"Gochisou-sama deshita (1)!" all the boys chorused. Rinko and Nanako giggled.

"Fioufffffffff…" Momoshiro sighed, petting happily his bulging stomach.

"That was really good, nyah!" Kikumaru said.

"My stomach is full…" Kirihara said

"I cannot eat anything anymore," Ootori said.

"Oh! That's regrettable," Rinko said. "There is still the dessert!"

"DESSERT!!!"

Rinko caught their interest.

"But since you said that you cannot eat anything more…" Rinko said again, sighing. She pretended to be disappointed, purposely teasing them.

"Echizen-san, a dessert is not a meal," Niou said, drooling.

"There is always a special place for dessert!" Marui added. Kirihara, Ootori, Kikumaru and Momoshiro vividly nodded.

Hearing that, Rinko smiled, but she was laughing inside. When it comes to food, they are similar to Ryoma. Nanako, Yukimura and Fuji chuckled.

"Ah, that's a good new then," Rinko said. "Why don't you go outside to enjoy the fresh breeze of the night? Nanako, Ryoma and I will bring you the dessert soon."

"HAI!"

The dessert was a small cake decorated with various fruits: peach, pineapple, grape, strawberry, blueberry, melon or cherry. It was colorful. The fruits were covered with a honey color syrup. And the smell sweet. It was obvious that it was a light dessert. It wasn't rich so it won't be heavy on the stomach. Just the perfect dessert after a huge meal. The taste was really good, but…

"Hum… The shape of this cake is somehow strange…" Marui said. Niou and Ootori nodded, agreeing.

"What do you mean?" Momoshiro asked.

"Well, we are used to Echizen-san's cooking now. Usually, what she made has a completed shape, perfectly done. However, this time is different," Yanagi said. He was holding his cake at the level of his eyes, examining it from every angles.

"I have the impression that my cake is a deflated tire on one side," Ootori said.

"Me, I have a fat ladybug swimming in honey," Marui said, looking at his big strawberry.

"Two small ladybugs with sea sickness," Niou described his green grapes.

"A green eye vampire who is sick," Kirihara said. He also has green grapes with strawberry.

"A drown fish that stares blankly at me with its blue eyes," from Shishido, who has a slice of peach with blue berries.

"An abstract sculpture?" Oshitari wondered.

"A failure of the modern sculpture," Atobe said.

"A monster who has a toothache," Gakuto said.

"A carnivorous flower which is puking a green caterpillar," Yagyuu said.

"A poisonous mushroom with a cold," Momoshiro said.

"A cat who has one ear bitten," Kikumaru said.

"A fat puppy who got ran over by a car," Hiyoshi said.

"Fssssssssssssssssssssssh!" Kaido said.

"But the taste is good," Fuji said.

"Even if the shape and the decoration is doubtful," Yuuta added, examining his cake like Yanagi did.

As the boys shoot their comments from right to left, Yukimura was trying very hard to refrain himself from laughing as he watched Ryoma. The girl has a pretty incredibly big number of red veins twitching on her head. Each comment from the guys got a new vein popping out. But she hasn't say anything yet. Ryoga was desperately trying to not laugh, his two hands coverings his mouth, tears in the corners of his eyes. Nanjirou was doing the same thing as him.

"Echizen-san," Kirihara asked Rinko.

"Yes?" Rinko answered.

"What happen to you when you did the dessert? Did you have an accident?" Kirihara asked.

"What makes you think so?" Rinko asked, smiling.

"Well, it seems like your hands were a little bit aloof when you did the decoration," Kirihara said.

"Yeah, as if your fingers were inflated or that you were wearing big gloves," Marui said.

"Or maybe you were holding something very heavy while decorating the cakes," Niou said.

"The decoration is really bad," Ootori concluded. "Really really bad."

Ryoma snapped.

'I should have put poison in the preparation!' she thought.

"Hey! If you don't like the cake, then don't eat it! And stop making your horrible comments! It's offending!" Ryoma yelled.

"Whoa whoa, Ochibi-chan! Calm down," Kikumaru said.

"We were only saying what were sincerely thinking," Marui said.

"We don't mean to offend your mother," Niou said.

"On the contrary, it's because we respect her that we tell her our true thinking!" Ootori said.

"But you must admit, Echizen. The decoration is very bad, unless you have no artistic senses at all!" Momoshiro said.

"Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!" Ryoma growled.

'Ungrateful jerks! After all the pain I had to make them dessert. I should have put something that slowly kills them with a lot of pain before the final dead blow!' she thought again.

"Wuahahahahahahahaha!" Ryoga and Nanjirou exploded. They could not hold themselves back anymore. It was too funny.

"Actually, the dessert was made by Ryoma-chan," Nanako said.

"She have been learning to cook recently and she wanted to help. So she made the dessert for you," Rinko explained.

"Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh!" they all exclaimed.

"Echizen made this?" Gakuto said.

"Then I'm no longer surprised by the strange shape and strange decoration of the cake," Yuuta said.

They all nodded, agreeing with Yuuta.

Twitch! Pop!

On Ryoma's head appeared a new vein.

"BWUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!"

"Oyajii, aniki, urusai!" Ryoma yelled.

"It was a wonderful feast, Echizen-fusai. Thank you very much for receiving us," Tezuka said, bowing.

"Thank you very much," the guys said, bowing too. Rinko chuckled.

"It was a real pleasure to meet you. Please come over again when you have free time," Rinko said.

"Hmn!" Nanjirou nodded.

"Pssst! Pssst! Come here!" Ryoga secretly called Kirihara, Marui, Niou and Ootori, a little bit away from where the others were standing. They approached him, curious.

"What is it?" Marui asked in a small voice. Ryoga gave him something.

It was a calendar.

"Why a calendar?" Niou asked.

"What for?" Ootori asked.

"This calendar is your life saver," Ryoga said. "Circled in red are the days of Chibisuke's PMS period. Do you still remember kaa-san angry, when she beat oyajii with her frying pan?"

The boys, remembering what happened a few hours ago, nodded.

"Well, compared to Chibisuke when she's in her PMS period, kaa-san is a sweet angel, even angry," Ryoga said.

The boys popped their eyes out of their head and turned to look at Ryoma. Right now, she was talking calmly to Yukimura and Fuji, smiling.

"Trust me, I know what I'm talking about. Don't piss her off, don't make her angry during the red days, especially if you bear a Y-chromosome in your DNA."

The boys turned blue and bit their lips, their body shaking. Marui clutched his hands firmly around the calendar, holding preciously against him.

"Thank you Ryoga-san, we will keep this preciously," Marui said, his body shaking. Kirihara, Niou and Ootori nodded to Ryoga. Their body were shaking madly too.

"Yuuta-kun, take this," Rinko said as she gave him a small pot.

"Euh… What is it?" Yuuta asked, opening the pot. Inside was a white cream with a nice smell emitted from it.

"It's a massage cream," Rinko said. "I always use it to massage Nanjirou, Ryoga and Ryoma. It will relax your muscles when they are tired. It will help you too."

"Ah!" Yuuta smiled. "Thank you, Echizen-san."

"Dou itashimashite."

Fuji didn't miss the exchange between Rinko and Yuuta.

"Then, see on Monday at school, Echizen-chan," Yukimura said to Ryoma.

"Hai. Arigatou, senpai-tachi. See you on Monday too," Ryoma said.

"Bye bye, Ochibi-chan!" Kikumaru winked at her.

"See you next week," Niou said.

"See ya!"

"Bye!" Ryoma greeted them a last time. Then, they left.

Before going, Fuji slipped a last glance to Ryoma. Ryoma got caught off by Fuji's cerulean orbs fixed on her. She blushed. Unsure about what to do, she simply bowed to him. Fuji smiled at her and nodded his head as a last greeting. They, he joined Yuuta to go back home.

That night, in his bedroom, Fuji was thinking about what happened today. But one person particularly occupied his thinking, a certain Seiyou female tennis regular.

'Echizen Ryoma…'

Fuji look through his window.

'For sure, you're an unusual girl…'

Fuji had never meet a girl like her. She is antisocial and too cocky for her own good. But she lives up to her cockiness. Her skills and talent in tennis are truly incredible. As for her antisocial side, she hates socializing with people, but people are mysteriously attracted to her. In the tennis club, she was like a magnet in the middle of many iron bars. While she wishes to be left alone, Kirihara, Marui, Niou, Ootori and Kikumaru are always around her - if not suffocating her with their presence. Even the cold and arrogant Yagyuu accepted her around him.

Fuji remembered the first day he met her. It was…

'Umm… a kind of very brutal first impression…'

Fuji chuckled.

Brutal, yes, not certainly not annoying. Not boring like the first impression of all the other girls he met before. Her first reaction was yelling at him and not blushing, like the other girls always do.

When a stranger bumped into you and you got threw on the ground, it's normal to be angry. But if this stranger happen to be Fuji Syuusuke, you will apologize to him for having step in the middle of his way. And if you don't know that he is Fuji Syuusuke, he will make you apologize to him anyway: by letting you the (rare) privilege to his eyes opened. Eyes that made anyone person feel uneasy by its presumptuous glare from someone from the high social elite.

Yet, Echizen Ryoma didn't back off even though Fuji glared arrogantly down to her. She stood up all her might against him and even glared back to him. Fuji admitted to himself, he was disturbed, but highly impressed. No one ever did this before to him. And he even admired her, for standing for her rights, for not letting overwhelming power crushed her.

Fuji remembered the revolting expression in her golden orbs.

'I never saw anyone with such beautiful eye color and such frankness before.'

He thought that it was because she didn't really know who he was. But even after that she learned about his true position and his power in the school, she didn't change her attitude toward him. Seriously, Fuji had thought about making her pay for behaving like this toward him, making her suffer in school. But since he was Fuji Syuusuke, he won't lowered himself to such undignified behaviors. He had decided to wait a little bit longer, thoroughly studying her so he can find her weak spot and strike. Until he finds the weakness, he will behave as himself around her, cold and arrogant.

But the unexpected happened.

Yuuta.

Yuuta's behavior toward him changed. Little by little. During the first visits to Yuuta at the hospital, Yuuta don't greet him, and even seemed bothered by his presence. Later one, Yuuta started to listen to him. Then, accepted his presence.

Then the big change happened. Yuuta talked to him. Yuuta happily greeted him when he came to visit him at the hospital. And Yuuta told him to forgive himself, telling him that it wasn't his fault for his shoulder.

It didn't take long for Fuji to figure out that the change in Yuuta was done by a friend who regularly visit him at the hospital, bringing him magazines, DVD and sometime sweets. That friend happened to be a mysterious girl. Yuuta always mentioned about that friend of his, time by time. Seeing Yuuta talked back to him, Fuji was so happy that he let skip many thing, as the girl's name, what was she, how did she meet Yuuta, etc.. Those things didn't matter to Fuji. Yuuta talked to him. For Fuji, it was the most wonderful thing that happened to him.

And when Yuuta called him on his cellphone to tell him when he will be released from the hospital, Fuji's happiness reached its highest level. That day, Fuji truly smile, a sincere smile that he didn't know he could do. It was then that Fuji thought about wanting to know more about that mysterious girl friend of Yuuta, to thank her for what she did. He wanted to know who was the girl that Yuuta so eagerly wanted to present her to him.

But what a surprising news when he learned that the girl he was so curious to know about was someone he sees everyday, but under boy garnment, and by the name of Echizen Ryoma. The girl that he was curious about was the boy that Fuji wanted to make him pay for standing against him.

'Echizen-chan… you're were interesting person…'

From that day, Fuji sees Ryoma with new eyes. She amused him. She was entertaining.

Fuji smiled.

It was the first time that he ever felt entertained and amused by someone.

'It feels different, but I like it.'

But let see how long can she hold his interest toward her.

'I'm starting to like you, Echizen-chan…'

Fuji stopped momentary, thinking again.

No, it doesn't seem right.

Then he tried again.

'I'm starting to like you, Ryoma-chan…'

Fuji smiled.

'Yes, that sounds much better…'

He flopped on his pillow.

'Ryoma-chan…'

And he felt asleep with this last thought.

(1) gochisou-sama deshita: thank you for the good meal. Can also be shorten as "Gochiso-sama". You say that after a meal.