Work Text:
Yesterday During Recess:
Chuuya sat with Kajii in the corner of the play area. He glanced out the window to see Sigma and Atsushi messing around with a small dirt box with a handful of flowers in it. He watched as Dazai came over with a watering can, helping them water the flowers in the box.
“Kajii, don’t you think that garden is pretty stupid looking?” he asked his friend, glancing back to him as he kicked a stack of blocks over.
“Ehh, a little bit. It gets in the way of us playing tag now.” Kajii started picking up the blocks again, stacking them up.
“Plus, Atsushi is working on it. All he does is whine about things and he calls me short. I hate when people call me short!”
“Hey, Chuuya!”
Chuuya saw Kenji standing a meter away from them, waving as he held another bucket of blocks. “What?”
“Can I play blocks with you today? I haven’t been feeling too great to play outside.” He glanced up at his classmate, eyes gleaming at the idea of being able to play and hang out with him. Kenji admired Chuuya, always seeing him as the “cool kid” in their class.
“Um, no? We’re not playing blocks anymore.”
“We’re not?” Kajii looked at Chuuya, catching him glare before walking away from the blocks.
“Aww,” sighed Kenji as he let his shoulders fall. “You looked like you were having fun, so I wanted to join you.” He walked back toward the shelves to put the bucket away.
Chuuya went back to looking out the window. “Kajii, let’s destroy the garden or at least ruin it. It’s just some ugly looking flowers and dirt.”
***
Present Day:
Chuuya and Kajii sat outside, taking occasional glances over to the garden. They were finalizing their plan.
“Alright. This will finally put that goody-two shoes, Atsushi, in his place.”
“Oh, what about the tiger are we talking about?”
The two looked up to see three figures, two of them continuing to walk past them toward the swings.
“What do you want, Shibusawa?”
“Well, I overheard you talking about Atsushi, and I don’t like him very much, so I was curious about what you were talking about,” Shibusawa answered, rocking back and forth on his heels.
“We’re gonna wreck that stupid garden he’s been working on,” Chuuya answered.
“Sounds fun. Can I join?”
Chuuya and Kajii looked at each other before nodding.
“Dostoevsky, Ivan, care to join?” he questioned, seeing his classmates still walking away.
Ivan turned around, silver hair brushing his chin. “As if Dostoevsky and I would play in the dirt.”
They kept walking toward the swings, turning down the offer.
“Alright, then. Here’s the plan…”
***
Kajii and Shibusawa stood further away, throwing a ball back and forth while Chuuya moved further away, trying to get himself closer to the garden. He hadn’t been paying attention to the garden, noticing who was over there.
“I’m open!”
Shibusawa had the ball in his hands, throwing it over toward the garden, watching as Chuuya ran for it, but tripped over his feet as he ran, knocking into one of their classmates that was working on the garden.
Chuuya glanced up after seeing blonde hair, realizing that it wasn’t white hair like Atsushi’s and it wasn't the split of white and purple like Sigma’s. He recognized Kenji as he pushed himself up, looking at the damage. He could see how visibly angry Kenji was with the new flowers in the garden being crushed, soil flooded with water from the watering can being knocked out of Kenji’s hands.
“You ruined our garden, Chuuya!”
He could only stand in front of the others, realizing the damage he had done. He heard Atsushi and Sigma get sent off when Kouyou had come over, placing a hand on his head.
She led both boys over to one of the benches, sitting both of them down next to each other.
“Chuuya-kun, what happened that led to you ending up in the garden?” she asked, glancing down at him.
Chuuya took a moment before he answered. He couldn’t say that it was his fault that the garden was now ruined because of his plan. “It was Kajii and Shibusawa’s fault. They wanted to see how far they could throw the ball, then told me to chase it. I didn’t mean to end up tripping and running into Kenji.”
“Kenji-kun, Atsushi-kun, and Sigma-kun have all been working with Dazai this week to get that garden set up. It was also far enough away that-”
“It’s not my fault!”
Kenji sat on the bench, shaking as the anger was starting to go down and be replaced by the sadness of realizing that the garden he and his friends had been working on was ruined. He sniffled.
“Let me go get Kajii-kun and Shibusawa-kun to let them know they can’t be playing around the garden, especially for something like that.” She walked away from the two boys, leaving them on the bench.
Chuuya started to panic. His classmates would definitely say that it was his idea to ruin the garden, not wanting to get in trouble themselves. If it got around that he destroyed the garden to get back at the bit of height teasing that Atsushi had done when he hit a bit of a growth spurt a few weeks ago, he would be seen as not so good of a classmate.
He noticed Kajii and Shibusawa talking to Kouyou, gulping as she turned around and walked back toward them, without the other two with them. He could feel his face heating up when he could see the look on her face, realizing that he might actually be in trouble if Kajii and Shibusawa ratted him out.
“Chuuya-kun,” Kouyou started, kneeling down in front of him. “Are you going to tell me the truth about what happened to the garden? It certainly wasn’t about playing ball or tag or any of the other games I’ve seen you play with the others.”
Chuuya blinked a few times, unsure of what to say. He didn’t want to get in trouble.
“Chuuya, can you just tell me why you ruined the garden?” Kenji muttered. He had tears in his eyes, small hands clenched into fists. “Sigma-kun and Atsushi-kun and I worked so hard to help Dazai-sensei plant the flowers and now they’re ruined.”
He looked down at the grass, kicking his legs back and forth. “Atsushi-kun was being mean to me and kept calling me short.”
Kouyou tilted her head, eyes narrowed a bit. “Chuuya-kun, you know that’s not what happened. He said that you were shorter than some of your classmates, but he didn’t call you short as an insult. Atsushi-kun was making the statement about the different heights in the class and said you were one of the shorter kids.”
Kenji kicked his legs back and forth as well, tucking his hands under his legs. “I thought you were really cool, Chuuya, and that’s why I always wanted to play with you, but you told me I couldn’t play with you. Then, the one thing I liked, you ruined it.”
Chuuya glanced at Kenji. He thought about what he said… And Kenji was right- he had gone to Chuuya plenty of times wanting to play with him: yesterday with the blocks, other times at recess while playing tag, asking if he would read with him, and just overall wanting to be friends with him. He tilted his chin down, biting his lip.
He knew that there was no way he was getting out of being in trouble.
“I did it because I knew Atsushi was working on the garden and I wanted to get back at him for calling me short. I didn’t know you were working on it, Kenji.”
“But what about Sigma-kun?” Kenji looked at him. “He’s been really excited about the garden, and he was actually starting to go outside for recess since the pebble golem incident. You really upset my friends, Chuuya.”
Chuuya had forgotten about that. Sigma rarely went outside for recess because the one time Nikolai had taken him outside, Ivan had scared him with the golems, but overall, Sigma still preferred to be inside and color during recess, and he had seen the flower drawings pinned to the board in the classroom.
“Chuuya-kun, you shouldn’t have destroyed or attempted to ruin the garden to begin with, regardless of who was working on it. It was something that other students were also looking forward to seeing,” Kouyou said. She patted his head. “Come on. You have a time out and an outside recess ban for the rest of the week.”
“The whole week?!”
“Mhm. Considering that you planned to ruin the garden means that it wasn’t an accident.” She helped him down from the bench, a hand motioning toward the door.
“Wh-What about Kajii and Shibusawa? They helped too!”
“And they will get punishments of their own when I deal with them, but yours is more because it was your idea. Now, inside.”
Chuuya huffed as he walked back inside the building with Kouyou.
Kenji hopped off the bench, running over to the door. He struggled a bit with getting it open, but when he did, he started running down the hall toward the classroom. He stopped in front of the door, catching his breath before going inside the room. He saw Sigma with Yosano as they sat at the arts and crafts table coloring some more flowers since they still had their “inside garden” on the board, but his gaze was searching for red hair.
“Chuuya.” He approached Kouyou’s desk where Chuuya was seated. He dragged a chair over to the desk, climbing into it.
“What?” he groaned, resting his chin on the desk. “I’m in a time out.”
“When you get out of time out, will you play blocks with me?”
“Huh?” Chuuya turned his head, resting his cheek on the desk and he stared at Kenji. “Aren’t you mad that I destroyed your garden?”
“Yeah, but I still wanna play with you. You’re like the coolest kid in the class!” His eyes lit up as he talked about Chuuya in front of him.
Chuuya looked at Kouyou. “Ozaki-sensei, am I able to?”
She smiled. “Tomorrow. You’re in a time out for the rest of recess today.”