X Months & Counting, a prince of tennis fanfic

Title: X Months (and Counting)
Characters: Shishido Ryou
Pairings: AtoShishi hinted
Series: Prince of Tennis AU
Genre: Drama, Angst
Rating: T for language

WARNINGS: Slash fic.

Summary: When good things come to an end…

Notes: This ficlet was written with specific Shishido and Atobe muses in mind. Thank you & 3 to you-know-who-you-are! o(-)o

Lyrics are set off by , lyrics are from "The Lover After Me" by Savage Garden.

X Months (and Counting)

"Maybe you should have thought before you opened your big mouth!"

"I was fucking pissed, all right? Wouldn't you be, too?"

"I'd have a helluva lot more decency than what you showed me! And what the hell gives you the right to demand things like that from me anyway, ahn?"

"So just because things aren't official means I have no right to know if there's something else going on? It means I shouldn't care!"

"… That's not what I said."

"That's sure what you're implying!"

"Awww dammit!" Shishido sat up with a growl and threw his pillow across his room. He angrily scrubbed the back of his hand across his eyes and forehead as he took a deep breath and cursed roundly.

Fuck you, Atobe, fuck you!

In an impatient motion, he jerked off the covers and swung himself out of bed and headed to the shower. Once in the shower, he slumped against the tiles and allowed the hot spray of water to warm the chill in his sweat-dampened body and to wash away the remnants of last night's dreams.

He wrapped his arms around himself and tilted his head up to receive the spray of water. His tanned lean body shivered violently at the sudden temperature change, but he ignored the feeling just like he ignored the taste of salt in his mouth.

His eyes fluttered closed as he concentrated instead on sharp stinging sensation of the hot water on his face and as he lathered up his shoulder-length hair, he refused to believe that his dreams were caused by anything other than the combination of stress and his overactive imagination.

Here I go again I promised myself
I wouldn't think of you today

It had been months already, as it was. He was over it. He, Shishido Ryou, wasn't the sort to dwell on things – especially not emotional things like that. It had been fun while it had lasted and nothing more. That was what they had both wanted, right? No regrets from either of them, right?

It's been seven months and counting…

Yeah. Right.

Yet…

You've moved on but I still feel exactly the same…

He couldn't deny that there had to be some other more logical explanation to his behavior of late. Nightmares weren't his sort of thing, especially not psychological ones at that. Not to mention his extreme moodiness and penchant for lashing out at all the wrong people.

Okay, scratch that. Some of the people he had barked at had deserved it, but he distinctly recalled being more patient than that, even if people were being morons.

Then there was the bag of trash he kept 'forgetting' to throw out. He reasoned that the 'trash' in the bag wasn't really 'trash' per se and thus felt bad about throwing it out. He didn't like wasting things and surely he would find other uses for a second toothbrush, a half-used tube of herbal toothpaste, raw sugar, and some Darjeeling tea?

Fuck. Who was he kidding?

He winced as some shampoo got into his eye and his lips cracked into the ghost of a cynical smile when he recognized the scent of the shampoo.

Well, apparently he had found some use for the shampoo, at least.

But really.

He was over it.

Although his actions of the night before seemed to contradict this.

"Not my fault he suggested the fucking Catalyst," He gritted his teeth and rinsed out his eyes with an impatient growl.

His classmate, Takahashi, had suggested they go out for drinks after their last round of finals. Not one to turn down offers like that, he had readily agreed and they had met up in his classmate's apartment before heading out.

He and Takahashi had been classmates for a few terms now and every so often, he had caught his classmate looking at him when he presumably thought he wouldn't notice. Not that he minded the attention, though. Takahashi was a pretty nice guy and he was actually fucking hot to boot and smart as hell to go with it, so when he looked, he looked back and winked. No harm in a little flirting, right?

The casual flirting had eventually culminated in Takahashi asking him out for drinks the night before and him accepting the offer with a rakish grin. The attraction between them had been pretty evident at the moment and on impulse, they had decided to head over to Takahashi's before heading out to the bar.

It didn't take them long before they were holding hands and kissing each other once in the apartment and it didn't take much longer for them to have their hands all over one another. Takahashi had been an aggressive kisser, which had only fueled his own dominance, and before long, he had had his classmate pinned against the wall while he growled and licked a path from his collarbone to his ear as he was being growled back.

It would have been a great opportunity for what promised to be hot sex or a steamy make-out session at the very least, but…

That was when he had noticed the cologne.

Suddenly, he was seeing someone else other than Takahashi pinned against the wall and he had reeled at the connection his mind made.

Under the pretense of being a little faint from pulling too many all-nighters, he had excused himself for his freak-out moment and after a few minutes of making sure he was all right, they had headed out to the bars.

In no time, chatting with his classmate as they drove to the city took his mind off of the disturbing realization and before long, he was feeling like himself again and had all but forgotten the earlier events.

But then, Takahashi just had to choose the place he did and well…

It's just that everywhere I go
All the buildings know your name
Like photographs and memories of love…

Fuck if he could ever stand in the elevator of The Catalyst again and be totally cool about it.

The mirrors, the lights, the sounds, even the goddamned button that kept the doors closed.

He really had freaked out, then, and after mumbling some incoherent apology or another, he had exited the elevator in the lobby and had run out of the establishment faster than he had ever run before in all his life.

But he didn't stop there.

Steel and granite reminders
The city calls your name and I can't move on…

Once out the doors, he just kept running.

It was as if he had been trying to outrun a ghost with the speed he had going and he only stopped when his face felt completely numb and when he could no longer breathe or distinguish the source of the pain that was lodged in his chest.

There at a bus stop on some random street corner, he had collapsed onto the empty bench and had buried his face in his hands as whatever he had been running from had finally caught up with him.

Or maybe that was just because he had finally acknowledged the pain in his heart that he had refused to show even though it had been tearing him apart from the inside out.

Ever since you've been gone
The lights go out the same
The only difference is
You call another name
To your love, to your lover now
To your love, the lover after me…

No, as of last night at 10:23 at the fucking PM, he, Shishido Ryou, wasn't over it, and he had to acknowledge it.

After half an hour of bawling his eyes out and cursing and screaming at every last deity known to man with a certain someone's name injected between deities, he had chosen to walk home instead of taking a bus or catching a cab.

He had spent a long time walking and with every step he made, he thought long and hard about the last conversation he had had with Atobe Keigo.

As he rinsed out his hair, he recalled what he had thought about the night before.

Atobe was right; a casual relationship was what they had both wanted from the start, right? Not to mention, Atobe was always right even if he didn't know it at the time, though that wasn't something he would ever admit to.

And they had had a casual relationship. And admittedly, it had been the hottest thing he had ever known.

In fact, during the time he and Atobe had started seeing each other, he couldn't really recall a time where he had felt more… alive. Of course playing tennis and accomplishing goals he set for himself always made him feel alive, but being with Atobe made him feel alive in a… different sort of way.

It was that spark of intimate human-to-human interaction – the pounding of his heart, the electric tingles running up his spine, the almost palpable feeling of desire and passion – that made him feel truly alive.

This was another person who stirred these feelings within him and not just his own hormones. Even more importantly was the fact that he was pretty damn sure he made the other person feel the exact same way.

Am I all alone in the universe?
There's no love on these streets…

As different as they both were, it became more than evident in their relationship that they also both shared some very important qualities. As it was, the passion they had shared together had been mind blowing.

He had always suspected the other to be a rather passionate person and their time together not only confirmed his suspicions, but showed him a raw and wilder side of Atobe Keigo than he hadn't glimpsed before, but never quite seen. It was like gasoline on an already raging fire and this knowledge had brought out the untamed and untamed wild side in him and for once, he had felt… safe. Wanted. Welcomed. But maybe that was also because he had welcomed Atobe's wilder side with open arms, too.

So as casual as they had been, it had also been a very intimate thing that they had shared.

As their last conversation whispered through his head, he realized that Atobe had been right; they really had shared a lot more than they had thought they would. It had never been just a quick fuck between them and even though he and Atobe had never been in a relationship, it never once occurred to him to refer to Atobe as something so crude as a fuck buddy.

They just weren't like that.

And maybe that was the very thing that had ended up driving them apart.

They had gotten too close for comfort.

I have given mine away to a world
That didn't want it anyway…

Shishido smiled ruefully to himself as he lathered conditioner into his hair.

Atobe had said that they were getting too involved for their own good – involved to the point where they weren't even realizing how close they were getting.

"Are you ready for a commitment Ryou? Is that really what you want? You're always fighting for your independence…"

And yeah… he had always been adamant about keeping his independence, yet…

So this is my new freedom
It's funny - I don't remember being chained…

"Maybe I actually liked what we had together because I didn't feel that my claws were being clipped and that I was being collared, chained, and caged?" He muttered to himself and gave a sharp laugh.

Oh, this was rich.

Atobe was right about another thing, too; he really wasn't making any sense and he probably hadn't been making sense back then, either.

Nothing seems to make sense anymore
Without you I'm always twenty minutes late…

But…

Did stuff like that ever make complete sense? Was there a time where only emotions could explain anything reasonably?

Oh god, if only he could go back in time and make himself stay quiet for another few seconds longer then maybe – just maybe – Atobe would have listened to him and then they could have reasoned things over more.

But… that was just the point, wasn't it? His outburst had been a completely emotional response in answer to a completely emotional reaction he had experienced and that was exactly the sort of behavior that Atobe had been concerned about to begin with.

Not that knowing that did him any good, though. Emotions were emotions after all and he was only human. After Atobe had left, he had screamed himself hoarse and had broken a saucer or two in an attempt to wash some dishes. And that had been a totally emotional response, too.

Ohhhhh fuck it.

Ever since you've been gone
The lights go out the same
The only difference is
You call another name
To your love, to your lover now
To your love, the lover after me…

His shoulders shook as he tilted his head back to rinse his hair and he kept his eyes closed longer than he needed to as he stood under the shower.

No, he wasn't over this. If his current state said anything, he definitely wasn't over it.

Goddamn stupid emotions.

He had gotten more than he had bargained for in his relationship with Atobe and he had loved every fucking minute of it.

And now he was paying the price for it.

And time goes by so slowly
The nights are cold and lonely…

And dear gods, but it hurt like hell.

He missed the other man like he missed something that he hadn't known had been missing until it had been found… and then lost again.

The saying that 'people don't realize how much something means to them until they lose it' certainly applied to his current situation.

I shouldn't be holding on, but I'm still holding on to you…

"FUCK YOU, ATOBE! FUCK YOU!"

It wasn't until the water had been running cold for a good several minutes that Shishido stepped out of the shower.

Wrapped in a towel and rubbing his hair dry, he dug around in his pants pocket for his mobile phone to see what time it was. It was a weekend, so maybe he could give Takahashi a ring and apologize for last night and see if he'd like to hang out sometime in the future.

His mobile phone was flashing, which meant he had new voicemail. He flipped his phone open and skipped scrolling through his missed-call list and went straight to his voicemail.

The first message made him grin and he glanced at the time to see if he'd be on-time.

"Shishido-san, I know you've been busy with your final exams so I've been giving you some space. Now that your exams are done I was wondering if you'd like to have lunch then catch a game later this afternoon on campus. I'll be at our coffee shop until noon, okay? Hope to see you there!"

10:45 AM. Yeap. Plenty of time.

The second message he heard made his legs give out under him and he sat down on the bed with a thump.

"Ahh… Ry-Shishido… I apologize for disturbing you, but I just realized that I left a cream silk button down with French cuffs at your apartment a while back and I was wondering if…"

"No."

He cursed under his breath and snapped the mobile phone shut and tossed it on his bed. A cursory scan of his closet found the offending item tucked in the corner with his other formal wear. He yanked it off its hanger and balled it up and stomped off to the kitchen to stuff it into the trash bag sitting next to his trashcan all the while muttering to himself about taking the trash out after he dressed.

He returned to his room and dressed, pulling on a pair of worn jeans, a black T-shirt, and a navy blue hoodie before shoving his feet into a pair of tennis shoes. After slipping his keys and mobile phone into his pocket, he grabbed his tennis bag and left the apartment, slamming the door behind him and locking it.

It was his every intention to head over to the coffee shop to catch Choutarou for lunch and then head to the tennis courts with him for a nice and long and hopefully bone-meltingly exhausting game, but somehow…

That wasn't quite where he ended up going.

Here I go again, I promised myself
I wouldn't think of you today…

It was only when he realized that the door he stood in front of wasn't the door to the coffee shop – or any shop, really – that he realized where he was.

The sounds coming from within only verified it.

He really wasn't winning this battle, was he?

"… Oh god, this is pathetic."

But I'm standing at your doorway…

With a muffled scream of frustration, he sat down on the front step with a 'thump' and cradled his head in his hands. "And I didn't even bring the goddamned shirt!"

Calling out your name because I can't move on…

fine

Ever since you've been gone
The lights go out the same
The only difference is
You call another name
To your love, to your lover now
To your love, the lover after me