All he could think about was the heat.
Tennis in the summer was to endure, to enjoy enduring, this heat. It was to love the blurring vision, straight lines becoming curved as light twisted under the waves of the heat, hair damp with sweat and plastered to face and eyes. When he had reached that point, when he felt the heat drive him, it felt as though he could live forever, and the tennis ball would never stop, caught in this never-ending rally.
But it wouldn't go on forever. He almost fell onto his knees when his backhand shot bounced off on the baseline, not coming back. He stumbled to the net, wondering if it was enough to catch him if he fell.
Sanada walked up to him, and said something. All Yukimura could think was how everything was blurring together, his senses of hearing and vision and touch, so that he was smelling Sanada and feeling his words and seeing the heat and it was impossible to make sense of. It was like the moments before his first collapse, body ravaged by illness back then. Except now, he felt so very alive.
The words that Sanada said were reaching towards him, enveloping him, like tendrils of the summer, embracing him. And nothing felt better.
He looked again. The net hadn't caught him, but Sanada had, muscled arms supporting him as if it took no effort at all. Sanada waited.
"Yes," said Yukimura.
He had fallen in love with summer.