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"Right now, you and I are the poster children for healthy Japanese youth everywhere."
"We are?"
"Yes. Look at us."
So Hiiragi looked at them, himself and her. Yumiko had a point; always perky and with pink-scrubbed cheeks, she never looked more pretty than when she was dressed for tennis. And right now she was wearing what had to be the most stereotypically perfect tennis uniform of all time, a blindingly white Lacoste polo (with the green alligator) with a similarly blindingly white skirt (very flirty), her hair tied back in a simple ponytail (and Hiiragi definitely was a fan of ponytails). She was grinning, expectantly, awaiting Hiiragi's assessment.
Hiiragi dutifully looked at himself next, looking down at his own outfit, which was a lot less blinding and yet similarly stereotypical, since it was their high school's standard gym uniform, boy-blue shorts and a clean white cotton shirt. He had to laugh a little, since they were both showing off a lot of leg, and although his were a lot less amazing than hers, they would do. He then looked around, taking in their surroundings, since they were taking advantage of the off-day to commander the school's tennis courts, and it was early early morning, the air still cool and dew still clinging to the grass outside the courts.
Yeah, they totally looked like the poster children for something. Of this there was no doubt.
"Boy, have we got them fooled." Hiiragi said, returning Yumiko's grin with one of his own. He raised his borrowed tennis racket, brandishing it like a warrior's sword. "Let's do this thing."
Yumiko just shook her head, fondly, a no-no gesture, except that she then turned to go take her place on the opposite side of the court.
Okay, so maybe swinging the racket around like a samurai was against the unwritten tennis code of ethics, and therefore spoiled the poster-children image a bit.
Hiiragi didn't care. He was happy.
While Yumiko was moving around to take her place, Hiiragi pondered where would be the best place to set up. Obviously near the back, of course, but should he stand near the middle, or more to the left, to accommodate his right-handed swing? He should take his cue from Yumiko, who sure as hell knew a lot better what she was doing, but he kind of wanted to do it right on his own, the first time. Not as a matter of pride or anything; Hiiragi wasn't the kind of guy who was especially attached to his own pride, after all. But he liked getting things right. It was important to do things right.
He decided on a spot to the left, but close to the middle, and settled in, doing a little knee-bending up and down crouch, trying to find a comfortable stance. He'd never actually played tennis before, but he used to play baseball back in middle school with his friends and so knew a little bit about swing. And there Yumiko was, and she stopped directly in the middle (damn) and was giving Hiiragi a look he knew all too well. That "you're a fool, a complete idiot and a moron, but I love you anyway" look, which was in his mind the utter definition of perfect love.
Hiiragi was still doing his bouncing prep work, and so when Yumiko started looking at him like that, he slowed down but didn't stop, since he was showing off, showing how ganbaru he was, since her love of tennis was infectious and he wanted her to really see how enthusiastic he was about this. He wanted to be a part of this part of her life. "Sensei-san, I'm ready to begin."
"Oh god. Stop that right now. That's lesson number one."
"But senseeeiiii...."
And in accordance to her role as sensei, Yumiko said no more, but instead hammered down the punishment, tossing the ball in the air in a graceful arc, and then with practiced precision, sent it flying, whizzing near (but not too near) his face, hitting the high walled chain-link fence behind him. Awesome! Hiiragi turned his head just in time to see the fuzzy green ball bounce from the fence to roll back onto the court, and then the hugged himself, shivering, because some things were just too cool for words, even if that serve was somehow meant to be a scold for Hiiragi's inveterate teasing ways.
"Lesson number two." Yumiko was staring him down, exasperated but fond. "Don't make me repeat myself, you're just going to give me a headache with all that nonsense." She signaled for Hiiragi to pick up and return the ball. "Send it back. I want to see what you can do."
So Hiiragi went to fetch the ball, picking it up and rolling it around in his hands. It was much the same size as a baseball, actually, but the weight was completely wrong, the feel completely alien. He bounced it once on the hard surface of the court, and then held it, looking it over once more. Still weird. Still made of rubber and felt. But this part of the game should be something he was good at, at least: Hiiragi had been pretty good at both badminton and volleyball too, back in the day, and the knock off fly from a tossed-up ball was something he felt pretty confident he could do. Hiiragi threw the ball up high, high... and swatted it brutally when it came down, hitting it as precisely as a mosquito which was destined to be dead, and... it flew forward in a swift dropping arc, falling short of the net by some few feet.
"Um..."
Hiiragi felt his cheeks go warm. He'd known he was going to be bad, that was inevitable. But he didn't want to suck.
"You've got energy, at least." Yumiko waved once more. "Again."
Hiiragi did it again. And this time it made it over the net, and with a swift shuffling rush forward (which reminded Hiiragi of kendo) Yumiko barreled on in, making the most of his serve to return it with a cut. Awesome, again!!! Hiiragi missed it on the return, but when he went to go grab the ball, Yumiko told him to leave it, and instead grabbed another ball from her little bucket of balls. "I'm going to serve to you for a while, now. Just try to hit. Don't be a hero. Just try to hit."
For a while, that's all Hiiragi did: just try to hit. And despite Yumiko's tough no-nonsense talk, she was very gentle about her serves, very fair, never sending him anything too fast or too out of range. And she periodically shouted out tips for improving his form, or compliments over some especially great return, and they got into a rhythm. Not a professional rhythm, not anything like it; their exchanges remained broken and slow, but they were steady, so steady, and in that steadiness Hiiragi settled into his lesson, getting the hang of it as well as getting into the mood of it, and it occurred to him that although there was nothing like how awesome Yumiko was when she was playing for real, and although this was hardly Yumiko at her best, there was also nothing like the feelings of being on the receiving end of her serves, interacting with her swings, actually playing and seeing her from the center of the action.
There she was, and as an spectator to her talent, there could be no better vantage point than to be right in front of her.