Forgiveness - KnB (ON-HOLD)

Chapter 3.2 - Kaijō vs. Seirin

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Seirin's basketball team arrived at the school yard of Kaijō for the upcoming practice match and Ai was glancing down.
Kise's words were repeating over and over in her head and she couldn't forget them.
Everyone had noticed that she looked even sadder than usual and they wondered what business she had with Kise.

Taiga's eyes were blood-shot because he didn't get to sleep in excitement last night, but he was also worried about the girl that was standing right next to him. But no one dared to talk to her because she looked like she would either beat everyone up or run away crying if they did.

'You have to explain me a crap load of things soon, Haru...', Taiga thought to himself and the strange silence was interrupted by an awfully familiar and cheerful voice.

"Hey! I will lead you to the gym since our school is really big!", Kise shouted and his eyes immediately caught Ai as he ran towards the team. A few of them replied his greeting quietly while the rest nodded and they followed him to Kaijō's gymnasium.

When everyone entered the gym hall, Seirin saw that the hall was divided in half, much to their dismay.

"Oh, there you are. Welcome. I am coach Takeuchi. Where is your coach?", a thicker man asked as the players walked to the dressing room, only leaving Aida and Ai on the court. The coach of Seirin got angry at this and stomped away to the boys to follow them to the dressing room, so Ai decided to answer the man's question instead.

"Hello. Our coach is Riko Aida, the girl who just walked away, and I am the assistant coach, Haru. Nice to meet you", she replied and bowed down politely, making the man opposite to her nod in slight shock because he hadn't expected a girl to be the coach of a male basketball club.

Kaijō's players gazed at Ai and Kise walked to them as he noticed where his teammates were looking at. "I-Is this the girl you were talking about? Seirin is lucky to have her in their team", Kasamatsu murmured shyly and the others agreed with nods while they didn't seperate their eyes from the ravenette. "Yes. Haru-cchi is an amazing girl!", Kise answered with a proud grin and made the others jealous. "Shall I introduce her to you? She is really friendly!", he then suggested and they didn't disagree as they had no reason to do so.

Kise ran to Ai who was waiting for her team to come back after she was finished talking to Takeuchi and she gasped when she was unexpectedly grabbed by her wrist and pulled towards Kaijō's players.

"Oi, Kise... Is this how you treat a girl!?", his Senpai shouted at him and the blonde shrieked like a girl while he hid behind Ai to use her as a shield. "Uh... Hey. My name is Haru, nice to meet you", the girl said awkwardly and the first one to introduce himself to her was Moriyama, the flirt of their team. He stepped forward and took Ai's hand, kissing it gently and smiling at her. "I am Yoshikata Moriyama. You can call me however you want, Haru-chan", he said softly and made Ai blush slightly from the contact, but she nodded.

"Kōji Kobori. Pleasure to meet you", the vice captain of their team said blandly.

"Mitsuhiro Hayakawa, I'm looking forward to the match!", the power forward shouted a bit too excitedly and made his teammates sweat drop.

"I-I'm K-Kasamatsu Yukio... N-Nice to meet you...", the shy captain said and looked to the side so that his blush wouldn't be that visible. He was a bit too shy whenever he talked to girls and didn't really like that side of him. But Ai didn't laugh at him or anything like that, her expression was soft and she bowed down politely as she saw that her team had came back from the dressing room and was walking to their bench.

"I will go back now. It was a pleasure to meet you, Yoshikata-senpai, Kōji-senpai, Mitsuhiro-senpai and Kasamatsu-senpai", she said and turned around to leave after exchanging short eye contact with Kise.

"Hah... The way she spelled my name... I think I'm in love~", the flirt daydreamed and the others looked after her.

"Coach Takeuchi said that there isn't anything to learn from the match for the other players. That is the reason why the hall is divided in half", Ai explained to her teammates after she arrived at the bench.
The brunette fumed in anger and everyone else except Ai and Kuroko were angry as well.

"We'll show them many things to learn...", Kagami growled and the match began after the players lined up on the court to start the practice match.

The practice match was over and Seirin won with only two points more than Kaijō. It was a really shocking result for Kaijō and the audience. It was a close match and both teams have given their best.

Ai got up as the team got ready to leave, but her eyes caught a certain blonde who was rubbing his eyes.

'Is he... crying?'

Ai decided to talk to him to cheer him up because she can't stand seeing people cry. She walked to Kise with a concerned look in her eyes.

"Ryō-kun?", she asked gently and made Kise smile due of the change of her voice. It sounded so cold and husky the evening before, but it sounded soft and angelic this time. She had also called him by his nickname again for the first time after about two years, which made him even happier.

He looked up to the girl and grinned as he wiped the sweat from his forehead, along with the tears that have been streaming down his cheeks. "I'm not used to lose. But I'm not sad though", he said and Ai nodded.

"Do you mind if we talk later?", she asked quietly and the blonde shook his head. "Of course not, Haru-cchi! Only if you don't mind waiting for me because I have to change and so on, -ssu...", he mumbled with the closed eyed smile that Ai had always loved. She nodded and left the gym with her school bag to wait outside. She didn't need to change because she had been in her school uniform the whole time.

Kise took pretty long, actually longer than Ai had expected, but she just guessed that he talked to his teammates, met a few of his fangirls or something like that. He finally walked out of the gym in his school uniform and ran over to Ai with his flawless smile.

"Sorry for having let you wait for so long, Haru-cchi! I will make it up to you I promise!", he whined apologizingly and Ai shook her head. "It's alright. Let's leave this place. There are important things I have to tell you", she said and the model took her hand, surprising the short girl once again.
She wasn't used to body contact -
Well, saying that she didn't really like body contact because of the bad experiences she had made fit better.

But it didn't matter in that moment because it was Kise who held her hand. It felt like the whole trust she had had towards him turned back in a matter of seconds.

"Let's go to the basketball court!", he chimed and dragged Ai behind him, but not as harsh as last time. He gently held her hand this time and intertwined his warm fingers with her cold ones.

She couldn't help but smile. Smile for the first time after two years of loneliness and nothing else but serious and emotionless looks and expressions.

Kise didn't see the smile, but Ai was really thankful that he was able to make her smile again after such a long time.

-

Let me tell you one thing:
I. Ship. Them. So. Much. But this has absolutely no effect on the plot, so no worries. ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ