AN: FINALLY! we're ready for take off. Kevin. Ryoma. Tezuka. Let's see how this happens. Sorry for any OOC

Chapter 2

It had been fate, and yet Tezuka didn't know what to say.

"E,echizen," the voice choked out of his now dry throat, his eyes never leaving the boy hat stood in the doorway.

"Pardon?" the man beside Tezuka, Robert Ford, head shot up from the clipboard he was carrying in order to take notes.

"N,nothing," Tezuka said, taking his eyes off Ryoma for a minute, and turning towards the project at hand.

A small portion of the street that collapsed in itself just a little bit, and the hole was growing larger and larger by the week, so they were finally going to fix it. Tezuka had been sent along with some of the department to survey the area. The entire road was a wreck, but that hole had become a huge hazard.

Mr. Ford scribbled some more notes and then started to circle the hole, and Tezuka turned his head back towards the door he had saw Ryoma standing at. The boy was no longer there.

"What are you doing, Kunimitsu? You're spacing out."

Tezuka snapped his attention back to the other man.

"Sorry, sir."

"Don't be sorry. Come help my measure this. Hold this side of the tape and walk on the other side."

Tezuka did as told, grabbing the small side of the measuring tap and pulling it to the other side of the hole. He stared at the black center of the gaping void. For some reason he made him feel weird, so he turned his eyes away.

"Ok, you can let go now."

Tezuka did, and the tape snapped back into the holder.

"Is that all?" Tezuka asked.

Ford nodded, and motioned towards the truck.

"Yea, just have to make the write up. It shouldn't take too long to patch. Just a days work is all."

Tezuka followed him to the truck, but his body felt heavy. That was Echizen, he knew it, but what was he supposed to do about it? He couldn't just walk up to the house and knock. That'd be weird. And did Echizen not recognize him? Is that why Echizen didn't say hi to him, and merely retreated into the door.

"Seat belt."

Tezuka nodded slowly, as he pulled the strap over his shoulders.

-------------------------

Kevin was furious. Ryoma had been skipping school, again.

Kevin pulled up to the home just as a city truck pulled off.

"About time they fix that damn pot hole," he grumbled as he marched up the walkway.

Fumbling with his keys he inserted it into the hole and threw the door open.

"Ryoma!"

Kevin hung his keys on the hook by the door out of habit, and marched deeper into the home, entering the kitchen.

"I knew you'd be here," he growled.

"If you needed me, you could have just called," Ryoma shrugged, turning back to the sandwich he was making.

He put the tomato on the pile of meat and lettuce and covered it with a slice of bread, before turning around and pushing the food towards Kevin.

"Wanna bite?"

Kevin glared at the sandwich, and Ryoma shrugged and bit it.

"What are you doing here?"

"Katrina had a job interview so I volunteered to watch the kids."

"No, really--" Kevin crossed his arms.

There was no way Ryoma opted to skip school in order to watch his cousins' kids while she had a job interview…. Or wait, maybe he had. It didn't take much to get the lad to ditch his obligations.

"Well, I came home from training this morning and the school left a message on the machine saying you missed homeroom."

"Ok, and you came here looking for me?"

"Isn't this where you always end up?"

"It's the last place the truant officer would look."

Ryoma went to take another bite of the sandwich, but Kevin snatched it from his hand.

"Go to school."

Kevin bit the sandwich and Ryoma pouted.

"Why? There's only like two hours left. Besides, I'm having a passing grade," Ryoma reasoned as he snatched the sandwich back.

"They might drop your grade with too many absences," Kevin explained.

Ryoma sighed and took one last bite of the sandwich before giving the rest to Kevin. They both knew that Kevin was right, but both boys knew that didn't change the fact that Ryoma didn't plan to go to school. He'd been like that for the past semester.

Kevin and Ryoma were playing a lot more tournaments before Ryoma injured himself. He tore his knee cartilage and had to get surgery, but the doctor said with proper rehab he'd be able to go back to tennis soon. But "soon" wasn't good enough. Ryoma was healing pretty well and didn't have to walk around with a brace any more. He even joined Kevin for training some days, but Ryoma was restless and everyone knew it. Ryoma was always making his parents worry for no reason. He had a perfectly loving and happy family that he constantly failed to appreciate, to the point that they even agreed that maybe living with Kevin would make the situation better. They were boyfriends after all, and most of the time when Ryoma skipped out on his obligations, it was to go be with Kevin. Oh how wrong they proved to be.

Before the accident, Kevin and Ryoma had a special deal with the school, due to their training and future prospect as tennis superstars, to only have to show up on test dates. However, Ryoma was now marked as a normal student whereas Kevin still enjoyed a lax schedule.

Kevin didn't want to scold Ryoma too much in one setting. He knew that it was going in one ear and out the other anyway.

"So where are the kids then?" he asked.

"Taking a nap."

Kevin stuffed the rest of the sandwich in his face, and Ryoma exited the kitchen and collapsed onto the living room couch. Kevin followed and moved Ryoma's legs out the way so as to make room to sit down.

"I'm glad they're finally patching that hole out there," Kevin mused, turning on the tv.

"Yea," Ryoma put his legs back on Kevin's lap.

"You feeling ok?" Kevin asked, rubbing the Japanese lad's legs gently, paying special attention to where the injury was healing.

Ryoma nodded and let his head fall back against the couch cushions. As soon as the boy closed his eyes he conjured up the image of Tezuka Buchou as he remembered him and the scene he witnessed earlier that day. Tezuka then was tall, rigid, and promising. The man he saw earlier was most definitely Tezuka. He could tell just by the posture, as he stood in the street near the city truck. There was no mistaking that dignified stance. When their eyes met, and the sun reflected off the edge of the wires, Ryoma felt sick.

He wanted to throw up.

So he went back in the house.

He didn't understand why he reacted that way. It was just Buchou. But that was exactly it. It was Buchou. His buchou that taught him so many things regarding tennis, and then even more. Tezuka was his first kiss and his first wild fluttering feeling in the chest.

Ryoma didn't want to think about it and yet he couldn't help it.

"I saw Buchou today."

"What? Who?" Kevin asked, pausing in his ministrations and ripping his eyes away from the tv.

"I saw Buchou. Tezuka-buchou," Ryoma clarified.

There was a silence and then Ryoma forced his eyes to meet Kevin's. It was a clash of blue and gold before Kevin turned away.

Ryoma resumed speaking, "He was fixing the street."

"Did you talk to him?"

"No."

Kevin returned to massaging Ryoma's leg and watching the television, swallowing the word that threatened to come out of his mouth… "Good".

-to be continued-

AN: sorry. i jsut thought i had to explain what Kevin and Ryoma been up to since the whole first chapter gave you Tezuka's. Anyway uhm... thanks for reading. sorry for any OOC and please review. i accept flames, praise, and criticism.