This was a request from a friend on Quizilla. I'm happy with how it turned out. : D
Disclaimer: Riichiro Inagaki and Yusuke Murata own Eyeshield 21, I don't... I don't even own the plot... KyomiHaru does... I just own the finished piece. (this)
"No! I want a chocolate cake!" The little seven- almost eight- year old yelled at the beautiful woman in front of her. They were surrounded by a small, beautiful kitchen that was cleaned almost everyday by the woman- the girl's mother.
"I'm sorry, sweetie, you should hav-" but the little girl cut her off.
"No! I already told you last year that this year I wanted chocolate! You never listen to me! Never!" Tears sprang to the little girl's large brown eyes and she ran out of the kitchen to her room. Her mother stared after her with those same brown eyes. She looked over at the cake that she had almost finished and then to the clock.
"I don't have enough time to make another…" she sighed, feeling terrible about forgetting that this year was supposed to be chocolate.
"Hey, what's the munchkin crying about?" Her husband asked, walking in from the hall and dipping his finger in the bowl of unused icing.
"Ah, I have to go buy a chocolate cake from the store! I'll be back in ten minutes tops!" She replies, grabbing her keys from the counter and then out the door. Her husband called after her to drive safely and that it was supposed to rain later as he helped himself to the batter lining the bowl that had been used to mix the cake.
The small light blue car flew to the shopping center and the woman walked into the nearest bakery. She emerged happily with a large chocolate cake and quickly but gently set it in the back of her car. On her way home it started raining, as was typical of a Japanese summer. She peered through the sheets of rain and switched on her wipers. All of a sudden there was a screech, a roar and the sound of metal being ripped off the frame of a car as lights flashed brightly in front of her and she slammed the break, hydroplaning into the two cars in front of her who were already aflame; it all went black. Red and blue lights, sirens, yelling…
"No! Mom!" I sat up in a cold sweat as rain pounded my windows. Curling my knees to my chest I stared at my door and tried to calm my breathing as tears fell softly from my eyes.
"Keiko?" I heard my dad's voice in the hall and the light in the hall shone under my door as he flipped the switch. "Honey, are you okay?"
"Y-yeah, just… just a nightmare." The last thing I ever said to my mother was that she never listened, but she always did.
"Well… try and go back to sleep. You have school in the morning." He leaned on the door jamb and scratched his head sleepily. Since Mom died, Dad had gotten thinner- it made him look older than his thirty-seven years.
"Yeah, night." I uncurled from my ball and pulled the covers back up.
"… you want to talk about it?" He asked softly, I shook my head and he left, closing the door softly behind him. This was the end of the eighth year that Mom had been dead. I looked at my clock: 12:43 AM, I was seventeen now and I hadn't celebrated a birthday since my seventh one. The eighth I skipped because I was busy being told that my mother had had a fatal car crash.
'Kurita won't be at morning practice for another hour or so…' I thought, fully awake since my nightmare. I sat up and stretched with a yawn. Jumping out of bed, I grabbed my school uniform and folded it neatly into my duffle bag before pulling on my practice pants and Deimon Devil Bats football jersey. I would just practice with the field all to myself for a while. I was supposed to be my dad's son, quite obviously I'm not. Either way, he was going to have a kid that played football- I love every minute of it.
On the way out, I passed my dad at the table with a cup of coffee and yesterday's paper. "Leaving so early?" He asked as I stopped at the door and slipped on my running shoes.
"Yeah, Hiruma called early practice again so I figured that I might get there early so he wont accuse me of being late when he's actually the last one there." I lied with a shrug and ran out the door.
"Practice over, get to class, ya damn brats!" Hiruma called, pulling off his helmet and tucking it under his free arm, seeing as he had an Uzi cradled in his other arm. I wiped the sweat off my brow and slung my own helmet over my shoulder.
"Now it's only about eight hours until the next practice!" I said in a sarcastically cheerful voice, having been there since one o'clock, then having to go through Hiruma's practice from Hell.
"Don't be so enthusiastic, damn fullback." Hiruma hit me lightly in the back of the head with the Uzi as he walked past. "You might be disappointed." He said just as he disappeared into the locker room.
"Keiko-chan!" I turned to see my best friend- Mamori- running up to me with a water bottle. "You did well today." She said with a smile.
"Thanks." I returned the smile and took a sip of water before handing her the bottle back and taking off my football pads. "I'd better put these up." I said as I walked towards the equipment rooms and dumped my stuff with the extra pads and gear, from here I grabbed my duffel bag and went to the gym for a shower before changing into my school uniform and heading to my shoe locker just as the bell sounded. When I opened my locker a piece of paper fluttered out to the ground. "What the…" I wondered out loud as other people around me hurried out and to their classrooms.
Come to the football clubroom after school alone.
I hurriedly stuffed the note in my pocket and went to class, not really giving it much thought until I was boredly sitting with my hands in my pockets during Math. I thought over the handwriting but drew a blank on whose it could be so I decided to just show up and see where it got me…
"Surprise!" was chorused as soon as I opened the club house door.
"Wh-what the…?" I looked from the banner that shouted "Happy Birthday" in bold caps to the smiling faces that surrounded a large rectangular box.
"Hiruma said that you prefered vanilla cake…" Mamori smiled and opened the box to reveal a cake that looked familiar.
"Oh my God…" tears brimmed my eyes but I quickly blinked them back and smiled. It looked exactly the same as the one my mother was making that day… "How'd you guys know it was my birthday?" I asked when Monta almost tackled me to get a party hat on my head, it ended up over my eyes.
"I let it slip and the damn manager wouldn't quit grilling me until I told her what else I knew." Hiruma said from behind me and pulled the hat back so that it was on top of my head as he walked past to swing himself onto the change counter and start typing away on his laptop.
"Oh… uhm… thanks you guys, but-" but before I could say anything about not celebrating, Kuroki was dragging me over to a large fighting game that looked like it had been pulled out of Deimon's arcade. "Where'd you guys get this?" I asked, grabbing a few 100 yen coins from the bowl on a table and putting them in.
"The arcade in the shopping center, where else?" Kuroki said as we chose our characters and the game started. "It's time to put your 'I'm better at games than you' attitude to rest!" I ended up winning the game, but I'm pretty sure that he let me win for my birthday, though.
After that, Mamori pulled me over to the cake with seventeen candles stuck in the top- unlit. "Mamori-chan, the candles aren't-" a line of flame shot past my arm and lit the candles! I turned and saw Hiruma with a flame thrower across his lap, sitting sideways on the change counter.
"Oops… I missed one." Hiruma raised the flamethrower again but Mamori quickly took one of the already lit candles and lit the unlit one. I laughed at Hiruma's disappointed frown and thought about what to wish for…
People started suggesting things like: "two dozen Kariya Cream Puffs!" "a truck load of bananas!" "another cake!" "the newest issue of Shojo JUMP!" "a puppy! (everyone looked at Jumonji questioningly at this but he shrugged with a "what? It might grow up big enough to take on that devil dog…").
"Hurry up already, dammit!" Hiruma growled after a few minutes
"Talk to me like that and I'll just take longer." I shot back at him, then I suddenly knew what I wanted. I took a deep breath and thought really hard about it before blowing out all of the candles in one shot. Then I opened presents from everyone… except Hiruma of course.
The rest of the night was a blast, needless to say. Music, games and contests took up the rest of the time, I even got Hiruma to play a few rounds of poker and he won them all- of course. By midnight I was getting a slight head-ache from the unaccustomed noise and hustle that came with parties.
"Mamori-chan, I'm going to be outside for some fresh air." I told her, she nodded and went back to the game she was playing. When I got outside it was almost scary how quiet it was with only the dull throb of music from the closed door. I started climbing up the back of the club room to the roof and almost slipped and fell when I saw Hiruma already sitting up there with his back to the sign.
"What the fuck, you trying to break your damn leg?" Hiruma asked, grabbing my hand and yanking me up.
"I didn't know you came up here…" I defended myself, taking my hand back and standing so that his personal space problem didn't bother me as much. "You startled me!"
"Che, whatever. It get too loud in there for you finally?" He asked, going back to his previous position with his back to the neon sign and his arms crossed.
"Yeah… I'm just not used to the noise and stuff." I shrugged and sat down next to him, staring at the stars.
"What, game crowds don't get you used to it, damn fullback?"
"Nah, the crowds aren't crammed into the football club room with me in the middle." I shook my head.
"Hn." Was his reply. After a few minutes of silence I thought of something.
"Y'know… you're the only person who didn't get me a present." I joked, mainly to break the silence, but it was also a fact.
"So… maybe I did." He said and when I looked down from the stars he was doing the personal space thing again and then… he kissed me. Just pressed his lips lightly to mine, whispered, "happy birthday," and then disappeared over the back of the club the same way I had come.
A few minutes later I heard Yukimitsu's voice drift up about a curfew and studying, Monta claiming, "maxi tired," and Sena offering to walk home with Monta since his house was on the way. I blinked for the first time in what seemed like forever and stole over the back of the club and to the front where Mamori was waving to the three as they headed for the school gates.
"Keiko-chan, are you feeling better?" I nodded my head to her question with an awkward, 'yes.' "Ah, Kurita-san, Komusubi-kun, Jumonji-san, Kuroki-san and Togano-san are cleaning up, I'll walk you home just to make sure." Mamori suggested and ran back into the club, reappearing a few minutes later with a plastic bag that contained my presents. We walked in silence for a few minutes until Mamori broke the silence. "So… what did you wish for?"
"I don't think so, Mamori-chan. That's bad luck!"
"Please?" She begged, clasping her hands in front of her.
"No!"
"Fine… but do you think it will come true?" She questioned. I looked to the sky and thought about Hiruma's kiss.
"It already did…" I smiled, touching my lips lightly in thought.