Disclaimer: I still don't play tennis, I still can't draw, and I'm still not a Japanese man. Logically, this manga is still not mine.
A/N: My PoT muse was missing RyoSaku so I decided to feed it with this.
Love goes out to my beta, strawberry ponta-chan!
It's not denial. I'm just selective about the reality I accept.
Bill Watterson
Air
He doesn'tneed her. Not like he needs air or food or water. He can live without her.
He just doesn't want to, is all.
Apples
Her hair ties have little apples on the ends and they've been clinking together all day.
It's driving. Him. Insane.
He snaps in the middle of lunch. It's in that moment, staring down at her, braids unraveling over slim shoulders, brown eyes wide, soft mouth in a tiny, surprised O that he realizes:
He's screwed.
Beginning
Sometimes, when he's almost insane with wanting her and not having her and fearing he never will, he longs for the days when he couldn't even remember her name.
Bugs
Sakuno likes Ryoma until they are fourteen.
She falls in love with him the day she sees him gently deposit a spider outside instead of just squashing it.
Coffee
Sakuno is the only person who can make coffee just the way he likes it. Even he can't get it quite right.
So, it's obvious that she should move in with him.
It just makes sense.
Dark
He tries not to think of her when it's dark and he's alone.
He rarely succeeds.
Despair
She is seventeen when she's finally gives up on her hope that, given enough time, Ryoma will develop normal social skills. He lives in his own world and isn't looking to emigrate.
She sighs once, shakes her head, and learns to speak the language.
Doors
"You're going to hurt yourself if you keep turning your head at that angle."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"We can trade seats if you want. I have a better view of the door."
"Whatever."
"I'm just saying. If you keep jerking your head around every time the door opens you're going to pull something and then Tezuka will be angry. We don't want that. I'm just looking out for your interests."
Fuji grinned cheerfully at the scowling boy sitting across from him. He really shouldn't tease the kid so much but Ryoma in love was the funniest thing he'd seen since Yuuta had first started dating An-chan.
Drink
She knew he loved her when he gave up the last Ponta (his favorite flavor!) without prompting.
She hadn't even mentioned being thirsty.
Duty
It wasn't like he wanted to be here. Seriously. This was a waste of his time. He was famous. He had better things to do than teach his former coach's clumsy granddaughter to play tennis.
And so, yeah, it wasn't like anyone specifically said he had to be the one to teach her. But those other guys were idiots, volunteering to teach when they couldn't even take a point from him. They sucked.
And Ryuuzaki already sucked enough. She didn't need those losers making her worse. Her tennis was so bad that it was practically his civic duty to help her. She was a danger to herself and others. He was a hero.
I mean, it wasn't like he wanted to be here.
Earth
He travels all over the world but he always ends up back in Japan.
It's where she is.
End
Ryoma always has a goal. He wonders sometimes when his stopped being about tennis and became her.
Fall
Ryoma had never considered himself a clumsy guy. But now, falling in love with her, scrambling for any hint of how he ever got to this point, he figures he must be.
He must have tripped because he sure as hell didn't do this on purpose.
Fire
Ryoma has the fireplace removed before she ever sets foot in their first home. She doesn't even know it's there.
He thinks it's probably better that way.
Flexible
"I've been working on my flexibility like you said."
He took her in. Shy smile. Short skirt. Full split.
.
.
.
He'd missed Japan.
Flying
He misses the days when his dreams were about flying rather than about her.
At least back then he could look her in the eye.
Food
He's come to associate her with food. It's not surprising, really. She's been bringing him bentos for years and she bakes things for the team and her class and pretty much everyone else she knows. So it's really not surprising.
And that's obviously why his stomach acts weird every time he sees her. Or thinks about her. Or—
He's a shit liar. Even when it's to himself.
Foot
If Ryoma doesn't say more than three words during her first dinner with his family it's only because she keeps rubbing her absurdly tiny feet up and down his legs.
Grave
Ryoma stared down at the large, grey stone in front of him, at his girlfriend kneeling in front of it, small and proud and sad.
It wasn't how he'd imagined meeting her parents.
Green
Watching her turn red over someone who isn't him makes him positively green with envy.
And nausea.
Head
He'd figured it out. Three years of wondering. Three years of puzzling. Three years of mystified speculation and he'd finally figured it out.
It was the braids.
They were unbalancing her, throwing her entire body off center. That was the reason for all the stumbling and tripping and falling. He had to tell her. If she just got . . . rid . . . of . . . them . . .
It wasn't the braids. It definitely wasn't the braids.
No need to be hasty.
Hollow
He's won. Thousands fans are screaming his name. It's a beautiful day. He should be happy.
He's not.
She isn't here and nothing can make up for that.
Hope
She'd been ready to give up. After five years as his fan and friend with no sign of ever being anything else she had decided to give up. She didn't make a fuss or go out of her way to avoid him. She didn't stop going to games or cheering, not entirely at least. She just bowed out quietly, gracefully, silently.
After the third time she missed a game he showed up outside her house and demanded an explanation. He was still in his uniform. She could tell he hadn't showered.
The next morning she woke up early and packed him a bento.
Honor
He hates award ceremonies, fancy dinners, and anything held in his honor but Sakuno loves to get dressed up and he loves what happens after she's been dressed up.
So they go.
Light
It's not like it's hard. She's tiny, almost worryingly so. He really doesn't see what the big deal is.
It's just . . . faster to carry her than to let her stumble around on her own.
Lost
He holds her hand the entire time they're in Kyushu. Everyone thinks it's adorable.
Ryoma thinks it's more practical and less creepy than a leash.
Metal
Ryoma knows, better than anyone else, that beneath the layers of shy, girlish charm and gentle, restful innocence is a spine made out of solid steel. Once she figures it out she'll be a force to be reckoned with.
He can't wait.
Old
Ryoma was not a fan of change . . .
New
. . . but eventually it just made more sense to lean over and kiss her than it did to sit around wishing he could.
Peace
She was annoying. Bouncing around all over the stands with her stupid, soft hair and her stupid, shiny eyes, in her stupid little dress, flashing her stupidly long legs all over the place, making a nuisance of herself. Destroying his concentration.
He wished she would just go home.
(Except he didn't. Not really.)
Poison
Pounding heart. Dizziness. Dry mouth. Nausea.
She'd definitely poisoned him.
Airborne, probably. He bet she'd hidden in the folds of her ridiculously tiny cheerleading outfit.
He hated that thing.
Seriously.
Pretty
Pretty. He'd called her pretty. To her face? No. Unprompted? Not really. Grudgingly? You bet.
But he'd said it.
And that was something.
Rain
Ryoma scowled at the scene playing out in front of him. Why was she even talking to that guy?
Momo snickered beside him. "It could be worse."
Ryoma didn't see how. She was giggling. He raised a skeptical eyebrow.
Momo shrugged. "It could be raining?"
Five minutes later it started raining. She was wearing a white shirt. Momo was right.
It was worse.
Regret
His biggest regret is that he was too stupid to notice her until he was sixteen. Hers is the two weeks she dated Horio in middle school.
Ryoma doesn't know about that. If he did his biggest regret would be not letting Horio get eaten by that bear.
Roses
In all their years together he never brings her roses.
She prefers sunflowers.
Secret
When he's fourteen he punches Horio in the nose in the middle of the public courts seemingly without provocation.
He makes up some bullshit excuse about being in a bad mood and no one's willing to question him after seeing him lay out one of his oldest friends for doing nothing worse than going through his tennis bag.
(It's more panic than anger. Horio is in the process of unzipping the compartment that contains the two items he never plays without: the tennis ball she gave him before he left for the U.S. Open and the picture of the two of them Kawamura's sushi place.)
Snakes
In their first year of high school Sakuno begins spending (what seems to him) an inordinate amount of time talking to Kaidoh. The older boy finds himself the target of a rather disturbing number of "stray" balls during practice that no one ever seems to see thrown.
Oddly enough the phenomenon ceases shortly after he asks Sakuno's Loud Friend out on their first date.
Sakuno thinks it was the universe telling him to get a move on.
Ryoma thinks that the Viper should work on making his intentions more clear.
Because really, with the way he was acting, someone could have gotten the wrong idea.
Snow
Every year during the first snow she makes snow angels in the yard. He never goes.
He's already got one angel in his life and she's more than enough.
Solid
They aren't the most romantic couple in the world. They don't go out very often and rarely engage in PDA. They aren't particularly dramatic, neither of them is big on grand gestures or theatrics. Neither of them ever remembers their anniversary.
But she keeps him grounded and he makes her believe in the impossible.
It works out.
Spring
It's not that he misses her. She's only been gone for two days. Losing sleep because he hasn't seen her for two days would be pathetic.
Echizen Ryoma is not pathetic.
It's just that he needs a new mattress. There's a spring digging into hisback.
Stable
She's the most uncoordinated person he knows but he hands his heart over to her anyway.
Strange
He never stops thinking she's strange.
Normal is overrated, anyway.
Summer
Summer is both Ryoma's favorite and least favorite season.
It's his favorite because Sakuno looks really good in a bikini.
It's his least favorite because Sakuno looks really good in a bikini.
Taboo
"And I know you aren't stupid enough to believe you could get away with dating my adorable granddaughter, right?"
." . . Right."
"But if you were you'd do the honorable thing and tell me, wouldn't you?"
". . . I would."
"And you would never, ever think of going behind my back and forcing my poor innocent little girl to lie to her darling grandmother, would you?"
". . . No."
"And if you were dating her you'd know better than to ever even think about doing anything to hurt her, wouldn't you?"
"Of course."
Ryoma knows better than to hesitate when it really counts.
Ugly
The only time he's ever wished Sakuno was even slightly less cute was the day he finally introduced her to his father.
Pervert.
War
Ryoma was used to competition. When you were the best everyone and their grandmother wanted to take you on. He was used to it. It didn't bother him.
But that was tennis.
This? This was war.
Fuji-senpai and his stupid lunch dates were going down.
Water
He doesn't understand what's so funny about their report.
It's just a stupid river.
Welcome
He never feels like he's properly home until he's had to bail her out of trouble at least once.
Winter
Ryoma hates winter. Sakuno loves it.
She loves the snow and the sleet and the chill. She loves the holidays and the activities and doesn't even mind the extra chores.
She loves the cold.
After listening to him complain about it for what has to be the ninetieth time, Momo shrugs irritably.
"I don't know why you're so surprised," he snaps. "She likes you."
. . . It kind of makes sense, actually.
Wood
They've been dating for six years and living together for two when he informs her, very casually, that she's going to marry him. They are lost in an unfamiliar city, sitting on a crowded bus that smells like feet. It's raining outside. She's hungry.
She lays her hand against his cheek and smiles at him fondly.
Dumb as a post.
He's luck he's cute or she'd have shot him years ago.
A/N: Ryoma is so much fun to write. I think it's because he's so socially stunted . . .
Anyhoo, reviews are loved, worshipped, and adored.