Author's Note: Sorry for a such a long wait! I've been extremely busy with school back up and now having two jobs. I will keep the updates as I promised to bi-weekly. Anyway, thanks for all the positive reviews for the last chapter! Also thanks for reaching to 100 favorites and the ever increasing amount of follows! I hope you guys enjoy this chapter!

I do not own Kuroko no Basuke.

Chapter 32: Meaning

Midorima and Takao continued to walk around the convention while Takao noticed how clearly annoyed the Oha Asa manic was after leaving the two teens alone but Takao knew the two should have some alone time. He groaned at how painfully unaware his friend was at being jealous but knew that Midorima was very unaware of his emotions.

"Shin-chan," Takao began and Midorima looked over to him, still clearly unhappy with what was going on, "Are you jealous of Murasakibara?"

Midorima stopped at those words and stared at him as if he had grown eight heads, clearly very surprised at this assertion.

"WHAT?" He said back in response to Takao's question and Takao sighed at this, not surprised at his reaction.

"Shin-chan, you must have noticed the way you were acting around Kiyoshi-kun and how unhappy you were with him around. You had a lot of disscontempt with Murasakibara around, especially near Kiyoshi-kun." Takao stated and Midorima narrowed his eyes at this, clearly annoyed at how accurate he was. The black haired teen then narrowed his own eyes and stopped it in the middle of the walk away, others walking past them with no notice.

"Do you perhaps know Kiyoshi-kun more than you state?" Takao again asked and Midorima looked offset at this statement, looking like he was trying to hide any way of showing his true answer.

"…Shin-chan, how exactly do you know, Kiyoshi-kun?" Takao questioned him and he scowled at this, rubbing the bridge between his brow.

"We have met before." He began and Takao still waited for him to continue, "Back in middle school."

Takao's eyes glowed at how easily he had said his answer to him and he grinned at this, glad that he had opened up about this.

"Really? How? When did this happen?" He continued to ask the green haired teen who looked gradually more annoyed with each question asked.

"I am not going to tell you more of something that you should not know of anyway." He hissed back and Takao blinked at this before he narrowed his eyes on wonder.

"You didn't answer my original question, though, Shin-chan." Takao said and Midorima glowered at this, "Are you really jealous of Murasakibara?"

Midorima looked even more frustrated at him and he tried to ignore Takao's words but it continued to pester him as they walked throughout the convention. He doubted that this could be true but it was like a snake slithering through his thoughts and would not stop anyhow as much as he tried to.

"You shouldn't avoid this. You are clearly jealous of Murasakibara even if you deny it, everyone can see it." Takao said while struggling to catch up to him and Midorima continued to ignore him, his scowl reaching further and further across his face, "Don't say that I'm making things up as I see them, Midorima. I know far more than others do. So don't try to pull a facade over me."

Midorima frowned at this and narrowed his heavy gazed eyes at this, clearly knowing that he should answer some of his questions but he did not want to burden Emi.

"…It is…very complicated on how I know Kiyoshi." He responded back and Takao's already narrowed gaze still held itself, patiently waiting for an answer. He then sighed and looked away, interest still hinted in his eyes but he did not push further.

"I'll make a guess that you don't want to talk about without her permission then." He answered and Midorima straightened at this comment, knowing it was true, "I'll also guess that you mean to say that Murasakibara does not know your affiliation with Kiysohi-kun too."

Takao knew he was head on with the comment as the green haired teen flinched at this, not noticing his own actions.

"You know, Shin-chan, you should tell them of your intentions before it becomes to late and something happens." Takao stated in wise words but didn't seem to pass into Midorima's ears at this as he saw the two people they were talking about.

Murasakibara walked side by side to Emi, staring down at her with narrowed eyes that held happiness in them while Emi had a small blush still featured on her cheeks, smiling up to the giant. Her eyes held a soft gaze and her stance was at ease and in comfort, as she was completely okay with the presence of Murasakibara near her.

He wished that he could be the one with a calming effect for her.

"You have that same look on your face when we started the conversation, Shin-chan." Takao stated and snapped the green haired teen out of staring at the two, clearly not happy with the fact that he was right.

He was clearly very jealous of Murasakibara.

"Ah, Midorima-san! Takao-san!" Emi exclaimed when she caught sight of them and the glass eyed teen stared down at her as she approached them. Her twinkling brown eyes looked up to him in joy, that he hoped was for seeing him, and a smile curved on her lips.

"How you been enjoying the convention?" She asked him and Takao made his way in front of Midorima as he knew that something was still up in his friend's mind.

"We've been having a great time, Kiyoshi-kun!" Takao shouted and she blinked at his forwardness, clearly surprised at him speaking for the two of them.

"That's good, Takao-san." She said and again looked up to Midorima, trying to see his eyes but Takao remained in the way.

"Yeah, Shin-chan was able to find some gifts for his sister!" Takao explained and Emi clapped her hands together at this, tilting her head to the side.

"That's so nice of you, Midorima-san!" She said and blinked when she realized how he seemed to paid no heed towards her words and her soft features turned far more sad at this.

"Midorima-san…are you alright?" She questioned and Midorima blinked out of his thoughts, clearly unhappy that his expressions betrayed him.

"I am fine, nanodayo." He responded, though more harshly than he attended for the brunette who flinched a little at the comment, "Thank you for your concern though, Kiyoshi."

She nodded slowly at this and Takao knew that the two should probably talk this out, without the giant and himself near them.

"Kiyoshi-kun, would you mind staying with Midorima for a few minutes so I can get something to eat?" Takao asked her and her gaze turned towards him before giving him small nod.

"Sure, I don't mind, Takao-san." She said and then turned to the giant, whom she knew would like to stay by her side, "Atsushi-san could you please get me something to drink, if you don't mind?"

The giant stared at her with some bored expression before nodding at her request, knowing deep in his gut that he shouldn't let the two of them be alone.

"Hai, Emi-chin." He said and headed away from her to get her something while Takao followed in suit. She faced her attention back to green haired teen with narrowed eyes and her smile broke into a thin line across her face.

"Is something really bothering you?" She asked him and he flinched at the comment, remaining to be calm and collected.

"I am fine." he hissed out between his teeth and she frowned at his words.

"…please don't lie to me, Midorima-san. What is bothering you?" She questioned him again and his bandaged wrapped hand, which gripped his lucky item, playing cards, were ready to explode out of the deck.

"What do you find so soothing about Murasakibara that you don't mind his presence near you?" He asked back in clenched teeth and she stared at him for the response before her eyes starting growing wider, as a light bulb went off in her mind.

"…are you jealous of Atsushi-san, Midorima-san?" She asked in a hushed tone and knew she was right when he remained silent, ignoring her gaze.

"I can't process the idea that you are fine with him near you." He said back and the hair on the back of her neck stood up, "You disliked how anyone was near you back then so how is it different now? You have seen him at his worst yet you continue to be near him."

Her expression turned pained and her heart was racing against her chest, fear starting its way into her system.

"I-I-I…I just…" She turned to say and her words were getting caught in her throat, "…It's…challenging to explain. Atsushi-san…he's…"

"What exactly does he mean to you?" He bluntly asked her and she paused at this question,

"Huh?" She said with confusion rippling over her features and he patiently waited for her to say something but she looked shocked over the question.

"Emi-chan…you can't become like her or your grandmother. You can't give yourself away so easily. You can't develop feelings for someone and give yourself to them. You mustn't! You are to move past their missteps and grow up, not become out what they have done. Don't think you can develop feelings for each other without contact. That contact is what brought your mother to the state was in: she followed her heart and ended with it crushed from the one she had feel for."

Her grandmother's words reminisced and echoed in her thoughts and terror struck onto her features. Midorima's eyes grew large and realized that he must have done something to her and her features were starting to pale, her body began to shake.

"…I…I c-c-c-can't…" She said with a lisp and her thoughts were ragging against her head, her breath was racing. She had unknowingly dropped her purse and paper bag that she had got from Midorima's sister and not noticed that orange hair had fell out of the bag.

"YOU WILL NEVER #%*& ANYONE! You are not worthy of that! You will never be worthy of it! You don't deserve it! Not after what you have done to HER!"

"No…I want to be worthy…" She said as tears rose up to the surface and Midorima remained frozen, trying to figure out what to do to try and break her out of the flashback.

"You are worthy, Emi-chan." A sudden femme voice came forth and Midorima looked in the direction of who spoke that, seeing a familiar pinknette. Momoi arrived in front of the brunette and gave her a sad smile, not touching the girl but stayed a good distance to her. Aomine appeared to be nowhere near her and her features had a look worry across her features.

"You are free to be whoever you want to be. You are free to have whatever feelings you have for other people. You are not dragged down from your family. You can make your own decisions and not be pushed to follow their path they lay before you." Momoi told her and Emi continued to tremble, her mind struggling to accept what words to follow, "You have no need to follow words that cause this pain, Emi-chan. You are not bound to follow them. You are your own person."

The cloudy like gaze that had appeared in her eyes slowly started to fade away and return her normal gaze but still hinted at this. She brought her hands up to her head as she tried to calm herself down and closed her eyes, trying to think of something else.

"Emi-chin, I'll still be your friend. You don't need to keep quiet."

"You aren't nothing."

"I don't expect you to forgive me. But don't yell at Emi-chin for something you want to say to me."

"Emi-chin shouldn't have to make something just for herself."

"I apologize if I had hurt your feelings or made you sad that day or never getting in touch with you again."

"…Emi-chin needs to be careful."

"Emi-chin is always beautiful in my eyes."

"…I…I want to…" She began and felt sick to her stomach but choked it down, "I-I-I-I want t-t-t-to h-h-h-hear it a-a-a-again."

Momoi gave the girl a sad smile as nodding at this while saying back, "Emi-chan, you can hear it as many times you too. No one can stop you from requesting that."

Her once dark expression changed to a softer tone and her eyes stared up to Momoi with wide gaze before her eyes began to return normal. Her breath was still heavy but the air in lungs flowed more freely into her body and she then locked gazes with the one had caused her such panic, her body's shaking slowly stopping as she had broke free from the delusion.

"Midorima-san…" She began and looked away again, clearly embarrassed by the whole ordeal that just occurred because his use in a certain word, "I'm…sorry that I couldn't answer your question…It took too much of me to answer it…"

He just stared at her in clear shock, not even realizing that she had apologized for something he had caused.

"Never mind the question, are you alright, Emi?" He said in pure worry and Emi blinked at this, confused why he should ask of that along with the usage of her first name.

"Eh, but why-?" She began until Momoi placed her hand on the girl's shoulder and caused her to look towards her, noticing that she also held the paper bag and purse in her hand that she had dropped. .

"Kiyoshi-chan, perhaps Midorin was concerned because you had frightened us just now." She told the girl, being careful with her own words she wouldn't relapse. Emi's eyes grew wide at her statement and knew that she should accept the concern of the green haired teen as it would be strange not to.

"Eh, if I scared you both, I'm sorry about that." She continued to apologize and Midorima opened his mouth to say something again but a flash of narrowed pink eyes caused him to be silent.

"Don't worry about it, Kiyoshi-chan." Momoi said and gave her a gentle smile, "Everything is alright. You don't need to worry about it anymore."

Emi stared at the girl with wide eyes and without any notice, tears flooded down her cheeks and she left her mouth open at this as she was ready to speak. Concern rushed back to the two but she now had a look of happiness across her face as if Momoi had spoke words she had waited to hear for the longest time.

"Thank you." Emi said and the tears still dribbled down her face but they were slowly withering away, "Thank you, Momoi-san. Thank you for your kind words…"

She gave another soft smile at this and wiped away her tears final trail of tears, saying, "You don't know how much it means to hear those words."

"Eh, what's going on?"

The sudden input from Atsushi caused Emi to turn and face the giant, seeing that he had listened to her request and brought her a bottle of water. He looked down at her in concern and narrowed his eyes at this, seeing the small rims of red around her eyes. Takao was besides the giant with the snacks he had gotten from the booths and stared at the three figures in confusion, as he was trying interpret what had gone down when he was gone. Atsushi clenched the water bottle tightly at this and a look of anger took over his features, looking now directly at Midorima.

"Why is Emi-chin's eyes red?" Atsushi hissed at the green haired teen who merely blinked at the question and then narrowed his own eyes at this.

"What are you talking about, nanodayo?" He questioned back and Momoi sighed at the two, knowing that they were going to continue to bump heads until someone would interfere.

"Muk-kun, Midorin," She said, catching the two's attention, "It's impolite to argue in front of a girl, don't you two know that?"

Atsushi blinked at this comment as anger slowly dulled down before glancing back to the brunette, seeing her stare up at him with wide eyes.

"Eh, sorry, Emi-chin…" Atsushi said at the look of Emi's doe like eyes and her gaze softened at this, happy that it didn't end in an argument between the two young men. She then turned back to Momoi who had small creases under her eyes that went unnoticed by her the first time and she felt her heart drop low in her chest.

"Momoi-san." She said in a soft whisper as the pinkette brushed some of her hair back behind her ear, looking away from the girl, "I didn't mean to-"

Before another word could escape her mouth, Momoi shook her head to stop her from saying something and again ignored the girl's gaze. The boys paid no heed to the small conversation between the girls as Takao had started his own conversation with them, trying to let the two girls talk with having them listen in.

"It's alright, Kiyoshi-chan. I'm fine. It just shocked to hear those words…" Momoi said and gave her a sad smile, "It never occurred to me. I just need time to…process it. Don't worry about what you had said, Kiyoshi-chan…Perhaps I should have taken notice of it earlier than what you had said and maybe this outcome would be different."

Emi slowly nodded at this and clasped her hands in front of her, before Momoi returned the paper bag to her with a relaxed.

"I'm going to find Dai-chan, Kiyoshi-chan. I hope by the time we see each other a little later, you'll be in high spirits." Momoi said and Emi nodded at this as she left the group but stopped after having her wrist held. She looked behind her to see Emi with wide eyes and holding her wrist, keeping her from moving.

"Momoi-san, I thought that you two seem to compliment each other in ways that not many do. That's why I said it. I just wanted to know that and how much it seems that Aomine-san cares for you, Momoi-san. I didn't want you to be ignorant of it when I could see it. You two have been friends for so long, the truth would come out and it could have been far more painful than what I told you." Emi explained her reasoning to the girl who merely blinked at her before a grin appeared on her features.

"Ah, I thought you had been angry at me for what I knew…." Momoi said and Emi blinked at this before shaking her head side to side slowly, a calm expression taking over earlier unease ones.

"No…it was not that Momoi-san." Emi responded back and Momoi nodded at this before glancing back over in the crowd, seeing her childhood friend looking at some of the magazines.

"I'm glad! I'll see you soon, Kiyoshi-chan!" She said with a far more happy across her face and waved goodbye as she had dashed over to the booth where he was at.

"Everything all good, Kiyoshi-kun?" Takao asked the brunette who turned him wth a joyful smile across her face, eyes twinkling in happiness.

"Hai, everything is good, Takao-san." She responded and he blinked at this before returning the grin, knowing that the two other young men behind him would be thrilled at this.

"Now, what are we going to do, Yukicchi?" Kise asked the green haired girl who was casually sipping away at a strawberry smoothie while in her other hand was a plastic bag containing the items she wanted from the store clerk and in between her elbow and arm she pressed her whiteboard against her body. She glanced up to him at the question before pulling the straw away from her lips and formed a somewhat assumed smile. She opened her mouth again so the words wanted to say could be read and mouthed it slowly so Kise could understand what she desired.

Get me to the back stage.

He stared at her as if she was crazy and she raised an eyebrow, challenging him to see if he would do anything before he sighed.

"Eh, I guess I can do that." He said with some annoyance while Yuki nodded at this, pushing her glasses up at this. She observed the blond as they then started heading in the direction of the stage, following his somewhat tall structure. Then without another say, someone yanked hard on her scarf and pulled her back. Her eyes grew wide at this as both her smoothie and whiteboard were lost in her grip, falling to the ground as the only noise that came from her. She landed on her butt and annoyance grew on her features.

"Eh, if it isn't that annoying little bitch."

She snapped around to look up and saw some figures who looked like delinquents from Kaijō High as they wore similar outfits with short cut hair along with some piercings. Two stood over her and she glared at them, anger lighting up in her eyes.

"You know, you should have just agreed to hang out with us, girlie." One said, probably identifying himself as the leader when he leaned down to get close to her face, "Then you wouldn't be in this situation."

She smirked at this words before flipping the group off who stared at her then the leader growled at this, raising a fist up to attack her.

But a larger hand was ready to catch the attack while she still managed to swing her leg out, whirling it around to only catch the two's legs from out of under them. She smiled at the realization of what happened as the two landed on their butts from this and she looked up behind her to see the blond with wide concerned eyes at what was happening before him.

"Midorima-chan, are you ok?" He asked her and she glanced over at his still open hand before accepting it to stand up. She nodded before looking back at the groaning thugs on the ground before a malicious smile crept up on her features and then harshly pressed her foot onto the leader's hand who swore at this while the group of thugs watched for they were unsure what to do.

"You bitch!" He hissed and she glared down at him, her green eyes narrowed at his comment.

"What were they even trying to do to you, Yukicchi?" Kise asked her and she glanced over to his direction, then looked down on the ground. Her whiteboard stained with the smoothie smothered all over it, looking as if it as a abstract painting. She snapped back to the leader before swiftly moving her foot away from the leader's hand and instead landed a kick to shoulder blade.

The leader again cursed and Kise pulled her away from the group as she had look of pure rage across both her face and her eyes. He stared widely at this before turning back to the leader who now clutched his shoulder blade, clearly in pain.

"You little bitch…" The leader hissed with narrowed eyes and shakily stood up with the help of his group, glaring at her, "You'll regret this."

She remained still until the group all left and she grit her teeth at this before Kise slowly released her. She slowly bent down on the ground where her whiteboard stayed on the floor soaking in the smoothie's juices and proceeded to pick it, not caring about how it was staining her hands. She held it tightly in her grasp before she stared swiping the smoothie off it with a look that held no care in the world about her dirty she, herself was getting.

"Yukicchi?"

The sudden voice of KIse caught her attention and she looked back to him, light green eyes looking empty.

"Are you alright?" He asked in concern and she glanced back down to her whiteboard before nodding at this, "…Ah, didn't you need to get to the back stage! We should get going then!"

She blinked at this before he then started pulling her in the direction of the back stage, in hope of easing the girl of whatever she was thinking. She looked up to him before she glanced back down to him holding her hand and realizing that he had took it without her noticing, an not even realizing that her heart skipped just for a second at his aid.