014: Training - Thomas and Noritaka Joint Post

Noritaka Ashida’s life had been ruined because a couple of the lads had
spent much of their time on the Easter Break tucking down hamburgers, ice cream and
bucket-sized containers of soft drinks, and none of it following the strict exercise regime designed to keep them in shape. Every student who wanted to do the advanced training programme had to undergo regular medical and fitness tests and both boys failed spectacularly.
As a group the ATP mentors and training instructors put their heads together and decided that all of those in training needed a sharp reminder about the importance of keeping fit. The reminder would take the form of a three-day hike across the Adirondacks near Esther Mountain. It would be led by the notorious Mr Baer. All their instructors were tough, but
Baer was the worst because he got a huge kick out of making kids suffer.
The nine red, orange and yellow shirts were dumped off the back of a truck just after sun-up, and Baer gleefully announced that they each had to carry a ten-kilogram metal weight,
on top of the tents, utensils, drinking water and clothing already crammed inside their packs.
Hot drinks and porridge were to be served ninety minutes later at a meeting point fifteen kilometres away, and those who didn't make it would go hungry until the evening.
Nori made it in time for breakfast, but that had been the high point of her day. It was dark now, and she lay inside a two-person tent with swollen ankles and red welts where her pack had chafed her shoulders. She watched the sleeping bag of her best friend, Angelica
Jones, swelling and dipping as she breathed.
“Angie?” Nori whispered, as she reached across and gave her companion a gentle nudge.
Angelica didn't stir, so Nori decided that it was safe to wriggle out of her sleeping bag. She had kept her jeans on, so she only had to slip her unlaced boots over her socks before she crawled up to the zipper holding the tent flaps together and opened it slowly to keep down the noise.
The full moon gave Nori enough light to see by as she crept between two rows of tents and into a cluster of trees at the edge of the field.
“Tom," Nori whispered. "Are you out there?”
The skinny sixteen-year-old called softly back in his thick Welsh accent. ‘Over here.'
Nori smiled as she sighted Tom, sitting with his back against a tree trunk. "How's it going?"
'Been better,’ Tom said, as he ran a grubby hand through his tangled hair. ‘Twisted my frigging ankle when we crossed that lake and my back is killing me. You?’
'About the same,’ Nori said, giving a resigned shrug as she sat in the grass and snuggled up beside Tom.
'How come you're so late?’
“Angelica. I thought she was never gonna fall asleep.”
The pair turned to face each other and exchanged a quick kiss.
'Is that all I get?’ Tom asked indignantly.
“You smell like BO and you've got dried-up pasta sauce around your mouth.”
Tom tutted. “Well Baer had us walking and running for like, twelve hours. You're no pot-pourri yourself.”
Nori gave some thought to this before leaning in again and giving Tom a much longer kiss.
'You know,’ Tom said when they broke off, 'I've been thinking.'
“Riiiight," Nori grinned. "That explains the clanking noise could hear when you and Johnny were walking in front of me earlier.”
'Seriously,’ Tom said, he was a touch irritated. ‘We've been sneaking around behind everyone's backs for ages now. I reckon it's time we went public.'
Nori scowled at the grass between her legs and let out a deep groan.
“If I'd known you were gonna start on that again I would have stayed in my tent.”
'I want a normal girlfriend. This is driving me nuts.'
Nori grabbed hold of a branch and hauled herself off the ground. “Goodnight, Thomas.”
'Don't be like that,’ Tom said, as he reached out and grabbed Noritaka’s trouser leg.
“Let go or I'll kick you one.”
‘You're doing my head in, Nori.'
“I like it the way it is. I don't want the pressure of everyone talking about us, and making snide remarks and asking what's going on all the time.”
'You're so full of crap,’ Tom snorted. ‘You're just scared that cow Angelica will take the mickey. It's totally immature.'
'Hey,’ Nori snarled, raising her voice above whisper for the first time. ‘I'm not immature. Angie is my best friend. Now let go of my bloody trousers.”
“You'll have to tell her that you've got a boyfriend sooner or later,’ Tom said, as he defiantly tightened his grip and tugged Nori towards him. ‘I mean, she'll get upset if you don't invite her to your wedding and she's bound to suspect something when you start knocking out kids.’
"What makes you think I'll ever be getting married?"
'I spent all day looking forward to meeting up with you,’ Tom said, as he gave up the struggle and let Nori go. ‘But you know what? I'm sick of this. It's pathetic.'
Tom letting go coincided with an almighty tug from Noritaka and the sudden lack of resistance caught her by surprise. She took an awkward stumble, tripped over a tree root and ended up clattering into the low slung branches of a neighbouring tree.
“Moron," Nori growled in Japanese.
'This was totally worth losing an hour's sleep over,’ Tom said caustically.
As he stood up, he grabbed a golden object a from the pocket of his fleece and threw it at Nori.
“What's that?” Nori asked, as she picked it off the ground between her boots.
‘Mint Twix bar, limited edition. The one you're totally addicted to.’
Mr Baer had given the students strict instructions not to bring extra food or items that weren't on the equipment list.
“Baer would have made you exercise till you puked if he'd caught you with this," Nori said. She tried to keep up her grouchy tone, but couldn't help letting a rush of warm emotion into her voice.
‘I know,’ Tom said, trying to make out that he couldn't care less.
Nori was totally flattered that Tom had taken a huge risk, just so that he could give her a gift. Tom cared about her and why the hell was she ashamed of that?
She stepped back towards Tom and gave him a big hug followed by a theatrical smooch on the cheek.
“Sometimes...” Nori smirked, but was unable to finish her thought. “I want to ask you something?”
Tom smiled in the dark as he felt the tension move from her. ‘Ask me anything.’
“Have you ever dated a boy?”
Thomas had grown up in a very LGBTQ environment having two mums and two dads, with the mums as a couple and the dads as one too. ‘I’ve kissed a couple of guys. Just experimenting you know. Why?’
“Would you want a boyfriend?”
‘Not really thought about it,’ he said, ‘I got you.’
“What if the boyfriend was me?” Nori said, trying to find Tom’s eyes in the moonlight.
There was a silence that hung between them.
‘Has your mutation changed you?’ he asked tentatively. Noritaka had always been a tough girl, ballsy Thomas had called it, but she wasn’t the only girl who was a tough nut on campus.
Her mutation had nothing to do with it, and over the next half hour Noritaka Ashida explained how she had always felt like she was in the wrong gender of body. Thomas listened and asked a few stuttering questions that he tried to phrase as appropriately as he could. Noritaka could see he was being as diplomatic as he could be and appreciated it.
“I don’t need an answer now Tom, and I understand if you don’t want to date me anymore.”
‘Is this the reason you didn’t want to go public Nori?’ he asked brushing fingers through her close cut hair.
He saw the nod in the pale light.
‘You muppet. I got four gay parents. And if you want to be a boy I am okay with that. It’s you I like, boy, girl or whatever.’
Nori hugged him close and Tom thought she was never going to let go.

Noritaka