an ayapin fanfic / a sequel to “Memories” http://chamomilehoneytea.tumblr.com/post/128654456104/memories
He pulled a cold beer from the fridge and pressed the full can to his head. His reflection in the bathroom mirror showed him that his spikey hair had started to fall – it looked as worn as he felt.
“Rest easy,” he said, messing it up until the shaggy strands covered his forehead.
There wasn’t anything on the television, and he wasn’t in the mood to watch any of his adult movies. He thought he might have been hungry so he opened a bag of potato chips and started eating them by the handful. Not hungry. So he flipped through one of the magazines piled up in the corner. There were appliance catalogues and ads for the newest computers (well, last year’s newest computers), and make-up products. His eyes lingered on one picture: a model with very full pink lips and softly curled hair. He quickly closed the magazine and pulled out his cellphone.
1 A.M. Shouta would still be up.
“Hello?” came the raspy voice on the other end. “Is this an emergency?”
“Were you really sleeping this early?! You kids have no stamina!”
The call ended. Pin stuck his tongue out at the imaginary Shouta in his mind. In his day teens would stay up all night; if they weren’t studying they were having fun. It made him wonder if he really was the one getting old.
Taking a look around he began to suspect that he was a hoarder, some kind of sentimental sap. Most people would assume he was just a dumb, messy guy but he really did have trouble throwing some things out. It was embarrassing.
“I should clean, shouldn’t I?” he said to himself, and hearing no strong objections he gathered a trash bag. He shoved in take-out cartons, pizza boxes, magazines, newspapers and tissues indiscriminately. Then, halfway through the process, he realized a lot of it was probably supposed to be recycled.
At least he had a place to sit.
He wondered if Ayane was asleep yet. Probably not. She was probably sitting at her desk, leaning over equations and English sentences with that serious look on her face. Her lips tight, scanning over page after page while scribbling notes with that stupid pink pencil she always used.
Pin palmed his forehead. Why do you always think about her? You’re such a creep…
That night they’d walked home from Sanada’s and he’d been restless since they parted ways. When she announced she was leaving early he’d had to scarf his ramen down as fast as he could in order to catch up to her. Once when she asked why he always walked home with her he’d said he was scared to go by himself. It was partly true, but he was more worried about Ayane being by herself. A pretty girl alone late at night didn’t sit right with him. And if Pin was one thing only, or two things, he was an honorable, really cool man!
But she was a strong-willed girl, she’d never have accepted his protection if he’d come out and told her the truth.
Somehow, whenever they were alone, he ended up spilling his life’s story, or his deepest thoughts. It was so easy to talk to her. Maybe that was why, in those moments, it was so easy to forget she was his student. He never really did, but if he wanted to, he could have.
That way of thinking was dangerous. How many nights had he chided himself for getting just a little too close to her?
Their encounter at the convenience store came to mind. Wasn’t that when he’d really noticed his treatment of her? She’d looked so pathetic all soaked through and that look in her eyes had made her seem like some sort of wounded animal. He couldn’t stand it. He couldn’t just leave her alone. Those kids were his responsibility, and for all his teasing, he genuinely cared for each one of them.
But if he’d found Kuronuma like that, wouldn’t he have just brought her into the store and called Shouta? Or if it had been Yoshida, wouldn’t he have called Ryu? But it was Ayane and so he’d covered her with a trash bag because sharing his umbrella might have seemed like coddling. She thought of herself as mature, after all.
“You haven’t done anything that you regret before, have you?” she’d said in a humiliated tone, like he was some impervious being because he had the nerve to give her advice about her future. She had the posture of a quitter, the look of a quitter, and that self-pitying meekness was too much for him to bear.
It was the first time he’d really touched her. Sure, he’d pat her on the head as a joke, but that time he’d gripped her shoulder. Tight. He’d been so caught up in the moment that he dropped his umbrella, and he almost left it there when he finished yelling at her.
It was inappropriate. He hadn’t needed to be that rough. He called Shouta so he would let her friends know. They could make her feel better than he had.
For hours afterwards he was angry, but more at himself. A student had gotten such a strange reaction from him, an almost violent one. She was probably scared or confused by the whole thing. She should have been. And so he kept his distance more than usual.
He only knew they were okay when she came to tell him that she was withdrawing her request for a recommendation. The light coming through the windows had blazed around her determined features and for the first time Pin saw Ayane Yano as a woman. He’d always thought she was objectively pretty, for a teenage girl, but seeing her rise to fight her doubts, seeing the pure force of her resolve locked in her eyes, made her the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.
Not good. Not good at all.
Hadn’t he paid attention to her ever since he saw her go to the library her first year? It had surprised him that a pretty girl who wore so much make-up and seemed obsessed with fashion was also extremely bright and a diligent student. It had been an ignorant assumption.
From then on she was fascinating to him.
She reminded him of himself. In high school he’d surprised his coach, his teachers and his peers by rejecting recruitment and becoming a teacher instead. Old Kazehaya was still mad at him for his decision. And Pin had had that weird intensity for baseball; he took it all so seriously, and it had scared all the cute girls away. He’d thought he was so mature. Then they lost one of their last games before Koshien and he’d been forced to re-evaluate his dreams.
But those old excuses he’d used, that he felt a mentor-pupil affection for her and that they were kindred spirits, they all seemed flimsy and pathetic when he saw her inner radiance.
And it had only gotten worse since then.
He’d brushed that misplaced feeling aside and treated her the same as he always did, but the day of the cultural festival he’d come so close to acknowledging it.
To see her studying filled him with a strange sort of pride. She really was taking the entrance exam seriously.
He’d let her mess up his hair (he was feeling generous, and real men weren’t afraid of anything), and when she beamed at him from across the desk his minor irritation melted away. Her smile was contagious. She was so happy and relaxed, he couldn’t resist telling her to enjoy the day and give studying a rest.
They were so close. How often had they sat like this in career conferences? No, she wasn’t any different. He was the one who’d changed, the one who’d become aware of how near she was. Somehow he seemed to be inching towards her, in tiny increments.
“You’re pretty good for your age…and that’s your strength.”
His heart was beating, he felt light-headed, he thought he could look into her eyes and find his student staring back at him. Feel nothing. But he did feel something. It was crushing him. Their faces were almost touching. Another inch or two and they’d be…
His instincts kicked in and he screamed. He played it off as an attempt to calm her nerves, and because he was so clever and quick on his feet she’d bought it.
And tonight he’d told her how it felt to be in love. He was starting to suspect that he was, in fact, a total idiot. He hadn’t even been thinking of her when he described it, had he? Was he looking at her a lot? She’d been staring at him and he’d deflected by making fun of her.
He definitely wasn’t in love with Ayane Yano. Pretty girls were everywhere, and being…attracted to someone wasn’t the same as loving them. It was natural to worry about her, because she was his student. It was expected that he would push her to do her best. That was a teacher’s job. He’d encouraged the others in similar ways.
He wasn’t in love with her.
He wasn’t in love with her.
He wasn’t in love with her.
It was wrong. It was abusive. It was predatory.
He would never do anything to hurt her. He remembered the guy who hit her, and how it had felt good to see Miura do what he never would to the boy who used her. She deserved better. She was leaving in less than a year, maybe to Tokyo, miles and miles away, and he might never see her again.
No matter what his feelings were for her, he would never let them show.
Pin finally crawled into bed, where he fell asleep to thoughts of a short, totally immature senior girl.
Sorry for spamming the ayapin tag, I just have a lot of feelings to get out haha - Pin is a challenge to write because we never really know what he’s thinking, so I hope this doesn’t mangle his character too much… Thanks for reading!
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