"Tetsu-kun, you're so cool!" Satsuki enthused from the outside of the court, waving her hand excitedly to capture the attention of the boy she was addressing.
Riko observed her unbridled enthusiasm from her seat next to the pink-haired girl. The Seirin coach couldn't help a small twitch of her facial muscles as she watched the Touou manager sit back down even though her love call had gone unanswered.
"You sure are full of energy about this, even after all this time…" the coach remarked offhandedly, the twitch in the corner of her mouth still present.
Satsuki gave her a curious look.
"Of course! No matter how much time passes, Tetsu-kun is still Tetsu-kun! He's the coolest!"
The pink-haired manager went on into an impromptu Kuroko ode that Riko blocked out for the sake of her sanity.
Still, there was something she didn't understand.
"Why do you think so? That he's the coolest?" Honestly, she couldn't wrap her mind around that. How could someone surrounded by a team made up entirely of aces from all over the country refer to invisible, barely worth mentioning Kuroko-kun as the coolest?
It just rang wrong, you know?
"Ehh? What are you saying, Riko-san?" Satsuki said, dragging out the syllables of her sentence. "You don't think that it's really cool how he changes into a totally different person when he plays?"
Riko sighed slowly through her nose as she turned to gaze at the boys on the field. Spotting Kuroko among the other, taller and sturdier built, guys was a feat she couldn't manage immediately and it was only through almost two years of practicing the task that she finally managed to see him.
The Seirin girl's eyes shifted slightly, fixing upon another one of the players on the court, and she gave a thoughtful hum.
"I guess you're right," she relented then.
"Right, right?" Satsuki called out, clasping her hands in front of her.
"But, Momoi-san, if it's about someone becoming like a whole different person when he plays… isn't Aomine-kun the one it applies to the most?" Riko ventured, setting her eyes on the girl she was talking to in order to gauge her reaction to her words.
The other girl's response was to blink several times in her direction in confusion. The comment obviously caught her off-guard. She then turned her gaze to look to the court again, at Daiki scoring a three-pointer while screened by Kagami.
Riko-san definitely had a point there. Off the court, Dai-chan is so tall and rather graceless when compared to the vast majority of the guys his age. His limbs are so long he more often than not appears to be lumbering along rather than walking. He's lazy and takes things so easy that it gets on the nerves of everyone.
It all changes when he takes a ball in his hands and starts playing the sport he loves more than anything else. His height becomes his advantage, his toned limbs one of his greatest strengths and his free-spiritedness a powerful weapon against most opponents. He's faster, stronger, better than anyone.
She guessed that Dai-chan really was a person her earlier statement applied to best.
At the inquisitive glance of the Seirin coach, she returned to present time. And to the fact she still hadn't responded to Riko's query.
Her lips turned into a pout, and she gave a dramatic sigh.
"Well, that may be true. But Dai-chan is just Dai-chan. Tetsu-kun, on the other hand—!"
And as she proceeded to fall into another impromptu Kuroko ode, Riko completely tuned her out.
Making any sort of point with this Kuroko-fan girl was simply impossible, she decided.
On their way back from the street ball match they'd had with Seirin's basketball club, Satsuki noticed the small smile tugging on the corners of Daiki's lips while they walked under the blazing summer sun.
"Was it fun? The game." She asked, but mostly out of courtesy – as a conversation starter. After all, she knew perfectly what the answer was even if he didn't say anything.
"Of course! Basketball is so awesome!" Daiki exulted, doing a small fist-pump in the air. "I got to play on the same team with Tetsu again for just a little while, too—it's been so long since we last did!"
At this, Satsuki's face bloomed into a fond smile as well. It sure had been long since they'd last been allies instead of opponents on the court.
Thinking of the past, she couldn't help but recall the small exchange she'd had with Riko-san earlier.
No matter how she looked at him, she just simply couldn't see Dai-chan in the light Riko-san insinuated. While she did agree that he was one of the most amazing players she'd ever seen on the field, she just couldn't label him as "cool" in the same sense as she meant it with Tetsu-kun.
Dai-chan was too… too Dai-chan for her to be able to see him as anything else but what she'd always perceived him as: her troublesome, high-maintenance childhood friend.
People often misunderstood their relationship because of the fact she went to great lengths to help him out in various ways; but she didn't like it when others thought her loyalty and sense of duty as something romantic.
Yes, she did take care of Dai-chan, but mostly because he did such a poor job of taking care of himself. He was too lax, too tardy if she wasn't there to whip him in shape. He cared too little about things that were important to society if she didn't nag him about them.
She worried for him and looked after him the same way you would look after a troublesome little brother or a small child.
But that was about all it was. She couldn't even imagine herself in a situation where he and she would be in any kind of romantic involvement. Dai-chan, a love interest? Her mind rejected it before the notion could even be properly conceived.
Although, when she considered the barren wasteland her love life currently was, she would probably be a lot better off if she could simply fall in love with someone like the Touou Ace.
She gave his profile towering next to her a searching glance. He was a lazy, thoughtless bastard and way too selfish for her taste, but at least he was close. She'd be able to see him all the time, to be with him all the time. And, even though it would be a different kind of 'like' than the one he'd have for her, he wouldn't push her away.
Not like Tetsu-kun did.
She heaved a sigh so deep it earned her a curious look from her childhood friend. She ignored his peering down at her as she trudged on.
It would definitely be much more convenient if she were to like someone like Dai-chan.
Too bad that you can't fall in love with people through rationalization alone, she lamented.
Satsuki surveyed the mess of papers strewn across the surface of the desk with disdain. How did she always manage to get herself into these situations…?
Well, actually, she had a perfect notion how and why, or rather because of whom. She'd make sure to remind him herself, too, after she was done here. Dai-chan owed her big time for, once again, dealing with his class duties instead of him.
She'd wondered why he hadn't resisted going to practice today when she had reminded him. She'd thought that he was just feeling agreeable for once, decided to stop giving her such a hard time maybe, and just maybe felt like acting a normal member of the basketball team for a change.
When she made it to the classroom where she had intended to get some data analysis done, she'd found a couple of girls from her class still lingering behind, wondering what to do with the class book left behind, unattended to by the one on duty with it for the day.
The one on duty being Dai-chan, of course.
She'd clenched her hands into fists at that and cursed him several times over in her mind. Dai-chan, you asshole—is that why you were so eager to flee to the court today?! So even troublesome basketball practice is loads better than dealing with class duties, is that it?!
She'd been angry—livid—but still, she couldn't ignore the fact that there was a job to be done. It wasn't what she'd had in mind when she asked coach Harasawa for a day off of practice—she'd wanted to work on the data of their next opponents—but she couldn't very well leave her classmates to deal with Dai-chan's selfishness on their own.
After all, cleaning after his messes was one of her main duties as his self-pronounced care-taker.
She'd told the girls that she'd take care of it – the class book. She should've reconsidered when the girls took a meaningful glance at the load of papers making the bag in her hand heavy. They didn't want to burden her with any more than she already had to deal with.
She had thanked them for their kindness but waved it off. Insisted that she was fine and this was something she was used to, so they shouldn't mind it and leave Dai-chan's work to her.
The girls didn't look very convinced but still thanked her, bowed and excused themselves for the day.
That left Satsuki alone in the room, bathed in warm colours as the late afternoon sun started to set across the horizon.
This was definitely not how she imagined the rest of her day going, and she would make sure to punish that bastard for ditching his duties later.
She stretched, arms high above her head, to crack her back before letting herself droop over the desk. She was starting to feel rather lazy and sluggish. At least she'd taken care of that idiot's work, even if she hadn't had the time to deal with the data analysis at all.
She thought she deserved a tiny break, in commemoration of that.
So Satsuki sighed slowly, crossing her arms over the desk and placing her chin on them. She'd just let her eyes rest for a moment, and then she'd get back to work.
There was something about the warm rays of the late afternoon sun that instilled her with a sense of calm and serenity, sucking the fight right out of her and lulling her to rest. So instead of struggling against its effect, she let her head loll on her arms. She savoured the feeling of comfort granted by the red and orange rays of the setting sun, letting her mind still and her breathing ease.
Soon, she was fast asleep.
The next time her eyes fluttered open, it took her hazy mind a moment to adjust. Adjust to the premise she was in, adjust to the changes of the room, adjust to accommodate the thought of how much time had passed since she'd put her head down.
While she slowly blinked her eyes open, chin still resting upon her crossed arms, Satsuki noticed that the room was no longer painted in the warm hues of the afternoon sun. The only source of light in the room was the full moon shining overhead through the large windows, casting beautiful shadows on the floor.
She woke up to a jacket much too large for her tiny frame draped over her back, making sure that the heat wouldn't leave her body too readily and keeping her warm. A familiar scent wafted to her nose from the garment.
It took Satsuki's garbled mind a moment to realize that the room was almost perfectly quiet, just as it was perfectly still. The only source of noise was the soft tune hummed by a familiar, soothing voice.
"Awake?" a familiar mouth whispered from just an arm's reach away from her.
The proximity and the sudden question gave Satsuki a start.
She sat up suddenly, blinking several times at Dai-chan sitting on the chair in front, his arm propped up on her desk as he stared at her with an unnaturally soft look in his sharp eyes.
She took in his silhouette outlined in a somewhat ephemeral way by the moonlight steaming in from the window behind him.
"You were sleeping so soundly I didn't wanna be the bad guy who stirred you, so I decided to just wait till you woke up on your own," he explained eloquently, leaning back against the desk behind him. "Come on, let's go home."
Only after he said it did she realize that he'd collected all of her papers and arranged them neatly into the bag she had carried them in. The notebook was nowhere to be seen and she could only assume that he'd gone to deposit it to the teachers' lounge before coming to wait for her to wake up.
She stared at him, lips slightly parted, as he collected his school bag and hers and started off towards the door of the classroom.
She stared and stared because it was all she could manage to do coherently while her heart fluttered in her chest.
It was truly odd. Just before she had fallen asleep, she had cursed him in every way she could think of.
But when she awoke to the sound of his voice gently humming a tune to himself, waiting for her to wake up instead of roughly stirring her awake…
And the way the light danced off his tanned skin, giving him an almost unrealistic glow.
It made her think, for the first time in her life, that he looked special.
In her eyes, in that very moment, she couldn't help but see Dai-chan—Dai-chan, whom she'd known her whole life; Dai-chan, who made her daily life an almost character-building torture—in a whole different light.
Just a little while ago, there had been nothing there. And then suddenly, it was like he was a whole different person to her.
She fisted her fingers in the edges of his jacket as she picked herself up clumsily from her seat at the desk. She pulled on the garment, until she effectively buried herself within in, trying to hide herself away from his view.
At the same time she did her best to ignore the hammering of her heart against her ribcage as the sound of his humming reached her ears again while they walked off in direction of their houses.
Throughout the whole trek there, the only thing she could think of was, 'What am I going to do? I'm in trouble…'
Falling in love is an odd thing. Especially when the one you end up falling for is someone you've known a long time before falling in love with them. It's funny, because nothing actually changes, and yet everything does.
To begin with, not much is understood by humans, about the dynamics of this thing called "love". That is evident in the numerous studies and commentaries, and all other sorts of explorations the phenomenon garners from people of various kinds of professions. Everyone's definitions of it, of "love", are different, focusing on different aspects of it—because it's a vast term, encompassing many, many different things. Maybe that's why it is so elusive to grasp.
Still, even less is understood about the hows and whys of the act of falling in love. For example, Satsuki doubted there could be anyone in the world who could explain to her, in a perfectly reasonable and sensible way, how it was physically possible for her to think of someone as nothing but a friend in one moment and then—for no reason at all—suddenly see him in a whole different light.
Falling in love is something she's done before. She fell in love with Tetsu in middle school, and, although it hadn't exactly been a walk in the park, it had been easy. Loving Tetsu. Even though he didn't reciprocate her feelings. Even though he never gave her definite answers to her confessions. Even though he pushed her away without really pushing her away.
Loving Tetsu had been reassuring. It had been easy in the sense she could act upon her feelings and, even though they went unanswered, never quite reaching him, she could display them, vent them.
Falling in love with Daiki—if that was even what this was—was nowhere near so simple.
He was her best friend. She had loved him long before she had fallen in love with him. It made matters even more complicated in her mind.
She started wondering how she had been acting before this—before all this happened. She wondered how she should act now.
She was self-conscious of every movement she made in his presence.
She was, because she didn't want him to know.
She didn't, because it would only complicate things between them, and she didn't want that.
Daiki was a simple person. Thinking wasn't one of his strong suits. She didn't want to worry him; she didn't want to burden him.
So she decided to keep her mouth shut. To begin with, she wasn't even sure that these… feelings, this stifling tension in her chest was even love. The love she knew, after all, was not this complicated, not this confusing.
The more time passed, the more she found her eyes following him everywhere. She noticed how much more observant she was of everything he did, how meticulously she catalogued in her mind any and every movement he made.
She had become more aware of him, of his existence, than she had ever been before.
It's only when her heart starts beating loud when he's next to her, leaning against her or draping an arm over her shoulders while he's mooching off her lunch that she knows. She knows for sure what those feelings are.
She knows because she feels nervous and excited, strung with trepidation when he's around. Her gaze follows his form, and no longer does he seem graceless and something of an eyesore. When he talks, she pays attention even to the most unimportant things he says. She can't help listening raptly to anything and everything that leaves his mouth. The sound of his voice makes the hairs at the nape of her neck stand on end.
Falling in love with someone you've known a long time, Satsuki discovers, is a painful, painful thing. It makes you painfully aware of that person's every move, of their every sound, of their every gesture.
And it makes you even more agonizingly aware of how little they care about yours.
Satsuki used to think that, if she could fall for someone close by like Dai-chan, it would solve a lot of her problems with her love life.
How naïve of her to believe such nonsense.
They were walking to school one day, on a day just like any other.
He was half a pace ahead of her, hands jammed in his Touou jacket pockets. He yawned widely—in a fashion reminiscent of a lion or other large feline—before closing his mouth and glaring at the road ahead of them.
"Mornings are such a pain. Whoever came up with morning classes should be stabbed to death several times over," he grouched and she couldn't help a small giggle.
When she realized she'd laughed, she stopped walking.
It took Daiki several strides to realize that she was not right behind him anymore. When he did, he turned around and threw her a quizzical look.
"What are you doing, Satsuki? I thought you didn't want to be late for class," he teased but with how tired his voice sounded, the effect was completely lost.
His friend paid him no heed. She was clutching on to the strap of her school bag, eyes pinned to the asphalt under their feet.
Her breathing was shallow with concentration. Her knuckles were turning white from the amount of pressure she was exerting, holding onto the fabric of the bag.
Daiki straightened his posture a bit, tilting his head in confusion at her. What was up with her so early in the morning?
"Dai-chan," she began and he gave her a noncommittal grunt to let her know he was listening.
She took her time continuing. It unnerved him more than he was willing to admit.
"If…" she started, but her voice faltered. "If I were to tell you…" she tried again and stopped midsentence when he turned to fully face her, hands in his pockets, brows quirked and questioning look scrunching his face up.
She pressed her lips together and steeled her nerves.
"It's just a 'what if' question," she told him, slowly, lest she should trip over her words again. "But if I were to tell you that I like you—that I'm… in love with you…" She tried to speak the last words with more strength than she had for voicing them, but she still pushed on. They rolled off her tongue like a secret, and she slowly, shyly lifted her gaze to look at him from underneath pretty, long eyelashes. "What would you do?"
He stared at her so intently that she couldn't help but start feeling nervous under his scrutiny.
"What kind of question is that?" he finally said, one brow rising higher than the other in nonplus.
She gave him a coy smile, hoping it didn't come off as a grimace in her nervousness.
"Just a 'what if' situation," she said in what she thought was a reassuring tone. "Humour me?"
Daiki surveyed her a while longer, with that same indifferent expression on his face.
He watched her as she shifted her weight to her other foot, the tension coming off her in waves. She didn't push him any further for an answer but he knew that she was waiting for it.
She was eager to hear it.
Who did she think she was talking to, anyway? Did she honestly believe she could fool him with this kind of acting? What a joke.
Still, he bit back on all the sarcastic and scathing comments he could make in this situation. Instead he continued staring at her, weighing his words carefully.
As he looked on, his gaze took on an edge of that smouldering intensity only someone as sharp as Aomine Daiki could manage. Not used to be the one on the receiving end of it, Satsuki swallowed drily but refused to allow her instinct to run away from this conversation overwhelm her. She refused to lose her nerve, or Dai-chan would know for sure what was going on (if he didn't already).
She felt like an eternity passed before he said or moved, for that matter. She was starting to wonder whether he planned on responding to her question at all. Did he forget what she'd asked, maybe?
When he went on to remove his hands from his pockets, never once breaking eye contact, Satsuki felt her heart skip a beat. And then, as he moved to take a step back, closer to her, her breath hitched in her throat.
"Well, if that happens," he began languidly, hunching over slightly so that he brought his face closer to her eye level. "First I'd take a goooood, long look at you, to make sure whether you're teasing or messing with me."
He was so close to her face, his nose mere inches away from her own, that she wondered if perhaps he could hear the rapid rate at which her heart was beating at.
"And if I decide that you're definitely not just saying that to make fun of me…" he trailed off, enjoying the way she sucked on a breath, expectant.
"If you decide… then what?" she murmured, just barely above a whisper.
"Then…" he breathed out, and she felt a shiver rake her spine when his breath fanned against her cheek.
She was grateful for the pause he'd made, because it gave her time to focus back on their conversation instead of his proximity to her body.
That was, at least, until his lips curled into a smirk that made her forget to breathe once again. How could she never have noticed before how handsome that smirk was?
"Then, I'd kiss you," he told her, confidently, unabashedly. He straightened his back, standing upright again, never breaking eye contact while he moved. "With tongue," he added with a mischievous glint in his gaze.
He savoured the blush that spread across her cheeks, and her speechlessness as her lips parted slightly in what he assumed was surprise at his response.
He smirk morphed into a smile—soft, kind, reassuring—one he rarely allowed on his face anymore.
One he saved only for her.
"And if you enjoy it… I guess we'll go from there."
He turned around and started walking off at a leisurely pace, giving her time to regain her sense of the present.
"But it's just a 'what if' story, anyway," he reminded her, a wolfish grin spreading on his lips.
The words brought Satsuki back to reality and made realization dawn on her. As it did, she chastised herself for the intermittent rate of her heart beat, tried her best to compose herself before jogging up to fall into stride with Daiki.
"Yep, just a 'what if'," she agreed with a smile so bright and pretty it should be criminal.
His hands were back in his pockets and the serious aura he'd had earlier completely gone, but somehow that made it easier for Satsuki to loop her arm with his, hanging onto his limb as she proceeded to tell him about her expectations of him for the day and that she won't stand for him ditching his duties or practice again.
He laughed heartily at that continued trudging on to school with small strides so that he wouldn't break Satsuki's pace.
She had spoken out because she had been uncertain and tired of feeling insecure.
She was so tired of being the only one feeling burdened.
But their "what if" talk made her think that maybe, just maybe, some of these days it would be good to raise this topic again.
Without the excuse of it being a "what if" conversation.
A/N: Yes, I just went there. I went and incorporated one of the key moments in the beginning of Kare Kano (Kareshi Kanojo no Jijyou) into a Daiki/Satsuki story. Go ahead, try to complain. See if I hear!
Joke aside, I just had to do this. And, although I do believe I did pull it off well enough, I get a feeling that it's somewhat off from what I imagined. Is that weird? And, in case anyone was left in a misunderstanding, even though Satsuki only recently started seeing Daiki in a different light, he felt that way longer than she had. But had simply decided to do the same thing she had, because he knew that even if he told her his feelings, that wouldn't end well.
Hope you liked anyway!
100 Situations, Table One; 048: Light.
16th March, 2013.