Ch. 10 – Mada Mada Dane, Sakuno

A year had passed since Ryoma and Sakuno's first date. Now, they were both sixteen and had gone on several other dates as time had passed. They were both really opening up to each other—Ryoma was showing more emotions around her and Sakuno was becoming more brave and outgoing around him.

It was a Friday afternoon, and Ryoma had told Sakuno that he would help her with her English homework after tennis practice. He had told her to meet him in Room 313 to do the homework. Practice had finished thirty minutes ago, and Sakuno was still not in Room 313.

'Ugh, where is that girl?' Ryoma wondered, glancing at the clock. He wasn't upset with her for being late, he was just worried about her. 'Could those fangirls be bombarding her again with pranks?' That last thought put him over the edge, and he stormed over to the door to head out of the classroom in search of Sakuno. There was no way that he was going to let those crazy fangirls hurt his Sakuno. Just as he was about to turn the handle, the door burst open, and Sakuno ran through. Not knowing that Ryoma was just on the other side of the door, her running through it ended up in her tackling Ryoma to the ground.

"Oi, Sakuno, what's with the tackle?" Ryoma asked her about her sudden outburst through the door.

"Ah! Gomen, gomen, Ryoma-kun!" Sakuno bowed and apologized.

"It's okay. You don't need to bow to me, Sakuno," Ryoma told her and grabbed her hand. "What took you so long? Were those fangirls bothering you?"

"N-No, they weren't bothering me. I'm sorry, Ryoma-kun. I was just resting under the sakura tree when I realized I was late."

"Oh, that's okay. Just let me know if those fangirls touch you," he commanded.

"Hai, Ryoma-kun, but why are you asking so many questions about your fangirls?" Sakuno asked curiously.

Ryoma thought about that for awhile. He was always worried that his stupid fangirls would try to hurt Sakuno since she was his girlfriend, but why was he so worried about that? He made sure that his fangirls wouldn't even lay a finger on Sakuno by talking to Sakuno's best friend, Tomoka, to handle the outrages once they found out he had a girlfriend. And Tomoka gladly obliged to help him. In fact, he could hear her giving threats to the whole Ryoma fanclub about not touching Sakuno all the way from the tennis courts to the classroom. Ryoma even had his senpais watch out for Sakuno in the hallways at school. So why was Ryoma so worried about her, still?

Since he didn't even know the answer to Sakuno's question, he decided to avoid it by changing the subject. "Should we get started on your English homework? I don't want you to spend your whole Friday night doing homework; we should try to finish it early."

Lucky for him, this question distracted Sakuno, and she quickly agreed. Ryoma, still holding onto her hand, guided her to the desks. They sat down, and Sakuno began to dig through her bag trying to find her homework.

"Thank you for helping me with my homework, Ryoma-kun," Sakuno smiled at him, "especially since it's a Friday afternoon."

"Hn, it's no problem. This should be a breeze," Ryoma assured her.

Sakuno's eyebrows scrunched up in frustration, and she said, "I wish it was a breeze for me, too."

Ryoma chuckled a little, "I promise you that I'll help you pass this class. And, besides, it gives us an excuse to hang out more often anyway."

Sakuno smiled and blushed after hearing that. She really did appreciate the time that he gave her. She knew that Ryoma was getting really busy with tennis lately, especially since he was becoming closer and closer to becoming a world professional tennis player. Thinking of it, she knew that Ryoma gave her a lot of time than what he should be giving her; he needed to get all the practice he could so that he could reach his goal of becoming a pro.

Ryoma smirked at Sakuno after seeing her blush. He really did love that blush. Sometimes he worried that one day he would not be able to make her blush anymore. 'If she stopped blushing around him, would that mean that she doesn't like him anymore?' his mind wandered and wondered.

"It looks like I have to translate the sentences into Japanese," Sakuno said, breaking Ryoma out of his thoughts. He saw Sakuno looking through the worksheet she had to do for homework.

With his mind back on the topic at hand, he took the worksheet form her to look at it himself. "Piece of cake," he said. He gave it back to Sakuno and explained it some more to her. "It looks like that the vocabulary used here is focused around family and friends."

"Okay, so this first sentence looks easy. It says 'My mother is strong.' Right?" Sakuno asked her boyfriend.

"Close. It actually says 'brother,' not 'mother.'" After explaining how to tell the difference between the spelling of "brother" and "mother," Sakuno was able to finish most of the assignment on her own. Ryoma began to study his girlfriend while she was working.

Her silky hair was down today, flowing all the way to her waist. Her eyes were beautiful—always shining with happiness when he was around. She could get whatever she wanted from Ryoma with those eyes of hers. Ryoma's eyes traveled down to her cute little nose and then to her cheeks. He loved it when she blushed, which was what Sakuno was doing right now. She could feel him staring at her again, but she wanted to finish her homework quickly so she let it go. Then Ryoma looked down to her lips. She always looked so cute when she would form her lips in an "o" whenever she was pouting. Right now, though, she was softly biting them in determination to finish her homework. Her lips were so soft, and smooth, and perfect…

"Ryoma-kun, I need help again. What does this one say? What's that big word mean?" Sakuno interrupted his thoughts.

Ryoma shook his head to clear out his distractions, and then he took the paper from Sakuno. He discovered that the big word she didn't understand was "amazing."

"It says, 'My friends and family are amazing,'" Ryoma helped her.

"Oh, thanks, Ryoma-kun." Then she went back to working on her homework diligently. As Sakuno became focused on her homework assignment again, Ryoma's thoughts wandered where they left off.

…Sakuno is perfect. Her looks and her personality make her so beautiful. 'I'm sure the other guys in school have noticed her too. Some of those stupid guys have actually tried asking her out!' Ryoma began to get jealous after thinking that. 'She's on her way to having her own fanclub sometime soon. Then there will be even more guys fighting for her attention.' He was starting to get worried. He didn't like sharing attention with other guys. He only wanted Sakuno to pay attention to him. 'I'm going to have to get the help of my senpais to foil anybody's plans of any guy trying to start a fanclub for Sakuno.'

After making himself jealous, he began to look over Sakuno again, but this time possessively. She was his, and nobody was going to take her from him. Nobody was going to lay a finger on her. Staring at her face made him calm down again. His eyes trailed down from her brilliant eyes to her perfect, soft lips again. He didn't realize that he was getting closer and closer to her until she said something.

"I need help on this last one, Ryoma-kun," she said while still looking down at her paper, frustrated that she couldn't figure out the last sentence on her homework assignment.

Since Ryoma was so close to her, he just looked over her shoulder to see what it said. Then his thoughts all clicked together as to why he was so worried and jealous all the time because of her. He smirked when saw what she had to translate. With his thoughts still occupied on Sakuno, he lowered to her ear and whispered, "Let me show you what it means."

Sakuno almost jumped when he whispered in her ear. She didn't realize that he was that close to her! Facing Ryoma, her eyes widened as she realized how close his face was to hers all this time. "Sh-Show me?" Sakuno squeaked.

Ryoma smirked at her and responded, "Hn." He brought his face closer to hers, lowering his lips to her lips. At first he would just lightly brush his lips to hers, but he soon started to kiss her slowly.

"E-Eh?" Sakuno got out between kisses, not understanding what this had to do with her homework.

Ryoma smirked again. She was just so cute when she never understood things like this. He grabbed her hand and pulled her onto his lap, and started to kiss her lips again, but this time with more force. Finally, Sakuno began to shyly kiss him back. She felt him smirk against her lips.

Then in between kisses, Ryoma started to whisper to her. "I…" Kiss. "Love…" Kiss. "You." Kiss. He stopped kissing her after he said the last word to stare into her eyes.

Sakuno was a little shocked upon hearing those words from Ryoma. She just always assumed that she would have been the first to say those words to Ryoma, since Ryoma was always so slow at letting his affections for her be known. Sakuno was joyously happy, though, when Ryoma said those words to her first.

"I l-love you, too, R-Ryoma-kun," Sakuno stuttered and blushed. Ryoma gave her his trademark smirk when he saw that he made her stutter and blush again.

"Ready to go?" Ryoma asked Sakuno. He wanted to "finish" enjoying his Friday night with Sakuno somewhere else instead of inside the school building.

"H-Hai," Sakuno still stuttered. With the blush on her face, she started to pack her school things away in her bag. Just as she was about to grab her homework assignment to stuff away, she remembered that she still had to write out that last sentence.

"Oh, Ryoma-kun, you still didn't tell me what this last sentence meant," Sakuno said cluelessly while looking up at Ryoma.

Ryoma mentally slapped himself. Sometimes Sakuno could be so slow to catching on to things. But then he smirked and said, "Mada mada dane, Sakuno." He trapped Sakuno between himself and the desk and started kissing her again. He will just have to "help" Sakuno "finish" her homework assignment at school this Friday afternoon. And he will make sure that she completely understands her "homework assignment" as well.