FIC: Glory Days, Yukimura/Sanada, NC17 (5/7)
Title: Glory Days (5/7)
Author: Ociwen
Rating: NC17
Disclaimer: Konomi owns all.
Summary: Sanada aims for the Nationals. And more...Yukimura/Sanada.
The hotel tennis courts are small, and the lines are faded and blurred with neglect. The floodlights are weak in this tucked-away back corner behind the hotel. Sanada can see the lights of the swimming pool through the chain-link fence, the blue of the water reflecting on the white of the hotel, sending eerie light filtering through the night. He can hear familiar voices shrieking between splashes of water- Jackal and Marui must be testing it out with canon balls and dives.
Sanada picks his racket up and tests the strings. It’s his first spare- his regular racket, his favourite Babolat VS Drive is in the shop after he broke a string in the Nationals returning Fuji Shuusuke’s Higuma Otoshi. Yukimura leans against the fence, stretching out his legs in lunges and squats. Then he walks up to the net, swinging his racket lightly. “Ready, Sanada?” he asks, smiling. He adjusts the black bands around his wrists and waits.
Sanada steps up to the court. “Smooth or rough?”
“Rough,” Yukimura says. His eyes don’t leave Sanada’s, but glow darkly, dangerously. Sanada feels a cold frisson from them and a shudder runs down his spine.
Yukimura has the first serve. He hesitates on the baseline as Sanada stands on centrecourt, where Yukimura likes to hit his shots most of the time, if he remembers Yanagi’s data. He cocks his head and fixes his headband. “We should play for something good, don’t you think? Winner…tops?”
Sanada blinks. Then turns a deep shade of red. Yukimura laughs at his blush. “Is that fair, Sanada?” he asks.
Sanada clears the choking in his throat with a wet cough. “Just serve,” he grumbles.
“Play hard, then,” Yukimura says as he throws the ball into the midnight sky above. It arcs, neon against black, then disappears into the clear blackness, before Yukimura’s racket slams it across the net. Sanada rushes left to return it with a fast volley.
Yukimura plays a quick game, perhaps in part because his body is still recovering, despite the drawn-out match with Tezuka, and in part because he knows that Sanada has the capability to best even Tezuka or Atobe with endurance matches. He wasn’t number one on the circuit for nothing. But Yukimura switches things up, a trickster like Niou in some ways, slamming balls fast and light, then slow and heavy, baseline, net play, volleys, lobs. Sanada is panting and his back is slick with sweat under his t-shirt before his second serve.
The clay court is old, and the rain from earlier in the day had left a muddy, mucky mess that makes it hard to move properly, that makes Sanada work harder to keep from slipping, to keep his speed and his movements at Yukimura’s changing pace.
Yukimura flows, raging and rippling like an icy brook when Sanada tries to use his iron wall of defense, immovable like the mountain. Yukimura ripples and draws back around, the ball sliding over the net silently when Sanada is quiet like the forest. Yukimura has always been quieter.
Sanada is swift like the wind, and Yukimura diverts his path, sending shot after shot to the baseline, heavy and hard. Sanada lunges and strains for the balls. His runners slap across the court, spraying muddy water. He invades like fire, and Yukimura neutralizes every shot, every top spin, every slice until they drop like flies on Sanada’s court, no bounce at all.
Yukimura is black water, ink over the court. His hair flutters around him as he flies across the court, his face set in a stiff line, his whole body moving with his shots. Sanada knows he has lost the game before it had even begun.
He collapses to his knees when Yukimura takes the game, 6-2. No one had announced points. No one needed to.
Yukimura holds out a hand, tucking his racket under his arm. He pulls Sanada up with a strong, warm grip. “You played well,” he says.
“You played better,” Sanada replies.
Yukimura smiles. “You didn’t lose, Genichirou,” he says.
They walk through the echoing hotel hallways, and stop at the ice machine to fill their waterbottles before they enter the room. Sanada’s heart pounds in his chest, so much that he can barely hear the door click behind them. The walls are closing in around them. He knows what will happen tonight, as much as he knew the outcome of the game before.
“Are you scared?” Yukimura whispers. He flicks off the overhead lights in favour of a swinging lamp between the two beds. The light is softer and hangs in shadows across his face, highlighting his smile, making his eyes glow like tiny lanterns, bright and yellow, lit by fires deep within.
“Yes,” Sanada says. He stares at his knees, caked with mud from the courts. He reaches for a tissue to wipe it, but Yukimura’s fingers close around his wrist. He pulls Sanada’s hand to his lips, then Sanada feels something wet and hot slide across his palm.
“So am I,” Yukimura says. “It feels like I’m at the Nationals, all over again.”
“You were scared at the Nationals?” Sanada stares at him, blinking quickly.
Yukimura makes a noise in his throat, not quite a hum, not quite a laugh. He takes Sanada’s cap off and sets it on the table between the beds. “Yes,” he whispers. His voice is so quiet it might be the wind, or the rattle of the air conditioning, if it were not for the slightest movement of his lips forming the word.
“Genichirou,” he whispers, stronger as he leans into Sanada. Their noses brush. Sanada cups Yukimura’s chin with his hands, unable to hold back. They kiss like fire, tongues invading and hands burning skin under shirts, under waistbands, undressing and tugging as buttons are loosened and fabric thrown across the room. Yukimura is glorious in this light, his skin warmed by the light, his skin soft under Sanada’s mouth. He moves and sighs, his chest rises and falls with gasps as Sanada kisses everywhere, touches the little places with his hands that he learns, from today and earlier.
Sanada Genichirou keeps his promises, even when Yukimura hesitates, pressed above his body. Their skin is slick with sweat and their legs slide together, hands grasping shoulders, arms, sides, hips, thighs before mouths and tongues glide over, tasting, testing, trying again. Sanada pushes a lock of Yukimura’s hair back from his eyes, telling Yukimura yes without words, without anything except a lingering kiss.
He had expected the awkward fumbling. He had expected the strange feeling. He hadn’t expected to gasp and gape as Yukimura strains above him, asking “Is this okay?” as he starts to wiggle his finger. Sanada can barely focus on anything more than Yukimura, than Yukimura’s fingers, sliding inside, experimental and new. He nods once.
Yukimura is heavy. And so close, so very close. They are naked and stripped to the bone in this moment, and Sanada longs for his cap, to cover his eyes, to cover the expressions he must be making, to hide in this moment of intense intimacy that scares him, not least when Yukimura enters him with a shuddered breath, not least when his body arches back, not least when they start to slide and move against each other, that age-old rhythm a little like tennis, the pace set by neither and by both this time.
“Genichirou,” Yukimura gasps in his ear, thrusting slowly. He’s heavier than Sanada would have thought, his body pushing down and back, then sliding deeper and deeper. He invades not like fire, but like smooth water, swelling back and forward like the tide, but his touch still burns. Pleasure courses through Sanada’s veins. He’s so hard, so aching, but he can’t get a hand between their bodies to touch himself; he’s clinging to Yukimura, digging his soft skin hard and sharp when Yukimura moves and hits something that makes him suck in his breath.
“Are you all right?” Yukimura croaks. “Am I-”
“No!” Sanada all but begs him, groaning and shifting his hips back. His legs are numb and cramped, hooked around Yukimura’s shoulders. He’s no acrobatic star and this position hurts, but it all feels so so good that he can’t stop and he doesn’t want to.
“Do that again!” he moans. “Seiichi…” he throws his head back on the pillow, arching himself, rubbing his cock on Yukimura’s belly, searching for friction on his slippery skin.
Yukimura finds that sweet spot again and again and again and Sanada can’t hold back the rising wave within. He stiffens and he can feel his legs shake around Yukimura and everything stills, time stopping, in that briefest moment before he falls, gasping his climax against Yukimura, digging in hard and fast and shuddering and gasping and falling falling falling.
His skin hums, Yukimura’s open mouth on his neck as Yukimura shakes and thrusts, erratic in his own last moments as Sanada recovers himself. He holds tight as Yukimura gasps against his skin, spilling himself hot inside with the smallest of moans, not quite a whimper, not quite a sob or a sigh.
They lie sticky and replete and silent. Sanada thinks everything has changed. He feels different, having done that, having had sex now. And yet at the same time, nothing has changed. Yukimura is still himself, solid and warm and lying across Sanada’s chest as his breathing slows and softens and his heart stops pounding quite so hard.
A light rain has begun outside again. It patters against the glass panes of the balcony doorway, tap tap tap in rhythm with their pulses. Yukimura rolls over and pulls the condom off. Sanada lets his eyes rove over his back. He props himself up on one elbow, still shaking from the aftermath, and watches Yukimura walk across the room to the bathroom, his skin aglow with muted light, glittering with beads of sweat.
Six months ago he was a skeleton in the hospital, threaded with tubes and needles, pale and scrawny and small as a child. He thinks of how much has changed when Yukimura crawls back onto the bed and under the sheets.
“Turn off the light, Sanada,” he says. “I’m tired.”
In the darkness, Yukimura spoons against Sanada’s back. Hands search out his, and tuck against his stomach, fingers twined and tight. Yukimura buries his face in Sanada’s neck and breathes in deep.
They have one more day here. Sanada doesn’t want this to end.
***
Come morning, he aches. His body has pains in places he didn’t think it could. He’s fit, he’s athletic and has excellent and strong muscles and bones, but he shuffles across the room like an old man, his legs and bum and back and everything stretched strange the night before. As pained as he feels, Sanada thinks it is a good sort of ache, one rooted deep inside, a memory of the night spent together.
He is furiously hungry, too. Dawn breaks and his stomach growls loud, raging with the desire to fling himself from bed and pray that the hotel breakfast buffet opens at six. He can’t sleep like this, as much as he wants to stay with Yukimura, warm and comfortable.
Sanada lies in bed, torn between Yukimura and breakfast. It takes him less than fifteen minutes before he can’t wait any longer. The shower is welcome against his skin, which feels slightly crusty. He leans against the tiles and his hand strays to his cock, his balls, cupping them and running over his stomach and his thighs, remembering all the places Yukimura had touched, had kissed.
Sanada dries his body off quickly and rubs his head with a towel, spraying the walls as he shakes the last bits of water he can from his hair. He pulls on his clothes, grabs his cap and shoes and runs out to the elevator, hotel swipecard in his pocket.
Marui is awake, too, and busy in the dining room. He is the first person there, and the only one besides Sanada. He looks up from a tray of steaming eggs and grins. They eat together, devouring plates of eggs and noodles and fried fish and toast and fruit. Sanada guzzles his tea, then goes back for more fish and bacon, too.
This is their last day here. They leave tomorrow morning. Sanada thinks that they will leave this interlude between school, between tennis season, and return to everything that is normal and usual and regular. He thinks that they will return to tennis and classes and he and Yukimura will be the same as they were before.
A hand brushes his shoulders, resting against the back of his chair. Marui looks up, fried fish still hanging from the sides of his mouth and says, “Buchou!” He sprays Sanada with food. Sanada scowls and wipes the fish from his face with a napkin as Yukimura sits down with them.
Sanada watches Yukimura out of the corner of his eye, the way he moves, the way he holds himself as he walks to the tables and serves himself noodles and baked fish and eggs and toast and tea. Does he move any differently? Does he act any differently? Since they had sex. Does Marui notice anything?
Sanada shifts in his seat. The chair is uncomfortable. His muscles ache. He wants to crawl back into bed and dream of tennis, and Yukimura, in exactly that order.
“Something wrong Sanada?” Marui asks. He prods Sanada in the arm with the end of his chopstick. “Your eye is twitching.” He smiles.
“Would you like some gum, Marui?” Yukimura offers him a stick from his pocket, which Marui accepts with relish.
“Cola-flavoured! One of my favourites, buchou!” He chews even louder than before, spitting everywhere as he starts to yak when Jackal slides into a seat at the table beside him.
Yukimura smiles at Sanada. His eyes glitter in the soft morning light streaming in from the wide windows overlooking the ocean, a beautiful azure glass plane, dotted with sailing boats and fishing trawlers. You’re welcome, he says without words.
This is their last day at the hotel. They go out to the beach early, although not early enough to avoid the initial onslaught of teeanged girls in tiny bikinis. Kirihara yawns and drags his feet on the beach, ignorant of the fleshy display. Jackal practically salivates whenever a buxom girl walks by, her barely-covered breasts jiggling. Sanada turns red and pulls his cap lower over his eyes. He is glad he has no sisters. He is glad he wants nothing to do with these girls. They make him uncomfortable.
Niou sleeps in the latest and joins them at noon. He saunters across the sand, wearing nothing but low-slung swimming shorts and a towel around his neck. “Yo,” he says, nodding to the group of them. Yagyuu glances up from his novel when Niou snatches it from him, and throws it over his shoulder. It hits Sanada in the arm with a thwap. The left side of his face twitches. His fist curls.
“Sanada,” Yukimura warns. Sanada stiffens and lets his hand go slack. Niou picks the novel up and dusts off the cover, before handing it back to Yagyuu, who frowns at him. Yukimura barely misses a beat when he continues to speak. “Would you mind?” he asks, nodding to the sunscreen in his hand. He points to his back.
“Not subtle at all, Yukimura,” Niou says. He whistles to himself as Sanada squirts some of the lotion on his hand and starts to rub it into Yukimura’s skin. He wants to backhand Niou’s smirking face so much that it hurts not to. He grinds his teeth and suffers in silence, doing exactly as Yukimura wants, as ever.
The thickest crowds come around lunch, around the same time as Niou. The air is filled with the smell of BBQed meat and grilled fish. They pull on t-shirts and sandals and walk to a little beachfront café run by a man covered in bandages. He runs around and speaks too loud and makes young girls squeamish as he leers at their cleavage and tries to pinch their bums. Sanada glares at him and asks where their food is in his loudest, most impressive sort of fukubuchou voice.
In the end, they leave the café, but not before Niou has managed to convince the bandaged owner to sell him a beer. He sips it as they walk along the boardwalk and eat shrimp skewers and grilled beef and shaved ice. Marui slows by an icecream vendor, ordering a triple cone of peanut butter, lychee and mint. Akaya whines loud enough that Yanagi caves and buys him a cone, too.
“Ice cream?” Yukimura asks Sanada.
“I don’t like sweets,” Sanada says.
Yukimura shrugs and orders chocolate.
He thinks that Yanagi ought to lecture them all about the dangers of swimming after eating, but Renji says nothing when they peel off t-shirts, barely back from lunch, and run for the ocean. Sanada hesitates for the briefest moment, but runs up to catch Akaya and Jackal, beating them both to the water as he splashes through the cold, surrounding waves. His skin is hot. His muscles are still sore from last night. It feels nice to float on the bobbing water. The ocean licks his ears as the tide rises and falls, rises and falls. He closes his eyes and lies back, spread-eagle. The sounds of hundreds of other beachgoers are drowned out. And he is silent and still and restful.
Until a hand shoots out to cover his face and pushes him under. He surfaces, sputtering and coughing with water up his nose and anger boiling. Kirihara grins at him after he pushes drenched bangs from his eyes.
“Akaya!” he shouts.
Kirihara bolts in a fresh kicking spray of water, laughing the entire way.
Sanada glares at him, and walks towards Renji and Yukimura, who stand waist-deep and talk. The sand shifts under his feet, cold earth moving as he walks through the resisting water. Renji smiles as Kirihara circles behind him, sticking out an insolent tongue at Sanada, happily flapping his arms in the water and being, in general, a complete brat.
“Do you remember Rokkaku’s Saeki?” Renji asks him. “I was speaking with him and he challenged us to a game of beach volleyball in a half hour.”
“We should show them what Rikkai can do in volleyball as well,” Yukimura says, smiling darkly. Sanada avoids reminding either of them that Rikkai has only managed to make runners up in the district preliminaries and Kantou regionals in volleyball for nearly twenty years, but grudgingly agrees to be roped into it. If even Yagyuu has agreed to play, Sanada Genichirou will damn well help lead the team to another victory.
Sanada doesn’t really remember any of Rokkaku’s team well until he sees the group of them, waiting and talking by a beach volleyball net. They are far too lax and casual for his liking. Maybe that was why they were eliminated in the first round of the Nationals. He’s heard rumours that they play on wooden playgrounds for practice, with elementary school children, no less. Rokkaku looks ever the part of Chiba beach bums, all tanned and some of them wearing sunglasses.
The one in the front of the group with bleached hair and black roots waves to Renji. “Yo!” he shouts. Sanada thinks this must be Saeki. He crosses his arms and scowls. Volleyball is not his game, but he’s not a spoilsport, either.
Someone pulls his cap from his head and a breeze ruffles his hair. Renji grins and scribbles something down in a notebook, before tearing the page up and shaking the papers in his cap.
“Nice hair, Sanada-fukubuchou,” Kirihara says. Another gust off the ocean flutters his hair. Sanada doesn’t pat down the flyaways, but he does box Kirihara on the ear when Yukimura is turned to pick a name from his cap.
“We’re playing doubles, Sanada,” Yukimura says.
“I’ll sit out and keep score,” Renji says. He passes the cap to Kirihara, who pulls out a paper slip and yells “Who is Kurobane?” into the Rokkaku team.
Yanagi sets himself up under the shade of a covered gazebo. The first teams are Jackal-Amane and Shudou-Saeki. Jackal stands ready to receive the serve. Sanada thinks he looks completely at home in the sand as Rokkaku, and when the volleys start, back and forth, slapping over the net, he plays better than they do.
“They must have a lot of beach volleyball in Brazil,” Yukimura murmurs beside him. Jackal scores a point and high-fives Amane. On the other side of the net, Saeki whispers something to his partner, who goes to serve the ball.
Jackal-Amane end up taking the game. After, as they walk to the gazebo and hand Kirihara the ball, Amane says something to Kurobane which Sanada doesn’t hear. What he does hear, however, is the sound of Kurobane’s leg whooshing through the air and smacking Amane in the back of the head.
“That wasn’t funny!” Kurobane shouts. “That was worse than usual.”
“Are they always like this?” Yukimura asks Saeki.
Saeki smiles back and says yes.
“We’re up,” Yukimura tells Sanada. Sanada grabs his cap from Yanagi’s lap and shoves it onto his head. He sighs heavily and digs his toes into the warm sand. Kirihara’s serve. In this game, he can use all the knuckles he wants.
His stomach twists a little with trepidation. The last time he saw Yukimura play doubles in anything was during a match in second year when the captain forced Yukimura and Yanagi to play doubles against the newly-formed Yagyuu-Niou team. In theory, they ought to have played a fast, fierce game, winning easily with 6-0 or 6-1. In reality, Yukimura was awful at doubles, ignoring Yanagi’s data, ignoring Yanagi’s attempts at hand signals, and instead going for all the balls himself.
It was also the only time he’d ever seen Yukimura shout at Yanagi. They ended up screaming over a ball at the centre of the court and refusing to play with each other ever again in doubles.
Sanada’s insides twist more violently as Yukimura narrows his eyes and bends his knees, ready to receive. He stands behind him at a far distance. Of all the names drawn from the cap, they ended up together.
Kirihara stretches the ball in front of himself with one hand and swings back with the other, arcing widely. Sanada tenses and leans forward, just as Kirihara makes contact with a slapping sound.
And falls on his knees, tangled up with the ball.
“Oops,” he says, laughing it off. He stands up quickly, swings his arm back again and hits it this time.
Kirihara is crap at volleyball, but Sanada is even worse. The lone ball he manages to hit- a stray missed by Yukimura- he hits into the net.
“What the hell was that?” Yukimura shouts. He stomps his feet. “Sanada, why did you go for that ball?”
Sanada says nothing. He rubs the inside of his forearms, where the ball hit. Little red bumps appear amidst his burning skin. The ball hurts. Kirihara pulls back during the next play and lets Kurobane take the hits. Sanada nurses his arm behind Yukimura, who defends the net like three Jackals, here, there, everywhere, refusing to let anything past. It grows into a stalemate of back and forth, back and forth, smashes and spikes and arcing of white across the net. Yanagi gets up at some point and comes back later with a large cup of crushed ice. He’s finished by the time Kurobane finally sneaks a ball past Yukimura, hard on his right, and wins the set.
“Why didn’t you go for that last ball?” Yukimura snaps at him after.
“Aa…I thought you had it,” Sanada manages.
“We were playing doubles, Genichirou,” Yukimura lectures. “You should have had my back.”
Sanada avoids telling Yukimura the same thing, and lets the matter slide. For someone who had just last night been kissing and touching and fucking him, Yukimura seems to have forgotten any recent intimacy and sweetness. His game face and his bedroom face are completely different. Two facets of the same player. His own personal Yagyuu-Niou combination.
Niou-Kisarazu pair and Yayguu-Itsuki play next. Sanada has always enjoyed watching Yagyuu and Niou play each other in practices. They know when and where the other will strike, particularly Niou. In volleyball, they play a haphazard game. Niou takes a hard ball to the side of the face barely a few minutes into the game. Yagyuu’s face looks pink and flushed in the sun. He apologizes, but Niou stalks under the net and punches him back in the face. His glasses fly onto the sand, glinting bright white as the two wrestle on the ground. Sand and punches fly by the time Itsuki and Renji pry them apart.
Niou lunges once more, taking a kick to the stomach from Yagyuu, but not before he manages to pants him. Yagyuu screams “Niou Masaharu you are DEAD!”
So much for a gentleman. He and Niou attack each other anew, grunting and punching and clawing. Sanada runs out to help Renji. He throws himself on Niou, pinning him to the ground. Niou flails and spits underneath him.
Yagyuu seethes through his teeth as he pulls his shorts back on. He carefully adjusts his glasses, and puts them back on too, and then he is the gentleman once more. “I think we ought to concede defeat,” he says. “Both of us.”
Niou snorts.
Yanagi has the last pair, Marui and Aoi, the Rokkaku freshmen captain, play next against Jackal-Amane pair. He sips the melted residue of his crushed ice and watches them. Marui looks forlornly at Yanagi, who waves for them to start. Sanada can practically hear the growling of Marui’s stomach from this distance, even over the loud, loud voice of Aoi.
“I’m so hungry,” Marui groans. He clutches his stomach and topples over onto the sand. Aoi’s face contorts and he dives to save the ball.
“Must. Get. It. Or else I’ll never date a single girl!” he yells.
The ball hits the top of the net and goes in. Aoi clenches his fist and grins.
“What is he talking about?” Yukimura asks Saeki.
Saeki shrugs. “He always does that.”
“That’s odd,” Yukimura replies.
“Kentarou-kun always manages to win, too,” Saeki adds. Yukimura hums and says nothing. Yanagi gets up and returns within a few minutes with a small cone of ice cream. Kirihara licks his lips, staring at the ice cream like a wolf staring down prey.
“Yanagi-senpai, do you think-” he starts, just as Jackal looks over from the middle of the game and shouts, “I really wish I could have Yanagi’s ice cream right now. It looks so-” he crouches to receive the ball, “good!” Jackal spikes the volleyball.
Marui is gone before the ball hits the sand, running across the beach and diving for the gazebo, grabbing Yanagi’s ice cream and moaning as he licks at it, over and over. His eyes roll back and a smile spreads over his face.
“You’re horrible, Renji,” Sanada mutters to him. Renji shrugs, face placid and ostensibly innocent.
Kirihara’s face, however, is crushed. He sighs heavily and mopes and refuses to play the next game with Kurobane against Jackal. Yukimura reaches into his pocket and hands Kirihara several bills. “Here, Akaya. My treat.”
“I’ll play for you, Akaya,” Renji announces. He stands, stretching his long arms out behind himself, then pads across the sand to play.
Between licks of ice cream, Marui cheers Jackal on. Rokkaku cheers for everyone, especially their teammates. Kirihara returns from the ice cream stand with an even bigger cone than Marui and screams for Yanagi to kick some Brazilian ass. In the cool shade, on the cool plastic chairs, Sanada leans back and contemplates napping. Or changing his position to one slightly more comfortable, one that doesn’t make his thighs and butt ache quite so much.
It doesn’t really matter to him who wins. Jackal-Amane team takes their friendly tournament, but the score is close. Kirihara flaps around Renji like a fly, buzzing about the game, his ice cream long forgotten. “Yanagi-senpai, Yanagi-senpai, you almost won!”
They shake hands with Rokkaku and linger around the area until the peanut vendors start to pack their umbrellas and the sun hangs low and gloaming on the meridian. The water shines with an amber stripe of sunlight as they walk back down the beach towards the hotel. The sand is hot as Sanada digs his feet into it, walking slowly to keep apace with Yukimura, who wades through the surf. The water washes around Yukimura’s ankles, lapping like a hundred thousand tongues all over his skin. His laughter is faint, but brilliantly bright.
Sanada wants their time here to last forever. He stops for a moment, and lets the feeling sink into his bones. Yukimura touches his elbow. “Sanada,” he whispers. The seabreeze flutters their hair, and it mingles over cheeks, over chins, black on black and glowing gold from the sunset.
“Yukimura-buchou!” Kirihara waves from down the beach, running back to them and dragging Yukimura’s arm for he and Sanada to catch up with the rest of the team. “Yagyuu’s found the chaperone!”
“He has?” Yukimura asks. He pries Kirihara’s fingers from his forearm delicately.
“Yeah- that girlfriend he was fu- I mean, brought here was tanning topless on the beach and they fell asleep and Yagyuu-senpai just found them. It was so funny!”
“Her…” Sanada swallows the dry lump in his throat. “Her breasts were funny?” he chokes out.
Kirihara stares at him as though he’s grown three more heads. “What? No, it was funny because Niou-senpai blackmailed Ito-sensei into giving us all the alcohol in his room’s bar fridge tonight so that we don’t tell the school what he’s been doing!”
The memory of the team with alcohol is fresh in Sanada’s mind. Too fresh. He slaps his hand to his forehead and groans. He can feel his skull pulsing with a headache at the thought already.
Yukimura holds Sanada back from the group, seeming to remain in the lap of the evening tide. He leans down and reaches in the rushing wet sand to pluck a small shell. “And if I had breasts, Sanada?” he asks, smiling.
Sanada blinks. “Eh?”
“So eloquent, Genichirou,” Yukimura teases. He leans down again, this time to flick water up at Sanada, provoking a reaction when Sanada steps back and trips on his feet, falling down onto the sand just as the tide rears up around him, wetting the bottom of his shorts. It soaks through to his skin. He stands, cringing at the feeling of wet underpants and shorts clinging and sticking the wrong way.
“I would…prefer you like this,” he manages.
Yukimura laughs again, and he forgets that his shorts are wet in the worst places, and he forgets that there is anything in the world besides the boy walking beside him through the damp, shifting sands.
***
Niou turns up in Sanada and Yukimura’s hotel room barely a few minutes after they return, with a large box in his arms. He pulls off his sunglasses and sets the box down on the glass-topped table, before calling Yagyuu on his cellphone. “I’ve got it,” he says, “Come over now.” He hangs up, then spreads himself out across Yukimura’s bed.
At least room service had been by while they were out at the beach. Sanada cringes inwardly at the thought of Niou discovering rumpled sheets and dried come and sweat stains.
“What are you doing?” he asks, crossing his arms across his chest and scowling at Niou’s toothy smile. “What’s in the box?”
“Provisions,” he answers enigmatically. When Yukimura pushes a flap from the top and peers inside, Niou adds, “Provided by our responsible and thoughtful chaperone, Ito-sensei.”
A knock on the door and Yagyuu and Jackal pour into the room, followed by Kirihara and Yanagi with Marui trailing.
“You are not drinking that here,” Sanada tells Niou, who pulls a little bottle of alcohol from the box and starts to drink it. Niou pauses mid-sip, then spits it out onto the carpet.
“The fuck!?” He wipes his mouth and starts to unscrew the other bottles. “The bastard tricked us! It’s not booze- it’s watered down tea!”
“That might not be such a bad idea, Niou-kun,” Yagyuu says.
“I didn’t really like booze before,” Kirihara says.
“I’m so hungry! Can we eat something soon?” Marui whines. He flops down on his back on the bed beside a sitting Yukimura and grabs the room service menu. Marui rubs his stomach and rolls over. “Isn’t anyone else hungry? Akaya?”
Niou dumps the entire contents of the box in the garbage can between the two beds. He sighs heavily. Yagyuu watches him out of the corner of his eye. Sanada does the same. The back of his neck prickles with the anticipation that the trickster has something else up his sleeve.
In this case, it seems to be a credit card.
“What’d you do? Steal the chaperone’s wallet from his room?” Marui asks. Niou waves it off.
“Dinner’s on the sensei,” he announces.
“Yukimura!” Sanada hisses. Do something!
Yukimura smiles. “Live a little, Sanada. We did make a bargain with him, after all. Which he broke.”
They order hamburgers and sushi and the biggest dessert plate on the menu, along with three dozen pontas and cokes. The valet gives them an odd look when Yukimura answers the knock on the door and takes the trays of food inside. He must see the eight teenage boys, all alone, in a nice hotel, and wonder if they had rich parents and where they were.
Kirihara is bouncing off the walls after three pontas and a piece of cake. Sanada wants to lecture him, to tell him that’s not a proper dinner for a growing teenager, but the jab in the side from Yukimura stops him. Even Renji is laughing and digging into the noodles and steak Jackal insisted on.
Sanada sighs, then makes a grab for the last piece of cake. He bites back a grin when Marui’s face falls as he takes a big bite, eating with his fingers and savouring the sickeningly sweet icing.
They finish off every bit of food, every parsley garnish, every slice of lemon for the drinks. Marui telephones for a second tray of desserts. “And make sure there’s big slices of cake,” he instructs.
Kirihara turns on the television and curls up between Yanagi and Yukimura, stretching out his legs. His eyes glaze over at the images on the television, but his fingers still reach for what few snacks Marui hasn’t got to. Sanada sips his coke. Jackal rolls over the other bed and Yagyuu and Niou have both snuck off. The first to arrive, the first to leave.
Author: Ociwen
Rating: NC17
Disclaimer: Konomi owns all.
Summary: Sanada aims for the Nationals. And more...Yukimura/Sanada.
The hotel tennis courts are small, and the lines are faded and blurred with neglect. The floodlights are weak in this tucked-away back corner behind the hotel. Sanada can see the lights of the swimming pool through the chain-link fence, the blue of the water reflecting on the white of the hotel, sending eerie light filtering through the night. He can hear familiar voices shrieking between splashes of water- Jackal and Marui must be testing it out with canon balls and dives.
Sanada picks his racket up and tests the strings. It’s his first spare- his regular racket, his favourite Babolat VS Drive is in the shop after he broke a string in the Nationals returning Fuji Shuusuke’s Higuma Otoshi. Yukimura leans against the fence, stretching out his legs in lunges and squats. Then he walks up to the net, swinging his racket lightly. “Ready, Sanada?” he asks, smiling. He adjusts the black bands around his wrists and waits.
Sanada steps up to the court. “Smooth or rough?”
“Rough,” Yukimura says. His eyes don’t leave Sanada’s, but glow darkly, dangerously. Sanada feels a cold frisson from them and a shudder runs down his spine.
Yukimura has the first serve. He hesitates on the baseline as Sanada stands on centrecourt, where Yukimura likes to hit his shots most of the time, if he remembers Yanagi’s data. He cocks his head and fixes his headband. “We should play for something good, don’t you think? Winner…tops?”
Sanada blinks. Then turns a deep shade of red. Yukimura laughs at his blush. “Is that fair, Sanada?” he asks.
Sanada clears the choking in his throat with a wet cough. “Just serve,” he grumbles.
“Play hard, then,” Yukimura says as he throws the ball into the midnight sky above. It arcs, neon against black, then disappears into the clear blackness, before Yukimura’s racket slams it across the net. Sanada rushes left to return it with a fast volley.
Yukimura plays a quick game, perhaps in part because his body is still recovering, despite the drawn-out match with Tezuka, and in part because he knows that Sanada has the capability to best even Tezuka or Atobe with endurance matches. He wasn’t number one on the circuit for nothing. But Yukimura switches things up, a trickster like Niou in some ways, slamming balls fast and light, then slow and heavy, baseline, net play, volleys, lobs. Sanada is panting and his back is slick with sweat under his t-shirt before his second serve.
The clay court is old, and the rain from earlier in the day had left a muddy, mucky mess that makes it hard to move properly, that makes Sanada work harder to keep from slipping, to keep his speed and his movements at Yukimura’s changing pace.
Yukimura flows, raging and rippling like an icy brook when Sanada tries to use his iron wall of defense, immovable like the mountain. Yukimura ripples and draws back around, the ball sliding over the net silently when Sanada is quiet like the forest. Yukimura has always been quieter.
Sanada is swift like the wind, and Yukimura diverts his path, sending shot after shot to the baseline, heavy and hard. Sanada lunges and strains for the balls. His runners slap across the court, spraying muddy water. He invades like fire, and Yukimura neutralizes every shot, every top spin, every slice until they drop like flies on Sanada’s court, no bounce at all.
Yukimura is black water, ink over the court. His hair flutters around him as he flies across the court, his face set in a stiff line, his whole body moving with his shots. Sanada knows he has lost the game before it had even begun.
He collapses to his knees when Yukimura takes the game, 6-2. No one had announced points. No one needed to.
Yukimura holds out a hand, tucking his racket under his arm. He pulls Sanada up with a strong, warm grip. “You played well,” he says.
“You played better,” Sanada replies.
Yukimura smiles. “You didn’t lose, Genichirou,” he says.
They walk through the echoing hotel hallways, and stop at the ice machine to fill their waterbottles before they enter the room. Sanada’s heart pounds in his chest, so much that he can barely hear the door click behind them. The walls are closing in around them. He knows what will happen tonight, as much as he knew the outcome of the game before.
“Are you scared?” Yukimura whispers. He flicks off the overhead lights in favour of a swinging lamp between the two beds. The light is softer and hangs in shadows across his face, highlighting his smile, making his eyes glow like tiny lanterns, bright and yellow, lit by fires deep within.
“Yes,” Sanada says. He stares at his knees, caked with mud from the courts. He reaches for a tissue to wipe it, but Yukimura’s fingers close around his wrist. He pulls Sanada’s hand to his lips, then Sanada feels something wet and hot slide across his palm.
“So am I,” Yukimura says. “It feels like I’m at the Nationals, all over again.”
“You were scared at the Nationals?” Sanada stares at him, blinking quickly.
Yukimura makes a noise in his throat, not quite a hum, not quite a laugh. He takes Sanada’s cap off and sets it on the table between the beds. “Yes,” he whispers. His voice is so quiet it might be the wind, or the rattle of the air conditioning, if it were not for the slightest movement of his lips forming the word.
“Genichirou,” he whispers, stronger as he leans into Sanada. Their noses brush. Sanada cups Yukimura’s chin with his hands, unable to hold back. They kiss like fire, tongues invading and hands burning skin under shirts, under waistbands, undressing and tugging as buttons are loosened and fabric thrown across the room. Yukimura is glorious in this light, his skin warmed by the light, his skin soft under Sanada’s mouth. He moves and sighs, his chest rises and falls with gasps as Sanada kisses everywhere, touches the little places with his hands that he learns, from today and earlier.
Sanada Genichirou keeps his promises, even when Yukimura hesitates, pressed above his body. Their skin is slick with sweat and their legs slide together, hands grasping shoulders, arms, sides, hips, thighs before mouths and tongues glide over, tasting, testing, trying again. Sanada pushes a lock of Yukimura’s hair back from his eyes, telling Yukimura yes without words, without anything except a lingering kiss.
He had expected the awkward fumbling. He had expected the strange feeling. He hadn’t expected to gasp and gape as Yukimura strains above him, asking “Is this okay?” as he starts to wiggle his finger. Sanada can barely focus on anything more than Yukimura, than Yukimura’s fingers, sliding inside, experimental and new. He nods once.
Yukimura is heavy. And so close, so very close. They are naked and stripped to the bone in this moment, and Sanada longs for his cap, to cover his eyes, to cover the expressions he must be making, to hide in this moment of intense intimacy that scares him, not least when Yukimura enters him with a shuddered breath, not least when his body arches back, not least when they start to slide and move against each other, that age-old rhythm a little like tennis, the pace set by neither and by both this time.
“Genichirou,” Yukimura gasps in his ear, thrusting slowly. He’s heavier than Sanada would have thought, his body pushing down and back, then sliding deeper and deeper. He invades not like fire, but like smooth water, swelling back and forward like the tide, but his touch still burns. Pleasure courses through Sanada’s veins. He’s so hard, so aching, but he can’t get a hand between their bodies to touch himself; he’s clinging to Yukimura, digging his soft skin hard and sharp when Yukimura moves and hits something that makes him suck in his breath.
“Are you all right?” Yukimura croaks. “Am I-”
“No!” Sanada all but begs him, groaning and shifting his hips back. His legs are numb and cramped, hooked around Yukimura’s shoulders. He’s no acrobatic star and this position hurts, but it all feels so so good that he can’t stop and he doesn’t want to.
“Do that again!” he moans. “Seiichi…” he throws his head back on the pillow, arching himself, rubbing his cock on Yukimura’s belly, searching for friction on his slippery skin.
Yukimura finds that sweet spot again and again and again and Sanada can’t hold back the rising wave within. He stiffens and he can feel his legs shake around Yukimura and everything stills, time stopping, in that briefest moment before he falls, gasping his climax against Yukimura, digging in hard and fast and shuddering and gasping and falling falling falling.
His skin hums, Yukimura’s open mouth on his neck as Yukimura shakes and thrusts, erratic in his own last moments as Sanada recovers himself. He holds tight as Yukimura gasps against his skin, spilling himself hot inside with the smallest of moans, not quite a whimper, not quite a sob or a sigh.
They lie sticky and replete and silent. Sanada thinks everything has changed. He feels different, having done that, having had sex now. And yet at the same time, nothing has changed. Yukimura is still himself, solid and warm and lying across Sanada’s chest as his breathing slows and softens and his heart stops pounding quite so hard.
A light rain has begun outside again. It patters against the glass panes of the balcony doorway, tap tap tap in rhythm with their pulses. Yukimura rolls over and pulls the condom off. Sanada lets his eyes rove over his back. He props himself up on one elbow, still shaking from the aftermath, and watches Yukimura walk across the room to the bathroom, his skin aglow with muted light, glittering with beads of sweat.
Six months ago he was a skeleton in the hospital, threaded with tubes and needles, pale and scrawny and small as a child. He thinks of how much has changed when Yukimura crawls back onto the bed and under the sheets.
“Turn off the light, Sanada,” he says. “I’m tired.”
In the darkness, Yukimura spoons against Sanada’s back. Hands search out his, and tuck against his stomach, fingers twined and tight. Yukimura buries his face in Sanada’s neck and breathes in deep.
They have one more day here. Sanada doesn’t want this to end.
***
Come morning, he aches. His body has pains in places he didn’t think it could. He’s fit, he’s athletic and has excellent and strong muscles and bones, but he shuffles across the room like an old man, his legs and bum and back and everything stretched strange the night before. As pained as he feels, Sanada thinks it is a good sort of ache, one rooted deep inside, a memory of the night spent together.
He is furiously hungry, too. Dawn breaks and his stomach growls loud, raging with the desire to fling himself from bed and pray that the hotel breakfast buffet opens at six. He can’t sleep like this, as much as he wants to stay with Yukimura, warm and comfortable.
Sanada lies in bed, torn between Yukimura and breakfast. It takes him less than fifteen minutes before he can’t wait any longer. The shower is welcome against his skin, which feels slightly crusty. He leans against the tiles and his hand strays to his cock, his balls, cupping them and running over his stomach and his thighs, remembering all the places Yukimura had touched, had kissed.
Sanada dries his body off quickly and rubs his head with a towel, spraying the walls as he shakes the last bits of water he can from his hair. He pulls on his clothes, grabs his cap and shoes and runs out to the elevator, hotel swipecard in his pocket.
Marui is awake, too, and busy in the dining room. He is the first person there, and the only one besides Sanada. He looks up from a tray of steaming eggs and grins. They eat together, devouring plates of eggs and noodles and fried fish and toast and fruit. Sanada guzzles his tea, then goes back for more fish and bacon, too.
This is their last day here. They leave tomorrow morning. Sanada thinks that they will leave this interlude between school, between tennis season, and return to everything that is normal and usual and regular. He thinks that they will return to tennis and classes and he and Yukimura will be the same as they were before.
A hand brushes his shoulders, resting against the back of his chair. Marui looks up, fried fish still hanging from the sides of his mouth and says, “Buchou!” He sprays Sanada with food. Sanada scowls and wipes the fish from his face with a napkin as Yukimura sits down with them.
Sanada watches Yukimura out of the corner of his eye, the way he moves, the way he holds himself as he walks to the tables and serves himself noodles and baked fish and eggs and toast and tea. Does he move any differently? Does he act any differently? Since they had sex. Does Marui notice anything?
Sanada shifts in his seat. The chair is uncomfortable. His muscles ache. He wants to crawl back into bed and dream of tennis, and Yukimura, in exactly that order.
“Something wrong Sanada?” Marui asks. He prods Sanada in the arm with the end of his chopstick. “Your eye is twitching.” He smiles.
“Would you like some gum, Marui?” Yukimura offers him a stick from his pocket, which Marui accepts with relish.
“Cola-flavoured! One of my favourites, buchou!” He chews even louder than before, spitting everywhere as he starts to yak when Jackal slides into a seat at the table beside him.
Yukimura smiles at Sanada. His eyes glitter in the soft morning light streaming in from the wide windows overlooking the ocean, a beautiful azure glass plane, dotted with sailing boats and fishing trawlers. You’re welcome, he says without words.
This is their last day at the hotel. They go out to the beach early, although not early enough to avoid the initial onslaught of teeanged girls in tiny bikinis. Kirihara yawns and drags his feet on the beach, ignorant of the fleshy display. Jackal practically salivates whenever a buxom girl walks by, her barely-covered breasts jiggling. Sanada turns red and pulls his cap lower over his eyes. He is glad he has no sisters. He is glad he wants nothing to do with these girls. They make him uncomfortable.
Niou sleeps in the latest and joins them at noon. He saunters across the sand, wearing nothing but low-slung swimming shorts and a towel around his neck. “Yo,” he says, nodding to the group of them. Yagyuu glances up from his novel when Niou snatches it from him, and throws it over his shoulder. It hits Sanada in the arm with a thwap. The left side of his face twitches. His fist curls.
“Sanada,” Yukimura warns. Sanada stiffens and lets his hand go slack. Niou picks the novel up and dusts off the cover, before handing it back to Yagyuu, who frowns at him. Yukimura barely misses a beat when he continues to speak. “Would you mind?” he asks, nodding to the sunscreen in his hand. He points to his back.
“Not subtle at all, Yukimura,” Niou says. He whistles to himself as Sanada squirts some of the lotion on his hand and starts to rub it into Yukimura’s skin. He wants to backhand Niou’s smirking face so much that it hurts not to. He grinds his teeth and suffers in silence, doing exactly as Yukimura wants, as ever.
The thickest crowds come around lunch, around the same time as Niou. The air is filled with the smell of BBQed meat and grilled fish. They pull on t-shirts and sandals and walk to a little beachfront café run by a man covered in bandages. He runs around and speaks too loud and makes young girls squeamish as he leers at their cleavage and tries to pinch their bums. Sanada glares at him and asks where their food is in his loudest, most impressive sort of fukubuchou voice.
In the end, they leave the café, but not before Niou has managed to convince the bandaged owner to sell him a beer. He sips it as they walk along the boardwalk and eat shrimp skewers and grilled beef and shaved ice. Marui slows by an icecream vendor, ordering a triple cone of peanut butter, lychee and mint. Akaya whines loud enough that Yanagi caves and buys him a cone, too.
“Ice cream?” Yukimura asks Sanada.
“I don’t like sweets,” Sanada says.
Yukimura shrugs and orders chocolate.
He thinks that Yanagi ought to lecture them all about the dangers of swimming after eating, but Renji says nothing when they peel off t-shirts, barely back from lunch, and run for the ocean. Sanada hesitates for the briefest moment, but runs up to catch Akaya and Jackal, beating them both to the water as he splashes through the cold, surrounding waves. His skin is hot. His muscles are still sore from last night. It feels nice to float on the bobbing water. The ocean licks his ears as the tide rises and falls, rises and falls. He closes his eyes and lies back, spread-eagle. The sounds of hundreds of other beachgoers are drowned out. And he is silent and still and restful.
Until a hand shoots out to cover his face and pushes him under. He surfaces, sputtering and coughing with water up his nose and anger boiling. Kirihara grins at him after he pushes drenched bangs from his eyes.
“Akaya!” he shouts.
Kirihara bolts in a fresh kicking spray of water, laughing the entire way.
Sanada glares at him, and walks towards Renji and Yukimura, who stand waist-deep and talk. The sand shifts under his feet, cold earth moving as he walks through the resisting water. Renji smiles as Kirihara circles behind him, sticking out an insolent tongue at Sanada, happily flapping his arms in the water and being, in general, a complete brat.
“Do you remember Rokkaku’s Saeki?” Renji asks him. “I was speaking with him and he challenged us to a game of beach volleyball in a half hour.”
“We should show them what Rikkai can do in volleyball as well,” Yukimura says, smiling darkly. Sanada avoids reminding either of them that Rikkai has only managed to make runners up in the district preliminaries and Kantou regionals in volleyball for nearly twenty years, but grudgingly agrees to be roped into it. If even Yagyuu has agreed to play, Sanada Genichirou will damn well help lead the team to another victory.
Sanada doesn’t really remember any of Rokkaku’s team well until he sees the group of them, waiting and talking by a beach volleyball net. They are far too lax and casual for his liking. Maybe that was why they were eliminated in the first round of the Nationals. He’s heard rumours that they play on wooden playgrounds for practice, with elementary school children, no less. Rokkaku looks ever the part of Chiba beach bums, all tanned and some of them wearing sunglasses.
The one in the front of the group with bleached hair and black roots waves to Renji. “Yo!” he shouts. Sanada thinks this must be Saeki. He crosses his arms and scowls. Volleyball is not his game, but he’s not a spoilsport, either.
Someone pulls his cap from his head and a breeze ruffles his hair. Renji grins and scribbles something down in a notebook, before tearing the page up and shaking the papers in his cap.
“Nice hair, Sanada-fukubuchou,” Kirihara says. Another gust off the ocean flutters his hair. Sanada doesn’t pat down the flyaways, but he does box Kirihara on the ear when Yukimura is turned to pick a name from his cap.
“We’re playing doubles, Sanada,” Yukimura says.
“I’ll sit out and keep score,” Renji says. He passes the cap to Kirihara, who pulls out a paper slip and yells “Who is Kurobane?” into the Rokkaku team.
Yanagi sets himself up under the shade of a covered gazebo. The first teams are Jackal-Amane and Shudou-Saeki. Jackal stands ready to receive the serve. Sanada thinks he looks completely at home in the sand as Rokkaku, and when the volleys start, back and forth, slapping over the net, he plays better than they do.
“They must have a lot of beach volleyball in Brazil,” Yukimura murmurs beside him. Jackal scores a point and high-fives Amane. On the other side of the net, Saeki whispers something to his partner, who goes to serve the ball.
Jackal-Amane end up taking the game. After, as they walk to the gazebo and hand Kirihara the ball, Amane says something to Kurobane which Sanada doesn’t hear. What he does hear, however, is the sound of Kurobane’s leg whooshing through the air and smacking Amane in the back of the head.
“That wasn’t funny!” Kurobane shouts. “That was worse than usual.”
“Are they always like this?” Yukimura asks Saeki.
Saeki smiles back and says yes.
“We’re up,” Yukimura tells Sanada. Sanada grabs his cap from Yanagi’s lap and shoves it onto his head. He sighs heavily and digs his toes into the warm sand. Kirihara’s serve. In this game, he can use all the knuckles he wants.
His stomach twists a little with trepidation. The last time he saw Yukimura play doubles in anything was during a match in second year when the captain forced Yukimura and Yanagi to play doubles against the newly-formed Yagyuu-Niou team. In theory, they ought to have played a fast, fierce game, winning easily with 6-0 or 6-1. In reality, Yukimura was awful at doubles, ignoring Yanagi’s data, ignoring Yanagi’s attempts at hand signals, and instead going for all the balls himself.
It was also the only time he’d ever seen Yukimura shout at Yanagi. They ended up screaming over a ball at the centre of the court and refusing to play with each other ever again in doubles.
Sanada’s insides twist more violently as Yukimura narrows his eyes and bends his knees, ready to receive. He stands behind him at a far distance. Of all the names drawn from the cap, they ended up together.
Kirihara stretches the ball in front of himself with one hand and swings back with the other, arcing widely. Sanada tenses and leans forward, just as Kirihara makes contact with a slapping sound.
And falls on his knees, tangled up with the ball.
“Oops,” he says, laughing it off. He stands up quickly, swings his arm back again and hits it this time.
Kirihara is crap at volleyball, but Sanada is even worse. The lone ball he manages to hit- a stray missed by Yukimura- he hits into the net.
“What the hell was that?” Yukimura shouts. He stomps his feet. “Sanada, why did you go for that ball?”
Sanada says nothing. He rubs the inside of his forearms, where the ball hit. Little red bumps appear amidst his burning skin. The ball hurts. Kirihara pulls back during the next play and lets Kurobane take the hits. Sanada nurses his arm behind Yukimura, who defends the net like three Jackals, here, there, everywhere, refusing to let anything past. It grows into a stalemate of back and forth, back and forth, smashes and spikes and arcing of white across the net. Yanagi gets up at some point and comes back later with a large cup of crushed ice. He’s finished by the time Kurobane finally sneaks a ball past Yukimura, hard on his right, and wins the set.
“Why didn’t you go for that last ball?” Yukimura snaps at him after.
“Aa…I thought you had it,” Sanada manages.
“We were playing doubles, Genichirou,” Yukimura lectures. “You should have had my back.”
Sanada avoids telling Yukimura the same thing, and lets the matter slide. For someone who had just last night been kissing and touching and fucking him, Yukimura seems to have forgotten any recent intimacy and sweetness. His game face and his bedroom face are completely different. Two facets of the same player. His own personal Yagyuu-Niou combination.
Niou-Kisarazu pair and Yayguu-Itsuki play next. Sanada has always enjoyed watching Yagyuu and Niou play each other in practices. They know when and where the other will strike, particularly Niou. In volleyball, they play a haphazard game. Niou takes a hard ball to the side of the face barely a few minutes into the game. Yagyuu’s face looks pink and flushed in the sun. He apologizes, but Niou stalks under the net and punches him back in the face. His glasses fly onto the sand, glinting bright white as the two wrestle on the ground. Sand and punches fly by the time Itsuki and Renji pry them apart.
Niou lunges once more, taking a kick to the stomach from Yagyuu, but not before he manages to pants him. Yagyuu screams “Niou Masaharu you are DEAD!”
So much for a gentleman. He and Niou attack each other anew, grunting and punching and clawing. Sanada runs out to help Renji. He throws himself on Niou, pinning him to the ground. Niou flails and spits underneath him.
Yagyuu seethes through his teeth as he pulls his shorts back on. He carefully adjusts his glasses, and puts them back on too, and then he is the gentleman once more. “I think we ought to concede defeat,” he says. “Both of us.”
Niou snorts.
Yanagi has the last pair, Marui and Aoi, the Rokkaku freshmen captain, play next against Jackal-Amane pair. He sips the melted residue of his crushed ice and watches them. Marui looks forlornly at Yanagi, who waves for them to start. Sanada can practically hear the growling of Marui’s stomach from this distance, even over the loud, loud voice of Aoi.
“I’m so hungry,” Marui groans. He clutches his stomach and topples over onto the sand. Aoi’s face contorts and he dives to save the ball.
“Must. Get. It. Or else I’ll never date a single girl!” he yells.
The ball hits the top of the net and goes in. Aoi clenches his fist and grins.
“What is he talking about?” Yukimura asks Saeki.
Saeki shrugs. “He always does that.”
“That’s odd,” Yukimura replies.
“Kentarou-kun always manages to win, too,” Saeki adds. Yukimura hums and says nothing. Yanagi gets up and returns within a few minutes with a small cone of ice cream. Kirihara licks his lips, staring at the ice cream like a wolf staring down prey.
“Yanagi-senpai, do you think-” he starts, just as Jackal looks over from the middle of the game and shouts, “I really wish I could have Yanagi’s ice cream right now. It looks so-” he crouches to receive the ball, “good!” Jackal spikes the volleyball.
Marui is gone before the ball hits the sand, running across the beach and diving for the gazebo, grabbing Yanagi’s ice cream and moaning as he licks at it, over and over. His eyes roll back and a smile spreads over his face.
“You’re horrible, Renji,” Sanada mutters to him. Renji shrugs, face placid and ostensibly innocent.
Kirihara’s face, however, is crushed. He sighs heavily and mopes and refuses to play the next game with Kurobane against Jackal. Yukimura reaches into his pocket and hands Kirihara several bills. “Here, Akaya. My treat.”
“I’ll play for you, Akaya,” Renji announces. He stands, stretching his long arms out behind himself, then pads across the sand to play.
Between licks of ice cream, Marui cheers Jackal on. Rokkaku cheers for everyone, especially their teammates. Kirihara returns from the ice cream stand with an even bigger cone than Marui and screams for Yanagi to kick some Brazilian ass. In the cool shade, on the cool plastic chairs, Sanada leans back and contemplates napping. Or changing his position to one slightly more comfortable, one that doesn’t make his thighs and butt ache quite so much.
It doesn’t really matter to him who wins. Jackal-Amane team takes their friendly tournament, but the score is close. Kirihara flaps around Renji like a fly, buzzing about the game, his ice cream long forgotten. “Yanagi-senpai, Yanagi-senpai, you almost won!”
They shake hands with Rokkaku and linger around the area until the peanut vendors start to pack their umbrellas and the sun hangs low and gloaming on the meridian. The water shines with an amber stripe of sunlight as they walk back down the beach towards the hotel. The sand is hot as Sanada digs his feet into it, walking slowly to keep apace with Yukimura, who wades through the surf. The water washes around Yukimura’s ankles, lapping like a hundred thousand tongues all over his skin. His laughter is faint, but brilliantly bright.
Sanada wants their time here to last forever. He stops for a moment, and lets the feeling sink into his bones. Yukimura touches his elbow. “Sanada,” he whispers. The seabreeze flutters their hair, and it mingles over cheeks, over chins, black on black and glowing gold from the sunset.
“Yukimura-buchou!” Kirihara waves from down the beach, running back to them and dragging Yukimura’s arm for he and Sanada to catch up with the rest of the team. “Yagyuu’s found the chaperone!”
“He has?” Yukimura asks. He pries Kirihara’s fingers from his forearm delicately.
“Yeah- that girlfriend he was fu- I mean, brought here was tanning topless on the beach and they fell asleep and Yagyuu-senpai just found them. It was so funny!”
“Her…” Sanada swallows the dry lump in his throat. “Her breasts were funny?” he chokes out.
Kirihara stares at him as though he’s grown three more heads. “What? No, it was funny because Niou-senpai blackmailed Ito-sensei into giving us all the alcohol in his room’s bar fridge tonight so that we don’t tell the school what he’s been doing!”
The memory of the team with alcohol is fresh in Sanada’s mind. Too fresh. He slaps his hand to his forehead and groans. He can feel his skull pulsing with a headache at the thought already.
Yukimura holds Sanada back from the group, seeming to remain in the lap of the evening tide. He leans down and reaches in the rushing wet sand to pluck a small shell. “And if I had breasts, Sanada?” he asks, smiling.
Sanada blinks. “Eh?”
“So eloquent, Genichirou,” Yukimura teases. He leans down again, this time to flick water up at Sanada, provoking a reaction when Sanada steps back and trips on his feet, falling down onto the sand just as the tide rears up around him, wetting the bottom of his shorts. It soaks through to his skin. He stands, cringing at the feeling of wet underpants and shorts clinging and sticking the wrong way.
“I would…prefer you like this,” he manages.
Yukimura laughs again, and he forgets that his shorts are wet in the worst places, and he forgets that there is anything in the world besides the boy walking beside him through the damp, shifting sands.
***
Niou turns up in Sanada and Yukimura’s hotel room barely a few minutes after they return, with a large box in his arms. He pulls off his sunglasses and sets the box down on the glass-topped table, before calling Yagyuu on his cellphone. “I’ve got it,” he says, “Come over now.” He hangs up, then spreads himself out across Yukimura’s bed.
At least room service had been by while they were out at the beach. Sanada cringes inwardly at the thought of Niou discovering rumpled sheets and dried come and sweat stains.
“What are you doing?” he asks, crossing his arms across his chest and scowling at Niou’s toothy smile. “What’s in the box?”
“Provisions,” he answers enigmatically. When Yukimura pushes a flap from the top and peers inside, Niou adds, “Provided by our responsible and thoughtful chaperone, Ito-sensei.”
A knock on the door and Yagyuu and Jackal pour into the room, followed by Kirihara and Yanagi with Marui trailing.
“You are not drinking that here,” Sanada tells Niou, who pulls a little bottle of alcohol from the box and starts to drink it. Niou pauses mid-sip, then spits it out onto the carpet.
“The fuck!?” He wipes his mouth and starts to unscrew the other bottles. “The bastard tricked us! It’s not booze- it’s watered down tea!”
“That might not be such a bad idea, Niou-kun,” Yagyuu says.
“I didn’t really like booze before,” Kirihara says.
“I’m so hungry! Can we eat something soon?” Marui whines. He flops down on his back on the bed beside a sitting Yukimura and grabs the room service menu. Marui rubs his stomach and rolls over. “Isn’t anyone else hungry? Akaya?”
Niou dumps the entire contents of the box in the garbage can between the two beds. He sighs heavily. Yagyuu watches him out of the corner of his eye. Sanada does the same. The back of his neck prickles with the anticipation that the trickster has something else up his sleeve.
In this case, it seems to be a credit card.
“What’d you do? Steal the chaperone’s wallet from his room?” Marui asks. Niou waves it off.
“Dinner’s on the sensei,” he announces.
“Yukimura!” Sanada hisses. Do something!
Yukimura smiles. “Live a little, Sanada. We did make a bargain with him, after all. Which he broke.”
They order hamburgers and sushi and the biggest dessert plate on the menu, along with three dozen pontas and cokes. The valet gives them an odd look when Yukimura answers the knock on the door and takes the trays of food inside. He must see the eight teenage boys, all alone, in a nice hotel, and wonder if they had rich parents and where they were.
Kirihara is bouncing off the walls after three pontas and a piece of cake. Sanada wants to lecture him, to tell him that’s not a proper dinner for a growing teenager, but the jab in the side from Yukimura stops him. Even Renji is laughing and digging into the noodles and steak Jackal insisted on.
Sanada sighs, then makes a grab for the last piece of cake. He bites back a grin when Marui’s face falls as he takes a big bite, eating with his fingers and savouring the sickeningly sweet icing.
They finish off every bit of food, every parsley garnish, every slice of lemon for the drinks. Marui telephones for a second tray of desserts. “And make sure there’s big slices of cake,” he instructs.
Kirihara turns on the television and curls up between Yanagi and Yukimura, stretching out his legs. His eyes glaze over at the images on the television, but his fingers still reach for what few snacks Marui hasn’t got to. Sanada sips his coke. Jackal rolls over the other bed and Yagyuu and Niou have both snuck off. The first to arrive, the first to leave.