A/N: I was going to update this around Thursday, but I finished it today (1742 words!). That's a good thing though, right?
Non-fic note: I drew some Silver Pair fanart, if anyone wants to look at it. The links to my drawings can be found on my profile page. Oh, and Thursday will be the three-month anniversary of my surgery (Yay!). My hair's finally grown back enough that I'm comfortable with it, though it looks oddly like Fuji Yuuta's. Hmm... Maybe I should do a bit of cosplay...
Shattered Reality
Chapter Thirteen
by Wolfram003
Kikumaru Eiji yawned loudly, tears forming at the corners of his azure eyes. The nine Seigaku regulars—Taka-san's father had allowed him to come after Akutsu (Eiji had been quite surprised at Taka-san's relationship with the frightening boy) had gone home, grumping about the noise—had returned to Ochibi's house shortly after the fiasco involving the Fuji brothers and Mizuki. The redhead blinked sleepily and glanced at his best friend who had challenged the whole team, separately of course, to a tournament of Tekken 3(1) on Ryoma's PlayStation. Needless to say, Fujiko was the official winner of every match so far except for the one he was currently playing with Tezuka.
Eiji raised his eyebrows as the spiky-haired man on the screen, Jin Kazama, defeated the red-haired man, Hwoarang, in the first round. Fuji fumed, and Tezuka watched the screen stoically, oblivious to the anger emanating from the tensai. Seigaku's tennis club's captain was surprisingly good at the game.
However, it was only a matter of time before the bespectacled boy lost. After all, he was playing against a frustrated, angry, pissed off, Fuji Shuusuke, and when the tensai wanted to win something, he usually won.
Well, he won except when the situation involved Fuji Yuuta, apparently. In that case, Mizuki Hajime won. Eiji tried to fight back a snicker, but he didn't succeed.
Beside him Oishi raised an eyebrow and asked, "Eiji? What are you laughing about?"
The acrobat blinked, grinned, and answered, "I was thinking about dinner. I feel kind of sorry for Mizuki. I think Fujiko will be out for his blood even more than usual now. Actually, I think I feel worse for Yuuta-kun. He has to put up with those two."
Oishi gave a hesitant smile, reached out, and ran his fingers through Eiji's hair. The catlike boy nya-ed and scooted over to lean against his boyfriend. They smiled at each other and leaned in for a kiss...
Then Tekken 3 loudly announced that Hwoarang was the winner. Fuji did not look the slightest bit happy as he met the combined gaze of the Golden Pair. Apparently he had heard their conversation. Eiji grinned and waved a bit, "Cheer up, Fujiko! They obviously like each other..."
He trailed off, and his grin wavered as his friend downright glared at him. Pouting, he looked away, "Okay, okay, I get it. It's a touchy subject."
Pausing, Eiji lightly brushed his fingers across his bruised cheek. His blue eyes softened and took on a sad glint as his smile completely melted from his features. Sadly, he continued, "Hoi, there seem to be a lot of touchy subjects these days."
The redhead leaned against his boyfriend and grinned again as he changed the subject, trying to ignore the startled expression that flashed across Fuji's face at his earlier seriousness, "Hey, at least everyone's okay with us, nya? That's not a touchy subject at all. Who would have thought that everyone on the Seigaku regulars is in love with another man?"
Eiji made a face and admitted with a conspiring whisper, "Well, I don't know about Tezuka-buchou, but I'm sure a certain someone," he pointedly glanced at the honey-haired tensai across the room before continuing, "would be happy if he was."
The redhead blinked and asked curiously, "Why are you laughing, Oishi?"
The dark-haired boy grinned, "By the end of the week, they'll be together. I'm fairly sure of that, Eiji."
"I'll confirm that the likelihood of such an event happening is 92 percent." Eiji jumped and looked at Inui incredulously. Did the data collector listen in on everyone's conversations? Forcing a grin, he asked, "I-is that so, Inui?"
"Yes. From my calculations, there is a 98 percent chance that Fuji-kun has romantic feelings for Tezuka. Probability that Tezuka shares these feelings—86 percent. Therefore, there is a 92 percent chance of a romantic relationship forming between the two at some point. Most likely, judging from how many of us have coupled together in such a short amount of time, it should happen sometime this week(2)," Inui stated as he adjusted his glasses.
Eiji miraculously kept himself from making a face when he tried to think of the phrase romantic relationship in conjunction with the name Tezuka. It didn't work, and he actually made a face as he felt a part of his brain die from pondering the impossible. He glanced across the room at his friend who seemed quite a bit calmer now that he had officially beaten—thankfully, only videogame-wise—everyone on the team. Fujiko was having a nice, quiet, non-blackmailing conversation with their captain, and Tezuka genuinely appeared to be enjoying himself.
The redhead let his face relax and shrugged slightly, ignoring the puzzled looks from both Oishi and Inui; maybe Fujiko and Tezuka would actually let their feelings be known aloud soon.
...And maybe the world would freeze over.
"Hey! It's snowing!(3) It's really snowing!" Momo exclaimed excitedly.
Eiji felt his eyes widen. There was no way. No way. Sure, it had been cold for the past week; that's what happened in the middle of winter. It hadn't been that cold though!
"No way!" the acrobat bolted toward the window and stared outside in disbelief. Momo was right; it was snowing. Small sparkling flakes fell from the strangely full fluff in the formerly star-speckled sky (4). Everything was dusted in a thin layer of white fluff. At least the snow wasn't sticking, right?
"It's sticking around too, Momo-senpai," Ryoma added blandly, taking a sip from his almost ever-present Ponta can.
Now, Kikumaru Eiji was not a very superstitious person—though he never did walk close to a ladder after that one incident which involved white paint if he could help it; he liked having red hair, thank you very much—, but since everything he seemed to be thinking was coming true, he was a little paranoid. Maybe Echizen-san would let him stay home tomorrow and sleep off his stress. Eiji let the corners of his mouth turn up slightly; yeah right, like that would actually happen.
His back stiffened as he heard the door to Ryoma's room open.
"Oyaji," the first-year acknowledged his father. The young boy turned his golden-brown gaze to the oldest male in the room and raised a slim eyebrow, "Why are you here?"
Nanjirou blinked as his brain took in the sight of his son and Momo standing close together, though not as close as that one time before grinning and explaining, "I just wanted to let you boys know that it's supposed to snow for quite a while. They even said on the news that it might be a blizzard. Seigaku's already announced that it won't be in session tomorrow along with a few other schools, so stay up as late as you want."
"Don't do anything I wouldn't," he left with a lecherous wink, and Ryoma choked on his Ponta.
The room was incredibly still for a moment except for Karupin's nya-ing as Kaidoh continued to play with the feline and the scratching of the tip of a pen on Inui's notebook. Everyone blinked in shock before turning toward Ryoma who was still choking. Momo finally patted the poor boy on his back and asked curiously, "What exactly wouldn't your dad do?"
Ryoma blushed bright red; Momo took that to mean, "Not a lot" and promptly kissed the younger boy.
Eiji blinked and shook his head. At least there hadn't been any love confessions yet. Yet being the keyword in that sentence. The redhead was prepared for that to happen at any given moment.
Hours passed, and somehow the group ended up playing another game of Truth or Dare, as if they hadn't learned enough from the last time. Fujiko had his camera out again and was snapping pictures at the worst possible moments. Kaidoh and Momo were out of the game—the two rivals had been forced to drink the latest Inui juice and were now unconscious—after they had flatly refused to kiss each other again. Fuji had clearly given them that dare for his own amusement.
Now it was Ochibi's turn, and he seemed to be particularly vindictive now that Momo was out of the game. With a snarky smirk he asked his victim a simple question. "Tezuka-buchou, truth or dare?"
Eiji belatedly recalled that Tezuka hadn't been there for the last game as he stood up from where he'd been leaning against the wall in search of a more comfortable place to flop down. He was getting too hot leaning against Oishi; maybe his fever must came back to haunt him once again. Why had he stayed out in the rain? At the present time, his decision made absolutely no sense to him, and he felt really stupid for letting himself get sick because of it. Oh well. What was done was done. He couldn't change what had happened.
"Dare, Echizen."
The redhead felt a shiver go through his spine as Inui passed a camera to Taka-san and whispered, "There's a 100 percent probability that this will be amusing. Take a picture, Kawamura, while I write notes." The normally shy boy nodded with a hesitant affirmation.
"Tezuka-buchou, I dare you to confess your love to Fuji-senpai, ask him out on a date, and kiss him," Ryoma's snarky smirk grew into a grin.
Eiji froze. No way. That had been the only thing he had thought that hadn't come true. Surely, Tezuka wouldn't do such a thing.
He turned around just in time to hear their captain go through with the dare.
"Fuji Shuusuke, I've been attracted to you for some time now. Would you," the stoic boy paused as if carefully choosing his words, "be willing to accompany me to dinner tomorrow night, given that the snow stops?"
Fuji was blushing at the sudden confession and his ice blue eyes were open in shock; apparently he hadn't expected their captain to go through with the dare either. The honey-haired tensai nodded slowly, and his lips curved into a genuine smile. Then Tezuka leaned in and kissed him gently.
Tezuka-buchou was a closet romantic. Who would have thought?
Eiji saw the world spin around him and knew that now all of his earlier thoughts had come true. He hadn't been prepared for love confessions between Fujiko and Tezuka after all, and his fever was back. His legs buckled and darkness clouded his vision.
Well, it worked before, so it should work now. Maybe Oishi would catch him.
To be continued...
Notes:
(1) Tekken 3: I chose this game because despite it's bad graphics and its age, it's still one of my favorites. That, and I find it can be a pretty violent game, if you have a good enough challenger. (It also helps that it was sitting right next to me as I typed this up, so I had a hard time resisting the urge to add it into the story somehow.)
(2) Inui's calculations: I did these myself, so they're pretty simple. Yeah... that's all I have to say about that.
(3) "Hey! It's snowing!": I just realized that I never fully stated what season it was. Of course, where I'm from the weather is prone to going from one extreme to the next without warning. Seriously, it snowed quite a bit one summer. It was really freakin' strange. o.o;
(4) Small sparkling flakes fell from the strangely full clouds in the formerly star-speckled sky: How's that for some alliteration?
(5) ...white paint... he liked having red hair...: In honor of Episode 99: The Cursed Racket. I love that episode.
Glossary of Terms:
-san/-kun— terms used to show varying levels of respect.
Ochibi— roughly "kiddo."
tensai— literally "genius" or "prodigy."
hoi/nya— nonsensical terms used by Eiji.
buchou— "captain."
—Wolfram003—
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