For people who think Kintarou and Sakuno are adorable together as BFFs or more. There are days when I'm certain I ship them more than I ship RyoSaku.
Also, the concept of Sakuno being an art student was borrowed from the Chinese TeniPuri drama--which I recommend everyone should watch if you want some really good RyoSaku moments. And MomoKai.
Short Circuit (Kintarou, Sakuno)
Wherein Kin-chan tried to impress Sakuno with his skills in circuitry. Operative word.TRIED.
-----
Circuitry was and had never been one of Ryuuzaki Sakuno’s strengths. Ask her to distinguish a Rembrandt from a Monet and she could so with ease. But ask her to tell the difference between a capacitor, a resistor and a transistor, and she'd tell you why she majored in the arts instead of anything related to the field of Science. So one day,when her radio-cassette player suddenly stopped working, she became distressed . The radio, you see, was an old gift from Tomo-chan , thus her great concern to its sudden breakdown.
Fortunately, she remembered that assistance lived just a door away. Bringing her portable cassette player with her, she left her apartment and headed to room 505 where a man named Haru was currently living with his younger cousin.
Haru was an electronics and communications senior from one of the local universities. A popular name among the residents of that apartment building, Haru was synonymous with the words broken appliances. Malfunctioning TVs? DVD players? Radios? Take them to Haru and definitely, he’d fix them all—and for free, too. Silently hoping that the 24-year old redhead was not busy with other things, the mahogany-haired girl raised a clenched fist and gave the wooden panel three consecutive knocks.
“Haru-san? “ she called out his name while giving the door another set of taps. From the other side of the door, the girl heard the sounds of shuffling feet coming nearer. As the door slowly opened, she was expecting the wooden panel would reveal a man with spiky, crimson hair. However, it was a different redhead who came to welcome her.
“Eh? Sakuno-chan?”
Sakuno smiled timidly at the boy before her. His name was Kintarou—a former Shitenhouji Regular, who was still a popular tennis star in the Kansai area. Who would have thought that she, after deciding to take her college degree at Osaka University, would end up living next to one of Seigaku’s greatest opponents?
“Ah, hello, Kintarou-kun. Is Haru-san around?”
“Oniichan? He left early this morning. He’s going to Meguro, I think.”
“Oh,” she muttered as a dejected expression crossed her face. “Umm..when will he be back?”
He shrugged his shoulders."I have no idea. “
“I see.” Smiling gently, she bowed her head. “ Well then, I’ll just come back later, ” she informed him before she turned to face the direction of her own apartment door. However, before she could take a step away from Room 505, Kintarou stopped her and asked why she was searching for his cousin.
“Ah, I just want him to have a look at this.” she responded, showing him her portable cassette player.
“Why? What’s the problem with your radio?”
“Ano…it suddenly ran out of power. It was working well a while ago.”
“Have you checked the electrical sockets in your apartment?”
“Yes. “ She nodded. “ And they are working perfectly.”
“Hmmm…” Kintarou mumbled as he stared at the radio for a few seconds. Afterwards, he held out his hand, signaling Sakuno to give the appliance to him. She did so, without thinking twice. Upon receiving the radio, he began to inspect it from top to bottom, from left to right. Narrowing his eyes, he gave a nod before returning his attention to Sakuno. “I can fix this.”
Upon hearing him say this, Sakuno threw him an incredulous look. “Eh? Really?”
As a response to her doubtful expression, Kintarou gave her a wide, confident grin.
---
“Are you really sure that you can fix it, Kintarou-kun?” Sakuno asked anxiously as she watched Kintarou take the final screw off her cassette player. Actually, she had already refused his offer of help, saying that she was in no hurry to have the radio fixed and that she was willing to wait for Haru. The younger Tooyama was so persistent,however.
“Relax!” he told her in an assuring tone. “I’ve assisted Oniichan several times. I know how this works.”
“Well, if you say so,” she muttered with an obvious tinge of hesitation in her voice. Kintarou didn't come across as the type who would be interested in circuitry; one time he even lamented to her how much he hated Science. So why was she even entrusting Tomo-chan's casette player to him?
Oh right, trust.
He told her to trust him, and she did, because all these months she had known him, he had proven himself to be reliable neighbor and friend. He had never let her down and today wouldn't be any different.
Right?
As Kintarou began to tinker with her radio, Sakuno took the space on the floor next to him and carefully watched his every movement. He seemed to know what he was doing, she observed. She smiled subtly. Maybe she didn’t make a mistake after all.
“Damn!”
Or maybe she did.
“Kintarou-kun, is everything okay?” she asked nervously upon hearing him curse.
“Yes, yes. Everything is all right,” he told her as he smiled sheepishly. “Uhmm…I’ve just momentarily forgotten which wire goes where.”
”What!”
“Don’t worry, don’t worry,” he coaxed. “I’ve already remembered it’s the blue wire that goes here,” he informed her, grinning confidently. His grin, however, didn’t last long as he started to doubt his own memory. Scratching his head, his brow furrowed as he wondered,
“Or maybe it‘s the red one?”
Sakuno at that moment was beginning to become very, very, very worried. “Kintarou-kun…”
“Ah, I’m sure of it now. It’s the red wire!”
Despite the certainty in the redhead’s voice, she was already reluctant to allow him to continue his work on her radio. “Kintarou-kun, maybe we should just wait for Haru-san,” she suggested, silently hoping that he, too, would see that as the better option. But it turned out that he was one insistent fellow.
“I can do this, Sakuno-chan!” he exclaimed zealously. ” Just trust me. Please?”
And there goes that word again. Trust.
Sakuno merely remained silent as she stared at him with concern in her eyes. Her brain told her not to say yes but the begging look on his face was more than enough to change her mind. Pleading expressions were one of her greatest weaknesses. “Oh, all right.”
With a wide grin on his face, Kintarou continued to try and repair the broken device, while Sakuno silently prayed that he wouldn’t mess things up.
Half an hour later…
“There, it’s fixed,” Kintarou declared right after the last screw had been returned to the radio. Then, he rose from his seat and walked to the nearest electrical outlet. Sakuno followed closely behind him.
Crouching down, he placed the radio on the floor and prepared to plug it in “Cross your fingers, ” he told her as he inserted the plug into its proper socket. Afterwards, he pushed the radio’s ‘On’ button. And then, to their delight, a familiar dance music began to fill the room.
“It’s working!” Sakuno remarked happily as she crouched down beside the redhead.
“See? I told you I could do it.”
Facing the crimson-eyed boy, she bowed her head out of sheer gratefulness for the help he had done. She shouldn't have doubted him at all.. “Thank you very much, Kintarou-kun. I hope there is some way that I can repay you.”
“Well, you can give me a kiss,” he said as his grin turned naughty.
” W-what!” she exclaimed as her cheeks turned as red.
Upon seeing her expression, Kintarou laughed. “I was only kidding." As soon as his laughter died down, he added, “But I’d be happy if you’d bake another batch of your delicious brownies. Oniichan and I really loved what you gave to us last week.”
“Really? “
“Yep. They were the best!” Sakuno’s shyly smiled, flattered by all the compliments her baking skills were receiving right then. She eventually agreed to bake for Kintarou, much to the boy’s happiness. After making that deal with him, she thought it was time for her to go back to her own apartment. She thanked him again for a second time and he responded by saying, “No problem, Sakuno-chan. That’s what friends are for.”
She smiled at him before she reached for her radio-cassette player to push the ‘Off’ button. But it didn’t work. She pushed the button once. Twice. Thrice. But still, it continued to play music.
“Kintarou-kun, why is the ‘Off’ button not functioning?”
Before Kintarou could answer, fizzing sounds started to replace the music, catching both teens’ attention.
“Now, what ‘s happening?”
“Uh-oh…”
“What do you mean ‘uh-oh’ ?” Sakuno got her answer when her radio suddenly stopped functioning and emitted white smokes. And frankly speaking, she didn’t like the response that she got. “Kintarou…”
Kintarou winced as he slowly he turned to Sakuno. When he heard her drop the –kun from his name, he immediately knew he was in trouble. When he was already face to face with her, he gave her a sheepish grin. “So… I guess this means I won’t be having those brownies, right?”
Echizen Ryoma thinks there is a special place in hell just for him, he swore he wouldn’t be a womanizing bastard like his father, but apparently his father must have accumulated enough negative karma from his various past affairs for it to affect him now. He lets out a tired sigh.
“Are you alright, Ryoma-kun?” A soft voice asked, brown doe eyes staring at him, curious and worried, across the dining table. He looks at the bane of his existence (the unrequited love of his life) and shrugs noncommittally; truly, he is fine, he just needs to ignore this problem- ignore her and it will all go away in time.
It has to. If not he may never get a restful sleep at night ever again. The thought of that sends a weary chill down his spine.
“Mah I guess Koshimae is tired from his long flight! Here’s your Ponta- Sakuno-chan and I bought it specially for you!” Kintarou exclaims, carrying a can of Ponta and another bowl of rice, and tosses the can to him casually before kissing his wife on the check. Ryoma barely manages to catch it, but even if he couldn’t he doubt they would have noticed. Sitting across him, their heads are buried close together: Kintarou tucking Sakuno’s hair behind her ear, eyes focused on her alone, bowl of rice forgotten. Sakuno blushes at the public display of affection but smiles at Kintarou, soft and sweet.
Their matching wedding rings glittering under the fluorescent light of their living room; obviously very well-cared for, adored, cherished.
(There are some things that do not change with time, like the way she blushes, and her cooking, and the fragrance of her hair as she walked past him to set the dinner table.)
Dinner sits unpleasantly in his stomach. He must have gotten too used to the food in America, in Australia, in Europe, in anywhere but here, a house filled with warmth and love and laughter in Osaka, where the smell of warm rice and fried fish permeates the air, supported by the many photographs lining the walls of the house, cataloguing every bit of happiness he missed out on by picking his career over her that fateful day in June after their last year in high school.
For all he used to joke about Kintarou being stupid, Kintarou had the right idea all this while, to pick marrying Ryuuzaki Sakuno (wobbly hips, he thinks, with a tinge of hysteria, for now her hips are anything but that) over a possible career in pro-tennis.
He remembers how she used to braid her hair, how there was never a need for anyone to help her tuck it behind her ear because most of it was tightly bound into twin pigtails he used to complain were too long, and he takes another sip of his juice.
The saccharine sweetness of the juice tastes bitter on his tongue.
“I should go.” He tries his best to feel vindictive glee at interrupting their moment, but all he feels is bone-achingly tired. The both of them immediately refuse his request, Kintarou nearly yelling “NO KOSHIMAE YOU PROMISED TO STAY THE NIGHT-WE EVEN BOUGHT TENNIS BALL BEDSHEETS FOR YOU-“ and Sakuno’s quieter, but no less firm denial “Ryoma-kun, please stay. We’d like to have you here- we’ve missed you.”
There is nothing he can say to that.
(There was nothing he could say to her then, when she told him she was attending omiais to find someone, and there was nothing he could say to him, when he told him that he was marrying Sakuno and wasn’t it awesome Koshimae Sakuno-chan is the cutest girl in the entire planet-no UNIVERSE-
So he keeps silent.)
There is nothing he could say to them, words dying in his throat as he thinks of how much they both mean to him and to each other, then and now and always, so he nods and tries his best to feel happy as they both look at him with matching smiles.
He takes another sip of his juice.
At least the bitter aftertaste makes a great complement to the food coagulating in his stomach.
Oh-uh. Having this KinSaku feels again. Pretty unhealthy for my heart but can't help it. They're so perfect ;u; Kin-chan you're so cute it almost hurts! ajshsg ♥
