Peer Pressure

By Ju

"You have to be more confident, Oishi."

"Yeah, seize the initiative, Oishi-sempai!"

"Maybe you should take it slowly; you wouldn’t want to put too much pressure on him–”

“No way, Taka-san!  You have to do it fast, knock him out before he realises what’s happening!”

“Momo, I don’t think knocking him out would be such a good idea.  It sounds an awful lot like date rape.”

“Agreed.  If you knock him out, Oishi, there’s a seventy percent probability that he won’t speak to you the next day.”

“But Inui-sempai–”

“Idiots who don’t know anything should shut up.”

“Is that why you’re not saying anything, mamushi?”

“Kaidou-sempai’s right, Momo-sempai.”

“Echizen, you’re siding with him now?!”

“Really, Oishi, I don’t think you should feel forced to take the relationship further than you want to right now.  And putting pressure on him would also be–”

“But Taka-san, they’ve already been together for how long?”

“Don’t say it like that, Fujiko-chan–”

“WHAT DID YOU SAY, YOU STUPID MAMUSHI?!”

“Geez, Momo-sempai… did you have to yell in my ear like that?”

“You scream like a girl.  Dunk smash idiot.”

“Now, Kaidou; play nice with the other kids.”

“Fuji, don’t tease the animals.  There’s a ninety-one percent chance that Momoshiro will pick up his racquet and actually attack Kaidou with it.”

“…Oishi-sempai.  You should just do it.  If you want to.”

Oishi stared, somewhat glassy-eyed, at the semi-circle his teammates formed before him.  Fuji was smiling, Kawamura looked concerned, Momo was red-faced and livid, Inui was holding him back, Kaidou was glaring, and Echizen appeared distinctly uninterested despite his last comment.  Further away sat Tezuka, who had remained silent throughout the commotion and was now looking very, very pained.

“Hoi hoi, what’s going on here?  There’s a team meeting and nobody told me about it?  No fair!”

Oishi glanced around at the faces that were all turned expectantly towards him, and sighed inwardly.  Then he walked over to Eiji and kissed him.

~ fin