For Services Rendered

By: Bunny

Rated: Teen 15 and up

Genre: Romance, Comedy, AR

Summary: RyoSaku, AR. Ryoma is a world famous tennis player, but at 22 years old, the world has noticed his deficiencies in the romance department and they demand some action. Enter Ryuzaki Sakuno, a girl normal enough for him to tolerate as his pretend girlfriend.

Chapter Twelve

The next few days followed in much of the same vein as the first shopping day had for Sakuno and Tomoka. Each day the young women spent all day shopping or making other preparations. They'd even spent a whole day at a spa and afterwards Sakuno had felt like her whole body was sparkling from head to toe. She didn't think her skin had ever felt so soft, or glowed so brightly.

The cold January days were short and the girls were returning later and later each evening. Sakuno hadn't been able to get in another tennis session at all with Ryoma yet. In fact, she hadn't even made it up the hill again since the first shopping day when she'd rushed to try to make it before sunset.

Was she avoiding Ryoma? Maybe. Okay, so yes, a little bit. It had been extremely uncomfortable for her that Horio-kun had walked in on them being so...naughty. The good thing of it was, Horio-kun had completely stopped trying to call them out for being liars about their relationship, and had instead jumped onto the 'So Happy for the New Couple' bandwagon with Tomoka. The bad of it was, things had been awkward with Ryoma ever since.

In fact, neither of them had even initiated kissing or touching each other in private since then. They still had dinner with their friends every night, both of them putting on a show of being a happy couple, and slept together every night, somehow managing to wake up each morning cuddling and then awkwardly separating, but that was all the interaction they had.

Sakuno was starting to feel a little depressed and empty inside over it. She didn't know what was worse; exposing herself to hurt by pretending they were dating for real even to themselves, or the hollow feelings she felt from pretending they were dating only in front of others.

The other change had been the extra efforts Tomo-chan and she'd had to make to protect her identity when they were out. Since her face was so new to the tabloids, thankfully most people she talked with didn't notice, or if they did, they didn't comment. The regular tabloid readers noticed though, and they were usually the women they were getting assistance from like the make-up counter assistants at the department store or the women giving them treatments at the spa. Thankfully everybody that had recognized her so far had been nice about it and had been more excited about asking her questions about 'Ryoma-sama' than details about their relationship. Sakuno knew it could have been so much worse. Perhaps it was the high end locations they were going to, she honestly didn't know, but she was thankful that she hadn't had another paparazzi encounter yet.

Trying to answer their questions about Ryoma would have been really difficult too, if Tomo-chan hadn't been there with her. Her BFF had blossomed into the perfect publicist seemingly overnight and Sakuno was rather awed by it. She had proved to be a bottomless well of knowledge on all things Echizen Ryoma and had been too happy to jump into the awkward conversations, effortlessly take them over, and then quickly close the topic. Through this, Sakuno was learning all sorts of things about Ryoma as well, though really...she would have enjoyed learning these things from him directly, at least she was getting prepared so she wouldn't be caught again not knowing something simple, like the fact that he was left-handed.

They'd really got a lot done though. She was starting to feel prepared for taking the world on as Ryoma's girlfriend. She had a full new wardrobe. She had a new laptop. Her whole body had been thoroughly pampered - she didn't think she'd ever looked or felt so good. Her hair glistened, her skin glowed, her nails and toenails were painted to perfection. She'd already interacted with several of Ryoma's fans as his girlfriend and she had Tomoka officially hired on as part of Ryoma's entourage.

Ryoma, on the other hand, was pissed. He was pissed and frustrated. It had been four days straight since he'd had any real time with Sakuno. It had been one day after another of getting up early to Sakuno acting well...weird, her being gone all day, way past the time for their evening tennis practice, followed by what he felt was a performance dinner with Horio and Horio's girlfriend and then their nightly routines. Ever since that time, Sakuno hadn't so much as looked him in the eye. Not even once. She even kept her back to him in bed. He just wanted to pick up where they'd left off before Horio had interrupted.

He'd ruined everything.

Today Horio was confirming Sakuno was his girlfriend and tomorrow they were all leaving for Australia. There was no going back to being single after this and Sakuno was avoiding him, acting like nothing outside of their "fake" arrangement had happened.

It had happened though. Lots of not fake stuff had happened and it mattered, dammit.

Something had to give.

So today instead of practicing tennis all day he'd done a bit of shopping himself. She'd need it anyway, and it would give him an opportunity to talk to her. He'd come home, bathed, shaved and was now dosing off on their bed, waiting for Sakuno to get back.

Utterly exhausted, Sakuno and Tomoka arrived back to Ryoma's house exceptionally late on their last night in Japan. There had been so many things to get done and since it was the last day before they left, they'd stayed out until everything had been completed. They'd even skipped out on having dinner with the guys.

Sakuno quietly entered the bedroom she shared with Ryoma. The lights were still on, but Ryoma was sleeping on the bed on top of the covers, his hands behind his head and a small wrapped present laying next to him. She cracked a smile. Wow...had Ryoma actually gone out to buy her a present? That was almost something a real boyfriend would do.

She swept her hair behind her ear and climbed onto the bed on her side, watching and waiting for Ryoma to stir.

As soon as he felt movement on the bed, an eye cracked open. Sakuno was hovering above him on the bed watching him and finally, he was able to make eye contact without her quickly looking away.

"Welcome home."

"I'm home."

Oh, how badly he wanted to just melt into her when she said things like that. Home. Their home. There was something kind of delicious about that.

He took his arms out from behind his head and pushed his hands down on the mattress, sitting up. He reached out the hand closest to her and strung his fingers through the hair on the side of her head against her scalp as she sighed.

"Are you ready for Australia?"

She nodded.

"Good," Taking his hand out of her hair, he picked up the wrapped gift sitting between them on the bed and passed it to her, "I got you something today."

Hesitantly, Sakuno took the gift from his hand with both of her own, "You didn't have to get me anything."

Ryoma shook his head, "You're going to need it."

She smirked at the gift, "Confident, aren't you?"

"Heh."

Slipping the bow off the box, Sakuno tore the wrapper off and stared at the box in surprise.

"You got me a cell phone?"

...

"Why? I already have a nice cell phone."

Ryoma took the box from her hands and opened it up, pulling the phone out he handed it to her, "It's a world phone, so it will work everywhere we go. The phone you have now would just be a paperweight outside of Japan. Cell phones that work in and out of Japan are especially hard to come by because the network technology here is different from everywhere else."

Sakuno stared at the new phone, "Wow, I had no idea." She held the phone up, "That was...really thoughtful of you. Thank you."

"It's nothing."

Setting the phone on her nightstand she decided to "move" into her new phone tomorrow on the plane, it would give her something to do.

"I'm going to take a bath," She announced as she swung her legs around and pushed herself off the bed.

Later that night, Ryoma stared at Sakuno's back in the darkness. At least she'd actually looked at him tonight. He reached out a hand and twisted a strand of her hair around his finger idly, lost in his thoughts, wondering when he'd have her permission again.

The morning they were leaving for Australia, they slept in. Ryoma and Sakuno were burrowed together under their covers, basking in their shared warmth and their first opportunity to sleep in together. Finally, Sakuno roused herself awake, and through half-lidded eyes realized that once again she'd woken up to being wrapped up with Ryoma. She tilted her head up and was met with open hazel eyes.

She flushed as her heart raced and looked down into Ryoma's bare chest. His arms tightened around her, squeezing her closer. She took in a hasty breath. He hadn't let her go yet, and she hadn't tried to push him away either. Was it because she'd woken only to discover he was already awake, watching her sleep in? Why was he watching her sleep?

He continued to gaze at the top of her head, waiting. Waiting for this awkwardness that had come out of nowhere after Horio had walked in on them to go away. What was it going to take for them to get back to where they'd been? Why the hell did he care so much? Absentmindedly, he rubbed up and down the side of her arm and then suddenly, he felt it. She relaxed. He'd felt her whole body tense as she'd woken up, given him a wide-eyed glance and then look away from him, but she'd just relaxed and nuzzled into his chest with her face. He dropped his hand that had been rubbing her arm down to the hem of her pajama top and putting his arm under the shirt he made contact with her bare back.

At the skin on skin contact, Sakuno startled for a second, and then looked back up at him with those questioning eyes of hers. He left a whisper of a trail across her skin on her back with the tips of his fingers as she gazed up at him, silently questioning him with questions he didn't even know and for answers he certainly didn't have.

"Are you ready for this?"

She licked her lips and gave a slight nod of her head, "As ready as I can be, I think."

"Everything's going to be okay."

She nodded emphatically this time, "You take good care of me, I noticed."

His chest puffed up a bit with pride at her unexpected praise, and he gave her a smirk adding, "It's going to be perfect because we're going to be together."

Sakuno blinked in surprise at his comment, "What do you mean?"

He raised an eyebrow at her, "You know what I mean."

Her eyes flickered for a second with some level of understanding and somehow, it was enough for him. He dipped his head to her and captured her lips in a soft, sweet kiss.

Pulling away he took in her flushed faced and then, she was grabbing his shoulders and pulling him back, kissing him again.

Finally! Things were back to normal.

For them.

As everybody woke up and started the day, the girls rushed about and fussed as they packed up, while the boys watched them in fascination.

"Girls have to pack so much more than we do," Horio commented.

"Hn," Ryoma agreed.

Horio held his hand up with his index finger pointing skywards as if he'd just received a revelation, "Though...I don't think Tomoka or Ryuzaki have ever left Japan before this, so going with us to Australia is a big deal."

Ryoma hoped it wasn't too big of a deal. After all, Sakuno had signed on for a whole lot of upcoming travel with him, and she'd need to get used to it really quick if she was going to be happy. Still, he crossed his arms and his legs as he lounged back into his chair deciding not to comment further.

Another 15 minutes passed by before Horio announced that their limo was there to drive them to the airport. The girls scrambled for a few more minutes as matching luggage bags began to appear on the stairway's landing. After loading his small amount of luggage, Ryoma started up the stairs and moved Sakuno's bags to the car while Horio followed suit with Tomoka's luggage. Before too long, they were all piled in the limo and Sakuno was pouring everybody drinks.

Handing Ryoma a vodka and orange ponta, Sakuno settled into the seat next to him with her own identical drink, "I'm so nervous."

Ryoma took a gulp of his drink, hoping it would make him tired so he could sleep the whole flight and gave Sakuno a questioning look.

"I've never flown before," She shared.

Ryoma gave a grunt of acknowledgement.

She took a big swig from her drink and added, "I've never left Japan before either. Actually...are we coming back here after the Australian Open?"

Ryoma shrugged, "Maybe. It depends on what Horio books for me while we're there, but there's another tournament about a week after the Australian Open, so if we come back it won't be for long."

She stared into her glass and rolled the ice around in the alcoholic soda mix for a moment in thought, "So what tournament is that?"

"The ABN AMRO in The Netherlands," Ryoma answered before tipping his glass for another big gulp.

"The Netherlands? Wow! I've always wanted to go there!" Sakuno exclaimed as her mind drifted into her fantasy Dutch world filled with tulips and windmills.

"It's really cold there in February," Ryoma groused into his glass before taking a small sip.

"Oh, is it hard to play there?" Sakuno asked, imagining tennis courts piled with snow around them and players trying to keep warm.

"No, the courts are indoor. It's just cold in Rotterdam in February," He explained as Sakuno nodded over the tip of her glass while taking a few more sips.

"So...do we come back after that then?" She asked.

Ryoma leaned forward and set his glass in one of the cup holders of the limo's bar. As he sat back he rubbed his hands together to warm them back up from the icy chill of the glass as he shook his head, "Then we go to Dubai."

"Dubai? As in that super fancy rich city with the tallest building in the world and the palm tree shaped island? Where exactly is that again?" Sakuno babbled in surprise. She thought it was just going to be the four big tournaments and then an exhibition match here or there, but it sounded like there were a lot of other tournaments throughout the year that were going to be keeping them busy and away from home. She sucked down about half of the contents of her glass quickly as she once again realized why Ryoma made such a big deal out of their arrangement.

Ryoma picked his glass back up and swirled the bits of ice cubes and drink that were left in his almost empty glass, "Yep. It's on the Persian Gulf on the Arabian Peninsula. You'll like Dubai, it's a really cool city," He finished off the last of his drink.

Sakuno took the last large gulp of her own drink and commented, "If I can handle flying!" She gave a nervous giggle and Ryoma cracked a smile.

"Flying only sucks when you have to get on a commercial airliner packed full of people."

Sakuno wasn't sure what that meant, so she took Ryoma's empty glass sans melting ice, "Would you like another drink?"

Ryoma shook his head and pointed towards the window, "We'll be on the plane soon."

"All right," Sakuno looked out the window to see how close they were to the airport and was surprised to see the control tower of Haneda Tokyo Airport already in view. She placed their empty glasses in the cup holders, sat back against the seat and watched as they drove into the airport.

The limo stopped at a small terminal set aside for VIPs and private jets, and they all piled out of the limo as their luggage was collected and brought in behind them by a luggage porter. As they entered the airport, Ryoma turned around and took Sakuno's hand into his own, "This way."

He led Sakuno by the hand with the rest of the group behind them out to the gate where a midsize jet plane sat waiting with it's airstairs open to the ground for boarding.

Sakuno grabbed Ryoma's arm in a vice grip, "You didn't tell me you had your own plane!"

They continued walking towards the plane as Ryoma teased, "Hey Sakuno, I have my own plane."

She punched the side of his arm playfully, "Don't make fun. This is a big deal!"

He glanced at her from the side of his eyes as she gazed at his modest Gulfstream in awe, "It's not a big deal."

"Yes it is!" She insisted.

He ran his free hand through his hair, "I have to fly a lot. I also get a lot of problems with fans and reporters when I have to go on a normal flight so I needed my own plane, this isn't just some show-off thing."

Sakuno nodded her head, "I think I'm starting to understand it a bit, Ryoma."

His life was hectic, complicated and always in the spotlight, that's what she was starting to understand. She had no idea it was so crazy for tennis stars.

They stopped at the bottom of the airstairs and Ryoma gestured for her to ascend first. As Sakuno cleared the top step, she got her first look into the cabin of the plane and noted how comfortable and luxurious it was. She shook her head in wonder at how very different her life was from her 'boyfriend's' and had a difficult time wrapping her head around how he could think that something like this wasn't a big deal. She was starting to understand though. After being chased down by paparazzi, and hearing about how they would be doing three tournaments in the next month or so in three different corners of the world. Yeah, she could appreciate why someone like Echizen Ryoma would actually need his own airplane. The mobs of reporters, the crowds of fans, the constant flying, the much needed continued practice; it would probably drive someone crazy rather quickly if they couldn't catch a break.

She was starting to see how it could also be rather lonely.

She felt Ryoma's hand at the small of her back as he joined her in the cabin and nudged her to enter further into the aircraft. She obeyed his steering and they settled across from each other in cream colored large leather seats.

"Wow! Ryoma-sama! You are a pimp!" Tomoka exclaimed from the doorway as she entered the plane behind Horio. Horio sweatdropped, Sakuno giggled and Ryoma put his hand over his face and covered up a chuckle.

The couple took the seats across the aisle from Ryoma and Sakuno, giving all four of them the ability to see each other and talk.

"How long is the flight?" Sakuno asked.

"About ten and a half hours," Horio answered as he stood back up and made his way to their steward to oversee their luggage being loaded into the cargo bay, and to give the go ahead for take off when everything was ready. Horio gave a nod to Ryoma as he settled back in his seat.

Within minutes the cabin door was sealed and the plane began to taxi to the runway. Sakuno gave a nervous glance out of her window and grabbed the sides of her chair.

Ryoma watched in fascination as Sakuno's knuckles turned white while the plane's engines ramped up and the plane began it's race down the runway for take off. It was so smooth, nothing like a commercial flight, and Ryoma knew the difference and even enjoyed flying in his plane, but Sakuno didn't know how good she had it, especially for a first flight. She was a nervous wreck. It was kind-of cute. He found himself reaching across the table and weaving his fingers between hers, giving her a reassuring squeeze. She squeezed back and kept her eyes out the window, her mouth dropping in an 'o' of appreciation as the plane smoothly lifted off the ground and took to the sky. She still squeezed his fingers as they continued to ascend, her eyes focused on the ocean that was getting farther and farther away until finally the plane leveled out and the seatbelt sign dinged off, letting them all know it was safe to move about the plane.

Sakuno finally looked at Ryoma with a big smile as she let go of the death grip on his fingers, "That was amazing."

He smirked, "Good, because you'll be flying a lot from now on."

She gave him that happy smile of hers that sparkled all the way to her eyes, "Okay."

Okay. Ryoma's heart sped up at her smile as it always did. That was...perfect, he thought.

Horio and Tomoka were starting up a card game on the table between them, and somehow he knew it was up to him to keep Sakuno occupied during this first flight of hers. Unbuckling his seatbelt, he motioned for Sakuno to get up and follow him before the two sat on the long sofa behind the plane's seats. Sakuno cuddled into his side as he flipped on the TV across the cabin from the sofa to watch a movie, and ordered the steward to make them some more ponta and vodka drinks. Maybe he'd still be able to get a bit of a nap in with her since they were on the sofa...

So things are barely, barely starting to calm down for us a bit as of today. This last week has been full-on insanity. The peak is usually around December 15th, but I think the 18th this last Sunday was actually our busiest day this year. I thought I was going to seriously lose it because it was tooo too much. GAH! So thank you all for your patience on waiting for this chapter to get posted up. I haven't had more than a few seconds to myself each day since I posted up the last chapter, but I've been carting my new little Kindle Fire around with me and reading your reviews as they've come in. It's been the highlight of my holiday season retail hell days. :) It's not that I don't love owning an anime store, it's just the sheer number of orders that come this time of year that's overwhelming and keeps me from having a life for a few weeks. I loved being able to read through your reviews from the monotony of pulling Hetalia keychains, Death Note pins, Soul Eater notebooks, Nintendo plushies, etc. etc. LOL...So thank you all for all your love. It got me through the busy-busy madness. MUAH! xoxoxo

Lots of new reviewers after chapter 11 too, which was so exciting for me! Thank you all for dropping me some love! It made me so happy! :D :D :D :D I'm also getting more reviews and favorites for my other PoT stories still as well, and it's been thrilling for me! Thank you so much everybody!

Next chapter we'll be in Australia and the pace of the story picks up quite a bit from here, so prepare yourselves! :D :D :D :D

So lots of love and thank yous to Maria-Reynne, 15meynanne, kawaii-witch181, ILoveSxS, wendydarling29, DarknessFlameWolf, mae, sixfeetunderthestars, CathLuvbear, Strands of Ivy and Sakura, Ranju, foureyesfreak27, 2lazy2createAnAccount, Sunshine-smile, SinfulEmerald, SoshiGee, and LunaxXmoongoddessXx for reviewing chapter 11. So many of you mentioned Horio ruining the moment and brought up the sexual tension, etc. of chapter 11, I'm so happy! Thank you all so much for all your reviews. ILU guys bunches! ILoveSxS for chapters 1-3 as well - thank you for getting over the hesitation to read the story! I'm so happy you did. :D :D Yeah, I'm really not so great at summaries I think. ...looks around...hehehehehe.

ILoveSxS, DarknessFlameWolf, and Strands of Ivy and Sakura thank you for the fresh reviews for The Pirate and the Princess! :)

MadClover-chan for the review for Never Forgotten. I hope you're reading through this fic too since you mentioned you read most of my other RyoSaku stories. I LOVED it that you quoted Ryoma's "There were two universal truths that everybody needed to understand. One, nobody beats me at tennis. And two, nobody gets fresh with my girl." I did a little happy dance. :D :D Never Forgotten is SO special to me, so every time I get a review for that fanfic I get really happy and I read the whole fic again. ...hearts... Thank you thank you thank you a million times thank you.

ILoveSxS for the review for It Was Me. (You're just going through all my PoT fanfics, aren't you? hehehehehehehe ILU! You are so awesome!)

ILoveSxS, and Kelley Splash for the reviews for The Graduation Caper. Seriously can't even tell you how happy THESE reviews made me. TGC is still somewhat new and it's this crazy long one-shot and I'm very proud of it, but it just fails on reviews counts and fave counts compared to my other PoT stories so I thought it wasn't that popular. Kelley Splash you SO MADE MY DAY with your review that you've read it over and over and over again and can't get enough of it. I just /died/ of happiness.

Maria-Reynne - My dear friend, I'm so sorry to hear about your trials from typhoon Sendong. I am THRILLED to hear that you and your family are okay and unharmed. According to the reports this has been the deadliest storm of 2011. That is just horrible beyond horrible. I hope very much all of your local friends and their families are okay as well. What a scary thing natural disasters are! We have had flash flood problems in my local area recently too because I live really near the Los Angeles forest, and the forest burned down really really bad 2 years ago and without all the trees, the rains bring floods and mudslides / landslides etc. I think landslides are the worst. :( I am so sorry you are dealing with that! I wish there was something I could do for you, I hate being so far away! If your mail system is working and there's anything you need let me know I'll mail it to you - you know, all that stuff that can be hard to come by after a disaster. I know it's not much and I wish I could offer more. :( Sadly, I hadn't even heard of the storm until your review popped in. Usually I know about these things right away, I'm generally very on top of it with keeping up with the world news and such, but since I've been 24/7 handling anime orders this week I haven't had time to check in on the world it's just been processing orders, pulling orders, shipping orders, restocking, counting in, putting stuff away, customer service, etc. 24/7. :( I know that A LOT of my PoT readers are in the Philippines though. From my stats page it's really clear USA and then Philippines by country, and the country counts for everybody after that is much smaller so now that I'm IN THE KNOW I'm so totally worried about EVERYBODY. ;_; Take care my dear. *hugs* I hope this will pass quickly for you. :(

kawaii-witch181 - You are cracking me up! I *love* it that you screamed! heheheheheh! That's sooooo awesome! :D :D :D :D And yay for being irresistible! bwahahahahaha. I just loved your whole review it was so cute and exciting and I wanted to update the next chapter up right away after I read it. (But the edits weren't ready yet and I was still busy pulling OtakuFuel orders like a madwoman, but still, thank you for making me excited!)

ILoveSxS - This is your favorite RyoSaku ever? Really? *blushes* I hope you still feel that way by the time it's all posted up. ^_^ I will do my best! Thank you so much for all the RyoSaku love this week! You've been awesome! I think you've read and reviewed all of my RyoSaku stories this week except Way Back Into Love and Never Forgotten. That's quite a feat! I'm super impressed! I'd highly recommend not passing up Way Back Into Love though, it's my most popular RyoSaku fanfic by fave's counts with It Was Me being right on it's heels.

DarknessFlameWolf - Yes, damn Horio. Tell me more about DFW's happy-fun time. ^_~ I dunno about another 10 chapters since the whole story is 19 chapters + an epilogue, BUT yeah as you just read in this chapter, Horio certainly set things back a pace. Still...there's A LOT more sexual tension to come. There are at least a couple of super sexy scenes I'm recalling off the top of my head that are coming up...

Strands of Ivy and Sakura - I would die shopping that much too. It's a lot of work. :/ Poor girl having to leave everything behind in her apartment is practically starting over. At least we have Mr. Rich Tennis Star footing the bill for her wardrobe upgrade. LOL! I'm really happy you liked the steamy bed scene. Wait until the [censored for spoilers] scene! Damn. I got censored. Also...for your review for The Pirate and the Princess - SQUEE! I'm so happy you enjoyed all the pirate talk, thank you so much! I worked really, really hard on that fanfic (research wise) though, I think I did even more for this current fic (scary, I know) the pirate stuff took up A LOT A LOT of that time. I actually found a pirate translator that helped me out for all the pirate speaking, it was a real gem. In the research I did on pirates I never saw anything that every crew had a sword master. There's a master gunner (Kawamura) whose job it is to do all the weapons stuff, and I'm sure there were/are plenty of pirates that are sword masters, but they weren't a crewman's position according to my research. I gave every position I found a character, so it was all accounted for. All in all though, I'm sure a sword master on a pirate ship would be cool and make for a cool story, so I wouldn't say something like that would make a pirate story unbelievable or anything. (After all, it's all fiction in the end.) There was a sword fight in The Pirate and the Princess though, between Ryoma and Fuji when they were fleeing the Spanish ship. Fuji sliced Ryoma's eyelid and Ryoma stabbed Fuji in the gut before Momo, Oishi and Eiji broke up the fight. It's in Chapter 9 if you want to have a re-read of that scene. ^_^ Oh and I can't believe TPatP was the first story of mine you read! It's still so new compared to most of the others. I guess, it's getting old now though, hahaha! Wow...time flies. Thank you for sticking with me over the years! MUAH! Have you read the older ones too?

foureyesfreak27 - So happy chap 11 is your fave chapter so far and you enjoyed the RyoSaku scene! :D There's more on the way...

2lazy2createAnAccount - Also happy to hear chap 11 was your fave chapter so far! So funny that you quoted The Pirate and the Princess again! You really like TPatP? You kill me. SQUEE! Yeah Eiji did ruin the moment then, didn't he? Then Tezuka ruined the next one. GRR! LOL! Fanfic is so much fun! *giggles*

Sunshine-smile - Your whole review was so sweet! I was really floored that you said you check for updates all the time and re-read through my older PoT fanfics while you wait for updates! WOW! Just wow! You take my breath away! Thank you for taking the time to send some love my way, I feel special. ...hearts...

SinfulEmerald - YOU take the CAKE for the review I read the most times from chap 11. Seriously! I kept reading it and giggling to myself. My husband actually accused me of chatting with a 'boyfriend' while I was reading it with a stupid grin on my face for about the 5th or 6th time. (He was joking about the bf, but that's his way of saying 'WTH?' so hahahahaha, you got me.) I LOVED LOVED LOVED that you quoted out the scene with your commentary! I was completely fangirl-ing over it. "he licked the corner of her mouth playfully" YAYAYAYAY! DAMMIT WHY HE IS SO HOT? "It's okay to touch me." Just kill me now, MY BODEH IS READY ASLDKJFLIAWEJRTLAWIDJLASKFJ - see that? It NEVER gets OLD! Just reading it AGAIN I grinned really big and blushed! You KILL MEH! Thank you thank you thank you for commenting on the permission. That made me so happy as well. There's more scenes coming up to kill your blood pressure, I HOPE you like them as much! :D :D :D :D

SoshiGee - It's funny you asked where I got the idea for this fic from because I just told Cinpii in the last chapter. So here it is - The inspiration for this story actually came from first love and exploration and the purity of those feelings, I did a lot of reflection when writing this to try to put that all into words and express it properly because it was really, really important to me to capture that. I was driving home from one of our distributor's where I'd picked up restocks and I was stopped at a red light. For some reason I was looking around (I don't normally do that when I'm stopped) and at the gas station right there on the corner there was an adult couple out of the car getting gas, and I *think* I saw one of their first kisses. It was just this...moment, and I just somehow knew in it's sweet awkward yet excited-ness that I'd just witnessed something really special, and it brought up feelings inside of me of falling in love. So I just knew I had to write a RyoSaku about it, about that moment, about those feelings and this whole story kind of blossomed from there.

15meynanne, mae, sixfeetunderthestars, CathLuvbear, Ranju and LunaxXmoongoddessXx - Thank you all again for your reviews as well. 15meynanne, sixfeetunderthestars, Ranju and LunaxXmoongoddessXx for your first reviews. So good to hear from you, thank you for dropping me little notes. Lots of RyoSaku love.

xoxoxo ~ Bunny