The Friend Zone

By Bunny

Rated: T

Summary: Nothing is interesting if you're not interested, and Ryoma has always found Sakuno to be interesting. Recently, she has him thinking about her to the point of distraction, which leads to a series of failed attempts to get her attention back to where it's always belonged. On him.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION ON THIS FIC:

This is the story I wrote for the 2013 Summer RyoSaku Express Fandom Exchange hosted by neko11lover. Below is my request prompt:

For OrangeAce

Canon Knowledge: Anime only

What you want to receive: Fic

Prompt: Nothing is interesting if you're not interested

What you want to see: Coming-of-age, Ryoma sees Sakuno in a new light, mixture of humor and drama, family, Nanjiroh's appearance, failed attempts

What you don't want to see: OOCness. That is all.

Chapter One

Echizen Ryoma couldn't believe it.

How had this possibly happened? When had things changed? How had he missed the signs? Had there not been any? Had it happened overnight? Hadn't he been obvious enough?

Was it possible she was really that stupid? Or had she simply changed her mind?

The idea of it was really so fresh, so new, so shocking, he was still wrapping his mind around it but...there was no mistaking it. The way Ryuzaki Sakuno had started talking to him left no doubt...

He was in THE FRIEND ZONE.

How in the world did he end up in her friend zone? It was truly a mystery. See...Ryuzaki and him...they had always, always, always been anything but friends. The day they met they'd been anything but friends. She'd always liked him, and the feeling had been completely mutual.

Of course, when they'd first met, they'd only been twelve. So naturally, not much had really come of it, and over the past few years things hadn't really changed.

Ryoma thought that they had both been perfectly content with the way things were. That is, there were obvious signs of their mutual attraction, but neither of them had pursued more than some simple flirting, walks home, and the regular exchanging of gifts for important things like birthdays and holidays.

It had been great. It had been comfortable. It had given him stability. She was something he could rely on in his life. They were as together as they could be without actually saying anything about being together or doing anything really romantic. It allowed him to keep his focus where it should be...on tennis.

He was a simple guy. He liked his life simple. There was tennis and there was everything else that he had to do that wasn't tennis. Included in that everything else was girls. One day he would want a girl of his own. He was lucky enough to meet that girl when he was twelve, and they had an understanding.

An understanding that when the time came...you know...when they grew up...they would be together. It was a given that they would be together. It made sense. It was nice and simple. It was just the way he liked everything in his life that wasn't tennis. When he decided he wanted to step things up, Ryuzaki was waiting for him. It would be nice and easy.

Or so he'd thought.

Then this morning, everything had fallen apart. He was still pissed off about it. How could she do this to him? What had he ever done to deserve this...this...great insult from her? Who gave her permission to put him in the friend zone? THE FRIEND ZONE!

His day had started out a little worse than any other day started out. He woke up groggy. He was really not a morning person, but this was worse than usual. Had he not slept well? Did he eat something funny before bed? He couldn't remember, everything was so foggy.

After slugging his way through his morning routine, he'd plopped into his chair at the breakfast table, "Western breakfast again?"

"I swear Ryoma, we should just stop feeding you," His mother snapped back.

Ryoma frowned. What the hell was her problem? He rarely complained about his food these days. Nothing like he had when he'd been younger. Usually his mom just brushed his comments about it off. So why was she being so snappy about it today? Wasn't he allowed to voice his opinion every once in awhile? They knew his food preferences, but somehow they still had western food more often than not. So of course he still felt the need to reinforce his unchanged opinion every once in awhile. Especially when he was having a bad morning.

Apparently, he just wasn't the only one grouchy this morning. How annoying.

A minute later a steaming plate of food was placed in front of him, and Ryoma dug into his eggs and bacon without any further ado. It was just not worth complaining about it any more. So troublesome.

"So how's your little girlfriend doing? We haven't seen her in a while," his father opened with as he took a sip of his coffee. He had his usual monk outfit on and was glossing over a newspaper. Ryoma would bet his left arm his father was just using the newspaper to hide whatever pervy pictures his old man was really looking at.

Ryoma barely glanced in the direction of his father as he irritably muttered his usual reply to such an inquiry, "I don't have a girlfriend."

"What's this all about? Did you guys break up? Do I need to call the Old Hag and apologize for having such a worthless son?"

Ryoma barely restrained himself from growling with annoyance. Why did his old man always have to bring up crap like this when he was obviously having a bad morning? It was such a pain. Not to mention he still had no idea where his old man had gotten the idea in his head that Ryuzaki was his girlfriend in the first place. If he wasn't so over it after years of her being referred to as such, he would be annoyed about that too. In fact...he was feeling a bit annoyed about it anyway...because whatever was or was not going on between Ryuzaki and himself was certainly not any of his dirty old man's business.

He looked up from his eggs and bacon and gave his old man a knowing smirk, "I doubt Coach will be happy to hear you want to leer at her granddaughter. OUCH!"

"OWW!" Nanjiro echoed.

"Don't talk like that at the breakfast table," Rinko scolded her two boys after slapping them both on the backs of their heads.

"Rinko, we're just having some fun," Nanjiro whined as he scratched the back of his head where he'd just been smacked.

"Oh...like that magazine you're hiding behind that newspaper kind-of fun?"

Ryoma's eyes widened. It was time to get the hell out of here. Where this conversation was headed...he didn't want any part of it. They were going to either fight and then go have some alone time...or go have some alone time...or he didn't really want to know more about their habits than he did already. His parents had a strange way of flirting, or foreplay, or ewwww...whatever it was called, he didn't want to hear or be around for any more of it.

He took a large gulp of his orange juice, trying to get as much of it down as possible in one gulp, grabbed a piece of toast and rose up from his chair.

"Leaving already, Seishounen?" His dad asked.

He gave a slight nod as he made his way out of the kitchen and into the entryway. As he quickly slid his shoes on and grabbed his tennis bag, his father called through the house, "Bring Sakuno-chan over sometime. I bet she's all filled out and pretty now. You should show your girlfriend off to your parents."

Ryoma's eyes narrowed at the door as he called back, "Yada."

Leaving the house, he slammed the front door behind him and put his piece of toast back into his mouth. It crunched satisfactorily as his teeth bit into it.

Damn...sometimes he really missed Nanako. His old man hadn't been nearly as outrageous when she'd still been living with them.

He leisurely strolled towards Seigaku High School as he munched on his toast, still trying to wake up and get a bearing on why he was so damn tired this morning. Ryuzaki...all filled out and pretty. The hell...

She had always been pretty.

He didn't think about it much because it made him feel pressure to do things...things he wasn't sure he was ready to do just yet, but it was true...Ryuzaki had filled out. He kind of felt like he would have to have been blind not to notice, but seeing as how she was his girl, that's probably why he noticed it. After all, you had to be interested in someone to notice things like that...right? He hadn't paid attention to any of the other girls that had probably also recently...filled out.

Ryuzaki on the other hand...he noticed it all right. Her body...changing. She had all sorts of curves now that she didn't have when they were younger. They'd really started showing up last year when they were in their final year of middle school, but this year she was looking all woman.

It made him...uncomfortable.

Lately, it had gotten so bad that he could barely even look at her. His mind would just travel to this other place. This place where she was beneath him making little sounds in her throat as he roamed his hands under her clothes and sucked on her neck. Or even worse was when he imagined her legs wrapped around him as he...

STOP! Can't think about it!

He paused there on the sidewalk and shook his head back and forth as if trying to shake his thoughts free. Calm down...calm down...

"Ryoma-kun!" A startled female voice cried out behind him.

He froze.

Oh...no...

He heard the quick slaps of her mary janes hitting the pavement as she ran up to him. A hand landed on his shoulder, and a second later her big cinnamon eyes appeared in his line of vision, "Are you okay? Is your head bothering you?"

Oh man...Ryuzaki did not just catch him fantasizing about doing naughty things with her curvy little body.

Not waiting for an answer from him, her other hand had already began rubbing over his head. He wasn't sure what she was doing, but her hand felt amazing in his hair. Oh man...she was touching him. This uncomfortable thing was about to get even worse.

He felt like he couldn't even walk now.

She moved closer as her hand roamed towards the back of his head. She pushed up on her tiptoes and her breasts pushed into his chest so she could reach all the way. She let out a soft, "Hmm," while her hand continued to run over his scalp through his black locks.

Hot damn. She was going to kill him. Her body felt even better than he imagined it would when it was pressed up against his. He was going to grab her and do all kinds of things to her and...oh no. He really needed to move back...NOW, but...she smelled so good that he kind of just wanted to eat her up...and see what...

His hand twitched as he finally managed to take a big step back. It came out more irritable than intended, "Ryuzaki...I'm fine."

She frowned up at him and it was all he could do to keep himself from closing the new distance between them and pressing his lips against hers. He needed to get away from her...it wasn't time yet for that stuff. He still had tennis...and tennis...and he couldn't get all wrapped up in his sudden interest in Ryuzaki and her curves right now.

"Ryoma-kun, you were standing on the sidewalk shaking your head. There must be something wrong," She insisted.

Well, hell. What do you say to something like that? 'I was imagining tearing your clothes off and licking your hot little body, so...you know...'

Yeah...he would never say something like that. It was bad enough he thought about those things...saying them would just make him as big of a perv as his old man. Well, maybe not as big of a perv as his old man. Any male would be hard pressed to be as big of a perv as his old man.

"Ryoma-kun is spacing out. It's not like you. I couldn't feel anything, but did you hit your head or something?"

He shook his head again, trying to get rid of the new thought he'd come up with of licking her all over...this was so out of control. Couldn't she just GO AWAY and leave him in peace to collect himself? Girls! They were so damn clueless!

She stepped towards him again, her hand reaching towards his head one more time and something inside of him just...snapped.

You know what? Maybe it was time. Time to start this thing for real. Time for them to stop with the childish relationship and move into something more...adult. She was driving him so crazy lately he couldn't even be in her company, which was a huge problem. He liked her company. He also had tennis practice with her every Sunday, and the past few weeks he'd been neglecting really teaching her because he'd been too busy caught up in some fantasy to pay attention to her tennis. They were almost sixteen, lots of their friends were dating, or had dated already. Maybe if he could just get this fire put out with her, he could get back to focusing completely on tennis.

He stepped back towards her and she smiled up at him sweetly, like she always did.

Wow...this was really happening. This was finally really going to happen. He was going to do it. Placing his hands lightly against her hips, he tilted his head down slightly, "Ne...Ryuzaki...don't you think it's time?"

He watched as her eyes quickly widened with realization. Good. She knew what he meant. Just like he'd always thought. This was going to be too easy...

He tilted his head down closer to hers, while she looked down.

Wait...why is she looking down when he was up?

He had barely registered that she was looking at her watch and then her head snapped up and caught his chin.

"UGH," He grunted from the impact as his teeth smashed down on his tongue.

What the hell just happened? This was NOT supposed to happen!

"Oh my! Ryoma-kun!" She was fluttering around him now as he bent over, spitting blood out of his mouth onto the sidewalk. He couldn't remember feeling so embarrassed in all his life.

"I'm so sorry! I didn't know you were so close, I just- you said it was time and I realized we must be late for school and then-"

He tuned her out as she kept on blabbering. He felt like he'd just bit off the end of his tongue. His whole mouth throbbed with pain. Before he could even think straight she was grabbing onto his wrist as she started pulling him towards school.

"Let's get to the nurse's office, Ryoma-kun! I can't believe I hurt you so badly, I'm so embarrassed. I hope it doesn't mess up your tennis."

His eyes narrowed at her slight form that was now barely in front of him as she dragged him along by his wrist. It was oddly reminiscent of the time he'd cut his eyelid in their first year of middle school during a tennis match and she'd fussed over him. Only this time, she was getting her way and taking care of him.

He couldn't help but let her do it. She was touching him again...and he'd just decided he was really okay with her touching him. In fact, he wanted her to touch him more. A lot more.

"I don't need my mouth to play tennis, Ryuzaki," He deadpanned.

Silly girl. As if a bit tongue would have any impact on his tennis. No...nothing to do with his tennis. Though he didn't know about kissing...and he had been anxious to try that out a few minutes ago. Now he would have to wait.

Maybe he was wrong and this was the universe's way of telling him it wasn't time yet?

Her hand slid down his wrist and grasped his hand. She turned slightly as she continued to walk. Her braids swayed with the cool fall breeze and she flashed him that radiant smile she sends his way when they talk about his tennis skills. As it always had, it took his breath away.

She was more than pretty.

"Ryoma-kun," It was all she said. She didn't need to say more. He understood. She got him. She really got him.

Okay...universe be damned. It was definitely time.

This bit tongue thing, it was just a minor setback.

Well here we are at the end of chapter one of yet another fanfic. I know as if It's Complicated and Decisions aren't enough. Problem is, I'm writing two more stories right now so I need to keep posting stuff or I'll get too backlogged. I hope you all enjoy this story. :D Can't wait to hear your thoughts. :D

xoxo Bunny