Slam Dunk Fan Fiction ❯ One Tokyo Night ❯ One Tokyo Night ( One-Shot )

Title: One Tokyo Night

Author: MitsuiSelphie

Genre: romance, ficlet

Rating: GP

Synopsis: Rukawa and Hanamichi are living together in a cheap 1 grand apartment in Tokyo. A RuHanaRu ficlet

Disclaimer: Slam Dunk and its bishielicious characters belong to Inoue Takehiko, JUMP and IT Planning.

 

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“Stop Rukawa…stop it, temee kitsune.”

 

As soon as they graduated from high school, the infamous duo packed their bags and left Kanagawa to pursue their dreams in the world's most populous city - Tokyo. Being students without much money and only earning enough from their dismal part-time jobs to feed themselves, they had little choice but to live in the cheapest most practical abode they could find. It was one drafty early spring day - they went around the city with merely a few thousand yen in their wallets, searching desperately for anything, any place they could rent in the middle of the warren. They've almost given up, when sitting on the steps of the fire-escape of a derelict building, an old woman reminiscent of their own Anzai-sensei came and spoke to them as if she was the long-awaited fairy godmother straight from a fairy tale book. She offered to lease them one of the rooms in the ancient edifice - dingy, minute even, yet adequately furnished with a single futon, a tiny stove and a miniature wardrobe. A grand each month - Rukawa thought it was a steal, Hanamichi demanded a television set.

After much squabbling, the red-head gave in and they settled in their new love-nest (the word “nest” being uncannily apt for the place seeing as they could barely fit within its confines given their outstanding heights and well-built bodies).

 

“I said stop it, Rukawa!”

 

Of course, they had to share the futon.

 

“Wake up, you stupid fox!”

 

Initially, they both secretly thought it was romantic - which merely attested to the verdancy of their relationship. After a while it only became a daily test of who's the more unyielding one who'll be able to stay on the futon `til morning.

 

Oomph. Rukawa's arm suddenly flew and hit the red-head's nose heavily. For only god knows how many times within that hour. Hanamichi could feel his sinuses at the back of his throat.

Groaning heavily, Sakuragi used his bigger frame to push Kaede off the futon and into the hard uncomfortable tatami surface. Not an easy feat considering Kaede mysteriously weighs like lead when he's asleep.

 

“Baka kitsune,” he muttered against his pillow, disgruntled and just highly exhausted. Tomorrow's another day. He sighed. He was getting tired.

 

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Sakuragi Hanamichi, self-proclaimed basketball tensai, could be seen sitting listlessly by the second floor window of a ramshackle stucco building one particularly humid summer day.

His sweat was pouring in viscid torrents, yet he remained oblivious, staring into the firmament with undisguised empty eyes. Gone was their sepia-like luster. “Dame, dame…” he kept repeating to himself, shaking his head.

 

“Oi, you're gonna be late for work.”

 

Rukawa came in from the communal bath on the third floor, rivulets of water still clinging onto his naked skin. Sakuragi merely blinked impassively, his mind still in deep reverie. Deep reverie…Hanamichi used to be incapable of that. Only recently has he developed the ability to spend hours at a time in unfathomable almost trance-like silence staring into the void and reflecting nothing in his once all too expressive brown orbs. “I can't see the stars…” the red-head sighed.

 

Kaede stared at his lover, stopping in mid-step while drying his ebony hair. He blinked and stated the obvious, “it's still daytime, do'ahou.”

 

“Huh?” Hanamichi turned his head and peered at Rukawa yet not really seeing him. “Oh kitsune…” he shook his head and breathed deeply, “you're done…”

“…”

“Uhm…”

“…you're gonna be late for work.”

 

“Oh right.” He stood up unceremoniously, grabbing his bag and wiping the sweat on his brow with his sleeve. “Ittekimasu,” he said under his breath, barely audible.

 

As he was making way towards the door, the other grabbed him by the arm and stared him in the eyes, brow furrowing in the slightest most inconspicuous manner.

 

“Huh?”

“Tell me what's wrong.”

“What do you mean?”

“You've been like this for quite some time. What's wrong?”

“…nothing.”

“You can't lie to me.”

 

How utterly and terribly true. There is no lying to the fox - it's as if his unclouded sapphires could bear into Hanamichi's deepest core.

 

“Why are we here Kaede?” He asked weakly, before gaining composure. “It's nothing, you dumb fox! How can there be anything wrong with tensai Sakuragi Hanamichi? Nyahahahahahahahaha…”

 

Rukawa's brows arched visibly, his mouth hanging open foolishly as if he'd never been more perplexed in his life. He always knew the red-head was an idiot but something was wrong and it irked him that he can't seem to be able to figure it out. Since when had Hanamichi been classified as a conundrum?

“Well, gotta go now. Gotta go to work,” he continued laughing maniacally, raucously exiting the room and leaving the flabbergasted Rukawa to his own musing.

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All his life he has been reticent. When he was a child, his relatives would malevolently scoff at him for being arrogant and un-cute. He didn't care in the very least. To him, the world was a sea of faceless strangers - an insignificant multitude he was burdened to co-exist with. That was until he found basketball. With basketball, he found meaning and along with it, his rivals, cohorts and mentors. Little by little he was able to see the faces of those who meant something to him. But that was all, no more and no less.

 

And then Hanamichi came and turned his life upside-down.

 

Hanamichi started like everyone else, a faceless stranger amidst the throng. But unlike most everyone else, the red-head didn't avoid, hero-worship, or secretly hate him. Rather, he impetuously challenged him, marking him as an unprecedented rival despite the palpable differences in their skills. At first it greatly annoyed him; he had no time and patience to deal with the likes of Sakuragi Hanamichi. And for quite some time that name was an anathema to his ears. But it didn't change the fact that the red-head shook his frigid façade immensely, a feat that has never been accomplished by anyone ever before.

 

And when they fell in love, it was as natural as the sun rising from the east each and every morning. There were never any questions of “why” or “how”. It just happened and when it did, it felt right. For the first time ever, his life wasn't the insipid existence it used to be.

 

So when Hanamichi asked him “Why are we here, Kaede?”, he was bemused beyond imagining. Since when had there been any questions in their relationship? There's daily bickering, but questions? No, there were none. And how was he to answer such a question as “Why are we here, Kaede?” Maybe it was never meant for him to answer - a rhetorical question in Hanamichi's part. But since when had Hanamichi been capable of rhetoric anyways? And so it baffled him even more.

 

And since Rukawa Kaede is rarely bewildered, he didn't know the right course of action - so he did the atypical.

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Tokyo nights have always been exceptionally bright and breath-taking - it is after all, the brightest city in the world or so people say. Hanamichi never ceased to be amazed by the stream of fluid neon city lights. It was a gay and rambunctious city and Hanamichi with his equally unruly personality, fitted in perfectly. For him, every night he spends in the city is as unique and exotic as the other.

He just got home from his afternoon shift as crew member in A Hamburgers where he's been working for a while now. It's his third job ever since they moved from Kanagawa and it's been the longest one he'd held so far. The manager is a good man and he's forgiven Hanamichi his more than occasional blunders. And in his part, Hanamichi quite enjoyed working there too, why, just earlier he was witness to a young couple's loving moment. The pair looked like they were in middle school, one of them being tall for his age and the other being a little too short. The taller boy ordered 11 hamburgers for his own and a single burger and can of Ponta for his companion, both of which he paid for. In the middle of his third burger, the taller boy with hair similar to Sendoh's started choking and gulped down the other's Ponta.

“Mou…you drank my Ponta,” the shorter boy whined.

“You would rather have me choke to death?!” the other scowled indignantly.

“Pigs would fly before you choke on food. You could even swallow a whole burger in one bite.”

“Fine,” the taller boy replied, unwrapping his fourth burger, “I'll stuff myself until I choke to death so you can see a flying pig,” he roughly bit on his food, snarling and averting his eyes from his friend.

The shorter boy with golden eyes resembling a cat's furrowed his brows and pouted. Silence ensued for a few minutes so Hanamichi was losing interest in watching but just as he was about to turn away, he saw the smaller boy's hand creep up to the larger one of his friend and entangle their fingers together. A faint color rose on the cheeks of both youth and Hanamichi sniggered - the smaller boy resembled someone he knew.

 

It is awfully quiet inside their dilapidated apartment building during the time of night he gets home and Hanamichi often walked the corridors while whistling a happy tune to himself, humming or dreaming of a good night's sleep without Kaede crushing his nose for once. He opened the door to their room slowly, expecting to see Kaede curled asleep like a cat on the futon, however, to his surprise; he wasn't welcomed by that usual picture.

 

“Why is it so dark in here…Oi, kitsune, you home?”

 

A tall man standing against the wall was silhouetted against the faint light streaming in from the windows.

 

“Why are you standing there in the dark, baka kitsune…”

 

Hanamichi started fumbling for the light switch beside the door frame when he noticed something different.

 

“Huh…what the…”

 

Strewn across the walls of their humble room were neon green stars of different sizes.

 

“…what…Ruka…”

“Close the door idiot, don't let the light in,” Rukawa grunted, drawing the curtains close.

 

The red-head walked in the room curiously, looking around in awe and shutting the door behind him.

 

“…Because you said you can't see the stars,” the blue-eyed fox said hesitantly, a tiny catch in his throat.

 

For a while Hanamichi stood frozen stiff. Since when had Rukawa been so…cute? He was suddenly reminded of the golden-eyed middle schooler in A Hamburgers earlier. He slowly walked over and leaned against the wall beside Rukawa, sliding down against it. Then he suddenly started laughing, softly at first and growing louder each second.

“What's so funny,” his partner grumbled, taking a seat beside him.

“Nothing….I just…this is so out of character for you.”

“If you don't like it, you can start peeling them off the walls. I already spent all afternoon putting them up. I'm going to sleep,” he began to stand up when he felt a hand grasp his wrist.

“Hey Kaede,” he paused, peering at Hanamichi in the darkness, “thanks.”

The red head slid his hand down the fox's wrist and clasped their fingers together as Rukawa sat back beside him.

“…don't keep secrets from me again, do'ahou.”

“You're the one who's always quiet!” Hanamichi retorted on impulse before calming down as fast.

“…”

“…yeah, you're right. And you too, you know. Share everything with me.”

 

What he really wanted to say was, `Whether it be joy, sorrow, hunger, pain, share everything with me,' but despite his loudness, Hanamichi has never been good with words and reckons he never will be. So he opted to squeeze his lover's hand tenderly - that would be enough to get his point across. And besides he's very sure that if only he could see Kaede's face right then, there would be a faint tint coloring his pallid cheeks. Yes, that would be enough. It would be fun to see Kaede blushing beet red, but he'd wait another day for that. For that night, that one Tokyo night is more unique and more exotic than any other. And he won't have it any other way.

 

~OWARI~

 

A/N: I'll give a big wet sloppy kiss to anyone who can guess who the couple in A Hamburgers is ^3^

Clue: There from another sports anime. The fast food they frequent is called A Hamburgers.

 

Ponta: Fanta

Dame: No; that's not it