Haruto's Point of View

I asked the man, "Who are you?"

He smiled at me, "Isn't it obvious?"

Then, I remembered the file the nurse had given me. I stuttered a bit, "Cavallone-san...?"

He nodded, "Yes."

I raised my voice at him, "Why do I have to leave? What's wrong with staying here? All my friends are here, and..."

He raised his eyebrow, "And?" He paused for a while before continuing, "I understand you have friends Haruto - but you've technically been missing for the past fifteen years. I was supposed to start preparing you to take over the family business when you were fourteen, so that's three years down the drain."

It was my turn to ask the questions. "What family business?"

He looked around the room before saying, "That's not something that should be discussed so openly."

I shook my head, "No. If you have something to say to me, you can say it in front of my friends!"

He sighed, "As much as I'd like to believe you, I can't. I'll get to the point. If your friends find out what our family does for a living, their lives will be in danger. Since you're the famous 'Sakuraba Haruto', you won't escape it. By tomorrow morning, the news of you being my son will have hit the press. It wouldn't surprise me if some of my enemies have already figured it out!"

This was starting to get a bit interesting.

"I don't want to be the one to call your friends' parents telling them they got themselves killed because you got them involved in our business dealings!"

My eyes widened at this. I stuttered, "Killed...why would they get killed?"

He shook his head at me, "That's exactly why I need to tell you in private. The less they know, the safer they'll be." He started chuckling, "I never thought I'd be the one saying that. Guess my little brother is rubbing off on me."

"Little brother, does this mean I have an uncle?" I asked him.

He laughed in response, "No. We just see each other as siblings. I have no brothers or sisters. It was always just me and my father."

I nodded my head. Then, I cleared my throat and asked him, "When can I know about this family business thing?"

He answered me, "I'll tell you whenever we're in private."

Suddenly, Shogun's voice broke into our conversation, "I'd hate to break up the family reunion, but the team's expected to be back at school in the next twenty minutes."

My father nodded at him, "Understood, Shoji-san."

*back at school*

When we got back to school, Shin asked me, "What was that about?"

I tensed up a bit and said, "Just some family stuff...that's all, nothing to worry about." I tried to be as calm as possible despite the fact that I was inwardly freaking out. What the hell was going on?

Shin frowned, "Are you sure?"

I replied, "Of course I am, why wouldn't I be? I've got no reason to lie."

Well, at least I don't THINK I have a reason to lie...unless my dad's involved in the mafia or something like that. Oh, wait...didn't Takami say that my father would most likely try to take me to Italy? I'm sure he did say something about that. Isn't Italy where the mafia originated...oh my god! That's the family business he was talking about...he's in the fucking mafia.

Shit! No wonder he wanted to tell me in private...if people found out, their whole family would be in danger.

He said he wanted to meet me after our practice game against the Zokugaku Chameleons. I just hope I'm wrong about the whole mafia thing.

The coach had made us change into our warm-ups before we left the school, so now that we were back, we were going to change into our school uniforms so we could leave for the day.

Shin was the first one to finish, but he stayed to wait for Takami and I. When we were all done, the three of us left the locker room. I'm not sure if the others noticed, but when we turned the corner, it seemed like there was someone following us. There wasn't really much to say about him except that he was dressed quite professionally; the suit he was wearing looked pretty expensive as well. I don't know why, but I have a feeling he has something to do with that so-called business my father had been talking to me about.

Please be wrong, please be wrong, please be wrong!

While we were walking away from the school, the three of us were stopped by someone - possibly the person that was following us - who asked us if we had any recent trouble.

Takami asked them, "Why do you care?"

The man replied, "The son of one of my boss's close friends was recently discovered to be attending Oujo. I was hoping that you would be friends with the recently found Cavallone heir."

This surprised me, and I made it known. "Me? Why would you care about what happens to me? Worry about your own family!"

He just smirked, "The company I work for see each other as family. Our boss is practically brothers with the head of the Cavallone family, so, by extension - you are family!"

I frowned, "That makes no sense!"

He laughed, "You'll understand soon, young Cavallone."

The man turned around and took out a cellphone. He called someone and said, "Avevi ragione, è il famoso Sakuraba Haruto. Egli doens't sembrano credere che le famiglie Vongola e Cavallone sono stretti alleati però. Potremmo essere costretti a guardare fuori per questo." (English Translation: You were right, he is the famous Sakuraba Haruto. He doesn't seem to believe that the Vongola and Cavallone families are close allies though. We might have to watch out for that.)

He stayed on the phone for a few more minutes before finally hanging up and walking away, leaving us dumbfounded. It seems I was right about him being related to my father's business, but I was still left with more questions than answers.

Shin and Takami turned to me and said, "We're following you to meet your dad next week."

I just nodded before I told them, "Make sure nobody can see you...he doesn't really want anyone else to know anything about it. I don't know why he's so adamant about keeping the family business a secret from the team, and I'm a little worried about it. I'd rather have you two there, even if it is in secret. Just don't bring Otawara with you because then he'll know people followed us and we won't learn anything!"

The two of them agreed and we went our separate ways. Right now, there was only one thing going through my mind.

I really hope they don't hate me if I end up being right about that mafia thing.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Here's chapter two! It's a little bit shorter than the last one, but it's something. I know that Oujo didn't really have a practice game against Zokugaku (in the anime), but I didn't want to jump right into the Kanto Tournament because, if I did, then I would contradict what was said in the last chapter. I'm not sure if the Italian dialogue is correct since I used a translator (since I don't like just using different font styles for different languages).