sportsanime | Bonus Round 1: Memory

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Bonus Round 1: Memory

Let's start our summer by looking at the past—things that happened in canon, or maybe in an AU, or maybe just as wishful thinking...

This round is CLOSED as of 7PM on June 9 EDT. Late fills may be posted, but they will not receive points.

Please read this whole post before commenting to ensure that your team gets the most points possible. (There are changes from last year!)

RULES

Submit prompts by commenting to this post! You prompt should consist of one scenario beginning with the phrase "Remember when", along with any ship/ot3/etc. from our list of nominated fandoms.
- Your prompts can take the form of recalling canon facts/events ("Remember when Nozomi and Eli got parfaits after school?"), non-canon events ("Remember when Megumi and Jin met at the Tadokoro Family Reunion?"), or somewhere in-between ("Remember when Bokuto and Kenma first met?"). Headcanons and AUs are welcome!
- Your prompt MUST include some kind of relationship. (This is not the sports anime gen olympics.) Platonic relationships are indicated by an "&" between the names (e.g., Rei & Nagisa). Non-platonic relationships use "/" (e.g., Rei/Nagisa). Please don't say "Any pairing," either!
Post fills by leaving a responding comment to a prompt with your newly-created work.
Remember to follow the general bonus round rules, outlined here.

FORMAT

Brand-new works only, please.

Required Work Minimums:

400 words (prose)
400px by 400px (art)
14 lines (poetry)

If PROMPTING:	If FILLING:	If FILLING as a TEAM GRANDSTAND participant:
PROMPT: TEAM [YOUR SHIP] Replace [YOUR SHIP] with the name of the team you belong to, including Grandstand or Sports Teams Write it exactly as it appears on the team roster or your team will not receive points Place the prompt's relationship in the first bolded line of the comment. Including the canon isn't required, but it's nice. Below that, place applicable major content tags (when applicable; otherwise write "no tags" or "none") Visual example	FILL: TEAM [YOUR SHIP], [RATING] Replace [YOUR SHIP] with the name of the team you belong to Write it exactly as it appears on the team roster or your team will not receive points Replace RATING with the rating of your fill (G - E) Place applicable major content tags and word count before your fill (when applicable; otherwise write "no tags" or "none") NSFW FILLS: Please cross-link these fills and use clear tags in your comment. Written/text fills should be hosted at AO3 ONLY. Art/visual fills can be hosted anywhere. You may include a small safe-for-work preview of the fill in your comment. To place an image in your comment, use this code: <img src="LINK TO YOUR IMAGE" alt="DESCRIPTION OF YOUR IMAGE"/> Visual example	FILL: TEAM GRANDSTAND, [RATING] Replace RATING with the rating of your fill (G - E) Place applicable major content tags and word count before the fill, where applicable NSFW FILLS: Please cross-link these fills and use clear tags in your comment. Written/text fills should be hosted at AO3 ONLY. Art/visual fills can be hosted anywhere. You may include a small safe-for-work preview of your work in your comment. To place an image in your comment, use this code: <img src="LINK TO YOUR IMAGE" /> Visual example

code of conduct

SCORING

For prompts: 5 points each (maximum of 50 prompt points per team per round)

First 3 fills by any member of your team: 20 points each
Fills 4-10: 10 points each
Fills 11-20: 5 points each
Fills 21+: 2 points each

All scored content must be created new for this round.

Etc.

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Warnings: Tenipuri Spoilers (possibly?), 2nd person POV, one mention of cursing
(heavily inspired by my Koganei-is-Kikumaru-grown-up theory, so Koga's tennis history has changed djflakfj)
2221 words

You never ask about, because you feel like, when he’s ready, he’ll tell you.

You remember the first day you met, how he was dressed in dirty tennis uniform and his eyes looked a little swollen from crying. But the contrasting smile on his face, the actual excitement in his voice when he asked you about basketball, the way he dropped his tennis bag and practically flew onto the street court like the world was finally off his shoulders...You’ll never forget that.

He asks you, one day, if you’ve played tennis and you have to shake your head no. It’s always been basketball for you. But as you teach him how to play, you notice how nimble he is, the silly way he tries to add an odd jump or some kind of acrobatics with that silly grin or sweet laugh of his. You don’t have the heart to tell him that that’s not allowed in basketball, so instead you find a way to compliment his speed and reflexes instead.

The grin you receive stays burned in your mind for a week.

-

Koganei, Shinji your mind supplies, ends up being a ray of light in your life that you never know you needed. You think that all the people in your family are enough, but Shinji fits in like a missing corner puzzle piece. He’s always there with a smile, bursting with energy to brighten any mood, and when he drags you to join the Seirin basketball team, you can’t help but follow with a smile.

“I’m good enough to play now, eh, Mitobe?” It’s been about two months since you met in the park, on the public courts, but it’s not like Shinji is bad at basketball. He’s a fast learner.

“That’s what I thought~,” Shinji continues, gently elbowing your side before you can even reply. This is a thing with him now, being able to guess your answers and not force you to talk and it’s sort of relieving.

He introduces you both to the other members of the team, tripping over basketball terms but doesn’t let that bother him. The others laugh and suddenly, you find yourself on a team that you feel incredibly comfortable with already.

-

“I...Hey, Mitobe.”

You look over the table, over the spread out books and papers to see Shinji staring out the window. He looks strangely melancholy and you immediately decide it’s not a good look on him.

“You wanna go play tennis? I have an extra racket and there’s some courts down the street, I can teach you…” His words don’t have the same energy they usually do and you make a soft noise of agreement.

You’ve seen the extra rackets in his room, the worn out tennis shoes under his bed, the medal folded carefully and hidden in the top drawer of Shinji’s desk. Besides, he sort of owes you in a way for teaching him basketball.

There’s a smirk on your face and then a hand is in your face, finger flicking your forehead.

“You offered to teach ME basketball!!! I owe you nothing, Mitobe!!”

You laugh and he laughs and by the time you finish laughing and wrestling, it’s too dark for tennis anyway.

Shinji waves you off home with a smile and you’re glad that his eyes are here in the present once again.

-

The day you actually have no practice, Shinji corners you with an old racket carefully wrapped with new grip tape and it fits perfectly in your hand.

“There’s no escaping now, Mitobe.” Shinji’s lips curl in the cutest way, and oh, that’s a new thing that’s been developing.

If you thought he was fast on the wooden floors in the gym, Shinji soars on the tennis court. You’re immediately reminded of the early days, months ago, when you were teaching him basketball. The acrobatics suddenly make sense and you’re truly amazed at how talented Shinji is with tennis.

There’s a question on your lips, words tangled with your tongue, but seeing the smile as he pulls off another impressive backhand, you swallow them down with your pride as he continues to kick your ass, six games to none.

-

When you walk home, you pass a storage container and you swear that Shinji hesitates, but then it’s like he vanishes in thin air and is skipping ahead in front of you, yelling for you to catch up.

-

You continue playing tennis with each other when you have time, in the off season of basketball, and you improve enough to at least take one game from Shinji. The courts remains weird to you, you feel too big when Shinji is small, darting around the singles boundaries like nothing. He still wins every time, and his victorious twirls of his racket at the end of every game only aggravate you a little bit.

It still bothers you, a bit (a lot), the joy that Shinji exudes on the tennis court, because the moment he steps off, his light seems a little dimmer, his smile less wide. You never noticed before because you had never seen him on the tennis court. But know that you have, you can’t unsee it.

-

He treats you to a parfait one day and spends a long time trying to order his own. When your orders are taken, he leans on his hand, jiggling his leg a bit as he stares around the room. It’s nothing unusual, not with the adrenaline still running through you both from tennis. It was a long game and the last you’ll be able to play for a while because of basketball starting again, which you find is a little sad.

Tennis isn’t too bad, it turns out.

“You know…” Shinji starts, still looking around the shop, eyes gaining that faraway look that you had only seen one time before.

“I used to play doubles. In middle school.” He sighs, moving his right hand so he can stare at it, curling his fingers into a fist. “I was pretty good. My partner was better than me, but together we-”

He’s cut off by the parfaits arriving and food distracts you both. It’s not until later that you realize that Shinji never finished his story. You stare at your phone for a good hour, trying to craft a text to tell him to continue, that you’re curious, that you hate seeing that faraway look in his eyes, that you’ll play tennis with him anytime as long as he plays basketball with you.

You want to ask him why.

Your phone drops on your chest as your fall asleep before hitting send.

-

“Tennis? Isn’t that Koga’s thing?” Izuki asks you, eyebrow raised. You shrug, because it’s true, but you need more people for this.

“No.” Riko states, not even bothering to look up from her practice outline.

“Uh, um.” Hyuuga stares at you a little flustered. “Did you know I played tennis when I was younger? What is this…”

“Of course!” Kiyoshi replies with an easy smile. You knew he would agree but his next words (“Can I play with my badminton racket?”) make you wonder if you should have tried to convince Izuki a little more.

-

“Hey, Mitobe! You busy Saturday? After practice, I mean.”

It hurts to deny Shinji, especially the pout he gives you, but you’ve been planning this for so long, you’re not giving in now.

You just hope Kiyoshi remembers to call Shinji in time.

-

The court is thankfully empty when you arrive, and you set to stretching immediately since you forget to stretch your legs after basketball practice.

Hyuuga arrives next, dressed smartly in tennis gear, racket and grip tape worn like he still plays every now and then. He sits next to you, like he’s expecting you to say something, but you just blink and go back to stretching.

Hiyoshi and Shinji arrive together, but you hear Shinji before you see him.

“-SO EXCITED that you want to play tennis! I’ve taught Mitobe as much as I can, but I really want to play doubles again, you know? I was a doubles player in middle school, so with you, we just need ONE more person…” Shinji enters the court and finally sees you and Hyuuga, and the shock on his faces worries you a bit.

But when everything sinks in, especially Hyuuga’s neon green tennis shorts, Shinji smiles, wide and bright, just like the first time you met him, and you know that you made the right decision.

-

It takes one game to realize why Shinji played doubles. It’s not that he wasn’t good at singles, he still beats you every time after all, but as he pairs up first with Kiyoshi (“It’s only fair, Hyuuga!! He doesn’t know how to play!” “That’s beside the point, Koga!”), you can see the imprinted, practiced comfort in his stance.

A few times, when you were playing singles with him, you’ve caught Shinji glancing backwards, like he was looking for something, for someone, but after a quick shake of his head, he was back looking at you and slamming a serve into your court.

Here, now, he’s smiling back at Kiyoshi, giggling as he lobs the ball past Hyuuga and smashes it between both your rackets after you return it. You and Hyuuga win the set, but only because Kiyoshi can’t serve and faulted all his service games.

You shuffle pairs, laughing a bit to yourself as Hyuuga tries to to show Kiyoshi how to serve and ends up just yelling at him when Kiyoshi serves into his face.

Shinji’s off the to side, fixing his shoes. You pick at your grip tape, not wanting to rush him, and when you look at him again, he’s leaning on his hand, staring at you with, what you think (what you hope) is a fond look. It squeezes your heart a bit and when Shinji jumps up and grabs your hand, you hope he can’t feel your heartbeat.

“Partner.” He says. “My Partner.”

This something definite about his words and you swear it’s the sun and the heat and the exercise making your face red. Shinji laughs, bright and loud again, your favorite, before shoving you to the back to the court.

“I used to specialize in netplay and I trust you enough to cover me.” He pauses again. “Partner.”

You’re more than flustered but take the back, definitely not at all distracted by Shinji leaning over, hands gripped around his racket, in the middle of the court.

“Serve, Mitobe!!” Hyuuga calls.

Shinji looks back at you, and there’s a moment of eye contact where you think, that maybe- just maybe--

You serve the ball and get your first service ace.

-

By the end, you think that you’ll never hear the end of Hyuuga’s complaints, saying that you and Koga obviously practiced doubles together and that this was a setup against their captain and that they’ll be running laps forever at practice on Monday.

Kiyoshi tries to comfort him by suggesting a badminton rematch but that makes Hyuuga even angrier.

This time, when Shinji steps off the court, his smile stays just as wide as it was on the court.
-

As the sunsets, you walk home side by side with Shinji, shoulders occasionally brushing.

The word “partner” still echoes in your mind and it would be so easy to reach out, to grab his hand, to say what you think that word means. But, as usual, Shinji beats you to it, grabbing your hand and lacing your fingers together.

“We won nationals. In my 3rd year.” Shinji isn’t looking at him, staring at the road in front of them instead. “It was the best moment of my life, we were the top of Japan, the best middle school doubles pair. But, ah-”

You gently squeeze his hand and get a smile and squeeze in return.

“He wanted to go to a different high school. I asked him if he would still play tennis, if there was a chance that we might meet again after high school and…” He drifts off and you let him. There’s no rush. You don’t need to know now, you don’t need to know ever, but you’re more than happy to listen.

“I lost my partner and my dream in the same day...but it was also day I met you, Mitobe Rinnosuke. You and basketball.” Shinji laughs and looks up at you. “I never thought I would find a new dream or even a new partner, but here I am and here you are. You really saved me that day, you know?”

You want to say that he saved you, that he brought smiles and friends and light into your life, but you decide that you want to beat him to something for once.

As you gently kiss him, you can feel the cute curl of his lips and it tastes a little saltier than you expected, but that’s fine. It’s perfect.

He squeezes your hand again as you part and pulls you down the street, almost flying like he was on the tennis court.

Offhand, you wonder when his wings will spread in basketball, but there’s no rush. You both have an infinite amount of time left.

Together.

Edited 2016-05-27 22:16 (UTC)

i m dead samy, samy, SAMY, WHAT HAVE YOU DO O N E

I HURT MYSELF BECAUSE I THOUGHT I EXPELLED THE DEMON, BUT IT'S STILL HERE

I GOTTA FIX IT SOMEHOW

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Bonus Round 1: Memory

FILL: TEAM TENNIS NO OUJI-SAMA, G

Re: FILL: TEAM TENNIS NO OUJI-SAMA, G

Re: FILL: TEAM TENNIS NO OUJI-SAMA, G