(After much debating, I decided to do Rinko. Unless something major comes to me in a revelation, Nanako will not be done. Due to PairPuri, Ryoga doesn't really exist so I'm not counting him. As such, next chapter will be Tachibana Kippei.)
Echizen Takeuchi Rinko
1. She had spunk.
Her father had been a harsh man, angry in many respects though his ethnicity didn't make for it. Her mother was helpless, always shrinking away in hopes of tomorrow being a better day. But Rinko – she had a spirit that would not be curbed, a tendency to fire off whatever thoughts were on her mind in anger regardless of whether she should have. It had gotten her into trouble as a child more times than was healthy, and years later she saw the same snark shine through in her only son, but she always saw it as a value and not a detraction.
2. Her first love was in kindergarten.
He was a cute boy with pale skin and electric blue eyes, so different from her own. He was wiry, even more so than a normal five year old, and managed to shoot questions and queries off to their teacher two-plus miles a minute. It had been a playground romance full of pretty yet allergenic dandelions and reserving the swing for each other at recess, but it was a pleasant batch of memories nonetheless.
3. She had six brothers and sisters.
In total, of course: she was fourth, smack dab in between a brother and a sister. There were two sisters before her elder brother, then her baby sister and two youngest, twin, brothers. Despite the vast amount of children the house wasn't always in the throes of complete chaos, and though the sounds of four different instruments could often be made out over the yelling at said practice-ers of instruments because someone was studying for a Japanese school exam or writing a paper, that was the highest the decibel level got.
4. She loved law because it proved she could go somewhere in life.
Her family wasn't huge, but they were larger than normal for a family of Asian decent of their time period. She had landed in the middle, four of seven total, never the best at anything. She wasn't the brightest, nor the prettiest, nor the kindness, nor the most proper. She wasn't the daughter who married first, nor was she the child who best knew how to handle money. She was almost entirely ordinary in the categories her parents were paying attention to, which is why she had decided to come out of nowhere and surprise them all – she was going to law school. Her parents were wary at first, and her siblings had laughed at her, but when she came through with both a degree and a job at a time where many of her family was lacking one or the other, it was all Rinko chuckling secretly behind their backs.
5. She found Nanjiroh absolutely appalling at first.
He hit on anything that moved, and half the time she wondered if that wasn't just constricted to things that walked on two legs. He cracked unfunny, disgusting jokes and acted as if he was on top of the world. Sure, in some respects he was, but when she first met him, Nanjiroh was just another wise guy off the street offering nothing more interesting than the last one. She hadn't even expected to take a second glance.
6. It was his dedication that got her.
He had latched on to her, almost creepily so, and she had tried to shake him off at first. But he followed her down the block, then down the next, and the next, and the next, until they arrived at her apartment. She had tried shutting the door on him, but he'd slammed his foot in it. When she'd threatened to call security Nanjiroh had shrugged, looked mildly sheepish, and backed off – but not without the promise that he would show up the next day. True to his word, he did, and Rinko ignored him every day. This went on for two weeks until finally, reluctantly, she gave in.
Her only regret was that she hadn't given in sooner.
7. She could not stand dairy products.
There was something entirely disgusting about drinking the milk – something produced for one's babies – of another species, chilled, through adulthood. There was something even more disgusting about the living bacteria cultures in yogurt. The colloid properties of milk – the fact that she couldn't see through it, but that it was murky – just added to her apprehension and disgust, a trait she seemed to be the only one to possess. It was an opinion she later passed to Ryoma, and while she knew it wasn't entirely healthy to exclude an entire food group she never lectured him about it. Finishing his vegetables, though, was an entirely different story.
8. She'd almost refused them moving to Japan.
She was, in truth, more Americanized than her family ever liked. The immigrated when she was very young, too young for her to remember, and growing up in an atmosphere so different than that of her parents did affect her. There was a part of her that she knew was more wild, more daring, more carefree because of America and not just because of her, and she was hesitant to leave the country behind – even if Nanjiroh promised it wouldn't be permanent.
9. She gave in for Ryoma.
She knew he was spoiled, but he was her only child, her precious baby. Rinko tried not to be too lenient with him, and if he had done something wrong she would punish him accordingly, but that didn't curb her indulging, mother-hen influences. The way Ryoma's face had lit up at the prospect of living in Japan had been all it had truly taken to get her to give in.
10. She would never understand tennis men.
They fell in love with a court – a court where they stood all alone, with no one by their side to help them. They fell in love with a ball – smaller than many things, yet bigger than the world. They fell in love with the rush – like drugs, but legal Nanjiroh had once joked as he tried to explain the appeal to her. They fell in love with tennis over everything, even if they didn't want to, and Rinko would never fully understand what it was all about.
