WUBMMQ Ch.9 Affection

A couple of hours have passed, and now Blossom was slowly walking to her 7th period class. She was aching terribly and could barely move her muscles. She entered the classroom and plopped down on a decorative Japanese pillow. The impact sent waves of pain throughout her body and she groaned in response.

She couldn't count the times she dropped that stupid flag on the ground, and she definitely couldn't count the times the butt of the flag smacked her in the face. She sighed, color guard was harder than she ever could have imagined. She didn't know if she could go through with it. She thought about quitting it all together. She knew that Marie and Lee would be disappointed, but she couldn't possibly learn all those techniques by next Friday.

"Okay class, let us settle down." said Yorishima. "Today, we are going to work on our worksheets from yestada and then you are going to separate into two and review for test on Friday."

The class started to giggle.                 

"You did again Ms. Yorishima." someone yelled out.

"What? What I do?" she asked.

"It's pronounced yesterday, not yes-ta-da." someone else added.

Ms. Yorishima pouted and placed her hands on her hips.

"How come you always make fun of me? You know I do not know this language."

"Didn't you go to school for English?"

Ms. Yorishima slapped a ruler against her desk.

"That's it. You guys are going to get it. Now, take out your work or I'll go Super Saiyan on you."

A few minutes later, the students put away their work and turned to their usual partners to study for the test. Ms. Yorishima once again slapped a ruler against her desk, and the class looked at her confused.

"Not so fast, since you want to play games, I can play games too. I will be assigning you your partners."

Horrified expressions spread across the faces of the students; it was like their worst nightmare came true.

"Oh, please Ms. Yorishima don't do this to us." someone pleaded.

"Well, too bad. You will be working with the person directly across from you."

"Aww man, the whole reason I sat here was to get away from that person."

"I am sorry, but that is not my problem. Now, go change seats and work with each other."

The class moaned and groaned while they moved across the room. Blossom was about to move, until a figure appeared in front of her.

"Umm... hey, Blossom."

Blossom blushed. "Hi, Brick."

Brick sat down next to Blossom and took out his textbook.

"Okay, I guess we should get started." he said without looking at her.

"Yeah... so this chapter is about families and relationships, right?"

Brick nodded. "Yup. So I was thinking that maybe I could tell the word in Japanese and then you could translate it into English."

"Okay."

Brick opened his textbook and looked down at a page.

"What is ryoshin?"

Brick waited for Blossom's answer, but she didn't respond.

"Umm... Blossom?"

Blossom snapped out of her dream land and looked down.

"I'm sorry, but I was just curious about your hand."

Brick glanced down at his cast. "Oh, it's nothing."

"Nothing?!" Blossom exclaimed. She reached over and grabbed his hand. "You must have broken at least seven bones."

"Yeah... how did you know?"

"I can tell by the way they wrapped the cast." She got her finger and began to trace along Brick's arm and hand. "They started mid radius and ended around the middle phalanx, indicating that you must have broken some bones in your carpal area and in your fingers."

"Wow, you sure know a lot about bones."

"Yeah, I was always interested in the human body. I want to go to medical school and become a doctor."

"I'm pretty sure that you'll be the best doctor ever."

"Thank you, that's nice of you to say."

"No problem..."

Blossom looked down to see that she was still holding Brick's hand. Brick noticed too, then they slowly looked into each other's eyes.

Oh my god! What am I doing, thought Blossom. I can't believe I just reached over and grabbed Brick's hand. He probably thinks I'm a weirdo or something.

"It's okay Blossom. I don't mind."

She quickly looked down and buried her face into her hands.

"Oh, this is so embarrassing! You can read me like an open book."

"Well, yeah... but that's not necessarily a bad thing. It just means you're more in tune with your emotions."

Blossom looked up at Brick and smiled and then she noticed something.

"There's no signatures on your cast..."

Brick looked down at his cast again.

"Well, the thing is... I kinda wanted you to be the first to sign it."

She blinked in amazement.

"You waited the whole day just so I can be the first to sign it?"

"Well, yeah... is that okay?"

"Of course! It's just... I don't know what to say."

He reached down in his pocket and took out a permanent marker.

"How about yes."

Blossom gently took the marker form his hand and began her masterpiece.

"Hey, no peeking." she said playfully.

Brick quickly turned his head to the side and blushed.

"I'm sorry."

"I'm just going to warn you beforehand that I'm not as amazing at drawing like Bubbles is. So don't laugh."

Like I would ever do that, thought Brick.

A couple of seconds later, Blossom was finished. "Okay, you can take a look now."

Brick looked down to see an oddly shaped object placed in the middle of his cast. He tilted his head to the side and a confused expression appeared on his face.

"Is that a potato chip?"

Blossom looked down at her drawing and pouted. "It's supposed to be a cherry blossom."

Brick covered his face and started to laugh. He tried not to, but he couldn't help himself.

"Hey!" Blossom whined. "I told you not to laugh!"

"I'm sorry, but..." he paused for a second to continue laughing "I just don't see it."

"You just need to look at it from my perspective." She grabbed his hand and faced toward him. "Look! Do you see it now?"

"Well, I guess if you squint your eyes until they're barley open you can see it."

Blossom covered her mouth to try to hide her laughter. "You're so mean to me; I bet you can't do better."

"You're on." he replied with a smile.

He grabbed the marker and began drawing the exact same thing on her hand. When he was finished, Blossom took a look at it for herself.

"Are you kidding me? its looks exactly like mines!"

"Well, that's because I'm at a disadvantage. If I was able to draw with my right hand, it would be so better than yours."

"Yeah rig-"

Ms. Yorishima slapped a ruler against her desk. (again)

"Hey you two love birds. Do not act like I do not see you. Get back to work."

Blossom and Brick looked at each other and began to giggle quietly.

"Okay, we should get back to reviewing." said Blossom.

They grabbed their books and opened them to the page they were supposed to be on. An awkward silence passed until Brick finally said something.

"With all joking aside, I really do like it. It's very creative."

"Thank you. I'm glad you think so."

She closed her book and placed it on her lap.

"I think it's time to really test our knowledge."

"What do you have in mind?"

"We should have a conversation together using our vocabulary."

"That's a good idea. You start."

"Okay, I'll try to go slow."

She cleared her throat and began to speak, but something inside her made her hesitate. Even though they were just acting, she felt like the question she was going to ask was a very personal one, and she was afraid of the answer that she was going to receive.

"Boku no koto suki?" she asked quietly.

Brick swelled up with emotion as soon as he heard the question. He also knew that they were just pretending, but there was something in her voice that made it sound so sincere. The phase loosely translated to "Do you care about me?", and Brick was trying his hardest not to overreact to it. But his emotions were stronger that he expected and he had no choice but to let them pour out of him.

"Watashi ga okonau mochiron, anata ga utsukushiku, sumāto, soshite sainōda. Watashi wa anata ni tsuite no subete no jikan o kangaeru to watashi wa jibun jishin o seigyo suru koto wa dekimasen. Anata wa, watashi ga mainichi no tanoshimini shite hitodesu. Anata wa... Anata wa watashi o shiawaseni suru."

Brick panted heavily after he was done unleashing his tirade of love to Blossom, and Blossom just sat there completely astounded. Not knowing what to do or say, she quickly grabbed her book and flipped through the pages. Then she slowly glanced back at Brick.

"Umm.. I don't think that's in our book."

Brick stared at her, unable to speak. All the blood that was rushing to his face, made it redder that his lucky baseball cap he had on, and he never felt the urge of wanting to kill himself until this very moment. He just wanted this embarrassing ordeal to be over.

A moment later, he wish came true and the bell rang ending the school day. Blossom faced away to put her stuff away, and when she turned back, Brick was already gone.

Brick continued to run down the hallway, until he reached the safe vicinity of the band room. He slammed himself against a row of lockers and slid to the floor, looking angry and confused.

Mr. T heard the racket and went out of his office to check it out. He was kinda surprised to see Brick there.

"What's wrong with you?" he asked.

Brick took his head out of his arms and looked up at him.

"It's nothing..." he sighed.

"That's just fantastic... so since you're here, I was wondering if you could clean out the practice rooms, some freshmen left their food in there and I'm pretty sure there's a dead animal in there."

"Sure..."

"Good, now when you’re done with that you can sweep this nasty floor."

Blossom took her time walking to her locker today. A lot has happened in the last ten minutes and she needed time to think it through. She arrived at her locker and started to put her books in.

She was still wondering about what Brick said. He was speaking so fast that she didn't catch anything. Well, there was one word that stuck out to her. Utsukushi, which meant beautiful. She closed her locker and began to drift back into her dreamland.

Did Brick tell me I was beautiful, she asked herself.

Images of her and Brick emerged in her head, and then she remembered it clearly. She remembered how his eyes burned with intense compassion while he spoke his heart-felt words.

"Yes," she concluded. "I'm pretty sure he did! He thinks I'm beautiful!"

"You talking to yourself again Blossom?"

She turned around to find Marie and Lee standing beside her.

"Hey, girls."

"Remember when you sent me that text earlier?" Marie asked. "What was it that you wanted to talk about?"

Blossom faced away from the two and played with her fingers.

She wanted to tell Marie that she was quitting the whole color guard thing. She wanted to tell her that she didn't have the patient for it anymore. That she didn't have the strength or the willpower to carry on. But that was before. In the last fifth-teen minutes, she realized that she had strength and willpower right in front of her all along. It was a special force that was kind, loyal, and would never leave her behind. And that special force was no other than Brick. She couldn't believe that she had forgotten the whole reason that she wanted to be the Head Majorette in the first place. For the chance to be with the person she cared about, the person she cared about, the person who thought she was beautiful.

"Well," Marie said. "What was it?"

Blossom smiled at her and shook her head.

"It was nothing..."

"Well, okay then, let's go to the band room and get our equipment, then we can go to your house."

"Okay."

Blossom grabbed her bag and then the three went on their way.

Brick eventually picked himself off the floor. He sighed and went to the supply closet to get a broom and a couple of trash bags. He might as well get started on the cleaning. He had nothing else better to do. When he came back out, he saw Marie, Lee, and Blossom over by Mr. T's office. He quickly dropped the stuff from his hands and ninja rolled behind a set of tympani drums before Blossom could spot him.

Blossom heard the sound and turned around to investigate. "Did you guys hear that?"

"It's probably the rats; this school's crawling with them."

"Rats?!"

"It's not the rats, Lee. It's the giant cockroaches." Marie added.

"Oh my god, ew! I hate roaches!"

"Join the club."

Marie banged aggressively on Mr. T's door.

"I know this guy sees us... we're standing right here!"

Mr. T looked up from his newspaper, rolled his eyes and got up to answer the door.

"What do you want?"

"We want to borrow some flags, so give us the key to the guard room." said Marie.

"Fine." He reached in his pocket and threw Marie the key. "But if you lose them, you'll have to pay for them."

"Yeah, yeah, we know."

The three girls got their flags and left the band room while Brick stayed behind the drums, spying on them like a creeper. When he was sure they were gone, he gave a huge sigh of relief.

That was a close one, he thought.

He sat on the floor and buried his head in his arms again.

I was doing so good.

It was the longest conversation he ever had with Blossom. He couldn't believe that actually had the courage to go up and talk to her. He had to admit, it was a little awkward at first, but then she started it by talking about his cast (which reminded him; he had to break his bones more often). Then they really hit it off after that. He never realized that besides from being smart, Blossom was also funny, quirky, and even a bit weird. But he didn't mind, that just made him admire her even more.

But too bad he could never show his face around her anymore.

Brick got up from the floor, went the nearest wall and started repeatedly banging his head against it.

He couldn't believe that he said all of that stuff to Blossom. He knew it wasn't it wasn't in English, and she probably didn't understand him, but it was still embarrassing.

He replayed the scene over and over his head. He started at the part when Blossom asked the sudden question: Do you care about me?

He remembered it so clearly. How he was literary chocking on the tidal wave of emotions trying to come out of him, and how eventually the tidal waves broke down the levee of reasoning and common sense and flooded Blossom with his words.

He responded in Japanese, of course, but his translated response went a little something like this.

Of course I do, you are beautiful, smart, and talented. I think about you all the time and I can't control myself. You are the person I look forward to seeing every day. You... you make me so happy...

Ugh, I can't believe I said that! That must be like the corniest thing ever spoken, he thought.

He continued to strike his head against the wall, until he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"What are you trying to do, split your head open?"

"Oh, Mr. T... I... I"

"It's okay. You don't have to explain your teenage problems to me. I just don't want you hurting yourself again."

"You know about that?"

"The whole school knows about that. So, are you going to clean or what, I got to be somewhere at 3:30."

Brick reached over and picked up the broom off the floor.

"I'm going. I'm going."