| Back To Fanfics |

Red
by Celeste

Author's Note: A drabble for Hana-kun that I made for Wowie, ::waves to Wowie:: My tribute to the great tensai with a mouth as large as a basketball hoop. ::grin::

Standard Disclaimers Apply

You see him with your eyes, and you smile inside, sigh inside. For the delectable redhead has done it again. Sometimes when he smiles, you think it’s all over for you, because of its brightness that’s almost blinding, or the warmth that heats you like a furnace. And now here you are with him. Not telling him, keeping everything inside. Because frankly, you’re halfway in and out of denial, yet you know you’re in love with the man.

Yes, a man. You admit to yourself. You know you two are of the same gender. And on how all of the feelings that are turmoil inside you are inexplicably wrong. Inexplicable because if the only basis that man was made for woman, and v.v. and God had made it so, then what about atheism? And when you see your Hanamichi smile at you, you find yourself an atheist already.

Oh God, you groan to yourself, and think the irony of your words. He smiles at you again and you think on how innocent it can be. How he doesn’t know that within lies the mind of a perverted little man in need to kiss him, touch him, and hold him in the most intimate of manners. How he doesn’t know that you feel content at the mere sound of his laughter, not the boisterous kind, the real one, when you’ve said something funny or when you see something that is. He doesn’t know that you’ve defended him from other people when they’ve mocked him or hurt him. He doesn’t know that when he hurts, and turns to you for brotherly comfort, that you hurt more than he does. For the injuries that he got, and how you think it can never be.

He’s talking again, about college and girls. He’s in college now, you both are and he’s gone off the face were girls make fun of him, to girls actually lusting after him and cheering for him in games. And you despise them; you utterly despise them… with their skimpy little outfits trying to seduce your Hanamichi. Draping themselves all over him because he was popular, handsome and sought after by so many people.

You laugh inwardly at the thought of Hanamichi being popular. If anyone had the gall to predict it and say it to your face, you would’ve been strangled with laughter, because who would ever think, Hanamichi and popular would be together, other than in an oxymoron? You would’ve never "thunk" it!

But then he was changed, transformed; it wasn’t the basketball that did it. Basketball only became the catalyst of his change. His passion for it made him practice more and fight less. The fights still come every once in a while, but his friends—his guntai, made sure it wouldn’t come to him, because they want Hanamichi to be happy. And then, you notice, that everyone is happy when the redhead is around, teammates and rivals alike. And then, you became happy when he’s around. And through the months of hardwork and practice, he was finally accepted as a ‘basket-ball man’. And you saw the change in him, when he had this acceptance, he became more lively, more robust, he laughed more and he felt more and he tried harder with his skills. It was acceptance that did it. It was the acceptance that made him the "Popular Dude", it was the acceptance that made him want less of the attention and more of the passion. He didn’t focus himself on impressing anyone but himself, and the standards he made on himself and how it escalates and you think if it reaches the pinnacle, he might actually be scouted by American colleges. Time passes and you became friends with him and realized that you actually like him.

The irony of it all, he wanted acceptance, and when he got it, he couldn’t care less. Maybe he cared, like in the small part of his brain. And he confides this to you, a moment of friendship you think. He tells you that he wanted the attention at first, and thought that basketball was the way to get it. But then, the scales tipped for basketball and less for acceptance. He told you, that as long as you get to play with great teammates and get to play the game he loved, he wouldn’t care if the other people hated him. And in that moment you ask him, ‘What if the other players hate you too?’ and then immediately regret it as you see a frown dawn his face. And then he grins again in a second, he tells you ‘It doesn’t matter then, I’ll just play for myself, and play with passion that’ll help the team’. And you thought, he’s a smart one, he is.

And then he tells you that he was scouted and your heart slams in your chest. But when he saw the look in your face he laughed and said that he wasn’t ready, and not really good enough. And then he tells you in a joking manner that when his English improves. And then you hope he’ll never learn the cursed language, if it’ll be the reason that he would leave you.

And everything comes into a full bloom. Everyone adores him, likes him for his passion and enjoys his little jokes and bursts of humor. And you, you the one tough guy, the one everyone fears, adore him just like everyone did. After all, everyone includes you too.

And then it dawns you. You’re in love with him.

You stumble to the pavement, and then plant yourself there as you suddenly wanted to process your every thought. But then you can’t, because he’s with you.

"Mitchy are you alright?" he asks you. And you look at those warm brown eyes and you felt yourself thinking: that’s right Hisashi, you fell for the bloke.

You mumble ‘fine’ but then, are you really?

-FIN-

| Back To Fanfics |