Sung by: Shakira
Lyrics and music: Shakira y Brendan Buckley
Slam Dunk belongs to Takehiko Inoue, IT planning and TOEI.
Fool
Another boring training day had finished at Shohoku High. It was a sad, grey afternoon outside the gym and the sky was painted the color of charcoal, threatening to wet all of Kanagawa's streets any time. The air was dense and humid and a hot breeze wandered heavily through all the city. Everything had that horrible sticky sensation on.
Rukawa came out of the gym in a hurry; he had to get to the park on time to meet with a special someone and he was already late. He had showered and changed his clothes in an almost supersonic speed, not even having time to cross some insults with his favourite enemy; the team's red-headed number 10 with the unbeatable ego and uncomparable bad-ass attitude.
He crossed the streets cursing Hanamichi for making him late, cursing the weather for chosing such a bad day to start raining and his date for picking such an impossible hour to meet with him. That had been, more or less, the worst day in the life of Kaede Rukawa. Since the very moment he had opened his eyes that morning, just to find his roommate hadn't woken him on time to go to school, but had instead left a somewhat horrible and almost unmade dark coffee over the kitchen table he had to swallow cold, with this blinding pain on his head and a terrible sensation of loneliness all over his chest, everything, absolutely everything had gone wrong.
Maybe that afternoon's meeting would cheer him a little bit, though he plainly knew he couldn't continue fooling himself for that person anymore…
***
Rukawa made it to the park miracolously on time, but no one was to be seen there. Nobody, empty, silent. Nobody. He let himself slowly sit down on the white bench where he had been so many other times before. It was kind of cold and Kaede hugged himself to keep his bosy's warmth.
The sky went darker and darker every minute and little rain drops started falling palyfully to the earth, turning bigger and more violent as the time passed by. The wind slapped furiously against every tree, making its branches shake like crazy, convulsionating each and everyone of its leaves.
Kaede kept his same position, arms embracing his frozen knees, sitting on the same old white park bench where he had once left the same person who dumped him that afternoon love him for the very first time. The same one that left him to sleep that morning and that, for a long, long time, kept on breaking his heart carelessly with deceiving sweet words and that irresisitible but treacherous smile of his.
"He won't come" Kaede said to himself, and he shed a tear or two, becoming one with the bitter crying of the storm.
*Tell me lies, slap me on the face, just…
*Improvise, do something really clever
*That'll make me hate your name forever
It was already late in the night when he finally got home. His roommate and himself had lived together for a year or two inside the modest third floor of an old and dusty building. The lights were off and the corridor to his department was submerged in a sad and sappy half-light. Kaede was wet from the tip of his toes to the very last of his black hair. He was plainly soaked. There wasn't a sinlge centimeter in him that didn't drip tiny drops of dirty water, so wet you could notice the track of his dirty Nike Air shoes from the first floor. The smooth hair that fell over his face hid the dancing pool of his blue eyes, tired and reddened of so much crying, and it made an unusual contrast with his pale white skin. It surely wasn't the first time he came back home all wet and dirty like that, alone, with that horrible so-lonely sensation over his chest and feeling betrayed and swindled. As if he hadn't got used to that stary-dog life of giving and never receiving.
That is what you get when you fall for the wrong person…
"Kaede, you are so pathetic…" a little voice cried inside his head, "Honestly, you really are…"
***
Kaede sat down on the sofa and turned on the TV. It was still raining outside. He tried to keep his mind busy with un-important silly stuff but his confused head couldn't get him out of his actual depressive state. He hated himself for being such an asshole that with the sole, only, and stupid reason of being in love was ruining his life in the worst of ways; by letting it pass in front of his eyes and not being able to live it or do any other thing for it as if he really couldn't care less. Cause it had been some months since the last time he remembered having had any kind of attchment for life. Kaede Rukawa as everybody knew him was dead and gone; his pride, his arrogance, his energy… even that obsessive passion he had for basketball. He had let himself get lost in the mist of what he thought was the only thing that could make him really happy: the pleased smile of his lover when he lied by his side at nights and being sure he could count on passing one more night with him.
He arrived then, while Kaede massaged his head with an old towel that smell like humid cloth. It was very late and the rain wasn't getting any better. The tall and athletic silhouette of his body materialized by the door, contrasting with the pale light of the corridor. Kaede didn't turn round to see him; he already knew by heart each and everyone of his body lines, and could have drawn a perfect image of him just with the power of his mind. Everything from his spike gravity-defiying black hair, probably wet beacause of the rain, his strong arms, long legs, sensual blue eyes to the characteristic and sensual half smile he always carried on his lips, wich Kaede had learned to hate out of loving it so much. He had gone through that body millions of times before, either with his eyes, with his hands, with his lips… so much it hurt him deep down in his broken soul.
The figure entered the department, closing the door quickly and throwing the key carelessly over the little table by the entrance. That was him, Akira Sendoh.
He had his silly half smile on his lips and was not wet, but slightly humid. Akira sighed before adopting his usual cool attitude and heading towards where Kaede was. He had apparently forgotten how he had kept his young lover waiting for him for countless hours in a little white bench under the raging storm, alone, carying not if he now was wet and in great paing, eagerly waiting for any sign of regret or a little apology that could make out any sense out of all this matter or at least make him feel a little bit better for a change.
Kaede felt him coming and in that mnoment his head started to cry out loud he HAD to make him know what he had been through, how he had waited and how much it hurt, but his heart made him keep his silence and feel a huge relief now he was there with him and not in any other place. He heard Sendoh stop right beside him and could feel the same bitter sweet aroma he never cared to hide. It was cheap woman perfume, he could notice, impregnating it's sickening fragance all over the place.
"Hey, Kaede," he smiled, "Are you OK? You're all wet…"
*You might swear, you'd never touch a lady
*Well, let me say, you're not too far from maybe
*Every day you find new ways to hurt me
It was always the same damn routine. He came back and a few minutes later they were both on the same old bed in the same small room of the third floor of a dirty old building somewhere in Kanagawa. It was always the same and then again Kaede couldn't feel but as if he was being used. Why? Why couldn't he give an proper ending to all this pain? What kept him from sending everything to hell and carry own with the life he had left? To go back to his family and friends and team… to everything he had left for him and for what? For nothing. And why…?
He knew he was living a big lie. He knew he was being cheated. God, he *did* know Akira Sendoh was only laughing of him at his back and all the love he said to have at night would disappear with the first sunbeams that woke up the next morning. He was nothing to him but a pair of playfull thin lips and a sweaty piece of meat. Absolutely nothing. And hell it hurt.
He was such an idiot. He had always been, ever since the first time his covalt blue eyes spotted charming Akira Sendoh and he left him seduce his back then inocent person. His worst enemy and rival to whom he had given his soul and body. Maybe it had been mutual love, back then where everything was but a game of seducing the other and avoiding their relationship to go public. He could now say those days were the only ones he had been autentically happy. He had learned to love and to smile, but if loving was now this, he preferred to die.
All of those joyful days had gone past. Their first kiss, their first time toghether, the careful caress he always received, the sweet kissing, the looks, the revolting sensation on the stomach whenever they were less than 10 feet away from each other. All of that was now a simple forgotten memory. He even wondered if it had actually happened as it seemed so unreal…
What's the point on keeping such memories when now you've got nothing, anyway? At least nothing but the loneliness and emptyness of daily life that turns every caress of him into fine needles that tear his soft skin and slowly break his body into pieces.
And even when he is dying in life… it's been two years of this. Kaede lives for him despite everything. He won't change, he won't complian, he won't demand…
"Pathetic…"
*All this pain, begins to feel like pleasure
*With my tears, you'd make a sea a desert
*Salt my wounds and I'll keep saying thank you
A new morning arouses through the dirty windows and the humid courtains. A new and brilliant day that talks not of the suffocating air that is breathed inside that third floor of a Kanagawa building. Kaede wakes up after a long, agitated night as so many other, with tears that drown the ocean of his eyes. He finds himself once more alone and naked, lying still between the yellow sheets. Alone and in silence. His hands moves to one side, hoping he will find there the body of his lover, but it's been a long while since he finally learnt he will not be by his side whenever he wakes up. What's the point on having those useless hopes lingering in his heart then? Mere stupidity.
He thought for a while. About nothing and many things at the same time. He thought he was maybe getting tired of being the one waiting on the park bench and staying up late at night just to be sure he would come back home that day. He thought he was maybe growing sick of the lies and fake smiles, of the ficticious love and all the sad afternoons behind the TV wondering if with that idiotic and permissive attitude he would make his lover see he still felt for him what he had felt the day they first kissed. He though about disappearing out of his life, once and for all. Sendoh would probably not even care or notice, he might even do him a favour. That way he wouldn't have to live a lie and could feel free to continue with his sickening games without hurting anybody.
A tear ran down Kaede's white cheek, coldly yet firmly. The birds outside sung happily and the sun shone behind the dusty window. He closed his eyes and sighed with resignation. It was always the same, it had always been the same. There was nothing about that morning, that day and that past night that wouldn't make Kaede think about the exact previous day. He decided to get out of bed.
Thankfully, it was Saturday once more and he didn't have to go to school. He felt he just couldn't take one more day of angles, atoms and acids explanations and God knows what other useless nonsense. After taking a quick bath, brushing his teeth and getting dressed, he made it to the house's little kitchen, where he found a folded note over the table.
He took it with trembling hands and started reading…
'Kaede:
I had to get to work earlier today, seems there have been some problems with the administrator and you now how's this. Gomen. Don't wait for me today, all this stuff is only making me work extra hours and I don't think I'll be able to get home till very late. We'll have to cancel this afternoon's date, I'm really really sorry. And, oh, you looked so cute in your sleep that I didn't want to wake you up… hehe. I left some food in the freeze, you'll just have to put it some minutes in the microwave (try not to break it this time, k? hahaha). Hey gotta go or I'll be late, take care! Love you~~~~ AKIRA!'
Kaede smiled impulsively, though his head did nothing but curse his damned luck. Weird, isn't it, everything about that thing called love? You can feel so many things inside your chest, and no matter how wrong your mind tells you you are doing, it can never beat the beaming happiness there is in your heart.
He closed the letter and smiled once again. He had a long and heavy day to come, but he couldn't care less. That only letter had wiped out all of his morning thoughs. The pain was still there, but he couldn't help his lips from smiling once more.
I can't leave him, because I love him.
*But I can't help it if I'm just a fool
*Always having my heart set on you
*Till the time you start changing the rules
*I'll keep chasing the soles of your shoes
*Ahh, fool
"Are you pathetic or what, Kaede…?."
~The end (sigh)~
**Yumi: To Sen fans: (Please don't kill me) ^^Uu I know, I know I made him look like a frigid bastard xD *hides behind desk* DON'T HATE ME PLEASE IT'S JUST A FIC!!! I love Sendoh too but… oh well. It's just one damn fic _. Anyway PLEAAAAAAAASEEE read and review, ok, if you wanna flame me, flame me…… U_U. or whatever. It ain't that bad, ne??? ^^Uu *runs for her life* Hia~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~!!!!!!!!!!