Hi you guys! I'm back. Oh yeah, USA lost in football in the WOrld Cup, raise hands those who were surprised...yeah, I thought so. Anyway, Brazil won their first match as expected, and Switzerland tied against France yesterday! It's not a bad result, but it would have been better if they had won, after all that would give them three points instead of two, giving them a share at the top of the position in Group G, who is currently being led by South Korea. They won their first match against Togo 2 goals to 1. Switzerland's next match is against Togo, on Monday afternoon. I do hope they win.

neko11lover: Good luck with school! I hope it's going fine. I took geometry in my third year in high school, and it's really not that bad. All postulates and theorems, like vertical angles are congruent and stuff. Calculus, now that was created by a sadistic evil man bent on world destruction through melting the brains of the youth. Trust me on that one.

Hala: You reviewed again! YAY! Technically, they're not broken up, Sendoh just knows they'll break up. Anyway, just go and read.

jenjen: Hello! Are you new? Here's the new update!

jhydl: I hope I didn't take long to update in your opinion. Kaede'll be...Kaede, that's all I can say, wink wink!

Here's the next chapter!

You Mean, Rukawa has a best friend?

Chapter Fifteen

Shoot.

Whoosh.

Score.

Shoot.

Whoosh.

Score.

This was how easy life should be. Just throw a damn basketball and watch it go through the damn basket and make two damn points.

But nooo, he had to mess things up by fighting with his friend and losing her to a stupid smiling doahou in the course of a few days.

It amazed him that he was still able to make shots while his brain was racking up a course of action. Normally, he wouldn't think of anything when he was playing basketball. He had always believed that the best way to play basketball was when your mind was completely devoid of thought, with only the basket and the ball pictured clearly in his mind. Kira called it his 'philosophy'.

Upon the thought of Kira, the basketball slipped from his hand and hit the rim of the basketball. He cursed out loud, no one can hear him anyway, and truth be told, he didn't really care. He grabbed the ball and looked at it, thinking forthe first timein his life, if it was all really worth it.

"You thought about her, didn't you?"

Rukawa wheeled sharply around, a ready glare planted in his face.

Standing by the doorway was Sendoh Akira, not in his basketball uniform, but in simple casual clothes, sans the smile in his face, which Rukawa found a little unnerving. Sendoh always had a smile on his face.

He didn't look very angry either, none of the features in his face betrayed the fact that he was getting a more and more pissed off by the second. Rukawa's face however, consisted of nothing but his mounting dislike for his rival, and he would wanted nothing more than to shove the basketball he was holding down his rival's throat.

At first, Rukawa thought that Sendoh looked a little apprehensive of going any more close to him. Maybe he glanced at the ball and saw that Rukawa's nails were now boring into the ball. But there was the determination in his face that Rukawa only saw during their games. Rukawa fought the almost overwhelming urge to rush up and punch him.

Sendoh seemed to know what he was thinking.

"If you punch me, Kira would only get more mad at you." He said quietly.

"Hn." Said Rukawa, before turning away from him. He knew that, and he didn't need Sendoh Akira to tell him that. Maybe if he just ignored him he would go away. What the hell was he doing here anyway? He has no business here. He ordered him mentally, but staring at the basket, to go away and leave him alone.

Sendoh, however, was having none of that, and turned him around so forcefully that Rukawa let go of the ball he was holding. It rolled in the nearby benches, where, Rukawa thought with a pang, Kira would be sitting if they were getting along.

Then he thought he wouldn't have let go of the ball if he wasn't fighting with Kira and Sendoh in the first play.

"Don't act like you don't care," said Sendoh menacingly.

"I never said I didn't care," snapped Rukawa, "you're just implying that."

Sendoh looked like he wanted to punch him. Rukawa almost wished that he would. He knew he needed to have some sense knocked into him, and if Sendoh punching him was the way to do it, then he would gladly take the full blow.

Sendoh had let him go and backed a couple of feet away. "Do you know how stupid you are right now?"

Yes, he thought, but what came out was -

"Hn."

All of a sudden, Sendoh gave him a sharp blow to the head. Rukawa, who didn't expect that at all, stepped sideways and then glared at him, clutching his temple. He, Sendoh, was looking more angry that he had ever seen him. His face looked like it didn't know how to smile at all, and his hand was still balled into a fist.

Rukawa however, could not find the strength to fight back. He felt like he deserved that punch.

"Now do you know?"

Yes.

But he didn't answer.

Sendoh had opened his fist, and fetched the ball. Rukawa wondered what he was going to do with it. He can't possibly thinking of playing one on one right now, and truth be told, he really wasn't in the mood for it. He walked back to where he was standing a minute ago, and presented the basketball to him.

Rukawa looked down at the ball in Sendoh's outstretched hand and then back up to his rival. "What?"

Sendoh glared at him. "Is this really all you'll ever care about?" he asked.

Silence.

Rukawa looked down at the ball again, and then back at Kira, and then back to the ball. He was almost on the verge of grabbing the ball, turning his back to him and continue practicing shooting, but the question shook him. It didn't show in his face, but he knew that Sendoh knew that the sentence would reverberate in the inner recesses of Rukawa's mind, and hopefully, his heart.

Sendoh really just had no idea how deep the sentence went into him.

They stood glaring at each other for a good two minutes before Sendoh let the ball drop back into the ground, bouncing away from the both of them. He didn't want to punch Rukawa, but the fact remained that the boy needed some sense knocked into him, and his anger towards his rival's cold, unflinching exterior was reaching the overflowing level.

But he knew, he knew when Rukawa didn't take the ball from his, that there was more to him that what he's showing. He hoped that his question shook him out of his stupor, and – though he couldn't see it in his face – hopefully, Rukawa might actually start doing something about it.

Rukawa didn't retrieve the ball when it fell for the second time. Sendoh's question was still ringing in his ear.

Is this really all you'll ever care about?

"No," he heard himself say.

"No?"

"No," he repeated, not focusing on Sendoh's face or anything else that's in front of him. "I care about Kira."

"You told me you love her."

"Because I do love her."

"And you mean that?"

At this, Rukawa's focus came back and he glared savagely at Sendoh. "Of course I mean it, doahou." He muttered. "I love my best friend." He had expected that the sentence would come out oddly from his mouth, but he found that it was the easiest sentence he had utteredandit was probably the most honest thing that he has said to himself in the past few weeks.

Sendoh didn't answer him.

"But she wants you," Rukawa's eyes were unfocused again, determined not to show any emotion in his voice, "she w-wants you, not me." His voice shook a little as he said it, betraying his unfocused eyes. "And I want her to be happy, and if that means that I have to put up with you for the rest of my life then fine."

Rukawa felt that this conversation was for someone who was much older than the two of them, but here they were, speaking in the way they were speaking. It was unnerving him, and he felt like he couldn't be prepared any less.

This thought however didn't register in his face. His arms were now crossed in front of him and he turned away, determined not to look at Sendoh. He didn't want nor need Sendoh to gloat in his face that he has lost.

However, Sendoh was chuckling.

Rukawa slowly turned his head to face him. "And what," he asked through gritted teeth, "the hell is so damn funny?"

"You."

"Me." He said coolly.

Sendoh then stopped chuckling, and suddenly he was all serious again. It was as if he never chuckled at all. "Do you honestly think that Kira's happy?"

Rukawa just stared.

"She misses you," he stated, "a lot."

The words echoed in his brain. Basketball suddenly became second priority.

"She's all depressed."

"De-depressed?"

Sendoh nodded. "She doesn't want to go out, all her smiles are fake, she's like a shell of her former self." He looked extremely grave. "She misses you terribly, Rukawa."

Rukawa didn't want to believe it.

"Believe it." Sendoh seem to have a knack of reading minds. "Don't tell me you don't miss her."

Rukawa thought that Sendoh could not have asked a stupider question. "I miss her," he mumbled, and added, "more than you'll ever know."

Sendoh smiled. "Good."

Rukawa then looked up at his senior. "But she has you," he said, trying to make sense of everything and hoping that Sendoh wasn't lying, "you're what she wanted all this time, and now she's not happy?" His face suddenly turned from confused to menacing. "What the hell did you do?"

Sendoh backed a step, hands in front of him. "I didn't do anything," he exclaimed, "this is really all your fault."

"Nani?" he snapped.

"Well," Sendoh said thoughtfully, "if you didn't snap at her last Saturday, you're probably getting along right now."

Rukawa knew he was right. He had already accepted that this was all his fault. He shouldn't have blown up like that. He had only accepted the fact that he was jealous when Kira had walked out of his gardens and back into her house.

"You're letting your pride get in the way," said Sendoh suddenly.

Rukawa looked at him.

"Your pride," he said, pointing at his heart, though Rukawa couldn't think that his pride might be possibly in there, "it's getting in the way. I suggest that you put it away and go to her and say, 'I'm sorry, I love you'".

Rukawa can't imagine anything harder. He looked at Sendoh like he had just grown six extra heads.

"It'll work things out on its own," he added, "but that would take forever. So you need to get a move on."

Now Rukawa thought he grew 8 more heads.

"Tell you what," he said, smiling now, "I'll even break up with her right now."

He was already making a move to leave when Rukawa grabbed his arm and pulled him back. "You're going to what?"

"Break up with her." said Sendoh, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"And why the hell are you going to do that!" He didn't need another reason for Kira to be sad!

"Leaves you free," he said simply.

If looks could kill, Sendoh would have died, embalmed, placed in a nice, respectable coffin and buried a good six feet underground right now.

"Rukawa, relax," said Sendoh, claiming back his arm, "I'm not going to hurt her, I promise."

"You better not." He threatened.

"I know, Rukawa," said Sendoh, walking away, "I know."