Another day ended in my life with the same old monotony like it had been for past two years. This was my school life. Attending classes and studying. Nothing more than that. A long sigh escaped Miyuki's mouth on her way back to her house after a seemingly long day at school. Since she lost her only passion 'Basketball', her life had resorted to only these two things. She slowly covered the not-so-long distance between her house and her school pondering about many things, her recent days, homework, life goals, what to cook, and surprisingly, Aomine. A small tick mark formed on her forehead when her thoughts rested on him. Again. Recently, Aomine hasn't left her thoughts ever since he returned her console back. First, it was 'Why did he returned my console out of the blue?', then 'What happened to that Ahomine all of a sudden? He stopped flashing his Oh-so-narcissist-smirk to me, on top of it he keeps averting his eyes whenever I think of asking him about his sudden change of actions.'

"That selfish jerk! Why is he being so unpredictable?" Miyuki cursed as she kicked a small rock in front of her. It skidded off and bolted straight to a lamp post, ricocheting and hitting her back.

"Ow…" she stopped and massaged her head where the rock had hit her. At that precise time, she heard a familiar sound of a ball striking against a metal band. A rebound. It was then she noticed, she was standing right in front of the gate of a nearby park. She peeked inside to see small children playing basketball. They stopped playing as their gaze met her's. Confused, as to why they suddenly stopped playing, she unconsciously took a step forward, only to find a ball at her foot, slightly swaying by her touch.

"Nee chan, pass the ball to us!" a small boy called from the concrete court. He was waving his hand furiously to gain attention from her. Miyuki's sight went back and forth from the ball to the boy. Nodding slightly, she bent down and picked up the ball; I haven't touched this for so long, she thought. Her hands trembled as she felt the rough texture of the ball that made her relive all those years of games and happy memories she ever felt, in a mere few seconds.

"Nee chan, pass it already!" the children complained.

Physically pushing back all her past memories and strong desire to play again by shaking her head, she tossed the ball to them with her still trembling hands. The ball barely made it to them but got caught, nevertheless.

"Nee chan doesn't know how to throw a ball." A boy called as he laughed but Miyuki didn't mind. It was indeed a bad throw: her hand weren't steady, she didn't bend her knee, plus her focus was way somewhere else. Instead, she was looking at a boy, who caught the ball, as he resumed their play. He was not as good as his other mates but he was happy. The disheveled yet excited look in his eyes clearly said how much he loved playing Basketball. A single tear escaped her eyes as she looked at him. He reminded her how she used to love the game, how it was everything to her. But now…

Miyuki wiped off the tear as she turned away from the ongoing game. 'No. I promised myself that I'll not play the game after what it did to me and my family. I'll not give up to my weakness.' She kept repeating the words, thinking, that would make her faithful toward her promise. She walked away from the court, straight to her house determined to not get deviated from her path this time.

"Hello"

"Satsuki? Where are you? It's been half an hour since I got here –"

"Gomen ne Yuki chan. I can't make it today. I am stuck with a chore my mom dumped me on. You see, there is this mega sale going on grocery products and my mom had dragged me to it. There is such a rush here and the people just won't let the line get thin! It's so frustrating! Please don't be mad at me. I thought I can finish up before our fixed time but it seems I won't be able to make it. Forgive me for today, I promise I'll bring you something good tomorrow. Okay, bye."

"But wait–"

Miyuki stared at her own phone, stunned to get hung up without even getting a chance to question or say something to her old friend. She slowly glanced up to looked straight at the blue eyes who returned it with equal astounding gaze. She shook her head infinitesimally, not sure as to what to do next, as she framed her sentence to deliver the news.

"Satsuki is not coming."

"What?!" Aomine exclaimed.

There was a pause, a sudden jerk of the body as Miyuki's voice rose. "Ugh! How could she leave us like this! And that to not giving me any chance to confront her?!" She dialed Satsuki's number furiously one more time, pacing to and fro from her spot and waited for her to pick up.

"Hel–"

"Don't. Hang up on me. Ever. When I'm in mid-sentence." Her voice was dangerously low. She paused, as she tried to return back to her questions she about to ask the first time of their conversation. Her eyebrows screwed when she voiced her confusion to her. "Fine. I get what is holding you back. But why in the name of damned hell, is Aomine here?"

"Oh... I forgot to mention you before. Dai chan is coming too."

"Well, It's no good informing me now! What is he even doing here?!"

"He had his own things to buy. You both asked me to go shopping at the same day. It's only efficient and logical to merge it together when we are going at the same place, at the same day and for the same work, right?"

"…"

"Look, I thought it would be okay as long as I am there between you too but it didn't turned out that way. But look at this way- the time has presented you with this opportunity to know each other better! ...You'll be fine. I know you both have come to tolerate each other on some level. So, please bear with it. Just don't bite each other's head off without me. Make it work, okay? Oh! Have to go now–"

The other side of the phone went blank but Miyuki still held it near her ear. Actually, she didn't moved from her stance for another minute or so.

Aomine on the other hand, was getting restless at this sudden turn of events. His eyes traced Miyuki's movements during the entire phone call, trying to guess the content of the call from reading her expressions. Creases on her forehead… squeezing her sidebag tightly…she is struggling to say something, that I can understand… it's Satsuki on the other line, afterall…. What are you explaining to her, Satsuki?

He averted his gaze from her face as she crossed the small distance between them.

"Umm…. Satsuki said she is caught up in some work and won't be able to make it."

"Oh." Was his only response.

An awkward silence stretched between them. 'Now what?' same thoughts circulated in their heads. 'This is so awkward… How my weekend plan ended up like this!'

Momoi Satsuki hummed cheerily throughout the house, adding a bit of hop here and there. It was clear that she was in a good mood, not that she ever the type of girl to brood on every little things of her life. But today was special. Today, according to her, she did a public service. 'A good deed' if you have to put a label on it. She had tried to bring her two nuisance of friends together. Two of her oldest friends.

Ever since she started her first year in high school with Aomine, coincidentally she chose the same school as her other childhood friend, Miyuki Hinagiku. Due to her circumstances (now she knew what they were), Miyuki disliked or rather, hated any Basketball related things. This special condition evidently, took toll on Satsuki's friendship- when she was with Miyuki, she can't be with Aomine, and with Aomine… well, he is so handful for Satsuki that she never had any spared time for her other friend. On the top of it, there was the basketball manager post. All in all, she was getting frustrated as well as exhausted with all the friend juggling thing. But things were just getting started for her. Everything got haywire when her two friend's different world clashed. The fights, the arguments, yelling, snarky remarks… it was all too much for her. It was then she came to a conclusion. Resulting in this.

One night earlier

"What a perfect situation!" Satsuki exclaimed aloud. "I have to take advantage of this or it will be rude to all serendipitous moments around the world!"

She grabbed a pen and a copy nearby and started writing different scenarios. "Let's see, Dai chan wants new shoes… Yuki chan is pestering for that new bookstore…that's not far from each other." Still writing her plan non-stop. "…So, where should I make them meet?" scratching her chin with the backside of the pen, "umm…Ooh! That cute café! By the central fountain! It will be so romantic…a sigh escaped her …this looks good. This way they'll both have a perfect day together. "

She picked up her phone and typed 'Hey! For tomorrow, let's meet at the Café nouveau near the station. We'll go shopping from there. I have an errand to run before that, so I'll meet you at 10:30 am.' and sent it both to Aomine and Miyuki.

Time: 11:30 am

Place: Café Nouveau

Current situation: Two awkward people, sitting at the corner table in the coffee house, sipping coffee whose sole purpose right now is to provide those two people something to do during the awkward silence stretched between them.

'Why those girls looking at us?' She thought.

'Don't people have any work to do besides gawking at us?' He thought.

'Are they thinking we are on a date?' She thought.

'Do we really stand out that much?' he thought.

'Why does it keep bothering me about what other people are thinking?' 'Why am I so over-conscious today?' they both thought.

After emptying their cup, which was being used as a tool to avoid conversation, Miyuki finally broke the prolonged silence, "So, what should we do now?"

Aomine had nothing to say. He had been out of words ever since the 'Satsuki news' was delivered to him, giving him the limited option of only 'grunts' and 'nods' to make any little interaction. 'Damn, it was way easy to throw remarks and comments at her! but now that I willingly made peace with her, it's hard to have normal conversation!' It was true. He never had a normal conversation with her during their entire school time. It was either just one sided comments, or full blown yelling.

"…We had plans with Satsuki." He paused. "…So, I think we should head back to our houses." He muttered. He wasn't sure what to reply. Of course he wanted to buy his new shoes today, the only work he came for, despite the store being so far away from his home but if he says to stay and do what they came for, she was bound to stay as well. It would be rude no to. On top of that, there will be more of these uncomfortable silence. He observed her face as it silently showed her disagreement. Once again they ended up on different pages.

Still with the furrowed brows, and trying hard not to be rude, she countered, "We have come so far… how can you–" she stopped, shook her head, and tried again to frame her sentence, "…don't you think we should complete what we came for. Or it would be a total waste of our time."

Aomine was surprised to hear what she proposed. He was so sure that she would say yes to the 'going home' plan but here she was, suggesting otherwise. With Satsuki not being here, it would be only the two us. Not that being with her is not good, it's more like…

"Hmm? I thought I was giving you an easy way out. But you are suggesting that you want to spend the day with the guy that you yourself said you hate most! That's… strange." Smirked Aomine. Damn it… I didn't meant to say that! It came out all wrong!

Provoking Miyuki like that, Aomine thought she would certainly leave the café at once but instead he saw something strange. He saw her ears go red at the comment.

"It's not like I want to… spend the day with you. I am merely suggesting that we should complete what we came for. I don't want to waste my afternoon doing nothing." 'Her face is still red. Is she… angry at me?'

"Okay… then." He stood up and walked up to the door. When he realized she was not behind him, he turned his head slightly only to capture her gaze which was directly on him, but still sitting at their table. Motioning toward the door, he said, "What are you waiting for?"

'She came all the way just for the grand opening of this store?' Aomine thought as he entered a rather small bookstore. Looking around, he surmised that the store was not even half the size of the bookstores near their houses. "Huh… what so good about this place?" he murmured. To his surprise, Miyuki was already half her way towards the book aisles. With a deep sigh, he too decided to look around, and ambled towards the magazine section.

Aomine stole some glances of her every now and then, as she glided through the aisles; it was amusing for him to see such a small girl with heavy books in her arms, screwing her face to decide which book to buy. He looked at her physique-

Is she the same girl who was once MVP on the national level? But she looks so small, he thought. And soft… can she really play the game that can get rough, sometimes? It made him imagine Miyuki in a basketball jersey and shorts, dribbling the ball against a no-face opponent, covered in sweat… breathing heavily….

Aomine's face got tomato red as his imagination got wild. He shook his head to clear off inappropriate thoughts that came into his mind so abruptly.

"Are you buying that… magazine?"

He snapped up his head to see Miyuki coming up to him with her already purchased items.

"…no. I was just browsing." He stated as he put the magazine he was holding, back at the stand. "Are you done?"

She nodded.

Shopping for shoes turned out to be more of a nuisance that Miyuki thought it would be. They had already scanned two sports shop but didn't find the shoe brand that Aomine was looking for. Now, their only hope was the last shop of the shopping area. It was an old sports shop specializing mainly in equipment and maintenance of the gears. Miyuki fell a few steps back as Aomine enquired for his specific model of shoes. It surprised her to see Aomine talking to the owner of the store in a casual way. 'That's rude to talk like that to a stranger.' She knew that he barely showed any respect to people in the school but to be so casual to a complete stranger…

Miyuki was in the middle of her 'criticizing Aomine' time, when she heard a soft deep laugh. To her surprise, she saw it was Aomine who was laughing… with the store owner! 'Is Aomine… laughing? It's the first time I have heard him laugh. So… strange. This Aomine doesn't look like the Aomine I know. His expression looks so warm... Like a total different person.' A small blush crept on her face as she saw the rare sight.

It turned out that he knew the store owner. He was a regular customer there back when he was a middle schooler. The owner went surprisingly chatty when he noticed Miyuki there with Aomine. He shared many anecdotes of Aomine with her when he was busy with the choosing and trying on the shoes. It came quite as a shock to Miyuki when she heard all this from the old man owner.

The rest of their day was quite uneventful. However, they did stop at the nearest subway to grab a snack for the afternoon. Neither of them talked much at their journey back home but they do replayed the events of the whole day constantly on their mind.

They'll never admit but they do enjoyed the day with each other.