Haikyuu!! Tobio's Girl. Chapter 4

It was class. It was quiet. You could hear the teacher scribbling the equation on the blackboard. Reina heard Sawako's snarky laughter, and she knew they were talking about her again.

It was all because she talked with Kobayashi-senpai in the cafeteria yesterday.

Of course, when she noticed him laughing with his friends, she tried to catch his attention in the most casual way possible. Every girl would. But he caught her completely off guard when he smiled widely and rushed over to her.

"I finally found you!" he said.

"Who? Me?!" She said, looking around. She dropped her wallet and forgot to pick it up. She couldn't quite believe this was happening.

"Yes. You're Takenaka-chan, right?" He picked up her things and put them in her hand. Contrary to her, he wasn't nervous at all.

"Mhm. Yes. That's me." She nodded her head eagerly.

"Well, don't you have something you should give me?"

"I don't know..." She got worried. Was it some kind of pickup line, she should know how to respond to? She wanted to make a good impression. "What do you mean?"

"The pictures. Don't you remember you took our pictures at the match last time? I want to see them."

"Oh, but I don't have them with me," she said with concern.

"Of course, you don't. Although I'd be flattered if you'd carry a picture of me at all times." He said, looking at her in a way that would make every girl in school jealous. Then he smiled cheerfully. "Just kidding... But I'd love to have them. I cherish such memories a lot." He took out his phone.

Reina got excited. She didn't have any boy's phone number yet.

"Do you think we could—" he started but didn't have a chance to finish.

"Oi, Kobayashi. Stop your flirting, and let's go," one of his friends called him.

"Oh, sorry. I need to go now. But I'll find you again." He said with a wink.

"Um... Yeah... Sure." She smiled nervously.

He waved at her and went to his friends.

That was their whole exchange. But it was enough for other girls to act colder toward her and talk behind her back.

She didn't care. Not at the moment, at least. To think that the most popular guy in school noticed her! Finally, something was starting. She just wished she could be more refined and witty around him instead of forgetting how to speak. Although weren't all the heroines in her favorite mangas clumsy and shy? Guys supposedly don't like girls that are too smart and confident. Maybe she did well. But she blew a chance to get his number...

She must have looked distracted, with her silly smile, because the teacher called her to solve the problem on the blackboard. Apparently, he did call her twice.

"Are you ok, Takenaka? If you need to go to the nurse—"

"I'm fine!" She stood up and examined the blackboard as she was approaching. She didn't listen during class, but she understood the equation itself. She quickly finished the calculations. The teacher praised her.

When she was returning to her desk, she realized Kageyama was looking at her. She was surprised. She didn't feel noticed by him often. Although it wasn't with a smile, his expression was tortured.

Oh, boy. He's really on alert with me being sick. My reluctant guardian. It stung her when she remembered what he said to Shimizu-senpai.

Reina tried to dismiss it, believing he would stop soon. But he was staring at her the whole morning.

At lunch, she was sitting alone. The only girl who normally talked with her was Eri, but she went to see someone in another class. It was a bit weird to spend lunch break alone. She was pretending to look at her phone when Kageyama suddenly appeared in front of her.

"Takenaka-san, I want to ask you something."

"Eee... sure."

" You are good with science, right?"

"You could say so." Did Kageyama only now notice that she was a go-to student for their science teacher whenever no one else could manage?

" And in English, too?"

"I'd better be. You know I was raised abroad for most of my life, a lot of it in the UK." Well, at least most of their classmates knew about it. She wasn't so sure about Kageyama.

"Then... Please help me study." Kageyama said formally, with a bow. "I'll give you this drink in return." He put a cartoon on her desk. This time it was strawberry milk. Cute.

"Ok... What do you not understand?"

"What do you think I need to pass the exam?" Kageyama put the science textbook on her desk, pulled a chair, and sat next to her.

"Let's see." She looked through her sparsely filled notebook. She didn't need to make many notes in class. She got the material covered anyway. But she did write down what the teacher foreshadowed for the exam.

"Mechanics, dynamics, movement, forces... Those are not that complicated. Do you..." Reina looked at Kageyama and saw a clueless expression. "Do you need me to teach you those?" She felt a small sense of superiority over him.

"Yes, please."

"Ok, Newton is basic. You must know that. What's next..." Reina flipped the pages of the textbook "...projectile motion. When you hit an object with force, near Earth's surface, mind you, it will go in a parabola like this." She moved her finger through the air. "The gravity accelerates it and points it down. You can use that to aim missiles and such. Here are the equations, now... V is starting velocity, g is Earth's gravitation... here you have the angle, but to calculate the time, you need a different equation, it's here."

"Do I need to remember all of these equations just to pass the exam?" Kageyama said, with distress on his face.

" Well, remember and be able to use them. Kageyama-kun, did you come to me, because you want to understand this? Or do you somehow want to get a passing grade?"

"I need it."

"Why?"

"Because otherwise I'll need to go to make-up exams, and I'll miss away games in Tokyo."

"Wow, you seriously only care about volleyball, don't you? You don't care about school at all." Reina then reflected she didn't care much about grades either. She shouldn't judge him.

"Can you please help me? Or not?"

"Ok. Let's ... hmm..." She looked at the textbook and then at Kageyama. "I don't know that much about volleyball. But, let's say... the serve. Kageyama-kun, you jump up when you serve. Why? Why is it better than standing?"

"Isn't that obvious? The impact point is higher. The ball goes a shorter way, in a straighter line, and reaches the other side faster," Kageyama answered.

"Exactly! Let's draw this. Here's the point of impact... here's the net... How high is the net?"

"2,43m"

"So you need to put the ball this high. When you change the initial point of impact, the whole thing changes. And to calculate that, you use this one."

"Initial height, angle... ok I get it, and gravity makes it faster. That's easy, actually. And what about the spin?"

"Eee... what?"

"When you put a topspin, it goes faster down."

"That will have to do with aerodynamics, I guess. Spinning makes the air around the ball move faster, and the air pressure changes. But we will have aerodynamics," she looked around the textbook, "sometime next semester, probably. You need this stuff now. So let's simplify a bit. Now calculate the speed for me..."

They worked for a while. Kageyama was now solving the problems with ease.

Then, Hinata entered their classroom.

"Oi, Kageyama. There you are! And Takenaka-san, we came to find you. Why are the two of you sitting together?!"

Reina saw that Hinata had brought with him a scared tiny girl.

"Hello, I'm Yachi Hitooka. I'm the new manager of the volleyball team," the girl said.

"Oh, hello. I'm Takenaka Reina." So they had found a new manager already. Reina remembered their conversation from a few weeks before and felt slightly bothered. And why did they come to see her? "Nice to meet you. I hope you do great on the team."

"Actually, I'm making a poster, and I wanted to ask for a favor. I heard you made a lot of pictures last tournament. Do you have any with a more general view of the match? If so, can you please share them with me?"

"I'll need to check. I can share them with you if you give me your e-mail."

"Kageyama! Why are you doing those so quickly? When did you learn that?!" Hinata was looking at Kageyama with disbelief.

"It's basic. You should learn that too. Look, if you hit the ball with such strength, you can calculate the speed with this."

"I don't get it." Hinata's eyes looked dizzy.

"I do," Yachi said, looking at the numbers and drawings. "But this is amazing. I never thought to use it like that. I've always viewed equations as abstract. How did you come up with this?"

"Well... it's because of my dad. He's a scientist. He's not the greatest when it comes to fairytales, so stuff like that was his idea of a bedtime story. You know, the world through numbers." Reina explained.

"Wow, that's impressive. I'm surprised you're not in an advanced class." Yachi said.

Reina hesitated. Telling that she didn't care about studying seemed cheeky. And using the excuse of her previous health problems was something she didn't want to do anymore.

Luckily, the bell rang.

"Oh, we need to go back. It was nice to meet you." Yachi and Hinata left the classroom. Kageyama went back to his desk, still looking at his notes. Social study class started. Reina found herself drawing volleyballs and courts all over her notebook, scribbling equations, and remembering how much fun she had at the match. At the end of the school day, she suddenly remembered about senpai. She rushed to the lockers, hoping to meet him after class. What if we went home together?!

Kageyama called after her.

"What's up?" She stopped to talk with him. "Is there something you don't understand again?"

"Actually, I wanted to ask you... Can you help me study other things? You explain it well. And the exams are so soon."

"Well, they're next week. And it's Friday."

"I know it's much to ask, but can you find some time tomorrow? I'll buy you yogurt for a week! Or do you prefer milk?"

"Hold off the dairy." Reina laughed. "Ok, I'll try to help you. What time can we start tomorrow? And where can we meet? Somewhere downtown?"

"I have practice in the morning. Then I'd need to go home and change..."

"Shouldn't you concentrate on studying now instead of practice?" She looked at Kageyama's confused expression. "Never mind, actually, don't you live nearby me somewhere? I saw you running the other evening. I live in _"

"My house is_"

"So it's like one bus stop, right? I can just come over to your house in time you're ready. I'll give you my phone number and email, so let me know tomorrow when you finish practice. I think that way it'll be the most efficient." Reina didn't give a second thought to it and took out her phone.

"Ok, I got it." Kageyama saved her number. "I need to go to practice now."

"So see you tomorrow. And please text me what you're struggling with the most."

"Osu," Kageyama said and went away. Reina rushed home to devise how to connect their entire curriculum to volleyball.