" Kaho offered.
"Not really, but, I did just run the medium trail," he glanced at his watch, "Think I did it in about forty minutes."
Kaho stepped aside and Naseru filled his own mason jar with the same purple all-berry smoothie. Kaho beckoned Naseru to come and join the team at the table.
As Kaho moved toward the doors, she heard some kind of yelling. It sounded, vaguely, like her brother, but mottled and panicked. She wasn't sure what the voice was saying. But she thought it was 'boar'?
Kaho and Naseru headed to the French doors and peered out, seeing none other than Taiga, high-tailing it from the mouth of a heavily wooded trail and into the clearing. He squawked wordlessly and leapt at a nearby tree, clinging to a low-hanging branch like a lifeline.
Kaho peeked further out into the clearing. Konoishi, Omura, Tomohiro and Fumiko had spotted the animal too. They'd eased their way to their feet and were backing up and away from the massive, tusked pig. Their shuffles backwards were tentative, their eyes wide, trained on the snout of the animal.
From somewhere, out of Kaho's eyeline, something struck the beast, drawing its eye. The third-year students bolted, running to where Kaho and Naseru had been watching. Konoishi slammed the French doors closed and locked them. He didn't draw the curtains.
The patrons looked up from their breakfasts, dropping their silver cutlery with bangs and clangs. A middle-aged woman with shoulder-length brown hair and flushed pink cheeks furrowed her brows. She got to her feet, running her hands down the length of her yellow floral dress and peered outside. She squeaked and grabbed her phone from her table, set for two, and punched in a number, but her eyes were trained on the boar, just like everyone else's seemed to be.
A moment later, the boar went flying toward one of the trees, colliding with the trunk. It staggered to its feet, snorted indignantly and shuffled off. Taiga scrambled down from the tree, swinging down as if he'd been doing pull-ups at the gym. He ran a hand through his hair and beckoned the kids outside.
Fumiko reached for the door handle and tried to open it. Konoishi turned the key and tentatively they made their way outside again. Smoothies had spilt all over the picnic table from their escape, but there didn't seem to be any other damage. Not even any of the mason jars had broken. Kaho nudged Fumiko with her elbow and handed her the mango and orange smoothie. She didn't drink it.
The teenagers watched Taiga cross the clearing and hold his hands out to two older men who were wearing matching khaki waistcoats. Behind them, a man in wet, black clothes, spattered with flecks of green. He squelched across the green with some haste, in the direction of the dining room, his sodden hair, pushed back off his face with some sort of snorkel, was sopping onto the grass. Kaho ignored him. He was probably staff. Trying to catch the boar or something. She turned her attention back to the men in Taiga's company.
The first of the two older men with Taiga was maybe five foot tall and had sun spots all over the crown of his head from where his hairline had receded. He had smile lines by his eyes, which were small and framed by fold after fold of wrinkled skin, like a balloon that had deflated behind the living room sofa. He stood with a gummy smile on his face. He leaned heavily on an ornately moulded cane with a bronze eagle's head on the handle.
The second man was taller, and looked less like a deflated balloon and more like he'd accidentally bitten into a lemon thinking it was an orange. Prominent lines marred the skin by his thin lips, and his sunken cheeks were even more accentuated by his expression. He had more hair than his companion, though, a fine crop of wispy white hairs stuck up like they were being held by static electricity. His big black eyes were deep and wise, and despite the sour and sallow look of him, he was also smiling. Laughing even, well, wheezing, letting out a gaspy, breathy chuckle, clutching his stomach with one of his blueish veiny hands.
"It's been a while Mr Kenjoku Kaiju. How are you, Aigawa?"
"Nice to see you, Mr Shirotani. Mr Tsukishima. It's been a long time."
"You don't need to tell us," the taller one, whose name tag identified him as Shirotani, said, "We're just here withering into dust and you come waltzing on in like no time has passed."
Mr Tsukishima, the shorter man, elbowed Taiga in the gut, making him double over. He reached over and gave him a noogie, tousling Taiga's hair.
"I know we're on a nature reserve, but those boars are everywhere this year," he said, his voice raspy. He coughed into his fist, a whooping smoker's cough.
"You kids better mind yourselves when you go running the trails. They're sneaky bastards, them boars," Mr Shirotani said, "Our boy Hideki will give you some emergency smoke flares so we can come and get you if they corner you, okay?"
Kaho shot her brother a worried look, but all Taiga did was grin. He slung his arm around Mr Shirotani's shoulder and grinned, "Tell me, Mr Shirotani, have any of the other teams I contacted booked your reserve for the weekend?"
He nodded, "Three – no two other teams are training here this weekend. We've bought so much fruit to accommodate the need for your blasted protein smoothies."
"Sorry about the mess," Taiga said, his eyes flickered to the spilled smoothie that one of the other staff members had begun cleaning up, "The kids were scared."
Mr Tsukishima and Mr Shirotani rolled their eyes.
"Yeah, the kids," they said in unison.
Taiga shrugged, "Okay, so you said we have company here this weekend, can I get the details of who's here? I invited all of my contacts."
"You are too kind to us, Aigawa," Mr Tsukishima smiled, "All of this promotion out of the kindness of your heart."
Taiga shrugged, "I had the time of my life here. I want as many people as I can get to enjoy this too."
Mr Shirotani smiled, "The school details and Coaches' room numbers will be at reception, come along."
The two older men hobbled through the French doors and back into the lodge.
Konoishi watched them go, "I knew we were going to a lodge in a nature reserve but I wasn't expecting… you know… boars."
Omura laughed, "I don't think anyone in a month of Sundays would have expected that, come on, let's get some new smoothies and go tell Azumi and the others what they missed."
Tomohiro grinned, and he and Omura scrambled to be the first through the doors to get back to the smoothies. They passed the soaking wet man, who was bickering in hushed voices with the woman in the yellow dress. She stormed out of the dining hall with a slam of the door.
There was a girl in the dining hall now, much closer to Kaho and Fumiko's age. She had a severe bob and a full fringe, accentuating her contoured cheekbones and her full lips. The girl was on her phone, ignoring her smoothie and scrambled eggs, nodding along to whatever song was playing in her pair of chunky red headphones. She wore a spaghetti strap vest and a pair of baggy cargo pants. She looked up at Kaho and Fumiko and beckoned them over.
"You from one of the other schools here to train?" she asked.
Fumiko nodded, holding her hand out to the girl, "I'm Fumiko, from the Hanagawa High School basketball team."
The girl shook Fumiko's hand, her nails were freshly painted with a shiny red gel polish. She smiled, "I'm Akane. I'm here with Kuroyama Academy's basketball team. My brother's on the team, I'm just chaperoning, I play at my college, but I'm not here to train, you know."
Fumiko nodded along, "May we sit with you?"
Akane shrugged, "Sure. Have you met anyone from the other school yet? Or is that you?"
Kaho pointed at herself. Akane nodded and Kaho shook her head.
"I'm from Hanagawa too. My brother's the coach."
Akane hummed to herself, and had a big slurp of her strawberry smoothie. Kaho and Fumiko each had a sip of their own, and while Fumiko and Akane made idle and amicable conversation, Kaho began people-watching. She observed the few guests in the dining space. There was a man with salt and pepper hair and stubble on his chin, wearing a black pressed suit, and ashy grey tie. He nursed a black coffee, and occasionally glanced at the woman at the table for two, still sans her dining partner. Kaho imagined they were having an affair, and trying to hide it from her ungrateful husband, but her imaginings were interrupted by the bawdy teenagers elbowing each other at the sides of the smoothie station, a few waved to Akane, who didn't even deign to look at them.
There were small clusters of students making their way in, from a white boy with fair light blond hair and brown eyes. He was slight, shorter than some of the players, but clearly one of them. He wore an NBA jumper and shorts, and had bulky headphones over his ears. He had poured himself a smoothie and gone to sit in the corner, headphones on and head down. Her eyes then flickered over to the few Hanagawa second years, primarily Ryota flocking in with his friends, the neon pink basketball in tow. More and more teens wandered into the dining hall to get smoothies, and some, who were feeling brave, some granola or a banana.
"What kind of dork brings a neon pink basketball to breakfast?" Akane snorted.
"Our ace," Fumiko said quickly, her tone sharp and clipped.
Akane bristled, "Ah, he's your dork."
Kaho said nothing. She wished she could send this conversation telepathically to Ryota, and give him that reassurance that his hard work was paying off. His teammates were defending him as the team's ace in private, despite him carrying a ball like it's a phantom limb. He had his charms and his quirks but he was undoubtably Hanagawa's ace.
Eiji kicked Yamada under their table, and all four boys burst into laughter. Yuta's knee collided with the underside of the table. He let out a heavy exhale of pain, giving the raucous laughter a second wind. The bang of Yuta's knee jostled the smoothies, which had been quickly drained down to the dregs.
"Kaho, what do you think?" Fumiko asked.
"About what?" Kaho said, tearing her gaze away from Ryota's table.
"Whether Ryota's already had a game this morning."
Kaho shrugged, "Maybe one of these teams has another basketball-brained boy who wants to play more than eating or sleeping too?"
"Ah, soulmates," Fumiko laughed.
Akane narrowed her eyes and shrugged, "Well, girls, nice to meet you. See you later."
Kaho frowned, "Were we leaving her out?"
Fumiko shrugged, "I reckon she's got the intel to feed the school coach now, like that Mr Neon Pink Basketball is our ace, and that they should keep an eye on him, see what he does. I'll have to tell him to do a slow burn. Me and my big mouth."
Kaho shrugged, "They would have known when they saw him play."
Taiga strode into the dining hall and used his head to gesture to the outside space. The team got up from where they were lounging and bounded into the clearing outside. There were two men that Kaho didn't recognise, followed by Akane, standing out there. One was tall and top heavy. He was wearing a pair of red shorts and a white tank top, more befitting of a lifeguard than a basketball coach. He looked like he could be in his late thirties, or early forties, the slightest spattering of grey hair cropping up in his crew cut. The second was lithe and sharp, a man with pointed edges; a strong jawline and an aquiline nose. He had Eurocentric features and thinning blond hair. His body was being swallowed by a thick grey crew neck jumper with an embroidered logo, and matching joggers. His shoes were top-of-the-line.
Akane flanked him, her chest puffed out in pride. He glanced over at her and she nodded, walking past the Hanagawa team and marching into the dining hall. Akane put her fingers together and whistled. Another team came out, dragging their feet and wiping sleep out of their eyes.
Akane returned to her spot beside her team's coach, and then the other man in the comically short shorts went into the dining hall. The lodge seemed to have very few boarders aside from the basketball teams. Kaho's eyes flickered across the teams. They all seemed bigger than the Hanagawa team, containing weedy first years with acne and braces, as well as the team that actually represented the schools at competitions.
Kaho raised her eyebrows, an impressed look clear to see. It must be nice to be in a school team that has enough interested parties to fill a team and a club, and need a proper bus to take them to events and trips like this, and not just a minibus like Hanagawa had. They were by far the smallest group, though, the other teams in their clusters could have easily been merging around her and she wouldn't have known.
The white boy, the one who'd been in headphones was on the other side of the dining room was among the kids outside stood on the outskirts of the pack, by the coach in the life-guard-like shorts.
"Welcome basketballers from Kuroyama Academy, Seiran High and Hanagawa High School. My name is Coach Tomogawa Goro from Seiran," said the man in the short shorts, "And my colleagues here are Coach Aigawa Taiga from Hanagawa, Coach Itomi Adam from Kuroyama and Assistant Coach Kiminara Akane we are all here because we love this game, am I right!"
A chorus of agreement echoed among the crowd. Kaho's eyes flickered behind her, where, at the back of the crowd, Naseru lingered, scowling. He hadn't joined in, exclaiming he loved the game, despite the skills he clearly had. Ryota, however, was whooping and cheering with Eiji and Yuta, all but howling like wolves in the centre of the Hanagawa pack. It set off a chorus of hollers from the rest of the team. Even Kaho added her own 'yeah' into the melody. The other teams seemed to slowly join in, captivated by the chaos and enthusiasm from the smallest team.
Naseru, however, was notably silent. Kaho furrowed her eyebrows.
"Now, firstly, we intend to mix our schools. We bought some brand-new bibs to co-ordinate you, and we will be sending you on the hiking trails for a jog," Taiga said, "So, each of you will draw a colour from our bowls, pick up a bib and mingle. These groups are just for today. We really want you guys to get to know other players, you know?"
The other coaches rolled their eyes, "So, we will be jogging the hiking trails in our various colours. When we finish, we can join the coaches in that big building over there," Akane said, pointing at a small gymnasium, where, through open windows, Kaho could see at least one basketball hoop.
"I'd also recommend," Taiga said, "Doing some pull-ups on the branches. Never know where a boar is gonna come from. I can tell you that first-hand. Consider it strength or endurance training."
The other coaches rolled their eyes.
"We are incredibly grateful to be here together, with the former small forward of the Kenjoku Kaijus," said one of the coaches.
Hanagawa's small wedge of the crowd broke into whoops and cheers, celebrating Taiga's career as a college basketball starter.
"Now, come and draw your lots," the other coach said.
The players nodded and drew their lots. Kaho had drawn a red bib. She was with Captain Hirano, Yamada and Matsushita. Meanwhile Ryota, Sunada, Tomohiro, Yuta and Konoishi were holding yellow bibs. Fumiko was wearing a blue bib over her yoga gear, arms crossed, sandwiched between Omura and Eiji. Nitta joined them and tousled Fumiko's hair. She elbowed him in the ribs.
The last person to draw a name from Hanagawa was the resident straggler. Naseru glared at the piece of paper in his hand, crumpled it up and stuffed it in his pocket. He trudged to the bin of red bibs and plucked one out, shoving his head and arms in the holes. He scowled and marched over to Kaho's side. He didn't meet her gaze.
His scowl only grew when the guy with the headphones met his gaze, wearing his own bright yellow bib, just inches away from Ryota. He looked at Naseru like he recognised, or maybe even knew him.