Title: Tennis Lessons (Theme: Wednesday/Park)
Author: Rissa
Pairing: TutixNagayan
Genre/Warning: General/Romance, mild shonen-ai
Disclaimer: I do not know any of the people in this story, and all events depicted are entirely fictional. Prince of Tennis is owned by Konomi. TeniMyu is a production of TK WORKS/Shueisha Publishing Co., Ltd.

A/N: A challenge issued by a friend of mine that went from being a 45min drabble to a 6 hour monster. The story is unbeta'd, and takes place during rehearsals for the first musical, second showing.

"We need to work on your forehand," is what Tsuchiya had said two days before, right before grinning and giving Nagayama the day, time, and location of where to meet him for tennis lessons.

It was a Wednesday afternoon, late summer with a touch of humidity in the air, nothing that Nagayama had never been exposed to in greater quantities before. Tsuchiya had chosen an out-of-the-way park that even Nagayama never knew existed in this part of the city, comfortably tucked away behind several apartment buildings and hidden by a shady grove of trees that lined a twisting path of colorful gravel leading deep into the heart of the park. Boxed hedges were tucked between the trunks, and rows of late blooming pale flowers looking slightly withered under the heat of summer hummed with the sound of buzzing bees meandering from bud to bud in search of food. The air smelled clean and earthy, a welcome difference from the bitter scent of the concrete and city Nagayama had left behind, and he found himself walking a little slower through the park to take in the unexpected pleasure of the scenery, regardless that he was already late for their appointment by five minutes.

Nagayama had not played any type of real tennis outside of junior high school PE classes, and those were hazy memories of idly swinging a racquet by his finger while talking to friends and watching the girls' PE class through the chain link fence. He couldn't recall ever having hit a ball across the net, though he did remember a few instances where he and other boys used their racquets to aim yellow balls at unsuspecting underclassmen when they were bored. Those memories amounted to the grand total of his experience with playing tennis, which made it especially ironic that he was now part of a musical based entirely around tennis. He supposed maybe he did look a bit stupid with a racquet in hand not even being held the right way, though it seemed the only person to have noticed so far was Tsuchiya. Nagayama would never admit to being bothered by his lack of experience, though secretly he was grateful for the offer of assistance when he hadn't yet mustered up the courage to even ask for help in the first place.

After several minutes of purposely getting lost amidst the trees and summer kissed grass, Nagayama found the tennis court Tsuchiya had specified near the back of the park, the green rectangle situated between a bright blue and red jungle gym and a small handball court. Nagayama could hear the rhythmic sound of a ball being hit the closer he approached, a sound he would know anywhere at this point thanks to countless rehearsals, and it was with a start of surprise that he recognized the lone figure standing in the center of the handball court, back twisting beneath a solid white shirt as the ball was sent over and over to the same area on the high wall.

Even with having spent the last month together every other day of the week at rehearsals, Nagayama had never seen Tsuchiya not wearing a pair of pants and at least two shirts as part of his daily ensemble. Gray shorts were definitely something he had not pictured Tsuchiya owning, let alone wearing voluntarily, and coupled with the white polo shirt it was amazing that he'd been able to recognize him at all from a distance. He realized with a smile that the hair had given Tsuchiya away in the end, dark and finger combed into a ruffled mess of spikes and strands going every which way, as much of a trademark of the other man as his boisterous laugh that could turn heads from all the way across an auditorium.

Nagayama came to a stop at the edge of the court behind Tsuchiya, taking a moment to watch the other man play his solitary game of tennis against the stained wall. Nagayama had never seen Tsuchiya like this before, so intently focused upon one thing with an almost alarming measure of concentration, his legs jumping and moving without conscious thought upon their destination, only springing to move his body to catch the ball in time with his racquet. He seemed to almost fly across the small space, the balls of his sneakered feet touching the ground for a second before pushing off again; long muscled legs bunching and releasing with a fluidity that was almost beautiful to watch. Nagayama knew Tsuchiya was strong in his own way, he'd seen the man dance nearly nonstop for hours and never once come close to being out of breath, and it had made him envious and feel in awe of Tsuchiya all at once. In the past he'd caught glimpses of the dancer stretching out on his own, limbs impossibly twisted and revealing their amazing flexibility, a much higher level than he knew his own karate trained body could ever achieve. Watching Tsuchiya play tennis was almost like a dance in itself, and Nagayama found himself held in silent fascination by the performance, unwilling to interrupt someone who, he understood now, was truly in sync with his game.

As it was, Tsuchiya slowly winded down and came to a stop on his own a few minutes later, giving the ball one last smash against the wall before bouncing it off his racquet and catching it in his free hand. If there was one thing Nagayama had learned during the short amount of time spent around Tsuchiya, it was never to form any expectations about the other man, because quite often he blew them out of the water and delivered something much more entertaining. Perhaps sensing (like some actors were able to do) that he now had an audience, Tsuchiya let out a loud, exaggerated groan as he turned around, pin wheeling his arms to loosen the muscles. When he spotted Nagayama, he grinned and tossed the green ball in his direction, which Nagayama only managed to catch and prevent from hitting his face out of pure reflex.

"You're late. Get lost on the way here?"

"I was enjoying the scenery," Nagayama answered honestly, then felt his face warm as Tsuchiya's grin widened, one eyebrow raised in amusement.

"Oh ho, like what you saw?" Tsuchiya half turned and shook his backside in Nagayama's direction, his hips gyrating loosely in a way that no normal man could ever hope to achieve.

"You know I didn't mean that," Nagayama protested, knowing his face was probably pink and on the verge of turning red. He looked away and crossed his arms, refusing to look Tsuchiya in the eye until he stopped his silly dance.

Tsuchiya ended his hip swinging and laughed loudly, the sound rich and deep with mirth. "Well then what did you mean?"

"Nothing. Just the park… it's nice," Nagayama muttered, wondering why he felt like he was praising Tsuchiya by admitting that he liked the place he'd chosen.

"Yeah. That's why I like to come here, it's really secluded and quiet. Not a lot of people seem to know about it I guess. At least whenever I come the courts are always empty."

Nagayama looked back at Tsuchiya, and caught the man smiling with a soft look on his face, as if he too felt awkward with that private admission. It made Nagayama feel a lot better, so he smiled back and held up the ball he'd caught earlier. "So are we going to play?"

"Play?" Tsuchiya suddenly laughed again. "Have you ever hit a tennis ball before?"

"I… well not really, no. It can't be that hard."

"Oh my poor little inexperienced student, whatever shall I do with you?" Tsuchiya sighed, tugging on the sweat soaked collar of his shirt as he started walking off the court. "If we play right now you won't be able to hit a single shot back to me, trust me. For now we're just going to use the handball court and practice hitting the balls. And since you've seen how it's done, it's your turn to give it a try." Tsuchiya waved toward the empty space he'd left in front of the wall as he set his racquet down on the grass and picked up the bottle next to his bag to take a long drink.

Nagayama looked down at the fuzzy ball in his hand and dropped it to let it bounce across the ground a few times. It was smaller than a baseball, which happened to be a sport he enjoyed playing in his youth, and a tennis racquet was definitely bigger than a baseball bat, so perhaps this wasn't going to be as difficult as Tsuchiya was making it out to be. He caught the ball and tucked it in his pocket before unzipping the bag he'd brought with him, withdrawing the dark red racquet he'd purchased just the week before. The coincidence of him buying the racquet and receiving Tsuchiya's offer was not lost on him, and Nagayama suspected a little brown haired bird might have spilled information about his insecurities over believably playing tennis on stage to at least one of their coworkers.

But there was no use brooding on it now, so Nagayama put on a happy face and walked bravely to the center of the handball court, racquet in his right hand as drew the ball out of his pocket to clutch it in his left. "I'm starting," he announced, then felt a little silly for saying so.

"Okay," Tsuchiya answered from behind him, now standing just inside the edge of the court and out of range of being hit by any wayward arms. He was probably perfectly justified in keeping a distance, Nagayama thought ruefully as he let the ball go.

He swung hard and felt only air pass through his racquet, then heard the sound of the ball gently tapping across the hard ground.

"It's a good idea to keep an eye on the ball," Tsuchiya supplied helpfully, though there was the sound of a smile shining brightly through the words.

Nagayama bent over to pick up the ball and repositioned himself for another swing, lips pursing slightly in concentration. "Right, eye on the ball."

This time he watched the ball fall from his fingers as he swung the racquet back, and managed to catch it on the edge of the strings, which sent the ball careening in a crazy diagonal to the opposite corner of the court.

"Ah I did it!" Nagayama exclaimed, then blinked in confusion as he watched the bouncing ball ricochet off the corner wall and leave the court a good ten paces away from where he stood.

Tsuchiya was already jogging over to where the ball had landed, and he scooped it up while it was still bouncing before walking back to where Nagayama stood. "Don't mind," he said, smiling and tucking the ball into one of his wide short pockets.

"Uh, I need my ball back."

Tsuchiya shook his head. "It won't do any good since you're holding the racquet all wrong. You need to work on that before you try hitting any more balls, or they're all going to go way out, just like that other one did. Here let me see that," he said, holding out his hand for the racquet.

Nagayama handed it over and watched as Tsuchiya firmly placed the black grip in the palm of his hand, long fingers curling around the handle. He held it so the flat head of the racquet was perpendicular to the ground, and slowly swung the racquet out and away from him a few times to show the motion.

"See? You want the ball to land in the center of the racquet. You hold it so that it swings parallel to the ground. That keeps it from hitting the ball wrong and having it bounce in the wrong direction, like what happened before. You have to pretend that it's part of your arm and you're just swinging that, with your whole body, not just your arm or your shoulders. Here you try."

Tsuchiya handed back the racquet. Nagayama adjusted his grip as per Tsuchiya's instructions and swung it once, looking over at the other man for approval. "How's that?"

"No no, your legs are too close together." Tsuchiya came closer and prodded Nagayama's feet further apart with the tip of his right sneaker until he was satisfied with their distance, then stepped back to let him try again.

Nagayama swung his racquet, but before he was halfway through the motion Tsuchiya was shaking his head again, his eyes darkening into that look of intense focus and concentration that he had seen before. "You're too stiff, swing with your whole body. Here like this."

Tsuchiya's moved behind Nagayama and placed both hands on the shorter man's shoulders. Nagayama's stomach did a strange half flip as the dancer's fingers dug into the shirt fabric over his skin, and he could feel the heat of contact between their bodies from standing in the sun for so long. Tsuchiya's grip was firm as he slowly guided Nagayama's shoulders to move, showing him how to rotate his upper body to match the motions he needed to make with his racquet.

"It's like this," Tsuchiya said, the close proximity of his voice lifting the hairs on Nagayama's neck.

Nagayama allowed himself to be slowly guided through a few swings of his racquet, all the while wondering why his heart rate had sped up when he hadn't even started running around yet. He tried to pay attention to what he was being shown, but it was hard to completely relax when having Tsuchiya so near was making him uncomfortable. He didn't know why this was happening now, and was feeling annoyed that he wasn't paying as close attention to what Tsuchiya was trying to teach him as he should have been.

Behind him, Tsuchiya sighed noisily. "Man, you're so stiff!" he exclaimed, suddenly digging the tips of his fingers into Nagayama's shoulders and making him yelp in surprise.

"What are you doing? That hurt!"

"No kidding, you've got knots all over the place here. What do you do, sleep on a rock?" Tsuchiya's hands began a deep exploration of the muscles along Nagayama's shoulders and upper back before he could answer, fingers scraping and digging purposefully to loosen the mass of bunched and stiff muscles. Nagayama winced each time his strong fingers found a particularly painful spot, and he had to fight back the urge to kick out behind him and injure one of Tsuchiya's knees for the pain he was inflicting.

Instead Nagayama held still and bit his bottom lip, which kept him from protesting aloud about the undue torture, and he hoped that with all the abuse his back was taking this was going to lead up to some really amazing end result. As Tsuchiya's fingers pressed, dug, and rubbed circles across his shoulders and down the back of his neck, Nagayama began to finally notice the difference the massage was making, as though tension he hadn't even realized was there was being sloughed off and slowly peeled away. He found himself concentrating on the motion of Tsuchiya's hands and fingers, feeling how they tested and pressed around a new area before going to work on another knot with an intense form of patience and tenacity, working and massaging until every last trace of the bunched muscle was gone before moving on. Nagayama felt his eyes blinking half shut as the pleasure generated by his loosening muscles began to register, his arms slowly growing heavy and his shoulders sagging under the pressure of Tsuchiya's hands. The pain from his initial ministrations had fully receded by this point; the feeling now replaced by warm tingles that shot down Nagayama's back and went all the way to his toes with every sensitive place Tsuchiya's fingers found against his upper back.

Nagayama heard himself let out a soft moan after a few minutes of standing in silence, not realizing the massage had lasted quite so long, and it was Tsuchiya's soft chuckle near his ear that jerked him out of the pleasurable daze he'd fallen into. His face already turning pink in embarrassment, Nagayama started to pull away, but felt Tsuchiya's hands fall from his back first and give him a friendly pat on the shoulder.

"Sorry, I guess I got a little carried away there, but wow you were really stiff. Feels like I almost wore my fingers to the bone." Tsuchiya laughed, moving around Nagayama so he was standing beside him again. "How's it feel? Better? I didn't hurt you did I?"

Nagayama shook his head, grateful that his blush had receded with Tsuchiya's joking laughter. He shrugged his shoulders and rolled them around, and smiled at how surprisingly easy it was now. "Nope, doesn't hurt at all. Totally fine. Did you take lessons for that or something?"

Tsuchiya shrugged. "I guess I just knew a lot of people with sore muscles over the years. You start to learn how to do it right without hurting them."

Nagayama watched Tsuchiya's eyes turn dark and serious for a moment, lost in whatever memories he'd conjured up, and it made him suddenly wonder what sort of secrets hid behind the smiles that Tsuchiya was always showing everyone. Nagayama didn't like seeing such a brooding face on the normally smiling man, so he cleared his throat and gave his racquet a playful twirl around his fingers. "So do I get my ball back now?"

Tsuchiya's eyes cleared and he smiled. "Let me see if you can swing it the right way now, then we'll hit some balls."

Nagayama fixed his grip on the black handle and lifted his racquet to perform a few swings, remembering to turn his whole body like Tsuchiya had showed him. It was much easier this time to let his whole body become involved with the motion, and after a few strokes Nagayama found himself becoming lost in the gentle rhythm, for the first time truly enjoying the feeling of swinging a racquet.

"Looks like you've got it down," Tsuchiya praised, meeting Nagayama's pleased expression with a happy smile that sent another small flutter through his stomach.

Tsuchiya stepped closer and closed his hand over Nagayama's wrist before the shorter man could think to pull away and prevent the contact. Nagayama felt his face warming again as Tsuchiya guided his hand over the handle and fixed the position of his fingers so that they fit easier across the dips and grooves created by the grip tape. "You should hold it like this," Tsuchiya explained, head bent over his task. "That way you won't get blisters, and the grip will last longer too."

Nagayama nodded mutely, not sure if he could trust his voice at the moment, and withdrew his hand the moment Tsuchiya's fingers slid off his wrist. He went through a few more practice swings, with Tsuchiya nodded and giving small bits of advice here and there, but eventually he seemed to be satisfied with what he saw and walked back to his bag to get his own racquet and a few more balls. This time Tsuchiya gently lobbed a ball against the back wall of the court and let Nagayama move to catch it with his racquet and hit it back. Nagayama didn't manage to hit a single one directly back to Tsuchiya for the first half hour, but over time he began to land the ball in the center of the racquet more times than not, and eventually a few started to return to Tsuchiya within enough range for him to only run slightly and catch up with them.

They continued to practice in this manner for another two hours, time that to Nagayama seemed to fly by without him even noticing how late the afternoon had gotten, or that they only had about two hours of sunlight left in the day. He was sweating and slightly out of breath from running around so much on the small court, but he felt great and happy that he'd managed to accomplish so much in so little amount of time. Tsuchiya had been a surprisingly patient teacher, and had made Nagayama laugh every time he sent the ball on an extremely crazy path, or managed to hit it over the concrete wall entirely. Tsuchiya never seemed to mind running around and catching all of the balls, and had even lightly teased Nagayama toward the end that he wasn't giving him enough of a challenge when he'd started hitting the balls exactly where he'd intended them to go. Overall it had been a lot of fun, and Nagayama was feeling high on the sense of accomplishment and the joy of having such good company during the whole experience.

Tsuchiya was packing up his bag with the balls and his tennis racquet, and even though Nagayama was sure both of them were looking to take showers as soon as possible, he realized he wanted an excuse for this day to not end so quickly.

"I could really go for a drink right now, you wanna come get something?" Nagayama suggested casually while zipping up his racquet.

"Sure," Tsuchiya replied, swinging his bag over his shoulder. "Got any place in mind?"

Nagayama smiled, hoping he didn't look as thrilled as he felt. "Oh I know a few good coffee places with some cold drinks. There's one nearby here we can stop at."

"Sounds good, lead the way!" Tsuchiya grinned and held out his arm for Nagayama to walk ahead of.

They were on the gravel path and almost out of the park when Nagayama finally worked up the courage to say the rest of what was on his mind. "You know, after we get drinks and stuff, we could go out later. Like karaoke or something. Or see if Kime is doing anything, I'm sure he'd like to come hang out. Want to?"

Nagayama turned to look at Tsuchiya, and felt something inside of him do a little jump of happiness at the sight of the smile that was on the other man's face. Tsuchiya saw Nagayama watching him and ran his free hand through the back of his hair, ruffling up the spiky mess even further, and was still smiling as he nodded. "Sure, I wasn't doing anything tonight, and it sounds like fun. Want to see if anyone else is free?"

Nagayama bit his lower lip, giving his head a brief shake. "It's fine if it's just us…"

Tsuchiya's expression turned soft, almost thoughtful, and he gave Nagayama a smile that somehow seemed more genuine and true than any of the other one's he'd seen in the past. It made Nagayama's cheeks feel warm again, but he was unable to resist smiling back slightly, a little confused by the look, but mostly happy to have seen it.

"Sure, just us is fine. We can always hang out with the other guys later, right?" Tsuchiya lifted his free hand and placed it on Nagayama's shoulder, giving it a short, friendly squeeze that not surprisingly ended up pulling a fresh memory of those same skillful hands massaging his back to the forefront of his thoughts. Nagayama sagged a little under the touch, and felt Tsuchiya's fingers slide across his shoulder to where his neck met the back of his t-shirt, a mere breath away from touching his bare skin, and it sent an unwanted shiver down his spine.

Tsuchiya suddenly laughed and pulled his hand away, pointing down the path to where two small boys were crouching with toy guns in their hands, leaves and vines wrapped around their child-sized military issue hard hats, and faces done up in full blown camouflage war paint. Nagayama laughed too, their voices mixing together in surprising harmony, and felt himself smiling wide as they stepped out of the park and emerged into the city beyond, knowing that he'd managed to bring a little bit of the park and earth back with him.

A/N 2: Tsuchiya is written as 土屋 - Earth House