Miyuki & Sawamura
御幸 & 沢村

Teeth

In reality, this sort of thing didn't happen, but in hindsight, Miyuki had seen the signs – he just hadn't known what they were pointing to. Not that anybody in his position would. Sawakana friendship. I dunno how to tag this. MiSawa, SawaMiyu. Vampire! AU

Chapter One
Graduation

'In the memories that I've started to forget
about, the lights start to turn on…'

The sun burned through the musty afternoon air, stifling the school hall of Seidou High School. The last day of term was always a struggle for Eijun, but today in particular was more difficult than usual; third year had flew by with more drag and endlessness than he had thought it would.

'I never realised so much could happen in a year,' he mused to himself as the school principal droned on to the first and second years who would be moving up a grade after the summer. 'And here I thought the first two years of high school had been busy.'

Hell, never mind the past year, the next one was going to be even tougher. Hōsei University. Eijun still didn't know how the hell he'd managed to study enough to pass the entrance exams. Even being scouted didn't mean he could enter the Big6 University without something to study.

Wakana would probably say something like someone mixed up the names on the application forms by sheer luck. She'd probably be right. Eijun was pretty sure he'd scraped in just enough to meet the standards and satisfy the red tape, even with all Kanemaru's help in studying.

Still, he got to play baseball, on another team. He'd be going home for the summer, and coming back and forth looking for a 1LD-K for living in ready for the first term, and looking for a job to help pay the bills. He shivered – when did he get so mature?

The principal changed his subject of address to the graduation third years, commenting on their achievements, congratulating the Baseball team on their first Kōshien win in eight years, and Sawamura sighed. How had they all held up this year? He really wasn't sure.

After the loss in his second year, right at the finals, when they came so close but so far away from that unattainable goal, he had no idea how they managed to pull it back together, especially after Kuramochi and all the other third years had graduated, going on to either pro team recruitment or college teams of their own.

Kanemaru had been named captain, Harucchi one of his vice-captains. Eijun was not jealous at all – he had liked being his middle school captain, but had been out of necessity. He was well aware that he wasn't the best to lead such a large team, with so many faceless figures, and unknown names. He hadn't quite achieved his goal, but… he'd get there. At Hōsei.

He had to, he'd be damned thrice if he didn't get that single digit number he so desperately craved on his first day at Seidou. He'd promised he would do it. He couldn't say he spoke much to his friends from Nagano as much as he used to now, but he owed it to them.

They'd all grown up, and being such a distance had been difficult to maintain relationships, though a mix of them had always come to Seidou's Kōshien games, but a promise was still a promise.

Even if it was only to himself, he wanted to keep it.

"Eijun-kun! The song!" Harucchi whispered, jerking him out of his thoughts. Glancing around, Eijun could see people getting to their feet and holding sheets of paper handed out at the start of the ceremony. Quickly getting to his own, he pulled the crumpled sheet with the days songs from his back pocket, unfurling it as the music for the school song began.

It passed into a song from the third years, then one from their underclassmen, then finally another group song. The faint music of Auld Lang Syne began to flow with the final song before diplomas were given, and Eijun concentrated, forming the words to the music as best he could with his head in such a mess.

He really couldn't believe it was his graduation today. 'Of all the days, it had to be today,' he sighed in his head, as lyrics continued to pour from his lips.

His tongue itched rough and dry against his mouth, and once it was over he had to sneak a drink from his water bottle (much to Harucchi's displeasure) as the diploma calls were started.

"It's too hot…" Furuya mumbled on Eijun's other side, picking up his own water bottle (even after three years, he still hadn't got used to Tokyo temperatures). For once, Eijun had to agree with him. It was way too warm for spring. Thank god the summer uniforms had been broken out already.

The rest of the ceremony hadn't taken long. Eijun collected his diploma, getting to his feet with a loud 'Yes!' when his name was called, much to his classmates amusements, nearly messing up his bow as he collected the paper form the principal.

He had seen parents at the back of the hall, but he didn't meet them until the ceremony and everyone had congregated outside, milling around for the hour wait until the photo was going to be taken. Which was where they were now, all being thoroughly embarrassed by their parents; his mother was beaming with the same kind of disbelief as him, and his dad looked like he was going to burst into tears.

Eijun let himself soak up all the warmth he could. He knew he would see them again in a few days, but he couldn't help but wish they were staying longer than to pick up his things from the dorm to take home (not that he had much).

"Are any of your friends going to Hōsei?" his grandfather asked. "That boy with the fast throws or the pink one?"

"Furuya isn't, he's going to Keio," Eijun nodded – his friend/rival had tested into the school, just as he had with Seidou. "And Harucchi is going to Waseda like his brother. I think Kanemaru is going to Rikkyo."

They continued chitchatting to pass the time between moments of proud (and stunned) family affection. Eijun was the first in the family to go to University, and whether he had scraped in with the help of a Baseball scholarship or not, it was still a big achievement.

His two friends soon joined them, accompanied by their own families (Ryou-san was as scary as ever) and the adults got caught up in conversation for a while until Eijun glanced up at the level of the sun. It really was strong today, and it was getting late.

"Do you want me to go get my stuff now? It'll take forever to get the photographer ready, and the baseball club will be doing their own thing later..." he asked.

"Oh! I completely forgot to tell you!" His mother blinked. "We found a place already! It's very close to Tama campus – that's the right one isn't it?"

Eijun blinked, then nodded furiously. "Yeah! But how did you find one so quickly? I thought the plan was to go hunting during the summer?" he asked. He'd been looking for places to live as soon as his admission had been guaranteed, and finding somewhere to stay close to Tama that was affordable was difficult.

Even a simple flat was hard to find, and he had been able to go to a few letting agents directly on his spare days, having the luxury of still being in Tokyo.

"Actually it was one of your old teammates who got in touch with us through Takashima-san," his mother explained. "They go to the same university and she asked if they knew of any places to stay being advertised on the campus itself."

"One of…?" Eijun stared, his brain trying to catch up – he was hungry, and the nagging feeling wasn't helping his brain cells keep up. The only teammate he was familiar with was-

"It might be an idea to go get your stuff kid," his father advised. "We arranged that it could be dropped off at the flat today so you can start getting ready as soon as you come back down. What's that snarky one's name? He said he'd come by to help pick it up."

Snarky one?

"Wait, you don't mean Miyuki Kazuya do you?" he asked. He'd barely heard from the catcher the past year, though admittedly they'd both been incredibly busy.

As far as Eijun knew, Miyuki was the only member of the team who had been purposely scouted by the same school he too had been approached by. Like the third years from his first year, Eijun had stayed in touch with all the second years who had graduated a year previously.

Kuramochi had gone to Hōsei too (he had applied) and he didn't hear much from him either. Though he did get frequent updates, and pictures from the victory parade at the end of the Sōkeisen (Eijun couldn't wait to get started and keep his rivalry with Furuya going).

"Yeah that's him! You'd better go get the boxes, he said he'd be here after the ceremony to help move stuff and show us the way to the building."

"We'll come help Eijun-kun, our parents have already picked things up, what was left anyway," Harucchi said, and Eijun nodded. He and Furuya both had a ways to go to get home (especially Furuya) but Harucchi lived a bit closer, so his parents had been helping to move his things for about a month now. Only a few things that could fit in a suitcase remained in his room.

With quick promises to return, the three third years headed off up to the Greenhorn dorm.

Eijun had several boxes, but after a couple of trips they had managed to bring everything down to his parents' pick-up. His father and grandfather were busy organising the previous trip's load into the boot when they returned from the second, and there were another two heads to the group.

"Kuramochi-senpai! Miyuki-senpai!" Harucchi called out, happy to see the two familiar faces.

"Kominato! Furu- shit, Sawamura! You grew! Asada, did you feed him your stupid protein shakes or something?!" the short-stop demanded of their now second-year roommate. The pitcher had been in the room when they arrived and helped get things out into the hall.

"They're not stupid, and I haven't!" Asada protested hotly.

"Eijun-kun just got his growth spurt," Harucchi said, causing Eijun to flush bright red at the unexpected contribution to his teasing. "We were all kind of surprised."

"You actually look like an ace now!" Miyuki snickered. "That's good. You'd have been ripped to pieces at Hōsei if you'd stayed so scrawny!"

"Shut up Miyuki Kazuya! I wasn't that short!" Eijun protested. He really hadn't been, he'd been of a fairly normal height until the sudden addition of extra inches occurred. Other than that, third year had been fairly kind to him in terms of random body changes (the summer holidays had been worse).

"Is that any way to talk to you two kind senpai who've come all this way to help you move you boxes of clutter in?" the catcher grinned.

Eijun was about to retort, but paused. Whether Miyuki was joking or not, he had a point. University had to be hard enough without adding the chaos of helping him find a place to live.

"You are correct! Indeed, I am grateful and offer my sincerest apology!" Eijun said. "This will save a lot of hassle when term starts, so thank you for taking the time out of your very busy day to assist me in this process!" He apologised, lapsing into flowery words and phrases.

Kuramochi laughed. "You're still an idiot, but maybe Wakana had a good influence on you after all…"

"Kuramochi-sen-" Furuya broke in but his voice was cut off by their former classmate's loud banter and arm around Eijun's shoulders.

"So?" He asked. "She's still coming to your games right? Nobody said anything otherwise so she must be!"

Eijun stiffened at the name, blood thumping in his veins with the pressure of Kuramochi's arm around his neck. Behind his glasses, Miyuki's eyes snapped to the expressions on the faces of the other graduates and Asada, and Sawamura's parents.

"Honestly Mochi, this is why you should pay more attention to your emails," he muttered to himself (but not without Eijun catching ear of it). "Oi, Kuramochi, we should help get this packed up. Traffic is going to be awful as it is, and Sawamura-san will need to drive back to Nagano later."

Kuramochi blinked, eyeing the catcher for a moment, before relenting. "Tch, don't talk to me like you're still my captain!" he said, picking up a box all the same and handing it to the elder (but not oldest) Sawamura male.

Mrs Sawamura fluttered around, ushering them to get a move on as the announcement was sounded for the group photograph. As they finished packing up and headed back to the school hall from the car park, Eijun took another long drink from his water bottle.

He wished they could hurry up with the stupid ceremonies. He was baking alive in the unnatural spring heat, and his uniform shirt was starting to get patches of sweat in a couple of places. 'As expected Wakana,' he thought to himself, thoughts drawn to his best friend from Nagano thanks to Kuramochi. '…water really is useless today. Damn it, I'm really thirsty.'

Scratching his arm where the sunlight was starting to itch furiously, he caught sight of his former battery partner watching him curiously. Grinning, he threw an arm around Harucchi's shoulder, and another around Asada's, jumping into the conversation.

No point moping today! This was a graduation after all. He just had to think about Hōsei and, though he disliked admitting it, how good it would be to play with Miyuki and Kuramochi again. This was his last official day as a high-schooler.

His first year as a university student was approaching, and it would be a fresh start. Not just with his baseball goals, but for him personally. It wouldn't be like last year. He promised Wakana he would make sure to adapt and move forward, so that was all he had to do.

Reaching for his water bottle again, he could only hope that goal would be as easy to achieve as it was to dream of.

So this is my first venture in to the Ace of Diamond (and MiyuSawa) Fandom, and I've got this thing for vampires in my head and there will be fluff and smut. not a regular update thing because... life. College reports etc, but I have a plot. Sort of. So there will be updates :) I wanted to do a oneshot but I fail at anything less than three chapters, so we'll see how it goes.

I know I still have Naruto fics to update, but I've had a block there since the manga ended. and generally writers in block in general, but sports anime have been helping. So here we have a trope I've wanted to indulge in for a while. I will finish my main stories eventually. I swear.

I have a house on Tumblr and AO3 - both go by Ncj700, or you can follow the links on my account.