Rinko was surprised when Ryoma came alone to the living room, a bush of roses hanging from his hand. Nanjiroh had told her Atobe had arrived, bearing roses and she had thought Ryoma had invited his friend because he felt nervous and thought Atobe could make them all feel a little less uncomfortable. But the way Ryoma's whole appearance had changed sorrowful at Atobe's absence told another story.

It took Rinko awhile to get her head around the idea that she wasn't going to be a grandmother unless she and Nanjiroh decided to give Ryoma siblings and she wasn't thrilled at the prospect of having sleepless nights and diaper changes and later on deal with puberty. Ryoma's teenage years had been somewhat mellow and she suspected that was all thanks to his son's obsession with tennis that Nanjiroh had caused. Maybe he could do that with the other children too?

Rinko shook her head and focused on now. She had a son who was apparently gay and in love, while his parents had called a girl they thought was his girlfriend to dinner and Ryoma invited his boyfriend at the same time. It wouldn't surprise her if Ryoma decided to disown his parents.

And it wasn't all just about Ryoma. There was poor Sakuno to consider. The way she threw shy glances at Ryoma, it was obvious the girl had feelings towards the boy. She and Nanjiroh had really messed up this time. All they really had to do was to keep their meddling hands out of their son's life. But Nanjiroh's enthusiasm that his son was finally dating a girl had had been contagious and Rinko admitted that she had also been slightly relieved. She had begun to fear her son was somehow challenged when it came to socialising with the opposite sex. Well, that fear turned out to be true, but not in the way she had feared. It was a relief really, in some ways, to find out Ryoma wasn't oblivious, just gay.


During the evening Sakuno noticed that Ryoma was even more antisocial than before. Soon she also noticed that Ryoma didn't let the roses out of his reach the whole evening. If he wasn't touching them, he was looking at them. He'd even placed them on a vase on the dining room table.

Sakuno felt her heart sank. She felt sad when the one constant in her youth, her crush for Ryoma, her prince, that had the potential to grow in to a deep and meaningful love, was revealed to be nothing more than a case of one sided puppy love. Ryoma, it seemed, had found his own prince.

When the evening was over, Ryoma walked her outside and after closing the door and making sure his father wasn't listening, started speaking. "Ryuzaki-san, I need to apologize to you."

"You don't have to, Ryoma-kun." Sakuno spoke in a hushed voice, bowing her head to hide her hurt. "I think I understand, and I'm sorry. I… I hope everything works out between you and Atobe-san."

She didn't have the courage to lift her gaze to face Ryoma's and she didn't turn to look at him when she walked towards the bus stop.


"Seriously kid, what's with the roses?" Nanjiroh asked, leaning on the doorway, looking at his son's back. Ryoma was sitting by his desk, staring out of the window, a vase full of flowers by his elbow. "And why are you home? You're never home on Saturday's. You're always with that weird kid."

Ryoma sighed dramatically and Nanjiroh was so shocked that he lost his balance and almost fell face down on the floor. In a daze he walked downstairs and to the kitchen where Rinko was eating chocolates and reading the afternoon paper. Karupin was on the table next to her, playing with a piece of wrapping paper. The cat seemed fascinated with the silver gleam on the pink paper.

"He sighed." Nanjiroh informed his wife. "He sighed and didn't even call me an idiot, or yell, or even, scowl. Just sighed." He slumped to the chair across from Rinko. "Rinko, darling, I think we're raising a teenager."

Rinko chuckled and picked up another chocolate from the box by her elbow. "Break-ups are never easy, especially when it comes to first loves."

"It was his fault for sending the Ryuzaki girl away." Nanjiroh scuffed.

"You can be so blind sometimes, darling." Rinko smiled at her clueless husband. "Whose roses has he been brooding over?"

Just like Rinko, it took Nanjiroh a while to get his head around the idea. "That snob? Wait! Is my son gay?" Nanjiroh didn't wait for her wife to answer but ran upstairs to Ryoma's room and repeated the question. "Are you gay, kid?"

Ryoma turned around to look at his father, blinked and said, "Yeah."

"Okay then." Nanjiroh returned downstairs. "Wish the brat had said something."

Rinko just laughed.


Ryoma took one of the roses from the vase and plucked the pedals from it. He scattered them on his desk and stared at them a good few minutes and then did the same to another rose. When he ran out of pedals, he started plucking the leaves. He pricked himself on the thorns a few times, but didn't care.

He was down to twisting the stems when someone knocked on his door. He turned and saw Momo.

"Ann spoke to Ryuzaki and Ann told me what she said." Momo told him. "Why the hell didn't you just tell me you were dating Atobe? I thought we were friends."

"Not this again! Soon Tomoko will be here complaining I didn't tell her so she could inform it officially in my fan club." The crazy girl kept sending her fan club news letters every month!

"Why is it such a big deal to everyone? Just 'cause I like to keep some things private." He grumbled.

"Friends are supposed to tell this kind of stuff to each other. I told you when I kissed Kaidoh."

"That was different. I don't hate Kaidoh-sempai." Ryoma returned to twisting the stem in his hand and got pricked by another thorn.

"So what if I think he's an idiot. If you love him, I can learn to deal with it." Momo said. "You love him right?"

"I think so." Ryoma mumbled. "Never told him, though. And now I can't."

"Why not? You break up, or something?" Momo laughed.

"Yeah we did." Ryoma said and stopped twisting the stem so he could focus his attention on Momo.

"Oh." Momo breathed. "Why?"

"The same reason you're angry with me."

"'Cause you didn't tell me?"

"Yeah."

"That's just stupid." Momo scuffed.

"Yeah." Ryoma twirled the stem in his fingers. "He thinks I'm ashamed of him. 'Cause I never told you, my parents. I never actually told anyone." Ryoma only realised it when he said it out loud. He gasped, covered his mouth with his hand, poking himself in the eye with the stem, screamed and fell off the chair, hitting his head on his bookshelf. Momo ran to him, placed a hand under his head, kneeling next to him.

"Oi kid, just because I'm okay with you being gay, don't mean I approve you doing stuff in your room. Besides, I thought you were in love with that Atobe kid. You move fast, don't you?" Nanjiroh frowned at both of them from the doorway.


After they convinced Nanjiroh that they were not, in fact, 'doing stuff', or intended to do anything like that ("Ever!" both Momo and Ryoma had shouted). Nanjiroh checked Ryoma's eye and head and proclaimed no permanent damage had been caused.

"Why don't you boys go out back and play some tennis. You can use my racket, Momo-chan, Ryoma can show you where it is." Ryoma grimaced at the way his father addressed Momo and after almost five years it had started to irk even Momo. Hardly anyone ever called him that, besides Nanjiroh and some of Ryoma's classmates who added the sempai to the 'Momo-chan'. That was cute. Nanjiroh was just irritating.

Nanjiroh stayed behind in Ryoma's room, stared at the ruined roses and shook his head. He considered throwing them away, but wisely decided to leave them be.

"You'd think that just breaking up with his boyfriend would affect his tennis." Momo thought bitterly, after loosing two sets in a row. Ryoma had beaten 6-7, 4-6. Momo vowed he would at least win the next set.

He lost 2-6.

"What the hell!" Momo yelled, while trying to catch his breath. "You're supposed to be depressed over your break up!"

"I am." Ryoma answered, panting and sweating. "That doesn't mean I'm going to let you win." He smirked, despite his fatigue.

"Tezuka-buchou would be so proud," Momo told him dryly. "You don't let your feelings affect your game. Or maybe you should fight with Atobe more often, if that makes you play like this."

"It wasn't just a fight." Ryoma told him. "Wish it had been. Then I could just go and smack him in the head for being an idiot. But I screwed up and don't know how to fix it."

"You beg," Momo said. "That's what I always do when I do something stupid and Ann-chan dumps me."

"Yeah, well, Keigo's girly enough to pass for a girl, but he ain't."

"Just give it a try." Momo suggested. "What've you got to loose?"


Ryoma spent the rest of Saturday and most of Sunday trying to call Atobe, but his calls weren't answered, not even when he blocked his number. Atobe must've realized he'd try calling from on unknown number or had some uber-special caller-ID. Ryoma bet his money on the first choice.

He sent millions of text message's and e-mails. Their wording was different, but they all had the same message in them; "I'm sorry."

Finally accepting that Atobe wasn't going to answer him, he thought of a plan. He knew where his target spent his Sundays. He'd seen him there before, always with the same girl.


Sanada took the girl's hand and swallowed nervously. It was the most important day of his life. He was about to ask the girl of his dreams, Yoshida Aiko to marry him, in the park bench where they'd shared their first kiss and confessed to each other. It was their park, their bench and the day couldn't have been more perfect. Clear skies, the sun warming them with its golden rays and birds chirping in the back round. And best of all, no Atobe in sight. He'd even shut off his phone, so Atobe couldn't bother him with an Echizen related drama. The only relationship drama Sanada wanted to experience ever again was with Aiko-chan.

"Aiko," he began. "The months we have spent together have been the happiest of my life."

"Oh Genichirou, I feel the same way!" Aiko gasped and smiled the way that always took Sanada's breath away.

Sanada slowly slid on of his hands to his coat pocket, palms sweating, and grabbed hold of the ring box. "Aiko, will y-"

"Sanada!"

"No way in hell! What, does he have a Sanada-radar, or something? Wait, that's not Atobe's voice!" Sanada turned to look at the disturbance. "What the hell do you want, Echizen?" He asked, fuming with anger. His gaze of rage was just as ineffective against Echizen as it was on Atobe.

"Lend me your phone," Echizen ordered.

"What? No! Why?" Sanada sputtered.

"'Cause Keigo's being a girl and won't answer when I call him. But he'll answer if you call him."

"No way! If I let you borrow my phone to call him, when he obviously doesn't want to talk to you, he'll never trust me again.""Wait. That's a good thing. Then he'll stop torturing me every time he has a problem." He handed his phone to Echizen. "Here. The pin number is 5932."

"Thanks," Echizen answered and took the phone.

"Genichirou?" Aiko asked, confused.

"Sush, darling. If everything goes well, we will never have to deal with Atobe's interruptions ever again and I can propose to you properly."

"Propose? Oh Genichirou! Yes, I'll marry you!" Aiko threw her arms around him and gave him a passionate kiss.

Well, it didn't go exactly as he'd planned, but he was still getting married. Maybe he should name his firstborn as Ryoma. If it was a girl, that is.


"Moshi, moshi, ore-sama shall now graciously listen to your humble words." Atobe answered the phone and Ryoma couldn't suppress the chuckle.

"Did you just chuckle, Sanada? Are you quite alright?"

"I'm sorry." Ryoma said. "Don't hang up, please!" Ryoma waited, hoping the next sound he heard wouldn't be the dial tone.

"Oh Genichirou!" a girls voice screamed from behind him and Ryoma glanced back at the happy couple. It was weird, seeing Sanada embrace someone so openly in public.

"Was that Yoshida-san's voice? Where are you? Did you steal Sanada's phone?"

"I'm not a pick-pocket! He even gave me his pin number."

"Oh really? What is it?"

"It's- Why do you want to know the pin number to Sanada's phone?"

"I wanted to know you were really using his phone with his permission, which I do not believe for one second."

"Well he did, since you're not answering when I call you from my phone."

"A wiser person would get the hint. I'm hanging up."

"I love you!" Ryoma shouted.

Atobe didn't answer for a long time and Ryoma feared the call had been disconnected or the battery had run out on Sanada's phone. But then he finally heard Atobe take a deep breath.

"That's it? You actually think you can fix everything by saying you love me? How do I even know you mean it?"

"I do! I love you Keigo!"

"It's not enough, even if it's true."

"My parents know and so does Momo-sempai."

"Did you tell them?"

Ryoma was tempted to lie, but knew Atobe would eventually find the truth and then he'd be in even deeper shit then he already was. "No, but what does it matter? They know!"

"I can't deal with this now. Don't call me anymore and stop spamming my e-mail." Atobe hung up.

Frustrated, Ryoma threw the phone on the pavement and it shattered.

"My new phone!" Sanada screamed.


Apparently Sanada didn't use cheap phones. How the hell was he going to get that kind of money? Maybe it was time to steal his father's credit card again. It had been a while since he'd done that. When was it again? Oh yeah, Keigo's birthday present a couple of weeks ago.

Ryoma sighed as he stared out of the window, rose petals and leaves scattered on his desk and floor.


"He's sighing again," Nanjiroh told Rinko. "It's making me nervous. It's so unlike him."

"It'll pass." Rinko said. "I remember my first love. I was fifteen, he was older, seventeen. We were so happy. Who knows what might have happened if he hadn't moved. I was heart broken for months."

"Do not say stuff like that to your husband, woman!" Nanjiroh yelled.

"My point is this, darling, that I love you far more than I ever loved him and wouldn't trade my life with you for all the first loves in the world. Everyone gets over their first love, eventually."

"Not everyone." Nanjiroh said. "I'm still very much in love with my first love." He drew Rinko in to a tight embrace.


A/N: Fear the OOC; ness of Sanada. Can't write him in any other way, it seems.