I guess I really have this fetish for Lilly hating running

“I think this is a bad idea, Hisao,” Lilly said without any mirth.

He rubbed the back of his head, yawning.  “Yes...well...Emi felt bad about asking you for study help, so, she wanted to return the favor.  It's the perfect trade!”

“Normally, someone offers something desirable in exchange for a service, not a form of tor-” She stopped.

Hisao glanced about and saw Emi jogging up before he heard her.

“Good morning, Hisao, Lilly!” She grinned.  “Hisao, can you show your girlfriend the stretches I showed you yesterday?”

The boy, to his credit, did not stammer even though he flushed red enough that Lilly probably would be able to feel the increase in heat coming off of him.  It was only the end of his first week here, and he was already the laughingstock of two different girls.

Lilly was hot, of course, but...he had known her for all of a few days now!

“There's no problem there, Emi.  I'm familiar with stretching from swimming.”

Of course, she didn't see the disappointment and relief that appeared on Hisao's face, but Emi smiled and elbowed him as she said, “okay, once we're all stretched, a quick warm up jog around the track and then four laps.”

“Emi, you seem to have forgotten something,” Lilly said with a neutral voice but a polite smile, “I can't see the track.”

“Oh, right!  Wait here, finish stretching, I'll get it!”

“Get what?” Hisao asked as she ran off.

“Darn it,” Lilly murmured.

“What is she getting?”

“Probably a running tether.” She sighed.  “I was hoping she wouldn't know about that.”

“Oh, it's a tether so you can follow someone else without holding onto them, right?”

“Yes.  You may not know this, Hisao, but without a visual reference, people tend to start drifting to the left or right.”  Another sigh.  “It's all rather bothersome, and we wouldn't be here if she hadn't twisted your arm.”

“Sorry, sorry.  It's only a week.  Maybe you'll-”

Lilly gave him such a look that he knew continuing this line of discussion would end him.

“Right.  It's only a week,” he agreed with a chuckle.

Emi came back with a bright red leash.  “Basically, just cinch this tight around your wrists, and...boom.  No problem running.”

Lilly put it on her right arm, Hisao on his left.

“All stretched?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“Yes.”

“All right.  Remember, five laps, one to warm up, four to finish off.  Let's go!”

Hisao started at a leisurely pace, thankful that Lilly seemed to have the same thing in mind.

Emi jogged backwards.  “Lap one's almost done guys.  Get ready to turn up the heat!”

“Yeah right,” the blind one murmured just quietly enough that Hisao nearly missed it.

Nonetheless, he took Emi's declaration as a challenge.  When lap two began, he sped up.  He never felt the tether go taut, but when he glanced back he saw two unseeing but all glaring blue eyes.

Last time he started to tire out around the second lap, that must be why Emi added a warm up lap.

He kept on.

He was not about to let Emi pull ahead without a fight, and he wasn't going to let Lilly's misgivings stop her from succeeding here.

The third lap started in no time, and he was almost feeling decent then.

“Still going?” He noticed Emi grinning back at him.

He was panting when he said, “wouldn't want you to think I'm out of shape.”

Lilly was silent, focused on her breathing.

Emi laughed and sped up.

And Hisao did his best to match her, even as he felt the tether go taut.

“Come on,” he said mostly to himself, but he hoped Lilly wouldn't give in right now.

Despite the burning of his lungs, the fact he had to run with one arm extended backwards, and the fact that his legs were trying to quit on him, he persevered.  He couldn't give up.  It'd be a loss for the both of them.

He was sure Lilly might ask something like, “when did this become a race, Hisao?”

Did she just say that out loud?  She was starting to gain speed, so she couldn't be complaining too much...

He turned back to look and all of a sudden, the air slipped from his lungs in a painful gasp.  He crumpled, one hand trying to come to his chest but restrained by the tether as the other thrust out to stop his face from smashing into the track.

Lilly screamed as she fell with him.

Emi whirled around and her eyes widened.

“Hisao!” In a flash, she was there.  “What's wrong?”

It bothered his pride, even now, that he was obviously the one with the problem even though Lilly was on the ground too.

He groaned and tried to say that everything was fine, but it took all of his effort to fight to keep his breathing steady.  Calm did not come easy in a time like this, but he knew the difference between calm and panic was life and death.

“Emi, he needs a nurse,” Lilly said with a grunt, forcing herself off of the ground.

Hisao shut his eyes, trying to banish the outside world.  His heart slowly struggled to regain its rhythm and, at last, the pain faded away.

They helped him to his feet before he could say anything else.

“Come on, it's okay,” Emi said in a voice that didn't know if everything was okay.  With two women trying to hold him steady, he could not quite help but be guided along.

He held on to his objections.  They were worthless now, anyway.

It wasn't much later when they were in the nurse's office.  Emi practically kicked the door in.

“Good morning, sunshine, what's up?” the Nurse said with his best coffee fueled smile.  “Oh...Hisao, Miss Satou, good morning.  What's brought you all here so early?”

“We were running and then he stumbled over and so did Lilly and I thought they just tripped over each other but then Lilly said he needed to see a nurse and we-”

“Easy there, Emi, calm down.” He frowned.  “Hisao, what happened?”

“I don't know.  We were running, and then my chest started hurting like that time before, but it went away after a few seconds,” he answered, but couldn't hold out from adding, “it was just a flutter, or something.”

“Just a flutter?” Lilly said out loud as the Nurse's frown dipped lower.

“I didn't mean quite this when I suggested to get some exercise.  You've got to be more careful, Hisao.”

“I was being careful, I just...” The response fell flat before he could think of a way that any of his actions proved that his brain was getting adequate blood flow.

“You just what?”

He began to stammer.  He looked to Lilly and realized that she didn't have much help for him, and finally blurted out, “we were racing Emi!”

“Emi, is this true?”

All of a sudden, she looked more like a kindergartner with her hand in the cookie jar.

She finally gave in to nodding after words failed her, a sheepish smile on her face.

The nurse sighed and rubbed his forehead.

“Emi, you've got to be more sensitive to the limits of others!” He sighed and rubbed his forehead.  “I don't know if he told either of you, but Hisao has a bad heart, and getting him to race you was incredibly irresponsible.  And for future reference, Hisao, if you're running guide for a visually impaired person, they set the pace, not you, so unless Miss Satou started the race, you're both shaping up to be idiots.”

The label fit him rather nicely, he decided, as he looked away.

“Okay.  Rant over, for now.  Get that tether off so I can make sure your heart isn't going to explode or something.”

Hisao dutifully followed him to the next room where the Nurse declared him fit to continue living, though perhaps not sensible enough.

“So how does it feel?”

“I don't know.  Nothing much.  Tired, but it might just be from the exercise.”

“You should stay here for a few hours and rest, and we'll see how you feel after that.”

Hisao was in no shape to object.

Lilly came in a moment later.

“Lilly, I am so sorry,” he said as he heard the door shut hard behind her.  A moment later, she sat down on the bed to his left.

“You should be.  Half the time, I was ready to trip, and then you fall over and drag me down too.” She didn't need to raise her voice, really.  The look on her face showed enough offense to make up for her lack of shouting.  “And if I knew that this could be dangerous for you, I would have put a stop to it right away.”

“I know.  I...I got caught up in the moment.” He rubbed the back of his head.

“Well, so did I,” she said, with some intensity, before sighing, “seeing you putting in so much effort almost made me feel like I would let you down if I held back.”

He tried to think of a safe subject to angle the conversation toward.  “You're...not hurt, are you?”

“Nothing more than a couple bruises.  The Nurse assured us you were all right, as well...though I could I'm sure he's saying nothing nice to Emi in there.” Lilly let the conversation hang for a moment before saying, “she'll always be like that, not thinking of others until someone is pushed a little too far and something goes wrong, but you have to know that she didn't mean it.”

“Well, I'll be thinking with more than just the part of me that wants to race next time.  I'm not going to stop running unless the Nurse says to.”

Lilly let out a little gasp, followed by an amused, “my, my.”

A thoroughly miserable Emi stepped into the room.

“Look, I'm really, really sorry.  I should have been more careful.”

“Hey, you didn't know, it wasn't your fault.”

“Well, not just for you, though mostly for you.  I should have taken the guide role for Lilly, since I know how to be a guide.”

Hisao felt his heart sink as his reassurances bounced off of the armor of her guilt.

“I want to make it up to the two of you.” She nodded with force.  “So you have to come to lunch with me.”

“I'll bring it for you, okay?  Something really really good!”

Ultimately, he couldn't say a word to defy her.

Lilly only said, “that would be nice, Emi.”

There was an edge to her voice, but Hisao could see the smile on her face.  Apparently the way to Lilly's good graces was through her stomach?

“We meet on the roof.”

“The roof?”

“Yep!  The weather's nice, and the roof's a good spot for lunch.  Lilly can show you where!” With that, she turned and gave a wave.  “Bye guys, see you at lunch!”

Lilly only dared to sigh after she left and the door to the infirmary shut.

She stood up and leaned over to him, speaking softly, “it'll never stop aggravating me, just when I want to forget myself and hate that girl, she does something to pull me back in.”

He looked from left to right, wondering if he was supposed to respond to that in a particular way. “...I'll meet you at the stairs to the roof, then?”

“That would be a good idea.  We still have six more days to run with her, so you better not burn any bridges.”

“I wouldn't think of it,” he said, having a feeling that he'd burn more than a few before his graduation.

And as she carefully stepped out of the room, he laid back and let fatigue roll over him...