Disclaimer: Prince of Tennis was created by Konomi Takeshi. A certain idea in this chapter was inspired by a scene from the POT doujinshi 'Kokoro ga tsuite yu kanai'. Neither belongs to me. Please don't sue.

Turbulence

By Cinpii

It was cold, harsh, and it roamed the night. Cornering innocent victims, it attacked under the cover of darkness. Hungry. Insatiable. It swept the land with frightening thoroughness.

Wild animals ducked for cover. Some burrowed deeper into their lairs. Some tucked their feathered heads underneath a wing.

It was known to be mercurial. There were times where it was gentle and soothing, compassionately laying a sweet caress upon the skin. Tonight was not one of those times. It was in a foul mood.

People peeked out from the comfort of their homes. Many thanked their gods that they were not ensnarled in nature's display of omnipotent violence.

It was wind, and it brought along with it the sharp taste of rain. It drove down in penetrating sheets, hard and unyielding as it assaulted the environment. Nothing was spared. Trees, grass, asphalt, buildings. Nothing escaped its fury.

Not even two occupants in an obscure tool shed.

The abominable weather was on everyone's mind. Everyone except the same two occupants whose thoughts were currently definitely not on anything occurring outside.

She was wet all over.

It was just one thought, one simple little fact, but it swirled in his mind, revolving round and round, reluctant to let him go. Unconsciously Ryoma's Adam's apple bobbed up, then down, a direct correlation to his swallowing reflex.

She was wet all over.

Distantly he could hear the wind howl and the abrasive rain pummel tiny fists upon the roof. It was a distant sound because her words were ever so much louder. They were whispered, but he couldn't have heard them more clearly if she intoned them through a bullhorn.

She was wet all over.

Up. Down. His Adam's apple completed another cycle. A small bead of moisture trickled down his brow. Ryoma gulped again.

Wet all over. They both knew exactly what that meant. He was going to be stuck in a tiny tool shed with a naked girl. A very cute naked girl. And a very, very tiny tool shed. Moreover, he was going to be in a similar state of undress.

Not good.

Most definitely not good. Curse the gods for manipulating him into a device for their sordid amusement. He didn't need this. He so did not need this. Stupid law of casualty. Perhaps this was his punishment for being such a cocky ass. Regardless, Ryoma didn't see why Sakuno had to be dragged into it. She didn't do anything to deserve something this bad – stuck sopping wet and freezing in dark, cramped quarters with the one person you wanted to avoid the most.

Ah well. No use crying over spilt milk. He'd just have to grit his teeth. It was only Ryuzaki Sakuno. Just the clumsy coach's granddaughter. No biggie. Ryoma hitched a shoulder with a careless attitude. Nothing to get worked up about. Nothing at all.

So why was his heart pounding so damn loud?

And why did it feel like his stomach was twisted in a gazillion knots? It was weird. These feelings were foreign. Ryoma tried to decipher the strange tumult of feelings churning in his gut, but it was a jumble of confusing emotions and he soon gave it up. Why was he feeling this way? If he was his old self a month ago, he would have just chalked this situation up as a mere inconvenience. Not something he would have enjoyed, but tolerable.

However, this wasn't a month ago. He had changed. He wasn't the same indifferent boy he was before. Because now he was extremely aware of the tension filled air, and it was choking him. He was very, very aware of how awkward it would be to share a confining space with a girl he liked, and with the knowledge that neither of them would be properly dressed.

Oh yeah, that was it. He felt weird because he liked her. Ryuzaki Sakuno. And it was all the more awkward because she was mad at him.

What a mess.

He didn't think for a second that being stranded in this situation was going to make her feel anymore kindly towards him. Oh sure, exactly what part of being stuck in the dark with the guy you hated would Sakuno like?

Okay, he had to take that back. She was too sweet to really hate anyone. He may not have known very much about her, but Ryoma knew at least that much. So maybe she didn't hate him. He wasn't exactly on her A-list though. This particular situation wasn't gonna help either.

Ryoma cursed himself for opening his mouth before thinking. He had an awful habit of doing that as of late, especially with this girl. He would have to tread a bit more cautiously with his words, at least for the time being.

But even if he said it more tactfully, the fact remained that it was still freezing in here and she needed to get out of those wet clothes. He just knew that if she somehow got sick, in her current state of mind, she would blame it all on him. Girls were like that. They didn't make sense. All this would become more fuel to dislike him even more. It was total unjust but Ryoma could see it happening.

But damn, what did she expect him to do about it? Simply because he was the voice of reason she was going to rely on him now? She just stood there expectantly, like he was gonna magically conjure some clothing outta his ass like he was the fairy godmother or something.

Wait a minute.

Ryoma blinked. Wait a damn minute. The heel of his hand whacked his forehead. He was a dumbass, he really was. He totally forgot what else was in his tennis bag. Letting Horio hang around him had to be scrambling his brains, it was the only way he could justify such a glaring oversight.

Immensely relieved, Ryoma pulled the brim of his cap a little lower over his eyes. It was an unconscious movement but it comforted him in its familiarity.

"My school uniform is dry." There. If she had any notion of keeping on those wet pieces of clothes, he sufficiently squashed them flat. He thoroughly annihilated any grounds for insubordination with his words. Now that he offered her dry clothing, she couldn't turn him down, couldn't get sick, and couldn't hate him. He was helping her out.

Perhaps his reasoning was a little nonsensical, but Ryoma could not be blamed for muddled thinking. Not in such severe circumstances. Now that he knew he liked her, he wanted her to like him back. Or at least have their relationship return to the status quo. He would be okay with that too. The way things currently were sucked. If things continued as it was, his concentration would keep slipping and he'd lose his edge.

The random thought of Horio beating him in a one set match horrified him. A quick shudder convulsed through the cap-adorned boy before he shook it off. No way in hell.

Oblivious to the flurry of thoughts of the boy standing next to her, Sakuno stood there, quietly digesting his words. With that one sentence the discussion was effectively ended. Not that it was a real discussion. More like a veiled order. Take off your clothes and get into mine. That pretty much summed up the gist of it.

It wasn't in Sakuno's nature to protest, but complying didn't make the situation any easier to bear. Yes, she was cold and soaking wet. Yes, she wanted out of the confounded trapping of sodden clothing and into something warm and dry. But no, she did not want to do it in front of Echizen Ryoma. Especially not in front of Echizen Ryoma.

Her common sense warred with her modesty. She had two choices and no, she could not wake up and be relieved that all this was just a bad dream because it felt very, very real. Nightmarishly real and she wished again that she had never fallen asleep in the grassy clearing.

A long, tense pause stilled the air, one wrought with indecision. After mentally running away for a second, the choices loomed over her once again, demanding to be made. One, she could be stubborn, remain dressed and possibly endanger her health. Or two, she could strip off all her wet clothing, which in her case, was everything, in Ryoma's presence. It was like deciding which of the two were the lesser evil and Sakuno was mired in her indecision.

Be wet and cold and keep her modesty intact, or submit and undress in a tiny cramped shed with the boy who broke her heart not an arm length away. It was a tough choice to make and Sakuno didn't have much time to ponder over it.

In all honesty, she was leaning towards undressing. Desperate times, desperate measures. It was so cold. If she changed fast enough, it would be okay, right? She had a silver lining on her side. Darkness. A complete and utter void of light.

In the end, innate self-preservation won out. Her chilled, damp skin yearned for the solace of his offered protection. His musky scent was bound to be enveloped in it, and thusly her once she donned his clothing. The pigtailed girl swore to herself not to let it bother her.

So what if wearing his clothing and smelling him on her body was the most intimate thing she'd ever experienced in all her young life?

So what if it would make them seem like they were more than mere acquaintances? Sakuno knew in her heart that he did not think of her in such a way so what did it really matter? If she did not let on that stripping to the skin and putting on his clothes didn't bother her, then perhaps she could walk away from this excruciating situation with some dignity intact.

Decision made, Sakuno bit her lip and forged on. With slightly trembling hands, she started unbuttoning her polo shirt. Time stretched as she quickly and nervously undressed. Long, tense seconds crept by with the speed of a slug. Every second felt like a minute.

His heart was pounding harder than it should, Ryoma thought. Her breathing was slightly labored, the cold air constricting her lungs and Ryoma could pick this up quite clearly, along with the other interesting sounds coming from her. The slither and slap of wet clothing leaving her body froze him in place. Ryoma had never really thought about girls before, but he was thinking about girls now, and especially the one standing not two feet away from him.

How could he think otherwise? She was taking her clothes off right in front of him. It was a novel experience to say the least. The feelings and thoughts that swirled through him were decidedly… warm.

A little too warm.

He turned around and closed his eyes, more for the principle of it than anything else. He would have felt a bit gauche if he hadn't. Just because he didn't observe them all didn't mean he was entirely without social grace. However in their situation it wasn't necessary to observe that little social rule and now the tennis prodigy felt a little ludicrous.

Ryoma possessed excellent vision but even he was rendered sightless. There was not an iota of light in the tiny shed. Without the assistance of light, he could not foveate on anything. Not that he wanted to. He wasn't a pervert. Just because he was a guy didn't mean a thing. Then again, if it was Ryuzaki Sakuno, Ryoma couldn't deny being a little bit curious.

Especially after those disturbing dreams.

He clenched his fist and willed the sudden thoughts away. Not now. Not now. Of all the inappropriate times to be recalling those dreams.

A faint hint of redness crept over Ryoma's cheeks. The movements coming from behind him sounded even louder than before, competing with the thrumming of his quickened pulse.

Ryoma swallowed. He stood rigidly as the memories attacked him.

Long mahogany hair and reddish brown eyes. Soft sighs and tentative touches. Flashes of golden skin, velvety smooth and welcoming. The rustle of bed linens and the muffled squeak of mattress springs. Low keening sounds and feminine whimpers that increased in crescendo until, until–

The tennis prodigy shook his head and ran a slightly trembling hand down his face. The moisture he wiped away was a mixture of rainwater and perspiration. He wasn't one to be shaken up so easily, but then again, he had never faced a situation quite like this before.

He quelled his pulse to a steady rate by forcibly taking in measured breaths. In. Out. In. Out. There. That wasn't so bad. In. Out. In. Out. The mental chant formed a relaxing mantra in his mind. In. Out. In. Out. No sexual thoughts here. No sir.

Who was he kidding?

She was taking her freakin' clothes off right behind him. If he was inclined, he could reach out and find out just how soft and smooth her skin really was. She was an arm's length away. It would be no trouble, really. So simple, so easy. Just a simple extension of his hand.

If he was inclined.

And of course, he wasn't. Nope. Not one bit. He wasn't at all curious how her skin would feel beneath a questing palm. Because he wasn't interested.

And the sun rises in the west. Ryoma let out a silent sigh.

Stuck in a shed on a rainy night with Ryuzaki Sakuno. How could he face her with that kind of dream in the back of his mind? The only way he could think of was to treat her indifferently, but that was what got him in this mess in the first place. If he hadn't denied his feelings towards the girl, things wouldn't be so strained.

And face it, Ryoma told himself; he didn't want things between them to be left so unsettled. It was a miserable month without her.

He missed her smiles and shy hellos. How she would stop in the hallways and seek him out, just to say good morning. Something he brushed off as so inane was now something he missed hearing from her lips. But now she dodged him in the hallways and looked the other way when he passed by.

It didn't really bother him at first. He hadn't noticed that she was avoiding him. Ryoma had to admit, he was slow on the uptake when it came to things like that. Leave it to Kachiro to point it out. After his empathic friend bought his observations to Ryoma's attention, Ryoma started to notice it too.

And the more time passed, the more he kept noticing it. Kept thinking about it. Thinking about her. So it made sense that she'd appear in his dreams. But why he dreamed of her in that kind of way boggled him.

He'd continue to wake up to a racing pulse and sweat damp sheets that tangled themselves around his legs and hips. It was incredibly frustrating. Sleep was difficult to obtain after one of those nightly visions. Nonetheless he grew more accustomed to them as the days progressed.

Not that getting accustomed to them made them anymore comfortable to tolerate. Sometimes thinking about tennis helped cool down the feverish sensations, but not always.

He knew dreams like this were natural, he wasn't concerned about that. He supposed that he was getting to that age. But why on earth, of all the girls he knew, did it have to be her? Granted, he didn't know very many, but then he had never cared to. So why did he let an insignificant little girl like her take such precedence in his mind?

Did he really think about her in that kind of way? Ryoma wasn't sure. He knew he thought she was attractive. But lots of girls were attractive, movie stars were attractive, and they did not render such cameos. Only she haunted his dreams.

Looking at other girls and then looking at Ryuzaki Sakuno, it was just different in a way he couldn't explain. And now he was having dreams about her. Dreams of him doing things to her. Things he knew he wasn't ready for in real life. So why the hell was he dreaming about it? And with her of all people?

The question plagued him for a long time.

And he'd continue to wake up day after day, crabby, hungry and late for morning practice. Then he'd catch a glimpse of her, sometimes in the hallway, sometimes near the courts. His stomach would clench and he'd cease feeling anything else except the stark awareness of her presence. He never realized before how often their paths could cross in one day.

And it hit him why things felt so wrong, why his life was off kilter.

He missed her.

He had said a cruel, hurtful comment about her person because he was too childish, too immature to own up to his feelings in front of his friends. Hubris. And now he was suffering from that very same pride that kept him from facing her, from resolving this.

It was almost a month now. Ryoma knew he couldn't run away forever, it wasn't in his nature. He would remedy the problem the only way he knew how. He'd analyze the situation and then take action. It was a strategy he employed in his games. It would now be one he would use to solve his current plight.

One, he knew he liked her. Two, he knew he hurt her. Solution? Apologize. But that was so much more easily said than done.

It had been a long time since a sincere apology left his lips. He wasn't sure if he was up to it. But if he didn't take the steps to mend what was left of their tattered relationship now, he would most likely not get another chance. It was a feeling Ryoma had in his gut, and his instincts were rarely ever wrong.

The tennis prince let out a little sigh. This was going to suck.