The Shohoku basketball team was busy with practice when Haruko appeared with a bag of refreshments for the boys. A few minutes later, Akagi, seeing that he has tortured - I mean, pushed the team enough for the moment, signalled Ayako to blow the whistle and she did to indicate that break was in order.

With relief the players shuffled towards the refreshment table and took their drinks offered to them by their manageress and her assistant. Hanamichi, who was less tired compared to the rest of the team especially when the cute Haruko graced his day with her presence, skipped over towards the pretty brown-haired girl to talk to her.

"Ah! Haruko-san! How are you today?" asked the redhead shyly, nearly crumpling his Pocari Sweat can in his hand.

Haruko forced herself to stop staring at Rukawa to regard the beaming redhead in front of her.
"I'm fine, Sakuragi-san," smiled the girl, "You played very well, today."

"Ahahah!" laughed Hanamichi, "That's me! The tensai!"

Haruko giggled at his boyish charm and lifted her hand to demurely cover her mouth. At that moment, the redhead noticed a plastic bag that the girl was carrying as she shifted her arms and curiously asked what its contents were.

"Ah!" Haruko exclaimed, "I forgot! I bought icecream for the team! There was this new icecream parlor selling icecream at half-price to celebrate its opening so I bought enough for everybody. Which one would you like Sakuragi-kun?"

"V-Vanilla, thanks," Hanamichi blushed, happy that Haruko asked him first.

"Here you go," Haruko said, handing over the small circular carton of vanilla icecream to the redhead before she went over to Rukawa - the source of her forgetfulness on the icrecream - to give him his choice of flavour.

"What would you like, Rukawa-san?" Haruko asked shyly.

"Whatever," Rukawa said, wiping the sweat off of his brow.

"Ummm... ummm... chocolate?" Haruko blushed.

Rukawa shrugged and took the icecream from her together with the small wooden spoon.

The manageress assistant then proceeded to offer the rest of the icecream to the other players, receiving enthusiastic arigato as most of them were feeling hot in that warm gym especially after doing an hour of strenuous practice.

"Mmmmmmm! This vanilla flavour is delicious, Haruko-san!" Hanamichi mumbled over his icecream, "You sure know how to pick them!"

Haruko giggled again while the rest of the team either ignored him or rolled their eyes at his clear-as-day (with the exception of one clueless brown-haired girl) puppy-love antics.

Suddenly there came a snort and recognising who it was that made that condescending noise, Hanamichi whirled around to demand to the fox-eyed boy, "You wanna say something, kistune?"

"Yes," Rukawa intoned, "Vanilla is boring."

"W-What??!" sputtered Hanamichi, "How dare you insult, Haru-"

"Since you picked vanilla out that means I'm insulting you, aho."

"Temmeeeeee!!!!"

"Chocolate is better," Rukawa stated decisively.

"Chocolate is dull! Vanilla is better!"

"Chocolate."

"Vanilla!"

"Chocolate."

"VANILLA!"

"Taste it, then."

"VA- *piku* huh?"
Thrust in front of the redhead was a wooden spoon with a fair amount of chocolate icecream on its end, just a few inches away from his mouth.

"Unless if you're afraid that you'd be wrong," taunted the fox-eyed boy.

Hanamichi scowled, "I'm not afraid!"
Hesitantly he opened his mouth and Rukawa's blue eyes focused at how the redhead's teeth bit into the chocolate icrecream before it scrapped against the wooden spoon to bring the cold chocolate gooey onto his pink tongue.

As he tasted the delicious (true to Rukawa's claim but he'd rather drop dead before he admits it) flavour of the chocolatey goodness, Hanamichi suddenly went red in the face when he realised that his enemy had just spoon-fed him in front of the entire basketball team.

"I didn't know they were that close," whispered Miyagi to a surprised Ayako.

Ayako just gaped along with the rest of the team.

"What are you waiting for?" Rukawa asked, looking at the redhead in a bored manner.

"W-What?" blinked Hanamichi in puzzlement.

"Let me taste yours. I'm being fair," the fox-eyed boy said, opening his mouth a scant.

Hanamichi's eyes went wide. Did the fox-eyed boy believe that he, the tensai, was going to spoon-feed him in return?! Rukawa has got another thing coming! Besides, he was not going to waste his precious icecream that Haruko gave him to a stupid kitsune!

With swift hand-movement that defied possibility, he managed to scoop and gobble up all of his remaining icecream before smugly showing the carton's empty content to the stoic raven-haired boy.

"Would love to, kitsune, but I finished it all," the redhead grinned, ignoring the pain of a brain-freeze occuring in his head.

Suddenly strong fingers gripped his jaw and before Hanamichi realised what was happening, Rukawa was bending him over with one arm around him to keep him from falling before warm and icecream-cold lips covered his forcefully opened mouth.

Hanamichi's stunned brown eyes crossed as they met with the blue ones hovering over him. He tried to make a protest but instead it turned into a whimper when Rukawa's tongue lapped the inner sides of his mouth to curiously taste the mixed blend of vanilla, chocolate and himself.

As his eye-lids fluttered shut, the redhead's arm grabbed at Rukawa's back as he fought to maintain conciousness at the hungry assault of Rukawa's lips and tongue. When he thought that he would pass out because of the sheer passion of the kiss or simply because of lack of oxygen, Rukawa slowly released him, a trail of their mixed saliva connecting their wet mouths before it seperated when the fox-eyed boy straightened up without an expression on his flushed face.

"Hmm... we were both wrong," Rukawa mumbled thoughtfully, wiping away the wetness from the side of his mouth with the back of his hand, "Vanilla mixed with chocolate tastes better than plain."

Hanamici was speechless. Rolling his taste buds in his mouth he realised that he couldn't taste anything at all of the icecream which he has eaten. Instead, Rukawa's taste was potent on his tongue.

"He-He... I... We..." Hanamichi stammered not believing at what has just happened.

Various responses overcame the people in that gym.
Akagi and Miyagi were looking oddly blue in the face, Mitsui was looking oddly intrigued, Kogure was looking oddly embarrased (especially with the odd glances from a certain scarred-face player), Haruko was looking oddly horrified and Ayako was looking oddly ... errr... unconcious.

Oblivious of everyone's shocked reaction in the gym, Rukawa walked away, licking his lips as he thought, Definitely got to try that out again.

~Owari


This fanfiction is based from Ayano Yaname's dj from Enilyn's page! Visit it here!