AN: Now THIS is a new chapter! Great, isn't it? haha! I'm awesome like that! Read on to find out what happens next!
Chapter 7:
"This sucks." Ryoma muttered as he stopped playing his chosen cello piece for the competition inside their club room. Sakuno also stopped playing. She looked at him curiously and sighed exasperatedly. Ryoma glared at their club president, still blabbering about him being too stiff after once again interrupting his almost flawless playing. Ishikawa argued that Ryoma's face was too stiff and that he looked like a robot. It was just stupid. Ryoma thought that it really doesn't matter. And besides he played it perfectly. No mistake, whatsoever!
"Why don't you loosen up and just put your feelings into your playing." Ishikawa suggested. "You're too stiff! It's not nice to look at! Why don't you use me as an example? Stop acting too stubborn and listen to me for once."
Sigh. "Why would I want to use you as an example? You make funny expressions when you play your violin." Ryoma said.
"Echizen, you should stop arguing!" Hideo said. (A/N: Remember him from chapter 5?) "You really are a talented cellist but your face does not blend well with that piece you chose to play in the contest." He really idolized Ryoma since the first day of their club activities. He was not that great in playing the cello as Ryoma was but he had to admit that the guy was really using his poker face too much that it was almost the only expression that he shows most of the time.
"Whatever. Maybe you should be the one entered in this stupid competition instead of me, since you know a lot." He said monotonously.
"No, no, no, no! I'm still learning, okay? You just fix that face of yours. Ahahaha~" Hideo said as he laughed nervously, scratching the back of his head.
"He's right! Echizen! Loosen up a bit!" Shouta said (A/N: He's also from chapter 5…) as he ruffles Ryoma's hair playfully.
Ryoma grunted in annoyance and tried to swat his hand away from him. "Sure, whatever. Will you remove your hand from my head, sempai?" He said threateningly.
"Ehehe~ Gomen~ Chillax man! You're too hot headed!" Shouta said as he removed his hand from the annoyed freshman and placed it at the back of his head, grinning like an idiot. (From Ryoma's perspective, of course.)
"Let's just play once more Ryoma-kun. And try to fix your expression as well." Sakuno said.
Ryoma sighed and nodded. He readied his position and waited for the piano to start playing. Right on cue, he started playing the cello. The sounds of the piano, played by Sakuno, blended well with Ryoma's cello. The piano sounded perfectly and it did not overpower the main instrument, the cello. Ryoma played perfectly. There was no note missed and he matched the piano and played perfectly. He breathed deeply while playing and tried to loosen his expression and fell the song.
Ishikawa saw this and smiled triumphantly, shooting his hand in the air in victory. Shouta and Hideo did an 'okay' sign to Ryoma when he glanced at them. Ryoma smiled slightly and continued playing until the end of the song.
"Perfect!" Ishikawa exclaimed, clapping his hands.
"Really cool, Echizen!" Hideo said as he patted Ryoma's shoulders in approval. "I only wish I could play like that! Awesomeness!"
"Yeah! Great job, Echizen! You too, Ryuzaki-chan. You played well." Shouta said.
"Great job, everyone! One week till the competition! Let's do our best!" Ishikawa exclaimed as he gathered the members around. "Alright. You may now go home."
Ryoma returned his borrowed instrument to the cabinet and followed the rest outside. Ishikawa reminded him to attend their practices tomorrow afternoon. That meant that he will not be able to attend tennis practice. He reluctantly agreed to the hyperactive president. It was not like he could do something about it. He did not attend their practice last week so it was only fair that he attend now that the day of the competition is around the corner.
He saw Sakuno waiting for him outside the club room, holding some piano sheets. He approached her and told her that he won't be able to walk her home today because he wanted to talk to Sumire about his recent absence from their afternoon tennis practice. Sakuno just nodded and headed for the exit ahead of him.
~~~~hohohohoho~~~~
Sumire watches the regulars run laps around the tennis court. They were wearing weights to help increase their stamina during games. There was just a slight problem. They were missing a player. Yes, it was Ryoma. He did not notify the coach about his absence today. She was getting worried (and slightly irritated) about the boy and wondered if he was feeling just fine. She knew that Ryoma did not miss school because Sakuno told her that he attended his classes.
She knew that the tennis prodigy would not miss tennis practice if he could help it. The boy is too obsessed with the sport that you had to practically drag the boy out of the court to stop him at times.
"Coach Ryuuzaki." A familiar voice called him from behind, interrupting her thinking. Sumire turned around and saw Ryoma.
"Ryoma~" She said in a threatening voice. Dark aura surrounding her as she slowly walked closer to the young rookie.
Ryoma gulped and prepared for the much expected retaliation. But instead a hand pinched his cheek and pulled it that he feared that it would actually come off.
"Ow…" He said monotonously as he rubbed his aching cheek.
"Why did you not attend practice, huh?" Sumire asked angrily.
"Ishikawa-sempai told me to come. I could not refuse because he dragged me out of the classroom right after classes. I did not have the chance to tell it to you." He answered.
Sumire sighed and looked at Ryoma tiredly. "Okay. At least you have a valid reason."
"One more thing." Ryoma said as he looked up to Sumire.
"What is it?" She asked suspiciously.
"I think I could not be able to attend afternoon practices tomorrow, or the day after that or the day after that…" Ryoma said unsurely.
"What a bother." Sumire commented. "I guess it's fine. You attended last week's practices anyway. Also we will only do light training this following days to not strain the muscles too much."
"Okay. Thanks." Ryoma said, bowing slightly.
"Just don't slack off and try to train on your own."
"Yes." Ryoma said in understanding. He already planned on practicing on his own anyway. "I'll be going now then."
"Okay." Sumire said as she watched the retreating back of Ryoma. She sighed and noticed that everyone was dismissed already. She then went back up to the teacher's room.
~~~~hohohohoho~~~~
As the other regulars vacated the locker room, they noticed a familiar figure of a certain someone talking to Sumire. They watched as that particular person bowed and casually walked away from the old coach.
Yes. It was Ryoma.
The regulars eyed him suspiciously and thought about why their ochibi missed practice today, of all days. For goodness sake it was four days before the district tournament! Ryoma should at least feel a little bit more responsible and attend practices punctually. Tezuka was beginning to get a tiny bit worried about the boy because he knows that it was not like him to skip practices just when their tournament is just around the corner. Although he suspects that the Ryoma still practices on his home during his own time but he couldn't help but be a little suspicious and worried as well for the boy for missing so much practice time.
"Sempai, why do you think Echizen skipped practice today?" asked Momo.
"I miss Ochibi! I hope he is not sick or something!" exclaimed Eiji.
"Maybe he needed to do some homework or something…" Taka murmured to himself.
"Nah! That guy won't miss practice just for that! I bet he went early because he has a date!" said Momo while giggling softly like a fangirl.
"Are you stupid? Echizen isn't like that!" snapped Kaidoh.
"Who you callin' stoopid! Huh? Mamushiii?~" taunted Momo as he glared at Kaidoh.
"Will you guys calm down?" Oishi said in his mother-hen mode.
"There is 74% that Echizen is having an important event of some sort coming up soon and 89% that it was the reason that he was not able to attend practice. Though I don't have sufficient data as to accurately tell you what exactly is this 'important event' aside from the district tournament, that is." Inui stated.
The others just sweatdropped and stared at him weirdly.
"Where do you get all those information anyway? Do you have a spy working for you or something? Or maybe you hire high class ninjas to spy on us? That's why you seem to know everything!" accused Momo.
Inui's glasses glinted slightly as he adjusted it (for dramatic effect). "That… is classified information." He said as he smirked at their dumbfounded expressions.
"Well, whatever he is preoccupied with better not hinder him from his performance this weekend." stated the ever stoic captain.
"Maa~ maa~ why don't we just ask Echizen?" asked the sadistic tensai as he faced his teammates, who by now are hiding behind the bushes near the exit gate. They had been speaking in hushed voices till now and are unconsciously (?) spying on their young rookie.
"And why are we hiding anyway? With Tezuka included? This ,indeed , is really a surprise." Fuji sad as he laughed in a creepy way that creeped out his teammates.
"Cuz it's more fun! It's like we are in a spy movie or something! Nya~"
"Yeah! We should find out what is behind Echizen's lack of punctuality!"
"Shut up, peach! He will hear us with your loud voice!"
"Speak for yourself, viper!"
"Indeed, this is a more entertaining way of gathering more data. Maybe I should do this more often. Of course without you guys tagging along." Inui muttered to himself.
"Are we not invading his privacy or something by doing this? Maybe we should just leave Echizen alone and go home."
"Yeah! This is sooo uncool."
"Hay Tezuka, why don't you contribute to our conversation since you are already here?" asked a certain tensai.
Cough cough "For your information, Fuji. I did not come here to spy on Echizen. I'll go home now." Tezuka said as he stood up and walked away.
And with Tezuka gone, the rest of the gang was left there hiding behind lamp posts near Ryoma's house. Not long after Taka excused himself, saying something about being needed in their sushi restaurant. And that left Momo, Inui, Eiji, Oishi and Fuji. Kaidoh left them without saying a work after their team captain left.
"This is getting boring, nya~"
"Yeah! Maybe we should sneak up to his room or something? We could find a clue there!" Momo exclaimed.
"No! In fact we should already stop this! Let's just go and leave Echizen alone. He will tell if something important is coming up… I'm sure he will…" reasoned Oishi.
"Saa~ Even though I find this 'spying' really entertaining, I do agree to Oishi that we should leave. Besides it's already getting dark."
"Nya! If Fujiko and Oishi says so~" said the still jumpy acrobatic player.
"So, this sums up our spying expedition for the day. I will be excusing myself now. I need to tabulate the new acquired data and update the latest volume of info about Echizen. Later then."
Now the rest of them split up and went home. And at the end, they did not find much about the reason why Ryoma was missing their practices recently. In fact, it could be considered a waste of time. But what's done is done. And besides they did somehow had fun in doing all those "spying", although nothing much came up significant from it.
~~~~hohohohoho~~~~
The next morning, Ryoma attended the morning practices. And just as expected they did not do strenuous activities. They just did the usual stuff: running laps around the court, practice games and doing their personal routine assigned by Inui to them.
"Hey, Echizen!" Momo called as he caught up with the running freshman.
"What?" Ryoma asked.
"You know, you should go to our afternoon practices like a responsible regular player. Just like me!"
"Whatever. A sempai asked a favor from me. I couldn't refuse because he kept on pestering me about it. So I have no choice."
"Really?" Momo asked, not sure if he should believe him or not.
"Yeah." Ryoma simply said as he hurried up a little bit and finished his last lap.
The morning practices ended quickly with Ryoma being pestered by almost all of his upper class men. Honestly, are older people really annoying or is it just them? They seriously need to lower their energies and use it to more sensible things. Ryoma grudgingly thought as he walked to his homeroom class.
Classes went on quickly and soon it was already time for Ryoma and Sakuno to attend their club practice. They silently walked to the music room, got their respective instruments and waited for Ishikawa to arrive. When he finally arrived, he assigned the other members to do their own practices in the adjacent room. Now, Ishikawa, Shouta, Ryoma, Sakuno and a few others who wanted to help them practice stayed in the room.
Ishikawa was the first one to practice his violin piece for the competition. He was accompanied by Shouta on the piano. Although they made some minor mistakes, everything ran smoothly after they were noted. Next was Ryoma and Sakuno's turn.
"Okay, Echizen-kun! Let me see if you have improved. And I don't want any more of your poker face so try and fix that like last time. And this time make it look more natural." Ishikawa instructed them.
"Hn." Ryoma muttred as he sat and positioned the cello correctly in front of him. He looked at Sakuno and signaled her to start playing. He listened intently to the piano and waited for his part to enter.
Perfect. He thought as he entered just at the right time. He played smoothly. He did not look at the music sheet that was in front of him. He memorized the song by heart and was determined to play it perfectly so that the loud Ishikawa would stop interfering him while he play.
They finished the song without mistake and no interruption. He looked up to see the startled faces of the people in the room.
"What?" he asked, breaking the silence instantly. Suddenly he was being praised from all directions.
"I knew you could do it properly, Echizen! Now you just have to do that again this Sunday and then we'll be sure to win!" he said gleefully. "Unless you beat my awesome performance, that is." He added at the end.
Ryoma scowled at the last part and glared at Ishikawa briefly. He turned to Sakuno and nodded to her.
"Good job." He said monotonously.
"You too. I'm sure you'll do beautifully on the competition." Complimented Sakuno.
"Hn." He muttered silently as he sood up from the chair.
"Echizen! You did a great job! I knew you had it in you!" Shouta said while patting Ryoma's head affectionately. Ryoma scowled and removed the offending hand. He did not even know what 'it' was that he was saying.
"Good work, Echizen. If you practice more at home then I'm sure that you could do a greater performance." Ishikawa said in his serious tone. He has gotten over his earlier excitement and now reverted back to his super bad-ass club president mode. Though he was the only one who thinks like that about himself. Most of them only think that he is just a narcistic, bossy and loud person.
"Right." Ryoma answered absentmindedly. Although he was also interested in beating up serious butts during the musical competition, he still preferred the adrenaline rush of tennis. And he gets to enjoy his beloved sport as well.
After another round of practicing, Ishikawa dismissed them. They returned their instruments, gathered their things and prepared to go home.
Ryoma offered to walk Sakuno home again and she reluctantly agreed after much argument. She could not lose to the famed Prince of stubbornness. They silently walked home and when they reached Sakuno's house, she thanked him.
"Thanks again, Ryoma-kun." She told him.
"No problem, Ma'am. I know you might get lost or might be attacked by some evil forces, so I took the responsibility into myself to see you home safely." He stated monotonously, but with a slight mocking and amusement in his tone.
Skuno blushed turned around murmuring something that what he said was not true. She went inside, stomping her foot angrily and shooed Ryoma away.
Ryoma chuckled silently and headed back to his home.
AN: I know right! This one is not as long as the others! Sorry bout that! But I just have to end it at this point! It is essential so that I won't mix up the next chapters!
Reviews, anyone? :P