Take 1
"The Heart and The Cowboy"
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The yellow cab halted to a stop just a few meters away from the tall front gate of Seigaku. There were students standing at either side of the opened gate, some wearing school uniforms or casual clothes, and others donning on costumes to pose as an orange-colored cabbage, a Goth who held a large long replica of a banana in her hand, and a number of other creative inventions Ryoma couldn't identify what creatures.
In leisurely paces, people from outside headed toward the gate; parents with hyperactive children tagging along, couples, groups of friends—and as they entered, the students who stood waiting at the gate bowed and greeted them all smilingly. Ryoma stuck his head out from the cab's rolled down window, inspecting the merry sight ahead.
"So many living humans." he pondered. The cab driver glanced sideways doubtfully at him. "So many fresh, human blood… And human meat… And human pulsing, beating hearts and leafy, leafy pancreas…" Ryoma noted with great feeling, not noticing that the cab driver was making a cross sign over himself, shuddering. Ryoma opened the door and stepped out, fixing the wide-brimmed hat perched on top of his head. Earlier his dear Oyaji had paid for the cab when he'd been picked up at the temple, because two days weren't enough for him to figure out how Japanese yen worked. "Thank you." he said, smiling at the cab driver.
Instead of responding, the middle-aged man yanked the opened door beside the driver's seat shut, and then without so much as another glance, sped down the road as if he couldn't go fast enough.
Ryoma blinked at the dust trailing after the practically flying yellow cab.
"And they say Japanese people are polite." he commented.
He turned his eyes on Seigaku's front gate and buildings again. His dear Oyaji had told him last night that a yearly tournament would be held at the school today. Originally he was supposed to be "showing up" after his Okasan had explained "everything that had happened" to the school authority, but his Okasan wasn't even in Japan yet, and Ryoma had been bored to death sitting around at the temple. When he'd told his dear Oyaji he wanted to "show up" without anybody knowing "what had happened" to him, his dear Oyaji had chuckled and told him to just go and have fun. Ryoma had even caught the man muttering amusedly to himself; "It's good to surprise that old woman sometime."
Ryoma knew Echizen Nanjiro would get a good deal of scolding and scowling from Echizen Rinko later for letting him go, but he wasn't too worried. Even though he didn't remember anything, he knew his dear Oyaji was an awesome man. He'd hardly believed it when Nanako had told him that before he'd lost his memory, he and his dear Oyaji had never gotten along this well.
Ryoma took out a small, fake leather notebook from his pocket. There was a photograph of everyone he should know at Seigaku that he'd pasted on every page of the notebook, along with "notes" about them that his dear Oyaji had written for him.
Kunimitsu Tezuka - The silent guy. Captain of Seigaku's tennis club. I don't know all that much about this guy, except he's really silent.
Ryuzaki Sumire - Cranky, meddlesome old woman. Stay away from her, but don't get on her bad side, you'll probably going to ask her granddaughter to marry you one day.
Ryoma paused at that. He flicked to another few pages, stopping at the one that had the photograph of a girl with long-braided brown hair. She was smiling timidly at the camera.
Ryuzaki Sakuno - The shy girl who's been admiring you. Heh, but don't get too arrogant now, shounen. You've been away for about three years. She's probably already given up on you and has a boyfriend now. Who knows, maybe she's even changed.
"Hmmm." Ryoma wondered. "Has she?"
xOxOx
Voices floated in and out throughout the school ground. The long corridors were filled with students who eagerly promoted their class' services and visitors who loitered outside trying to decide which one to go into. Some of the students wore school uniforms, others casual clothes or posing as characters ranging from maids and male servants, samurais, robots, a Totoro, Star Wars' roles, vegetables and fruits, and even unrecognizable creatures. One of the second-year classes had decided to switch school uniforms, so that there were now about twelve male students wearing short pleated skirts and tight blouses, and thirteen female students donning on dark trousers and school shirts.
Sakuno had heard Takeshi Momoshiro complaining about how "unappetizing" it was to see so many rough, unshaven legs all at once.
"Sakuno, have you finished yet?"
Sakuno turned to Keishi.
"There's still a few." she said, noticing that there were no fliers remaining in his hands.
Keishi took the few fliers that left from her.
"We'll distribute them as we walk." he said, taking Sakuno's hand as they began to head back to their class. "How are you feeling, anyway? You've just been well from a fever."
"It's really been fine, Kei-kun."
"Tomoka was very dramatic about the whole thing, I thought you were going to lose it."
"You should've known better."
Keishi laughed.
"I suppose." he agreed.
As Keishi handed out the remaining fliers to the visitors who milled the corridors, Sakuno glanced down at her hand; her fingers intertwining with Keishi's. They had been dating for about two months now, but she wondered why it was that she never felt "nervous" whenever they were together. Keishi had transferred to Seigaku last year, and they had never really made conversations back then. It was only by chance that one Saturday Tomoka had insisted that Sakuno go with her with three other girls to meet some guys at the shopping mall. There had been five boys to match them, two from Seigaku; one of whom had been Keishi. It had turned out that he too had been forced to come along, and Sakuno had been pleasantly surprised to find that they had things to talk about. They hadn't been overly mushy like the other pairs at that time, but she'd been comfortable with him.
Comfortable, but that had been it. There had never been that "butterflies in my stomach" feel whenever she was with Keishi. She'd listened about that kind of feel from her close friends and the other girls, but she'd never felt it herself. If it wasn't for the title that she was his "gilrlfriend" and he was her "boyfriend" that came with Keishi asking her to go out with him, Sakuno would've thought they were just friends. There had been kisses to distinguish friends from couples of course, but still to her it had all been "flat" without much to anticipate about.
Matsuo Keishi was a good guy and a good boyfriend, it was just—to Sakuno it felt like something was missing in their relationship; something she couldn't identify what. And sometimes, Sakuno hated herself for thinking about asking Keishi for a break-up. Lately she was beginning to think more and more about how she wasn't supposed to have agreed to go out with him.
"You're sighing for the third time already, and we haven't even reached the class." Keishi's voice broke Sakuno from her lamentation. She smiled mildly. "You know, sometimes I think you don't really enjoy being with me."
Surprised that it came out of the blue, Sakuno's eyes widened.
"I do." she insisted.
It was Keishi's turn to sigh.
"I wonder if I'm anywhere near Echizen Ryoma. Probably nowhere." he pondered. Sakuno's eyes widened even more—not that it was quite possible. Keishi grinned as he looked at her. "Tomoka told me about him the first thing after she heard that I asked you out. She was blunt; she said compared to me, Echizen Ryoma was multiple times better. Good-looking, great at tennis, and, well, girls liked him." he said. Sakuno opened her mouth twice, closing it again when she failed to summon the right words to say. Keishi chuckled. "I know I'm good-looking and girls like me, but Tomoka made Echizen Ryoma sound really mighty that I can't help feeling intimidated."
Sakuno frowned.
"If Tomoka told you so, Kei-kun, then I would admit it. I did have feelings for Echizen Ryoma back then." she smiled faintly. "But before he went back to America, I confessed my feelings to him; he rejected me straight away."
Keishi was silent. They walked past a row of classes at either side of them; there was a class that served as a café with waitresses in cute animals uniforms. Laughter and chats abounded the corridors, mingling with students' voices as they kept on with their efforts to get visitors to come into their class.
"That doesn't mean you don't have feelings for Echizen anymore, does it?" Keishi suddenly spoke up again. Sakuno stared at him as he looked at her, smiling. "If Echizen comes back, what would you do?" he asked.
Sakuno blinked. What would she do?
"What kind of question is that, Kei-kun?" she frowned. "I've told you that I confessed to him and he rejected me."
"And as I said; that doesn't mean you don't have feelings for him anymore, does it?"
For the first time, Sakuno was getting angry at Keishi. And she'd hardly ever gotten angry at anyone.
"What do you want me to say?" she asked, pulling her hand from his.
Keishi paused. He pointed an index finger at Sakuno, leaning closer to her shorter figure that they were face to face.
"If Echizen comes back to Japan and we're still in school and we're still a couple, I want you to break up with me and work hard at impressing him." Keishi closed his fingers into a tight fist, nodding encouragingly at Sakuno with narrowed eyes. "Make him yours."
Sakuno's mouth hung opened.
"W-what?" she blurted out in disbelief.
Was her boyfriend telling her to leave him and go chase after her old crush?
Keishi reached for Sakuno's face and held it in one hand. When he kissed her, Sakuno's cheeks flamed heatedly, but it had nothing to do with the kiss. It was because they were standing in the hallway of the corridor, being openly watched by surprised visitors and some giggling females. Still, Sakuno closed her eyes automatically, calmly, and kept quiet.
"What did you feel?" Keishi asked when he'd pulled away. Sakuno stared at him. "Anything at all?"
Did he want her to be honest?
"I feel…" Sakuno began slowly. What did she feel? "Not much."
"What about our first kiss? It was also your first kiss, wasn't it?" Keishi asked. Sakuno's eyes dropped to gaze at the cemented floor, unsure whether she wanted to recall it or not. Keishi sighed. "It's not really normal to have felt "not much" on your first kiss, you know." he said.
Sakuno looked up at him with a fresh, deep frown.
"You're saying I'm not normal, Kei-kun?" she accused.
Keishi ruffled Sakuno's hair.
"I've always sensed that something is missing in our relationship." he said. Sakuno held her breath, surprised that he actually felt and thought the same way. "Other than brandishing all of Echizen's greatness to me, Tomoka also mentioned that since Echizen went back to America, you've smiled less and you've worked too hard. I know you sometimes work too hard and I know you don't smile much, but it's the only you that I know of. I wasn't even in Tokyo yet when Echizen was around, so I don't know how you were back then." Keishi smiled lightly at Sakuno. "But I think what's missing is your heart." he said. "It's not here with you, certainly not here for me."
xOxOx
Now that he gave any thought on it, Momoshiro would definitely have agreed that Tezuka would look undoubtedly good in a Rurouni Kenshin's samurai outfit. Not that he needed any confirmation; the Tennis Club captain was indeed looking good in a dark-colored kimono with a sword attached to his side. Even with Tezuka's pointedly steely look at him, Eiji still couldn't stop snickering.
Momoshiro reckoned it was his and Eiji's work, really, to have had suggested to the head teacher that the Tennis Club members pose as samurais this year. Tossing Tezuka and Kaidoh aside, the other members weren't quite as unhappy with the idea. Momoshiro saw Takashi laughing sheepishly and rubbing his head at the attention the girls were showering him. Oishi was patiently tolerant as usual, even as the girls flocked and flowed excitedly around him with endless flashes of camera lights. The rest of the first-years and second-years were enjoying it too much it seemed, but admitedly it was Fuji who got the largest bunch of female fans; even the grandmothers who trudged along with their families couldn't resist cackling like a teenage girl beside him.
"Nya! That's Ryoma!" yelled Eiji out of the blue, bringing the commotions around them to an abrupt stop.
Breaths seemed to hold, eyes turned in the direction Eiji's finger was exuberantly pointing at.
A few meters across from where the Tennis Club's samurai stall was erected, a boy taller than Echizen Ryoma they'd last seen three years ago stood languidly beside a stall that sold colorful sweets in the twelve zodiac shapes. He wore boots, a dark wide-brimmed hat, black jeans with a gleaming belt, a crimson button-up long-sleeve shirt under a black vest and a matching bandanna around his neck. If they weren't seeing it wrong, there was also a leather holster for a gun strapped to the left side of his jeans.
"It's—" Takashi frowned in confusion. "—it's a cowboy, isn't it?"
"That's Ryoma!" Eiji insisted confidently. Before any of them could interject that Ryoma was in America—and more importantly, to point out that Echizen Ryoma would never wear such kind of a dressing—Eiji waved and shouted at the boy, calling cheerfully, "Nya! Ochibi! Ryoma~!"
For a few seconds only the other students and the visitors who turned, but as Eiji kept on calling out, the cowboy shifted and slowly turned around, his hands holding a rather large, transparent packet of a rooster-shaped candy.
Most of those who by then had their eyes on him went slacked-jawed, staring with mouths opened and eyes wide.
No mistake that the smartly-dressed cowboy was, Echizen Ryoma.
He cocked his head to one side, looking in their general direction as if trying to figure out who they were. Then, in a flash, his eyes lit up. He strolled toward them with a smile and the large packet of rooster-shaped candy.
"That's not right." Momoshiro pondered. "He's smiling."
"The costume suits him." Fuji's blue eyes were opened then.
Ryoma stopped right in front of Tezuka.
"You're Tezu-chan." he said, loud and clear. Tezuka blinked. Kaidoh sputtered from the wooden water case he was drinking from. Ryoma turned to him. "And you're Kai-kun."
"I'm not Kai-kun!" Kaidoh barked.
"Doh-kun?"
Fuji and Momoshiro raised an eyebrow. Eiji pursed his lips curiously. The rest of those around them were still openmouthed and wide-eyed.
Kaidoh's eyes narrowed.
"Who the hell are you?" he hazarded. "That Echizen brat's look-alike?"
"I don't think so." Ryoma stuck out his right hand. "I'm Echizen Ryoma, but you've probably known that."
Kaidoh didn't take Ryoma's kindly outstretched hand, staring warily at it as if it might grow into tree branches. Oishi made way to the two of them, carefully putting his hands on Ryoma's shoulders and turning the younger boy around to face him.
"You do look a lot like Ryoma." he said with a contemplative frown.
"Oi-kun." Ryoma experimented.
"Urm, I'd like Oishi, but, whatever suits you." Oishi said. Ryoma smiled at him. "The smile is a little off."
"How does that Echizen brat smile then?" Ryoma asked, repeating Kaidoh's choice of words.
Oishi's eyes went to the sky, as if remembering.
"Well… He doesn't smile. Not really."
"He smirks." Eiji chirped.
"Ei-chan."
"Nya! I like that! Call me that!"
"I'm going to get sick." Kaidoh whispered, quietly easing himself into the wooden bench near their stall.
"He gets everyone's name shortened." Momoshiro pondered. Murmurs were beginning to buzz around them. Momoshiro leaned to Ryoma until their foreheads almost touched. "Hey, you,"
"Momo-chan."
Momoshiro chuckled.
"You get that right. But you're sure you haven't got your brains missing?" he inquired.
"A bit."
"Abit?"
Ryoma stepped back from them. His smile turned into a slow grin. He took off his wide-brimmed hat and they could see that his hair had been cropped short, which suited him perfectly well. Without the hat they—perhaps even more so to the girls' eyes—could clearly see then within three years he'd turned from adorable to downright good-looking.
"I had an accident in America." he declared. "Took me about two months to recover and got home, there's a scar here—" he pointed at the top of his forehead, beneath his bang. "—and I lost my memory."
For the second time, Kaidoh sputtered his drinks. Only this time it was followed by a set of severe, suffering coughs as his eyes nearly bulged out from their sockets.
"WHAT?" some of them barked.
"I'm back in Japan because Okasan thinks it might help me remember. She would come to tell Coach Ryuzaki and the head teacher next Monday, it's when I would start back here too."
"WHAT?"
Ryoma shrugged and kept his grin. Before Momoshiro or anyone else could gather their senses again, Ryoma's attention had moved from them to the couple walking a few meters ahead.
"Is that Ryuzaki Sakuno?" he asked.
Momoshiro looked at the girl distractedly. She was walking with Matsuo Keishi, her boyfriend.
"Yeah that's Ryuzaki Sakuno. Hold on, how do you recognize her? Come to think of it, how did you recognize us?"
"Pictures."
"I see, and where are you going—"
Ryoma sauntered away from the Tennis Club's stall. The murmurs were rising to animated talks after his declaration of "losing my memory" just seconds ago, but he kept his eyes on the brown-haired girl, Ryuzaki Sakuno.
Unlike in the pictures that Ryoma had of her, she didn't have her hair in braids now. Ryoma couldn't help but wondered how long it had been that way. Her hair was now tied simply into a pony tail at the back of her head, and it was evidently shorter than it had once been; barely reaching her waist.
When Ryuzaki Sakuno turned to him, noticing someone walking her way, a look of shock washed over her expression as her eyes widened and her mouth parted in disbelief. The boy who walked beside her stopped walking as she froze on her spot. Ryoma smiled, and just like that, he leaned to her and kissed her.
People had talked about their mind "going blank" in a certain unexpected crisis, but it really did happen. Sakuno thought about absolutely nothing at all when Echizen Ryoma—coming out of nowhere—stooped low to her and caught her mouth with his own.
Nothing at all except that her heart was thudding so loud in her ears she was sure he could hear it; that he smelled of a fresh cologne; that he was firmly pressing something—his wide-brimmed hat she supposed—at the back of her head, pulling her closer; that he had wounded his other arm around her waist, drawing her even closer; that they were pressed so intimately close as if they were long-time lovers; that he was deepening the kiss and she felt like a group of butterflies—though it was a pleasant feeling—were fluttering in her stomach.
That was when somebody shouted and shoved hard between them. Sakuno staggered, breathless and in a daze, and Keishi was already punching and tackling Ryoma to the ground in front of her, before Momoshiro and Oishi hastily rushed to the scene.
"What do you think you're doing!" Keishi grabbed the front of Ryoma's shirt, the bandanna around Ryoma's neck crumpled in his fingers.
"Keishi!"
"Ryoma!"
"Stop it!"
Everybody seemed to be shouting as voices around them rose to a crescendo.
Pausing, Keishi blinked, staring at Ryoma with fresh wonders.
"Wait. You're Echizen Ryoma?" he asked.
Ryoma put his tongue in his cheek, looking back at Keishi with a stoic face and slightly-bleeding lips.
"I think so." he deadpanned.
"Holy Digimon! I'm so sorry!" animatedly Keishi pulled Ryoma off the ground. When Momoshiro and Oishi reached them, there was no longer a fight to be stopped. Keishi was already brushing at Ryoma's shirt, even picking up Ryoma's wide-brimmed hat and dusting it off. "Gomen, I thought you were some loose-screwed pervert or something." he apologized, bowing three times.
In the blink of an eye Ryoma was grinning again.
"Who're you?" he asked.
"I'm Matsuo Keishi, call me Kei. I'm Sakuno's boyfriend—" Keishi patted Ryoma's shoulder when a surprised look crossed his face. "—fornow." Keishi leaned close, saying conspiratorially in a low voice, "We were just talking about you."
It was indeed confusing, the spectators were watching with puzzled looks and creasing foreheads, but by then Sakuno had regained enough of her senses to interfere.
"Let's go, Kei-kun." she grabbed at Keishi's hand, pulling her boyfriend away.
"But I've just met—"
"—we have to get back to class."
Quietly wiping the back of his hand to his injured lips, Ryoma watched them with great interest as Keishi was half-dragged by Sakuno to continue walking. She hardly glanced Ryoma's way, her face red and looking angry.
"Nice to meet you, Echizen! Welcome back to Japan!" Keishi called out. "And sorry for hitting you!"
Ryoma raised a hand at the black-haired boy.
"What in the name of hamburgers had just happened here?" Momoshiro hazarded.
Ryoma put on his wide-brimmed hat again, taking out his notebook and his pen from his pocket, jotting down another name: Matsuo Keishi.
After keeping quiet throughout the entire ordeal, finally Inui crept up next to Ryoma, gazing over his shoulder at his notebook.
"What is that?" he asked.
"A notebook."
"What are you doing with it?"
"Collecting data." Ryoma stared at Inui. "You're the one who makes strange juices and collects data."
"That's about right. And how do you know about us if you've lost your memory?"
"My Oyaji is an awesome man, he tells me everything."
"I see." Inui's own notebook was out, and with glasses shimmering, he too began to jot down something next to Ryoma.
Momoshiro burst out laughing at the sight of Echizen Ryoma and Sadaharu Inui standing beside each other scribbling importantly into their notebooks. Oishi frowned, observing the two of them with a serious look on his face. Tezuka took off his glasses and rubbed tiredly at his temple. Eiji was delighted. Fuji was amused. Takashi didn't know quite what to feel. And as the visitors and the students in the vicinity either continued their speculative chatters or returned to their activities, Kaidoh bolted up from the bench he'd been sitting on, cupping his mouth.
"I'm really going to get sick." he whispered as he rushed to the nearest washroom.
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Sighs. I hope the first chapter's alright. Tell me what you think about this? Thank you.
On a random note, keep praying for Japan! Though of course I know we all do, (: