Prince Of Tennis Fan Fiction ❯ Tattered Strips of Green ❯ Chapter 4

Tattered Strips of Green

 

Chapter Four

 

 

Disclaimer: I do not own Prince of Tennis or the associated characters.

Author's Note: 10,000 yen is about $85.55

 

WARNING: Self-mutilation

 

* * *

 

Kaidoh stared apathetically at the ceiling while he lay sprawled across his bed, barely working up enough energy to pet the black cat on his chest. It was the afternoon of the next day, and he had already taken the dog out on her morning walk. Inui and Nabiki were shopping for juice ingredients, leaving him as the only human currently in the house.

 

He sometimes wondered what would have happened to Nabiki if he and Inui hadn't become friends again. He hadn't planned on it happening, had even managed to convince himself that he never wanted to see Inui again, but chance had caused their paths to cross one day, five years ago. He remembered it as if it were just yesterday.

 

It was awkward, the first time they saw each other after the breakup. He mentally cursed the construction that had led him to walk the puppy along the river instead of taking their usual route. He turned away, meaning to leave quickly, but Inui's hesitant voice stopped him.

 

“I…uh…I heard you got married.”

 

“Nn.” Kaidoh gave a slight nod without turning around. His fists clenched as a storm of conflicting emotions raged through him. Hatred, love, hurt, betrayal, and the longing to once more have a friend who really understood him. He could never forgive him, but….

 

“I can never forgive you, Inui-senpai!” he blurted, whirling around to face the other man. For just a brief moment, Inui looked utterly stricken, but his expression quickly changed to one of calm neutrality.

 

“Yes, that's to be expected,” he said quietly, using one finger to adjust his glasses. He turned to leave, but Kaidoh lunged forward and grabbed his arm.

 

“I can never forgive you,” he repeated. “But maybe… maybe I can forget, just a bit, what you did.”

 

“What does that mean, Kaidoh?”

 

“I…” He looked down at the ground and took a deep breath, then raised his head to meet Inui's bespectacled gaze. “Were you ever really my friend, or was that just an experiment too?”

 

“Our friendship was real,” Inui said softly. “Kaidoh, I…” He stopped himself, as if he wanted to say something but couldn't. He looked away. “You were the only person who ever really seemed to understand me.”

 

Kaidoh gave a jerky nod and turned around, starting back the way he had come. “The dog seems to like being walked along the river. I think I'll start bringing her here more often.”

 

He would never be able to forgive Inui for playing with and breaking his heart, but maybe they could be friends again, if he could try to forget that they'd ever been anything more.

 

He was pulled from his memories by the ringing of his cell phone. He shooed Gremlin off his chest and sat up before grabbing the phone from the nightstand. He frowned slightly at the name flashed by the caller ID. Tezuka? Why was Tezuka calling him?

 

“Yes?” he said into the phone as he answered it.

 

“Meet me at the street courts in half an hour,” was all Tezuka said before hanging up.

 

Kaidoh stared at his phone for a minute. Tezuka lived two hours away. Why was he close enough to make it to the street courts in half an hour?

 

I guess it doesn't really matter, he thought, getting up. He would go, of course. Even after all the years since his second year at junior high, it was hard to even consider not obeying an order from Tezuka. Besides, he didn't have anything better to do.

 

* * *

 

“Hm. It appears you've won,” Tezuka said calmly, briefly glancing at where the ball had recently slammed into the ground.

 

Kaidoh growled. “Why didn't you play seriously, Buchou?” His hand tightened around his racket in fury. Why? Why was he feeling like this? He hadn't felt any strong emotions for the past eight months, but now he was angry.

 

Tezuka had been toying with him. Over the years, he'd gotten good enough to hold his own against his former captain. The game should have been a close one with either capable of winning, but Kaidoh had won six games to love.

 

“Should I have played seriously?”

 

Rage filled the younger man at the question, the emotion bursting through his defenses and overwhelming him. Did Tezuka consider him so pathetic that it wasn't even worth it to win against him?

 

“Fssh-” He stopped mid-exhalation, his anger suddenly gone. He hadn't consciously realized it before, but he hadn't made that particular sound at all in the past eight months.

 

…Within the serpent's coils, the young man stirred once more. Something had managed to get past the serpent, disturbing its charge, but not yet waking him. Something had made him… angry. He slowly rolled to his side and curled into a tight ball. Then he was still again, except for the slight movement of his lips as he began to hiss….

 

Tezuka turned and walked away while Kaidoh was distracted. He permitted himself a small smile as he slid his hand under the wristband of his long-sleeved shirt, lightly touching the scrap of green cloth.

 

He pulled out his cell phone and made a call. “Your turn,” was all he said before hanging up. Kaidoh's anger had been a good sign. It would take time, but he would come back to them.

 

* * *

 

An hour later, Kaidoh was sitting by the river, trying to figure out just what had happened. He was proud of his tennis abilities. By the time he was a second-year in junior high, he had developed his own variation of the buggy whip shot, a move that required a great deal of skill and technique.

 

And Tezuka had acted like he was so insignificant that it wasn't even worth winning against him. Anger threatened to overwhelm him again, but he ruthlessly forced it back, along with a tinge of fear. If one emotion could get through, then others could as well.

 

He gasped softly in sudden realization. That was it. That's how it had happened. When he had seen Nabiki trip, concern for her had somehow broken through his emotional armor. It had left enough of an opening for Tezuka's actions to piss him off.

 

He hugged his knees tightly to his chest. He had to stop this somehow. He didn't want to feel. It was like he had been asleep for a long time and was on the verge of waking up. And when he woke, all of his emotions would come back. And with them came the possibility of the voices returning as well.

 

A small whimper escaped him as he clutched at his head. He would throw himself in the river again before letting that happen. An image of Nabiki floated through his mind at that thought. How would she feel if he did that?

 

Why did it matter? It wasn't like he was capable of being there for her in his current state. He was a useless waste of resources at the moment, doing nothing more than existing from day to day and dragging down those around him like some sort of living whirlpool.

 

The ringing of his cell phone interrupted his melancholy thoughts. He dug it out of his pocket and checked the caller ID. Oishi. Should he bother answering?

 

He sighed and answered. It wasn't like he had anything better to do.

 

* * *

 

It felt strange being back at Seigaku after so many years, watching a new batch of boys practice at the tennis courts. His attention was focused mainly on a second-year who was clearly good enough to be a regular, but wasn't for some reason.

 

“Sorry for calling you on such short notice, but I could use the opinion of a former Seigaku captain,” Oishi said apologetically. “The current captain is good, but he tends to defer to me quite a bit.”

 

Oishi had taken Ryuzaki's place as tennis coach and had adopted her method of working closely with the team captain to make decisions for the team.

 

“I didn't have anything else to do,” Kaidoh mumbled in response to the apology. He didn't bother to point out that Oishi had been captain while Tezuka recovered from his injury. The other man had been much more comfortable in his role as vice captain. “Why isn't that kid a regular?”

 

“Miyazuki is a transfer student who joined the club yesterday. I can already tell he's better than at least one of the regulars, but we just had the ranking tournament for this month a few days ago.”

 

“He's better than that one.” Kaidoh indicated another second-year. Unlike Miyazuki, he was wearing a regular's shirt. It had been about a decade since he had taken over as captain after Tezuka's graduation, but he was still good at quickly and correctly figuring out potential.

 

“Aomaru just made regular in this last set of ranking matches.”

 

Kaidoh closed his eyes for a moment, thinking the problem over. “You could hold another ranking tournament, but that would put everyone on edge. The best thing to do would be what you decided on when Echizen came back in time for the Nationals. Make the rules a bit different though. Aomaru might be able to manage at least one service game.”

 

Oishi nodded slowly. “A private match between Miyazuki and Aomaru. And, let's see, instead of having to win six to love, whoever can win by a three game lead becomes a regular.” He wrote down a few things on his clipboard. “I'll set that up for tomorrow.”

 

“Why not today?”

 

“Well, I had an ulterior motive for calling you here,” Oishi admitted. “I was talking to Taka-san yesterday, and it came up that neither of us had seen you in a while. We're supposed to head over to his restaurant in a bit. You don't have any plans already, do you?”

 

“…No.”

 

“Good. Go on ahead and I'll catch up. I have to let Arisawa know that I'm leaving early. He can finish up practice without me here.”

 

Before Kaidoh could respond in any way, Oishi ran out onto the courts and called all of the regulars, plus Miyazuki, over to him.

 

“Good job, guys,” he said. “Thanks for your help.” He felt bad about all of the lies he'd told, but they had been necessary.

 

Aomaru grinned at him. “It was fun pretending to be a regular, Oishi-sensei.”

 

“Tch. Just be glad you didn't get my shirt dirty, or I'd have to hurt you,” Miyazuki said gruffly. Then he ruined the tough guy image by reaching over to ruffle Aomaru's dark brown hair.

 

“I'll have everyone run a few laps, then send them home, Coach,” Arisawa said. “Now get going.”

 

Oishi laughed and waved as the teenager gave him a gentle shove to send him on his way. Arisawa was almost as good a captain as Tezuka and Kaidoh had been. He could manage just fine on his own.

 

* * *

 

Kaidoh barely noticed when Oishi caught up with him. He was too busy staring at a clinic that treated stray animals. He had forgotten that it was between the school and Kawamura Sushi.

 

“Sorry about the wait, I…” Oishi trailed off, looking at Kaidoh in concern. “What's wrong?”

 

Kaidoh silently stared at the building for a little over a minute before finally answering. “Nothing.” He turned away from the animal clinic. “We should go. Kawamura is expecting us, and it's rude to keep people waiting.”

 

He murmured soft words of comfort to the trembling puppy in his arms as he neared the animal clinic. It looked up at him with large, trusting brown eyes, as if knowing its broken leg would soon be taken care of.

 

Kaidoh stopped and looked over his shoulder at the sound of running footsteps. There was a woman rushing toward him. He tensed, waiting for her to screech something about someone as scary looking as him obviously being responsible for the puppy's injury.

 

Instead, she ran right past him and held the door to the animal clinic open. She smiled at him. “That should make it easier to get him in without jostling him too much.”

 

He blinked in surprise. “Th-thank you.” He gave a slight bow of his head and went in.

 

“Ah, Kaoru-kun, you found another one?” the elderly woman behind the front desk said as he entered. He nodded, and she came around the desk to carefully take the puppy from him.

 

Once she disappeared into the back room with the animal, the woman who had held the door came over to him. “It's nice to see someone who cares about injured, helpless creatures.” She smiled at him again and held out her hand. “Hanatori Yukiko.”

 

He shook her hand. “Kaidoh Kaoru.”

 

She looked like she was about to say more, but the old woman returned then, and Kaidoh refocused his attention to her as she went back to her place behind the front desk. He pulled out his wallet and gave her ten thousand yen. Payment wasn't required when bringing in an animal, but he always made a donation.

 

“You're such a sweet, kind boy. I'm surprised you haven't been snatched up by a pretty young lady yet.”

 

He blushed and looked down at his feet. Compliments always embarrassed him, and he could never figure out how to respond to them. He was saved from having to say anything by Yukiko coming up beside him to make her own donation.

 

“If you aren't busy tonight, would you like to go out to dinner with me?” Yukiko asked as they left the animal clinic together.

 

He froze and stared at her with wide eyes. “You mean…go on a date?”

 

She smiled and nodded. His eyes narrowed as he studied her. Pretty girls shrieked and ran from him. They didn't ask him out on dates. “Did Momoshiro put you up to this?”

 

He knew his former rival meant well, but if he was trying to set him up with someone again, he was going to throttle him. The only person he had ever loved had broken his heart. He wasn't going to stupidly trust it to someone else, especially not someone chosen by Momoshiro.

 

Yukiko's lovely smile turned into a frown of confusion. “Who?”

 

“Ah, never mind.” He stared down at the ground, then looked back at her. One date couldn't hurt. “I'm not busy tonight.”

 

Her dazzling smile reappeared. “Then it's a date.”

 

* * *

 

When they got to Kawamura Sushi, Kaidoh was surprised to see Tezuka there, sitting at one of the stools in front of the counter. He stopped in the doorway, but Oishi gently pushed him forward, herding him to the seat beside Tezuka.

 

Kaidoh barely kept from jumping in surprise when his former captain gave his shoulder a brief, light squeeze in greeting. Then Oishi sat on the empty stool beside him and casually flung an arm across his shoulders.

 

The tennis coach didn't seem to notice Kaidoh's wide-eyed stare of shock. He was not used to so much casual physical contact. What was going on? Why had both Tezuka and Oishi suddenly called him? And why were they being so friendly toward him? He especially wondered it of Tezuka. He was acting as if the match earlier that day hadn't happened.

 

“It's good to see you again,” Taka said with a smile, breaking into Kaidoh's thoughts. “It's been awhile.”

 

“It's good to see you too,” Kaidoh mumbled, looking down as Taka patted him on the head. He had the feeling that the sushi chef would have ruffled his hair if not for the gray bandana that was in the way.

 

“Do you honestly think anyone could care about someone like you?” Yukiko's voice whispered faintly in the back of his mind.

 

He swallowed hard, forcing down a wave of panic. He couldn't lose control in front of anyone. His emotional walls had taken several beatings in the past two days. They weren't strong enough to deal with this. And now the voices were coming back.

 

* * *

 

He had managed to hold himself together the entire time he was with Tezuka and the others, but he was trembling by the time he got home. A quick look in the fridge showed that Inui and Nabiki had been home at one point, but had apparently left again.

 

“Damn it,” he whispered, even his voice shaky. He had a better chance of controlling things when there were other people around.

 

“Don't be ridiculous, I never loved you. You were just a way to achieve my ultimate goal.”

 

“It was just an experiment. It didn't really mean anything.”

 

They were faint and barely audible, but they were there. The voices were definitely back.

 

Panic and anxiety threatened to overwhelm him, his body going into fight or flight mode with no idea of what was wrong. He forced himself to take a deep breath. He knew how to handle this. Inui would be upset if he found out, but he didn't particularly care. Let him be angry, he had no right to interfere in his life anymore.

 

He searched through the kitchen drawers, trying desperately to tune out the voices as they gained in volume, until he found a sharp-edged knife. Then he made his way to the couch, nearly dropping the knife several times before he sat down.

 

The shaking stopped with the first horizontal cut across his left arm, his body noticing the pain and incorrectly identifying it as the cause of his fight or flight reaction. The anxiety and overflow of adrenaline stopped.

 

At the third cut, a wall of calm started to form, cutting him off from his emotions and stopping the voices. The next three cuts didn't hurt at all, each one adding a layer to the wall of calm. As he made the seventh cut, he was so absorbed in watching the knife split his skin that he barely noticed the front door opening.

 

“P-papa?” Nabiki wailed in obvious distress. He froze, but didn't look up from his arm.

 

“Nabi-chan, go to your room,” Inui ordered quietly. She obeyed without a word.

 

Kaidoh stayed perfectly still, the knife still pressed against his arm, as Inui came to stand in front of the couch. Inui gently took it away from him and threw it across the room. Then he grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him to his feet.

 

He expected Inui to slap him, yell at him, or possibly both. That would be fine. Nothing like that could get past his wall of calm.

 

Inui did neither of those things. He pulled Kaidoh close and hugged him. And the wall of calm shattered.