Chapter Text
“Well, aren’t you a model student.”
You sit up abruptly from lying down on the tiled floor, panic rising from your gut. The voice is unfamiliar, and your first instinct is a new teacher-- a substitute? Maybe a teaching assistant-- has come and caught you skipping class.
“You don’t always do this, do you.” It’s an observation, barely an accusation. You nervously peek at the source of the voice, and find a young man in your school’s uniform leaning by the door. It’s almost as if he’s blocking whoever dares to come in. Upon meeting your gaze, he drops down to a squat, smirking at you with the sneakiest fox eyes you’ve ever seen on anyone.
If you didn’t know any better, you’d have called him a fox spirit personified.
A plea is at the tip of your tongue, asking him not to rat you out-- because clearly, from the way he asserts himself, he must have some kind of power over the school system, though you’re not quite sure what. You feel like he’s a delinquent, probably the principal’s kid who’s running around scot free just because his father owns the whole school, and as plausible as it is that he might be skipping just like you, the likelihood of you being persecuted is more concrete than him ever suffering from such consequences.
He picks up on this and calls you out for it. “What’s the big idea? Yeah, I’m some big shot. Not some stupid delinquent.”
He sure looks like one, is what you think, but you hold off on saying it out loud. As if reading your mind, he scoffs. “Get your stupid eyes fixed, Ms Goody Two Shoes.”
You calmly explain that you’re absolutely no Goody Two Shoes and have been diligently skipping class since the semester started. Around the same period, specifically, because this stupid teacher is just shit and likes to pick on you for sleeping on your desk. You can manage well during his exams, thank you, so you’re obviously allowed the leeway to rest during one of his boring lectures.
He barks out a loud laughter, full of life and amusement, and you have the nagging feeling he might be laughing at you, and not at your teacher’s absurdity. You let it pass, though not without an offended huff.
“Pretty damn sure you’re barely scraping by his class, ma’am,” he remarks, a smug grin greeting you when you look back towards him. You’re getting incredibly tired of his presence, and make a quick decision to spend your time in the infirmary instead, where you can just fake being sick or some other stupid excuse just to get some peace and quiet.
“‘Fraid you’re not going anywhere,” he says, as he leans back on the door, back firmly planted on the only way you’re getting out of this. “But hey, if you need a tutor, I’m a natural.”
You groan loudly in irritation, cover your face in controlled anger, and stomp away. The rooftop is big enough for the both of you, and as long as you don’t hear any trace of his voice and see any glimmer of his stupid looking hair, you’re safe.
“Now, now, that’s not how you treat Banri-sensei!”
You stomp away louder.
The annoying teacher appraises you for being present in his class (a surprising feat if he’s ever seen one, he emphasizes) and you sit through class glowering the whole time. At least the sight of the sky outside is distracting enough, white clouds flowing aimlessly across a sea of blue, and when you look down to the school grounds, you find another class doing P.E. and running around like little ducks. Such are the perks of sitting by the classroom window, and it’s the only good thing in this ugly classroom that you let out a tiny giggle.
Something hits you from behind your head, and you cry out. Sensei is quick to reprimand you for disturbing the lethargic discussion he is having with your classmates that you’ve purposely abstained from participating in, and you grunt out an apology.
Someone had the nerve to hit you with an eraser from behind, and to say that you’re annoyed is an understatement. You look behind you with purpose, glare ready to kill, and find Banri sitting at the back, hands in his pockets and mischievous smirk on his face.
The window really is the only good thing in this ugly classroom.
Your homeroom teacher is concerned. You beg for her not to say anything to your parents, and she reluctantly gives in on the condition that you manage to hike up your grades in at least a passing grade.
“It shouldn’t be that hard,” she sighs, “You’ve always gotten good marks before this.”
This, being something of a phase, as she puts it. It’s a light jab, though you know your homeroom teacher said it more to assure you than dissuade you, but the weight of it lingers in your head, and after school you find yourself sulking in a hidden corner of the library, idly looking through the pages of a book you’re barely interested in.
Someone sits beside you, and you’ve grown so accustomed to his presence (teasing you on the rooftop, visiting you in the infirmary, and the incessant throwing of paper airplanes in the classroom) that you don’t really bat an eye while Banri makes himself comfortable. Instead, you reprimand him for making a mess of all the paper airplanes he’s sent your way that you had to clean up after, and he scoffs.
“It gets you to pay attention in class,” he grumbles. “If anything, you should be thanking ol’ Banri-sensei for keeping you in check.”
You sigh and force yourself to agree, because Banri would never take no for an answer, and you’re really too tired to deal with arguing with him.
“What, no fight? What the hell,” he sounds annoyingly shocked, like you just did him a huge disservice. “Finally gonna take your studies seriously?”
Another sigh escapes you, and you lean back in your seat to look at the ceiling. You mention you never really were good with studying, but you always managed until you started losing focus for some reason recently. He surprisingly listens quietly to you questioning where your motivation has gone.
“You’re thinking too hard,” he finally says, leaning on the table with his elbow as he looks back to you. “If focus is all you need, I thought I told you I’m going to help you with it.”
Ah, fuck it. You take him up on his offer right then and there.
“Well, damn,” Banri gasps out, “you solved that faster than i thought you would.”
What do you take me for, you respond quickly, though it’s with amusement and a certain sense of pride. Astounding Banri is very rare, since nothing ever really seems to faze this sly fox and he’s always on top of everything and everyone. You’re glowing as you start unpacking your bento, ready to dive in to a modest helping of your morning cooking.
“Quick, but not accurate,” he amends soon after deliberating over your scores. It’s passable, but he’s not taking a grade less than 70%. “You gotta pay more attention to the answers! Don’t just run like you’re trying to win a goddamn marathon!”
You hum, non-committal, as you bring a bite of an octopus sausage to your mouth. Banri steals it, rushes forward to claim it in his mouth within just a breadth of you putting it in. He chews victoriously while you gape at him, ready to throw insults that’ll make a sailor blush.
“Don’t you have friends?” The question is so direct and came out of nowhere, and you’re too shaken to stop him from taking your chopsticks in his hands and picking more at your food. He doesn’t mind; if anything, it’s as if he wants you to dwell on the question on purpose.
“You’re always here during lunch. During free period and after school, you lock yourself up in the library. And,” he points your chopsticks at you to make you look at him, “you barely talk about your friends.”
That’s because you don’t have any, was your automatic reply.
“Dude, that’s fucking sad.”
You hit him hard enough on his arm for him to growl.
“Do you want friends?”
The answer’s pretty damn obvious.
(Perhaps) due to Banri’s guidance, you manage to ace your recent test. And not only ace-- you were the only one who had a passing grade, and a grade good enough to make the terror teacher that’s always made your life living hell finally spare a smile your way. It makes you shiver in disgust, and from all the way in the back of the classroom, you hear Banri’s stifled giggle.
What makes for a really good reward is the chocolate bar that sits under your desk when you’re back in your seat. You know who it’s from-- and when you look behind you, Banri only winks at you proudly. You try to suppress the way the corners of your mouth quirk upwards at the validation, but you do nod him your thanks before looking forward again.
Lunch comes, and you make to get off your seat when some classmates suddenly surround your desk. It makes you nervous, and you’re about to quietly ask Banri for help when one of them speaks up, and then another, and another, and another.
“The test was really tough!”
“How’d you do it?”
“Say, is it okay if I can ask you for help?”
“Please teach me how to solve this!”
The attention is surprising. You feel your cheeks warm up in embarrassment as they introduced themselves to you, because you had to shyly admit that you’ve been barely in class to know who’s who, but they just laugh it off. They tell you they know you for skipping class, and it makes you groan, but they quickly add that they’ve always been interested in getting to know you better. The confession calls out an overwhelming amount of emotion from you, and your chest feels warm with gratefulness.
You look behind you to beckon Banri over, because no way in hell are you gonna take his hard work over you and pass it off as your own, but he’s already on his way out of the classroom.
“What’s wrong?”
“Someone who taught you…?”
“Might be her guardian angel.”
They giggle at the thought, wishing they had their own. In the far back of your mind, you admit you can call Banri that.
Much to your embarrassment, he finds the notion of it funnier than you thought he would. He’s on his back, clutching his stomach, the absolute manifestation of a fox rolling around in autumn leaves, having the time of its life. You click your tongue, instantly regretting telling him.
“Listen, if you wanted me to be your something so bad, at least make it something believable,” he chokes out, wiping the tears off the corners of his eyes. You mock his laugh, challenging him to say something better.
“Your friend,” he says, watching your face for a reaction. “Your first friend, your first man.”
He promptly receives a heavy smack on his arm, and he clicks his tongue. “It’s true!”
Annoyingly, you find that it fits. You don’t say it out loud, but you already know Banri knows, because he always did have a way of reading your thoughts, and you’ve practically given up on trying to insist he’s got your thoughts wrong. He can read you like the back of his hand, and there’s no winning against him.
Someone used to know you like the back of their hand once. You wonder if you were to meet them, and if they would be able to still do the same.
Study sessions with Banri turn into less studying and more hanging out. There’s still some lectures and snide tutoring from him, but you’re doing so well on learning the subjects that he practically just listens to you teach him instead.
“Practice run for your tutoring sessions with your friends,” was what he said, and suddenly he’s being nitpicky with the way you word your lectures in a way that he says people would understand. You had a tendency for rambling too much, he says, and he thinks you could do more with a more direct approach.
After school, you’re booked with hanging out with your newfound friends. They once invited you out to karaoke instead of studying, and the experience has you floating into the clouds as you tell him about it. Your sighs are less exasperated, and more dreamy and content, and everytime you make this particularly satisfied face he roughly cups your face with one hand to make fun of you.
“Seriously, you shouldn’t forget your number one man,” he comments one time, and you frown at him in an attempt to hide the way your heart skipped. If you didn’t know any better, you’d think Banri was actually missing you and your company, but you do know him enough to know anything he says is just to rile you up.
“I didn’t think you’d be this stupid.” He looks disappointed as he looks over you, and for a tiny moment you realize you know nothing about him.