"THANK YOU FOR THE FOOD!!" everyone grabbed a bowl and started eating dinner happily.

"Hey, if you two kept eating like that, you'll choke" Sugawara told Kageyama and Hinata, who were competing on who can eat most and fast.

"They're like wolves..." Ennoshita noted.

"Well, they are wolves..." Tsukishima corrected him. The duo heard him and gave him a glare before stuffing their mouths again.

"I think I'm gonna puke just by watching them..." Yamaguchi said, his face turning pale.

"Don't focus on those two. Focus on the food in front of you" Sugawara advised him.

"Seconds!!" Tanaka and Nishinoya both said again, holding out their empty bowls for their manager to fill. Shimizu shook her head and pointed Ayame "Sorry, it's all gone. Why don't you go to Ayame-chan? There's some food left there"

"Ayame-chan, seconds please!!" they said. Ayame smiled and give them two scoops of rice and extra spicy pork curry. The two were oblivious about it and when they took a bite, fire erupted from their mouths like dragons.

"HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!!!!!" the second year duo ran around, looking for water. Sugawara gave them a glass each and quickly drank it, refilling the glass until the hotness subsided. Ayame sat next to Yamaguchi and ate the same curry she gave them and ate in content. The freckled teen and the tall blonde stared at her in disbelief.

"Ayame, you just ate an extra spicy curry" Tsukishima told her. Ayame looked at them and ate another spoonful "So? I like spicy food..."

That's a first...

The players stared at her, not believing that she, a soft spoken and gentle girl, would like spicy foods.

"What?" she asked.

"Nothing..." they looked away and shook their heads.

She continued eating with sparkly backgrounds and she's smiling happily.

"So delicious~!"

Something's off...

She's smiling yet...there's something different about her eyes. Not the eye colour but there is a hint of sadness and fear in it...or was it just his imagination? He really liked to see her smile and happy, though something tells him that she's carrying something inside her. A burden perhaps? Who knows?

"Everyone, the bathroom's upstairs if you want to take a bath. First years will go first, followed by the second years and then the third years" Takeda-sensei told them.

"Right!"

After dinner, the first years went to their rooms to prepare their futons. Ayame couldn't decide where and who she will sleep next to. "Waah~! This is almost like a sleepover! Too bad Shimizu-san is not staying..."

"Confused?" Tsukishima told her. She nodded and the megane thought hard for a few seconds and spoke "You sleep between Yamaguchi and Hinata, then"

Yamaguchi overheard their conversation and his face exploded in a dark shade of red "Oh man...Ayame's sleeping next to me...a girl will be sleeping next to me..."

"I guess..." she said, placing her futon next to Yamaguchi's. The girl noticed that the freckled teen is not moving and his face is red as a tomato "Tadashi-kun, are you all right?" she asked him, placing a hand on his face "Are you sick?"

Yamaguchi flinched at the contact and stuttered "Y-yes, I-I'm fine, A-Ayame!"

"Daichi-san will kill me..." he gulped.

*flashback*

"Oi, Hinata, Kageyama, Tsukishima, Yamaguchi, come here. We need to talk" Daichi called them. After they went outside, the captain looked at them seriously, making the four feel a little uncomfortable.

"You guys are in the same room with Ayame-chan, right?" he asked.

"Uh...yes, captain" Hinata told him. Daichi looked at them again and he told them in a serious voice "It's a good thing the some of you are simpleton idiots...Well, you all probably know what will happen if you cross the line, right? If you know what I mean..."

"Y-yes!" Yamaguchi nodded fearfully. Kageyama and Hinata were scared by Daichi's dark aura and they nodded, though they didn't know what he meant by "crossing the line" part.

"...yes" Tsukishima answered monotonously, though he was unnerved by the captain.

The captain patted their heads a little too roughly while smiling as a warning.

*end*

"Tsukki, Daichi-san will kill me..." Yamaguchi told him. Tsukishima deadpanned on his nervousness "Calm down, Yamaguchi. You're overreacting...Daichi-san won't do something like that. You just slept next to Ayame, what's the harm?"

"Eh...oh, right..." he sheepishly answered.

"Unless you wanted me to sleep next to her instead?" the tall blonde smirked. Yamaguchi quickly shook his head, indicating that he's fine sleeping next to the girl.

"Eh? Where did Shoyo-kun ran off to?" Ayame asked "He said that he's going in first..."

"He went downstairs. He kept saying that there's someone other than us who is here..." Yamaguchi told her.

"A ghost?"

"Knowing Hinata, that's what he probably thought..." Tsukishima added "You go take a bath first, Ayame" The girl sighed and went in the bathroom first. After a nice long bath, her stomach rumbled. "That's strange...I'm pretty sure I ate a lot during dinner...Oh well, time to head to the kitchen"

She wore her white shirt and pants and covered the towel around herself and marched toward the kitchen. "They wouldn't mind if I ate some midnight snacks..."

She rummaged the refrigerator's contents and she stopped as she saw the most delicious food in the whole world (to her).

Chocolate cake...

She drooled at the sight and she was about to lunge at the plate when something caught her eye. There was a note attached on the plate. Curiously, she picked it up and read:

Ayame-chan, I bought you some chocolate cake for you to eat as thanks for helping me earlier in the kitchen. Sawamura told me how much you love chocolates so I bought you one. Enjoy the food. -Shimizu

"Thanks, Shimizu-san" she thought. She quickly ate the cake without leaving a single crumb on the plate. Satisfied, she quietly tried to return back to her room when she heard a commotion in the hall.