Shishido Ryou yawned sleepily as he walked towards his shoe locker. Finally, it was Valentine's Day. He did not get enough sleep due to arranging an 'escaping route' for the day. No, it wasn't for him, though he was quite popular, he surely was not that popular that he needed something like that to run away from the fangirls. It was for his doubles partner, Ootori Choutarou. Being a well-known and cute (according to 99.7% girls in Hyoutei High School) boy plus having a birthday on Valentine's Day, Choutarou had it tough. That was why Shishido had to protect him, no matter what.

    "Ryou-san!"

The blue-capped boy turned his head to the voice quickly, not expecting himself to hear the voice there, of all places. "Choutarou! I've told you not to come from the front door, or you'll—"

    "AH!! THAT'S HIM!!"

    "Kyaa~! Choutarou-kun!!"

    "Ootori-sempai!!"

    "Choutarou-sama!!"

Shishido growled as he shook his head. In front of him, there was a very manga-like scene where Choutarou was at the corner of the room, surrounded and pushed by at least forty girls who were trying to give their chocolates to Choutarou's hands.

He sighed. Plan A: failed.

Zutto...
~Always...~

Shishido Ryou still remembered that day like yesterday. It was Valentine's Day two years earlier, when Choutarou was still in the third grade of middle school. Since he had graduated and rarely hung out together with Choutarou anymore, he decided to hold a birthday party for him. And so, he went off to the middle school to pick him up.

    'Better check the court first,' Shishido thought when he arrived at the front door. He just shook his head when he saw a group of uncountable girls were encircling a certain guy (which Shishido could not see from his point of view), handing their handmade chocolates to the guy. 'Poor him. Last year it was Atobe there, with maybe slightly more girls.'

    "Shishido...san?"

The called boy blinked. Did he just hear Choutarou's voice? He looked left and right, up and down but seemed like he was nowhere to found. "Cho... Choutarou?"

    "Shishido-san...Here!"

Well, of course Shishido could not see him! He was that 'poor guy' among those fangirls, looking nearly white due to the lack of oxygen he could breathe in. Before Shishido knew it, one by one the girls went away from his kouhai, saying "I can't believe I've finally given it to him!", leaving Choutarou and a pile of chocolates, some on his hands, some lying on the ground. He smiled palely to his sempai.

    "Konnichiwa, Shishido-san."

    "Don't 'konnichiwa' me!" the blue capped boy frowned as he took out his right hand out of his trousers' pocket and tapped his kouhai's back. "What was that?"

    "Eh... If I'm not mistaken, they said that they were members of 'Choutarou-oujisama Fans Club'," he replied with a blush when he said the last three words.

Choutarou-oujisama Fans Club? Must be because Atobe graduated, the girls were looking for another idol to replace him, and so Choutarou was chosen. Poor him.

Aa, wait, wait, wait! How cruel of him, thinking like that of his own best friend! That was SO mean of him! Choutarou was his one and only doubles partner, and, not to mention, was his savior for making him get his regular title back. Now it was the perfect time to pay him back. He swore to himself he would make sure something like this never happen to Choutarou again, ever!

---

    "Choutarou, I've told you a million times before, don't come in from the front door on Valentine's Day. Look what's happened to you now," Shishido frowned as he helped the sophomore standing up and picking up the chocolates on the ground.

    "Gomen, Ryou-san."

    "Maa, what's done is done. Now, make sure you go to your class safely. And DON'T open your shoe locker—I've got another pair of shoes in my locker, so use mine."

    "Eh? I can't open the shoe locker? But..." Choutarou blinked like a lost sheep.

    "Aa, right, that..." Shishido scowled. He had surely forgotten about that, the most precious thing for Choutarou that he only got once a year, how foolish of him! He must think of a way so Choutarou could get that without being buried under a pile of chocolates.

    "I—I'll think of a way later. Just—DON'T open it until I say so, okay?"

    "Okay." Choutarou nodded understandingly.

    "But man, curse that damn Atobe for this!" Shishido said as the two of them walked towards Choutarou's classroom (he finally decided to accompany Choutarou to his class, in case something happened). "If only he hadn't gone to France, he would be the one with this problem, not you."

The sophomore sweat dropped. "Ano... Ryou-san, I think that's a bit harsh..."

    "Doesn't matter, does it?" he frowned. "After all, he's the all-great Atobe-sama with all of his self-centered and over-confident self, and he wouldn't mind being popular. Ah heck, what am I talking about, he LOVES being popular. Now Choutarou, you're not that type a person, are you?"

    "Err..." he scratched his head.

    "Ooh! Choutarou-oujisama!!" a redhead grinned and waved to Choutarou from in front of the class. Behind him, there were regulars of Hyoutei High School tennis club, who—unsurprisingly—hadn't changed at all from the ones from middle school.

The grey-haired blushed. "Mukahi-sempai, don't call me that, please..."

    "Che, I've got rid of the fangirls and now it's you?" the blue-capped boy uttered somewhat unpleasantly.

    "Oi oi Shishido, don't be like that t'your own teammate..." Oshitari shook his head and tapped Shishido's shoulder. "We're just here t'greet our Choutarou a happy birthday, right Kabaji?"

    "Usu."

Taki sweat dropped. "You're becoming more and more like Atobe..."

    "Anyway, Chouta-chan~" Jirou said with starry eyes. "Where will you treat us today? Thinking about it makes me drool~"

    "Sempai, you've hung out with Marui too much..." Hiyoshi shook his head.

    "But as Jirou said," Gakuto said as his eyes, too, became all-starry, "Birthdays are no fun without a party! You SHOULD at least take us to a restaurant and treat us!"

    "Party? Eh..."

    "You guys..." Shishido said, annoyed.

    "Anyway, Shishido," Oshitari called. "I suppose y'haven't done your English homework yet?"

    "English—" the senior's eyes widened. "Crap! I totally forgot 'bout it! Oshitari, you REALLY should've reminded me last night! I'm going to my class—and DON'T do something weird to Choutarou while I'm gone, and as for Choutarou—DON'T do something stupid like walking in front of your fan club's room alone!" And with that, he went away, leaving his dearest doubles partner with all the regulars.

    "Hhh... Finally the mother's gone..." Gakuto grinned.

    "Eh?" Choutarou blinked. "M-mother?"

    "He really is your mother, isn't he?" Jirou said, landing himself perfectly on the seat next to the sophomore. "I mean, he's all 'don't do this' and 'don't do that' to you."

    "Yeah, right, right," Gakuto nodded in definite agreement.

    "Ne, Choutarou," Taki sat in front of the boy and asked, "Don't you feel tired being with him all the time?"

    "Huh? Me? No, not really..." Choutarou smiled. "Maybe sometimes he's a bit too overprotective, but that's because he cares for me. Just thinking about that makes me really happy..."

All the regulars fell completely silent by the sentence that sounded more like an angel's saying than a high-schooler's.

    "CHO~TA~RO!" Gakuto, Jirou, and Taki yelled all of a sudden, then huggled their beloved Choutarou simultaneously. "We're touched~!"

    "Eh... Mukahi-sempai... Jirou-sempai... Taki-sempai..."

---

Ootori Choutarou sighed. As he was told by Ryou-san, he was at the rooftop right now, while other people were having their lunches at either class or cafeteria. While taking out his bento for the day and munched his onigiri, he took out some pieces of papers, each sized 4x6 inches with a sentence and a picture on it, stapled into a small picture book. His lips drew a small smile as he started reading the story.

   "Once upon a time, lived a happy rabbit family.
   The youngest son in the family was a grey-colored bunny.

   Sometimes his siblings teased him, but he did not mind since he knew they loved him.
   But there were times his siblings saw him with a sad face.

   Some time later, a female bunny saw him and fell in love.
   She wanted to be friends with him, but she was too afraid.

   She could only look at him from faraway places and send letters to him.
   Though she always did that, it seemed like he did not care at all."

    "I wonder how this will end..." Choutarou murmured as his eyes, once again, scanned through the pages.

    "Choutarou! Reading it again?" a familiar voice asked as the sophomore looked up.

    "Ryou-san..."

What he was reading were cards he had collected for four straight years, ever since he was in the first grade of middle school. He first found the first two cards inside his shoe locker on Valentine's Day. At first he thought it was a usual secret-admirer card (which he sometimes got in his elementary school days), but then changed his mind 180 degrees after reading them. For some reason, he really liked them and wanted to keep them. And his feeling was right. On the next Valentine's Day, he had received yet another two cards with the continuation of the story. And ever since that day, February fourteenth had always been the day he waited the most, for his curiousness about the ending of the story.

    "Why do you like that so much?" Shishido asked as he took a seat beside him. "Looks like a usual child's picture book to me."

    "I think there's more than that in this story," Choutarou said with a smile. "I feel like he—" he pointed to the grey bunny. "—is very much like me."

Shishido raised an eyebrow. "Your siblings like to tease you for any reason?"

Choutarou chuckled. "No, not like that. There's more than just that in this story, Ryou-san."

    "Alright, alright, you've said it a million times," he said and leaned to the wall. "The weather is nice today..."

He nodded as he, too, looked up to the clear sky. "Nice indeed..."

While enjoying the cool breeze that passed by his skin, Choutarou gazed at the cards yet again. Today there should be the next part of them, and he was dying to see them. But then again, he fully understood his sempai's feeling that he did not want to see Choutarou 'suffering' anymore.

    "Ah! Right!" Shishido cried abruptly, breaking the calm silence they were having, and tapped his own forehead. "I just remembered. That English homework Oshitari told me this morning—I didn't make it in time. Mr. Wolff told me to come to teacher's office after school—yes it sucks. So I can't pick you up by then, but wait for me in front of teacher's office, 'kay? Otherwise..."

Without hearing the rest of the sentence, Choutarou understood entirely. He knew Shishido was worried about him, and he respected him for that.

He stood up and walked slowly to the fence, leaning his almost-190-cm body forward. Shishido stood up instantaneously.

    "Choutarou, what are you doing?!"

He let out a soft chuckle. "Don't worry Ryou-san. I'm not going to jump."

Shishido flushed over his own foolishness (How could I think he wanted to jump?!) and walked towards his kouhai. While adjusting his blue cap, he noticed that Choutarou's eyes were focused on something below. For his curiousness' sake, Shishido secretly peeked to where he was looking at. He smirked.

    "Who's that girl?"

    "Eh?" Choutarou gazed quickly, surprised by the unexpected question. "W-what girl?"

He grinned. "You should've known you can never lie to me."

Choutarou looked aside as he felt his cheeks heated up. "She's in my grade, but I don't know her name or her class. She just seems familiar to me."

    "Love at first sight, I suppose?"

The silver pair turned their heads in surprise as they found 'Choutarou-Teasing-Trio'—Oshitari, Gakuto, Jirou—behind them.

    "I knew you two would be here," the Kansai-accented boy's lips formed his usual smirk to the two.

    "So Chouta-chan's got a girlfriend now? Sugoi~!" Jirou bounced merrily.

    "E-eh?" a scarlet flush rose upon Choutarou's cheeks as the word 'girlfriend' reached his very ears. "N-no! I-I don't even know her name!"

    "Shall I ask her then?" Oshitari asked teasingly.

    "Eh?"

    "Oshitari, leave him alone! The fangirls are enough for him today!" Shishido demanded with a stiff tone.

    "Here he goes again..." Gakuto rolled his eyes.

    "What did you—"

Before Shishido could complete his sentence, the bell rang. He frowned as the trio waved a goodbye to them, while Choutarou was waving back.

    "Remember what I said yesterday on the phone. And wait for me in front of teacher's office after school," Shishido reminded.

Choutarou nodded.

---

Ootori Choutarou almost dropped two boxes of chocolates as he hardly walked towards the teacher's office. Though he had followed Shishido's instruction, half of his fangirls could still find him. Choutarou heaved a long sigh. He knew he should've brought a plastic bag or such so he wouldn't be this troubled.

He took another step slowly. While preventing the blue-wrapped box from falling down, the pink-wrapped one slid down his arms.

    "Ah—"

To Choutarou's surprise, a small hand caught it. He could not see the face of the one saved his chocolate, since all of the chocolate boxes blocked his view.

    "You're quite popular aren't you—"

Choutarou's eyes widened. This voice...

He quickly lowered his eyes and turned his body to see her.

    "I-I'm sorry I didn't—" she left her sentence unfinished as she put the chocolate on the pile and ran off to the teacher's office. Choutarou blinked as he caught a slight blush on her cheeks.

Slowly, he walked towards the door and lowered his head a bit to eavesdrop.

    "Shishido, this is the third time you've forgotten doing your homework, correct?"

There was a pause before Choutarou heard a mumbling "correct" out of Shishido's mouth. He smiled. He could imagine Shishido's bored face at the time. After all, it wasn't his first time being called to teacher's office.

Choutarou's ears slowly searched for another voice he was hoping to hear.

    " ! This is the third time!"

His ears stopped searching at that yelling.

    "Su-sumimasen, sensei..."

    "You know, there are things that can't be done just by saying sorry," the teacher said. Choutarou lowered his head. So her name was .

    "I-I'm really sorry, sensei..."

    " again?" another teacher asked.

    "Yes! This is the third time she's caught drawing in geography class!"

Drawing? No wonder Choutarou often saw her sitting under a tree with a pencil and a sketch book.

    "Yes, and—"

The sudden sound of the door startled him as he dropped all chocolates in his hands.

    "Cho-Choutarou!" Shishido said in surprise. "What are you doing in front of the door?"

    "Eh... Err... Nothing," he blushed instantaneously as he got down and picked up the chocolates one by one.

    "Can't help it..." Shishido shook his head. He opened his backpack and searched for something, then gave Choutarou a plastic bag. "Here. This might help."

    "Eh? Arigatou, Ryou-san!" Choutarou bowed a thank you and put the chocolates in the it.

    "Let's get going now," Shishido said as soon as the two finished recollecting all the chocolates.

    "But Ryou-san..." Choutarou stopped. "I've got to get the cards..."

    "Ah," Shishido sighed. "Alright. I understand. Let's go there now."

The two of them—both holding a plastic bag on their hands—strolled away from the locker room.

    "Ready Choutarou?"

    "Ready."

They were holding yet another empty plastic bag in front of the locker, so that when they open it, the chocolates would go in the without falling down to the floor.

    "One, two, THREE!" Shishido opened the locker with his right hand. As expected, a pile of numerous chocolates flowed out from it. While putting the rest to the plastic bag, Choutarou searched impatiently and frantically for the cards. To his surprise, he found nothing that looked like them

    "What's wrong, Choutarou?"

    "They aren't here..." he blinked in disbelief.

    "Eh? The cards??" Shishido questioned, startled. "Maybe you missed them. Let's search for them again."

But no matter how many times they tried, the results were all the same.

Shishido heaved a long sigh. "Maybe the person that usually sent it for—" he stopped as he saw an expression of fear and sadness appeared on Choutarou's face. "I—I mean, she probably for—for now is errr.. A-absent... So err... yeah..." he said quickly, though he himself did not know what on Earth he was talking about. "Maybe she'll give them to you tomorrow!" he encouraged when Choutarou breathed out.

The two of them fell silent.

    "Ryou-san..." Choutarou called.

    "Yeah?"

    "You can go home if you want," he said, letting himself to slid down and sat on the floor. "I'll wait for her."

Shishido's eyes widened. "Eh?! But there's no guarantee that she will—I mean, like I said, maybe she's absent today so she can't give it to you!"

    "No, it's alright, I'll wait for her," he said with a smile. "You were the one who taught me never to give up, right?"

Shishido fell silent, but then finally spoke, "Go home before dark, okay?"

Choutarou chuckled. "Okay."

    "Ja, I'll be going," the senior said as he walked away, though he was still unsure to leave his kouhai like that.

Choutarou was just about to take his bag when he caught a glimpse of a girl running away from him. He stood up instinctively and tried to chase the girl. His heart raced. Could it be the girl that had been giving his those cards these four years?

The girl dashed, and so did he. "Aa—ch-chotto!! Wait for me!!"

Feeling aware that Choutarou might catch up to her, she speeded up again.

    "W-wait! Please! Wait for me—" he stopped for a second. "-san!"

That exact moment when the name '-san' slipped out of his mouth, the girl stopped completely. Still unbelieving her own ears, she turned her head slowly.

    "So it's really you, -san," he said, feeling his heart beat hard.

    "W-what do you mean, Ootori-san?" she said, sensing sweats pouring down her neck.

    "Those cards," he pointed to the cards she was holding. "Those are for me, right?"

    "I-I don't know what you're talking about..." she mumbled, though obviously it was the exact opposite of what she was saying, She looked around nervously. "I-I'm going—"

    "He cared," he spoke before completed her sentence. She blinked.

    "Eh?"

    "That grey bunny—he cared," he said. "He cared about her so much, maybe more than her herself. But since she never wrote her identity on the letters, he did not know what to do."

looked up in surprise, but then looked aside. "But he was so popular, yet she's unnoticed."

    "Well, he noticed. Actually, the reason why his siblings sometimes saw him sad—" he pointed to the fourth sentence, then continued, "—is because he wanted to be friends with her, too. He had noticed her way before she knew him."

flushed upon feeling Choutarou's stare at her. Was it or was it not a dream? If it was, then she did not want to wake up now, for sure. Unable to say anything, she took out some pieces of paper and started drawing on them. Choutarou was about to walk to her when she said, "Wait." And he did.

Around five minutes later (which was probably the longest five minutes of Choutarou's life), she handed him the papers. His eyes widened.

   "One day, the two of them met, and to her surprise, he called her name.
   And when she asked him why he knew her name, he said that he had always noticed her.

   And the two of them started a brand new page together..."

Choutarou gazed quickly to the girl as soon as he finished reading. Blushing, the girl asked sheepishly, "How do you like the ending?"

He smiled and nodded. "Perfect."

Note:
Dedicated to Chota on his birthday [2006/02/14] and to myself who currently is in love with Date Koji
Thanks to Hitomi-buchou for helping me with this DN! ^_^