A Good Reason

By: rennomiya

Ding Dong

An old man in a black robe yawned lazily as he read his newspaper with boredom. And if one would look over, the newspaper he was reading had definitely no other magazines hidden beneath it. One possible reason: his wife burned it.

That explains the remnants of a smudge in the backyard. Someone had been burning something.

Ding Dong

The old man scratched his head in annoyance. 'Can't a guy read his newspaper in peace!?' he thought to himself and lazily dragged his body to the door.

"Nanjiroh doesn't live here," he greeted lazily as he opened the door while scratching his stomach unethically.

"Uhm…" a timid voice said.

Nanjiroh stared at the girl. She had auburn hair tied in twin braided pigtails and her eyes were the color of russet. She was also holding a brown envelope. After his mind registered on whom this girl was and who was she there for, he immediately shut the door.

The girl jumped in surprise. No one had ever shut the door in her face before. She pouted and blushed in embarrassment. She looked down, feeling embarrassed.

"OI, RYOMA! COME DOWN HERE THIS INSTANT!" Sakuno heard the old man yelled from inside their house. Sakuno blushed furiously. After that, she heard some other noises inside, and more yelling (most of them were curses). She could've sworn she even heard some crashing and brawling and banging.

Her sweat dropped. "Uhm…! Excuse me, Echizen-san! I-I'm not—"

She was cut off when the door flew open again. But this time, instead of Nanjiroh greeting her, it was those familiar amber eyes of his.

Correction: irritated amber eyes of his.

She looked away awkwardly, not really knowing what to say to him once she found him like that.

"Ryuzaki…" he muttered confusedly.

Sakuno dared to look at his eyes again and saw that his irritation had faded away. He looked at her, puzzled. "Ah… yes. It's me, Ryuzaki Sakuno," she introduced herself uncomfortably although she knew that he already knows her.

"Baka Oyaji," he muttered under his breath.

"Eh?"

Ryoma sighed and made way for her to get in. "What are you standing around there for? Don't tell me you're here to stare at my porch?"

Sakuno blushed shyly again and nodded. She timidly went in, saying a soft, "Pardon my intrusion…"

"Sit," he ordered as he went to the kitchen. "Tea or coffee?"

Sakuno sat on the couch and after hearing Ryoma's question, she realized that he was going to entertain her as his guest. "Anything would be fine…" she immediately said.

"Hn."

Sakuno looked around, hoping to find Nanjiroh. But he wasn't anywhere within her sight. She kind of expected that. He probably thought that she was there to see Ryoma.

After a while, Ryoma came to the living room holding a can of Ponta.

"Here," he monotonously said as he placed the can on the coffee table. He was also holding a can for himself. He sat across her and opened his can.

She stared at the Ponta he gave her on the table. She inwardly sweat dropped. Ryoma would never change, she thought. She took the can and began drinking from it. "Thank you…"

After drinking some of his Ponta, he asked, "So what brings you here?"

Sakuno gently placed the can back on the table. She showed him the envelope she was holding since she arrived. "Obaa-chan wanted me to bring this paperwork to Nanjiroh-san."

Ryoma kept on eyeing her, as if expecting more words to come from her mouth. And after a few more seconds of staring at each other, Ryoma's expression turned into disbelief. "That's all?"

"Eh?" Sakuno was never really the one to understand his words immediately.

"That's your only reason for coming here?" he elaborated.

Sakuno blushed and hid half of her face behind the envelope she was holding. "Yeah…" she answered, quite embarrassed to think that Ryoma wanted her to have another reason to be there. Unless he…

"Oi, baka Oyaji! She's here to see you!" he yelled with irritation and casually walked outside.

Sakuno wanted to just curl into a corner and die. She didn't want Ryoma to be mad at her. Heck, she didn't even know why he was mad at her in the first place!

After a while, Nanjiroh arrived, descending from the stairs. He grinned mischievously at her, which made Sakuno shiver uncomfortably. "Hey there, Sakuno-chan~" he greeted in a tone which made Sakuno more uncomfortable.

"G-Good afternoon, E-Echizen-san…" She shifted uncomfortably on her seat.

When the older Echizen was about to sit next to her, she immediately sat up and handed the envelope to him. Actually, she pushed the envelope to his face. "E-Echizen-san…. Uhm … Obaa-chan wanted me to give this to you…"

Nanjiroh grabbed the envelope (since he was beginning to choke on it as she kept on pushing it harder to his face) and thanked her. He was about to say something else to her when she hastily took her bag with her and headed straight to the door. She bowed respectfully to him and said in the most polite way she can, "Well then, I'll be leaving now. T-Thanks for the drink!"

With that, she opened the door and went out as fast as she can.

Nanjiroh chuckled.

When Sakuno was finally outside the Echizen residence, she exhaled deeply. She didn't even know she was holding that breath in. She adjusted the bag's strap on her shoulder and began walking to the gates.

"Oi," his voice called again.

She stopped and turned around.

Ryoma was standing a few feet behind her, looking as handsome as always.

"Yes?" She immediately collected her composure. "Is there something else you need?"

"Have you given the paperwork to the old man?" he asked.

Sakuno nodded.

Ryoma's eyes narrowed. "Is that really the only reason why you came here?"

Sakuno nodded again, not failing to notice his emphasis on the word 'really'.

Ryoma's already narrowed brows, narrowed even more. "I guess you won't be coming back here without any reason in the future," he said.

Sakuno didn't know how to answer to that so she just nodded unsurely.

Ryoma rolled his eyes. "Well, for your information, you have another reason why you should come back here tomorrow."

Sakuno tilted her head in confusion. Either Ryoma just wanted her to visit him tomorrow and too shy to say it or he wanted her to return a favor. The former was most likely impossible, so she just stayed with the latter.

"You owe me a can of Ponta," he said while tilting the brim of his cap lower.

Sakuno smiled weakly. She knew that it was only for the sake of his selfishness. She mentally laughed at how Ryoma was being himself. "But, Ryoma-kun… as your guest, shouldn't you just give that can for free?"

Ryoma looked at her with slight confusion. And after understanding what she meant, he shook his head. "I'm not talking about the Ponta I gave you today. I was talking about the Ponta I gave you when we first met."

Sakuno blushed, wide-eyed. Ryoma, the boy next to having amnesia as his hobby, actually remembered the time they first met! The time when she wanted to make it up to him by buying him Ponta but it turned out that she didn't have change in her so in the end, he was the one who bought for both of them. Then, her slight happiness was suddenly ruined when the idea registered in her mind. 'He only remembered it because of the can of juice…' she thought sadly.

"Well?" Ryoma interrupted her inner monologue, "If you can't return the Ponta today, then I'm expecting it tomor—"

"Here," she handed a can of Ponta to him tiredly.

Ryoma looked at her with slight surprise. "You brought one all along?"

Sakuno nodded weakly. "I actually bought it on the way here so that I would have something to drink in case I get thirsty," she explained.

"Then this can is not intended for me. Come back here tomorrow with the can intended for me," Ryoma said stubbornly.

Sakuno sighed unenthusiastically. She grabbed Ryoma's hand and placed the can of Ponta on it. "Here. Now I don't owe you any Ponta anymore," she said, ignoring Ryoma's stubbornness. She began walking away.

"Oi, I won't accept this," he persisted. "You better return here tomorrow with my Ponta."

Damn spoiled brat.

She just kept on walking away. "I'm sorry Ryoma-kun. I don't want to return here just to give you a can of juice that I don't owe you anymore. And besides, I don't want to waste transport money," she clarified to him. In addition, she was really not in the mood to deal with the bratty Ryoma right now.

Ryoma groaned.

Before Sakuno could turn into a corner, Ryoma grabbed her cheeks from behind, turned her body around, and kissed her lips.

Chuu~. . . . Chuu~.

Ryoma pulled back, his mind was all foggy. He cleared his throat as he pulled his cap lower. "There. It's only natural to return a kiss."

Sakuno stared at him, her face fully red. Her mind currently cannot register anything.

Ryoma turned around and began walking back to his house. He waved an arm coolly. "Come back here tomorrow and return that kiss."

He turned his head slightly to look at her. He smirked. "You now owe me one kiss." He turned his head back around to hide another coming blush. "See you tomorrow."

.OwArI.

A/N: Hi^^ another one-shot coming from me. Sorry for the grammatical errors and misspelled words. Leave a review, okay?

Disclaimers apply.

And of course, a story wouldn't be complete without an omake… so read on!

.OmAkE.

Ryoma opened the door to his house and wasn't really surprised when he saw Nanjiroh's face a few inches in front of him.

"What now?" he asked irritatingly as he began removing his shoes.

"You were jealous, weren't you?" Nanjiroh asked slyly.

"What are you talking about?" he asked dumbly as he made his way to his room.

"You were jealous because Sakuno-chan went here for me and NOT YOU, who was of course me, the great Samurai Nanjiroh, who would never be YOU," he said.

"Whatever," Ryoma said as he opened the door to his room.

Nanjiroh tsk-ed. He teased his son even more. "And you actually thought that a blonde booby girl was there to see you. Yeah right! Like that's ever going to happen!"

Ryoma glared at him. "I said I don't even want to meet that woman! I was about to tell her to go away but when I opened the door, it was Ryuzaki. How dare you lie to me?" he hissed dangerously.

"But you were—"

Ryoma glared at his father with the whites of his eyes. Then, he smirked in a freaky manner. "Don't worry Oyaji. Ryuzaki won't be coming back here for you anymore."

Nanjiroh ignored his son's usual crankiness. "Why? You did something to her?"

"I just gave her a good reason to return here," he said and shut the door close.