[FIC] Takeoff and Landing (GP)
To counteract the negative energy I have going on right now, I'm posting this fic that I wrote for a number of reasons: 1. To answer a conversation I had with senshixdoukeshi; 2. For the GP Fortnight; 3. For miss_vichan's birthday (even though it's very very late).
Disclaimer: Not mine. If it were, there'd be sex on the courts.
Warnings: POV, AR
Notes: IN A WORLD WITHOUT TENNIS... my sister, senshixdoukeshi and I were talking, one night, about what would happen if the GP hadn't had tennis. I thought about it for awhile and decided to fic where my thoughts lead me. I don't want to say too much before the fic, but I think that there's some sort of connection between Eiji and Oishi on a bit of a fatalistic level... a bit of unmei. Many thanks to pixxers for reading over the fic. Dedicated to miss_vichan. Happy very late birthday!!!
Takeoff and Landing
by Solanum Dulcamara
The rough of the concrete platform is cold and hard beneath my feet, and despite it's sturdiness, I always feel a little weightless when I stand up here, where air moves around me even in this enclosed building. The heady rush of adrenaline is thick in my veins and I shiver with it, feeling it tingle down my arms and legs to my fingertips and toes, goose-bumps rising on my skin. The mixed babble of the crowd and the intercom has faded to a constant buzz overlaid by the rhythmic lapping of water against the sides of the nearby lane pool. I love this moment; when everything lay below me in a heart-stopping, three-second drop. I step to the edge, reveling in the precariousness, and turn to balance just on the balls of my feet, toes flexed tight on the concrete. The rapid beating of my heart pounds against the tightness of my chest. I love this feeling: the 'make or break' nervousness that makes most people want to vomit. I can feel my habitual smile as I grab onto that chilly feeling in my gut and set to use it. My muscles tense; knees bending, arms swinging forward, heart and lungs pausing altogether. Contract and flex - then I'm rising up and back, and I'm flying. This is the moment I truly live for. Everything else fades away completely, and it's just me and the air and the rush. I don't know if I'd be able to live without this moment, even if it's just three seconds. And every time I leave the board, and kiss the air, and feel that heady sensation of weightlessness, I'm taken back to that moment... the moment we met, the moment that brought me here and gave me my wings.
I tuck, and twist, and feel the world turn around me.
One.
The pathway pounded beneath my feet as I ran for the school. I was going to be late for classroom duty. I'd had to cook breakfast instead of my eldest brother because he skipped out on his chore to meet his girlfriend. Lame! I was going to be late because of him... he was getting toads in his underwear drawer. Definitely. My eyes were on my trainers as they hit the dirt, not ahead of me like they should have been. I never saw you walking along, unaware of me barreling toward you. I hit your back hard. It must have hurt... it hurt me, at least. I recovered before you and handed you the duffel bag you'd dropped during the collision. I hated awkward apologies, but when I looked at you, all I saw was a pair of confused green eyes, crazy fluffy hair, and a face so open, I was sure it could never successfully tell a lie. The words that passed between us were insignificant and unmemorable; some apology given and accepted. I didn't stand with you for more than a minute, but my hand tingled as I ran the rest of the way to school, the hand I'd given you your bag with. I was late... I got detention... I didn't care.
After school, I was walking to the gym hoping to join the gymnastics club. I loved gymnastics. I only had a little formal training from a tumbling class I took in grammar school. Mostly I made up routines in my back yard to the audience of squirrels and birds using the grass and my family's swing set. Gymnastics was like flying. The feeling of hopping through handsprings and cartwheels; momentary skips like a plane on a runway about to take off, like any minute I might stay off the ground and take to the sky. I'd wanted to join the gymnastics club and do REAL gymnastics, but on my way to the gym, I saw you... and my hand started to tingle again, and I didn't know what was wrong with me, but I had to go talk to you. So, I did.
We were by the pool, and I found out that you were on the swim team. "Aren't speedos uncomfortable?" I wondered aloud. You laughed a bit, blushing slightly. I didn't know what was so interesting about you. You were quiet and shy; not my usual choice in friend... then again my usual friends didn't make me tingle when I touched them. I followed you into the pool house, asking you questions that I wouldn't remember an hour later... probably something about what kinds of workouts swimmers did and was it cold to practice in the winter. That's when I saw it, ten meters above the diving pool. I knew that I had to try jumping off of it. I don't know that I saw a platform... I think I saw a launch pad. I was wearing my phys. ed. clothes, so I just kicked off my shoes and toed off my socks. You asked what I was doing and I didn't answer right away. It wasn't till I handed you my shirt that I said I was going to try that platform. I think that you stuttered some objections, but I didn't hear them and didn't listen for them. All I knew was that I needed to jump off of that platform; to see if it was the ticket to freedom that it looked like. I'm not sure that you followed because I think that your protests faded behind me.
When I gripped the rungs of the ladder for the first time, I felt an electric tingle, like the one from your hand. I climbed... I had to. Some dumb upperclassman tried to tell me to get down. I told him he could climb up and make me. I didn't hear what he said after that because I'd stepped up onto the platform and for the first time, I felt my stomach drop out in a way that I knew would become addictive. I'd never gone off of a board this tall before... and this wasn't even a board. I walked to the edge and peared down. The water looked so far away, and I think I should've been scared, but I wasn't. I just jumped off, then instinct and years of habit from backyard acrobatics kicked in and I was twirling my way towards the water. I hit the surface with a splash that didn't happen exactly how or when I wanted it to, but all the same, as I floated in the twelve meters of chlorinated water, letting my eyes burn as I stared up at the blurry image of the platform above me, I knew that that jump was as close to flying as I'd ever gotten. I let myself float up, not quite ready to move and disrupt the wonderful feeling singing over my nerves. As I broke the surface, my calm was interrupted by the shouts of so many voices that I only heard an echoing roar in the warehouse-like building. The spark faded to a memory, but a vivid memory, and I knew I'd be able to catch that feeling again. When I reached the side of the pool, I was greeted by a man with the oddest stubble who was wearing sunglasses indoors. He spoke with the kind of calm that I was sure Zen masters of old had searched for, “You probably shouldn't jump off of extremely high places without the permission of the club supervisor," a pause and then, "Having said that, though, I'd love to let you jump as many times as you'd like if you just join the team.” I was sold and told him so. You were waiting there with my shirt just a few paces behind the man known as Yamato-kôchi. I think I must have been smiling like crazy, still a little high on the dive. But you returned my smile, just as wide, and told me that it was an awesome dive, and that it was cool that I was joining the team, and that I'd seemed to be flying. That's when I decided we absolutely would be friends.
The muscles in my body are tight in all of the right places to give me the rotation I need. The only person with rotation better than mine in the entire university circuit is that damned Mukahi Gakuto from Hyoutei, and I'll beat him yet. The world is a nonexistent blur beyond my line of sight, as I continue downward.
Two.
Our friendship was hard-won, but at the same time, so incredibly easy. We fought almost from the very beginning. Sometimes we argued about me being too flashy, too reckless, too much of a showoff. Other times, it was about you not having enough faith in your skills and being too restrained. We'd yell and say things we didn't mean, then go our separate ways, each sure that we wouldn't speak again. Not more than a day later (sometimes not even an hour) found one of us at the other's door offering a clumsy and sheepish apology that was brushed aside with an invite in to watch movies or play video games. Sometimes we never got around to movies or video games because we just sat around talking.
Our friendship grew up around our swim and dive meets. I went over to your house the night before joint meets and carbo-loaded with you, even though I didn't have to because my metabolism just works well that way. We lied awake in your room those nights, staring at the ceiling, knowing we needed to get a good night's sleep, but too excited to actually fall asleep. You always crawled down onto the floor with me and we lied side by side on the futon, arms just touching, an electric tingle between us, and we talked out our nervousness until we both fell asleep. Your mom always laughed at us in the morning and asked if it was good for our backs to be sleeping on the floor when we had meets the next day. It became our joke that we spent our nights before meets in preparation like samurai the night before battle, and it was, therefore, only good and proper that we sleep in traditional fashion.
When we had separate meets, I still always took the train out to watch you swim and to cheer for you. I felt a million times more nervous when you stood on the starting block than when I stood on the diving platform. You told me once that you could hear me cheering while you raced. I said that was ridiculous because with all the splashing, and your head being under the water half of the time, and the other people cheering, there was no way you could hear me (no matter how loud I was). You just smiled at me in a way that brought me back to the day we met and the way my hand had tingled. I had no more protests. And you were always at my meets, too… though you occasionally complained about having to wake up early to get to them. Still, whenever I climbed out of the pool after a dive, you met me with a shammy cloth and a towel, and stood by my side while I waited for my scores. I don't think you knew how much your presence alone settled my nerves.
Winter meets through junior high and high school were spent huddled together in our team sweats, wrapped in your thermal blanket, sharing my MP3 player's headphones, and preserving each other's warmth as best we could between events. You told me I stole more heat than I gave. I told you that if you had enough warmth that I was stealing some, then you had plenty to spare. You said the blanket was weird because even though I leeched heat, it was still warmer when I was under it with you. We concluded that Physics wasn't either of our strong point, and it was better just to enjoy the warmth than to question it.
I'm rushing towards the water and the blood is rushing in my ears. Every hair on my body is on-end with the thrill. I know I'm not breathing, I never can when I'm air-born. I savor the last sliver of time I've got as I feel my body begin to unfurl.
Three.
I banged incessantly on your door the day I got the call. You answered, I think your whole house knew it was me. I'd been scouted. At one of our meets, a university coach had seen me dive and wanted me for the team. They offered me a scholarship. They offered me a free shot into the school. I don't know how I expected you to react... maybe to sweep me up into one of those big swinging hugs that you're capable of after years of racing the butterfly stroke and weight-training... maybe to squeeze my shoulder like you do when my dives go well, not bothering with words of congratulations and just smiling at me in a way that says more than words ever could... I don't know what I expected, but it definitely wasn't the frown that set into your brow. That frown made me nervous. Were you upset that I'd gotten scouted and not you? Were you angry that I'd been offered a free-ride instead of you? You'd been swimming longer than I'd been diving. Maybe you thought I didn't deserve it.
But that couldn't be true because no one knew how hard I worked like you did. You were there all of the times that I'd bungled practice dives; when I bruised myself on the water's surprisingly hard surface. You were the first one at my side the time I really screwed up and caught my leg on the platform doing an inward dive. You even went with me to the hospital and helped me convince the doctor to give me a soft cast. You were there when I practiced before I was supposed to, worried I was going to aggravate the injury during the healing process, but supportive of my desire to get back in the water. You couldn't be upset or jealous. So, I waited because I knew if I waited, you'd let me know what the frown meant.
Finally you spoke, "Rikyou isn't an easy school to get into..." your words were measured, "I'm going to have to study hard for the exams if I want to get it." I felt the weight of uncertainty lift from my chest. You wanted to come with me! "Congratulations, Eiji," and then, you smiled. I felt the tingle, and the warmth, and the strength of your support. I tried to sweep you into one of your big swinging hugs. Considering I had the more lithe musculature of a diver, it wasn't such a good idea. We ended up in a pile on your foyer floor, laughing hysterically.
I promised to help you study for your exams, and you laughed at me and told me that my hectic, sporadic study-style was more of a distraction than a help. You were bloody ungrateful and I said as much. You told me to just wait for you and you'd meet me there.
You did.
We walked onto campus Spring of our Freshman year together with our luggage and care-packages from our families. Sharing a dorm was a given, despite me majoring in History and you going pre-Med. You joined the swim team, while I did my best to earn my keep for my scholarship on the dive team. We fought over space, study habits, mess, idiosyncrasies. We watched movies and played video games, but more often than not, we just talked. Two years passed in a blur of midterms and finals, meets and competitions, and more laughter and tears than I can remember over the entirety of my life before then.
Plish.
My body breaks the surface of the water, not quite at the perfect perpendicular angle I strive for, but damned close to it. Still, I'd have to work harder. As always, I take a minute in the twelve meters of chlorinated water that still burns my eyes to look up through the three seconds of air, to the platform above, and let the adrenaline run its course. I surface, reluctantly. All sound has returned and the building is an echo of too many voices to hear anything clearly. I slip through the water, feeling it wash away the last of the rush, and by the time I reach the ladder, I've returned to the calm anticipation of the next time I'll dive and the promise of flying again. The rungs are cold in my hands, and I have to wonder, as I tend to, if I hadn't met you, would I have found this freedom anyway? But as I'm exiting the pool, you're there with a towel and a smile and I realize, I wouldn't want to imagine not having met you. You are the ground that holds me up until I can fly again, and I wouldn't be complete without either.
Glossary:
kôchi: coach
Disclaimer: Not mine. If it were, there'd be sex on the courts.
Warnings: POV, AR
Notes: IN A WORLD WITHOUT TENNIS... my sister, senshixdoukeshi and I were talking, one night, about what would happen if the GP hadn't had tennis. I thought about it for awhile and decided to fic where my thoughts lead me. I don't want to say too much before the fic, but I think that there's some sort of connection between Eiji and Oishi on a bit of a fatalistic level... a bit of unmei. Many thanks to pixxers for reading over the fic. Dedicated to miss_vichan. Happy very late birthday!!!
Takeoff and Landing
by Solanum Dulcamara
The rough of the concrete platform is cold and hard beneath my feet, and despite it's sturdiness, I always feel a little weightless when I stand up here, where air moves around me even in this enclosed building. The heady rush of adrenaline is thick in my veins and I shiver with it, feeling it tingle down my arms and legs to my fingertips and toes, goose-bumps rising on my skin. The mixed babble of the crowd and the intercom has faded to a constant buzz overlaid by the rhythmic lapping of water against the sides of the nearby lane pool. I love this moment; when everything lay below me in a heart-stopping, three-second drop. I step to the edge, reveling in the precariousness, and turn to balance just on the balls of my feet, toes flexed tight on the concrete. The rapid beating of my heart pounds against the tightness of my chest. I love this feeling: the 'make or break' nervousness that makes most people want to vomit. I can feel my habitual smile as I grab onto that chilly feeling in my gut and set to use it. My muscles tense; knees bending, arms swinging forward, heart and lungs pausing altogether. Contract and flex - then I'm rising up and back, and I'm flying. This is the moment I truly live for. Everything else fades away completely, and it's just me and the air and the rush. I don't know if I'd be able to live without this moment, even if it's just three seconds. And every time I leave the board, and kiss the air, and feel that heady sensation of weightlessness, I'm taken back to that moment... the moment we met, the moment that brought me here and gave me my wings.
I tuck, and twist, and feel the world turn around me.
One.
The pathway pounded beneath my feet as I ran for the school. I was going to be late for classroom duty. I'd had to cook breakfast instead of my eldest brother because he skipped out on his chore to meet his girlfriend. Lame! I was going to be late because of him... he was getting toads in his underwear drawer. Definitely. My eyes were on my trainers as they hit the dirt, not ahead of me like they should have been. I never saw you walking along, unaware of me barreling toward you. I hit your back hard. It must have hurt... it hurt me, at least. I recovered before you and handed you the duffel bag you'd dropped during the collision. I hated awkward apologies, but when I looked at you, all I saw was a pair of confused green eyes, crazy fluffy hair, and a face so open, I was sure it could never successfully tell a lie. The words that passed between us were insignificant and unmemorable; some apology given and accepted. I didn't stand with you for more than a minute, but my hand tingled as I ran the rest of the way to school, the hand I'd given you your bag with. I was late... I got detention... I didn't care.
After school, I was walking to the gym hoping to join the gymnastics club. I loved gymnastics. I only had a little formal training from a tumbling class I took in grammar school. Mostly I made up routines in my back yard to the audience of squirrels and birds using the grass and my family's swing set. Gymnastics was like flying. The feeling of hopping through handsprings and cartwheels; momentary skips like a plane on a runway about to take off, like any minute I might stay off the ground and take to the sky. I'd wanted to join the gymnastics club and do REAL gymnastics, but on my way to the gym, I saw you... and my hand started to tingle again, and I didn't know what was wrong with me, but I had to go talk to you. So, I did.
We were by the pool, and I found out that you were on the swim team. "Aren't speedos uncomfortable?" I wondered aloud. You laughed a bit, blushing slightly. I didn't know what was so interesting about you. You were quiet and shy; not my usual choice in friend... then again my usual friends didn't make me tingle when I touched them. I followed you into the pool house, asking you questions that I wouldn't remember an hour later... probably something about what kinds of workouts swimmers did and was it cold to practice in the winter. That's when I saw it, ten meters above the diving pool. I knew that I had to try jumping off of it. I don't know that I saw a platform... I think I saw a launch pad. I was wearing my phys. ed. clothes, so I just kicked off my shoes and toed off my socks. You asked what I was doing and I didn't answer right away. It wasn't till I handed you my shirt that I said I was going to try that platform. I think that you stuttered some objections, but I didn't hear them and didn't listen for them. All I knew was that I needed to jump off of that platform; to see if it was the ticket to freedom that it looked like. I'm not sure that you followed because I think that your protests faded behind me.
When I gripped the rungs of the ladder for the first time, I felt an electric tingle, like the one from your hand. I climbed... I had to. Some dumb upperclassman tried to tell me to get down. I told him he could climb up and make me. I didn't hear what he said after that because I'd stepped up onto the platform and for the first time, I felt my stomach drop out in a way that I knew would become addictive. I'd never gone off of a board this tall before... and this wasn't even a board. I walked to the edge and peared down. The water looked so far away, and I think I should've been scared, but I wasn't. I just jumped off, then instinct and years of habit from backyard acrobatics kicked in and I was twirling my way towards the water. I hit the surface with a splash that didn't happen exactly how or when I wanted it to, but all the same, as I floated in the twelve meters of chlorinated water, letting my eyes burn as I stared up at the blurry image of the platform above me, I knew that that jump was as close to flying as I'd ever gotten. I let myself float up, not quite ready to move and disrupt the wonderful feeling singing over my nerves. As I broke the surface, my calm was interrupted by the shouts of so many voices that I only heard an echoing roar in the warehouse-like building. The spark faded to a memory, but a vivid memory, and I knew I'd be able to catch that feeling again. When I reached the side of the pool, I was greeted by a man with the oddest stubble who was wearing sunglasses indoors. He spoke with the kind of calm that I was sure Zen masters of old had searched for, “You probably shouldn't jump off of extremely high places without the permission of the club supervisor," a pause and then, "Having said that, though, I'd love to let you jump as many times as you'd like if you just join the team.” I was sold and told him so. You were waiting there with my shirt just a few paces behind the man known as Yamato-kôchi. I think I must have been smiling like crazy, still a little high on the dive. But you returned my smile, just as wide, and told me that it was an awesome dive, and that it was cool that I was joining the team, and that I'd seemed to be flying. That's when I decided we absolutely would be friends.
The muscles in my body are tight in all of the right places to give me the rotation I need. The only person with rotation better than mine in the entire university circuit is that damned Mukahi Gakuto from Hyoutei, and I'll beat him yet. The world is a nonexistent blur beyond my line of sight, as I continue downward.
Two.
Our friendship was hard-won, but at the same time, so incredibly easy. We fought almost from the very beginning. Sometimes we argued about me being too flashy, too reckless, too much of a showoff. Other times, it was about you not having enough faith in your skills and being too restrained. We'd yell and say things we didn't mean, then go our separate ways, each sure that we wouldn't speak again. Not more than a day later (sometimes not even an hour) found one of us at the other's door offering a clumsy and sheepish apology that was brushed aside with an invite in to watch movies or play video games. Sometimes we never got around to movies or video games because we just sat around talking.
Our friendship grew up around our swim and dive meets. I went over to your house the night before joint meets and carbo-loaded with you, even though I didn't have to because my metabolism just works well that way. We lied awake in your room those nights, staring at the ceiling, knowing we needed to get a good night's sleep, but too excited to actually fall asleep. You always crawled down onto the floor with me and we lied side by side on the futon, arms just touching, an electric tingle between us, and we talked out our nervousness until we both fell asleep. Your mom always laughed at us in the morning and asked if it was good for our backs to be sleeping on the floor when we had meets the next day. It became our joke that we spent our nights before meets in preparation like samurai the night before battle, and it was, therefore, only good and proper that we sleep in traditional fashion.
When we had separate meets, I still always took the train out to watch you swim and to cheer for you. I felt a million times more nervous when you stood on the starting block than when I stood on the diving platform. You told me once that you could hear me cheering while you raced. I said that was ridiculous because with all the splashing, and your head being under the water half of the time, and the other people cheering, there was no way you could hear me (no matter how loud I was). You just smiled at me in a way that brought me back to the day we met and the way my hand had tingled. I had no more protests. And you were always at my meets, too… though you occasionally complained about having to wake up early to get to them. Still, whenever I climbed out of the pool after a dive, you met me with a shammy cloth and a towel, and stood by my side while I waited for my scores. I don't think you knew how much your presence alone settled my nerves.
Winter meets through junior high and high school were spent huddled together in our team sweats, wrapped in your thermal blanket, sharing my MP3 player's headphones, and preserving each other's warmth as best we could between events. You told me I stole more heat than I gave. I told you that if you had enough warmth that I was stealing some, then you had plenty to spare. You said the blanket was weird because even though I leeched heat, it was still warmer when I was under it with you. We concluded that Physics wasn't either of our strong point, and it was better just to enjoy the warmth than to question it.
I'm rushing towards the water and the blood is rushing in my ears. Every hair on my body is on-end with the thrill. I know I'm not breathing, I never can when I'm air-born. I savor the last sliver of time I've got as I feel my body begin to unfurl.
Three.
I banged incessantly on your door the day I got the call. You answered, I think your whole house knew it was me. I'd been scouted. At one of our meets, a university coach had seen me dive and wanted me for the team. They offered me a scholarship. They offered me a free shot into the school. I don't know how I expected you to react... maybe to sweep me up into one of those big swinging hugs that you're capable of after years of racing the butterfly stroke and weight-training... maybe to squeeze my shoulder like you do when my dives go well, not bothering with words of congratulations and just smiling at me in a way that says more than words ever could... I don't know what I expected, but it definitely wasn't the frown that set into your brow. That frown made me nervous. Were you upset that I'd gotten scouted and not you? Were you angry that I'd been offered a free-ride instead of you? You'd been swimming longer than I'd been diving. Maybe you thought I didn't deserve it.
But that couldn't be true because no one knew how hard I worked like you did. You were there all of the times that I'd bungled practice dives; when I bruised myself on the water's surprisingly hard surface. You were the first one at my side the time I really screwed up and caught my leg on the platform doing an inward dive. You even went with me to the hospital and helped me convince the doctor to give me a soft cast. You were there when I practiced before I was supposed to, worried I was going to aggravate the injury during the healing process, but supportive of my desire to get back in the water. You couldn't be upset or jealous. So, I waited because I knew if I waited, you'd let me know what the frown meant.
Finally you spoke, "Rikyou isn't an easy school to get into..." your words were measured, "I'm going to have to study hard for the exams if I want to get it." I felt the weight of uncertainty lift from my chest. You wanted to come with me! "Congratulations, Eiji," and then, you smiled. I felt the tingle, and the warmth, and the strength of your support. I tried to sweep you into one of your big swinging hugs. Considering I had the more lithe musculature of a diver, it wasn't such a good idea. We ended up in a pile on your foyer floor, laughing hysterically.
I promised to help you study for your exams, and you laughed at me and told me that my hectic, sporadic study-style was more of a distraction than a help. You were bloody ungrateful and I said as much. You told me to just wait for you and you'd meet me there.
You did.
We walked onto campus Spring of our Freshman year together with our luggage and care-packages from our families. Sharing a dorm was a given, despite me majoring in History and you going pre-Med. You joined the swim team, while I did my best to earn my keep for my scholarship on the dive team. We fought over space, study habits, mess, idiosyncrasies. We watched movies and played video games, but more often than not, we just talked. Two years passed in a blur of midterms and finals, meets and competitions, and more laughter and tears than I can remember over the entirety of my life before then.
Plish.
My body breaks the surface of the water, not quite at the perfect perpendicular angle I strive for, but damned close to it. Still, I'd have to work harder. As always, I take a minute in the twelve meters of chlorinated water that still burns my eyes to look up through the three seconds of air, to the platform above, and let the adrenaline run its course. I surface, reluctantly. All sound has returned and the building is an echo of too many voices to hear anything clearly. I slip through the water, feeling it wash away the last of the rush, and by the time I reach the ladder, I've returned to the calm anticipation of the next time I'll dive and the promise of flying again. The rungs are cold in my hands, and I have to wonder, as I tend to, if I hadn't met you, would I have found this freedom anyway? But as I'm exiting the pool, you're there with a towel and a smile and I realize, I wouldn't want to imagine not having met you. You are the ground that holds me up until I can fly again, and I wouldn't be complete without either.
Glossary:
kôchi: coach