Clockwork
A/N: Sometimes, there are things that are too simple that we tend to oversee them.
EDITED, not BETA-ED
Summary: It is not your typical roundabout tell-tales of romance. Not the usual, girl hates boy, boy loves girl, blah and happily-ever after, either. Distorted childhood memoirs take part, along with pride, ego and a few accounts of profanities and verbal attacks.
. . . . . . .
A little boy, age six, occupies the empty swing on a park just a few blocks away from their house. Winter arrived with fierce assault of the temperature leaving everything at its wake ice cold. He looks up the sky, wondering why Santa hasn't come to drop by this year. He has been a god boy yet there are no presents to open and no new toys to play with.
A little girl, barely age six, looks around the strange, new neighborhood. She doesn't recognize the ugly trees that decorate the sidewalk; doesn't recognize the large cars that beep and swerve along the road as their owners struggle to make their way for work. She pulls the red coat closer to her shoulders and makes her way to the empty park.
They just moved downtown from the countryside and she missed a lot of things and a lot of people from their old home. The creaking floorboards as she runs around the hallway, the crisp wind of the morning, the old family cat, Neko-chan, Miss Miyamoto, her primary class homeroom adviser, her friends. Their new apartment is just plain cold and scary.
Tears spills from her eyes as she slumped on the empty park bench. She felt all alone.
The little boy turns around to see another child in the park. She is crying, her face smeared with water and her cheeks flushed from the cold. One of her mittens is missing too.
Maybe she is also watching out for Santa? Good, they can look for him together.
He jumps off the swing and his feet both land on the ground. The little boy pulls his scarf closer to his neck and runs to the side of the little girl.
"Hey," he speaks while occupying the empty space to her right. The crying little girl looks at him curiously and sniffs.
"Who are you?" She wipes her tears with the back of her hand.
"Kunumitsu." He smiles, as if trying to ease a little of her sorrow.
"I'm Kaho."
"Well Kaho," Kunumitsu places his small gloved hands upon Kaho's bare one. "I can sit here with you until he arrives."
She takes Kunumitsu's warm hands and turns to look at him. When she sees that he is facing the sky, she looks up and wonders what is there to see.
And the first flakes of snow falls.
She smiles, and she reminds him very much of his mother.
. . . . . . .
The crowd roars. They cheer. The bleachers are packed out, the air filled with so much noise and excitement from both the players and the watchers.
She smiles, her smile genuine and childish, as she watched the two figures walk up in the middle of the field, each taking their posts on opposite sides of the court. Both of them held a racket in their hands, gripping tightly like a child who just received his first toy. Only this time, the emotions are very much different. Much, much different.
She cheers and shouts his name, along with the crowd that surrounds her. The situation feels ironic, she contemplates as Hiritaii Kaho remembers the past. It is strange to be feeling sentimental at a place like this, she realizes, but she does it anyway. The booming sound of the announcer shouting words she doesn't understand are drowned on her ears and the sound of it is replaced with the sound of her own voice.
"You're going down, Tezuka!" she screams, her voice to the highest octave, and she stands up to curse his name. "Beat him, Atobe Keigo!"
It is childish, she knew but she didn't particularly care. She hates Tezuka Kunumitsu and that thought alone is a paradox in itself.
"Game set match won by Hyoutei University Junior High, Atobe Keigo, 6-5!"
She freezes for a while, trying to comprehend the oddity of the situation. She grins, her expression torn between surprise, joy and irritation. "What the hell was that?" she shouts again and the brown-haired boy looks at her, his eyes filled with emotions she can not point out which. Pain, perhaps? Kaho furrows her brow and points at him her well-graced middle finger.
The game is about to start, as the players shook hands and turned back at each other to move at the back part of the court. The announcers yell at the microphone and Tezuka throws the ball up in the air.
"Tezuka!" Kaho yells but he doesn't hear. He had drowned out the sound of everything that surrounded him and focused on the game.
Because he will win.
Because he isn't just Tezuka Kunumitsu.
He is the Tezuka Kunumitsu.
. . . . . . .
She remembers.
Their cockfights, their arguments, her belligerent verbal attacks, her loud declarations of war. Most of them are one-sided because Tezuka doesn't give a damn. She doubts he ever listened. He is a very patient man and she knows that and hates him more for it. She wants to break his cool but it doesn't seem to falter at all.
She can not remember when she started calling him Bighead and Wonderboy and Know-It-All, but she can remember the moment he asked her why she hates him that much.
There is no logical reason behind it, she decides, so she will not tell.
'I hate you because you're a smartass.'
'I hate you because my mom pays more attention to what you have done than to what I have accomplished.'
'I hate you because you attract too much attention.'
She swears to God she will not tell a soul and he will not know. Because it all comes down to two things: her selfishness and her inferiority complex.
She remembers. And she almost laughed.
POK.
He returns the ball with ease.
POK.
He's flying, Kaho thinks as Tezuka followed the direction of the ball. He maneuvers his racket to the left and the ball bounces back to the other side of the court. His opponent misses it for a few millimeters.
And the crowd roars again, louder that the other time when Tezuka scored 15-0.
. . . . . . .
She remembers.
That time he tells the team he's leaving for Germany. She stands there, watching from a short distance, as Tezuka says to them, "I have accepted a scholarship to Berlin. I'm leaving Echizen in charge from now on," he nods to the boy, the new pillar of Seigaku, his successor. Tezuka continues, "Do your best."
The court is silent, the members of the tennis club holding their voices in. But all feelings are mutual—albeit unspoken—their captain understood.
When Echizen mutters, "Mada mada dane," he means, "I'll do my best, buchou!"
When Momo contemplates loudly, "Germany . . . there are a lot of pretty girls there," he wants to tell him, "Good luck."
Kaidoh hisses but Momo doesn't snap.
Fuji is the first to move, a smile evident, his eyes unseeing. He hugs him, and the whole team follows, crushing their captain in the middle.
She remembers.
How she points him an old rackets she got from the men's locker room and he stops. Tezuka looks up to her and she glares.
"You can't leave," Kaho tells him, her voice firm.
He simply stares back, daring her to continue. She speaks, "Let's duel. If I win, you stay. If not, I'll do what you want and stop bothering you."
'I have not beaten you yet.'
He accepts, and they stand on each side of the court. Momo climbs up to umpire the game and they start.
POK.
15-0
POK
30-0
Kaho misses his serves. His face is straight, and Eiji whispers to Oishi, "He's not taking this seriously, is he?"
Fuji interjects, "You know Tezuka."
Game set, 5-0.
POK.
Beads of sweat dot her face and she wipes them with the back of her hand. She misses another. And another. Until . . . she whips the racket and the ball bounces to the other side of the court. Tezuka prepares to hit it back until—
"OW!"
"KAHO-CHAN!"
Tezuka's concentration falters, and hit a little too hard. Momo screams, "Out!"
He stares at her with every focus his brown eyes can muster and she stares back. She throws the old racket on the ground and tells him, "I give up, freak."
She turns and walks out of the court.
. . . . . . .
"GAME SET MATCH, WON BY KUNUMITSU TEZUKA, 6-4!!"
The whole stadium shakes with the sound of the bellowing audience. Tezuka raises both his hands, as his agent and manager rush over and crushes him to a bone-snapping embrace. He nearly toppled off balance.
Kaho yells on her seat, calling his name, chanting his victory.
He won.
. . . . . . .
She squeezes herself through the crowd, and she sees him, his bodyguards swarming like dogs with sharp fangs. She calls his name—Kunumitsu—loud enough to stand out. He turns and sees her, their eyes meeting for a split-second and she smiles. He stops and smiles back.
They stood in front of each other and Tezuka wonders how long it has been since he last saw her. Ten years, perhaps? Such a long time . . .
She says, "Hi." He says, "Hello."
They are quiet for a moment and she speaks.
"This seems quite . . . familiar, don't you think?" she jests and he smiles.
Yes, familiar indeed. But very much different.
And they remember. In that spacious and crowded lobby of the stadium, as Tezuka hides with her at a private corner on the stadium lobby, he and she remembered. And they are brought back ten years ago when Tezuka stood at the gates of the airport foyer, looking at her with distant eyes.
"Oi, Bighead!" she yells, her voice shaking, her tears edging out.
He looks at her and stops. She continues, "I'll wait! You just see! I'll beat you!"
Tears spill out and he sees them run down her cheeks. She rubs them at the back of her hand and she curses. Tezuka grabs her and pulls her to him.
He listened to her sobs, glad that she doesn't push him away, or shout profanities to his ear.
"Is that the reason why you hated me since third grade?"
He remembers. "You are bad! Kaho hates you!"
It rings on his ears and it stung.
"I hate you. I hate you. I hate you," she chants for more than a dozen times, her voice muffled on his shoulder.
"Remember the day you got lost and your mom went looking for you?" he asks her. The first time they met. The first time Tezuka realized her smile is just like his mom's. Genuine and child-like. "I saw the look on her face and was dead scared of losing you."
She sniffs and sobs more. He wants to see that smile again . . . so he can remember his mother. So he can return eleven years back when she smiles at him and promises she will be back. The last time he remembered, he waves his hand to his mother's retreating from. A few hours later, Grandma and Grandpa cries while hugging him. Mom didn't return since.
"Your mother loves you more than anything else," he tells her. "More that anyone, including me. You're the most important person to her."
"Don't speak as if you understand!" she shouts, and Tezuka feels her voice vibrate on his chest.
"I understand."
She cries more, and he pulls back. "I understand," he repeats. He brushes his lips against her hair and says to her, "So please don't hate me anymore."
Because I want to see that smile again.
Smile for me.
. . . . . . .
They sit across each other, in a dark, crowded bar where nobody knows them. He orders beer, she orders juice.
"Why juice?" he wonders aloud and she looks up, bringing the glass to her lips. He doesn't miss the glint of platinum on her left finger. A glint of diamond and he knew at once.
She smiles a mocking smile and takes a long sip from her drink.
He swallows, his stomach dropping to his intestines. "You're pregnant?"
She simply smiles, and he sees it—that smile, real and frank. Just . . . frank. He likes that about her.
He is silent for a while. "Who—?"
"Well after I got off from law school, Syusuke asked me out," she tells him. "He's a very nice guy."
"Fuji didn't tell me anything," he says.
"We wanted to surprise you and invite you to our wedding."
"Hn," Tezuka's beer is half-empty.
"He's sort of on a business trip right now," she explains briefly when he doesn't ask.
"Is that so?"
"What's wrong?"
He looks at her and contemplates her question. "Nothing is," he lies.
. . . . . . .
He sees Fuji and hugs him. Fuji hugs him back and they stay like that for a while. Kaho clears her throat loudly and they back away from each other.
"You didn't tell me you got engaged," Tezuka accuses him and Fuji grins.
"But I told you I fell in love," he says to him and Kaho holds his hand, squeezing it tightly with a smile. Tezuka saw it again.
"You didn't tell me it was Kaho."
He is very much surprised . . .
"It doesn't matter," Tezuka tells them.
. . . as long as she keeps on smiling that genuine smile . . .
"What wedding are you planning?"
"Since the baby's due March, we're planning a June one."
"That's great."
. . . he will be happy for the two of them.
"Tezuka, do you know Momoshiro got married to Anne Tachibana last year?"
"He called, but I was busy I couldn't come."
"And Echizen—"
"He told me about it."
"Ryuzaki-sensei, even at her age, chased him out with an axe on one hand and a butcher's knife on the other."
"It's a shame you missed it."
Because love is like the first snowfall. Even if it indicates the start of a ravenous weather, it is beautiful.
"Oh, and Tezuka—you're the first to know about the baby and the wedding."
And even if it melts . . . winter starts all over again, like an unending cycle, a non-dimensional geometric shape—a circle, continuous and unbroken.
He looks at them, their arms wound around each other and he smiles. It reaches his eyes as he whispered, "Thank you."
It is enough.
. . . . . . .
END
A/N: It hit me. Like tons of cold blocks of ice. Like huge chunks of iceberg that hit a ship ever since Titanic. So, please review.