notes: a modern teacher au for juasu i randomly thought of one day and i had to write it out as a stress reliever from my finals [cries]

this is an EXTREMELY self-indulgent fic that i posted for myself to read (i'm tired of opening it in google docs since it drains my batteries on my phone tbh), so i don't particularly care if it's too ooc or cringey or if it's not well-liked [shrugs]; i still have a queue of other judai/asuka fics to be posted, but yeah, this particular modern teacher au is purely written for myself this time, which is why i immediately uploaded both chapters upon posting it :'D

other notes: johan's a biology teacher since his manga self loves bugs; i like anime johan more though, so i tried to insert gem references halfway in. also, i couldn't give everyone teacher roles, especially in a limited high school setting, but there are some cameos! :)

disclaimer: i do not own yugioh gx.

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talking buddy

judai & asuka

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i. one;

"Get that away from me."

Smiling cheekily, Johan takes the fake replica of the Miyami stag beetle away from her face with a glow to his eyes that Asuka finds annoying because Johan is annoying when he has that glow. "But you already know it's a fake anyway."

Grimacing in distaste, Asuka taps her pen with a finger and twirls it in her hand as she scoots her chair away by half an inch. "That doesn't mean it's not unsettling." Eyes flickering to the replica in question for approximately one second, she tells him, "Especially when it's right there; you're putting my students on high alert."

Johan casually ignores the wary stares of the students in her classroom and continues to wave the fake stag at her. Maybe she shouldn't have chosen her classroom to take her break in while she tries to go back to grading.

Eyes slanted, she says, "I will throw that out of the window if you don't stop."

She has never seen anyone cradle the thing so protectively before. Mothers with babies would be envious. Johan strokes the fake stag lovingly while somehow giving her the evil eye. "Don't do that. No, wait— Don't even think that, please."

Humming, the corners of her lips curl up. "No-Nonsense Asuka, remember?"

Johan amusedly smiles and is about to say something back to her, probably some retort, but then a new voice speaks up from behind him. "Someday, we'll change that to Fun Asuka instead."

For a few seconds, Asuka finds great entertainment as she watches Johan widen his eyes and jump in his chair next to her desk before he cradles the Miyami stag for life support and turns around. (And also, she thinks 'Fun Asuka' is a lame moniker anyway.) "Judai, don't sneak up on us!"

"Sneak up on you and Asuka, or you and…" Judai looks at the stag thoughtfully, placing a hand behind Johan's chair and tapping a finger. "That."

Rolling his eyes, Johan says, "Miyami's not a 'that,' y'know." (Who names their fake bug replicas?)

Judai shrugs lightly, grinning. "I'm not a bug type of guy."

Johan laughs in response and they begin to exchange some secret guy fistbump ritual that she never understood because she's a girl and she doesn't understand why the both of them are here, invading her classroom.

When Asuka goes back to grading and scribbling more red correction marks, she thinks she could've gotten away with tuning out their guy talk until: "Asuka, you're grading during lunch break?"

She looks up mundanely at Judai. "Well, I'm not lucky enough to be a physical education teacher." He doesn't really have to worry about grading papers at all. She doesn't mind grading, if she's honest—she likes being able to offer her guidance and corrections to help students improve. As a student herself, she knows the struggle of trying to maintain and balance her grades while seeking for honest feedback.

"Johan's a biology teacher, but you don't see him grading," he whines, pointing at Johan sitting next to her. Since he doesn't want to steal one of her students' chairs, Judai sits on the side of her desk.

"Because he likes to do labs instead of assigning paperwork," she sighs, rolling her eyes. Before Johan could remark about anything in his defense, Asuka mentions idly, "I was going to eat in a few minutes. Lunch break is still for another forty minutes, after all." She lightly gestures with her pen towards her still-wrapped bento box at the corner of her desk. He always tells her that she should eat her lunch during breaks, and sometimes she feels like he acts like the school nurse—but it also makes sense to her; physical education teachers do care about health, after all.

Nodding approvingly, Judai smiles while lifting his own wrapped bento box. "Good. I brought my lunch too, so I'm gonna stay for a bit." She watches him glance at Johan questioningly, finding no bento box with him. "What about you, Johan?"

Very lazily, Johan gives Asuka a look—some sort of cheeky knowing look that she hates—while absently stroking the stag replica in his hands. She bravely ignores it, face pink. "I already ate before I came, so I think I'll go back to my own classroom to check on my other beauties." He lifts up the stag for emphasis before standing from his chair, an easy smile on his countenance. His hand gestures towards the empty chair next to Asuka welcomingly. "You can take my chair, Judai. I'll see you after school later. Bye!"

Asuka hopes that her eyes will slowly burn through Johan's back as he casually saunters out of her classroom, whistling merrily. (Lunch break barely started about fifteen minutes ago. He didn't even start on his lunch. That traitor.)

Sitting on Johan's empty chair, Judai starts unwrapping his bento box on her desk. "That was nice of him," he chimes, happily opening up his lunch and already prying apart the chopsticks.

Capping her pen, she figures the headstart on her grading saved her a fair amount of time of grading later. Asuka also starts piling the papers neatly to set aside, making space for her to set her own lunch in front of her to unwrap and open. "Yeah," she says, stiffly. A little too nice of Johan. But Johan's always too nice in general, so it's not like Judai can understand why she's a little ticked off today at Johan's apparent betrayal towards her.

Judai starts eating, so she also starts eating while quietly thinking about how she can make things difficult for Johan tomorrow because it's one thing to wave fake Miyami stag beetles in her face, but it's another thing entirely when he finds sick entertainment in her feelings. Johan never told Judai about it, thank goodness, but Asuka might as well suspect that hints were dropped anyway because those two are still best friends and because Johan apparently finds all of this very humorous to him. (Ugh.)

Her eyes narrow sulkily as she begins to chew her rice. She should've just thrown that fake stag beetle out of the window after all.

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It was when she was talking with Manjoume in the hallways the next day about the rising boom in Japan's newer business corporate chains (it had been something his business class was learning about recently) that Asuka finds herself injured and cringing from an injured arm.

"Tenjoin-kun!" Manjoume frets, eyeing her worriedly as she leans against the lockers to her left. "Is your arm all right?" With a fierce glare, he immediately gives a miffed look at Judai who stands next to her with guilt while holding several boxes stacked up. "This is what happens when you carry too many things to a point where you can't even see where you're walking, idiot!" (To others, it may seem harsh and brash—but for Manjoume and Judai, it is of normalcy ever since high school.)

"I tried to steer away," mumbles Judai, apologetically eyeing Asuka's arm.

Clutching her left arm, she tries to smile reassuringly while bravely trying to bear with the pain jolting through her arm from the impact of colliding with the lockers and the knobs of the locks. She thinks she might have also earned a bruise near her shoulders after scraping against the lockers when the boxes bumped into her and she had stumbled on her feet. She had been rather interested in her conversation with Manjoume, so she really did not pay attention to her surroundings. "It's okay! I'm fine. We should be lucky that none of the boxes fell, right?"

Manjoume skeptically looks at her, the concern unyielding. "Still, I think you should stop by the nurse. I don't know if it's bleeding or not, but that stiffness doesn't look good, Tenjoin-kun."

Using her best judgment, she personally thinks she might have swollen her arm—and from the searing pain on her shoulder, there might be a purple bruise on her skin there after all. Still, the last thing she needs is to be coddled, so she continues smiling and says, "I'll go there now if it'll put you at ease, Manjoume-kun." (He visibly relaxes.) It's not really a secret that Manjoume likes her, even now as adults. Alas, she does not bear any feelings of reciprocation back—however she does regard him as a friend and she does value his concerns. Asuka then glances at Judai momentarily. "Why don't you help Judai carry those while I make my way over to Ayukawa-san's office, okay?"

He wastes no time to grab the top two large boxes from Judai's total of three. "Of course, Tenjoin-kun. Obviously, we can't leave it up to him—" Judai awkwardly averts his eyes. "—all alone, so someone has to rectify this." She watches as Manjoume starts walking down the hallway where Judai had been attempting to go before her injuries happened. "Let's go, slacker! She still needs to go to the nurse!"

When Judai walks past her, she hears him murmur a very genuine, "I'm sorry," before trailing after Manjoume. She watches as his shoulders sink a little, pace a bit slower and dull compared to Manjoume's proud stride.

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"It's just a case of hematoma," Ayukawa-san tells her reassuringly with a kind smile while rolling up Asuka's sleeve securely. "Those are common when we get bruises. If you ice it around four to eight times, twenty minutes, per day, it should heal up nicely. But just to make sure…" Her fingers gently curl around Asuka's arm bruises. "Does it hurt a lot, or just a little bit?"

Trying not to writhe, Asuka answers with an honest, "Somewhere in the middle." While it hurts, she wouldn't think it's something too severe. Though, it is a bit painful to feel if the bruises are touched.

Ayukawa-san contemplatively muses, "I think you'll be fine then. I've never had a case beyond this before from bumping into lockers. As long as you ice it like I told you to, you should heal up fine. I'd suggest icing it for a few weeks for now. Oh, and make sure not to move your arm too much since you need to rest it. If you can, elevate it with a pillow when you're at home—above the height of where your heart is, so that it helps the blood flow."

Nodding slowly, Asuka looks apprehensively at her bruises aligning her arm. She also tries to move the collar of her button-up shirt to take a peek at her shoulder. "I think I have a bruise here too…"

"Oh my…" Ayukawa-san peers at the purple mark on her shoulder worriedly. "You must've been really caught off-guard to have so many bruises… I'll go grab an ice pack for you! Please wait here, Asuka-san," she frets, hurriedly rushing out of the office.

Left alone, Asuka sits there in the silence while eyeing her bruises. She really hadn't thought they would look so bad, but the impact she remembers also felt pretty painful too.

"Are you doing good?"

She looks up at the door, finding Johan by the entrance and leaning against the doorframe. Asuka lifts up her injured arm with a raised eyebrow. "Does this look 'good' to you?"

"Nope," he chuckles, crossing his arms. "Thought I'd still ask, though."

"I'm fine," she says, rolling her eyes. "How did you know I was here?"

He begins to look amused. "I knew something was up when I heard Manjoume in the hallways yelling something about how 'Judai injured an innocent lovely, pure dove like Tenjoin-kun' as if we're in a poetry class." (She makes a face momentarily.) Shifting his eyes a little, Johan starts looking more serious. "I thought he was kidding until I took a peek into the hallway and saw Judai."

Asuka feels like she is starting to understand why Johan is here. "How… is he handling it?" she asks quietly.

"Not as good as you are," he answers bluntly, grimacing a bit. He didn't even need to ask her for the full story. Johan always knows Judai best, so she trusts his word on it—although, it makes her feel sad that she caused Judai to feel guilty. "He looked pretty upset."

Pursing her lips a bit, she offers, "You can tell him that I'm okay. Ayukawa-san said I just need to ice it for a few weeks and then I'll heal up."

He is about to say something, but then she wonders why Johan pauses to look into the hallway curiously before grinning back at her. "You can tell him that yourself. See ya!" Chipper, he starts walking back into the hallway after waving at her and Asuka, flabbergasted, hears him tell someone with a fake poetic voice, "The lovely, pure dove is in there!"

When she sees Judai peek through the open door, it all pieces together instantly in her brain. She scowls to herself. Johan is starting to develop a fabulous track record for betraying her lately.

"You heard that, didn't you?" Judai casually asks, stepping inside slowly.

"I am not a lovely, pure dove," she mutters indignantly. Which lame poetry source did Manjoume get that from anyway? Her brother?

Amusedly, he smiles weakly, "The full quote was: innocent lovely, pure dove. But he did consider using 'swan' before he thought of 'dove,' though."

"Even worse." Definitely, a quote this bad must only be the work of her brother. Her face scrunches.

He starts looking at her arm instead, and she can practically see the guilt embedded in his eyes. "Does it hurt a lot?" ('Did I hurt you a lot?')

She smiles, slowly lifting up the injured arm so that the pain doesn't feel too bad. "Not too much! I've been told to ice it daily, so it'll heal up on its own. I can't really move it a lot right now, though, so I can't really do much for a while."

"I could help you—" he says quickly, hand behind his neck as he shoves the other into the pocket of his tracksuit jacket. "Help you around if you need it. It's the least I can do to make it up to you." He truly looks genuine with the offer.

Normally she would've politely declined it; she didn't want to conform him into some guilt-fueled way of atonement to her. But she takes another look at him and notes that look in his eyes, that determined spark he often has when he feels particularly strong about something—it's the one that he has when he makes promises. Still, in one last attempt, Asuka tries again, "You don't have to—"

"I want to," he tells her, simply.

Tentative, she replies after a moment, "You're sure?"

"I'm sure," says Judai patiently.

Sighing softly to herself, she supposes it's best to resign to her new fate by this point, so she concedes, "All right. I suppose I could use an extra hand while mine is out of commission for a while."

He finally shows her a real grin. "I could meet up with you after school."

Bemusedly, she inquires, "Why after school?"

Judai returns the confusion by arching an eyebrow. "How else will you drive home with your arm like that, Asuka?"

Everything freezes for a moment after he asked that. Asuka spends around ten seconds trying to come up with an answer and comes up with blanks instead. "Maybe if I drive slowly…"

"While the other cars would probably honk at you for driving slow?"

"Maybe if I just steered with one arm… It's not too uncommon to use one arm." And it could be very dangerous—yes, she knows. But it just seems like something private to share rides with someone, especially since she's always driven by herself all the time. She's given rides before to Fubuki, but he's her brother.

Judai doesn't really look convinced. "But don't people also use two hands to make turns? It could be dangerous using one hand. I've seen reckless driving on the news before."

"Fine," she sighs in defeat, wilting. Okay. It's okay. She can survive this. She's liked him ever since high school when he rescued her from her capturer, Titan, and it's been years since then. She trusts him and she knows that he just wants to help her out. She can do this. She can survive this. "Would you like to meet at the front of the school then? Or should I meet you at the gym?"

"Front is fine," he smiles at her before walking backward to the door after glancing at the clock, probably to go back to the gym before classes resume again. "I sometimes see you park at the front, so I figured you'd be more comfortable waiting there. See ya!"

The moment he leaves, Asuka starts wondering whose car they would take after school, and whether or not she would ever see her car again if they take his car. It helps to distract her from the warm feeling in her heart.

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Leaning back in her chair, Asuka sighs wearily as she watches her students file out into the hallways to go home. She's sure that her students had noticed she came in with injuries due to the large white bandage slapped on her left shoulder, slightly exposed due to her collar, and her ice pack strapped to her arm. Ayukawa-san borrowed a large velcro strap from Misawa's physics classroom in order to ensure that Asuka had, at least, one hand available to teach for the rest of the day.

When one of her students asked how she got these injuries, she said something along the lines of I got pushed into the lockers and my arm scraped against them while conveniently leaving out anything that might have implied Judai's (unintentional) involvement. The last thing everyone needs is some drama or rumor starting based off of false pretenses taken out of context, because there's always something stupid like that in high school.

"Wow, you look like you went through war."

Asuka tiredly blows a strand of hair from her face, carefully leaning her injured arm on the armrest of her chair. "I felt like I did."

Johan simpers down at her before observing her ice pack and bandage on her shoulder with some real concern. "I take it everything is going to be okay?"

His words stir her memories a bit, and she uses her right hand to grab a balled-up sticky note (that she tried to write on, but accidentally smudged due to her arm) and tosses it at him halfheartedly. It hits his chest before ricocheting back to her table.

He amusedly asks, "What was that for?"

"For everything that happened between yesterday to now," she frowns. If her arm and shoulder wasn't like this, she would've done a lot worse to him. (Well, not really. She would've just tossed a bigger paper ball at him.)

"If it's about the dove thing, I couldn't help it! Gotta use the line at least once to make it trend!" He laughs. She scowls. Heavens forbid that it trends. "And besides, I'm just doing what any good friend would do in my shoes, y'get me?"

Sarcastically, she dryly asks, "As in making people uncomfortable?"

"Nah, as in helping people!" Johan corrects her, blithely. "What did he tell you if you're so quote-on-quote uncomfortable?"

Asuka has no motivation to feed him any lies, so she says, "He volunteered to be my extra set of hands while I heal up."

He smiles, teasingly. "I'm sure you're ecstatic on the inside."

She uses her good hand to bring her bag on her table and starts idly piling up her papers with much effort. He sees her struggling a little, so Johan piles her papers for her while she gathers her pens and highlighters. "Not really."

He casually hands her the papers when she gestures for them. "That's the worst lie you have ever told me," he says, like it's a normal occurrence every day for him.

Shoving the papers into her bag, she bristles. "What can I say that would not be classified as a lie then?"

Johan beams, that glow to his eyes returning. "That you're happy it turned out like this?"

Lazily looking at the clock and setting her pens inside her bag, Asuka points out, "You forget that he's the reason why I'm like this." She points to her arm.

"No, I didn't," smiles Johan patiently, in a matter-of-factly tone. "I can't forget progress."

"Progress for what?" She zips up her bag.

He ruffles her hair, cheeky. "For you two."

Grumbling under her breath, Asuka doesn't like that her face betrays her this time. Johan is one of the few people who somehow found out about her feelings even though she didn't remember telling anyone about them. And she hates it because he never lets her live it down. (Although, he isn't as annoying about it like Fubuki.) "Why aren't you with him instead? I thought you two usually hang out when classes end." Using her good hand, she smoothes out her hair.

Strangely, he looks away and smiles widely and looks like he's stifling a laugh. "I figured I should help you pack up."

Narrowing her eyes tensely, she looks at him and tries to emulate a foreboding aura. The seconds tick by.

Johan finally lets that laugh come out. Then another. And another. And it keeps on going. "I did go to him to hang out—but he said he was driving you home, so I thought I'd do you both a favor by helping you pack so that you can meet him on time!"

Asuka throws the balled-up sticky note right into his face and he yelps while continuing his (rude) laughter.

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She sits in his car very politely, her hand readjusting the velcro strap for her ice pack that she had to refill before meeting up with Judai. (Which wasn't so bad actually, because she got Johan to be her pack mule while she went to get new ice.)

She and Judai somehow reached an agreement to take his car, and he had offered to drive back her car for her after he drops her off because she had remarked about worrying if her car would be tolled overnight. Currently, they are on the road back to her apartment.

Asuka quietly places her purse right underneath her injured arm so that her ice pack doesn't drip water on the seats because the ice is starting to melt already due to the seasonal weather.

It's silent for a bit until: "You don't have to do that, y'know."

"Hm?" She looks at Judai bewilderedly. "What do you mean?"

They stop at a red light, so he looks at her briefly. "I mean, you don't have to worry about using your bag as a cover. If the water drips, let it drip. It'll dry up, and my seats will be as good as new." A pause, and then: "Besides, you keep your papers in there, right? Wouldn't want them wet. That'd be pretty bad, I'd imagine."

A little embarrassed that he caught onto her, she says nothing and feels awkward.

"Asukaaaa," he says in a long whine, tapping his fingers on the wheel. "Put your bag awaaaay."

She looks at the water droplets still dripping. "But—"

"The light just turned red, so I have about a minute or two to convince you." Judai gives her a look.

Not wanting to know what ideas he might have, Asuka hesitantly takes her bag and gently sets it aside on the floor by her feet. "Happy?"

He beams brightly at her face, looking extremely satisfied despite the water of her ice pack making big dots on his seat. "Very!" He takes one hand off the wheel to ruffle her hair, reminding her of Johan.

Once more, Asuka grumbles. "Not again."

"What?" he asks with a pleased smile, putting both hands on the wheel again.

Absently, she looks around and sees that his car is pretty normal and relatively clean; a bit unusual for someone like him. "Johan did that to me too today," she replies, using her good hand to point at her hair before smoothing it out for the umpteenth time. "It's like you really are twins sometimes."

Humming, he looks thoughtful. "How about I do something else to you so that you could tell the difference between us?"

"Like what?" She studies the dripping water off her ice pack and the water stains on his car seat, and fights back a very deep apologetic cringe. If he saw that, then he did not say anything about it at all.

"Actually, I'm still thinking about that," Judai laughs, starting the car again at the sight of the green light. She goes back to watching the scenery pass by. "But when I figure it out, you'll be the first to know!"

"Even before Johan?" she asks with mock surprise.

Indulgently, he grins while keeping his eyes on the road. "Even before Johan!"

She smiles, and looks at her reflection in the window. "I'm honored."

"How so?" He makes a turn left. (He used to visit her sometimes back in high school and occasionally in college, so he still remembers the directions to her place. That's good because she'd have to explain the directions had it been someone else other than him or her brother.)

Leaning back in the seat, she smiles lightly. "Well, knowing Johan, he might be horrified that you told something to me first before him." That's not even a truth. Johan would probably use that as new material to tease her over instead.

"I don't know everything about him and he doesn't know everything about me," says Judai patiently, absently smiling. "So what he hears before or after you shouldn't matter as long as he knows, right?"

He was never this wise back in high school or even college. "Right…" she agrees softly.

"So, it also shouldn't matter if I tell you something first or after him as long as you know, 'kay?" When he says this, Judai has stopped the car and she notices that they're at her apartment complex. Asuka turns to look at him, but she immediately sees his hand extend out to her and then she feels pain on her forehead.

Did he just flick her forehead? "What was that for?" she mumbles, rubbing the spot he flicked at.

Casually, he turns the car off and rests his arms on the steering wheel. "That's what you get for worrying about being first or second with Johan."

Rolling her eyes, she turns away with a slight pout. If her left arm wasn't like this, she would've crossed her arms in exasperation. "I didn't say that."

Judai scoffs in amusement. "You sort of implied it." He smiles cheekily. "If you keep thinking that, I could always do this again, y'know." He lifts up his hand and positions his fingers for another flick to her forehead, but she leans her head back just barely out of reach. Judai regards her with a laugh evident in his crinkling eyes. "Maybe that's what I'll do to you from now on. Johan gets to mess up your hair while I get to flick your forehead! Plenty of fun for me!"

"That's not fair," she mutters in anguish, wishing that she would never see those two in the same room ever again. He laughs again as she leans down to grab her bag, unzipping it and looking through it. Asuka finds her set of car keys from beneath her papers (miraculously dry from the ice pack water) and offers them to him. "Before I forget, here are my car keys. You could park my car around here when you come back; I don't mind since I won't be able to drive for a while."

"I'll park it where I parked my car," he tells her with a nod. "You need help going back to your apartment?"

"It's only a bruised arm, not broken," she replies, smiling reassuringly. She swings her bag straps over her right shoulder and opens the door to step out carefully. "Thanks for offering, though. See you tomorrow, Judai."

He leans over the passenger seat. "Wait, Asuka!" He seriously beckons her to lean down, stopping her from closing the door. When she curiously leans her head down, Judai flicks her forehead gently and sits back with fresh laughter erupting from him. "Gotcha!" he chortles.

She slams his car door with a roll of her eyes, a dull look on her countenance. By this point, she isn't sure if Johan is worse or if Judai is worse. Proceeding to turn around and go back to her apartment, she starts walking while rubbing her forehead.

Though, she only takes four steps until she hears him roll down the window and calls out to her again, still chuckling, "Okay, I'm sorry! I just wanted to know if you needed me to drive you again in the morning!"

No, her mind rehearses the answer because she doesn't want to impose. I could take a bus. But then she starts thinking about chatting with him in his car, him joking around with her, him flicking her forehead, the two of them being able to hang out while he drives her home from work—

"Sure," she agrees without looking back at him, a bubbly feeling building up inside of her chest. "I'm usually done getting ready by 7:20." She doesn't even take the bus anyway.

The bubbly feeling continues to grow when he replies back, "Alright, I'll come by around then! See ya later!"

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The next morning, Asuka makes sure to bring a small towel with her to help with the dripping water if her ice pack starts melting again. She lays it on her lap so that she can easily grab it to wipe at the ice pack before it begins melting and dripping.

It didn't help her conscious at all that Judai's car seat had so many water stains by the time he dropped her off yesterday; he never complained about it, but it just… didn't sit well with her at all, even if he did insist that she shouldn't use a cover.

Which is still what he is currently trying to do right now as he drives them to work. "I'm telling you, water stains are no big deal."

She calmly uses her right hand to touch the wet spots on her seat from yesterday. "But they don't dry that quickly."

"Because today's the official first day of me driving us to work!" he complains, making a turn. "Yesterday doesn't count! We get to work until three in the afternoon when the sun is still out. It'll have enough time to dry by then!"

"And if it doesn't?" She rolls her eyes, utilizing her towel to wipe at the ice pack. Cars are expensive, after all.

He confidently retorts without looking away from the road, "It'll dry by tomorrow then!"

"Yes, because sitting on a wet seat, in someone else's car, caused by my ice pack is something that I will tolerate," grouches Asuka, semi-apologetic and semi-sarcastic and semi-guilty.

Judai sighs. "Well, it is my fault that you're like this. Water stains on my seats are nothing compared to that." He pauses, considering an idea. "What if you hit me back so that we can be even?"

Blinking, Asuka gives him a look. "No." Perhaps the guilt is interfering with his ability to think. "Besides, don't you sometimes get injured too? You are a P.E teacher. You must be used to bruises."

"Yes," he agrees easily with a slight nod. "I get them and they hurt, and sometimes I see my students cry from them—but my point that I'm trying to make is: you don't have to do anything while you're in my car. I got you like this, so I want you to feel as guilt-free as possible while you sit here, 'kay?"

She clears her throat, finding his reasoning to be a little off. "But you also didn't mean to do this to me, so I think you should feel guilt-free too while you drive me, Judai." He's quiet for a bit, but is still driving. "It wouldn't be fair if I'm supposed to be guilt-free while you can't," she murmurs encouragingly.

"Well said," he comments with a rueful smile.

"Does this mean no more driving trips to and from work?" she inquires.

"Oh, this is something that I want to do," he replies more genuinely. "Partially to make it up to you, but I also want to help you too. Besides—" Judai starts grinning. "—I could use a talking buddy while I drive! It gets boring by myself. Not to mention, it'd be pretty weird if we didn't have anymore driving trips after the first day."

"You're right," Asuka agrees, mainly to the latter part. (She sort of looked forward to riding with him.) "But I don't know about the talking buddy part—I don't really have much to say."

Lazily, he asks, "Then what have we been doing up until now?"

"Sitting."

He smiles. "And?" He makes another turn.

"Going to work."

He smiles wider. "And?"

She stays quiet, pretending to observe the scenery.

"Is Tenjoin Asuka still in this car with me?" he dramatically asks as he continues driving. She mutely smiles, looking at the passing buildings. "No? Okay. I guess I'm driving a random corpse to work. Johan would probably jump at the chance to examine it for his class—"

"Tenjoin Asuka wants peace and quiet at 7:47 in the morning," she drones from her seat.

"Oh, she speaks! Bummer; I thought you were the spirit of the corpse I was driving," he casually says as he starts pulling into the parking lot of the school.

She can only shake her head at him as he turns off the car after parking.

"Wait. Before we exit…" Judai looks at her seriously and then flicks her forehead again, gentler than the other times. He laughs victoriously. "Now we're all set!"

He immediately exits the car, amusedly chuckling, before she can utilize an improvised weapon.

.

.

Today, Johan brought with him a replica of an Anotogaster sieboldii dragonfly into her classroom. Though, he only had enough time to give her a quick greeting since their classrooms are only a few doors apart. He said something about helping out with a club dedicated to learning about gems and jewels during their break today. Apparently, he's fascinated by them; sort of like a side hobby.

However, Johan's absence does not change anything of normalcy in her classroom during break time. And to Asuka, normalcy during lunch time in her classroom means seeing Judai visit her. He's always taken a habit to visit her even before the incident to her arm; said something about it being closer to the gym anyway.

And true to that semblance of normalcy, Judai is eating his lunch in her classroom again. Though, Asuka's not oblivious enough to not notice his glances to her arm from time-to-time.

Keeping her word to Ayukawa-san about not using her injured arm so much, she could barely unravel her bento box today—in fact, it had been hard just even cooking her lunch last night with what the occasional jolts of pain she felt whenever she accidentally moved her arm too much. She had, luckily, some leftover rice and other seasonings and side dishes that didn't require so much effort of two hands. If she keeps it a bit scarce for her bento box, it could last her a few days. Plenty of time for her to heal up.

"Your lunch looks light today," comments Judai, a bit too casually.

She swallows a bite of rice, already knowing where this conversation is heading. "I was in the mood for something light."

"You're already low on rice," he says with muted incredulity while glancing between his lunch and her lunch, appropriately perplexed because he's supposed to be the fast eater of the two and not her.

Asuka calmly uses her chopsticks to eat some of the cooked eggs she also packed. She ignores the jolt of pain from her left arm; the bruise started hurting again last night when she accidentally bumped her arm into an open drawer while attempting to prepare her lunch for today. "I'm in the mood for rice as well."

He rolls his eyes. "Lemme guess: you were also in the mood for eggs and carrots?"

"Yes," she nods simply, nipping at her carrot slices next.

"Asuka," he says, sounding as stern as he could while sliding his bento box closer to her. "Take something from my lunch because yours look really sad today. I'm begging you. Seeing you just eating rice, eggs, and carrots is starting to make me wonder about my job. I'd be setting a bad example for my students if I let you eat this."

"I'm not a student, so I don't see why it should affect me," she mumbles.

"Physical education affects everyone, and it's important to eat healthy," chimes Judai annoyingly, giving her a look. "Emphasis on healthy."

Boy, if they were back in high school themselves, this would've been so ironic. His black hole of a stomach was still quite disastrous back in high school.

She tiredly eats another carrot slice that she had gotten from her other leftovers in her fridge. If only she hadn't bumped her arm again last night. "Rice, eggs, and carrots are all healthy, Judai."

Patiently, he nods and says, "I know, but I'm saying that you're not eating healthy enough."

Knowing that he wouldn't be so persistent without reason, Asuka sighs and goes to take one of his toppings without really looking. "It's just a little hard to cook with my arm like this, but I will do my best to pack more next time if it makes you happy."

It's probably an unsaid fact by now that she hates coddling, so he smiles approvingly and nods. "You better pass my inspection next time then," he teases, resuming his eating.

She laughs softly in response before peering down at her chopsticks and finally realizing what she had just taken from his bento.

He loves fried shrimp and he just let her have the last one without a fight?

.

.

Two days later, Asuka finds herself in Ayukawa-san's office again. Good news: no more ice pack. Bad news: she wears an arm sling this time.

With sympathy, Ayukawa-san smiles timidly as she secures the sling, mindful of Asuka's frown. "It's really not as bad as you think."

If Ayukawa-san wasn't so genuinely nice, Asuka would've said something sarcastic. Instead, she sighs and forces herself to keep her foul mood in check. "How so?" She wearily looks at the posters on the walls, feeling a sense of familiarity in this office the more she sits here.

"Um…" The nurse darts her eyes nervously, a finger in the air. "Well… At least this way, your arm will definitely not be moved, so it'll help with the healing process! You don't have to prop it with anything anymore…!"

Asuka begins to wonder how unlucky she has to be in order to injure her left arm for a second time within the span of three and a half days.

Perhaps she really shouldn't have circled past the softball field while going to the gym to tell Judai that she had a meeting after school with the other history department teachers instead of going home immediately. She hadn't been aware that someone could actually hit a ball that far to a point where it knocked her into the dirt in passing, and made her fall on her injured arm and twist it. (The student responsible apologized profusely and almost cried themself silly with guilt, even when she reassured them that they weren't in trouble.) Ayukawa-san nearly burst her eyeballs out of their sockets from shock when Asuka stumbled into her office while stained with dirt and her hair left unkempt; a disaster, basically.

And the sad thing is that she never even got to reach the gym.

"I suppose so," utters Asuka, exhaustedly with a vast lack of energy.

Ayukawa-san is about to speak up, probably with more words of comfort, but the next voice she hears after some loud footsteps thumping outside in the hallways makes Asuka want to inwardly cry and scream, but mostly scream. "Asuryn! Are you okay?!"

Praying to all the deities in the world that she had taught about in her history class, Asuka exhales soothingly. "Nii-san, I'm fine as you can see."

Fubuki marches over to her with great purpose, brow scrunching up. "You're wearing an arm sling, Asuka! That's not fine!" He worriedly looks her over as she continues sitting on Ayukawa-san's examination table. The aforementioned nurse is browsing through her cabinets to search for something.

When Asuka looks up, she nearly falls over at seeing Johan, Judai, and Manjoume peeking their heads through the wide-opened door slammed opened by her brother earlier. Sometimes, it really sucks sharing a classroom in the same area as them. News travels too fast here. (She's pretty sure that the students she passed by on her way to the nurse's office were responsible for spreading the news anyway.) Luckily, Misawa and the science department are on the other side of campus. Kenzan and Jim should still be held up in the history teachers' meeting that she is unfortunately missing out on right now.

Eyes darting to everyone, Asuka says exasperatingly, "I'm fine."

"Fine? Do you need a mirror? With how you look right now, I might as well think you were attacked!" bellows Fubuki disapprovingly, brushing the dirt off her sleeve. Manjoume bravely comes into the room to help brush the back of her dirt-stained white collared blouse quietly. (It might as well be called a beige shirt, with how stained it is right now. Fortunately, there is no blood.)

"Well, you aren't exactly wrong," she placatingly replies, sitting still. "But it was only just a softball that attacked me." Ayukawa-san fishes out a clean rag and a box of band-aids from the cabinets, approaching Asuka to gently dab the rag at the dirt on her cheeks before taking out a band-aid for a small scratch on the side of her face. "The student apologized to me, so it's okay."

Now it's Johan's turn to enter the room, eyebrow raised and genuinely bewildered. "A softball? Why were you near the softball field?"

Absolutely not blind or oblivious to the fact that her brother and Johan and Judai are all in the same room, Asuka placidly answers, "I was passing by. There was a meeting among the history teachers that I was going to attend after school instead of going home." She really hopes Johan understands her hidden message as she nods her chin towards her brother.

He probably did, because he subtly nods and purposefully replies with a feigned chiding tone, "Well, you should've taken the route past the tennis courts instead. It's a lot safer there because of the high fence." She reads the hidden message in his own eyes as he mentions, "A lot closer to the gym."

She wonders why she never thought of going through the tennis courts instead. "I'll keep it in mind." Fubuki looks between them, bemusedly brushing the last of the dirt on her sleeves. "Besides, I can't do anything about it since the meeting is probably over by now," she casually mentions, noting the time on the clock. She'll just have to ask Kenzan or Jim what she missed tomorrow.

Ayukawa-san dabs her rag against Asuka's other cheek, sounding motherly as she gently scolds, "In any case, Asuka-san, you need to make sure you don't fall again—and please take safer routes, okay? You might need to get yourself scanned if you get this arm injured again. I really hope it doesn't get to that level."

Fubuki's eyes widen, looking intensely at his sister. "Again?"

Squirming at his tone, she hears Manjoume tell him, "Yeah! Because the idiot over there at the door bumped into her with boxes, and she fell against the lockers. Scraped her arm pretty badly."

"But it all worked out fine!" Judai placatingly replies with a weak smile and his hands up, finally stepping into the room as well. "She and I worked things out, and we have a system going that we both like." He looks at her arm sling sympathetically.

"System?" asks Fubuki, confused. Manjoume narrows his eyes suspiciously.

Judai shrugs nonchalantly. "I drive her to and back from school while she heals."

Ignoring the four pairs of eyes abruptly on her, Asuka awkwardly sighs and slumps her shoulders. There's a reason why she doesn't like it when everyone gathers up. (Even Ayukawa-san looks intrigued.) "It saves money since I don't take the bus," she offers with a fake pleasant smile, like she's offering an opinion on the weather.

Manjoume contemplatively cradles his chin. "Is this why I've been hearing rumors that he's been dropping you off in the parking lot lately?"

There are rumors? She blinks. Asuka doesn't know if she should be seething or consider taking an early vacation and blasting all of her vacation hours on somewhere far away from here.

Johan casually walks up to him and pats his shoulder in a friendly manner. "Weren't you in the middle of composing a presentation earlier, Manjoume? I heard you practicing in your classroom." As the business teacher widens his eyes in realization, Johan turns to Fubuki with an easygoing smile. "And don't you have to help out your drama class with their next play rehearsal after you finish sewing up the cast's costumes?"

"Take care, Tenjoin-kun—I hope your arm heals up quickly!" Manjoume quickly tells her before offering a small wave and smile, exiting the room with his black tie flapping in the air as he turns a corner.

Patiently, Asuka pats Fubuki on the back with her unharmed hand when he brings her into a large hug briefly. "I'm off too, but promise me you'll be safe, Asuryn."

"I promise, Nii-san," she simply sighs, ignoring the smiles she's getting from the others.

While Fubuki doesn't ruffle her hair like a barbarian, he does pat her head lovingly before jogging out of the office to the school auditorium. Asuka honestly, truly lost count of how many times she had sighed today. Her brother still sometimes treats her like she's still a child despite the both of them working in the same school institution for their jobs. But she is grateful that he immediately came to see her the moment he heard about her incident, even if he abandoned his work for it. She'd do the same anyway.

"No need to thank me," Johan simpers at her once Fubuki's footfalls fade in the hallway, hands on his hips in a smug manner.

Serenely smiling, Asuka says, "I wasn't going to."

He fakes offense, frowning dramatically with a hand to his chest. (Judai snickers a bit from behind him.) She does feel grateful that he shooed off two people for her, but she can also tell that he's going to make her regret it somehow if she thanks him right now given his track record for teasing her lately.

Ayukawa-san amusedly looks at them while sealing up the band-aid box and putting her rag on her table. "Anyway, you're all patched up, Asuka-san. You're free to leave now if you'd like." The nurse eyes her messy dirt-stained hair with a slight cringe. "On second thought, maybe we should fix your hair first."

As Ayukawa-san combs her hair with her fingers as gently as she can, Asuka glances up at her two remaining visitors semi-curiously. "How come you two are still here?"

With a stifled laugh, Johan cheerily answers, "I don't know about Judai, but I tagged along when I saw your brother run through the hallways and scream your name. Thought I'd stick around to see the chaos!"

Dully, she gives him a blank look before glancing at his accomplice quietly.

"I sorta followed for the same reason," Judai admits with a grin. She isn't sure how many times she can roll her eyes today. "But I also need to drive you home, so I have a valid reason to stay, right?"

Nodding, she agrees, "Yes. A valid reason to stay." Her eyes cast another mundane look at Johan. "Something that you don't seem to have."

"I would mess up your hair for that comment, but I don't want to ruin Ayukawa-san's hard work," he says with a peaceful smile.

Judai steps forward to her before she can give the biology teacher another look. "Wait, I got you covered." The look on Johan's face when Judai gently flicks her forehead makes her eyebrow twitch. Cheeky, Judai grins at her glare. Embarrassed, Asuka looks away sulkily as she rubs her forehead and hears him chime, "It's a new thing I'm trying out just for her. It's actually pretty fun!"

Amused, Johan replies with a laugh prominent in his tone, "I see."

These two! Cheeks flaring with vivid pink hues, Asuka grinds her teeth together and glares at Johan with flames embedded in her eyes. "Leave."

.

.

"Are you still mad?" casually asks Judai when they're both in his car later and he starts up the engine. He drives out of the parking lot, and she finds some solace in the soft engine hums.

Intensely glancing out of the window and not really looking at the trees they're passing by, she drones, "About?"

He sounds like he's trying hard to contemplate his answer. "About Johan?" he offers, finally.

About Johan, he says, she grouches inwardly. They were practically terrorizing her earlier after her brother and Manjoume left. Not even a shred of remorse was in their eyes when he flicked her forehead and Johan looked ready to burst a lung laughing. Geez.

She rolls her eyes and huffs, "I'm just wondering, between you and him, who's more of a menace."

Indulgently, he goodnaturedly hums and asks back, "Any conclusions so far?"

"No. It's something that I can't ever solve," she shrugs with her good arm. Sometimes, it's Judai. Other times, it's Johan. But mostly, they seem to tie often for the title of menace equally.

He smiles whimsically, humored by her behavior. "Then why think about it if you can't solve it?"

Asuka shrugs again. "Something to occupy me."

"I'm flattered we could be of use to you." He rolls his eyes.

Idly looking at the street lights they pass by, she quips, "On the bright side, you're more useful than him since you're driving me."

The car makes a right turn. He asks, conversationally, "Doesn't he do anything for you?"

She thinks really hard, and concludes that Johan likes to see her suffer. "He helps me pack up my papers," she says instead, because Johan really does help pack her papers and she doesn't know what else to say. "Nothing exciting."

"So, it's exciting to be here in the car with me?" laughs Judai, and she thinks that she would've accidentally smashed her head against the window had they made another turn at the same moment he asked her this.

Clearing her throat awkwardly, she ignores the beats of her heart and adamantly keeps looking out the window as much as she can with her arm sling on. "Compared to packing up my assignment papers, I'd say so."

"I'm glad that my talking buddy is enjoying herself while she's here," he grins, eyes bright.

Leaning her head gently against the window, she tenderly smiles into her reflection and doesn't really look at the passing buildings this time—she looks at him instead; his eyes are cut off from the reflection, so she can smile as much as she wants at him. "It's because she has a talking buddy of her own now," she says, soft.

In the reflection, she sees him smile back and she's reminded of why she fell in love with him all those years ago.

.

.

A week passes, and she thinks she's slowly getting accustomed to wearing an arm sling. If Ayukawa-san said broken arms typically take around six to eight weeks to heal, then Asuka figures she should really get used to using one hand soon.

Grateful that she is right-handed, she has no problems with writing or using her chopsticks. Though, it could be a slight hassle to write since she needs to improvise her desk objects as paper weights.

She still can't cook properly with one hand, so she had decided—when the third day of Judai reprimanding her about eating leftovers passed—to buy premade lunches at the grocery store rather than cook. She thought Judai would also tell her something disapproving about that, but he ended up laughing a lot when she brought it up one day because: Asuka, do you see what I eat for lunch everyday? I buy them allI can only prepare the rice! I'd have to get a new apartment every time I cook!

(Well, she can't really see him cook anyway.)

Taking a bite out of the chicken in her premade lunch, Asuka puts down her chopsticks to grab a pen with her functional hand. While she can still do her job and teach like normal, her grading speed has substantially decreased. To make up for it, she decided to cut out some assignments from the syllabus (much to everyone's sheer joy) and decided to spend more free time grading.

And of course, the world never lets her have what she wants.

"Asuka," Judai casually speaks up, tapping the side of his lunch with his chopsticks.

She tries to continue grading the fill-in worksheets on her desk; an action of rebelling. "Yes, Judai?" she says with a feigned pleasant tone after swallowing the chicken.

"I thought you were supposed to take it easy while you're recovering," he sighs tiredly. Really, it should be her who sounds tired, given her situation. "Do I need to get Ayukawa-san in here to repeat herself?" He eats a cherry tomato as he leans back in his chair and props a leg on his knee; his long stare at her belies his outer casualness.

There are times where Asuka does miss Johan, because Johan would've been able to distract Judai with their weird guy talk while she could go back to grading in peace. Why did Johan have to ditch lunch time with them to go help supervise that gemstone study club?

Calmly, she replies, "No. I heard her loud and clear." Her pen slashes a wrong answer and she places an eraser on the paper as a weight before helpfully writing the correct answer.

Patiently and disapprovingly, he says, "Then you should know that it's bad to put pressure on your arm, like what you're doing right now." With his chopsticks, he points to her leaning forward at her desk, slightly on her broken arm.

"Things won't grade by themselves," she states, writing a score for the paper.

"Yeah," he easily agrees, eating more rice. "That's why some teachers have TAs. Y'know, teacher's assistants?"

"Yes, assuming that students are actually interested to assist in a history class," Asuka replies, grading another worksheet. She likes her job, but she knows that most people find history boring—teachers like her don't really have it easy.

He stifles a laugh. "If it makes you feel better, I don't have one either." Pondering, he adds, "I think your brother does, though. Fubuki-san sometimes talks about assigning a girl for his assistant so more people would actually stay awake in his class."

She momentarily rolls her eyes and feels a vein pulse. Why can't her brother stop with the secondhand embarrassment? "I think I'll be fine without one if people are going to be distracted like that. Most people are awake for my class anyway."

Judai exhales to himself at her stubbornness. "How about I help you then? Not the whole time, but at least I'm here during lunch."

Asuka finally puts down her pen with an arched eyebrow. "Judai… Your handwriting is chicken scratch; I don't think this is your strong suit." He has something of a pout while he sulkily eats the remaining bit of his rice. "But I suppose you could help with sorting the papers alphabetically by surname. I need two hands to shuffle papers anyway."

He perks up a little and looks at her arm sling. "As long as you loosen up on the grading, I'll do it."

Shaking her head in defeat with a slight smile, Asuka goes back to eating her cold lunch that sat there for a while. If he wants her to rest her arm for an hour lunch break, then she might as well. She still has the rest of the day, after all. "Fine."

His triumphant smile beams at her as he tucks away his empty bento box and chopsticks at the side of her desk before sorting her worksheets. Contently, Asuka watches as she eats her lunch.

.

.

"So… Rumors," Johan casually hums, helping her lift a box of textbooks in the backroom of the school's library after classes had finished up.

Wishing she has two functional hands to rub her poor head, Asuka simply deals with the inevitable migraine by asking, "What about them?"

She takes the duty log her class president filled out and remembers to note down the students in her class who are still missing a class textbook. Opening it with one hand to read through it, she starts exiting the backroom and Johan takes that as a cue to follow her, closing the door with his foot.

Catching up, he chirps, "People are starting to think you're dating."

Scowling, she pauses reading the duty log and hisses a strong, "Excuse me?" She will not even ask who people assume she's dating since she knows who it is already, because it's apparently such a hot topic nowadays. Honestly…

"Girls are gushing over how cute it is that he keeps dropping you off while guys are betting on a secret relationship." Johan sighs suddenly. "It's all I ever hear about during my classes anymore since you're only a few doors away from me. You're probably the goldmine for gossip right now. I miss hearing random conversations while my class does their work."

They exit the library.

Rolling her eyes, she feels like the weight of the world is on her shoulders. "I would say I'm sorry—but it's high school, you know." Shutting the duty log with her hand, she calmly adds, "There is no secret relationship, so I hope the stakes aren't too high for them."

He snickers in response. "You might have some dissatisfied students if you tell them that."

"I can't be responsible for something I didn't start," she shrugs. It's not her fault if those people betting on them end up losing. She hadn't been aware there was even a bet.

A tease: "So you're saying it's his fault instead?

"With the way gossip spreads here, I'm sure you've already heard over fifty variations of how my arm ended up like this," Asuka deadpans, dryly.

Interestedly, Johan rolls his eyes up in deep recollection. "I think my favorite version is the one where Manjoume held you hostage in the hallways, demanding you for a date, and then Judai somehow threw three boxes into his face before Manjoume pushed you out of the way and you knocked into an open locker where you scraped your arm. Then when you were walking to the nurse's office, Judai tried to run after you—but he tripped on his shoelace, slammed into you, and you broke your arm when you hit the wall."

Blinking, Asuka quietly wonders if this is a result of sheer boredom or complete lunacy. If this is Johan's favorite out of the many versions he heard, then she really doesn't want to know how badly butchered all of the other ones turned out.

Taking in her silence, he nods consolingly as they walk down the empty hallway to her classroom. "I know; I was speechless from laughing on the inside too. He would totally trip on his shoelaces!"

Knowing that Judai likes velcro straps on his shoes more, she shakes her head exasperatedly as they approach her classroom door. They can't even get the details right for their gossipy tales.

It's not like she didn't predict rumors stirring up—but she had been hoping to play the oblivious card for a while and ignore all those silly stories because they're not worth her time. Even her own classroom is not safe, so it's a miracle she lasted this long. As much as she loves Judai, she thinks these rumors are just stupid.

Although, maybe the unknown forces of the world enjoy a bit of entertainment once in a while—because the first thing she sees after sliding her classroom door open is Judai, the person of her conversation with Johan, looking at home at her desk and playing with her paperclips by connecting them into a chain.

He looks at them very casually, "What's up?

Johan stifles a laugh before going inside and setting the box of textbooks on an empty desk. "Judai, don't ever get shoelaces, okay?"

Very puzzled, he blinks and tilts his head. "But you already know I don't wear those?"

Johan only laughs harder, leaning on the desk for support.

Asuka pretends that Johan's existence is not in the room by calmly placing her duty log on the desk next to her invaded box of paperclips and bending down to pick up her bag to slide her papers into.

"Were you waiting long?" she inquires, looking at the length of his paperclip garland. At some point last week, he had taken a habit to wait for her in her classroom before he drives her home since he got tired of people giving him strange looks. (She's absolutely certain it's because of the rumors.)

Bemusedly looking away from a laughing Johan, Judai pleasantly smiles at her. "Not really. I've only been here for ten minutes. These paperclips are pretty addicting."

Cheekily, Johan chortles, "Asuka, maybe the next story can have paperclips in it!"

After he said that, he starts escaping her wrath by strolling out of her classroom with a broad grin, deeming it time to head back to his own classroom and waving goodbye at them as she burns another look into his back. Judai just looks back and forth between them, perplexed.

.

.

"You're never going to tell me what you and Johan talked about, huh?" he asks rhetorically, giving her a glance when he stops the car at a red light.

She can tell that the curiosity is eating him, so she simply says, "Yes."

Hopefully, Judai asks, "Yes, as in you'll tell me?"

Asuka slowly leans into the car seat. "Yes, as in I'll never tell you." He starts opening his mouth— "And yes, Johan will not tell you either." He will not.

Judai pouts, thumping his fingers against the wheel. "That's not fair!"

"You snooze, you lose?" she offers, deliberately being as unhelpful as possible.

"I was close to snoozing until I found your paperclips," he smartly replies, eyes flickering to the red light absently. "Good thing I did or else I wouldn't know that you two are probably conspiring against me."

Rolling her eyes, she says, "It may not even be about you." Because it's about us.

Scoffing lightly, he resumes the car at the green light. "If it wasn't, then you would've told me."

"I don't really tell you things that Johan tells me because you two seem to think similarly, so you already have an idea of what he's thinking about." She focuses her eyes on the dashboard in front of her.

Amused, he asks, "Like?"

"Things that make my head hurt," she sighs gravely.

She doesn't notice the way his eyes are gleaming with a tease. "So, us being in a secret relationship makes your head hurt?"

Asuka thinks it's remarkable how she is able to turn her head so fast that she felt like she could've gotten whiplash and not notice at all. Her heartbeats are pounding and she is wide-eyed, probably resembling a fool of some sort because he starts laughing uncontrollably. And laughing. And still laughing.

And they're still somehow alive on the road, unscathed in his car. A world mystery.

She breathes soothingly. "Where—"

"You'd be surprised at all the things I catch my students talking about when I'm waiting for them to finish their laps, or if I'm in the guys locker room!" he wheezes with tears in his eyes, catching his breath with a breezy grin. "I recognized some of their faces from your class, and also Johan's class." Judai thinks for a moment. "I wonder if this means we're popular now, Asuka."

Trying to calm down her rapid heartbeats, Asuka sighs heavily. "Considering that I've injured my arm twice already, I think I've been 'popular' for a while now."

A bit rueful, he smiles. "Then I guess I am too since I hurt your arm the first time," he responds casually, probably trying to not feel guilty again because she can see it in his eyes and knows that he's trying to listen to her from before and be guilt-free.

"On accident," she hums lightly, consoling. "You aren't responsible for the sling."

He hums halfheartedly, making a turn with the car.

It's suddenly quiet.

Asuka sits in the foreboding silence for ten seconds and blurts, "The shoelaces." Judai gives her an odd look very briefly. "Johan told me that he heard a version of my incident where I broke my arm when you tripped on your shoelaces."

Stifling a laugh, he plays along, "Why did I even trip?"

She smiles, amused, as he pulls up to the curb when her apartment is in sight. "You were apparently chasing me when I went to the nurse after you threw boxes at Manjoume-kun for taking me hostage in the hallways."

Grateful that he turned the car off now that they're parked, his head leans on top of the wheel as he laughs carefreely. "I wouldn't have done that!"

"Throw boxes at Manjoume-kun?"

"No, but that'd be pretty tempting." Sitting up appropriately, Judai beams at her with crinkling eyes and gently flicks her forehead. "I meant I wouldn't have chased after you because I know you'd take care of yourself, so I wouldn't have even tripped in the first place!"

Her heart never sounded so loud before. "O-Oh…" Awkwardly, she fumbles with the straps of her bag when she brings it over her shoulder.

An eyebrow raised, he inspects her face after he leans his head down. "Are you getting sick? You're as red as my tracksuit."

Mustering all of her willpower, she shakes her head and looks away from his unzipped red jacket and starts opening the car door with a weak smile. "I'm fine; just tired, but I'll sleep it off. See you tomorrow!"

She scrambles out, shuts the door, and briskly walks to her apartment without looking back. He finally starts driving after she enters the building because she hears the engine start again.

.

.

The next day, Asuka finds herself struggling with her laptop. One hand restrictions are not good when she needs to adjust her presentation slides for next week's lecture.

"I could help…"

Stubbornly, she ditches trying to resize a picture on her slide and goes to edit the text instead because she can at least type somewhat better with one hand than trying to click and drag photos.

Rolling his eyes because he probably expected that reaction from her, Judai lightly thumps her worksheets on the table to make the pile neater after he finishes sorting the last paper. "At the rate you're going, you might need more than eight weeks to recover."

Not knowing if he's joking or not, she huffs while typing in a sentence, "You're not a nurse."

Patiently, he says, "No—but I'm a P.E teacher and I know how bad broken bones can be." He lays the pile of worksheets on the side of her desk, closing the lid of his emptied bento box before eyeing her laptop screen. "Or frustrating, in your case."

Switching to the next slide, she quietly types a small paragraph. In the notes section of the program for this particular slide, she leaves a memo of: Remember to resize the photo bigger. She inserts similar notes for her other slides.

Judai probably lost count of how many times he rolled his eyes in this one lunch break today the more he watches her because she hears him sigh deeply and feels him grab her wrist gently. She stops typing and knows she won't win if she fights for her laptop custody with one less arm, so she frowns in defeat and lets him slide her laptop closer to him.

"How big do you want this resized?" he simply asks her, rolling up his jacket's sleeves to his elbows and letting his hands hover over the touchpad.

Grumbling, Asuka says, "Until it takes up the free space—but leave a bit of the background there so it's easier to read."

"That wasn't so hard, was it?" he smiles cheekily, resizing the picture—like how she wants it—in a few seconds with his two functioning hands and arms. (Yeah, she really misses the stupid guy talks he has with Johan: her only time of peace.)

Sulking next to him, she watches quietly as he goes through her other slides and resizes the other pictures accordingly to her notes with that smile on his face. He either really likes to help her, or he's tired of doing nothing but eat while he's here for their break. She assumes it must be somewhat amusing to him to watch her struggle for a bit before he makes offers to help.

"Done!" chirps Judai, sliding her laptop back to her with a self-satisfied smugness. Trying to make a point, he fakes looking at the clock and says, "And look at that! It didn't even take me five minutes! That's why it's important to get help if you need it."

Sighing, she tells him, "Thank you for the help that I never asked from you, Judai."

He flicks her forehead softly with a broad grin. "My pleasure, Asuka!"

Bravely ignoring the not-so-subtle glances from her wandering students (and her students' friends from other classes, who would no doubt start more rumors that Johan would get a kick out of) who stayed inside to eat their lunches, she resumes working on the text of her slides, finding it easier to work on now that he adjusted her pictures.

Since she's not experiencing any more technical difficulties, he smiles at her as he quietly plays with a rubberband on her table for the remainder of their lunch.

.

.

"Is being a pack mule my only purpose to you?" Johan asks humorously, walking next to her with a thick pile of photocopied papers in his arms when they leave the teacher's lounge.

Asuka is starting to see a pattern in her life as long as she has this arm sling around her: Judai drives her to work in the morning, Judai eats in her classroom at lunch, Judai lectures her on not overworking during said lunch time, and Johan helps her lug stuff around for her classes after lessons are done before Judai drives her home. If her arm wasn't like this, then this list would've been halved and it could've saved her from so many headaches.

But of course, that's not possible for her.

Awkwardly coughing into her right fist, Asuka murmurs, "You are a few doors away from me."

She doesn't really know the other teachers in their area as close as him, aside from Judai or Manjoume or her own brother—but alas, two out of three of them seem to be preoccupied with other things often: Manjoume with splitting time between teaching and helping his older brothers with their family business, and Fubuki spends hours in the auditorium for rehearsals. Besides, all Johan does after school is either hang out with Judai or he polishes his creepy bug replicas or he's doing something for the gemstone study club.

Sometimes he tells her about the club in passing—about the myths and stories and symbolisms of gems that fascinated him—and she thinks it's good that Johan is branching out since she's noticed his free time is spent with the club lately. It's just her and Judai nowadays during lunch. Although, Johan does spare his time when it's after school hours since the club members all go home after the dismissal bell. He's still a biology teacher, so it's obvious he would stay for a while after school. Which is really good for Asuka because he easily excels at being a pack mule for her.

"I thought you'd ask someone else," Johan casually smiles, not caring for his safety even though there aren't any witnesses in this hallway.

"Judai needs to clean up in the gym before he comes here," she serenely smiles back, icy. "And even though he's the P.E teacher, I don't think lifting is something he really does. He's more of a runner, if anything."

"Good for waiting on you, hand and foot."

If Johan wasn't so strangely buff, she would've smacked his arm—but she doesn't because she could possibly break her other hand, and she can't have that. "Involuntarily, you mean."

Eyebrow raised, he echoes, "Involuntarily?"

Releasing a tired sigh, she elaborates, "He's been yelling at me about overworking and eating more. He's been trying to help me organize my papers during lunch, and he also likes to rub it in that he can adjust my presentation slide photos quicker than me."

Guffawing, Johan's eyes are twinkling and absolutely traitorous. "Are you positive that you two are not dating?"

Her face scrunches in an uncomfortable way, but persists, "Positive." After so many years, she's sort of used to the teasing.

"Then I'd suggest cooling down your face before you enter your classroom," he smartly says when he sees the sign overhead bearing her classroom number as they near it. Using one arm to easily cradle the stack of papers, Johan lazily smiles at her before sliding open her classroom door and going inside to greet Judai waiting inside at her table.

Asuka stops walking just enough for the walls to hide her. When she takes a look at the window showing off the campus premises, she sees herself, her black arm sling, and red on her face. She sighs.

Definitely, she really doesn't have it easy.

.

.

After that talk with Johan, three days passed by agonizingly slow for Asuka. Amidst those three days, Judai fell into a routine of eating his lunch for the first fifteen minutes of their break before spending the remaining time helping her with papers or presentation slides.

Currently, he is playing around with her paperclips again while she makes use of her functioning hand to type in some facts on her slides because he finished sorting more worksheets for her.

Asuka only looks up from her work when she sees someone wearing a white button-up shirt in front of her desk. She knows it's a new visitor because Judai always likes wearing his tracksuit with his black shirts—and while he does wear white shirts, Johan seldom visits her classroom anymore for lunch due to club activities. "Jim? You usually don't come around here. Need something?"

With a cordial smile, Jim lifts up his cowboy hat in greeting and readjusts the crocodile plush sitting on his shoulder. She's always wondered about it, but figures it's probably a new weird trend to have plush toys of dinosaurs and crocodiles among the teachers teaching about the prehistoric era. (Probably to be hip in front of teenagers.) Extending his hands, he greets, "Dino Boy wanted me to deliver these to you."

Taking the light stack of papers from him, she sees that these are forms about future career plans for students to fill out. Right—it's almost that time of the year again.

Smiling gratefully, Asuka nods at him and puts the papers gently in front of her to pass out later. "What happened to Kenzan-kun anyway?"

At this, Jim chuckles. "Dino Boy got in trouble for dropping a fake dinosaur bone on a student's leg. Poor kid was bawling." As she amusedly stifles a laugh, he tilts his hat at her and winks gentlemanly. "I better go check up on him to see if crutches are involved. I'll tell Dino Boy you said hi. Have a good lunch, Tomorrow Girl." Politely, he also smiles next to her. "Judai."

When Jim exits her classroom, Judai asks her with an arched eyebrow, "Tomorrow Girl?"

Absently smiling, Asuka goes back to her laptop and resumes typing. "A nickname. He likes to come up with them for us in the history department because he thinks it's a sign of friendship."

He mulls, "I don't have any nicknames for you and we've been friends for years."

Adamantly focused on staring at the text on her screen, she awkwardly says, "You never have nicknames for anyone."

"Names are easier to remember!" he defends, sitting up in his chair. "I don't see why you have nicknames when you already have a name."

Indulgently, Asuka supplies, "They're terms of endearment for some people." Her fingers lightly tap the keys of her keyboard, light enough to not register as a click. "Nicknames can be anything you associate with that person. You can still use someone's name as a term of endearment too. I think it just depends on the tone you use to say it."

Idly, he looks at her. She squirms a little, but not too noticeably. "Then I'll stick with 'Asuka' for you," he states casually, nodding like it's official.

She doesn't really understand it, but nods anyway. That sounded heartfelt when he said it just now.

.

.

After school, she wonders how she keeps getting herself into these situations that she would rather not be a part of.

Entering her classroom after coming back from the teacher's lounge, Asuka awkwardly stands at the door, shirt and face and skirt drenched. Johan and Judai look up from their conversation and blink simultaneously at her as water drips off her bangs, staining the floor. Miserably, she sighs and awaits the inevitable questions.

Johan takes the first bait. "What happened…?"

Grimacing at some water dripping on her arm sling, she tiredly sits down at a random student's desk at the front since the guys stole her normal chair. Luckily, all the students went home so there shouldn't be a rumor about this. "I was asking Kenzan-kun when the next meeting was for our history department until Misawa-kun's experiment exploded."

Judai takes the second bait. "What experiment?"

"He was asked to perform an experiment that involved exploding water, which was going fine until someone bumped into him and he added too much baking soda," she wearily sighs, rubbing her temple with her right hand. Given Misawa's meticulousness, no one had a problem with him experimenting in the teacher's lounge—but today changed her mind.

With a low whistle, Johan inspects the bits of baking soda on her hair from his spot by her desk. "You didn't stop by the restroom to clean up first?"

"How can I?" dully asks Asuka, pointing to her arm sling. (She must also remember to apologize to the student whose desk she is sitting at right now.)

Standing up with a sheepish smile, he rubs the back of his neck apologetically. "I'll go find a towel for you," he helpfully suggests as a peacemaking offer.

"The gym has some," Judai speaks up. "I put everything away before I lock up. You know where I keep everything." Searching his pockets, he lazily tosses a pair of keys at his best friend. "We'll wait here, but I guess you better hurry before Asuka shrivels up."

She gives him an evil look as Johan snickers while stepping into the hallway. "Will do."

Turning away from Judai in defiance the moment Johan leaves, she sits sideways on her chair connected to the student desk and quietly runs a hand through her sticky hair. She cringes when more water drips on her arm sling, bits of baking soda staining dots on the material. Asuka frowns for every tangle her fingers encounter.

Eventually, she gives up untangling her hair without a comb and goes to squeeze her hair dry instead. It stays silent for a while: she squeezes the water out of her hair, and he watches.

Preoccupied with angling the left side of her hair away from her sling, she squeezes the water onto her wet skirt. (She'd have to apologize to the janitor as well for tracking wet footsteps back.) Then, suddenly, she feels a warm material over her shoulders.

Casually, Judai kneels down in front of her and brings his tracksuit jacket over her head to wipe it dry. "It's not as good as a towel, but it was getting a little sad watching you use your hands."

Enduring the static of the jacket and her hair, she says, semi-spluttering from the pressure, "But your jacket—"

"I have extras," he grins, not even pausing his relentless drying of her hair. "Like, I-have-three-pairs type of extras!"

She reaches up to blindly grab his wrist to stop him because she's absolutely certain that her head looks like a nest by now. He does stop, and she does look up. Asuka ends up glaring at some of the messy strands splayed in front of her eyes.

Judai takes one look at her as he brings the jacket down to her shoulders, assessing the mess on her head with a huge smile. "You should consider this hair for Halloween!" he teases, leaning up on his knees more to helpfully smooth out the top of her hair while she finally releases his wrist to brush back the strands poking at her eyes. (Her hair is still a bit wet, though.)

Eyes absently on his plain black shirt in front of her, she sighs. "I think I might stain your car if I leave like this."

"So?" he responds with the air of someone who doesn't care about stained car seats. He continues patting down the top of her hair at the stubborn strands. She thinks he's being gentler than when he dried her with the jacket.

Averting her eyes, she replies slowly, "So… I might ruin your car."

"How else will you go home then?" He stops patting down her hair and simply props his arm on his bent knees from his spot on the floor in front of her. He places his other hand on the ground to support himself. "And don't say 'bus'—because I know you don't even take it."

Avoiding his eyes, she awkwardly twirls a wet strand of hair to ignore the anxious heartbeats in her chest. "Walking?"

He's unimpressed. "You live thirty minutes away by car."

She shivers a bit now that her wet clothes are starting to feel cold. Noticing it, Judai goes to put his jacket around her shoulders more securely. "I like walking," she mumbles.

"Then why do you still let me drive you?" he fondly teases, softly.

You offered it, her mind reasons. You felt guilty, so you offered to drive me home until I heal. You offered. You said you wanted to— "We're talking buddies," she ends up saying, tenderly smiling back. She pulls his jacket closer around her, wrapping herself up in undoubtful warmness like this feeling in her chest.

This time, he flicks her forehead and she doesn't rub it because it's a very gentle touch; barely even qualified as a touch at all, but she accepts it anyway because these forehead flicks are their thing.

That's just like Judai—he makes something so annoying so gentle for her. He sacrifices a good tracksuit jacket just to help dry off her hair abomination, and he sacrifices good car seats just so she can be comfortable in his car. It annoys her that he's always sacrificing things for her—does he know how expensive tracksuits and cars are nowadays?—and it also annoys her because he does it for her. He's been like that since high school; sacrifices things to make her happy when he deserves some happy things in his life too. She wonders what makes him happy.

She feels his hand settle on the top of her head, lightly patting. "We are," he says back with equal genuinity, eyes crinkling fondly.

Releasing his jacket, her good hand goes up to cradle his face. He leans into her palm. Her thumb strokes gently for a few silent moments as they stay like this; a quiet peacefulness it becomes.

He starts to grab the jacket when he sees it slipping off her shoulders, pulling it around her slowly as he leans up on his knees again. She bravely sits through the echoing heartbeats her heart resonates, keeping very still. Chin tucking down, she thinks her courage is starting to fade as she hides behind her wet bangs.

Judai brushes her bangs aside, fondness evident in his smile. It gives her heart another jolt of emotions—and out of instinct, she removes her hand from his face and sits upright and feels positively scared. "You can still drive me," she says, very softly and safe. It's a safe response.

He smiles, standing up and brushing off his pants. "Wouldn't have accepted 'no' for an answer anyway."

She glances down at her lap, unable to convey how that made her heart skip a beat.

When he sits atop the desk next to her, Johan comes back in with two towels and both Judai and Asuka look at him distractedly.

"I got two since I wasn't sure how much water splashed y—" He abruptly stops himself and observes Asuka very carefully before raising an eyebrow at Judai. Then he looks back at Asuka. Then Judai. Looks at the red jacket on Asuka's shoulders, then starts looking at Judai without his jacket. Johan calmly saunters in and shoves both towels and the keys to the gym at Judai, who almost falls off the desk. "I'm not walking all the way back, so you better take these." Casually, he goes to sit back at Asuka's desk.

Asuka feels a towel on her head when Judai leaps off the desk and approaches her, and she keeps her head down when she sees his black shirt next to her. The other towel rests on her shoulders with his jacket.

He dries off her hair slowly and properly this time and clears his throat. "Keep them for now; we have plenty," Judai tells her, helpfully, in this unidentifiable silence.

Johan amusedly observes them, smiling serenely as he takes Asuka's bag to help pack her papers away.

She just sighs loudly, emotionally tired, and finding some solace as he quietly dries her hair.

.

.

When she gets into the car this time, she makes use of the spare towel Johan got for her by setting it on the car seat before sitting over it with a regal motion. The other towel sits atop her shoulders, and she is still wrapped in Judai's jacket—sort of unsightly and mismatched on her, but at least she is kept warm.

Everything exhausted her too emotionally lately. So, she sighs when the car starts. She's been sighing so much lately, and all she can do is blame the arm sling.

Sympathetically, Judai turns on the heater for her. "It's not that bad," he tentatively says to lighten the grim mood in his car.

Since she can't zip up his jacket on her because of her sling, she holds the flaps together for some semblance of extra warmth. "I was splashed head-to-toe with baking soda and water, Judai," she wearily responds with the aura of someone who really wants a break.

"Which won't leave stains by the time you wash it out," he offers consolingly. "It could be worse. What if Misawa used juice instead? Or soda?"

Nodding, she concedes, "All right." Water beats carbonated sugary drinks that would attract ants. "But that doesn't make up for Johan."

Laughing weakly, he jokes, "Sorry, I can't do anything about that."

Harrumphing as she looks at the orange sky, Asuka asks, just for the sake of conversation, "Did you two talk about anything interesting while I was gone?"

Judai is quiet for a few seconds, eyes up in thought when they reach a red light. "He was telling me about the gems his club was studying lately. Did you know sapphires stand for wisdom?" he asks in a fake sage-like tone. She responds with a small smile. "Other than that, I think he mentioned taking a summer trip to Europe with that club to hunt for gems. He's really interested—I'm glad, since he spent last summer trying to catch a bunch of weird bugs for his collection." He rolls his eyes, looking nostalgic.

"Will you be tagging along with him?" she asks, idly looking forward at buildings.

He smiles crookedly. "I'm not a member, so I'm not interested in paying for my own transportation. I'm fine just being here. There's a lot of things I like here."

"Like what?"

He starts driving again at the green light. "Like my students. I sometimes see them outside of school and it makes me laugh at how surprised they look when they see me! Geez, it's like they don't think teachers have lives!" Involuntarily, she smiles. "And let's see… There's my favorite restaurant. I can go there all I want if it's summer."

Asuka chimes, "For the fried shrimp?"

"Exactly!" he grins, making a turn. "There's also this place that sells ice cream that I like. Good popsicles! Or this lake where I go fishing at. And of course, I like all of my friends! See? Plenty of things here that I like."

Distractedly, she glances down at her arm sling. "Hmm."

Flickering a look at her, Judai adds casually, "I like having a talking buddy too. Wouldn't know what I'd do without her to make things entertaining around here."

A pause. "Really?" Her gaze glues to her lap.

He keeps his eyes on the road this time, and nods. "Really."

Tentatively, she returns with a: "Even if she stains your car seats?"

He nods.

"Even if she broke her arm twice?"

He nods, a small smile etched on his countenance. She cannot interpret what it conveys.

She hesitates. "Even if she can overwork herself and you need to tell her to stop?"

He nods.

"...Even if she can forget to eat sometimes?" she mumbles.

Nod.

A bittersweet smile. "Even if she can be very stubborn about doing things on her own and not asking for help?"

Nod.

"Even if she told you already that she doesn't have much to talk about as a talking buddy?"

Nod, and a small laugh.

Asuka exhales for a moment, listening to the engine hum with steady heartbeats and finding small courage as the sunset gently beams upon them and she is still wrapped in his jacket; this endless peace. "Even if she told you that she loves you?"

He simply nods and smiles, and she sees her small courage pay off when she looks at his face and finds something tender in his eyes and curled lips even though he is still focused on the road.

The car doesn't go off course, nor does he stammer, nor does he say anything—he simply accepts, like he has known about it for a while. Perhaps he had noticed earlier in the classroom; back when he gave her his jacket and she lost her bravery in the last moment because she teaches history for a living and not about love, so how is she supposed to know what to do if he's her first love anyway, right? She's as clumsy as any novice in love—maybe he saw it in her eyes at some point when she held his face and found out that way because she can be obvious when she doesn't mean to.

"It wasn't Johan influencing me, if that's what you're thinking," he casually mentions after some silence. It's not an awkward silence, but a more tentative unsure one. "I've heard those rumors, yeah. Johan mentions you, yeah. But they exaggerate things too much."

Asuka barely notices that he's parking the car on the curb outside her apartment complex.

He switches off the engine, leans back in his seat, and glances out the window. "I like this—" His finger gestures vaguely between the car and her apartment. "—and simply spending time with my talking buddy."

He says 'talking buddy' like a term of endearment, like it's meant only for her. Like a nickname.

"Johan's moving forward in his life and making more friends in his gem club, and he's going to explore Europe in the summer. That's great; I'm really happy for him as his best friend." Judai peers away from the side window and stares at the car wheel absently. "But I'm not Johan, and I'm staying here because I'm content with what I currently have right now. Sure, I don't really go anywhere or do much during my summers—but this is the life I'm happy with." He looks at her from the corner of his eyes, something meaningful in the glance. "And I'm happy if my talking buddy is there with me—if she wants to be."

She isn't sure if she should cry or smile or run out of the car. So: she fights back her tears, smiles until her jaw hurts, and stays in the car. "She would like that."

He lifts up his hand and she patiently waits for a flick to her forehead. Judai grins as he affectionately flicks her and she laughs this time without rubbing her forehead—and she embraces this happy, happy feeling that he, his car, his jacket, his nickname, their routine makes her feel.