PoT Fic: Growing Pains (Atobe/Shishido)

[hermiones]

Title: Growing Pains
Fandom: Prince of Tennis
Pairing: Atobe/Shishido
Rating: PG-13 for a bit of language.
Warnings: Nothing much. Teenage boy angst?
Disclaimer: For peacock, who asked me for a story I'd not written about Atobe/Shishido and a wall. So, it, er, became a story I have now written. Excellent!



Growing Pains


Atobe's feet still don't quite reach the floor in the chairs around his father's dining table. It's okay, though, because neither do Shishido's. Both of them are eleven and tiny and they'll grow to be as tall as their dads, with any luck, just not yet.

Atobe spreads papers across the table, covered in scrawly handwriting. Shishido shows the barest amount of interest, reaching into his bag for his Gameboy. Atobe's house is deathly quiet, his mother flits in and out of the room, reminding Atobe not to get pen on the table. Atobe knows. She regards Shishido with fond familiarity, in a distant sort of way.

Shishido drinks orange juice at Atobe's, even though it's the properly squeezed stuff that he hates, not the kind his mother buys in the supermarket, the stuff Atobe swears is full of toxic crap. Atobe drinks spring water because he reckons it makes him look grown-up, which is just stupid. Atobe is the kind of person who'll drink cider at fifteen and think himself really adult, he's that kind of stupid person. Shishido slurps his orange juice and plays his Formula One game whilst Atobe drones on and on to himself about how much he Just Can't Wait To Be King.

Eventually, Shishido can't take it anymore, so he just splutters out with it.

“Why can't I be Captain?”

It's a little bit like their first meeting, in first school. Shishido wanted the truck, the big red one you could drive yourself by walking around inside it, and it was Atobe's truck. Apparently, that's what all the other kids said. They were too scared to take it from him. Sometimes they snuck behind him and stole it, but it never worked because Atobe would scream at them until they gave it back. To Shishido, the solution was simple. He punched Atobe in the nose with his little fist, and Atobe saw blood and screamed like a demon, and Shishido got the truck.

Atobe hated him from that moment on, because all the kids threatened to punch him after that, and Shishido became some sort of God. Until, that was, Shishido deemed Atobe his best friend, and threatened to pummel anyone who pummeled Atobe. Though bemused by the inconsistency, Shishido was useful, and they made it to the age of eleven with no further punching incidents.

“Because,” Atobe said, full of grandeur and weariness, as if the answer was perfectly simple, “you wouldn't know the first thing about it.”

Shishido ponders this. “Yeah, I would! Like...you've put Kabaji-san on your list! What the hell is that about? Have you ever seen him play, moron?!”

Atobe raises his chin up. “Actually, I have.”

“Then you'll know he can barely hit the ball.”

“He has potential.”

“You're an idiot.”

“You just don't understand what it takes-”

“This is why I'm joining the football team,” Shishido says. “Your tennis team is going to suck.”

Atobe's jaw drops and he throws his pen onto the table. “Football team?”

Shishido nods. “Yeah. Nakamura-san is in charge and it looks-”

“Football?”

“Yes. It's a game where people kick a ball about and try and get it-”

“I know what it is! Why the hell would you want to do that? Idiot!”

“Keigo,” Atobe's mother says, swooshing in and filling Shishido's glass up. “Language.”

“Because football's great!” Shishido says, eying the juice with an internal wince, but saying 'thank you' nonetheless. “It's better than tennis!”

“Nothing is better than tennis! I thought you wanted to be on my team-”

“I wanna play football. The practice is on at the same time, so.”

“But,” Atobe says. He's heading for a full-on strop, Shishido can feel it. “This is my team! You can't drop out of my team!”

“It's not even your team yet!”

“Well, the football team won't have you!”

“Why?!”

“You're too short!”

“Well-”

“Hah!”

“Do you want another bloody nose?!”

“You wouldn't dare!”

“That's enough,” Atobe's mother says, clearing the desk of Atobe's papers and putting them aside. “Another word and I'll insist you do your homework.”

They're both silent, just glaring at each other in their seats. Atobe kicks Shishido under the table, but Shishido is growing up and he doesn't tell on him. He bides his time, waits until Atobe's mother leaves to greet Atobe's father, then kicks Atobe's shin so hard he squeaks.


Despite himself, Shishido hangs around the rest of the week to listen to Atobe's plans for his team. He doesn't want to be on the team, but he wants to know what he's missing out on. It isn't that promising. Whatever Atobe says, he just can't see the point of Kabaji, that kid called Gakuto, he's a gymnast or some sort of circus freak, not a tennis player. He's better than most of the sub-regulars so he guesses he's made the right choice, choosing the football team. Nakamura has his head on his shoulders, he's a few years old and a few inches taller, someone Shishido is almost in awe of. Someone who probably never was a kid, not like Atobe.

They sit together in maths, scribbling down notes and drumming on the buttons of their calculators. Atobe hisses on beside him, about how good the team is going to be and how you don't win anything in football, really, nothing you don't have to share with other people. Shishido hisses back that unlike some people, he doesn't mind sharing and gets on with his work.

“I'll buy you a pizza,” Atobe hisses. Shishido stops scribbling, scratches the back of his ear with his pen.

“No,” he says. Football is worth more than pizza.

“I'll buy you every time we go for the next four weeks.”

“No,” he says, more insistent.

“I'll-”

“You could buy me the whole restaurant and I still wouldn't join your team. Go. Away.”

“But-”

That gets Atobe into trouble, then, and Shishido smirks to himself. He sticks his tongue out at Atobe as he leaves the room, leaving Atobe inside for a stern talking to. He still waits, of course, outside the classroom. Doesn't want to be alone at lunchtime. So instead, he leans across the doorway and makes faces at Atobe through the glass. Atobe looks the way he does when his father is telling him off, all quiet and head-bowed and positively steaming inside.

When he comes out, he marches straight past Shishido. They go to lunch together but Atobe doesn't speak, not until Shishido gives him half of his pudding.


The next day, Atobe comes equipped with supplies. Tennis magazines, mostly. They used to pore over them together, Shishido sleeping over at Atobe's (the snacks are better, the television bigger. Plus, Atobe has a Playstation, which Shishido's parents disapprove of). Shishido always wanted to be the next Sampras, Atobe the first Atobe. Big priss.

“Name me one Japanese footballer, one,” Atobe is saying. “They're all just boring and one-dimensional, not like tennis players, not-”

“I can name all of the National squad, actually-”

“Yes, but they're all boring, so what would be the point.”

“Nobody's talking about the rest of our lives, stupid, just the school clubs. You have to overdo everything, it's not life or death, s'just a club.”

“Then join the tennis club.”

“No.”

“If it's just a club-”

“It's just the club I want to join! You don't need me, anyway. I don't understand the big, scary tennis team, you said it. You can have it all to yourself.”

“I could make you vice-captain!” Atobe is desperate.

“They don't have vice-captains here, idiot. Maybe I could be captain of the football team, someday.”

“You're not being captain of the tennis team.”

“Well, see, what's the point in joining, then?”

“Because it's...tennis!” Atobe's voice is so high, it's practically climbed Mt. Fuji.

“And it's football!”

“Is there anything you'd do this for? Anything?”

Shishido thinks about this. He thinks about it, long and hard and over-dramatically, gestures and everything. He eventually hits the jackpot.

“Cindy Crawford.”


It takes Atobe all of two and a half hours to brave knocking on the door to his father's study. His father is much taller than he is, wears glasses as if they're a weakness when actually, they're more an intimidation. Atobe can see his tiny reflection in them, so insignificant and small. His father's desk is covered in paper and leather-bound manuscripts, one or two fountain pens and an enormous ink-well.

His father looks up, briefly, doesn't pause in his writing. Atobe stands, quietly, unsure whether to let him finish or begin talking. It's difficult to know, with his dad. Either he'll get it wrong and be told to be quiet, or he'll get it right and his father won't say anything at all. Or, the third option, he'll wait too long and-

“What is it? I'm busy.”

The second statement somehow negates the first, but Atobe perseveres.

“You know that...once you told me that in your job, you buy...people?”

Atobe's father sighs. “I don't buy people. I buy stocks, shares. I buy parts of companies and sell them off. I don't buy individuals. Don't be silly.”

“But you buy...you bought.”

“I buy people out, occasionally, if needs must and they're very obstinate.”

“That's sort of the same thing, right?”

“No,” His father's tone is very firm. “It isn't at all the same. It sounds as though you need to do more reading on the subject. What I've told you obviously isn't making any sort of impression. I'd expected more understanding from you, you're nearly a man now.”

Atobe chews his lip. “I understand that you can exchange money for people's jobs. Give them money instead of their jobs. So that they can find new jobs, sometimes working for you. You call it 'poaching'.”

Atobe's father turns a page. “Yes, that's a bit better.”

“Okay. Um,”

“Can we get to the point of this conversation? I assume you're not here to learn, you have homework to do, surely?”

“One of my friends at school wants me to buy somebody. Out of their job.”

Then, he looks up. “Who on Earth are you associating with?”

“I-”

“Is it that Shishido child? You mustn't listen to what he says, it's what his parents feed him. It isn't good for you to be around such nonsense.”

“He wants you to buy Cindy Crawford.”

The look on Atobe's father's face is nothing short of murderous. He says absolutely nothing, rises without pause, takes Atobe by the shoulder and leads him to his room. All of this he does without a trace of fury in him, just cold, firm guidance.

“You'll stay in here tonight and think about my time, which is important to me and must not be wasted. Do you understand.”

It is not a question. Atobe nods, and sits down on the bed. He's glad he went for a sneaky pizza with Shishido, after school. Scoffed himself stupid, the way he can only with Ryou. He curls up and starts to do his homework, resigned to the fact that his tennis team isn't ever going to be perfect. Things just don't work out for him, the way they do for his dad.


By the end of the week, Atobe has run out of ideas. He's tried bribing, blackmailing and insulting Shishido. Complimenting lasted longest of all, mostly because it amused Shishido, but it was no good. Nakamura-san, a third year, seemed to hold complete sway over him. Much as Atobe was loathe to admit it, he could see the attraction. Nakamura-san was cool, calm and composed. He held everyone under some sort of command, despite not being superbly rich or massively attractive. Atobe thought slyly that he might learn something from him.

He watches Shishido kick a ball around, mostly to avoid having to go home. Atobe doesn't like football, finds it irritating and muddy, and besides, people tend to kick him on the sly because he isn't tall and they can get away with it. He often loses his temper and gets sent off, and it seems very fruitless as far as sports go. He is never placed in a position where he can score a goal, so football is on the whole a humiliating experience. Shishido is pretty good at all, though, and obviously enjoys it. So Atobe sits on the sidelines and watches and tries not to look as bored as he feels.

Shishido doesn't seem to care that his desire for a Western supermodel had gotten Atobe into trouble, he's so buzzed about the football and the wonderful, wonderful captain that he cares about very little else. Atobe waits for him to change and then they both do their hair, the one thing that they do seem to agree on. Shishido's was better, Shishido always said. Length wasn't always the most important thing, though, and Atobe has access to more expensive products, so his hair is always shinier. He can always use this to annoy Shishido and as it was that sort of day, annoy Shishido he did.

They walk out of the locker rooms furious with each other, Atobe having accused Shishido of having a crush on Nakamura and Shishido having accused Atobe of having a crush on Shishido, for wanting him on the team so much. And despite himself, Atobe still wanted his best friend on his team, so he goes for the only option left. The one he hadn't wanted to do, more than anything he'd wanted to avoid it, but Shishido had given him no choice.

Noting the presence of girls near the changing rooms, Atobe pushes Shishido up against the wall with a mutual 'oof' and grabs hold of his long, newly clean hair. He then pulls, as hard as he can. Shishido shrieks, tries to stop himself, and splutters and tries to kick. All the while, the girls stare over in their direction, Shishido squirming and squealing and Atobe trying his best to look dignified, and Shishido eventually relents because his scalp feels like it's on fire.

“Join my team!” Atobe says, over and over and over again, like a drill boring a hole in his skull.

“Alright!” Shishido yells, shoving Atobe backwards, sending him reeling a bit, trying to make him look as stupid as Shishido did. “I'll join your stupid team!”

The means aren't good, Atobe guesses, but the end result? Worth it.



As it turned out, being on Atobe's team wasn't that bad. Kabaji actually did have potential, Gakuto was...a lost cause, really, until Oshitari turned up and that, that really gave Hyotei the boost they needed in the National tournament. They recruited Ootori at Shishido's insistence, Atobe allowed him that much, and Shishido gained another best friend. One that didn't punch or kick, but with whom he enjoyed others things that Atobe couldn't understand, like being quiet, playing arcade games and just sort of hanging out, not doing too much.

Most of all, what was great about picking tennis over football was having fan clubs. The football team didn't have fan clubs. Atobe, Oshitari and Shishido were plagued with girls, wanting to go out with them, wanting to do...positively unspeakable things to them after school. This was a little bit like having the keys to a candy store handed to Shishido, and he went out with a few girls, just enjoying the attention. Most fourteen year old boys had problems getting girlfriends, whereas he had problems losing them.

That was even better than tennis itself.

And Atobe, as it turned out, had been right. He led Hyotei in a way Shishido couldn't have. He inspired and tested the sub-regulars in a way Shishido couldn't ever have mastered. He remained within their reach but distant, a benchmark, a standard. His tennis got better and better by the year, until Sakaki-sensei started talking about scouts, and Atobe's face lit up like one of those weird pumpkins Shishido had seen in American horror films. Their friendship deepened. Shishido still found his ego intolerable but he accepted that Atobe was right more often than he was, so he granted him a bit of leeway. Atobe trusted Shishido, the only person ever to tell him the truth one hundred percent of the time. They talked about girls and about tennis and sometimes even about Atobe's father, whom Shishido had never liked much. Atobe was coming up to a difficult position in his life, one that Shishido couldn't help him with, and that was hard.

At the same time, being with Ootori made Shishido re-evaluate tennis, alongside other things. They practiced together until Ootori's serve was perfect, until Shishido had increased his strength tenfold. They made each other better in an understated way. Shishido felt more complete around Ootori, he didn't need Atobe to push him. The two of them were equal. He no longer felt the urge to punch Atobe, and Atobe no longer felt the need to drag him along after him, like a shadow.

It was only when Shishido got kicked off the team that he realised, how far the pair of them had left themselves behind.

Shishido looked at it like a video game: he'd evolved. He'd reached his maximum capacity, had to change. Had to become something else, something with the ability to be bettered. More goals, more leveling up. So when he failed, when he failed Atobe, failed Hyotei, failed himself, he worked harder than ever so as not to fail again. He learnt something and vowed never to make the same mistake. With Ootori's help, he built himself back up, developed new skills, new attacks, even. Made himself ready to get back on the team.

Atobe wouldn't let him, at first. This was tennis, this wasn't friendship. Atobe wasn't there to be liked, not anymore. He was there to set an example, not make exceptions. He told Shishido this with distant fondness, the way Atobe's mother had always treated him. Shishido wanted to ask for orange juice, in a weird sort of way, but he stopped himself. So Shishido appealed above Atobe's head, which seemed to surprise him. But then, Shishido had evolved.

The final step in the evolution was to change physically, to sever the ties with anything and everything that'd held him back. So Shishido cut off his hair. It seemed the right thing to do. He wanted to show their coach that he'd really changed, that he finally needed Hyotei the way Atobe had needed Hyotei, the way Atobe had insisted Hyotei had needed him. It wasn't meant to be a false gesture, as some of the sub-regulars had said. Shishido meant it. He had changed. Everything that he had been before: the vanity, the pride, the stubbornness. That had gone.

Sakaki-sensei relented, but only because Atobe stood up for Shishido. Took a risk, the way he had with his father. For a week, Atobe bore the scorn of the sub-regulars, but all he said to Shishido was: “this will never happen again”. Shishido knew.


Atobe looks at Shishido, across the room. They take maths in a room overlooking the field, now. The sun glares in, making it difficult for Atobe to keep looking at Shishido, but he's stubborn even in the face of blindness. And besides, he's talking to a girl. Atobe knows her, vaguely, she's new. He doesn't think much of her. She's fairly plain, not that developed or into football or whatever it is Shishido wants in a girl. But she likes him and Atobe guesses that's enough. He's the only one out of the pair of them with any standards.

Mostly, it's the hair. Just as it had attracted younger girls when it was long, it attracts older girls short. It makes Shishido look older, more manly, Atobe supposes. He's really taken on the look: slouching, hands in pockets, chewing gum. Grunting. Wearing his cap backwards takes it to a whole new level, previously they'd both loathed hat hair. Shishido no longer looks like the Shishido Atobe remembers, which makes sense because he no longer is the Shishido Atobe remembers. That isn't easy for Atobe to deal with. Not just because he hates change, but because Shishido has always been a constant. Since Atobe was a rowdy, spoilt toddler, Shishido has been there to punch his face. Now, he just isn't, not as much. Touching a girl's breasts, that's far more compelling.

Atobe overhears her asking Shishido on a date, and Shishido is non-committal. So Atobe steps in, as she leaves, asks Shishido to go for pizza with him. He's not sure why he does it, jealousy, he supposes. He's not supposed to have inappropriate girlfriends, just ones his father approves of. And his father's standards are slim. Shishido sort of accepts, shrugging, his newfound technique for expressing any of a wide range of emotions. Atobe supposes that it'll have to do.


He waits for thirty whole minutes before becoming resigned to the fact that Shishido has stood him up. He can't even get stood up by girls, that'd at least be something less pathetic and depressing than being stood up by your supposed best friend.

Atobe goes home angry and his father lectures him about the state of his clothes, muddy trousers from the school field, wet shirt and askew tie from waiting in the drizzle. It's the last thing Atobe needs, on Friday evening his school clothes won't be pristine, why doesn't his father understand that. So he lashes out, trying to say that, but not quite managing it, something like, “Nothing I say will make any difference to you, will it?” and he's sent to bed without food.

This time, he goes hungry. An empty stomach only fuels the fire.


He goes to school the next day intent upon ignoring Shishido entirely. He kind of hopes that Shishido hasn't managed to sleep with a girl, neither of them have done that yet and if he has, Atobe will have to break his vow and ask him about it. The curiosity will get the better of him. Atobe supposes that his only consolation would be that Shishido would be crap in bed, all brute force and no technique, no skill whatsoever, and whoever the girl was would be disappointed. It's cold comfort: Atobe wants to be the first to do it, to be the one in demand for answers. It's a pride thing.

Shishido's face in the school yard tells Atobe he hasn't managed anything of the sort. He's completely downcast, doesn't say a word, just skulks around in the corner with Oshitari, who's slyly smoking and trying to hide it. Much to Atobe's chagrin. He stomps up to them both, grabs Oshitari's cigarette and stubs it out on Shishido's bag, which is leather and new, a bit nicer than Atobe's. Understandably, Shishido goes nuts and Oshitari is forced to intervene between them, which he says he doesn't want to do – out of breath, he should just let Shishido on Atobe for doing that with his cigarette – but which he does for the sake of the team. He holds them apart until the bell goes, and when neither of them move, he sighs and gives in. As Atobe shoves Shishido up against the wall, Oshitari walks off into the building alone, hands in pockets. Atobe realises that Shishido's slouch, his swagger – both stolen from Oshitari. Perhaps he isn't as confident as he looks, after all.

Still. He can't weaken in resolve, not when Shishido is glaring at him like he is. They've been here before and Atobe usually wins, he's better at this.

“Where were you yesterday?” He demands. “You didn't turn up.”

“What?” Shishido screws his face up. “Is that meant to be some kind of joke? Bastard!”

Now Atobe's confused. “Joke?! You were meant to come for pizza with me!”

Shishido stares at him. “Huh? Was I?”

Atobe stares back. His fists unclench. “Yes,” he says, confused. “You were. Didn't you hear me?”

“Sorry. I...I was...well, she asked me on a date, and I sort of shrugged, and then she walked off and I wasn't sure she got that I meant 'YES LET'S DATE', you know, from the shrug.”

Atobe stares at Shishido and his never-ending mouth of ramblingness.

“So I was trying to think of how to get her back without looking stupid.”

“And you didn't hear me.”

“No. Sorry.”

“Well,” Atobe says, unreasonably stung. Confusing. “I hope you had a nice date.”

Shishido looks momentarily wounded. “She didn't turn up in the end. I found her again, said I wanted to go...I think she was pissed that I shrugged at her. It's no big deal.”

Atobe looks at him. His mouth says one thing, his face another. Atobe knows which to trust.

“That's rough,” he says. He doesn't want to be sympathetic, Shishido's a big twat, but.

Shishido laughs, hollowly. “No, it's fine, I mean, she wasn't attractive, really, was she?”

Atobe considers this. “No. You can do better. She's probably just unhinged or something.”

Shishido needs Atobe to be saying stuff, and the more Atobe thinks about it, the more the stuff makes sense. Shishido probably wouldn't be good in bed but he's interesting, honest, he says whatever he thinks. That's more than most of the girls Atobe knows can bear to do. With Shishido, you always know where you are. And he's good looking, mostly. He might not be an unbearable kisser. And almost to stop himself on that thought, that weird thought, Atobe reaches up to yank Shishido's hair.

“Unhinged, yeah,” Shishido is saying. Then, “what are you doing? Are you unhinged as well?”

Atobe sneers. “I was trying to pull your hair and then I realised you haven't got any, you stupid tit. What the hell did you do that for.”

Shishido's hair is spiky and soft to the touch. It feels nice. Shishido opens his mouth to answer, but Atobe just looks at him.

“Shut up, don't answer that. Just shut up.”

Shishido shuts his mouth. His eyes are wide, brown, unusually unsure. Things have changed, alright. Atobe realises that Shishido cares about tennis now, so his job is done. He doesn't need pulling to water, not anymore. Shishido is new, without his crowning glory, without his need for Atobe. Their friendship is something different. Atobe wants Shishido to need him. He wants to be something to Shishido.

And Shishido. Well, Shishido probably wants to punch him in the face again. But Atobe thinks, beyond all logic and consistency, there'd be things he could think and say that'd be worth being punched for.

Instead, though, he says nothing. Because there's nothing he can say, not really. His father is right: it's nonsense. Nothing but nothing but nonsense.

“What are you thinking,” Shishido says. Atobe has been quiet for some time, and his hand's in Shishido's hair, still, and it's all just plain weird. Not uncomfortable, but definitely weird.

Atobe does the only thing he can do: he lies.

“Sorry,” he says, starts. “I've got a pain in my leg.”

“Oh, I get that,” Shishido says, shrugging. “My mum says it's growing pains.”