Disclaimer: I own very little.

A/N: This is an entry to the rikkai-shorts fic exchange at LiveJournal, the recipient being star-in-my-soup.

True Friends

True friends, Sanada had heard, were those who knew everything about you.

It was the best thing about friends, Seiichi had once said, that they knew you so well. While Sanada was willing to agree with the fact that friends did, indeed, know you best, he wasn't absolutely sure it was the best thing about them. In fact, he was rather convinced it could be considered the worst thing about friends.

Especially when it came to friends like Renji.

Now, Renji was more intelligent than he was, there was no doubt about that. Their strategist was at times frighteningly sharp, and Sanada was not at all willing to enter a battle of wits with him, knowing he would lose. His own strengths lay elsewhere. Outside the tennis courts his most remarkable attribute was his commanding presence; indeed, nobody but Seiichi could resist whenever he voiced an order, and it wasn't only because he was the vice-captain. Not even Renji had ever tried to deny the fact that he was a leader type.

Renji, however, all too often questioned almost everything else about him.

It didn't bother him that Renji knew of his fear of dogs. Irrational though it was, Sanada was convinced it was somewhat understandable -- anybody would be scared if they had been knocked over by a lion-sized beast in the tender age of two. Being close to him as he was, Renji naturally knew of this, and while he usually made no mention of it, he'd noticed Renji never did anything that might bring him anywhere around the objects of his fear. This was all right. They were, after all, friends.

It did, however, bother him that Renji actually made the connection between this irrational fear and the way he picked the longer route to get home. He did not want anybody to know that the mere display of a pet shop, with the pictures of dogs, was enough for him to feel uncomfortable. No matter how often he told that it was simply for the exercise, however, Renji never believed. Not even Seiichi knew his fear was this strong -- Renji, on the other hand, had never even assumed otherwise.

Of course, there was Seiichi, too. They were friends, just like Renji and he were. The three of them had stuck together since their first year, as close outside the courts as they were furious rivals on them. Still, even though Seiichi seemed to know every last thing about him, there were times when Sanada realized that Renji still knew just a bit more.

Sanada was fairly certain, for example, that Seiichi hadn't ever known about his crush for the captain. Being who he was, Seiichi would have never let it slide without commenting on it -- most probably telling him with a few sharp words and a smile that he was not interested in the least but thank you anyway. Renji, on the other hand, had been all too well aware, still occasionally commenting on it no matter how many times Sanada told him he'd gotten over it already. And he had, really, despite his nigh obsession with the captain -- old habits simply died hard, after all, and it was good to be concerned about your friends, wasn't it?

He wasn't sure exactly how Renji had found out. If Seiichi, ever observant as he was, hadn't noticed, how had Renji? Then again, the strategist knew everything about everyone, as it often seemed -- or at least he wanted everybody to think so. It only made sense that he would know even more about Sanada as they were friends.

But then, why didn't he know Seiichi's favourite ice cream flavour, even though he was aware of even Sanada's favourite brand?

Especially disturbing it got at times when Renji seemed to know more about him than he did himself. As he could not momentarily recall a book he'd read about a month ago, Renji could tell not only the title and author's name, but also Sanada's opinion and the time he had spent reading it. It even got to a point where Sanada sometimes glanced towards the window when he was perfectly alone to make sure Renji wasn't secretly watching him or something.

Sanada noticed he'd developed a tendency to watch Renji no matter the occasion, trying to figure out just how the other collected his reserves of information. Thus far he had concluded that Renji was apparently well capable of following three conversations and two practice matches at the same time and still play himself. How he did this remained a mystery, as well as how he managed to remember all the information he gained.

The more Sanada actually paid attention to Renji, the more often he caught the other looking at him. He wasn't entirely sure whether this meant Renji was watching him more than before or if he simply noticed it more. Whichever was the case, he was fairly certain Renji noticed his constant watching, and tried to avoid it. However, he simply couldn't help it. It was like his eyes were naturally drawn to Renji.

At least Renji refrained from commenting on it -- for now. Sanada knew the information was stored carefully away, ready to be used whenever the opportunity presented itself. He wasn't sure what kind of an opportunity would call for this piece of information, but he was fairly sure he wouldn't like it.

The more Sanada watched Renji, the more clearly he realized just how little he knew about his friend. And the more clearly he realized this, the more frustrated he was about how well Renji seemed to know him.

Only Renji wasn't surprised as Sanada made Marui try playing doubles with Kirihara. He alone also seemed to understand why Sanada wasn't as surprised as everybody else when the attempt, while not really successful, didn't turn out to be a complete disaster, either. Now, Sanada perhaps wasn't the most observant of people, but he wasn't blind, either.

He wasn't sure whether it was a good or bad thing that only Renji seemed to realize this.

It was also only Renji who noticed his bad mood another day. The others did grumble about him assigning more laps than usual -- and got more laps for that whenever he heard them, naturally -- but didn't seem to realize that he was being meaner than usual for a reason. It perhaps wasn't a good reason, but he had a bad day and they weren't supposed to chat during practice, damn it.

Renji, however, seemed to know otherwise. At least this was what Sanada concluded as the strategist stopped by him after practice.

"We all have our off days, Genichiroh," he said, smiling a bit. "However, not all of us take it out on others quite as violently." And then, he was away before Sanada could assign him any extra laps.

The worst part was, Renji might have actually known just why he was in a bad mood. Sanada did not want anybody to know that he'd been chased by a fist-sized dog for two blocks on his way to school. And the fist he was thinking of wasn't very big, either. Why did people want 'cute little doggies' who could fit in a glass and ran like hell?

Again, though, Renji didn't say anything about it even if he knew, storing the information for later use. Come next, thankfully dog-less morning, and the strategist was the first to greet him at morning practice.

"Ah, Genichiroh," Renji said, calm as always. "You've had a better day than yesterday, I hope."

Sanada glared at his friend. "Don't hope too much," he grumbled. "I'm going to put you all through one Hell of a practice."

"But of course." Renji smiled. "If you didn't, you wouldn't be the Genichiroh I know." With this and a brief touch at his shoulder, the data player walked out of the club room, leaving Sanada looking after him.

True friends, Sanada had heard, were those who knew everything about you -- and loved you nevertheless.