Echizen's New Rival

Chapter 6: Chance

-panting-
"Oi Echizen you're being left out again!" Momo shouted. He still had that sadistic smile on his face and he had kept that twitch in his mouth ever since they were in the bus. The tennis prince flushed when he remembered what happened a while ago- where that silly smile from Momo is pertaining to. He tried to shake it off his head but his mind doesn't listen to him. His brain-filled-with-tennis is now continuously hunting him with a scene he wished would stop now. He can't concentrate in the training and he's getting more and more confused.

Ryoma slapped his head lightly before he rushed as fast as he can to his sempai's side to frown at him, "Stop it already," he plainly ordered. He became disappointed when Momo just smiled at him. The man even got the Polaroid pictures from his pocket and showed it to the young shounen.

"I can't, not with pictures like this," The dunk master laughed and sprinted to join Eiji and the others to flaunt their treasures. Ryoma became flustered after seeing the pictures. "It was an accident, Echizen Ryoma." He said to himself. "No big deal…"

FLASHBACK:
The soft warm light coming from the sun outside slightly warmed the cold air that circulated inside the bus. The tennis prince and the princess at the back still had their eyes closed. They both had fallen asleep a while ago after that conversation they had.

-flash-
Echizen did not budge but felt that artificial light from behind his eyes and since it was a bother to move in that position, he just ignored it.
-flash- -flash-

The flashes of soft light could not have come from outside. It was too much uncomfortable that he had to pry open his eyes to see where those flashes were coming from. As soon as he did, he saw two smiling men, taking pictures of both he and Sakuno. Ryoma flinched and immediately reacted by reaching for the camera, totally forgetting about Sakuno who was peacefully resting on his shoulder. Good thing, Ryoma had his left hand immediately stretched out to catch the girl's head in no time. (His fast reflexes came from his training in tennis)

"What are you doing?" Ryoma angrily asked in a whisper. "Oh, come on Ryoma… It's alright. I got good pictures of you and Sakuno. Here, look!" Momo replied, also as softly as possible. Momo handed the picture to Ryoma and the tennis prince flushed. Sakuno was beautiful and the light from outside accentuated the beauty of the picture. They were both sleeping soundly under the soft orange light of the sun.

"I didn't know you that you were a photographer, momo-sempai…" Echizen unconsciously said while he admired the picture. "That was just a fluke…" Eiji defended with a soft laugh.

"And ochibi-suke! Go back to the princess so we can take pictures of both of you!" he added while taking the pictures out of the prince's hand and shoving him back to his seat. The force of Eiji's push was joined by a swift right swerve by the bus causing the boy to be thrown out of balance.

"-Woah!"

Echizen shouted. After that display, he was now squatting in front of Sakuno, maintaining that one strong step that prevented him to fall down, flat on the floor. He heaved a sigh of relief. He almost fell down on the girl which he rather would not have happened. But as soon as he tried to stand up, he was surprised when the bus roughly halted to a brake, causing Echizen to be thrown forward in front of Sakuno. Ryoma's face met the girl's and their lips felt each other. Everything happened so fast that the tennis prince couldn't even move- he was too shocked. He was kissing Sakuno, the coach's granddaughter, Seigaku's cheerleader and sometimes a companion and a student.

-Flash-
Seeing the bleak light brought him back to his senses and forced him self to move backward. He had his left hand cover his lips and the right clutched in to his chest. He just kissed Sakuno. "But I never kissed anyone in my whole life before. th-that was just an accident…' Ryoma tried to rescue himself. "I…"