Author's Note: I know it's not valentine's day yet, but I'm busy this week so I have to post it before the actual day. Also this is just a really random idea with no plot whatsoever. And no proofreading just like always. You've been warned.
"02-29-12…"
The lock to Fuji Syusuke's locker opened cleanly with a click. With a box of chocolate in hand, Ryoma opened the locker door quickly and was about to leave the box of chocolate in there until certain things caught his attention.
For one, there were no other boxes of chocolate inside the locker.
It was Valentine's Day. Not to mention Fuji wasn't here at the moment because he was in a practice match with Kawamura. Given Inui's personality, there was simply no way Ryoma was the only one who obtained Fuji's locker combination from the data-collecting senpai.
It was rather odd that there were no traces of chocolate in the locker whatsoever. Knowing how popular Fuji was with girls, Ryoma assumed Fuji's locker would be stuffed completely full with chocolate, like how his own locker almost exploded with all the chocolate inside. Ryoma originally planned to place his unlabeled box of chocolate inside the locker and camouflage it with the other boxes so Fuji would just throw everything away in one sweep.
Oh well, Ryoma thought. Not like it matters. He'll throw it away if it's unlabeled anyways.
The more important thing was Fuji's regulars jacket.
Round, golden eyes stared the lone blue and white jacket inside the locker. Then, the eyes stared at a smaller jacket on Ryoma's own body.
Ryoma's regulars jacket was the smallest size ever made for a regular – a size S. Fuji, on the other hand, wore a size M. The size difference could not possibly be that big, could it? For what reasons could it be that everyone was so fascinated by an S-sized regulars jacket?
Small hands reached towards Fuji's jacket. Ryoma then took off his own jacket, temporarily placed it next to the box of chocolate inside the locker, and tried on Fuji's.
He tugged on the sleeves.
It doesn't look that different. Not much bigger, Ryoma thought.
"Ochibi!" A voice rang from outside of the locker room. "It's almost your turn to play a practice match! Hurry up!"
Ryoma blinked blankly for a few seconds, before replying, "I'm coming!"
He took a little too long.
Hurriedly, Ryoma took off Fuji's jacket, returned it back to where it came from, and closed the locker door. He dashed out of the locker room and into the tennis court with racket in hand, ready for any practice Inui could throw at him.
"You're late!" Kikumaru yelled from the opposite side of the court, waving his arm at Ryoma.
"I'm not! I was just getting ready for the match!" Ryoma retorted, slightly annoyed by how loudly Kikumaru called him out for being late. The freshman swore he could see Inui's glasses glinting from a distance, his prepared Inui juice waiting to be used on someone.
A pleasant chuckle reached Ryoma's ears, and the freshman found Fuji staring at him with amused eyes.
Before Ryoma could say anything to Fuji, Kikumaru was yelling at him again to get started. Fuji got off the court in a blink of an eye after hearing that. The freshman prodigy shrugged to himself. Oh well. It wasn't anything important anyways.
Something was bugging Ryoma inside his head, but he could not figure out what. He played distractedly, losing a few points but still managed to win against his senpai. Winning was a piece of cake for him, especially if it was only a practice match without special conditions. Kikumaru looked slightly dejected, but still rather cheerful despite losing.
"Ochibi, you're so distracted! What's wrong?" The cat-like senpai clung onto the freshman and asked.
So. Heavy.
"Senpai, if I can win so easily against you when I'm distracted, you've still got a lot more to work on."
Kikumaru gasped loudly and almost fell off of Ryoma.
"You're so mean, Ochibi!"
Ryoma could feel his cheeks being pinched. Why is Kikumaru-senpai so childish?
"Oh hey, Echizen! Are you done yet? Ready to go home? I'll take you on my bike!" Momo approached the two of them with a casual grin, slinging an arm around Ryoma's shoulders.
From the corner of his eye, Ryoma caught a glimpse of Fuji attempting to approach him, but giving up after seeing Momoshiro's joining. The freshman wanted to ditch his loud, annoying senpais who were huddling around him to see what was up with Fuji instead, but before he could voice any opinions, Momo was already in the process of dragging him towards the locker room.
By the time Ryoma realized that he was lost in his own thoughts, he found himself on his way home with Momoshiro, hitching a ride on his bicycle.
"Here you go!" Momoshiro exclaimed loudly, and the bicycle stopped right in front of Ryoma's house. The senpai turned around to face Ryoma, who was riding quietly behind him. "You're so spaced out today. Ohhh, are you thinking of a girl? It IS Valentine's Day, after all!"
Momoshiro had a large smirk on his face.
Ryoma got off the back of the bicycle. "Momo-senpai, stop being nosy. You're the one that's thinking of a girl, not me," Ryoma replied calmly. "See you tomorrow."
The freshman quickly entered his house and shut the door before he could hear what Momoshiro was yelling at him about. Ryoma sighed. Nothing was going according to his plan today, it seemed. At least he gave away the chocolate successfully.
A set of shuffling footsteps approached the entrance.
"Ryoma-san! Welcome back!" Nanako greeted the young boy with a happy smile. "Did you give away the chocolate I made?"
"Nn. I'm home," Ryoma nodded.
While Ryoma was taking off his shoes, he noticed his cousin staring at him curiously. He raised an eyebrow and tilted his head. Nanako waited until Ryoma was finished taking off his shoes before asking anything.
"Ryoma-san. Where's your jacket? Let me wash it for you."
Jacket?
Ryoma blinked blankly. He looked at himself; he was not wearing his jacket. He opened his tennis bag; it was not in there either.
Karupin walked towards Ryoma and circled around the young boy's left foot. The cat meowed and rubbed his face onto Ryoma's leg. The young boy stared at his cat, and the cat eventually stared back.
Karupin's blue eyes had always reminded Ryoma of someone.
…Oh.
"Ryoma-san?"
Ryoma facepalmed. "I think… I left my jacket in Fuji-senpai's locker."
–
It took Ryoma a while to find out the phone number for Fuji's house. He stood in front of his landline phone, not sure how he should ask but dialed the number anyways. Hopefully, this could be settled as painlessly as possible.
A minute passed before someone finally picked up the phone.
"Fuji-household. Who is it?" asked a rather grumpy voice.
"Are you… Fuji-senpai's younger brother?"
"This voice… Echizen! And my name is Yuta, stop forgetting it!" Yuta yelled from the other side. "Do you want to talk to Aniki?"
"Y-… Actually, maybe you can help me, Yuta-san."
"What the… Stop creeping me out. I didn't think you'd ever call me by my name."
"I'm trying to get my jacket back."
The other side of the line went eerily silent. For a minute, Ryoma thought the phone call was cut off for some reason until he heard an inexplicable sound of struggling that sounded like a mix of screaming and choking. Ryoma's eyebrows furrowed, slightly concerned. Only slightly.
"Yuta-san?"
"Echizen, listen to me and trust me on this," Yuta spoke, his voice deeper than usual. "You. Don't. Want. Your. Jacket. Back."
Confused, Ryoma asked back, "What are you talking about? I need my jacket for practice!"
"Okay, let me phrase this another way," Yuta could be heard taking a deep breath. "PLEASE DON'T TAKE YOUR JACKET BACK! I'msorryIcan'thelpyoubye!"
The phone call was cut off.
Ryoma frowned. That accomplished absolutely nothing. Oh well, I'll just ask Fuji-senpai directly tomorrow.
—
It had been a while since Ryoma waited for someone by the front gate of the school before school started. Actually, scratch that. Ryoma had never, ever waited for someone by the front gate, but it was the only way to see Fuji Syusuke as soon as possible.
When Fuji finally showed up, he was getting off of a fancy red car that Ryoma could not recognize. Not surprising – Ryoma had never been interested in cars. A lot of attention seemed to be drawn towards the car and Fuji, and that only made Ryoma wonder why Fuji's locker was so empty.
The freshman realized he must had been staring when he locked eyes with his senpai. Fuji looked cheerful and happy all of a sudden, waved goodbye to someone inside the car, and jogged towards him.
"Good morning, Echizen," Fuji greeted.
"Morning, Fuji-senpai," the freshman greeted back dryly.
Fuji's smile turned into an exaggerated pout. "Echizen, what's wrong? You don't look so happy today."
When have I ever looked happy in the morning? Ryoma asked inside his head. As far as he could recall, he was always in a sour mood whenever he had to wake up early. No exceptions.
"Senpai, can I talk to you? Alone?"
Fuji smiled, "Sure!"
The freshman led his senpai to the back of the school building, where students rarely visit in the morning. He figured this problem needed to be solved completely alone. When the two finally reached their destination, Ryoma turned around to face Fuji and bluntly held out his hand.
"Give it back," Ryoma said.
There was a moment of silence.
Fuji tilted his head, frowned for some reason, took out a box from his backpack, and placed it on Ryoma's hand. Ryoma looked at the box; it was the box of chocolate he left inside Fuji's locker.
The young boy resisted the urge to fling the box right back at his senpai's face.
"Fuji-senpai," Ryoma hissed with a shaking voice. "Why the hell is this still in your backpack? Eat your damn chocolate and give my jacket back!"
Unexpectedly, Fuji grinned happily. "So it WAS you that put this in my locker!"
"My. Jacket."
"Echizen!" Fuji exclaimed and hugged Ryoma's head. "I can't believe you didn't write your name on the box! If I hadn't noticed it was from you, I would have thrown it away! You can't be so careless next time. But either way, I'm so glad you finally decided to confess your feelings. Do you know how long I've waited-"
Ryoma sighed loudly. He stopped listening to Fuji's words halfway through.
"So let me get this straight," Ryoma interrupted. "I'm not getting my jacket back, am I?"
Fuji was irritatingly delightful. "Nope!"
Ryoma pinched the bridge of his nose. Now he understood why Tezuka-buchou did this so often whenever Fuji was up to no good.
"Senpai, the tennis club requires the regulars to wear the team jacket. What am I supposed to wear if I don't have one?"
Fuji let go of Ryoma for a brief moment and tapped his chin with his index finger, deep in thought. Then an epiphany seemingly struck, as Ryoma could almost see a lightbulb appearing above Fuji's head, before the senpai reached for his backpack and handed Ryoma a jacket.
A jacket of size M.
"…Senpai, what's the point of giving me your jacket? Just give mine back."
The school bell rang at an untimely moment, and Fuji was gone from the scene in what seemed like only milliseconds. By the time Ryoma recovered from the shock from the bell, his senpai had already walked away, leaving him with an oversized jacket.
…Fine. At the very least, I can wear this jacket without getting into trouble.
—
That was what he thought at first. Until he reached the tennis courts once more.
"Pfft. PfftHAHAHAHAHA," an irritating laughter loudly rang into Ryoma's ears.
Ryoma glared at the culprit, Momoshiro.
"What's so funny?"
"Y-You look like," Momoshiro struggled to talk while laughing, "you look like an angry baby that stole his parent's jacket HAHAHA-"
Ryoma was about to retort when he heard a surprised gasp from the other side of the court. Kikumaru was staring at his best friend Fuji, who was wearing a smaller jacket than usual.
The freshman could not help but notice that the small jacket highlighted Fuji's slim waist.
"F-Fuji! What are you wearing?" Kikumaru yelled.
Fuji's eyes opened. The blue irises shone happily as he smiled and replied, "Can't you tell? It's a boyfriend jacket!"
The world around Ryoma went silent for a few seconds.
Kikumaru stuttered dramatically, clearly not knowing what to say. The other regulars (aside from Inui) looked flustered as well and could not concentrate on practicing at all. By the time Tezuka finally finished his morning report to the coach and returned to the court, the regulars were in completely chaos.
Tezuka sighed in disappointment and quickly spotted the cause of all the trouble.
"Fuji! Echizen! 50 laps!"
Without any complaints, the two jogged outside of the courts and started their laps together.
"Fuji-senpai, are you free this Saturday? I need you to go to the mall with me."
"Is it a date?"
Ryoma grumbled.
"You owe me a new jacket. I'll make you pay for it."
"Hehe, it's a date."
-End-
Omake:
Ryoma: Senpai, how come there were no boxes of chocolate in your locker?
Fuji: Silly, I was asked Inui to make sure you were the only one who could access my locker. How else do you think I knew it was you who gave me the chocolate?
Ryoma: ...Wait, I thought my jacket-
Fuji: Did you get my chocolate?
Ryoma: What?
Fuji: I stuffed my chocolate in your locker.
Ryoma: Uhhhhhhhhh.
Fuji: Don't tell me you didn't see them? I bought all 100 boxes just for you!
Ryoma: THOSE WERE ALL YOURS? GODDAMMIT FUJI SYUSUKE.
Author's note: I swear, they are not communicating in the same language.