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“And this one, she’s really popular with the guys. But quite unlikable otherwise. I really don’t get what they see in her,” Sugawara said, pointing at a 2nd year girl who had just entered the gym.
“Although she is quite pretty. And hot,” she added, looking towards Dai and smirking.
The two of them were sitting on a bench in the volleyball gym, already dressed for practise way too early and Suga was sharing gossip on the girls on their new team that she had heard from her older sister.
But Dai was quite taken aback by that statement. She looked back at Suga, confused and trying to figure out what she had meant by that. Because it couldn’t just have been the most casual way of someone coming out, right? Dai was really reading too into this, right? Right?
She decided to test the water slightly to clear things out. It was so early into their friendship, so if a problem were to rise, then maybe they could get over it as soon as possible.
“Uh, yeah, she is,” Dai smiled nervously and rubbed her neck. “I really used to like this girl back in middle school, she looks a lot like her but that’s really just bringing back a lot of bad memories.”
Suga just nodded and her smirk turned into a soft, genuine smile. She looked back at the door and for a long moment, they were both quiet.
Then Suga started talking again.
“It took me ages to figure anything out. But I guess both is good. Yeah, both is very great.” There was a nervous note in her voice and her finger were digging into the bench.
“Same here, that’s okay,” Dai answered.
They looked at each other, smiled and sat in comfortable silence until practise started. And more than once during that first training, Dai caught herself stealing started at Suga and thinking to herself, “Cute.”
***
It was their first training camp with the team. Everybody had bathed and was getting ready for bed, but some 2nd years were playing music in one corner of the gym they were all sleeping in. Right where Dai’s, Suga’s and Asahi’s mattresses were. Suga seemed to be in a really good mood and was bugging Dai to get up and dance with her.
“No, I’m really tired and you should be, too,” she said with a slightly annoyed voice. But Suga was already up and stretching her hand out to Dai, to pull her up too. Dai only hugged her knees close to her and shook her head.
“Really, no. Every part of my body hurts. Torture Asahi, if you need to spend your energy on anybody.”
“Ugh fine,” Suga groaned and turned to the third girl, who was reading a book and hadn’t payed attention to their previous exchange.
“Asahiii,” Suga cooed. “Dance with me, please?” She was already twirling in place some kind of step set in her feet as she made her way to Asahi’s bed. The latter put down her book and looked at Suga, with a terrified look on her face.
“Koyuki, I really don’t want to. The 3rd years already told the others to quiet down and I don’t want to get in trouble. Or up, I’m already comfortable here,” she stuttered out and smiled apologetically.
“You bores. But I’m not tired. I could go outside running right now,” Suga said back and jumped up into the air, tried to make a turn but landed facing away from her friends. Just to see their captain marching towards them.
“Settle down now!” she shouted with a stern face. The music died and Suga was left recovering from her landing.
“If you want to stay up, go outside but no music. Those who want to sleep have to have that chance.”
Suga sat down and pouted. At the same time, Daichi got up and started walking towards the gym door.
“Wait, you prick, where are you going now?” Suga asked and threw her hands up in disbelief at this wicked action.
“To the bathroom?” Dai said back. “Is that not allowed anymore?”
“Wait, I’m coming with you”
“Umh, okay.”
Suga got up with a struggle and groaned in pain. Dai was right, Suga was tired and hurting too but her hyperactivity seemed to be overbalancing that.
Dai finished first and was standing next to the stalls, waiting for the other girl to finish her business. She was studying her reflection in the mirror in front of her when Suga stepped out.
Instantly, a sly smirk spread over her lips and she kept her eyes on Dai’s reflection as she went to was her hands.
“Don’t worry, gal, you look great. No need to stare a hole into the mirror,” she remarked.
Dai instantly turned her gaze to Suga as she felt ears get burning hot. At least her hair was down and covering them.
“Yeah, I look barely human after today. How great,” she said bitterly.
“Shut the frick frack snick snack up, I will not allow this kind of attitude in my wonderful friends.”
Suga had dried her hands and taken one long step to Dai. She brought her hand to the girls’ face and pinched her cheek.
“You’re the cutest, okay? Now let’s get some beauty sleep.”
She let go of Dai’s cheek and gave a light pat on her head, all while smiling as brightly as the sun. Or so it seemed to Dai. She followed Suga out the bathroom and they went quietly back to the gym to get some truly deserved sleep.
***
The three 1st years were in Dai’s house, studying for an upcoming test. Dai was sitting by her desk, while Suga and Asahi were sitting next to each other on the floor, leaning on the high bedside.
They’d been sitting in silence, each one busy with different problems for almost half an hour when Suga threw her notebook across the room and groaned so loudly, it startled Asahi, the poor soul.
“I don’t want to,” she whined and stretched, while also turning towards Dai and Asahi. The former hadn’t even bothered to turn around, she was used to Suga’s short attention span and Asahi was just looking annoyed at being disturbed.
“You gotta,” Dai said, still not raising from her workbook.
“You know, I really don’t. I’ve managed for years with doing the minimal amount of homework,” Suga argued. “Or I could just drop out and become a prostitute.”
“Don’t you even dream, you’d turn off any clients with that mouth of yours,” Asahi replied quietly.
“Wow, since when are you so smart?” Suga stuck her tongue out at her friend. “Also excuse you, I would make a wonderful prostitute. Have you seen those legs of mine?” She pulled her skirt up her leg to display the pale thigh underneath.
“How can you even talk about legs with Dai in the same room as you?” Asahi said back
Dai felt hot. Incredibly hot. She buried her face deeper into the workbook to hide her red face.
“Oh shit, you’re right. I can’t compete with that.” Suga faked falling back into a faint and brought the back of her had to her forehead.
“I’ve been deceased by the mere imagination of Sawamura Dai’s thighs. Lord forgive me for ever wanting to raise myself higher than that,” she shrieked and closed her eyes, pretending to be dead on the floor.
“Shut it,” Dai hissed from her chair. She grew more and more uncomfortable with each sound coming from Suga’s mouth.
“Oh, do you wish to object? Because you can’t, you really can’t, Dai, and you should know that.”
Suga was back sitting up now and had grabbed Dai’s turning chair to swirl her around to face the others. She quickly brought her hands up to her face. Better make it seem like she was just really annoyed rather than embarrassed.
“Could we not just talk about that?” she muffled.
“Dai! This is unacceptable. How are you so blind? Everybody in this room who thinks Dai has the best thighs in the school, raise your hand!” Suga almost shouted and threw both of her hands violently in the air. Next to her, Asahi raised one slightly wobbly hand, but chuckled along.
Dai peeked through her fingers her friends and the results of this highly professional vote and couldn’t hold a laugh.
“There’s literally only two of you here,” she said and finally let her hands fall down to her lap.
“And that’s relevant how? We’re literally your best friends, you should value our opinions more than anybody else’s!”
Suga had a fierce look on her face, like every time she was trying to convince somebody of something.
“Stop this. Unlike you, I have no intention of becoming a prostitute so let me get back to studying, you ass,” Dai replied and turned her chair back towards the table.
“Oh! But this would be wonderful, Dai! We could work as a team, get customers together and practise on each other and-”
"I don’t want to think more about what you’re implying so I need you to stop right there or I’m leaving,” Asahi raised her voice and gave Suga a light smack on the back of her head with a nearby notebook.
“How rude,” Suga fake pouted. “Do you have a problem with the concept of two gals doing the do?”
“Of course not, but I do when the concept is my two friends being prostitutes together.”
“Don’t worry, you’ll get a discount once we’ve got the business going,” Suga winked and plopped back to her seat on the floor.
Asahi just shook her head and got back to her notes, while Suga looked for her thrown away notebook. She saw it on the floor next to Dai’s desk and scrambled there on her knees to get it.
Once there, Dai turned for a moment to give Suga a disappointed look but the girl quickly sat down on her knees and pulled a peace mark and over exaggerated duckface at her.
“Is this a good angle for me? Gotta make sure before we go picking up the clients,” she pressed out through her stretched lips.
“You asshole, get back to studying,” Dai snapped a finger at her forehead.
Suga did, but not without saying, “You’ll see, I will get into the best university out of the three of us and save thousands of nerve cells by holding back with homework.”
“What’s wrong with the prostitute thing now?” Asahi breathed out.
“Still a valid career choice. It’ll be my backup plan once I get kicked out for being a smartass.”
“That’s the truest thing I’ve heard you say today,” Dai said from her desk.
***
Dai and Suga were in the latter’s room, getting ready for the volleyball club’s 3rd years goodbye party. Asahi wasn’t coming, she didn’t enjoy social situations and had said she’d rather stay home and binge some old series in her bed.
Dai couldn’t blame her, she would have done the same if only Suga had stopped bugging her about coming.
“I can’t wreck Asahi’s weak heart and force her to come. So you have to and no objections.”
And Dai really didn’t have anything to put out against Suga’s begging.
She’d come over to Suga’s hours earlier and by now, they’d gone through each washing their hair (Suga had insisted Dai use conditioner which she never did, it left her hair too slick to put in a ponytail for practise) and 5-step face masks and had finally gotten dressed. Suga was curling Dai’s hair from the tips. It left a nice bounce and Dai discovered that she really liked the way the light curls framed her face.
Sugas own hair was already braided from two sides and pulled back into a bun on her nape. It was simple and elegant and Dai couldn’t stop staring at it in the high mirror in Sugas room that showed Dai sitting in a chair while the other girl was leaning down and messing with her hair.
Suga’d just finished and pulled out a can of hairspray.
“Close your eyes,” she warned and sprayed the curls lightly.
When Dai opened her eyes she gave a light shake with her head. The curls stayed in place.
“Wow, thank you, Suga. That looks great. Let’s hope they stay there for the night.”
“No problem. It really suits you. Okay, now to the makeup.”
Dai pushed out of the chair and put her hands in front of her in an X.
“Nope nope nope. Not gonna do that. That’s my line,” she said, backing away from Suga who had already grabbed her giant bag of makeup.
“Oh Dai please, stop whining, you already let me touch your hair. You can trust me,” she said with a chuckle.
“Trust you? Excuse me, you are dangerous and I only let you do my hair because you wouldn’t stop whining about it. Although I am happy with it.”
“Oh come on! Just some lipstick. I have a great shade for you. And some mascara. You gotta impress the upperclassmen, or I’m going to beat you with getting a partner.”
“You’re going to do that anyway. Now shut it with the makeup, I’m not doing that.”
Suga darted past her and slammed her room’s door shut.
“You’re not leaving until you let me put some lipstick on you, fucker,” she said and there was a mad gleam in her eyes.
“I’m putting it on, you’re not wiping it off. It’ll look wonderful and you’ll end the night in somebody’s bed.”
Suga got scary in that mode and Dai decided to let it drop. She lowered her hands and said, in a defeated voice, “Okay, you win. But only lipstick and nothing too eye catching.”
“Yess!” Suga pumped her fist into the air. “Sit down!”
Dai did and Suga was instantly in front of her with a tube of lipstick. She took the cap off and twisted it out of the tube.
“Hey hey that’s way too dark,” Dai tried to protest.
“Shut your mouth, I’m only lightly dabbing it on.” Suga rolled her eyes and bowed deeper down to get on the same level as Dai’s face.
“Do this,” she said and showed how to hold her lips. Dai mimicked the expression and Suga made a light swipe over her bottom lip with the lipstick.
“No this isn’t good, I can’t do it like this,” she said and straightened. Then sat astride on Dai’s lap and leaned forwards, so that their faces were right across each other.
Dai tried to hold back gulping while Suga continued with the lipstick. It took her a good minute, dabbing repeatedly with the colour and her finger and examining her work with a light frown.
“Done!” he finally exclaimed and pulled back. Dai’s torture had ended. She stepped closer to the mirror and examined her face. Okay, maybe Suga was right and the color really suited her. It was unusual, yes, but somehow fitting. Her lips curled into a soft smile and she turned towards Suga, who was standing next to her.
“Okay, thanks. This does look quite nice. I’m giving you this point.”
“Thank you, fucker,” Suga grinned and gave Dai a push towards the bed.
“Now do whatever you want to, I need like half an hour and then we can go.”
So Dai sat onto Suga’s bed and spent the next 30 minutes on her phone and peeking Suga, who was busy with one and then the other product.
“Okay, let’s go!” Suga finally turned around and smiled brightly.
“How is it?”
“What do you think? Amazing as always,” Dai responded in awe. Suga had once again done a marvelous job on herself and now Dai felt really underdressed next to her. Suga looked like an angel in her long light blue skirt and gray shirt that complimented her unusual hair colour. But the hands that were shoved deep into the pockets of her skirt and the smirk playing on her lips also gave her a mischievous look that made Dai’s heart flutter and ears redden.
“Okay,” she said and got up from the bed. Her own flowy, dark blue dress was much simpler, but at least she felt comfortable in it and not many clothes she owned had that effect.
The walk to the party was a short one, and mostly filled with meaningless banter.
And when they got there the party wasn’t much of a party.
“More like an elderly knitting club,” Suga snickered once they’d sat down on a couch and watched the upperclassmen chat quietly in tiny groups around the room. Sure, there were snacks and some music, but nothing else was really happening. As far as Dai knew, there weren’t any games or activities planned, everybody was to just show up and stay in honour of the 3rd years leaving.
“And man, we got all dressed up for this,” Suga groaned.
“Hey, you wanna sleepover tonight?” she then asked Dai, who had sunk into her own thoughts so Suga’s question startled her quite a bit.
“Umh, I don’t know if I can? Would your mum be okay with it?” she asked. She couldn’t really bring herself to look up at Suga so she kept her gaze fixed on a nearby group of older girls, especially the hot 2nd year who was to become the new vice captain after the previous one graduated.
“Probably. She gets home late tonight and leaves early tomorrow, I probably won’t even have to talk to her. And Aiko’s away too so it’s all as good as being home alone.”
“I’ll have to call my parents but okay, I’m up for it. Can you borrow me clothes?”
“Sure thing.”
That was a deal sealed and Suga wrapped an arm around Dai’s shoulder and pulled close with a “Thank god I was worrying today would be the most anticlimatic ever.” Dai decided to not think too deep into this but instead relaxed into Suga’s arm.
***
They left the part only an hour later, after Dai had called her parents and confirmed she’d stay at Suga’s for the night.
The cold December night made them stick close to each other while walking back from the party. Dai had long before accepted Suga’s fondness of physical touch and was good at not getting her hopes up. But this time seemed different. More personal. It was as if Suga was leaning more into her than usually, matching her steps with Dai’s with more care. These were subtle changes to the routine, but seemed oh so big for Dai.
Once inside, Suga darted to the kitchen and put the kettle on.
“What tea do you want?” she yelled from the other room while Dai was only untying her boots.
“Black please!” she answered and smiled softly to herself. She really looked forward to this comfortable night in more than the party, even when they were still expecting it to be a huge event like the upperclassmen had made it seem like. Dai was still bitter from it but a cup of hot tea was to make everything better.
5 minutes later they were sitting behind the kitchen table with the radio on and slowly sipping the steaming tea.
“I’m gonna get an ice cube, you want one?” Suga asked suddenly.
“Good idea,” Dai answered and continued to take tiny sips from her mug.
Suga got up and went to the freezer, then bowed down and opened the deep freeze door on the bottom.
And Dai couldn’t stop staring at her ass. Not even when Suga got up and understood exactly what was going on. Her trademark smirk spread over her lips.
“You like what you see, huh?” She asked and took a slow step back towards the table.
Terror flashed over Dai’s face. She stuttered something but nothing came to her head that would get her out of the embarrassment and she put her head on the table in defeat while groaning as loudly as she could.
She didn’t hear Suga say anything else, but heard the music get louder, then felt Suga tug her hand.
“Dance with me,” she insisted.
“No,” Dai stretched out against the table.
“Sawamura-chan. You stared at my ass and got caught miserably. Now I want to see you dance. It’s my vengeance and you’ll take it.”
Dai got up in defeat and followed Suga to the open space in the kitchen, back hunched and eyes fixed to the ground.
“Straighten up now, you queer,” she heard Suga say and forced herself to stand up straight. This was really the biggest faux pas in her life and nothing was getting her out of it.
“I’m really sorry, please don’t make me do this,” she pleaded but Suga only laughed in response.
“No. Now i want to dance.”
She grabbed Dai by the waist with her right and from behind her shoulder with her left arm nudged Dai with her elbows to hold her the same way.
“I’m going to lead.”
She did. Suga had a confident step in her feet and she started moving around the small kitchen with it, forcing Dai to follow her and adjust to the rhythm. The song on the radio was upbeat but not too fast and supported the step Suga had taken. Soon they were swirling around the kitchen in a memorised pattern and Dai couldn’t hold a smile back. Suga held her close and only got closer, until their heads were right next to each other, bodies pressed together and feet moving only so little that they could continue twirling in the place.
Dai was looking over Suga’s left shoulder and just thinking what could Suga’s intentions behind the act be when she felt Suga forcefully take down their speed. The music had ended and a voice on the radio was reading the title of the next song. Suga let go of Dai and went around the table to turn it off. She turned around in that place and they were left staring at each other from across the now too quiet room. Neither said a word, until Suga opened her mouth and said quietly, “Thank you for dancing with me.”
“It wasn’t really a choice,” Daichi answered and rubbed her neck. That seemed to be her natural instinct whenever Suga made her nervous. And that happened quite often.
“Yeah, but you came along with it. You have no idea for how long I’ve wanted to do this.”
Suga’s voice continued to be unusually quiet and Dai didn’t respond at first. Whatever she said next, could mean a lot to their relationship. When she finally did respond, it was a simple “Koyuki, I’m in love with you.”
Suga seemed to be on the verge of tears when she ran over to Dai and wrapped her in a hug. "Fucking finally!” she said with a teary-eyed smile that Dai felt but didn’t see until she stopped hugging the girl back and they stood, opposite of each other. Dai’s hands couldn’t let go totally and stayed around Suga’s shoulders, while she felt herself be pulled closer with the hands resting on the small of her back.
A quiet moment, a single movement and Suga’s lips were on hers. Dai kissed back while their bodies shifted to match each other like when they’d been dancing. Neither dared to do much and the kiss ended after a few seconds but they stayed, foreheads touching and breathing in the same air until Suga broke the connection and said, “Our tea is getting cold.”
“It is,” Dai agreed and let herself be pulled back to the table.
Once seated, Suga winked and with a familiar grin said, “But our gay love isn’t.”
“Oh shut your mouth, you’re making my bisexual heart burst.”
“You destroyed mine months ago.”
“I guess we’re even then.”
A long sip of tea.
“I guess those crushing thighs are mine now?”
“I will kindly give them up if it is for you.”
“Good, because I’ve been planning things to do with them since the moment I laid my eyes on you.”
“I take everything back.”
“You still love me.”
That evil smirk.
“I do.”