Paparazzi
Standard Disclaimers Apply.
A/N: The title is from the Lady Gaga song, but the content is not. XD I've been wanting to see these two from the media point of view for the longest time, because if nothing else, I lvoe reactions. I'm not entirely happy with this piece, but it satisfied that particular bunny, so I just hope you guys like it.
They are the word's hottest tennis stars, young and sexy at Ryoma's sixteen and Tezuka's eighteen, fantasy material for women everywhere, practically idols in all their popularity. So of course, when the first paparazzi photo leaks out, the press is all over it. The tabloids haven't had a good scandal in a while, and the image of Echizen Ryoma, notorious for his silence in interviews, sensual in an oversized lavender shirt, spooned in the arms of Tezuka Kunimitsu, infamous for wearing lavender shirts and his sudden burst onto the tennis scene, is too good of a visual to go to waste.
In their defense, Ryoma and Tezuka didn't think that the paparazzi would be able to stalk them all the way to their shared fourth-floor apartment in a somewhat ritzy New York high rise. Their managers just shake their heads and sigh and say in unison: "It's good publicity."
Karupin yowls and tries to claw them both in his master's defense and Ryoma shoots them laser-beam glares and only Tezuka's restraining grip on his arm stops him from throwing Hansen's cans (because America sucks and grape Ponta does not exist there).
Ryoma and Tezuka don't deny anything and they don't say anything, but they're twitchy when they go their separate ways for practice in the mornings and they don't go shopping together anymore. Ryoma talks to Tezuka in Japanese more often, brushing the inside of a wrist or fluttering fingers by Tezuka's sides in contrast with gentle embraces and teasing kisses. Tezuka understands; Ryoma hates attention more than anything, and loathes invasions of privacy. What Ryoma and Tezuka have is special, and Ryoma doesn't want anyone who doesn't have their permission coming in between them.
"This is stupid," Ryoma breathes in Tezuka's ear one day, as they grind against each other in the shower, hot and wet and slick as they burn off the frustration. Tezuka can only nod stiffly as Ryoma bucks up, back arching perfectly into Tezuka's hand, warm, supporting and reassuring.
The next day they go shopping together for the first time in two and a half weeks, and they get bolder and bolder with every outdoor venture, suggestive touches, playing footsie underneath cloth-draped café tables, staring contests and hand holding at the right moments, and Ryoma laughs when he gets and email from Fuji: Echizen, I have taught you well.
At the French Open, Ryoma and Tezuka make out over the nets after their match, heady with adrenaline and full of the completeness that can come from nothing else, and break only when Ryoma leans backward too far and Tezuka follows him down, tripping over the net.
The tabloids explode in a scandalized frenzy; so does their answering machine with some seven plus messages from the old middle-high school circuit, but at the end of the year they still end up as People's Best Couple of the Year.