Fairytale Ending
by Yume M.

Once upon a time. That was how most fairytales started, right? And of course most fairytales had the pretty little damsel-in-distress, the evil witch/dragon/thing, a handsome knight/prince/some sort of savior to slay said evil and get the girl. The savior would always be a gentleman, sweet and so very open to his princess. And the princess would do the stereotypical attitude: "I'm in love with you because you saved me, we shall get married & have beautiful children together in your palace/home and live happily ever after!". Yeah, the kind of fairytales that adults, inwardly, get stomach aches and nausea reading to their children at night. The ones that always had the cute little endings.

Somehow, the meeting between Sakuno and the infamous prince of tennis was similar to a fairytale (in Sakuno's mind, of course). Only he was a bratty kid and she didn't fall in love with him right away.

He never really opened up to her, even though she secretly adored him.

And, of course, they were only 7th graders, so neither of them even had thoughts about living together or having children (although a 9th grade Sakuno catches herself thinking these thoughts one day and promptly blushes many shades of pink and red for having such thoughts about Ryoma and herself).

So she pined for him, hoping that one day he would sweep her off her sneakered feet, to return the feeling of like she had for him, to be his and only his. She pined for him through middle school and through high school. She watched him play his tennis matches, getting playfully teased by his senpai, and turn down many girlfriend offers from his always-following fan club.

As she watched him from afar, however, she started to lose some hope on Ryoma, starting in middle school. She was always loyal to him and was, probably, his closest gal friend. But he never really appreciated some of the things she would do for him. Like once on a rainy day, Sakuno had made him an elegant bento because she wanted to cheer him up from not being able to do any practice. Ryoma only looked at her, took the bento and said an unreadable "Thank you". Sakuno thought it was nice of him to say thank you, but deep down inside, Sakuno was a little disappointed. She wanted him to give her a smile, albeit a small one, and say thank you in a happier tone.

In high school, her hope was waining even more. Though Ryoma turned down all offers for dates and girlfriends, Sakuno still thought he would maybe ask her to be his girlfriend, to be the princess to his prince. Sakuno was older, though. She knew that in a small part of her heart, Ryoma would never do that because Ryoma was Ryoma, the (socially-retarded) tennis player and that he would never ask anyone out, including her. Regardless though, Sakuno still saw him as her fairytale prince, her knight-in-shining-armor (and he was, sometimes).

It was very hard to keep telling herself that. It was worried Sakuno to see Ryoma talk with another girl. It hurt Sakuno emotionally to see him get kissed on the cheek (by pure surprise, of course) by another. It was hard to keep telling herself that Ryoma was her prince when he had so many suitors and zero to none meaningful interaction with her.

No matter what, though, she never felt discouraged from showing hints of her adoration and love to him, even if he never really noticed them. That, however, sort of got in the way of seeing her supposed-fairytale prince in Ryoma.

Now, at 22 years old, Sakuno finally realizes something that she refused to acknowldge when she was younger.

Ryoma Echizen, the tennis player, would never return any of the love she gave to him.

Ryoma would never sweep her off her feet.

Ryoma would never fully and completely open up to her.

And Ryoma would never love her the way she used to love him.

He could never do any of these things because he wasn't the prince of her dreams, the one she lived happily ever after with. It hit her hard in the face, this realization. Sakuno didn't know why it took about 10 years to fully grasp this, but she guessed her "love" for the prince of tennis was ingraved into her heart so deeply that it took some time for it to fade away. That's just how it disappeared. She also realized that the happy, cutesy fairytale endings were for stories that hadn't ended yet, or nor properly. That life would never be a fairytale and that not all guys were gentleman-like saviors and that the damsels-in-distresses didn't know how to save themselves most of the time.

Ryoma was the ungentleman-like prince and she was the damsel-in-distress that couldn't save herself half the time.

So, Sakuno finally decided, once in for all, that she would no longer be the distressed and that she would be able to save herself. She decided that Ryoma may be the Prince of Tennis, but he would never be the prince in the fairytale.

Sakuno decided to make her own fairytale ending.

The End

Author's Notes: My first fanfic, as you can see. Hope you enjoyed it Oh and btw, I adore the RyoSaku pairing. Just wanted to get this out into the open. Helpful, non-flaming comments, if you don't please.