Bad Boy

Chapter Twelve

"Intertwined"

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They sat on the cemented floor under a desk situated directly beneath a window, Ryoma's back leaning against the wall with Sakuno tucked close to him, sitting between his legs which he stretched out on the floor, her back pressed to his chest.

Her mobile phone's screen flickered into life in Ryoma's right hand, but Sakuno blinked slowly at the images that began to form.

"It's the video of our last year at middle-school." she murmured, her eyes and her voice heavy with sleep. "It was filmed by Kotoko and Shiraishi-kun."

"Yu Shiraishi?" Ryoma asked. Sakuno's head nodded against him. "Isn't he dead?"

"Shiraishi-kun died two days after the filming was finished." Sakuno confirmed. She smiled sadly with a mild frown. "Kotoko liked him." she whispered. "She confessed to him on the last day they worked together. Shiraishi-kun smiled at her and thanked her… And then two days later we all heard about his death."

Ryoma didn't make a comment. None of them in the class back then had known that the reason why Yu Shiraishi had rarely come to school that year was because he'd been sick, and they'd only discovered that fact on the day when they'd watched the completed video together in the classroom. During the display, one of the boys had received a text message from Yu Shiraishi's younger sister, telling them that her brother's condition had worsened the previous night at the hospital, and he'd passed away.

"Kotoko-san must've been sad." Ryoma finally spoke again.

Sakuno glanced up at him, noting it was the first time that Ryoma was remembering her friend's name. Although she wasn't certain if he would still remember it an hour later.

"Kotoko never said anything about Shiraishi-kun after that." Sakuno said. "We went to his funeral, but she didn't say anything about him; not then, not now. It's like her confession to him never happened. Like Shiraishi-kun was just another classmate."

"Some people find things hard to be put into words." Ryoma responded absently.

Sakuno blinked at what he'd just said, and again she glanced up at him. But his brown eyes were fixed on the screen of her mobile phone, his attention captured by the various acts their classmates—some ex-classmates now—were performing in front of the camera. Horio's voice could be heard distinctly several times above the din made by him and the other boys. Sakuno glanced at the mobile phone, looking into the screen to see the late Yu Shiraishi waving with a friendly smile at them as he stood next to a disheveled-haired Kobayashi Shouta.

"What happened to your forehead?" Shiraishi interviewed, pointing at the patch of plaster which adorned the left side of Kobayashi's forehead. The black-haired boy didn't answer and simply glared, his jaw clenched in irritation. Unperturbed, Shiraishi turned to the front of the class, and the camera shifted from him to fall on Aoi Mizuki. "Mizuki-san, will you tell us what happened to your subordinate's forehead?"

"She hit him with a frying pan!" one of the boys shouted, followed by giggles and howls of laughter.

"He got into a fight with a stray cat!" chipped in another.

Mizuki threw the boys a nasty look.

"Shouta got injured during Kendo practice." she replied heatedly.

"Awwww! She's defending her scary boyfriend! How sweet…!" gushed a few boys, rushing to fill the view of the camera and dramatically hugging each other, swaying from side to side, provoking Mizuki's annoyed yelling and one of Kobayashi's shoes—which he flung toward the group of boys, narrowly flying past one of them over the head.

The camera returned to Kobayashi, only to be pushed away by his hand.

"I've nothing to say." he said.

"Don't be like that. You're the only one not camera-friendly here, Shouta." Shiraishi persuaded, but then the camera turned direction, falling on Ryoma who sat at his desk beside the window. Some of the students laughed, joined in by Kotoko—who was holding the camera—as Ryoma stared blankly back at the camera which focused in on him. "Alright, we've got two camera-unfriendly people here." Shiraishi's voice corrected. "Come on Shouta, Ryoma, smile for me."

"Why?" Ryoma and Kobayashi asked tonelessly, faint annoyance in their voice.

"Because I look exceptionally adorable today…!" Shiraishi declared, throwing his hands up cheerfully in the air.

Poker-faced, both Ryoma and Kobayashi turned away, ignoring the shameless exclamation.

The classroom was immediately filled with laughter from their classmates, some of the boys booing Shiraishi and one chucking the shoe which Kobayashi had thrown earlier at him.

"That was a very bad joke, Shiraishi-kun." Kotoko's amused voice remarked from behind the camera.

"Really? I'm not adorable?"

"You wear red contact lenses, and you have purple hair." Kotoko pointed out.

Shiraishi grinned.

"Some people are different, but that's what makes them adorable. Or at least, I believe it, because that's what makes me adorable." he excused, pointing at another direction. The camera moved away from his red eyes and purple hair to focus on Tomoka, Sakuno and Minami who gathered at the same table. "Anything to say, ladies?" Shiraishi's voice asked teasingly. "You can make your love confession to somebody you like if you want, and we can go outside if that somebody is here in this classroom." he offered, and the camera singled out Sakuno from her two giggling friends.

"Ryoma-kun." Sakuno murmured with a reddening face when she heard Ryoma snort softly above her head. She frowned when she saw that herself in the video was also turning red. Encouragingly Shiraishi ruffled her hair, and Sakuno remembered again how he'd liked to do it to the girls, probably in the same way he'd always done to his younger sister. Sakuno sighed, leaning her head to rest on Ryoma's chest. "That was the last day we saw him. He looked fine, didn't he, Ryoma-kun?"

"As annoying as always." Ryoma confirmed.

"I thought Shiraishi-kun liked Kotoko too, even Tomoka and Minami said so. If it was true, maybe Shiraishi-kun should've told Kotoko why he couldn't accept her back then." Sakuno pondered as both of them kept their eyes on the screen of her mobile phone. "He just smiled and thanked her for her confession, and rejected her." she recalled. "Even though he did it all kindly, I think it hurt Kotoko a lot to suddenly find out the truth afterward."

"You think it would've turned out any differently if he'd told Kotoko-san he couldn't accept her because he had terminal cancer and was about to die?" Ryoma asked.

"Maybe Kotoko wouldn't have looked… That much in pain when she heard about his death in the classroom when we watched the video together. It was… So sudden. Nobody expected it."

Ryoma kissed the top of Sakuno's head.

"You're upsetting yourself by thinking too much." he told. "As much as you'd like to see a happy ending between him and Kotoko-san, Shiraishi's gone. The least we can do is pray that he rest in peace." Ryoma exited the video and reached his right hand out over the desk under which they sat, feeling for the green strips of Sakuno's hair ribbons which had been left on it.

Sakuno sniffled and rubbed her teary eyes with her fists. She knew she was upsetting herself by thinking too much, getting sad over something in the past which she—no one—could do anything about.

"But still," Sakuno murmured. "If something that important happens to someone I like… I would want to know it. Even if it might not be easy to say, I would want to know his pain."

Ryoma's fingers which had just taken a full grasp of Sakuno's hair to be tied froze mid-way.

He gazed down at her as she carefully put her mobile phone into its glittery green pouch. After a second he opened his mouth a little hesitantly, unsure on how to put what he was about to say into words.

But before he could speak, Sakuno's mobile phone emitted the familiar melody of a song—which Ryoma didn't bother to figure what name—that signed the arrival of a new text message, and Ryoma held back. He closed his mouth again and returned to his task of tying her long hair with the green ribbons.

Sakuno pulled out her mobile phone, reading the text message which came from—

Tezuka-senpai? She blinked.

"Sorry for disturbing. Will you meet me at the laboratories' building fifteen minutes later?"

The text message said.

Sakuno chewed her lower lip anxiously. She knew Ryoma hadn't seen it, and she wondered if she should tell him.

She decided against it—because she hadn't any clue what it was that Kunimitsu Tezuka wanted with her, and because such an incident had never happened before—Sakuno pushed her mobile phone into the green pouch again, frowning mildly in deep thought.

xXxOxOxXx

"That was terrible."

"It was."

"I think you've blown any chances on getting back with him off this time."

"It's been about a year, anyway. We don't know for sure if he still has feelings for her."

"Of course he still does. He hasn't dated any girl after breaking up with her. Not a single one."

Rie pursed her lips.

"Maybe Shouta-kun's just traumatized and is afraid to date again?" she suggested.

"Are you kidding? Shouta-kun isn't weak! And there isn't a lot of girls as stubborn and arrogant and bossy as Mizuki, anyway." Chitose argued.

Listening to the two girls' heated debate—about her, nonetheless—Mizuki frowned. But then she'd known Rie and Chitose long enough to know that they weren't afraid to list every bad thing about her in her face as if she was entirely invisible, despite the fact that she was sitting right there between the two of them at the table.

On the bright side, at least she knew her friends didn't talk bad things about her behind her back, which Mizuki took—all things considered—to be tolerably acceptable.

She'd told them how she'd mistakenly blurted out some… Harsh words to Shouta back at the old storeroom. But Rie and Chitose hadn't been surprised about it.

They too had known Mizuki long enough to know that she was someone rash—admitedly, sometimes to the point where it brought troubles to herself. Another time, to the point where she lost the boy she really liked.

"You're prejudice, stubborn, arrogant, too afraid of getting hurt that you lash out at people to defend yourself without thinking through if they really want to hurt you. To put it simple, you're quite difficult." Momoshiro Takeshi had once told Mizuki (he was yet another person who hadn't been afraid to spit all her faults into her face). "But you're not necessarily hopeless." he had added with a smile in the end, but up to this day Mizuki didn't believe she was any different than before.

Shaking her head, Mizuki slammed the table to get the girls' attention.

"I didn't tell you about what happened to hear your analysis on me." she told irritably. "I'm—" she faltered, uncomfortable at the way Rie and Chitose were staring expectantly at her. "—I'm… Hoping that you'll… Give me some suggestions." she muttered.

"Oh?" Rie's smile lit up. "It's easy."

"It is?" Mizuki asked slowly, skeptical. "What do I have to do?"

"Something you should've done a long year ago." Chitose informed.

Both girls turned their eyes square on Mizuki's face.

"Go find Shouta-kun, apologize, and tell him that you want to get back with him." they said in perfect unison. "Now."

xXxOxOxXx

The spacious art room situated at the farthest end of the building's fourth floor was painted pure. Drawings from the students, teachers, and several local artistes hung on its pristine off-white walls, while gleaming black shelves and cupboards lining up the walls were ornamented with slender vases and clay figurines in various shapes.

At one corner of the room, multiple already-painted canvases stood displaying beautiful drawings. In the middle of the room, a grand piano perched majestically; its polished, deep-brown body glistening by the sunrays that peeked through the thin, pastel-blue curtains which rustled softly in the wind at the opened windows.

Azusa sat on the magenta couch across from where Kotoko was sitting at a stool. Her back was facing him, her attention fixed on the white canvas in front of her, which depicted the view of a serene valley; a lush stream of water gushed forth from an opening under a large boulder on a mountain, where a lone mermaid sat looking out over the valley below. The expression on the mermaid's delicate face was that of hope; perhaps searching for someone's face, in the crowded and too-far-away, busy street of the valley.

Kotoko bent closer to her drawing, briefly pushing up her glasses as they slid down her nose. Her long, dark hair spilled past one shoulder to cover the side of her face when she moved, and she pushed the strands back over her ear almost subconsciously, intent on her task.

Azusa smiled.

"Like I said, you'll look even cuter without your glasses, Kotoko-san." he remarked.

She didn't give him as much as a shift in response.

Drumming his fingers on the couch's arm, Azusa looked around at the other standing canvases, and his eyes stopped for the second time on the grand piano placed in the middle of the room.

Slowly his fingers wrapped around the couch's arm, firmly, then tighter, as he felt the familiar vines of anger and dissatisfaction seep into his veins.

Kotoko glanced back as she reached for another paintbrush at a low table beside her canvas stand, but she paused when she caught the expression on Azusa's face. He'd never had that kind of look on him before; he'd always been the careless, laidback, smiling player in their class.

But now he looked like all he wanted to do was to smash something into pieces.

Particularly the piano he was currently staring at.

"That piano is really expensive." Kotoko said, and she could see that Azusa startled at her sudden voice. He turned his eyes from the piano to her, his expression distant, as if he was still not quite awake. "It's a gift from President's father."

"Shouta's Dad?"

"Yes."

Azusa didn't make a comment. He watched as Kotoko turned to her drawing again, with a paintbrush tucked at her ear.

He leaned his head back on the couch and stared blankly at the white ceiling above.

"Doesn't solve a thing." Eri's voice resounded in his mind. "I don't want you."

It wasn't exactly something he'd like to be reminded of, but it brought his thoughts away from crashing the grand piano into shambles.

He snorted softly, smiling as he replayed the withering look Eri had thrown at him along with her response. It was officially the first time he'd received that kind of an answer from a girl.

He was a player—he'd admit to that—and throughout his "career" it was only twice that he'd been unlucky to be turned down by the girls he'd put some efforts in. The first time had been with Aoi Mizuki; who'd ignored him completely as she'd seen only Kobayashi Shouta. The second time was, no doubt now, Okumura Eri.

But maybe, the fact that she had been using him—aside from rejecting him—and the fact that it was the first time he had been used—even though it had been mutual at the beginning, as they had both agreed that they were spending time with each other out of of pleasure; no strings attached—but maybe, he wondered, that was what had slowly drawn him in.

Azusa suspected it was more than just "drawing in" matter. It was a "trap" he'd read and heard and watched—as well as laughed at and ridiculed—too many times before in fictions; the movies, the books, where the plot was generally about a player who had it all slamming back into his face when he found a girl who simply wouldn't relent to him.

A girl who was different from those he'd met before.

A girl who knew how to play the game just as well as he did.

A girl who, in some of the fictions, no matter how hard he tried and no matter how much he wanted her to, simply would never be his.

Azusa closed his eyes and pressed one palm over his forehead, letting out a long, audible sigh as he smiled in irony at the turn of event.

His left hand which stretched out over the couch's arm touched something, and he turned, opening his eyes to see a sketchbook with underwater view cover lying on the side table.

The name Miyahara Kotoko was written neatly in Katakana at the upper right side of the cover.

Azusa took the sketchbook and turned to the first page.

He blinked in surprise.

It was the sketching of Yu Shiraishi's image; a friendly, cheerful—and sometimes crazy—boy in their class who had died from cancer back a year ago.

Azusa remembered how Shiraishi had showed up at school with purple hair and a pair of red contact lenses in his eyes the day after one of their classmates had called him, informing that he'd been picked to work with Kotoko to do the filming of their class video for a tribute to their last year as middle-schoolers. Shiraishi had rarely come to school that year—sometimes being absent for one whole week. Even though it had been obvious that the teachers had known something, none of them had probed the matter further as when being asked, Shiraishi had always waved it off as if he'd been skipping school simply out of boredom—the way some of the other students had done.

Silently Azusa turned to the second page of the sketchbook, the third page, the fourth, the fifth, the sixth…

But they were all the sketching of Yu Shiraishi's images.

The time when he'd sat at his desk beside the window at the back of the classroom, gazing out over the sky with a pencil twirling between his fingers.

The time when he'd scored a goal for his team at the school's football field, the number on the back of his shirt clearly outlined.

The time when he'd worn a pair of rabbit ears and stood on the teacher's desk, using the broomstick as a "guitar" to be plucked, singing out-of-tune on the day their class had thrown a party to celebrate their homeroom teacher's birthday.

Too much.

The sketches were of various occasions, all of them depicting nothing but Yu Shiraishi's images, as if the one who had drawn them was trying to transfer all the memories involving him into papers, capturing and clinging to every little flash of him so that he would never fade.

Before Azusa could turn to the next page, someone snatched the sketchbook abruptly from his hand, and he looked up to see Kotoko standing in front of him.

She stared at him with an expression that was a mix of anger and pain.

Surprised, Azusa stared back, his eyes locked to Kotoko's own; her glasses no longer worn over her face.

"Who gave you permission to look through my things?" she asked in a shaky voice.

Before Azusa could answer, she stormed past him with the sketchbook clutched tightly in her hand. In the blink of an eye she was out of the art room, leaving him alone with the canvases, the flowers that sat still in slender vases lined on top of furniture, and the piano.

xXxOxOxXx

The large, bushy tree shadowed them from the glaring sun overhead.

The stone bench pressed cold against the side of Sakuno's legs. She fidgeted with the folds of her skirt in her lap, waiting anxiously—since five completely silent minutes ago—for Ryoma's buchou to open his mouth and get this "meeting" over and done with.

She had thought the day when Ryoma had first kissed her (at the hospital, in his striped pajama patient shirt in his ward) to be the day when her heart had almost burst out of her chest. But today the mere knowledge that she was sitting alone on a bench under a tree near the school's laboratories building with no other than Kunimitsu Tezuka, the experience was proving to be scarier than riding a roller coaster without the seat belt on.

Of course, not that she had actually tried it.

But still Sakuno suspected if Ryoma's buchou wouldn't start talking soon, she might suffer from a stroke or a heart attack—or both.

"I've been giving it some thoughts, really." out of the blue, Tezuka broke the stillness in the air. Unprepared, Sakuno jumped at the sound of his voice despite that it was calm and monotonous. He stared at her through his glasses as her hand flew to her chest. "Is it too chilly here?" he asked. "Maybe we should go elsewhere—"

"—n-no." Sakuno shook her head, smiling weakly. "I'm fine, senpai. You can go on."

Tezuka stared for some other seconds, then he fixed his glasses almost awkwardly.

"I don't know how to explain this to you." he confessed. "I had thought it would probably be better that Ryoma come back to the team willingly on his own. I had let him lag behind because I had thought it would be better if he take some time off—your grandmother had agreed, his father—" Tezuka paused. "—his father had shrugged, but I took that as a positive sign of agreement." he blinked, and Sakuno smiled.

"You trusted Ryoma-kun to bring himself back up. I get that, senpai. I believed the same, I always will." she said, feeling gradually at ease.

Tezuka watched her for a moment, before a mild frown appeared on his face.

"So what's happening then?" he asked.

"What?" Sakuno frowned back, not understanding.

"Even though he said he was returning—and he is, now. He acts—" Tezuka searched for the right word. "—it's not the same. On the surface, he's doing good. To most people, he's doing good." he looked seriously at Sakuno. "But if he keeps going that way… To put it simple for you; he won't keep winning for long."

At his words, Sakuno felt herself slowly tense. The comfortable feeling gradually turned into alarm and uneasiness.

"I don't understand… What you're saying, senpai." she said. On the surface, he was doing good. To most people, he was doing good. "What do you mean… By all those words?"

"You don't know?" Tezuka asked in return, as surprised as Sakuno at the confused, afraid look she was giving him. "Didn't you notice how he acted before his match at the mock game began? He shook. He wasn't exactly as confident as he seemed then. I think he's scared of tennis." Tezuka watched her. "You really… Have no idea?" he asked, but as Sakuno's eyes widened and her expression entirely changed, he shook his head and straightened. "I'm sorry, maybe this isn't the right thing to do. Maybe I shouldn't have—"

"—scared." Sakuno repeated in a whisper. "Y-you must've been mistaken, senpai. Ryoma-kun isn't scared of tennis. He… He can't be. He seems fine. It doesn't… Even make sense."

Tezuka didn't say anything to contradict her.

Yet Sakuno knew who was the one who'd been mistaken.

xXxOxOxXx

The snickers and the snorts of laughter that came from the boys and girls who milled the hallway across from the vending machine made Eri turn to their direction.

She sauntered to them, tilting her head to a side with a smile.

"Mind sharing what was so funny?" she prompted.

One of the boys—her own classmate—grinned sheepishly.

"About an hour ago Yazawa and Fumi walked into a classroom where Ryoma and Ryuzaki-san were making out." he told.

"I really thought Echizen was going to beat me up." Yazawa sighed in relief, his arm draped over a giggling girl's shoulder.

"He looked really good without his shirt." she fuelled, and as Yazawa threw an offended look at her, she smiled up at him. "I like you without your shirt, too." she amended.

"You better do." Yazawa grumbled.

The rest of them laughed and joked about it, but Eri stood motionless where she was. Her blood froze at the moment that what the students had just talked about registered into her brains.

It shouldn't have been surprising. At the school it was a fact well known that Echizen Ryoma and Ryuzaki Sakuno were lovers, a couple; that they had been dating for about three months now. It shouldn't have been surprising at all that they were sleeping with each other.

But it hit Eri like a full force slap in the face.

It was only then that it truly dawned on her.

Ryuzaki Sakuno could have all of Ryoma—his smile, his attention, his arms around her, his body lying next to her on the same bed; his heart—because of the significance that he was her boyfriend. Ryuzaki Sakuno could have all of Ryoma to her own, as easily as if he chose to give them to her.

And the mere thought of it made Eri sick to the stomach.

She turned and stormed from the hallway, ignoring the voices of some of the boys who called her name.

The sheer anger, the dissatisfaction, the jealousy, the frustration and the pain all came crashing down on her stronger than they ever had. They mixed and shoved and clawed at her insides until her breath came out hard and heavy from the swirling emotions. Her hands clenched into fists, her jaw set tight.

She hadn't moved all the way from America to Japan to watch Echizen Ryoma taken away from her.

Eri's vision blurred by tears that welled in her eyes. She stalked to the right turn of the empty corridor, and bumped straight into a hard wall of someone's chest.

"Watch where you're going, Okumura." Kobayashi Shouta's voice spoke from above her head, catching Eri by the arm as she staggered backward. She looked up fiercely at him, but he blinked back in surprise. "Why are you crying?" he asked.

"That's none of your bloody business." Eri spat. She wiped the back of her hand over her eyes, but when she tried to sidestep him, Kobayashi pulled at her arm again.

"Are you sure you're alright?" the class president asked.

Eri threw a dirty look at him.

"Why, you're such a busybody. You must've cared too much about other people that Mizuki got fed up with it." she shot vehemently.

Kobayashi went quiet.

At the flicker of hurt that crossed his face, Eri somehow realized that she simply wanted to vent out her broiling frustrations—and how she was venting them out at the wrong person.

Kobayashi's fingers loosened from around her arm.

"I take that as you're fine." he said.

Eri swallowed.

"Wait," she pulled at the back of his jumper. "I didn't mean that."

Kobayashi glanced back at her shorter figure, staring blankly. Eri frowned, waiting for a response.

"S' fine." he retorted. "You got me suspended, you stole my bubblegum. I'm quite used to being bullied by you now." he said.

Eri couldn't fight off a smile.

She reached a hand up to touch the strands of hair that hung almost to his eyes. She pressed her palm up against his forehead, pushing his bang up.

Kobayashi Shouta really was good-looking, she realized thoughtfully.

They stood in the hallway in front of each other, Eri looking up at the class president with a smile.

"Mizuki is stupid for not appreciating you." she said, shrugging when Kobayashi raised an eyebrow at the—more or less—compliment. Slowly she lowered her hand to his chest, pressing firmly until she could feel the rhythmic beating of his heart against her palm. "If a guy like you would be here for me, I might just let go." she whispered.

Kobayashi watched her silently.

"I think Azusa really likes you." he said after a while.

"Maybe." Eri smiled bitterly. "Or maybe Azusa thinks he likes me but it's really just the thrill of it. He never got rejected before, and now because I'm the first girl to refuse him, to use him and to throw him away like he's thrown away many other girls before… He became interested in me." Eri presumed. "And if that's true, then Azusa's feelings for me will wear off some time after I bow to him." she looked at Kobayashi. "They're not real feelings like the ones you keep all this time for Mizuki."

"I see." the class president said. "But you don't really know that, do you? How could you know how Azusa feels better than himself?"

"Common sense."

"That's no guarantee that you're actually right." Kobayashi shook his head when Eri opened her mouth to argue. "You might get me suspended again for saying this, but I'm still saying it; whatever it was you once had with Echizen Ryoma—if my limited observation is right—it seems to have ended to me; it's over. He's with Ryuzaki Sakuno now, and if you keep going the way you're intending to, one day you'll hurt not just yourself—"

Eri cut him off when she pressed her lips to his.

Kobayashi froze.

One hand still laid to his chest, Eri closed her eyes and brought her other hand to hold his cheek, standing on her tiptoes to reach his height. It took a few seconds, but slowly after a few seconds as if the shock was finally washed away from him, Kobayashi moved again.

He leaned in to the kiss and returned it.

Across from them in the long corridor a mere few meters away, Mizuki stood frozen at the sight.

She'd never wondered too much about it before, perhaps because her friends had been claiming it over and over that she became confident they were right. She'd never wondered before if there was still a chance for her and Kobayashi Shouta to get back together. Because her friends had claimed he still liked her over and over and she'd seen for herself how he'd kept turning down girls who'd confessed their feelings for him.

But now that she watched how his hand moved to hold Okumura Eri's face, gently wiping away the tear stains from her cheek as he deepened the kiss, Mizuki pressed a hand to her mouth and cried; wondering if she had finally really lost Kobayashi Shouta to someone else.

xXxOxOxXx

Suddenly it felt quite strange.

When the sun had been shining fairly intense only seconds ago, the sky opened without so much as a warning and began to release rain in a tumultuous downpour.

Fast droplets pelted on the sidewalk and the open ground, ceaselessly, one after another, forcing the students and the teachers who had milled about to run for shelter to their school buildings, hands raised over their heads. The sky darkened, as if a large invisible blanket had slowly, quietly, wrapped its arms around earth in a protective coccoon.

Still Ryoma stood in front of the painted-blue wall a few blocks away from his class building and hit the tennis ball, repeatedly, swinging his tennis racket and focusing on just the right aim.

The yellow tennis ball thumped and thudded against the same spot on the wall, hard, over and over for as long as his fingers wrapped firmly around the tennis racket's padded handle, for as long as he kept swinging.

In the biting cold of the wind, his school uniform was drenched and he was soaked to the bone. Still Ryoma didn't stop. He knew Ryuzaki Sakuno would come running to find him some time soon after discovering he wasn't in the classroom or in the Tennis Club room, and he smiled as he imagined that familiar worried look she would have on her face.

It would involve a clumsily-held umbrella, stuttering, a terribly-concerned frown, as well as two ponytails—and not braids—which he had tied her hair into half an hour ago in that empty classroom.

Somewhere in the long corridor of the hallway where the first year students' voices could be heard from inside their classrooms and from where they loitered outside, Mizuki stopped in the doorway to their class, watching Shouta as he stood by the window, knowing that he stood looking out at Eri far below; her bookbag slung over one shoulder, her fingers wrapped around the handle of a black umbrella as she made way alone to the school's main gate.

Somewhere in an empty laboratory of the school, a Bunsen burner sat on a long table with flickering fire. A crumpled page torn from a sketchbook was held directly above the bluish flame. But at the same time that Azusa closed his eyes and laid his fingers on the keyboard of the piano in the art room, Kotoko withdrew her hand and carefully smoothed the crumpled paper on the long table; so that the smiling boy's face sketched onto it could be seen again.

Ryoma thought he heard the sound of a piano from somewhere in the large building behind which he stood. Although the hard downpour hindered the clear sound of the music from being heard; the slow, exquisite melody wafted beautifully outside from wherever it came.

But somehow, as the tennis racket moved in a vague hissing sound and the tennis ball slammed against the wall, somehow as he waited in the pouring rain, Ryoma thought it felt quite strange.

Almost as if she would never come.

.

.

.

Author's Note:

Okay, okay, so I lied about updating in April. I mean, I had a little time (the time for sleep, but as I couldn't sleep...). My final exam is still coming so until then, I might or might not update again. Thank you for reading, reviewing, alerting, favoriting, everything?

P.S.: I hope you're still alive and hanging on, RaV, :)