Disclaimer: Do not own Prince of Tennis, just Emiko.
Missy: WHEEEE!!! New chapter! Thank you KeitorinTeirra and stophoggingtheblanket for reviewing! By the way, great stories stophoggingtheblanket! I just wish you would finish them. You didn't finish The New Girl Next Desk or Tensai, Tensai, Tell Me Why and you started The Iceman Cometh!
Creator: Come on! We need to work on this chapter, not worry about other people's work right now! (grumbles) I have such a crazy sister…
Missy: Yeah, yeah.
Creator: (Sigh.) Well anyway, here's the next chapter!
Missy: And don't forget to review! We'd like to know what you think of the story so far. And feel free to make suggestions! Now read on!
Gentle Smile – Chapter 2
Emiko found herself sitting to the left of the boy that had bumped into her earlier. From the conversation of the other boys who she suspected were his friends, she guessed that his name was Tezuka. As the class moved on to history, she studied him out of the corner of her eye. His features were stern, with straight brows over brown eyes framed by silver glasses resting on a long, straight nose. His light brown hair fell from a side part, cascading around his face and into his eyes.
Class continued, the minutes crawling by. History had never been an interesting subject to her. As a result, her history grade had never been that high since she was never motivated to do well in the subject. Homework was dull, but she had always done relatively well. It was just the tests and quizzes that brought her grade down.
As her attention began to wander, Emiko began to notice that a girl in front of her kept glancing behind herself. Wondering what on earth could be so interesting, Emiko turned slightly in order to see what the girl was looking at. As she looked around she noticed that other girls kept glancing in her general direction. What could they be looking at?
When the bell rang for break her question was answered as a flood of girls rushed towards Tezuka's desk, effectively demolishing the neat rows of the desks.
"TEZUKA-SAMA! I CAN'T BELIEVE WE'RE IN THE SAME CLASS!"
"DID YOU MISS ME, TEZUKA?"
"DID YOU HAVE A GOOD BREAK, TEZUKA-SAMA?"
"DO YOU LIKE MY HAIRCUT?"
"DOES THIS SKIRT MAKE ME LOOK FAT?"
And so it went on for the whole break. During this time, Emiko stared at the mob in disbelief. Tezuka must be a really popular guy, she thought, as the crowd appeared to expand tenfold with every second that passed. Everyone else in the room had scurried towards the walls in order to avoid getting injured by the crazy fan girls.
Feeling that there was suddenly very little room between her and the mass of flailing arms and legs, Emiko inched out between her desk and the window and moved to a place where she could still see out of the window that and was relatively quiet. The sky is clear today, she thought. Some sakura petals whipped past as the trees bent in the wind. It's also windy out there, she noted with a small, amused smile as the mob behind her shrieked like a fierce gale.
--
Finally, the merciful bell rang and the teacher shooed a majority of the girls out of the classroom. Now that peace had been restored to the classroom, desks were put back in order and English began.
This period turned out to be just as dull as history, the only difference being that she knew all of the material already. Living in America all of her life had taught her all the English she wanted to know. Plus, she was way past this level already. I learned all this in second grade. Emiko suppressed a yawn. I wonder when lunch is?
--
The lunch break was a relief after a pretty boring morning. Emiko got her lunch and walked into the cafeteria, looking for a place to sit. It was rather loud and confusing, what with the chatter of voices from every corner. Emiko turned back towards the hall, intending to find somewhere quieter to eat her lunch, and consequently bumped into someone.
Both of them staggered a little as they attempted to regain their balance. Why is it that I keep bumping into people today? Emiko wondered as she found her feet. "Sorry about that," she said, smiling somewhat ruefully as she looked at the figure standing before her.
"You're the girl with violet eyes from this morning, aren't you?" the brown-haired, smiling boy asked as Emiko recognized him as one of the boys she met this morning.
"Yes." Emiko really didn't know what else to say. She had never been particularly good at keeping a conversation going, since most of the time she didn't know what to say. Neither of them said anything for a few uncomfortable seconds. Then the volume of in the cafeteria suddenly rose and Emiko flinched.
"Are you alright?" the boy asked, concern evident in his voice.
"Oh, I'm fine," Emiko replied, grimacing slightly. "It just got really noisy in here all of a sudden. I don't mix well with loud noise sometimes." She smiled suddenly, remembering Tezuka's fan girls. "Sometimes it's amusing though."
"Ah. In that case, would you like to join me outside? It shouldn't be too noisy, though perhaps a little windy."
"That would be nice," Emiko told him politely. The two made their way outside into the sunshine. The air was warm, but it was slightly nippy due to a small breeze. The sakura swirled.
"I just realized that I don't know your name," the smiling boy said as they walked.
"It's Rōsoku Emiko. What about yours?"
"Fuji Syuusuke," he answered, smiling.
--
"I forgot to tell you that it may possibly get a little rowdy," Fuji voiced as they neared a group of boys sitting under a couple of cherry trees. "And in case you were wondering, those are the others you met this morning. A few others too, by the looks of it."
"Okay," Emiko said and she smiled as a boy with spiky hair waved and called out to Fuji.
"Hey, Fuji! Who's the girl? Is she your girlfriend?"
Fuji chuckled as they drew up to the group. "No, Momo, she's not my girlfriend. She's just a girl we met this morning, though I didn't get her name until just now. But I'll let her introduce herself." The two of them sat down.
"Hello. I'm Rōsoku Emiko, but please just call me Emiko-chan," she told them, smiling and trying not to look down at the grass. She wasn't ordinarily shy, but as she was receiving undivided attention from a group of boys, she couldn't help but feel slightly intimidated.
(A/N: Emiko, being from America, is more used to being called by her first name. I won't have the boys question it at this time, and maybe not ever, because it detracts from the rest of the story.)
"It's nice to meet you Emiko-chan," said one of the boys she had met this morning. This boy, who had two funny bangs in front, introduced himself as Oishi Syuichiro. The rest of the boys proceeded to tell her their names as well. The bouncing redhead was Kikumaru Eiji. The boy with the rectangular glasses and notebook was Inui Sadaharu.
The shy boy from earlier was called Kawamura Takashi. All of these boys, she learned, were in the third year just like she was. There were two second-years as well. Momoshiro Takeshi was the spiky haired boy while Kaidoh Kaoru seemed to have a permanently angry expression.
"Oh, and Tezuka will eat with us when he isn't doing other things," Fuji added.
"What's he do during lunch break?" Emiko asked, but before Fuji could answer, Momo, as Momoshiro liked to be called, broke in and said, "Eh? How do you know our buchou, Emiko-chan?"
"Buchou?" Emiko asked, confused.
"He means Tezuka," Oishi explained. "All of us are regulars in the tennis club and Tezuka is our captain."
"You guys play tennis?" Emiko asked. She had an odd, distant look on her face as she said this.
"Well, yes," said Fuji. He studied her closely. "Is something wrong Emiko-chan?"
"Oh, not at all," she said, coming back to earth. "It's just that I used to play a lot."
"Really? What a coincidence!" Momoshiro exclaimed as Inui scribbled in his notebook. "Hey, do want to have a match after school? Only I would probably be the only one at the courts since everyone else is going to play with another school today."
"I don't think I should." Emiko said, smiling at him. Fuji noted that she looked a little sad. "It's been years since I picked up a racket. You see, I used to play a lot with my brother."
"Used to?" Fuji asked gently. Emiko nodded and that distant look came over her face again.
"I haven't seen him for years though. After he moved out of California I… sort of lost interest in tennis. It wasn't as fun anymore." Emiko looked up into the forget-me-not blue sky. "I wonder what he's doing now."
--
Emiko wandered about the school grounds. Classes had ended a little while ago, but she didn't quite feel like walking home yet. As she walked she thought about her brother. She wondered what he was doing, where he was. Emiko hadn't thought of him for such a long time. They had been so close.
The sound of a racket hitting a tennis ball brought her out of her reverie. That sound was so familiar to her ears… like music. It was a sound she found that she missed.
All she had to do was follow the sound of the ball and let her feet carry her to the tennis courts. Looking through the fence she saw that a couple of boys were serving balls at a small can. The first two boys didn't come close to hitting the can. The third boy who tried came close, but didn't knock it over. Then one of the two older boys present called to another boy that was standing to the side, a large tennis bag slung over his shoulder. This boy was rather short and was still wearing his school uniform. There was something in the way he carried himself that seemed familiar though.
The boy took a racket out of his bag and served. Emiko knew the ball was going to hit the can even before the ball hit the strings. That easy, almost lazy service motion…it was so familiar… but why? Emiko strained her eyes through the links in the fence and laid her hands against the wire mesh, watching as the boy hit the can repeatedly. The older boy from before yelled something at him but Emiko didn't hear it. She gripped the fence so tightly that her knuckles turned white as the color drained from her face, her eyes riveted on the boy still wearing his school uniform.
Emiko recognized that face, those eyes, even though it had been years since she had last seen it.
"Otouto-kun," she breathed
Creator: I'm really sorry about the mob, but I really found the crazy fan girls fun to write about. It is much more likely of course that the girls wouldn't directly approach him and put love notes in his locker or something, or that Tezuka would give them all a glare and walk out to look for his teammates, or something like that. I'm also really sorry that the action in these first two chapters has been so slow. Well, they're slow to me anyway. But I had to clarify the cast of characters (more or less) before I could get anywhere particularly interesting. I hope the mob made things more interesting in this chapter, because I felt that this chapter was rather dry for the most part. And then the trickiest part for me was trying to figure out the class schedule since I have no idea what kind of schedule one would have in a Japanese school. All references to classes were made up. You may comment about the classes, but I doubt I will do anything to change it in this chapter though because I'm too lazy. Might use any advice given for future reference though. Ah, but I'm ranting on and on here. Chapter 3 should be more interesting and a bit faster paced. I'm sure that most of you can guess who Emiko's brother is at this point. Please review, correct anything that might need correcting, and feel free to leave suggestions about things you want to have happen! I really ramble too much… and the sentence structure is a bit wonky in places… (grumbles)
Missy: Creator, would you just shut up and save everyone from your ranting?
Creator: (Continues mumbling.)
Missy: (sigh) Never mind. We hope that there will be more reviews, but no one's gonna force you. It's just that we feel like no one's reading da story if there aren't many reviews.
Creator: Please review! (Makes puppy dog eyes.)