(no subject)
Warmth, Words and Victory, part I
[A tenipuri Kite/Rin fanfiction][R for non-graphic sex, masturbation, the occasional swearword][slash]
Disclaimer: Prince of Tennis belongs to Konomi Takeshi.
Author's Note: Originally for subrosa_tennis.
Summary: Rin, and tennis, Kite Eishirou, love, and family. Set pre- and post-Nationals arc. With a Atobe/Oshitari cameo.
Warmth and Words and Victory
30th October 2007
Rin yanks a change of clothes from the chest of drawers, stashing it in the duffel bag without regard for wrinkles. He tosses in the work that’s due the next day and grabs his tennis bag, then takes a deep breath and steps out of his room.
The decibel level immediately goes up, and Rin’s forehead wrinkles into a frown.
It’s been an hour, and they’re still shouting. Rin could hear the faint scorch of their words even when he was in his room with the door tight shut, sprawled out on his bed with a pillow over his head, wondering when they were going to start slinging objects. And now that he’s out in the open, he can actually hear what they’re saying, which only makes him feel worse.
‘- Don’t give me that -’
‘ - not as if I’ve ever been any good at school anyway! Not like Rin -’
‘Your brother is a different case, we are talking about you, Rika -’
‘Why is it that you think we both owe you something? Just because you didn’t have an abortion? Because you decided to keep us? I don’t have to do anything just because you want me to do it!’
‘If you want to keep living under my roof, this is my house, if you want to keep eating the food I put on the table -’
‘I wish I didn’t have to! Does that make you so great? You’re never at home, you never ask me what I want, it’s always about you! You let Rin do what he wants -’
‘Your brother at least -’
They’re in Rika’s room, so it means he can edge past them and slip out the front door unnoticed, hopefully. Rin knows what the latest outrage is, ’Kaa-san found a box of condoms in Rika’s underwear drawer, and assumed the worst. Rika’s told him - she said it was a dare, and honestly Rin’s more inclined to believe her, but if their mother sees him she’ll chew him out for not telling her earlier.
He makes it to his front door and leaves at stop speed, still working his feet into his shoes as he closes the door. He doubts they’ve heard him leave and anyway he doesn’t care.
He’s always the bone of contention. His sister resents their mother’s double standards - what behavior she condones in Rin as boys, it’s typical (staying out late, leaving the house without telling her, piercing ears, fighting, the experimental cigarette) she punishes - harshly - in Rika.
Rin grins a little to himself, remembering the day his thirteen-year-old Rika came home from a supposed project meeting with her neat blond five-year-old-type pigtails sheared off and with her shock of short hair streaked pink. The dye had washed out, but the haircut didn’t. The peace and quiet of the Hirakoba household fell to pieces.
At that time he was proud of his sister, resonating with her exhilaration, but now, a year later, every step of the way a fight, he’s kinda tired of all the mud-slinging. The tennis tournaments are looming, their graduation examinations are looming, and he’s sick of the constant shouting. Their mother can’t see that her twins are too alike, she can’t help but superimpose her ideas about how girls should be behave and about the consequences of what she calls ‘bad behavior’.
One consequence is having to bring up two little children single-handedly, of course. Which is why the condom stunt is totally freaking ’Kaa-san out, because the thought of her daughter ending up like her is probably what she’s been trying to avoid all along. But Rika’s not stupid, and Rin’s not stupid, and it won’t happen like that.
Now if only they could tell her that.
Rin shrugs to himself, gazing idly round the bus stop. It’s old, the paint on the pillars peeling in some places, all kinds of graffiti scribbled on it, and there are notices tacked hodgepodge all over it. His eyes follow them in no particular order - left, tuition classes. Rika refuses to attend hers. Above, piano classes, which, like the ballet lessons, ended when they couldn’t afford it. A couple flats for rent - even at those prices, Rika won’t be able to move out like she threatens, and they all know it, ’Kaa-san uses it as ammunition and Rika swears that one day she’ll be desperate enough to sleep on the streets and become a prostitute (if that ever happens Rin will club her on the head and drag her home by her short hair). Some flats for sale. A missing Shih Tzu by the name of Akiko and a reward - Rin can’t help but think that a dog that pretty, if not found by now, would have been totally bashed up by the neighborhood dogs. Just like Rika, who’s all bark and no bite.
The bus rolls up, resplendent in a cloud of dust particles and exhaust and setting sunlight, and Rin gets on. If only ’Kaa-san would just see that Rika isn’t a little girl anymore, Rin thinks. And if only Rika would stop doing things just to piss ’Kaa-san off. She likes brushing Rin’s hair so much that Rin knows she likes long hair, only that ’Kaa-san likes it too, so she’s keeping hers short, which to Rin’s mind is just stupid.
Rin sighs and leans his forehead against the windows.
*
It’s only early spring, and the night breezes are icy-fresh against Rin’s skin by the time he gets to Kite’s house, and his cheeks are a fine pink and his feet and fingers are frigid as he buzzes the intercom.
‘Kite residence!’ It’s Kite-san, Kite’s mother, who speaks in dulcet tones, like a balm to Rin’s ears after the shrieking he’s endured in his own home.
‘Ah -’ there’s a moment of hesitation, there always is. This isn’t his home, after all. ‘It’s me, Rin. I’m sorry for disturbing, you, Kite-san -’ And it’s kinda strange, and Rin can’t exactly explain this yearning in him, this awkwardness when he’s usually straightforward and direct and unafraid to tell people what he wants.
‘You’re never a bother, Rin-kun! Come right in, then. Have you had dinner?’ It doesn’t matter if he says yes or no, Kite-san will feed him anyway, because she believes growing children can never have too much nourishment. Honestly, Rin thinks she’s an amazing woman. She looks like Kite, or rather, Kite looks like her, except that she doesn’t have Kite’s bizarre (he’ll never say it to Kite, though) cowlick. Instead, her hair falls down her back in luxuriant waves, and she doesn’t look in the least like she has a fourteen-year-old son. She was a university professor in biology before she decided to stay at home, and very importantly, she cooks absolutely fantastic food.
Rin’s half in love with her as she ushers him into the house - three storeys and a garden and a backyard, installments probably fully paid off since Kite’s father is a chemistry Ph.D. working with a major pharmaceutical, two cars in the driveway, and it’s so warm. They probably have some funky central heating system, because honestly Rin can feel the parquet of the floor warming his frozen toes, and he can’t help but compare it to his own dingy apartment. He can remember first coming here when he was twelve, and admiring the Chinese calligraphy on the wall and the light-colored wood that featured so predominantly in the Kite household, and the plush cushions in velveteen, and there’s an elegant timelessness about this house that Rin just adores.
He’s glad that he’s welcome here, and even gladder when Kite-san sets a bowl of seafood stew in front of him, saying, ‘Eishirou’s in the shower, and we’ve already had dinner. I was just about to clear that away, so you can eat as much as you want, Rin-kun.’
Man, he doesn’t need her to tell him that! It’s fantastic. Convenience-store food has nothing on this, and he says so.
She laughs, taking the seat beside him. ‘It’s good to know you enjoy it. It’s nice that Eishirou has a friend like you. He’s always so... serious, and he never really gets into trouble. When I was younger I had all sorts on theories on child raising. I was a rebellious teenager too -’ To Rin’s immense surprise she sticks out her tongue, and Rin realizes she’s had her tongue pierced before. It’s not a very... motherly thing, and she laughs again, this time at the look of complete shock he’s probably wearing. ‘So I wanted to make sure I didn’t make the mistakes my parents made with me. But Eishirou’s so like his father.’
‘Mother,’ Kite says, and Rin jumps in his chair, barely managing not to splash the soup.
‘Ara, Eishirou,’ she smiles innocently at her son, as if she hasn’t been talking about him at all. ‘I’ll cut the two of you some fruit. Are peaches alright with you, Rin-kun?’
‘Sure,’ he answers.
She busses her son on the cheek. Kite accepts the caress and sits down beside Rin, falling gracefully into the chair his mother recently vacated, watching Rin eating. Only he and Kai and Chinen know that Rin has family troubles - it’s not something Rin wants broadcast, and Kite can certainly understand that. His mother knows, but Kite has long resigned himself to the fact that his mother is disturbingly insightful. He’s never said a thing to her about Rin’s situation and she’s certainly never pried, probably because she somehow already knows.
And recently, Rin’s been coming over to his house more and more, almost two days out of three, which can only mean it’s getting worse. As captain and classmate, Kite knows Rin needs the peace and quiet, to actually study and rest and be prepared for the upcoming tournaments and tests, and because of that it’s his duty to let Rin come over when the bickering at home gets too bad. As a friend, as a best friend, Kite wants to be able to help Rin, because he knows that while Rin adores being in his house, Rin also hates the fact that it’s not his house. That he’ll never be more than a guest. Kite wants to tell him that Rin should feel welcome to be here. That Rin’s not a guest in this house, that his mother loves having Rin around and Kite certainly doesn’t mind the company and Rin is welcome to take whatever he wants.
But instead, all he can say is, ‘Did you bring the work for class tomorrow?’
Rin nods, swallowing a mouthful of squid before he replies. ‘Yeah, I did. Haven’t finished it, though, and if there’s a quiz tomorrow I’m probably gonna fail.’ He stretches, and his feet brush against Kite’s.
Kite hisses and draws away. ‘Are those your feet? They’re cold!’
Rin shrugs. ‘I get cold easily, especially my fingers and feet. It’s already warmer in your house, they’ll be fine soon.’
Kite looks at Rin, notes the yearning in his voice when he says your house, and stretches out his feet, putting them on top of Rin’s. Rin glances sharply up at him, but Kite doesn’t acknowledge it, instead choosing to say, ‘I made notes. I’ll lend them to you.’
Rin looks at him for a moment longer, then wriggles his toes into the arches of Kite’s feet with a little contented sound. They’re so cold they barely tickle, more like a numb sort of burning where they touch. If Rin’s feet are this cold now, they must have been terrible before.
‘Thanks, Eishirou. You’re the best,’ Rin says, and smiles. There’s a bit of vegetable stuck in his teeth, and it ruins the tableau a little, but Kite appreciates the sentiment anyway, and smiles back. ‘How’s doubles with Chinen?’
‘It’s going good,’ Rin answers, taking more leisurely bites of the dinner now that the first edge of hunger’s blunted. His toes are getting warmer. ‘Better than you and me, anyway.’
‘You and I,’ Kite corrects absent-mindedly. ‘Yes, our doubles combination was quite bad.’
‘Quite bad doesn’t even begin to cut it,’ Rin snorts. ‘We were awful, Eishirou. You ran straight into me!’
‘And you did the same,’ Kite reminds Rin, raising an eyebrow.
‘Whatever,’ Rin answers. ‘But Chinen and I - ’ Rin drawls sarcastically ‘- will be in fair doubles shape, and there’s Aragaki and Shiranui, so it should be fine.’
‘Should be isn’t good enough,’ Kite warns.
‘Hai, hai, buchou,’ Rin laughs. ‘We will be. Better?’
In the kitchen, Kite-san listens to the sound of laughter and smiles as she slices peaches with a deft hand.
*
‘Shit,’ Rin swears, tilting his head at the mirror and glaring, his hands at his right ear. ‘Eishirou!’
Kite looks up from his book. ‘Yes?’
‘Help me,’ Rin says, walking over and plopping down on the edge of the futon. ‘The stud’s caught, and I can’t pull it loose from this angle.’
Kite looks at Rin’s ear and says dryly, ‘Which one?’ Rin has three metal studs in his ear, and Kite has no clue which one he’s talking about.
Rin makes a little huffing noise. ‘The third one!’ He taps the earring.
Slightly bewildered, Kite moves a little closer to peer at the earring - ah, now he sees what Rin means. Instead of going straight through the backing, the stud’s canted to one side and probably not moving as it should. ‘Hold still,’ he instructs, trying to find a way to get a good hold of the earring. He’s used to a tennis grip and fists in the dojo - the smallest things he ever handles are usually chopsticks or pencils. Earrings are new.
Rin waits patiently as Kite fumbles with the earring. It’s an unexpectedly nice feeling, to have Kite so close to him, hands pressed against Rin’s cheekbone and neck. It’s warm, which has to be the best thing about being here. It’s certainly more than he can say for his family. He and Rika may be twins but they’ve been growing apart, surely but steadily, and their mother’s never been a particularly demonstrative person.
Family. Funny how Higa - even Tanishi, and certainly Chinen and Kai and Kite - have been become more of a real family than his sister and mother. How much more he enjoys being with them.
Kite eventually wedges a blunt fingernail between Rin’s ear and the metal and pulls it apart, getting the earring loose. Rin makes an exaggerated wince and laughs as he takes the earring from Kite, putting it on the desk with its fellows.
‘Goodnight, Eishirou,’ Rin murmurs, snuggling down into the blankets. More warmth. Fluffy, rich goosedown comforters, not like the cotton at home, which is all his mother can afford. Beside him, Kite’s already returned to his book, but he murmurs, ‘Goodnight, Rin.’
Probably he’s just read something amusing, but Rin would like to believe that Kite’s quirky little half-smile is directed at the rumble of satisfaction that Rin makes as he buries his face into the pillow.
*
Rin wakes up warm. He’s completely curled up in the blanket and there’re all these delicious smells in the air and it’s warm.
It’s brilliant. Rin rolls over and the whole blanket rolls with him. It’s still early - the sun’s barely risen, but Kite’s already up, he can hear the sounds of movement and the futon beside him’s empty, and he closes his eyes again. He’ll stay here a bit longer till Kite comes to wake him, and pretend that this is where he belongs.
But it seems like all too soon that Kite’s got one hand on his shoulder, shaking him gently. ‘Rin. Wake up.’
‘Nnnngh,’ Rin says, and uncurls himself from the blankets unwillingly. ‘Don’t wanna.’
‘I’ll make you run laps.’
‘Do you have to be so mean early in the morning, Eishirou?’ Rin grumbles, unfolding himself and getting up.
Kite’s lips move upwards in a half-smile. ‘My mother and I made pancakes.’
Ah. That’s a different story altogether. ‘Okay,’ Rin says. ‘I want second helpings.’
‘Certainly,’ Kite says. ‘I’ll see you at the breakfast table.’
Rin tidies himself up and charges downstairs, hair barely brushed and curling around his shoulders. Kite-san doesn’t seem to mind, greeting him with a smile and a plate of fat pancakes liberally coated in butter and honey.
If he were at home it would be bread and peanut butter or dry cereal with a glass of milk, him and Rika standing at the kitchen counter and eating mechanically. His mother would have left for work a great deal earlier. Here, it’s pancakes and cocoa and more fresh fruit, and they’re all sitting at the dining table (Rin’s family doesn’t even own a dining table) and there’re moments when jealousy sours the food in his mouth, jealousy at Kite and all the things he has in life. And then he feels guilty, because he has no right to think that about Kite, especially since he’s the interloper here. And then he figures that there’s no point thinking about it, so he just takes another bite of the pancakes, and tries to focus on how wonderful this is, here and right now.
*
Other than Kite’s house, Rin’s only escape is tennis and tennis practice.
They collapse on the beach. Every muscle in his body is burning, Rin thinks to himself. It even hurts to breathe.
Damn. He hurts.
‘You got that right,’ Kai groans. ‘Running on sand sucks.’
Rin agrees, though he can’t find the air to actually say it. He’d never thought he’d see the day when he actually disliked Okinawa’s beaches of soft, white sand, but running on it - there’s no resistance, no feeling of solid ground, it feels like every step you take you slide back half a pace. It sucks.
Running on sand sucks. Stamina training underwater sucks. Tug of rope sucks. Swing practice in the sea sucks. And he’s got an essay due tomorrow, which also sucks.
But it’s tennis, and they have the first round of the prefecturals coming up soon, and Rin tells himself firmly that he’s doing this for the day they’ll step onto the tennis courts and demolish their opponents. Without tennis he’d only have school and home, one uninspiring and the other one depressing. He’d be lost without tennis.
Kite staggers to his feet. ‘Let’s go,’ he says quietly, and the rest of them get up without any further complaint. Kai offers him a hand, and Rin takes it gratefully. ‘Morning practice tomorrow. Anyone who’s late is going to be doing a thousand push-ups.’
Kai drops back down to the sand and begins an excruciatingly slow push-up, dragging out the ‘Onnnnneeeeeee...’ mournfully. He flops back down, rolls over and offers Kite a grin. ‘Making a down payment first. Do you take IOUs, buchou?’
In answer, Kite places a foot square in Kai’s side and shoves. Kai rolls over and says, ‘Twoooooo...’, but doesn’t bother attempting the push-up. Rin giggles, too exhausted to laugh, and somehow it’s kinda hilarious because suddenly everyone else is giggling, chortling, chuckling, guffawing, and Kite’s firm mouth is quirked in a half-smile as his hysterical team laughs and laughs and laughs.
Yeah. There’s tennis and Kite’s grand crazy plans to go to Nationals and somehow, Rin knows it sounds crazy but the exhaustion and the pain and the hard work’s kinda fun and kinda worth it, and he likes it, loves it.
*
Victory is sweet. They sweep the gold trophy at Kyushu Regionals, and now it’s on to Nationals, and they’re training like crazy because it’s Nationals and by now everyone knows their name. They’ve come a long way from being absolute unknowns, and it’s great to be famous for being champions and right now it feels like they’re unstoppable. Rin loves the nickname they’ve given Kite on the tennis circuits: Hitman, very apt for Kite’s ruthless, driven style on the courts, and Rin thinks it’s pretty cool even if Kite himself won’t admit it. Rin teases him about it all the time in the hopes of getting a rise out of the ever-implacable Kite.
And Rin enjoys training more and more. Their entry to Nationals means that they all spend more time at tennis practice, which, for Rin, means less time in the house. He leaves the apartment whistling in the mornings, and smiles all the way to school.
It’s just another morning, one day closer to the Nationals date but otherwise a typical one, but this time, Rin pauses in mid-change of shirt, staring, arrested, at Kai’s swollen face. The right cheek’s entirely puffed up, making him look comically lopsided. ‘Whoa! What happened?’
‘Got slapped. Twice.’ Kai answers, wincing as he touches his cheek, which is rapidly going from dark red to plum-purple.
‘By two different girls,’ Aragaki adds, coming in behind him.
‘You were watching?’ Kai demands angrily, whirling around to face his teammate.
Aragaki scoffs and turns to his locker, grabbing his racket and beginning to wind grip tape around it. ‘Kai, half the schoolyard was watching. Your homeroom teacher was watching. Hell, I think the principal was watching.’
‘You deserved that one,’ Kite points out from his spot on the floor, stretching. ‘We did try to tell you this would happen.’
‘Bu-chou,’ Kai whines. ‘Take pity on me! Let me off practice today?’
‘No.’
‘I’m injured!’
‘Some injury,’ Rin snorts as Aragaki laughs, ignoring the glare Kai sends his way.
‘Someday, Hirakoba Rin,’ Kai proclaims, ‘You’re going to get slapped too. And when that day comes, I’m gonna laugh at you. And you too!’ he snaps at Aragaki.
‘Please,’ Rin dismisses the idea. ‘I’m not stupid enough to two-time. And besides,’ he adds slyly, ‘There’s only one person I want to date.’
‘There’s someone you want?’ Kai gasps, his anger forgotten. ‘Oh my god, Rinrin, who?’
‘Don’t call me that.’
‘I know! Takahashi Mayumi from Class C, right? She’s totally into you!’
‘Of course not.’
‘Who, Rin, who?’
‘Buchou,’ Rin calls. ‘I’m going to run laps.’
He waits for Kite’s answering nod before setting off with a self-satisfied little chuckle, Kai still hot on his heels. There’s no one he wants to date right now. He gets love letters from girls, yes, but unlike Kai he never bothers to answer them, even to reject them. Right now he just wants to focus on winning at tennis and being with his friends, and that’s enough.
*
They lose at Nationals. Nobody knows what to say on the plane trip back to Okinawa. No one says anything at all. It’s markedly different from the atmosphere when they left, when they were all chattering and fighting for the aisle seat or the window seat or the last bag of vacuum-sealed peanuts and Kite uncharacteristically permitted their antics, made indulgent by success. Rin tries to sleep but fails - but he just keeps his eyes closed and pretends anyway. At least that way he has a reason not to be saying anything. At least that way it’s less obvious that he doesn’t know what to say.
Seigaku beat them six sets to none and it’s a shock to their collective pride, their undefeated record crumbling under the might of Tezuka Kunimitsu’s team. And now they’ve seen the matches - Hyotei against Seigaku, Seigaku and Shitenhouji, Seigaku and Rikkai, and Rin is never going to forget those matches because they were completely awesome, but what rankles is the fact that they were never going to win anyway. Rin’s prideful, not stupid, and he knows they would have been owned. The amount of talent in the Kanto region is terrifying. Compared to them, Kyushu’s teams were just the tip of the iceberg, and they hadn’t realized it, and they’d crashed their ship.
No matter, though. Now that they know it’s there they’ll watch out for it in future.
Kite, though, continues to brood over the next few days, and so does the rest of the team - except for maybe Kai, who’s like the ocean, taking whatever comes with an easy, graceful acceptance. Kite’s determined but in a black way, with a storm-cloud expression on his face, and Chinen, Tanishi, Aragaki, Shiranui - they’re just depressed. There’s none of the drive they had in practices before. Sure, they do them, they run laps and swing and play matches but there’s something intangible gone from the air, and it’s pissing Rin off, majorly.
Rin stomps into the locker room one morning and sees Chinen with his head bent at his locker and damnit, it’s such a dejected posture that Rin just throws his tennis bag against the wall and kicks the door shut behind him and everyone in the room jumps and stares at him as he folds his arms and yells, ‘Can we please stop acting like someone’s just died?’
No answer, only blank faces and empty looks, as if they don’t know what he’s saying. It only goads Rin’s temper more.
‘Sure, we lost. Yes, Eishirou lost. Seigaku’s a better team than we are! There! Said it! Now we’d bloody better start improving and stop moping about it!’ Rin hollers. The door creaks. There’re probably freshmen outside with their ears pressed against the wood, but he doesn’t care. ‘Sure, tennis is over for this year. There’s always next year! And if you want to be better next year, if you want to go somewhere next year, we have to start improving because if you think Rikkai’s moping cause they lost to Seigaku you’re probably wrong!’
Rin stands there and smokes, like a gun that’s just been fired, letting the words sink in. Tanishi - of all the unexpected allies - says, ‘Rin’s right. Marui was telling me that Yukimura’s working them all twice as hard as he used to.’
‘See?’ Rin smiles the self-satisfied smile of the vindicated.
‘Rinrin’s right,’ Kai says, over the annoyed automatic ‘Don’t call me that’ from Rin. ‘We should be working harder.’
Rin watches in satisfaction as the spirits lift. There’s no actual difference but who cares about actual differences? They feel different. Warmer, stronger, closer for what Rin’s just said. Defeat can bond a team as strongly as victory, Rin realizes. Maybe even more.
*
Kite walks to the clubroom still carrying the baggage of Nationals, and Tezuka Kunimitsu. Try as he might he can’t see any other way their match might have gone. Seigaku irritates him, them and their charmed tennis careers. Their freshman against Yukimura Seiichi, reigning prince of the tennis courts - Kite would never have expected Yukimura to lose. But he did.
But Echizen Ryoma’s not the point. The point is Tezuka Kunimitsu and Yukimura Seiichi and the rest of the third years who will be right there again next year at tennis Nationals. And he’s got a year to think of how to beat them - cleanly this time. None of the desperate tactics.
That’s one thing he’s not proud of. He won’t tell his parents and he won’t tell his grandfather anything about that, because he can see now, how pointless it is to win by crippling an opponent. By hurting the other side’s coaches. By throwing grit in his opponent’s eyes. If he had a way of contacting Tezuka he’d call and apologize for it, even if he had to throw away every last inch of his pride in doing so.
But he doesn’t know how to contact Tezuka, so for now he settles for running laps like they’re a punishment, for working at the bench presses and the weights till every inch of him is sore, like it’s some kind of atonement. Until next year, when he can play Tezuka again and play him properly and show him that Higa can win without playing dirty.
No guarantees on the violence, though. No coaches, and no dust, but he’s not about to tell his teammates to stop being intimidating. He’s not going to tell Tanishi to stop using the Big Bang to hurt his opponents. As far as Kite’s concerned, once you’ve stepped onto the tennis courts you’re fair game for anything, including injuries.
As he wraps his hand around the doorknob, he hears a familiar voice scream ‘Stop moping about it!’ Raising an eyebrow, he opens the door a fraction and slips in noiselessly. Some eyes widen at the sight of him, but he gives them a definite shake of the head, closing the door soundlessly and leaning against it. Rin’s standing in front of him, completely oblivious to his presence and yelling fit to burst.
Rin. Willful, headstrong Rin, who’ll play his game his way regardless of orders from captain or coach. Rin, who’s been working harder than ever and now, Rin, who’ll apparently yell at the team in Kite’s absence. He listens to Rin’s words and smiles a little to himself, watching Rin’s confrontational stance, the way he tosses his head as he gestures to make a point, blond hair falling down his back. Rin, who without knowing it is encouraging Kite, warming him, as much as it’s galvanizing the rest of them. And as he watches them respond to Rin, he’s suddenly so proud of all of them, even despite their loss.
They’ve tried hard. They’ve come a long way, even if they’ve lost. He shouldn’t have lost sight of that.
Kite grins and steps forward. ‘Fifty laps, all of you. And if you ever lose again, it’ll be five hundred.’
Rin whirls around in surprise and then breaks into a massive smile when he sees him. ‘Eishirou!’ he exclaims. ‘When-’
He cuts across Rin’s question. Not now. ‘And the freshmen listening outside! Swing practice, go to it!’
Higa will be stronger than ever for this.
*
‘Come to my house tonight,’ Kite offers. As Rin hesitates, Kite adds, ‘My mother’s cooking udon.’
They walk back to Kite’s house together, silent for a while. Tennis season’s going to be over soon, Rin thinks. Winters in Okinawa are rarely very harsh, but soon the courts’ll be closed and it’ll be endless repetitions of exercises in the gym amidst the end-of-year examinations. Hopefully there’ll be time for ice-skating, though.
‘I heard what you said today,’ Kite says, interrupting their silence. Rin flushes a little.
‘Thank you for saying all those things,’ Kite continues, his dark eyes intent on Rin. ‘I should have been the one to say it, I know.’
‘Eishirou-’ Rin begins, then stops. How to say this? What to say, what won’t sound like a platitude even if he’ s sincere in saying it? He’s not like Kai, who has a good instinct for when to say what to say. He’s not like Chinen, who can say something without actually saying it. Rin envies the two of them.
He eventually settles for: ‘We believe in you.’
Because those are the words he used when they first started to play tennis. They’re unoriginal and not enough, not enough to convey his faith in Kite and his trust in Kite’s leadership and the fact that without Kite there, there wouldn’t be much of a them at all, and that they need him.
‘We always have, Eishirou. I always have,’ Rin says softly, looking at Kite, willing him to understand. ‘And we always will.’ The words are all he has to offer.
Finally, Kite dips his head in the slightest of movements, the smallest of smiles creasing those full lips, easing away the compressed lines that Kite had been wearing ever since their return to Okinawa without the medal they’d wanted. ‘Thank you, Rin.’
Rin smiles to himself, and the rest of the trip back is taken up by talking about plans for next year’s tennis.
The words are enough, then.
*
It’s the last practice of the winter season when Shiranui appears at morning practice covered in bruises. Kite takes one look at him and demands the whole story. Shiranui tries to demur but by now all the Regulars are gathered in the clubroom, all of them serious, none of their usual jokes and good-natured ribbing. The story comes out - Shiranui’s younger brother being extorted and bullied by a gang of thugs, high school dropouts - the whole tired old story, and by the time Shiranui is done, Rin is cracking his knuckles and Chinen’s smile is just a little bit feral, and Kite has that look. It’s the look that none of them can actually describe, but it’s the look that earned Kite the nickname Hitman.
After practice they gather by unspoken accord in the clubroom, waiting till everyone else leaves. Kite looks squarely at his team and says quietly, ‘If any of you get hurt, I’ll have you run laps till the middle of next week.’
An answering ripple of ‘Hai, buchou,’ rumbles throughout the room.
‘Let’s go,’ Kite orders.
No one messes with his team.
*
Kite asks, ‘Can I go home with you tonight?’
‘Huh?’ Rin asks. Has he heard wrong? He did get punched but it shouldn’t be affecting his hearing.
‘I don’t want my parents to see,’ Kite explains, and Rin nods, comprehension dawning on him.
Kite feels a rush of gratitude towards Rin. If he goes home like this his father will give him hell to pay - slight bruises, scraped knuckles, blood though it’s not his own. Rin’s mother - according to Rin - is far less likely to care, and even if she has the explanation she won’t be too concerned, especially if Rin can explain the reason. His father, though... The injuries aren’t anything that can’t be explained away by a hard tennis practice, anyway, but Kite doesn’t think he’s in any mood to lie - or even demur - right now, certainly not enough to fool his father. He’s still high on adrenaline and flushed from the fight, and his father would know something was off in an instant.
Rin knows, Rin understands, Rin’s own blue eyes still glittering queerly as they pick a back road, where they attract fewer wary stares. There’s a rip in Rin’s jersey and a fine bleeding line on Rin’s arm. Not a deep cut, but it was a blade they hadn’t expected. It was a good thing Rin had good reflexes, and Kite, furious and seeing red, had broken the guy’s arm so many ways that he doubted he’d ever be able to hold a knife again.
When Kite mentions the wound, Rin shrugs it off, laughing; Kite fixes him with a stern look. ‘You were lucky,’ he admonishes.
‘Not lucky,’ Rin corrects him. ‘I would’ve ducked his next one, you know that. And besides, you were there.’ He slings the uninjured arm over Kite’s shoulders, and after a moment, Kite does the same.
Rin grins. ‘That’s right. Ain’t no one ever gonna beat us, Eishirou.’
*
Rin gets a great deal more hesitant as they get closer to his house. He pulls away from Kite, stuffs his hands in his pockets and slows down, his steps shuffling against the concrete. ‘My place - well, it’s not like yours,’ he says, not looking at Kite.
‘It’s fine,’ Kite answers. He thinks he has a good idea of what he can expect.
It’s better than what he’d thought, actually. The flat is small but clean and neat if a little bare. There’s none of the elegance of his own house and a lot of the furniture is the cheap, flimsy sort, but it’s not haphazard and it’s nothing to be ashamed of. Rin introduces him. She looks stressed, tired, old, but again that’s nothing Kite doesn’t already anticipate. She says a few polite words and then Rin pulls Kite down a corridor and into his room.
As Rin disappears to get the first aid kit from the bathroom, Kite looks around the room itself. Closet, bookshelf, desk, bed. It’s fairly neat, with only the books spread across the desk, the blanket not tucked in properly into the bed. Kite’s seen Kai’s room. It looks like a tornado. Clothes closest to the door are the filthy ones, clothes further in on the floor are cleaner. The only thing you can find in Kai’s room is his tennis racket, which he places on a rack on the wall.
Kite sits himself down on the floor and leans against the Western style bed.
Suddenly, a door slams. There’s a call of ‘Rika!’ - he assumes it’s Hirakoba-san - and suddenly, footsteps echo down the corridor. Rin enters the room hastily and shuts the door, leaning against it for a moment before he approaches Kite and sets the first aid box down between them.
‘Are you drunk?’ Hirakoba-san again, her voice rising, incredulous on the last word. ‘You’re barely fifteen! Where - who did you get the liquor from?’
If Rin’s twin - Rika - makes an answer, Kite can’t hear it. He douses the line on Rin’s arm in antiseptic, but Rin doesn’t wince. He does wince, however, when his mother begins shouting, and looks away.
Kite flushes. He’d thought he could have anticipated what the quarrel would be like. But the reality of it is quite different, he feels the shame of a voyeur who doesn’t want to watch this family air their dirty laundry in public, not quite shame for himself but for them - and suddenly he feels a surge of sympathy for Rin, who must feel like an interloper in his own house, nowhere to belong except maybe at school and at tennis, not even in Kite’s own house. It’s no wonder that he likes visiting his place, if this - Kite flinches involuntarily at a high-pitched female scream of outrage, the fury joined by another voice in a rising crescendo - is what he has to face daily.
On impulse, he sets the cotton pads aside and shuffles closer to Rin, rising to his knees to pull him into an awkward sort of half-hug half-pat. He’s not good at physical contact but he’s even worse at words, and Rin is the sort of person who responds to being touched. To warmth.
Rin holds still for a moment, as the shouting continues. Then, as Kite doesn’t let go, he relaxes and burrows closer, trying to muffle the words. Kite shifts and he shifts and they end up in a proper hug, bodies pressed together with a soothing arm around his shoulder, the kind of hug that Rin doesn’t know that he’s been craving.
It’s not just the central heating or the lovely surroundings and all the wonderful things that make Kite’s house warm. It’s the people. It’s Kite, because Rin’s never been anything but cold in this room but this once, just this once, it’s warm and Kite’s arms are warm and he doesn’t want to let Kite go.
When Rin wakes up the next morning, the two of them are curled up together on the bed with the thin blanket thrown over them and his feet are caught between Kite’s calf and the bed and his toes are wonderfully warm. A thought occurs to him:
He’s in love with Kite Eishirou.
*
Rin struggles with it. He struggles with it and doesn’t dare tell anyone, not even Rika, who can sense that something’s up with him but she doesn’t ask him and that tears at Rin too, because it wasn’t that long ago that they were willing to tell each other everything. It’s different now, though. Rin finds himself writing Kite’s name in the middle of a sentence on history or literature or something, and he doesn’t dare hand up his essays without proofreading them several times anymore. He doesn’t know what to think of this feeling, like a girl, really, and that’s another thing, because they’re both boys and Rin’s not stupid enough to think that that’s all right.
He keeps it to himself for about a month and then can’t bear the pressure anymore.
He has to tell someone. Anyone, to talk it out with. To actually hear the words that keep resounding in his head and maybe then he can tell if they sound true or false and if they’re true maybe then, then he can try to deal with it.
He decides to tell Kai.
Kai gets into a lot of shit with girls because of his easygoing attitude (that, and the fact that he’s too in love with the ocean to be very in love with them). They think he doesn’t take them seriously, they think he treats everything too casually, including his relationships, half of which end in slaps, or tears, or both. But it’s not that he doesn’t care, honestly. It’s just that Kai’s a relaxed person, that he accepts things and doesn’t let them ruffle him too much.
Even so, even knowing that much about Kai, Rin hesitates to tell him.
But as he sits on the sand and watches the waves and knows that Kai’s somewhere out there, still swimming until the last light disappears, Rin remembers how Kai taught him and Rika to swim. How the sea had seemed frightening at that age, until Kai came along, an exuberant seven-year-old who’d almost been swimming before he started walking.
It would have been more typical if he’d done something like push Rika into the water. But instead, he’d cocked his head at Rin and Rika and asked them if they knew how to swim.
And when they said that they didn’t, he’d spent the rest of the day teaching them (as best as he could).
Trusting Kai. Trusting Kai not to drown them, trusting Kai not to give him away. Wasn’t it kinda the same thing?
Rin waits till Kai wades out of the ocean, golden in the dying light. He waits till they pack up and start back towards home.
And then he quietly gathers up his courage, and asks, ‘Kai?’
‘Hmm?’
‘I think I’m... I think I don’t like girls. I think... I might be in love with Eishirou.’
Kai doesn’t react immediately, though his face becomes more thoughtful - the slight wrinkling at the corners of his eyes, the unfocused look - and Rin doesn’t know whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing so he settles for being more anxious than ever although he tries his best not to let it show, but the thought of losing Kai, losing a best friend -
He won’t compare it to the standard clichés, like losing a limb. He’d rather lose a limb than Kai.
Finally, Kai nods. ‘Yeah, you might be.’
Relief.
It’s overwhelming. It’s all Rin can do not to stumble and keep pace with Kai. ‘What do you mean, might be?’
‘You probably don’t like girls. You’ve never thought even one of them was cute, right?’
For a moment, Rin wonders, does Kite’s mother count? He loves her, but not in that sense, more like, she’s the mother he’s always wanted but never actually had, so if he can’t really love his own mother he might as well love her. And if she’s the best example of women he’s ever seen, no, none of the simpering girls in school are anywhere near cute or lovable. ‘No.’
‘And honestly, Rinrin, you’re quite vain.’
Rin’s face rearranges itself into a highly indignant look as Kai chuckles. ‘You take longer in the shower than anyone, you use more sunblock in a month than I use in a year, you condition your hair, you moisturize. That’s... really kinda girly. Sorry to break it to you.’
‘I can’t help it if I sunburn easily. And I wouldn’t want to have hair like yours,’ Rin snipes half-heartedly.
Kai merely grins mischievously. ‘You break my heart, Rinrin. But anyway, if you don’t like girls, then you like guys. And honestly, if I were you there’re only so many guys you could be in love with. There’s me, of course.’
‘Come off it!’ Rin laughs, swattting at Kai’s arm. ‘No way!’
‘And honestly, you and Eishirou are very close, aren’t you? And even I think Eishirou’s hot and charismatic - hell, we all think he’s charismatic - and I don’t even bat for your team.’
‘Yeah,’ Rin murmurs. ‘He is.’
‘Do you want me to tell him?’
‘What?’ Rin yelps. ‘No! Of course not!’ There’s no way he’ll tell Kite - what’re the chances of Kite liking him as well? Kite might not even be as accepting as Kai about the ‘don’t-like-girls’ bit, and Rin has the sinking feeling that if he tells Kite, they’ll never be able to speak naturally again. There’ll always be the awkwardness between them. And he doesn’t want that, ever.
‘Yeah,’ Kai agrees, and Rin sighs in relief. ‘It’s probably better to tell him yourself.’
Rin blanches.
Part II
[A tenipuri Kite/Rin fanfiction][R for non-graphic sex, masturbation, the occasional swearword][slash]
Disclaimer: Prince of Tennis belongs to Konomi Takeshi.
Author's Note: Originally for subrosa_tennis.
Summary: Rin, and tennis, Kite Eishirou, love, and family. Set pre- and post-Nationals arc. With a Atobe/Oshitari cameo.
Warmth and Words and Victory
30th October 2007
Rin yanks a change of clothes from the chest of drawers, stashing it in the duffel bag without regard for wrinkles. He tosses in the work that’s due the next day and grabs his tennis bag, then takes a deep breath and steps out of his room.
The decibel level immediately goes up, and Rin’s forehead wrinkles into a frown.
It’s been an hour, and they’re still shouting. Rin could hear the faint scorch of their words even when he was in his room with the door tight shut, sprawled out on his bed with a pillow over his head, wondering when they were going to start slinging objects. And now that he’s out in the open, he can actually hear what they’re saying, which only makes him feel worse.
‘- Don’t give me that -’
‘ - not as if I’ve ever been any good at school anyway! Not like Rin -’
‘Your brother is a different case, we are talking about you, Rika -’
‘Why is it that you think we both owe you something? Just because you didn’t have an abortion? Because you decided to keep us? I don’t have to do anything just because you want me to do it!’
‘If you want to keep living under my roof, this is my house, if you want to keep eating the food I put on the table -’
‘I wish I didn’t have to! Does that make you so great? You’re never at home, you never ask me what I want, it’s always about you! You let Rin do what he wants -’
‘Your brother at least -’
They’re in Rika’s room, so it means he can edge past them and slip out the front door unnoticed, hopefully. Rin knows what the latest outrage is, ’Kaa-san found a box of condoms in Rika’s underwear drawer, and assumed the worst. Rika’s told him - she said it was a dare, and honestly Rin’s more inclined to believe her, but if their mother sees him she’ll chew him out for not telling her earlier.
He makes it to his front door and leaves at stop speed, still working his feet into his shoes as he closes the door. He doubts they’ve heard him leave and anyway he doesn’t care.
He’s always the bone of contention. His sister resents their mother’s double standards - what behavior she condones in Rin as boys, it’s typical (staying out late, leaving the house without telling her, piercing ears, fighting, the experimental cigarette) she punishes - harshly - in Rika.
Rin grins a little to himself, remembering the day his thirteen-year-old Rika came home from a supposed project meeting with her neat blond five-year-old-type pigtails sheared off and with her shock of short hair streaked pink. The dye had washed out, but the haircut didn’t. The peace and quiet of the Hirakoba household fell to pieces.
At that time he was proud of his sister, resonating with her exhilaration, but now, a year later, every step of the way a fight, he’s kinda tired of all the mud-slinging. The tennis tournaments are looming, their graduation examinations are looming, and he’s sick of the constant shouting. Their mother can’t see that her twins are too alike, she can’t help but superimpose her ideas about how girls should be behave and about the consequences of what she calls ‘bad behavior’.
One consequence is having to bring up two little children single-handedly, of course. Which is why the condom stunt is totally freaking ’Kaa-san out, because the thought of her daughter ending up like her is probably what she’s been trying to avoid all along. But Rika’s not stupid, and Rin’s not stupid, and it won’t happen like that.
Now if only they could tell her that.
Rin shrugs to himself, gazing idly round the bus stop. It’s old, the paint on the pillars peeling in some places, all kinds of graffiti scribbled on it, and there are notices tacked hodgepodge all over it. His eyes follow them in no particular order - left, tuition classes. Rika refuses to attend hers. Above, piano classes, which, like the ballet lessons, ended when they couldn’t afford it. A couple flats for rent - even at those prices, Rika won’t be able to move out like she threatens, and they all know it, ’Kaa-san uses it as ammunition and Rika swears that one day she’ll be desperate enough to sleep on the streets and become a prostitute (if that ever happens Rin will club her on the head and drag her home by her short hair). Some flats for sale. A missing Shih Tzu by the name of Akiko and a reward - Rin can’t help but think that a dog that pretty, if not found by now, would have been totally bashed up by the neighborhood dogs. Just like Rika, who’s all bark and no bite.
The bus rolls up, resplendent in a cloud of dust particles and exhaust and setting sunlight, and Rin gets on. If only ’Kaa-san would just see that Rika isn’t a little girl anymore, Rin thinks. And if only Rika would stop doing things just to piss ’Kaa-san off. She likes brushing Rin’s hair so much that Rin knows she likes long hair, only that ’Kaa-san likes it too, so she’s keeping hers short, which to Rin’s mind is just stupid.
Rin sighs and leans his forehead against the windows.
*
It’s only early spring, and the night breezes are icy-fresh against Rin’s skin by the time he gets to Kite’s house, and his cheeks are a fine pink and his feet and fingers are frigid as he buzzes the intercom.
‘Kite residence!’ It’s Kite-san, Kite’s mother, who speaks in dulcet tones, like a balm to Rin’s ears after the shrieking he’s endured in his own home.
‘Ah -’ there’s a moment of hesitation, there always is. This isn’t his home, after all. ‘It’s me, Rin. I’m sorry for disturbing, you, Kite-san -’ And it’s kinda strange, and Rin can’t exactly explain this yearning in him, this awkwardness when he’s usually straightforward and direct and unafraid to tell people what he wants.
‘You’re never a bother, Rin-kun! Come right in, then. Have you had dinner?’ It doesn’t matter if he says yes or no, Kite-san will feed him anyway, because she believes growing children can never have too much nourishment. Honestly, Rin thinks she’s an amazing woman. She looks like Kite, or rather, Kite looks like her, except that she doesn’t have Kite’s bizarre (he’ll never say it to Kite, though) cowlick. Instead, her hair falls down her back in luxuriant waves, and she doesn’t look in the least like she has a fourteen-year-old son. She was a university professor in biology before she decided to stay at home, and very importantly, she cooks absolutely fantastic food.
Rin’s half in love with her as she ushers him into the house - three storeys and a garden and a backyard, installments probably fully paid off since Kite’s father is a chemistry Ph.D. working with a major pharmaceutical, two cars in the driveway, and it’s so warm. They probably have some funky central heating system, because honestly Rin can feel the parquet of the floor warming his frozen toes, and he can’t help but compare it to his own dingy apartment. He can remember first coming here when he was twelve, and admiring the Chinese calligraphy on the wall and the light-colored wood that featured so predominantly in the Kite household, and the plush cushions in velveteen, and there’s an elegant timelessness about this house that Rin just adores.
He’s glad that he’s welcome here, and even gladder when Kite-san sets a bowl of seafood stew in front of him, saying, ‘Eishirou’s in the shower, and we’ve already had dinner. I was just about to clear that away, so you can eat as much as you want, Rin-kun.’
Man, he doesn’t need her to tell him that! It’s fantastic. Convenience-store food has nothing on this, and he says so.
She laughs, taking the seat beside him. ‘It’s good to know you enjoy it. It’s nice that Eishirou has a friend like you. He’s always so... serious, and he never really gets into trouble. When I was younger I had all sorts on theories on child raising. I was a rebellious teenager too -’ To Rin’s immense surprise she sticks out her tongue, and Rin realizes she’s had her tongue pierced before. It’s not a very... motherly thing, and she laughs again, this time at the look of complete shock he’s probably wearing. ‘So I wanted to make sure I didn’t make the mistakes my parents made with me. But Eishirou’s so like his father.’
‘Mother,’ Kite says, and Rin jumps in his chair, barely managing not to splash the soup.
‘Ara, Eishirou,’ she smiles innocently at her son, as if she hasn’t been talking about him at all. ‘I’ll cut the two of you some fruit. Are peaches alright with you, Rin-kun?’
‘Sure,’ he answers.
She busses her son on the cheek. Kite accepts the caress and sits down beside Rin, falling gracefully into the chair his mother recently vacated, watching Rin eating. Only he and Kai and Chinen know that Rin has family troubles - it’s not something Rin wants broadcast, and Kite can certainly understand that. His mother knows, but Kite has long resigned himself to the fact that his mother is disturbingly insightful. He’s never said a thing to her about Rin’s situation and she’s certainly never pried, probably because she somehow already knows.
And recently, Rin’s been coming over to his house more and more, almost two days out of three, which can only mean it’s getting worse. As captain and classmate, Kite knows Rin needs the peace and quiet, to actually study and rest and be prepared for the upcoming tournaments and tests, and because of that it’s his duty to let Rin come over when the bickering at home gets too bad. As a friend, as a best friend, Kite wants to be able to help Rin, because he knows that while Rin adores being in his house, Rin also hates the fact that it’s not his house. That he’ll never be more than a guest. Kite wants to tell him that Rin should feel welcome to be here. That Rin’s not a guest in this house, that his mother loves having Rin around and Kite certainly doesn’t mind the company and Rin is welcome to take whatever he wants.
But instead, all he can say is, ‘Did you bring the work for class tomorrow?’
Rin nods, swallowing a mouthful of squid before he replies. ‘Yeah, I did. Haven’t finished it, though, and if there’s a quiz tomorrow I’m probably gonna fail.’ He stretches, and his feet brush against Kite’s.
Kite hisses and draws away. ‘Are those your feet? They’re cold!’
Rin shrugs. ‘I get cold easily, especially my fingers and feet. It’s already warmer in your house, they’ll be fine soon.’
Kite looks at Rin, notes the yearning in his voice when he says your house, and stretches out his feet, putting them on top of Rin’s. Rin glances sharply up at him, but Kite doesn’t acknowledge it, instead choosing to say, ‘I made notes. I’ll lend them to you.’
Rin looks at him for a moment longer, then wriggles his toes into the arches of Kite’s feet with a little contented sound. They’re so cold they barely tickle, more like a numb sort of burning where they touch. If Rin’s feet are this cold now, they must have been terrible before.
‘Thanks, Eishirou. You’re the best,’ Rin says, and smiles. There’s a bit of vegetable stuck in his teeth, and it ruins the tableau a little, but Kite appreciates the sentiment anyway, and smiles back. ‘How’s doubles with Chinen?’
‘It’s going good,’ Rin answers, taking more leisurely bites of the dinner now that the first edge of hunger’s blunted. His toes are getting warmer. ‘Better than you and me, anyway.’
‘You and I,’ Kite corrects absent-mindedly. ‘Yes, our doubles combination was quite bad.’
‘Quite bad doesn’t even begin to cut it,’ Rin snorts. ‘We were awful, Eishirou. You ran straight into me!’
‘And you did the same,’ Kite reminds Rin, raising an eyebrow.
‘Whatever,’ Rin answers. ‘But Chinen and I - ’ Rin drawls sarcastically ‘- will be in fair doubles shape, and there’s Aragaki and Shiranui, so it should be fine.’
‘Should be isn’t good enough,’ Kite warns.
‘Hai, hai, buchou,’ Rin laughs. ‘We will be. Better?’
In the kitchen, Kite-san listens to the sound of laughter and smiles as she slices peaches with a deft hand.
*
‘Shit,’ Rin swears, tilting his head at the mirror and glaring, his hands at his right ear. ‘Eishirou!’
Kite looks up from his book. ‘Yes?’
‘Help me,’ Rin says, walking over and plopping down on the edge of the futon. ‘The stud’s caught, and I can’t pull it loose from this angle.’
Kite looks at Rin’s ear and says dryly, ‘Which one?’ Rin has three metal studs in his ear, and Kite has no clue which one he’s talking about.
Rin makes a little huffing noise. ‘The third one!’ He taps the earring.
Slightly bewildered, Kite moves a little closer to peer at the earring - ah, now he sees what Rin means. Instead of going straight through the backing, the stud’s canted to one side and probably not moving as it should. ‘Hold still,’ he instructs, trying to find a way to get a good hold of the earring. He’s used to a tennis grip and fists in the dojo - the smallest things he ever handles are usually chopsticks or pencils. Earrings are new.
Rin waits patiently as Kite fumbles with the earring. It’s an unexpectedly nice feeling, to have Kite so close to him, hands pressed against Rin’s cheekbone and neck. It’s warm, which has to be the best thing about being here. It’s certainly more than he can say for his family. He and Rika may be twins but they’ve been growing apart, surely but steadily, and their mother’s never been a particularly demonstrative person.
Family. Funny how Higa - even Tanishi, and certainly Chinen and Kai and Kite - have been become more of a real family than his sister and mother. How much more he enjoys being with them.
Kite eventually wedges a blunt fingernail between Rin’s ear and the metal and pulls it apart, getting the earring loose. Rin makes an exaggerated wince and laughs as he takes the earring from Kite, putting it on the desk with its fellows.
‘Goodnight, Eishirou,’ Rin murmurs, snuggling down into the blankets. More warmth. Fluffy, rich goosedown comforters, not like the cotton at home, which is all his mother can afford. Beside him, Kite’s already returned to his book, but he murmurs, ‘Goodnight, Rin.’
Probably he’s just read something amusing, but Rin would like to believe that Kite’s quirky little half-smile is directed at the rumble of satisfaction that Rin makes as he buries his face into the pillow.
*
Rin wakes up warm. He’s completely curled up in the blanket and there’re all these delicious smells in the air and it’s warm.
It’s brilliant. Rin rolls over and the whole blanket rolls with him. It’s still early - the sun’s barely risen, but Kite’s already up, he can hear the sounds of movement and the futon beside him’s empty, and he closes his eyes again. He’ll stay here a bit longer till Kite comes to wake him, and pretend that this is where he belongs.
But it seems like all too soon that Kite’s got one hand on his shoulder, shaking him gently. ‘Rin. Wake up.’
‘Nnnngh,’ Rin says, and uncurls himself from the blankets unwillingly. ‘Don’t wanna.’
‘I’ll make you run laps.’
‘Do you have to be so mean early in the morning, Eishirou?’ Rin grumbles, unfolding himself and getting up.
Kite’s lips move upwards in a half-smile. ‘My mother and I made pancakes.’
Ah. That’s a different story altogether. ‘Okay,’ Rin says. ‘I want second helpings.’
‘Certainly,’ Kite says. ‘I’ll see you at the breakfast table.’
Rin tidies himself up and charges downstairs, hair barely brushed and curling around his shoulders. Kite-san doesn’t seem to mind, greeting him with a smile and a plate of fat pancakes liberally coated in butter and honey.
If he were at home it would be bread and peanut butter or dry cereal with a glass of milk, him and Rika standing at the kitchen counter and eating mechanically. His mother would have left for work a great deal earlier. Here, it’s pancakes and cocoa and more fresh fruit, and they’re all sitting at the dining table (Rin’s family doesn’t even own a dining table) and there’re moments when jealousy sours the food in his mouth, jealousy at Kite and all the things he has in life. And then he feels guilty, because he has no right to think that about Kite, especially since he’s the interloper here. And then he figures that there’s no point thinking about it, so he just takes another bite of the pancakes, and tries to focus on how wonderful this is, here and right now.
*
Other than Kite’s house, Rin’s only escape is tennis and tennis practice.
They collapse on the beach. Every muscle in his body is burning, Rin thinks to himself. It even hurts to breathe.
Damn. He hurts.
‘You got that right,’ Kai groans. ‘Running on sand sucks.’
Rin agrees, though he can’t find the air to actually say it. He’d never thought he’d see the day when he actually disliked Okinawa’s beaches of soft, white sand, but running on it - there’s no resistance, no feeling of solid ground, it feels like every step you take you slide back half a pace. It sucks.
Running on sand sucks. Stamina training underwater sucks. Tug of rope sucks. Swing practice in the sea sucks. And he’s got an essay due tomorrow, which also sucks.
But it’s tennis, and they have the first round of the prefecturals coming up soon, and Rin tells himself firmly that he’s doing this for the day they’ll step onto the tennis courts and demolish their opponents. Without tennis he’d only have school and home, one uninspiring and the other one depressing. He’d be lost without tennis.
Kite staggers to his feet. ‘Let’s go,’ he says quietly, and the rest of them get up without any further complaint. Kai offers him a hand, and Rin takes it gratefully. ‘Morning practice tomorrow. Anyone who’s late is going to be doing a thousand push-ups.’
Kai drops back down to the sand and begins an excruciatingly slow push-up, dragging out the ‘Onnnnneeeeeee...’ mournfully. He flops back down, rolls over and offers Kite a grin. ‘Making a down payment first. Do you take IOUs, buchou?’
In answer, Kite places a foot square in Kai’s side and shoves. Kai rolls over and says, ‘Twoooooo...’, but doesn’t bother attempting the push-up. Rin giggles, too exhausted to laugh, and somehow it’s kinda hilarious because suddenly everyone else is giggling, chortling, chuckling, guffawing, and Kite’s firm mouth is quirked in a half-smile as his hysterical team laughs and laughs and laughs.
Yeah. There’s tennis and Kite’s grand crazy plans to go to Nationals and somehow, Rin knows it sounds crazy but the exhaustion and the pain and the hard work’s kinda fun and kinda worth it, and he likes it, loves it.
*
Victory is sweet. They sweep the gold trophy at Kyushu Regionals, and now it’s on to Nationals, and they’re training like crazy because it’s Nationals and by now everyone knows their name. They’ve come a long way from being absolute unknowns, and it’s great to be famous for being champions and right now it feels like they’re unstoppable. Rin loves the nickname they’ve given Kite on the tennis circuits: Hitman, very apt for Kite’s ruthless, driven style on the courts, and Rin thinks it’s pretty cool even if Kite himself won’t admit it. Rin teases him about it all the time in the hopes of getting a rise out of the ever-implacable Kite.
And Rin enjoys training more and more. Their entry to Nationals means that they all spend more time at tennis practice, which, for Rin, means less time in the house. He leaves the apartment whistling in the mornings, and smiles all the way to school.
It’s just another morning, one day closer to the Nationals date but otherwise a typical one, but this time, Rin pauses in mid-change of shirt, staring, arrested, at Kai’s swollen face. The right cheek’s entirely puffed up, making him look comically lopsided. ‘Whoa! What happened?’
‘Got slapped. Twice.’ Kai answers, wincing as he touches his cheek, which is rapidly going from dark red to plum-purple.
‘By two different girls,’ Aragaki adds, coming in behind him.
‘You were watching?’ Kai demands angrily, whirling around to face his teammate.
Aragaki scoffs and turns to his locker, grabbing his racket and beginning to wind grip tape around it. ‘Kai, half the schoolyard was watching. Your homeroom teacher was watching. Hell, I think the principal was watching.’
‘You deserved that one,’ Kite points out from his spot on the floor, stretching. ‘We did try to tell you this would happen.’
‘Bu-chou,’ Kai whines. ‘Take pity on me! Let me off practice today?’
‘No.’
‘I’m injured!’
‘Some injury,’ Rin snorts as Aragaki laughs, ignoring the glare Kai sends his way.
‘Someday, Hirakoba Rin,’ Kai proclaims, ‘You’re going to get slapped too. And when that day comes, I’m gonna laugh at you. And you too!’ he snaps at Aragaki.
‘Please,’ Rin dismisses the idea. ‘I’m not stupid enough to two-time. And besides,’ he adds slyly, ‘There’s only one person I want to date.’
‘There’s someone you want?’ Kai gasps, his anger forgotten. ‘Oh my god, Rinrin, who?’
‘Don’t call me that.’
‘I know! Takahashi Mayumi from Class C, right? She’s totally into you!’
‘Of course not.’
‘Who, Rin, who?’
‘Buchou,’ Rin calls. ‘I’m going to run laps.’
He waits for Kite’s answering nod before setting off with a self-satisfied little chuckle, Kai still hot on his heels. There’s no one he wants to date right now. He gets love letters from girls, yes, but unlike Kai he never bothers to answer them, even to reject them. Right now he just wants to focus on winning at tennis and being with his friends, and that’s enough.
*
They lose at Nationals. Nobody knows what to say on the plane trip back to Okinawa. No one says anything at all. It’s markedly different from the atmosphere when they left, when they were all chattering and fighting for the aisle seat or the window seat or the last bag of vacuum-sealed peanuts and Kite uncharacteristically permitted their antics, made indulgent by success. Rin tries to sleep but fails - but he just keeps his eyes closed and pretends anyway. At least that way he has a reason not to be saying anything. At least that way it’s less obvious that he doesn’t know what to say.
Seigaku beat them six sets to none and it’s a shock to their collective pride, their undefeated record crumbling under the might of Tezuka Kunimitsu’s team. And now they’ve seen the matches - Hyotei against Seigaku, Seigaku and Shitenhouji, Seigaku and Rikkai, and Rin is never going to forget those matches because they were completely awesome, but what rankles is the fact that they were never going to win anyway. Rin’s prideful, not stupid, and he knows they would have been owned. The amount of talent in the Kanto region is terrifying. Compared to them, Kyushu’s teams were just the tip of the iceberg, and they hadn’t realized it, and they’d crashed their ship.
No matter, though. Now that they know it’s there they’ll watch out for it in future.
Kite, though, continues to brood over the next few days, and so does the rest of the team - except for maybe Kai, who’s like the ocean, taking whatever comes with an easy, graceful acceptance. Kite’s determined but in a black way, with a storm-cloud expression on his face, and Chinen, Tanishi, Aragaki, Shiranui - they’re just depressed. There’s none of the drive they had in practices before. Sure, they do them, they run laps and swing and play matches but there’s something intangible gone from the air, and it’s pissing Rin off, majorly.
Rin stomps into the locker room one morning and sees Chinen with his head bent at his locker and damnit, it’s such a dejected posture that Rin just throws his tennis bag against the wall and kicks the door shut behind him and everyone in the room jumps and stares at him as he folds his arms and yells, ‘Can we please stop acting like someone’s just died?’
No answer, only blank faces and empty looks, as if they don’t know what he’s saying. It only goads Rin’s temper more.
‘Sure, we lost. Yes, Eishirou lost. Seigaku’s a better team than we are! There! Said it! Now we’d bloody better start improving and stop moping about it!’ Rin hollers. The door creaks. There’re probably freshmen outside with their ears pressed against the wood, but he doesn’t care. ‘Sure, tennis is over for this year. There’s always next year! And if you want to be better next year, if you want to go somewhere next year, we have to start improving because if you think Rikkai’s moping cause they lost to Seigaku you’re probably wrong!’
Rin stands there and smokes, like a gun that’s just been fired, letting the words sink in. Tanishi - of all the unexpected allies - says, ‘Rin’s right. Marui was telling me that Yukimura’s working them all twice as hard as he used to.’
‘See?’ Rin smiles the self-satisfied smile of the vindicated.
‘Rinrin’s right,’ Kai says, over the annoyed automatic ‘Don’t call me that’ from Rin. ‘We should be working harder.’
Rin watches in satisfaction as the spirits lift. There’s no actual difference but who cares about actual differences? They feel different. Warmer, stronger, closer for what Rin’s just said. Defeat can bond a team as strongly as victory, Rin realizes. Maybe even more.
*
Kite walks to the clubroom still carrying the baggage of Nationals, and Tezuka Kunimitsu. Try as he might he can’t see any other way their match might have gone. Seigaku irritates him, them and their charmed tennis careers. Their freshman against Yukimura Seiichi, reigning prince of the tennis courts - Kite would never have expected Yukimura to lose. But he did.
But Echizen Ryoma’s not the point. The point is Tezuka Kunimitsu and Yukimura Seiichi and the rest of the third years who will be right there again next year at tennis Nationals. And he’s got a year to think of how to beat them - cleanly this time. None of the desperate tactics.
That’s one thing he’s not proud of. He won’t tell his parents and he won’t tell his grandfather anything about that, because he can see now, how pointless it is to win by crippling an opponent. By hurting the other side’s coaches. By throwing grit in his opponent’s eyes. If he had a way of contacting Tezuka he’d call and apologize for it, even if he had to throw away every last inch of his pride in doing so.
But he doesn’t know how to contact Tezuka, so for now he settles for running laps like they’re a punishment, for working at the bench presses and the weights till every inch of him is sore, like it’s some kind of atonement. Until next year, when he can play Tezuka again and play him properly and show him that Higa can win without playing dirty.
No guarantees on the violence, though. No coaches, and no dust, but he’s not about to tell his teammates to stop being intimidating. He’s not going to tell Tanishi to stop using the Big Bang to hurt his opponents. As far as Kite’s concerned, once you’ve stepped onto the tennis courts you’re fair game for anything, including injuries.
As he wraps his hand around the doorknob, he hears a familiar voice scream ‘Stop moping about it!’ Raising an eyebrow, he opens the door a fraction and slips in noiselessly. Some eyes widen at the sight of him, but he gives them a definite shake of the head, closing the door soundlessly and leaning against it. Rin’s standing in front of him, completely oblivious to his presence and yelling fit to burst.
Rin. Willful, headstrong Rin, who’ll play his game his way regardless of orders from captain or coach. Rin, who’s been working harder than ever and now, Rin, who’ll apparently yell at the team in Kite’s absence. He listens to Rin’s words and smiles a little to himself, watching Rin’s confrontational stance, the way he tosses his head as he gestures to make a point, blond hair falling down his back. Rin, who without knowing it is encouraging Kite, warming him, as much as it’s galvanizing the rest of them. And as he watches them respond to Rin, he’s suddenly so proud of all of them, even despite their loss.
They’ve tried hard. They’ve come a long way, even if they’ve lost. He shouldn’t have lost sight of that.
Kite grins and steps forward. ‘Fifty laps, all of you. And if you ever lose again, it’ll be five hundred.’
Rin whirls around in surprise and then breaks into a massive smile when he sees him. ‘Eishirou!’ he exclaims. ‘When-’
He cuts across Rin’s question. Not now. ‘And the freshmen listening outside! Swing practice, go to it!’
Higa will be stronger than ever for this.
*
‘Come to my house tonight,’ Kite offers. As Rin hesitates, Kite adds, ‘My mother’s cooking udon.’
They walk back to Kite’s house together, silent for a while. Tennis season’s going to be over soon, Rin thinks. Winters in Okinawa are rarely very harsh, but soon the courts’ll be closed and it’ll be endless repetitions of exercises in the gym amidst the end-of-year examinations. Hopefully there’ll be time for ice-skating, though.
‘I heard what you said today,’ Kite says, interrupting their silence. Rin flushes a little.
‘Thank you for saying all those things,’ Kite continues, his dark eyes intent on Rin. ‘I should have been the one to say it, I know.’
‘Eishirou-’ Rin begins, then stops. How to say this? What to say, what won’t sound like a platitude even if he’ s sincere in saying it? He’s not like Kai, who has a good instinct for when to say what to say. He’s not like Chinen, who can say something without actually saying it. Rin envies the two of them.
He eventually settles for: ‘We believe in you.’
Because those are the words he used when they first started to play tennis. They’re unoriginal and not enough, not enough to convey his faith in Kite and his trust in Kite’s leadership and the fact that without Kite there, there wouldn’t be much of a them at all, and that they need him.
‘We always have, Eishirou. I always have,’ Rin says softly, looking at Kite, willing him to understand. ‘And we always will.’ The words are all he has to offer.
Finally, Kite dips his head in the slightest of movements, the smallest of smiles creasing those full lips, easing away the compressed lines that Kite had been wearing ever since their return to Okinawa without the medal they’d wanted. ‘Thank you, Rin.’
Rin smiles to himself, and the rest of the trip back is taken up by talking about plans for next year’s tennis.
The words are enough, then.
*
It’s the last practice of the winter season when Shiranui appears at morning practice covered in bruises. Kite takes one look at him and demands the whole story. Shiranui tries to demur but by now all the Regulars are gathered in the clubroom, all of them serious, none of their usual jokes and good-natured ribbing. The story comes out - Shiranui’s younger brother being extorted and bullied by a gang of thugs, high school dropouts - the whole tired old story, and by the time Shiranui is done, Rin is cracking his knuckles and Chinen’s smile is just a little bit feral, and Kite has that look. It’s the look that none of them can actually describe, but it’s the look that earned Kite the nickname Hitman.
After practice they gather by unspoken accord in the clubroom, waiting till everyone else leaves. Kite looks squarely at his team and says quietly, ‘If any of you get hurt, I’ll have you run laps till the middle of next week.’
An answering ripple of ‘Hai, buchou,’ rumbles throughout the room.
‘Let’s go,’ Kite orders.
No one messes with his team.
*
Kite asks, ‘Can I go home with you tonight?’
‘Huh?’ Rin asks. Has he heard wrong? He did get punched but it shouldn’t be affecting his hearing.
‘I don’t want my parents to see,’ Kite explains, and Rin nods, comprehension dawning on him.
Kite feels a rush of gratitude towards Rin. If he goes home like this his father will give him hell to pay - slight bruises, scraped knuckles, blood though it’s not his own. Rin’s mother - according to Rin - is far less likely to care, and even if she has the explanation she won’t be too concerned, especially if Rin can explain the reason. His father, though... The injuries aren’t anything that can’t be explained away by a hard tennis practice, anyway, but Kite doesn’t think he’s in any mood to lie - or even demur - right now, certainly not enough to fool his father. He’s still high on adrenaline and flushed from the fight, and his father would know something was off in an instant.
Rin knows, Rin understands, Rin’s own blue eyes still glittering queerly as they pick a back road, where they attract fewer wary stares. There’s a rip in Rin’s jersey and a fine bleeding line on Rin’s arm. Not a deep cut, but it was a blade they hadn’t expected. It was a good thing Rin had good reflexes, and Kite, furious and seeing red, had broken the guy’s arm so many ways that he doubted he’d ever be able to hold a knife again.
When Kite mentions the wound, Rin shrugs it off, laughing; Kite fixes him with a stern look. ‘You were lucky,’ he admonishes.
‘Not lucky,’ Rin corrects him. ‘I would’ve ducked his next one, you know that. And besides, you were there.’ He slings the uninjured arm over Kite’s shoulders, and after a moment, Kite does the same.
Rin grins. ‘That’s right. Ain’t no one ever gonna beat us, Eishirou.’
*
Rin gets a great deal more hesitant as they get closer to his house. He pulls away from Kite, stuffs his hands in his pockets and slows down, his steps shuffling against the concrete. ‘My place - well, it’s not like yours,’ he says, not looking at Kite.
‘It’s fine,’ Kite answers. He thinks he has a good idea of what he can expect.
It’s better than what he’d thought, actually. The flat is small but clean and neat if a little bare. There’s none of the elegance of his own house and a lot of the furniture is the cheap, flimsy sort, but it’s not haphazard and it’s nothing to be ashamed of. Rin introduces him. She looks stressed, tired, old, but again that’s nothing Kite doesn’t already anticipate. She says a few polite words and then Rin pulls Kite down a corridor and into his room.
As Rin disappears to get the first aid kit from the bathroom, Kite looks around the room itself. Closet, bookshelf, desk, bed. It’s fairly neat, with only the books spread across the desk, the blanket not tucked in properly into the bed. Kite’s seen Kai’s room. It looks like a tornado. Clothes closest to the door are the filthy ones, clothes further in on the floor are cleaner. The only thing you can find in Kai’s room is his tennis racket, which he places on a rack on the wall.
Kite sits himself down on the floor and leans against the Western style bed.
Suddenly, a door slams. There’s a call of ‘Rika!’ - he assumes it’s Hirakoba-san - and suddenly, footsteps echo down the corridor. Rin enters the room hastily and shuts the door, leaning against it for a moment before he approaches Kite and sets the first aid box down between them.
‘Are you drunk?’ Hirakoba-san again, her voice rising, incredulous on the last word. ‘You’re barely fifteen! Where - who did you get the liquor from?’
If Rin’s twin - Rika - makes an answer, Kite can’t hear it. He douses the line on Rin’s arm in antiseptic, but Rin doesn’t wince. He does wince, however, when his mother begins shouting, and looks away.
Kite flushes. He’d thought he could have anticipated what the quarrel would be like. But the reality of it is quite different, he feels the shame of a voyeur who doesn’t want to watch this family air their dirty laundry in public, not quite shame for himself but for them - and suddenly he feels a surge of sympathy for Rin, who must feel like an interloper in his own house, nowhere to belong except maybe at school and at tennis, not even in Kite’s own house. It’s no wonder that he likes visiting his place, if this - Kite flinches involuntarily at a high-pitched female scream of outrage, the fury joined by another voice in a rising crescendo - is what he has to face daily.
On impulse, he sets the cotton pads aside and shuffles closer to Rin, rising to his knees to pull him into an awkward sort of half-hug half-pat. He’s not good at physical contact but he’s even worse at words, and Rin is the sort of person who responds to being touched. To warmth.
Rin holds still for a moment, as the shouting continues. Then, as Kite doesn’t let go, he relaxes and burrows closer, trying to muffle the words. Kite shifts and he shifts and they end up in a proper hug, bodies pressed together with a soothing arm around his shoulder, the kind of hug that Rin doesn’t know that he’s been craving.
It’s not just the central heating or the lovely surroundings and all the wonderful things that make Kite’s house warm. It’s the people. It’s Kite, because Rin’s never been anything but cold in this room but this once, just this once, it’s warm and Kite’s arms are warm and he doesn’t want to let Kite go.
When Rin wakes up the next morning, the two of them are curled up together on the bed with the thin blanket thrown over them and his feet are caught between Kite’s calf and the bed and his toes are wonderfully warm. A thought occurs to him:
He’s in love with Kite Eishirou.
*
Rin struggles with it. He struggles with it and doesn’t dare tell anyone, not even Rika, who can sense that something’s up with him but she doesn’t ask him and that tears at Rin too, because it wasn’t that long ago that they were willing to tell each other everything. It’s different now, though. Rin finds himself writing Kite’s name in the middle of a sentence on history or literature or something, and he doesn’t dare hand up his essays without proofreading them several times anymore. He doesn’t know what to think of this feeling, like a girl, really, and that’s another thing, because they’re both boys and Rin’s not stupid enough to think that that’s all right.
He keeps it to himself for about a month and then can’t bear the pressure anymore.
He has to tell someone. Anyone, to talk it out with. To actually hear the words that keep resounding in his head and maybe then he can tell if they sound true or false and if they’re true maybe then, then he can try to deal with it.
He decides to tell Kai.
Kai gets into a lot of shit with girls because of his easygoing attitude (that, and the fact that he’s too in love with the ocean to be very in love with them). They think he doesn’t take them seriously, they think he treats everything too casually, including his relationships, half of which end in slaps, or tears, or both. But it’s not that he doesn’t care, honestly. It’s just that Kai’s a relaxed person, that he accepts things and doesn’t let them ruffle him too much.
Even so, even knowing that much about Kai, Rin hesitates to tell him.
But as he sits on the sand and watches the waves and knows that Kai’s somewhere out there, still swimming until the last light disappears, Rin remembers how Kai taught him and Rika to swim. How the sea had seemed frightening at that age, until Kai came along, an exuberant seven-year-old who’d almost been swimming before he started walking.
It would have been more typical if he’d done something like push Rika into the water. But instead, he’d cocked his head at Rin and Rika and asked them if they knew how to swim.
And when they said that they didn’t, he’d spent the rest of the day teaching them (as best as he could).
Trusting Kai. Trusting Kai not to drown them, trusting Kai not to give him away. Wasn’t it kinda the same thing?
Rin waits till Kai wades out of the ocean, golden in the dying light. He waits till they pack up and start back towards home.
And then he quietly gathers up his courage, and asks, ‘Kai?’
‘Hmm?’
‘I think I’m... I think I don’t like girls. I think... I might be in love with Eishirou.’
Kai doesn’t react immediately, though his face becomes more thoughtful - the slight wrinkling at the corners of his eyes, the unfocused look - and Rin doesn’t know whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing so he settles for being more anxious than ever although he tries his best not to let it show, but the thought of losing Kai, losing a best friend -
He won’t compare it to the standard clichés, like losing a limb. He’d rather lose a limb than Kai.
Finally, Kai nods. ‘Yeah, you might be.’
Relief.
It’s overwhelming. It’s all Rin can do not to stumble and keep pace with Kai. ‘What do you mean, might be?’
‘You probably don’t like girls. You’ve never thought even one of them was cute, right?’
For a moment, Rin wonders, does Kite’s mother count? He loves her, but not in that sense, more like, she’s the mother he’s always wanted but never actually had, so if he can’t really love his own mother he might as well love her. And if she’s the best example of women he’s ever seen, no, none of the simpering girls in school are anywhere near cute or lovable. ‘No.’
‘And honestly, Rinrin, you’re quite vain.’
Rin’s face rearranges itself into a highly indignant look as Kai chuckles. ‘You take longer in the shower than anyone, you use more sunblock in a month than I use in a year, you condition your hair, you moisturize. That’s... really kinda girly. Sorry to break it to you.’
‘I can’t help it if I sunburn easily. And I wouldn’t want to have hair like yours,’ Rin snipes half-heartedly.
Kai merely grins mischievously. ‘You break my heart, Rinrin. But anyway, if you don’t like girls, then you like guys. And honestly, if I were you there’re only so many guys you could be in love with. There’s me, of course.’
‘Come off it!’ Rin laughs, swattting at Kai’s arm. ‘No way!’
‘And honestly, you and Eishirou are very close, aren’t you? And even I think Eishirou’s hot and charismatic - hell, we all think he’s charismatic - and I don’t even bat for your team.’
‘Yeah,’ Rin murmurs. ‘He is.’
‘Do you want me to tell him?’
‘What?’ Rin yelps. ‘No! Of course not!’ There’s no way he’ll tell Kite - what’re the chances of Kite liking him as well? Kite might not even be as accepting as Kai about the ‘don’t-like-girls’ bit, and Rin has the sinking feeling that if he tells Kite, they’ll never be able to speak naturally again. There’ll always be the awkwardness between them. And he doesn’t want that, ever.
‘Yeah,’ Kai agrees, and Rin sighs in relief. ‘It’s probably better to tell him yourself.’
Rin blanches.
Part II