Chapter 9

Mizuka stayed in bed the next day. She had been crying so hard she hadn't even realized where they were. They had still been outside and she couldn't stop her high pitched sobs. Atobe then leaned in and kissed her forehead, then her eyelids. His kisses had traveled down her cheek to her neck, his mouth landing on the spot between her neck and shoulder and giving it gentle licks, causing her to shiver, her knees bending together, her fingers grasping his jersey tight. And then he seemed to relax his body against hers. "I'm sorry."
He had sounded so defeated. It pained her just to hear him like that. Atobe had given her a last kiss before taking her back to her room, a long kiss given after and another apology. He had to go. Tomorrow was the shuffle match. The most important one.
She had ignored the knock at her door after Atobe had left her there. She couldn't face anyone with her eyes all red and puffy.
And now, she still lay in bed and she wasn't going to leave anytime soon.

It was a loud signaled knock that brought Mizuka out of bed. The matches were over. Atobe had won but he sounded defeated, his eyes weren't shining with victory either. They were dark and dead. Kabaji was gone.
"What do you mean gone?" She said.
"He stupidly got in the middle of my match when he wasn't supposed to. He should've known better," Atobe said quietly. "Echizen's gone too. Those idiots."
He grabbed her arm and pulled her to him, embracing her, hugging her tight. She could feel his sadness, how lost he felt that his childhood best friend was gone.
"How did your match go?" She asked, trying to distract him.
"I partnered up with Nio."
"Nio?" Mizuka repeated.
Atobe nodded.
"And you played a doubles match?"
He finally gave her a grin. "Ahn, don't look so surprised. I too can play a doubles match."
He lay in bed with her and told her the rest of the lineups and who had won. He kept his eyes on her the entire time, his hand always lay on her cheek. It still felt good to be near him, always so comforting to be enveloped in his scent. His cologne was so captivating she tilted her head in more and then they were kissing. It was a soft kiss, his eyes stared passively into her.
"I'm sorry."
Why was he still apologizing? "It's okay," she said, feeling her heart warm at the light in his eyes. But for some reason, she couldn't bring herself to look him in eyes as she added, "I love you."

Atobe wasn't the only one feeling the loss of Kabaji. Oshitari could feel it too and he could see it in the rest of the Hyotei Regulars. They had their Hyotei jerseys on and Atobe brought Mizuka to sit with them, to eat. It had been a while since they all sat together. He tried not to stare at Mizuka as she devoured her food.
"She hasn't eaten since last night," Atobe said, his eyes glittered with amusement as he sat with his arms crossed as he watched her.
Oshitari had a feeling Atobe was trying to keep his hands to himself. Atobe would stretch his hand out over her back only to bring it high up and over his back. He repeated this a couple times before he settled on crossing his arms.
"There is no meat in any of the dishes," Shishido stated. "Man, I was really looking forward to it. How super lame!"
"Yeah, they didn't have any yesterday either," Ootori said.
Oshitari hadn't really realized it. Everything looked good to him, almost comparable with Atobe's foods. He thought he had overheard a strange rumor stating that they hadn't received a shipment of meat. A lot of the other players had complained about it yesterday as well. Meat was supposedly the thing they were all craving but he saw the way they all looked at Atobe and knew that wasn't all there was to it.

This was the third day and Atobe was beginning to notice the restlessness of the players. He was beginning to wonder if it was due to the lack of meat since he was noticing the first stringers giving him side glances. He knew it was bad when his friends started to notice it and were trying to surround him when he walked but he wouldn't allow it, he pushed himself to the front of the group where he always walked. This was ridiculous. He didn't need protecting.

Take better care of her.

Sengoku's words still rang in his head. Sengoku, the biggest fucking flirt there was, telling him to take better care of Mizuka. The orange haired player had found him walking the path with Oshitari to look for Mizuka. He had indicated that Mizuka was in that court and hadn't said anything except for that. Take better care of her. He had royally screwed up. Whenever Mizuka was involved, he couldn't think straight. He always knew himself to think things through but with her, he wasn't able to think at all. All he could think about was her and he knew the time was coming soon. Today would be the day. It was such a shitty time but it was now or never.

The first thing was her brown eyes, always so sparkly, and her smile, always so happy when she saw him. Her smile faltered and he felt his gut sink even more.
"You're all wet. Why didn't you go wash up first?" She moved up to kiss him.
He had come straight to her room after training. The rain had come down on them in the middle of practice, it was a good cool down. He took her hand and led her to the table and sat across from her, studying every piece of her, he brought her hand to his lips to kiss it.
"Keigo, what's wrong?"
He had to tell her. He took a shallow breath and kissed her hand again. She blinked and he could see the confusion in her eyes.
"Don't worry, Kabaji's back at home now. He's just waiting for you to get back."
"It's not that," he mumbled against her hand and gave it another kiss before putting it down. Even the loss of his childhood friend was not as hard as this was going to be.
"What is it? What's wrong?" Her voice had gone soft.
Here it goes. "It's...It's me," he said after a moment. "I need to tell you something and I wanted you to hear it from me."
He looked down at her hands clasped in his.
"I'm pretty sure you've already heard some stuff and I wanted to be the one to tell you all of it," he puffed a breath. "There is no easy way to say this."
She was so silent that he had to look at her. She was also staring at their hands joined together. He had to see her face for this. He had to see her reaction so he brushed his hand over her hand and she looked up at him.
"There's a nickname that I've received because of it. I'm not proud of it...Anymore."
"What...is it?" She asked so quietly.
"I'm known as a lady killer amongst the housewives in Osaka," he could feel her hand shaking so he rubbed them, trying to soothe her. Her eyes were wide, her head tilted. "But I'm not that anymore."
"What does that nickname mean?"
That made him freeze, his thumb stopped rubbing against the back of her hand. Atobe closed his eyes for a second, Gods, she was so fucking innocent. He looked at her again, her eyes tugging at him, and he did a soft sigh as he said in a dead voice. "It means that I've slept with a lot of women."
"That's okay," her voice was small but he could only shake his head.
"It's not okay," he said, everything must come out. "These women are housewives, they're married women. I slept with them and...I slept with their daughters. A lot of these women are mothers and sisters of some of the players here."
She pulled her hand back from his so fast it shocked him.
"Why?"
He didn't understand. What was she asking? She looked so confused he didn't know what to do.
"Why are you telling me this?"
And here was the hardest part. "Because you were supposed to be just one of the women that I've slept with."
He could see it breaking her, the hurt in her eyes, her hand to her chest.
"What?" She whispered.
"You were my greatest rival's sister," the words were all tumbling out now. "It was supposed to be the greatest triumph of all, that I fucked the great Tezuka's sister. That I fucked you."
Her eyes were brimmed with tears and she blinked then to have the tears fall. His hands were itching to be around her, he wanted to hold her.
"W-Why? Why? Why?" She kept asking, repeating the same thing, her tears kept streaming down her face. "Why are you with me?"
"Because I fell in love with you." The answer came out so easy for him because he knew it was true. He loved her. He wasn't supposed to fall in love with her. He was supposed to be done with her after sleeping with her but he couldn't stop. He stood up when she did, her steps moving her back. It was breaking him how she was looking at him with such hurt on her face. He reached out for her hand but she moved back from him, she looked terrified. "I-" He didn't know what to say so he said the only thing that came to his mind. "Mizuka."