note: there are references to the events in chapter 2

It was finally Saturday! Momo woke up extra early and hopped on his bike to one of its many familiar stops.

"Echizen! Get up!"

A sleepy kid opened the door, looked at Momo for a brief moment, and shut the door back on his face.

"Oy! Echizen! Is that any way to treat a Senpai!" He pounded on the door some more. "Don't you remember that we have a doubles match today!"

Echizen reluctantly reopened the door. "Oh yeah!" He hurried to grab his stuff.

Geeze, thought Momo, This kid…

Ryoma hopped on the back of Momo's bike despite his dad yelling, "Don't do that with other boys!" out the window.

"I wonder who Jirou's partner will be?" Inquired Momo on the way there.

"I dunno. He didn't mention it at work."

They had decided to meet halfway between Seigaku and Hyotei, which was actually St. Rudolph's territory, but he doubted there would be any problems. He pulled into the park and saw Jirou and his doubles partner.

"Kikumaru-senpai! What are you doing here!"

"Hey, hey now! That's no way to treat my doubles partner! You never said my partner had to be from Hyotei." Jirou came in defense.

Eiji, however seemed to be bothered by something. Strange, thought Momo, Kikumaru-senpai has been acting weird the last couple days. Kikumaru was at the bursting point. He couldn't keep inside what he'd overheard at the pet store anymore. He looked at Jirou, then pointed at Echizen.

"Chibi! You are too young for that sort of thing!"

Ryoma gaped. Jirou gaped. Momo gaped.

"Um, what sort of thing, Kikumaru-senpai?"

"Don't think I don't know your secret, chibi!"

"Echizen! You have a secret!" Momo wondered why he hadn't been told.

"I have a secret?" Echizen wondered what his own secret was.

"Spill it, Echizen-kun." Jirou was ready to hear what this was all about.

"That's right! You shouldn't be keeping secrets either!" Eiji accused Jirou.

"Me! What did I do! Why am I involved?"

Eiji was so frustrated that no one was fessing up. He had heard it clear as day with his own two ears hadn't he! Finally, he just screamed, "Echizen! You shouldn't do that with other boys!"

Echizen gaped, and stuttered, "Well, we've ridden a bike together since Junior high… I never saw it as a big deal."

"You were using a bike!"

Echizen looked at Momo, who looked at Jirou. None of them were coming up with anything.

Atobe and Mizuki were surprised that the first thing they saw when they came into the park was Kikumaru Eiji from Seigaku High running the other way, having some sort of fit. First of all, what was he doing here, and second of all, what was he so disturbed about!

"Oy! Kikumaru-kun! Over here!"

Eiji, who seemed to be in some sort of a panic, came over to them and fumed, something incoherent about 'chibi'.

Seeing the owner of the pet shop, he imparted, "You have no idea what I saw in your store a couple nights ago!"

Mizuki stared at him weirdly and said, "What did you see?"

Eiji lowered his voice to a whisper and said, "A pile… of clothes. Can you tell me why there was a pile of clothes on the floor?"

"Umm…" Thought Mizuki, "Its not uncommon to leave work aprons on the floor if they're dirty."

"Nope, that's not it. I heard everything that happened... well… I didn't want them to find me… so I ran away."

Atobe looked at Mizuki, "Umm… what?"

Mikuzi shook his head and said, "If he's trying to imply something went on in the back room with the employees… he's wrong. We haven't had that problem since we fired Sengoku. Besides, the only female employee in our company is our regional manager, and she's… 46 years old. A customer would have to be involved. We can keep track of all the people who have entered the store by surviellance."

Mizuki smiled. "So you wanna check the tapes? Its like detective work." I think I'm already drawing a conclusion, too… he thought.

Atobe laughed and said it would be fun to watch Kikumaru-san flip out on video. Maybe they could send it to Japan's Funniest Home Videos and win thousands?

For the time being, Atobe and Mizuki went over to the courts to see if any tennis matches were going on.

The three high school students stood on the tennis courts bummed out, and completely stumped as to what was wrong with Eiji. As they just stood, not knowing whether to pack up and go home, or call someone else to fill in, Jirou suddenly gulped. He tapped Echizen hard on the shoulder and whispered, "Hey! I don't think Atobe has a cat after all!"

Holy crap! Thought Jirou as he watched Mizuki and Atobe approach together, we were right! They're together after all!

While Momo stood blissfully unaware, Jirou and Ryoma just let their mouths hang open in shock.

Mizuki was in no mood to deal with work on a Saturday. He looked at Jirou and Echizen and said, "So, I leave you guys in charge of the store for a night and you guys work naked!"

"What the heck! When were we naked!"

"Hmm… according to Kikumaru, all your clothes were on the floor. They couldn't very well have been on your body if they were on the floor."

"We weren't naked!"

"Umm, I really hope you're right, cause I'm the one who has to check the surveillance tapes!"

"Check them then! We only did our job! Besides," Jirou pointed at Mizuki, "Atleast I don't call my boyfriend while I'm on the clock!"

"What!"

"We saw the caller ID! Now we know your excuse was fake!"

"Baka, I don't have a boyfriend. I'm straight. Besides, I take personal calls on my cell phone." Mizuki wondered where the heck they came up with this stuff sometimes.

"Oh yeah? Well we found out anyways." stated Echizen.

"I don't understand." Mizuki put his hand on his head, "Just who exactly do you think I'm dating!"

Confused, Jirou and Echizen looked in Atobe's direction and nodded.

"What!" Shouted Mizuki, "Where the heck did you get that idea!"

"Whoa!" Interjected Momo, "You guys are all dating!"

"NO! We're not!" Shouted the other four.

"Umm, let's see," Pondered Jirou, "Where did we get that idea, Echizen? I know the first thing is that you left somewhere in a hurry, so we tried to figure out where you went. We checked the caller ID, and found Atobe's number."

"What kind of proof is that! Just because I was at his house doesn't mean…"

"So you were at his house! Echizen, we were right!"

Mizuki blushed. Then Atobe decided to come to his rescue… sort of. Atobe wrapped his arms around Mizuki as a joke and said, "So what if I swing that way? What are you gonna say about it? You two naked lovebirds are the same way…"

Mizuki's thought he would pass out. Atobe continued to hold him and smile. Jirou and Ryoma didn't know what else to do other than insistently deny the naked lovebird factor.

Momo, shocked beyond all reason, blurted, "Mizuki-san! You're uke!"

"Nooo!" shouted Mizuki, "Nothing actually happened!"

Reluctantly, Atobe let go, and said, "Yeah, he's right. Nothing actually did happen. I just wanted to see what you guys would do."

"Atobe, what the heck were you thinking!" Mizuki demanded.

Atobe shrugged. "Did you see the look on their faces? They were about ready to jump into each others arms, like they probably do anyways."

Jirou and Ryoma blushed and said, "That's not true!"

"Hey, Echizen! That's the first time I've ever seen you blush!" Momo mused. He was the manliest one here, he decided, and that made him smile.

Echizen looked straight at Mizuki and challenged him, "Let's go watch those surveillance tapes. You'll see I'm right."