disclaimer: trust me, you'd know if i owned tenipuri. i'd forget the tennis part of the equation and just go straight to gay sex part. lots and lots of gay sex. yummy.
contents: emoness, some sort of black fluff, words... oh, yeah. i use the word "love".
a/n: ummm… well, i was watching tenimyu and there's this scene where rikkai appears in uniforms and sanada's the only one without a scarf. so i looked through my manga and saw that he actually WAS the only one without a scarf. and then yaoi popped into my head. so, yeah. this was born.

Scarf

He could remember it perfectly.

It hadn't been that long, anyway. Or maybe it had. Looking back inside the darkness of his mind, it felt like those days where they spent running silently alongside each other was eons ago, when, if he actually looks on a calendar and flips the marked pages to find the shaky red circle he had drawn on that day, it was actually only four months ago. Not even half a year.

That confused him. He would stare at the calendar above his bed with a empty heart and think over how many things seemed to happen in such a small amount of time. Years had never held as much events as the past four months had. He had never felt so many emotions at one time, nor had he ever felt so devoid of such emotions. His thoughts had never ran away with his logic so many times, and he had never pushed himself, both mentally and physically, as much as he had for the past four months. Never.

So when he sits there and thinks, aside from pondering how long such a short time had been, he also tries to block out the second half of his memories from that day. The first half was perfectly acceptable—enjoyable, even. Just not the second half.

The day had started well. Average. There was classes like any other day, the only difference being the tranquil air of relief that was always apparent after the last exam had finished for the current year. The tennis club practice had been canceled due to snow and not many people seemed to mind, what with the tournaments and season being over. So, since there wasn't anything else to do, Sanada, Yukimura and Yanagi all decided to just head to the station. Their group of friends had not yet extended to the rest of the regulars, although some of them thought it would be fun to just keep contact every now and again. Yukimura seemed to mind that just a bit, but never said anything about it. In fact, he wanted to get home quickly because he said he had a slight headache.

He was smiling placidly when he said that. "Just a little headache, nothing to worry about."

They believed him and left for the station.

Yukimura had pulled Sanada behind when they were nearing the station, complaining of the worsening pounding in his head. Yanagi informed them that he would be going ahead, and Sanada agreed with him, thinking that it would be best if he bought Yukimura something along the lines of tea for his headache. As Yanagi headed for the station, head low in his scarf due to the wind and bitter cold, Sanada lead Yukimura into an alley vending machine for him to choose his preferred beverage.

He never even got to put his money into the machine. Before Yukimura could even say which one he wanted, his dark eyes widened horribly and a low, strangled sound emanated from deep in his throat. Sanada hadn't actually taken much notice for he was busy with looking for his wallet in his book bag, but then he felt his hands, tightened into feebly twitching claws, gripping onto his scarf for balance, and his heart skipped a beat. He felt as if ice water had been poured down him back and he grabbed him by his shoulders, trying desperately to hold him up as Yukimura visibly lost feeling in his limbs. Helplessly, he crumpled into a heap against the machine, landing in the dirty snow and pulling off Sanada's scarf and he lost consciousness rapidly.

Sanada's mind could not have been more scrambled. He scratched at his jacket, fumbling for his cell phone to call someone, anyone, for help, quickly, before someone worse happened, before the cold got to him, before anything. Perhaps he was in luck, for Yanagi answered quickly, possibly knowing that there was an emergency, because he hadn't even bought his ticket yet.

Yanagi's voice was cool and analytical, a sad attempt to soothe Sanada as he sat there and gripped Yukimura's freezing cold hands with his own frosty, sweating hands. He tried to convince him that all would be well and that, as soon as they hung up, he should quickly bring him to the nearest hospital as Yanagi left the station to meet up with him.

Sanada agreed hastily, wrapping his own plaid scarf around Yukimura's now shivering body—was that a good sign or a bad one, Sanada couldn't stop to think, he couldn't think at all—and picking him up easily—that couldn't be good, could it, he was so thin, that headache must've caused such pain for a longer time that he was letting on—sprinting to the hospital Yanagi had told him about.

He didn't know if he was surprised or not at the sudden appearance of the entire regulars there. How long had he been running? How fast had they? Yanagi must've called them. Did it matter? No, nothing did. The doctor took Yukimura in with a straight face, seemingly not caring about whether or not their precious buchou lived or not. Yagyuu had provided information for the rest of them, having either known, heard or whatever about Yukimura's condition.

"It is a disease closely related to Guillian-Barré Syndrome, which is an auto-immune disease," he told them all simply. "First, mobility in the hands and feet are lost, then slowly it spreads throughout the entire body. When it reaches"—when—"the respiratory muscles, it cuts off breathing, making the patient unable to talk, eat, or breathe. If not treated when the disease first surfaces in two weeks, the patient may die."

Kirihara, the young one, was the one to ask the question everyone wanted to hear. "How long will it take for him to recover?"

Yagyuu lowered his head, possibly peering over his glasses, or maybe just avoiding Sanada's intense gaze. "If the treatment goes well, one month. If not, almost a year. If in one year it is not treated, then—"

The punch Sanada had thrown into the wall was drowned out by another banging sound, doors flinging open. Apparently, the blank-faced doctor finally thought that Yukimura was important enough for something to happen, for he was hooked up on a respiratory machine, the mask over his now-peaceful face, the soft and pale one that Sanada shamelessly watched in classes, looking so perfectly serene that, if you had taken off the disgusting mask and removed the drug- and saline-filled IVs, you could've mistaken for sleeping.

Unable to hold in his feelings anymore, unable to properly think and form a sentence that could show his thoughts and emotions and wants and needs properly, so that Yukimura could hear them and wake up and speak again, smile again, tell them all again that there was nothing to worry about again, tell them that they needed to work harder and that he was proud of them regardlessly, Sanada twisted around, shouting into the corridor after his buchou, his friend, his unrequited lover, "Yukimura! We'll be waiting for you, undefeated!"

And then he bowed his head, barely aware of the soft patting on his shoulder, Yanagi's other sad attempt to soothe him, trying even harder than ever to hold in the wave of emotions that he barely ever felt, that he never wanted nor needed. He was biting his lip, holding back a burning pain in his eyes, watching his feet and wishing that he could've done more for Yukimura, could've given him more than a ride to the hospital and a plaid scarf.