A/N: Inedited so bear with the countless errors.
Friday. 7:20 PM. Kanagawa basketball park.
For a minute and a half, Mitsui roots himself in a standstill, his mind in a chilled stupor against what seems to be a prolonged, muted bedlam. Until something inside his skull gives way...
'What!' he gasps. An incessant shiver creeps its way through his core muscular areas, rummaging and drilling his fleshy fibers in freakish excitement. Radical disbelief is the singular, rightful reaction; it's all too good to be true.
He looks askance at Rukawa a full 50 times, pondering or striving to. He tries to absorb much of the words 'You win.' But his conflicted state of mind fails to maw down the whole of it. His cockeyed dreams are fabricating into bold reality, finally.
'I don't want to play. You win,' Tritely and plainly, Rukawa liberates a reticent, subzero coolness. 'It doesn't matter. Just do what you like,' He finishes. So okay, he's still girth with his traditional passive expression but he can't get heavier on those words; he's vented enough seriousness to make a fluke out of it and he's never the ilk who clowns around anyway. Just try to clap an eye on his steady face; no sneer, no scornful brow raising, no stare-down, no nose up, and no low blows from his ever filthy mouth. Everything's suddenly jumping on a fine line of harmonic tunes; he wants him, he wants him too. Neat. Just neat.
'Rukawa, are you sure about this?' Mitsui wobbles, slightly doubting the authenticity of the other's intonations. He still can't ascribe any absolute meaning to Rukawa's words and he's getting impatient as seconds drift to minutes.
Rukawa rocks a pithy, out-of-character nod.
This can't be, Mitsui thinks. His ears and eyes are playing dirty tricks on him. The story's sensational enough to get anyone out of whack; the uppity superstar cum floor mopper of Shohoku High is finally saying yes to aggressive Mr. Ball Buster. The news can've graced the cover of Tokyo Today and even go for the headline but senior press Yayoi Aida isn't around for a piece of this tasty novelty. Oh well, it's that incredible.
'I can't get the hang of it.' Mitsui says.
'I just said yes.' Rukawa spats. 'What, don't want it?' he finishes almost stridently, seeming to have lost half his interest in Mitsui. Nevertheless, the blind animosity he's long been nurturing for this equally haughty, modern day Narcissus is taking a whole new vision. Actually, it's taken a turn-around position; Mitsui's no longer his personal demon and his repulsive anti-pole, but someone more significant and worth...loving? Perhaps.
'Well,' Mitsui starts as he pries open an electrifying, angelic smile. He gives a good hard swig to peddle up the right words to say. 'I know I may have deserved your assent in the long run but...I didn't-never once thought that it'd be a...well, a piece of cake, you know...' He stutters, smiling apologetically at each short lived interlude. He's too hard pressed to show his gratitude to Rukawa and the fact that he owes the freshman for his consent is no light load.
'What, you're declining?' Rukawa snarls.
'No, no, no!' Mitsui hurtles on. 'It's just that...you have something to forgive. I mean, I fucked you over pretty badly and it'll be a little too skewed if I latch on the chance just like that...so...' He falters.
Mitsui has an unusual penchant for challenges, and getting Rukawa may have been the toughest course. But things don't run in accordance to the expected status quo this time; Rukawa's not playing hard to get, in fact he's scratching Mitsui's back instead of acting like the spiteful protagonist in this helter-skelter story. If anything, Mitsui deserves to be decked into a bloody pulp for whatever harassment he's done to Rukawa before, truly.
'Just go point blank.' Rukawa hisses in a vexed monotone. He too, is up in the air in what the other means. He tautly fixes his cheeks in a headstrong surface as a stroke of skepticism becomes apparent in each brow twitching. He's getting hot under the collar and a good deal of waffling will all the more broil his skin.
'Er, uhm...ok,' Mitsui decides to right the target finally. 'I'm sorry, dead sorry to have given you that much hell when you wouldn't come to me. I acted pretty much like a cracked nut back then and I...well, I hope you'll forgive me and I...I promise I won't screw up, I...you know what,' Mitsui says in all honesty like a renewed extravagant lover. He can've accidentally entailed the last phrase with an 'I love you,' but his inborn pride stifles the onsent and he ends up yakking away in hesitation and getting it all riled up.
Rukawa scowls but makes a point of showing that all has been forgiven simply because he can't quite recall the majority of those hell times when Mitsui was harassing him. But still, something irritates him; 'Why didn't he (Mitsui) just needle up a single-line apology instead of squabbling like a moronic imp?' Rukawa thinks.
Mitsui smiles at this. He knows only too well that Rukawa is terribly allergic to scenes of sappy love plots like this one; he's always been the mighty scorcher of mushy tales and only hell knows how he dreads being a cast. This isn't going to be easy for Hisashi Mitsui. But who cares a dime? They're the newest couple in town and are therefore obligated to call for a celebration, right?
Mitsui immediately offers a night stroll along the town; nothing can be more satisfying than that for a just-pronounced couple like them. They begin to cover the silent sidewalks, keeping a minimum distance from each other. Mitsui longs to rest his arm on Rukawa's shoulders. Rukawa remains stiff as if mimicking a rolling boulder. But this turns out to be the luckiest day for Mitsui; he can rest assured now. Everything (or everyone for that matter) is efficiently caught in his net and this mere fact gives him a higher justification to all the more strike an I'm-too-sexy-for-this-love strut every accursed second. Now that's a pretty accurate definition of luck.
Late night comes. They settle themselves inside Kingsha Coffee shop near 6th avenue, inexplicably happily. Mitsui lights up a stick as both peg down the 4th table. Exactly on his third sip, he stops dead; behind the translucence of the thick smoke puttering out from his lips, some ten meters away from where he and Rukawa are, Akira Sendoh, Mitsui's sophomore lover, is carelessly flirting with someone else on the 7th table, their hands tangled in a loose lock. The Ryonan Ace's smile projects a heavenly innocence brandished with an all-the-time-in-the-world composure which almost sends the Shohoku senior in an instant tantrum. Mitsui's fingers sink deeper on his palm as his cigarette becomes reduced in pathetic ashes due to the scrubbing heat crawling out from his enraged lips. He can't eat it all up; 'So this is what I get after accomplishing the steepest feat of the millennium; catching your favorite boy in somebody else's arms. He thinks, not realizing that he's in the same degree of treachery with Sendoh. How can he do this to Mitsui? He clenches his teeth, hard enough to crack their ivory-surfaced material.
About this time, Sendoh has already caught his eyes. The sophomore smiles; obviously apoplectic from guilt and shock. Mitsui manages a snide smile in return, bitter however, and places an arm on Rukawa's shoulder. Sendoh freezes, understands the gesture, and lets go of his companion's hand. Mitsui's lips curl in a wider, more boat-like breadth. Sendoh's smile vanishes; his unknown lover turns to look where Sendoh's eyes are. Mitsui learns who it is.
It isn't Hiroaki Koshino; It's someone else dear to him.
TBC
