I'm coming home, I've done my time
And I have to know what is or isn't mine.
If you received my letter, telling you I'd soon be free
Then you'd know just what to do,
If you still want me.
If you still want me.

The man sat hunched in his seat by the back of the bus, studiously ignoring the cheerful chattering of the people around him.  He ran his hand over his recently cropped head of hair, savoring the feeling of the short, silky strands against his skin.  He hadn't felt this amazingly clean, this amazingly liberated since he had last been with his love.  His Kiminobu...

Smiling softly, he took out a small picture, a bit worse for wear, what with all the times that he had handled it, and gently brushed his fingertips against the face of the brown haired boy smiling out at him from it.  It would be good to see him again.  To touch him again.  The man's face suddenly darkened when he remembered that he wasn't even sure if he would be able to do that...He wasn't even sure if Kiminobu would even want to see him again.

That thought hurt .

" Who's that?"  He was brought out of his reverie by the inquiry of a young man, one roughly around his age, with the strangest, gravity defying hairstyle that he had ever seen.  He also looked vaguely familiar but he couldn't, for the life of him, figure out why this was so.  " Your brother, or something?"

Mitsui Hisashi shrugged.  " Or something..."

The guy seated beside him chuckled as though he had said the funniest thing in the world.  " You're not much of a talker, are you?  You remind of one of my friends.  But then again, some people get freaked out when somebody they don't know tries to start a conversation with them in the bus...Maybe you're that type?  Oh, well...I didn't mean to scare yah or anything...It's just that you've been awfully quiet the whole trip and I was getting sorta bored.  Just say the word, and I'll shut up.  Hiro-kun says it a bad habit of mine, always talking to strangers.  He says that he doesn't know how I managed to survive my childhood years, the way that I'm always willing to talk to just about anybody.  He thinks it's amazing that I didn't get myself kidnapped by hentai pedophiles back then..."

Despite of himself, Mitsui found a small smile tugging at his lips.  There was something about this guy...Something that made you immediately take to him.

Seeing that the ice  had been broken, the boy's grin widened, and he held out his hand to be shaken.  " Sendo Akira."

" Mitsui Hisashi.  Nice to meet you."

" Mitsui Hisashi, huh?  Sounds familiar.  Did you use to play basketball, or something?"

" Yup.  For Shohoku."

" Then we've met each other before." Sendo pointed out, tipping his head to the side and examining the guy beside him thoughtfully.  That was why he had looked so familiar!  He looked sort of different now, a lot thinner and a little run down, but there was still no doubt that this was the guy who had helped to bring Shohoku to the top with his beautiful three pointers.  " Don't you remember me?  Ryonan's ace, Porcupine head?  Smiley, as Sakuragi used to call me.  Actually, he still does."

" Oh."  Mitsui squirmed uncomfortably in his seat.  He hadn't counted on bumping into anyone that he had know from back then in the bus and he didn't really think he was ready to face anyone yet.  Anyone that was not Kiminobu..." That's right.  How have you been then, Sendo."

" Good.  Good.  Still with my adorable Hiro-kun.  Still getting pounded on the head daily by a frying pan, you won't believe how many we've gone through!  I'm working for the Kanagawa Bank now.  I'm taking care of their computer infrastructure."

" You didn't pursue a career in basketball?" Mitsui asked, slightly surprised.  When he thought of the name Sendo Akira, he remembered an extremely talented young man who he had been certain would be able to make it into the NBA someday.

Sendo shook his head.  " Nah.  I never considered basketball a career move for me.  It's fun, but...Well, you know.  It stops being fun when it becomes all business.  And I've always been sort of a computer geek, hard as that may be for you to believe, so I chose a career with computers.  Rukawa seems to be doing great though, have you been following his career?  I always knew that kid would make it to the top.  The very first time that I saw him play, I knew.  He had that something, you know.  Something that made a player great.  as for Sakuragi, can you believe that that idiot actually makes a great coach?  He's coaching for that new High School now, the one that was established just recently, and they actually made it to the final four!  A great achievement for a team that's only been around for two years.  He swears that they'll make it all the way to the IH this year and for some reason, I believe him..."

Mitsui chuckled.  " Sakuragi's always managed to do what he promises.  Remember all that shit about being a basketball genius?  He actually managed to become one by the time that he started college.  It was amazing."

" He's the genius, all right."  Sendo agreed with a small laugh.  " Even Rukawa's starting to admit it...Hell, the two of them have gotten really close, if you know what I mean.  Rukawa even sits in on some of Hanamichi's coaching sessions and gives a few tips.  But how about you, then?  How have you been doing?  It seems as though you just disappeared right after College.  The guy in the picture, that's Kogure, right?  I remember it now.  The two of you used to go out together.  You were really sweet on each other back then..."

" Back then..." Mitsui mumbled.

" Not anymore then, huh?"  Sendo smiled sympathetically.  There had been a short period back in College when he and Koshino had taken a break from each other.  He could remember how it felt to be separated from someone that you loved, and it wasn't a very nice feeling at all..." The two of you have broken up?"

" Not exactly broken up.  More like, separated under unfortunate circumstances...I still don't even know if he'll want me back..."

"Why.  What were the ' unfortunate circumstances '?"  Sendo inquired, as usual, not thinking twice about poking into other people's business.  Nobody had ever taken offense to it so he didn't think Mitsui would mind..." What happened?  Did you cheat on him?"

Mitsui was offended.  As if he would ever do anything like that to his Min-kun. " I would never cheat on him, Sendo!  It was nothing like that.  But it was my own, stupid fault...If I hadn't been so stupid, then maybe..." Mitsui let out a heavy sigh as he stared out of the bus window, watching the scenery passing by.  "  You really wanna know why I disappeared right after College, Sendo?"

" Yeah.  I do.  I had a feeling that the Shohoku guys knew what was up with you.  They wouldn't say anything about it though..."

' Yeah.  Those guys are great.  They didn't want to cause me anymore grief than I already had... But, anyways.  I guess I should tell you.  It's all gonna come out again, sooner or later.  I guess it's better for you to hear the truth from me than to get some twisted version of the whole story from someone else, right?"

" Right."

" So here it goes..."  Mitsui took a deep breath before going on with his story...

~**~

" I think you know about me taking two years off from basketball before I started playing with Shohoku again on my third,
and final year of High School. I don't think you know the real reason behind that long hiatus, though. Most of the people
think that it's because of the injury that I sustained in my first year at Shohoku. That's a part of it, I guess you can
say."

" It really got to me, that injury. You can't know how difficult it is for a guy who knows that he is at the top of his game to
be injured, to be worthless, sitting by the side lines day after day, watching your team lose games when you knew that
you could have led them to a win if you could have just been there. If you had just been able to help...It really eats away
at you. So I got restless. I tried to play, even though I knew that my knee was still bad, and managed to injure myself
again. I was devastated. All hope of me returning to my former condition left me, and after weeks and weeks of no
improvement, I just gave up. I just didn't want to try anymore. I decided that I hated basketball, and anyone else who,
unlike me, were capable of playing it, and since I was miserable, I would bloody well do my best to make everyone else's
lives miserable too."

" That was why I started hanging out with Tetsuo and his gang. A bad crowd, I guess you can say, and not really the
best companions for an impressionable young freshman. But they became my friends, and they stuck by me through
that hard time, not like some of the hangers on that I acquired during my basketball playing days, and I was grateful to
them."

" They taught me a lot of things, not all good, but, well...They were my friends so I just went along with anything that
they wanted to do. I've never really had that strong a character, so it was really rather easy for them to get me to do
what they wanted. Well, throughout that time, I managed to make quite a few enemies, needless to say. But I didn't
care about them, because as far as I was concerned, my gang would always be there to watch out for me..."

" On my final year in Shohoku, I had this conflict going with Miyagi Ryota, you know him, don't you, Sendo? The Point
Guard? He was great, wasn't he? So I decided to teach him a lesson, and me and the old gang went to have a little fun
with him and the rest of the basketball club inside the gym. Kogure was there, though, and so was Akagi, and they
managed to bring me to my senses and made me realize that my life was going rapidly nowhere at the moment, so when
Anzai-sensei came, I went down on my knees and begged, I begged, knowing that this might be my last chance of
straightening myself out, to be accepted in the team once more."

" He agreed. I buckled down, stopped all my bad habits and became the model player that I had once been. After a
while, Kogure and I started going out. You couldn't believe how happy I was back then. It finally looked as though I had
my life back on track. Shohoku was doing better than it ever had in the Inter High tournament, I had real friends who
cared about me, even after everything that I had done to hurt them in the past, I had a lovely boyfriend who meant more
to me than anything else in this world, and it looked as though I would be able to swing it to College after all. I hadn't
thought I'd be able to enter College, what with my incredibly bad academic record, but Kanagawa University offered me
an Athletics scholarship and of course, I wasn't stupid enough to say no to something like that!"

" So I spent a few years at Kanagawa University. I did pretty well, with Kogure's help. The University team was great,
how could it not be, with players like Fujima and Akagi and later on, Sakuragi and Rukawa? So I graduated with a degree
at Human Resources Management, I got myself a job in my dad's company, and it sure looked as though I was set for
life. I had forgotten about my old enemies from my gangster days, but they sure as hell hadn't forgotten about me."

" One of the gangs that I had gone up against back then hadn't forgotten what I'd done to them, and they wanted
revenge. One day, while I was on my way home, they cornered me, and I tried to get them to see that those days were
behind me, but they would listen. So we fought. One of the guys had a knife, and out of self protection, I wrestled it
away from him, and I stabbed him. Only out of self protection. But he died, because of me."

" Everything was covered up by my father, of course. He's always been rather influential around Kanagawa, but even he
couldn't do anything about the ruling of the judge. I had to go to a correctional institution for three years...Each day of
the trial hearing, Kogure was there, each day he just watched, not saying a word to me, and I had to go to prison without
ever knowing whether he still loved me or not. He sent me letters and things while I was still there, but they were always
impersonal. Never saying anything much about himself and what was going on with him in his life, never saying anything
about where the two of us stood..."

" So until now, three years later, when I finally got out of there, I still don't know. But in a few minutes I should find
out...Cos when I knew for sure that I was about to get out of there, I wrote him a letter. There's this really big oak tree
near his house right near the bend of road where this bus will pass, so I told him..."

Tie a yellow ribbon
Round the old, oak tree
It's been three long years
Do you still want me?
If I don't see a yellow ribbon
round the old oak tree
I'll stay on the bus, forget about us
Put the blame on me
If I don't see a yellow ribbon
Round the old, oak tree

~**~

" So what you're saying is, that if you see a ribbon tied to the tree, then that means that everything will be all right and
Kogure still wants you..." Sendo mumbled thoughtfully, enthralled by the story. " But if you don't-"

" Then that means that he want's nothing more to do with me. I couldn't blame him, if that was the case. Who would
want an ex-convict for a boyfriend, anyways?"

" Ne, Mitsui-san. You shouldn't think that way. Positive thoughts. That's what I always say!" But Sendo sounded a
little preoccupied. He was too busy craning his neck out of the open bus window, a very dangerous thing to do, trying to
catch a view of the tree that Mitsui had spoken of..." I don't see the bloody tree, goddam it..."

" Tree? Hell, Sendo, have you gone blind? The whole street is lined with trees!" The guy seated right behind the two of
them pointed out.

" Not just any tree, Ikegami-san." And before Mitsui could stop him, blabber mouth Sendo had told his former team mate
everything that Mitsui has just relayed to him. Pretty soon, the whole bus was buzzing with his story, and were all avidly
looking out of the window, searching for any signs of the tree where the indication would be.

Mitsui sighed. Oh well. He hadn't meant for this to get out or anything but, misery loved company, didn't it? He could
take consolation in the sympathy of the rest of the people in the bus if he didn't see what he was hoping to...

" Here we go, people!" Exclaimed the bus driver as they came up towards the bend. Mitsui's face reddened visibly.
God. Even the bus driver was in on it. He didn't like the idea of everyone knowing all about his sordid past but he took
solace in the support of the people around him. He held in his breath apprehensively as they came towards the bend.
Beside him, Sendo had his fingers crossed and Ikegami had a hand clasped about his shoulder.

At the last moment, he closed his eyes, not able to bear the thought of what he might not see when the bus rounded the
bend...

Bus driver, please look for me
'Cos I couldn't bear to see what I might see
I'm really still in prison
And my love he holds the key
A simple yellow ribbon's all I need to set me free
I wrote and told him please

" Oh, god." Gasped Sendo.

Mitsui squeezed his eyes shut tighter, knowing already, from Sendo's reaction, what he would see. Still, taking a deep
breath, he opened his eyes slowly, needing confirmation. Needing to know once and for all how Kogure felt about him
after everything. He blinked. Then he blinked again.

He couldn't believe what he was seeing. The branches of the oak tree were completely covered with masses, and
masses of yellow ribbons tied around them, billowing gently in the summer breeze like banners welcoming him home.

And on top of it all, standing under that tree was the person who had kept Mitsui's hope up through the three difficult
years. Kiminobu. He still wanted him...

Now the whole damn bus is cheering
And I can't believe I see
A hundred yellow ribbons
Round the old, old oak tree.

" What are you waiting for, you idiot?" Sendo demanded, as he remained in his seat, still quite stunned. The bus had
rolled to a stop right before the tree. The tall, spiky haired man gave him a none too gentle shove towards the front of
the bus. " Get up and go to him. Geez. The two of you have a lot of catching up to do after three years!"

He didn't need any more prompting. He got up shakily to his feet and shouldered his gym bag. The people around him
were cheering and letting out good natured wolf whistles. They called out their well wishes as he hurried down the aisle
of the bus, jumped down from it and right into Kogure's arms. Right where he belonged.

" You still want me..." Mitsui whispered hoarsely, as he blinked back tears of joy, which were immediately kissed away
by the slightly shorter young man. " After everything...You still want me..."

" Of course I do, you idiot..." Kogure Kiminobu told him. He let out a contented little sigh as he snuggled closer to the
man that he had waited for all of these years. " Was there ever any doubt of that?"

~**~ Owari ~**~