The Key to My Heart

Title: The Key to My Heart: Chapter 30
Author: JadeHeart
Archived: Found on gurabiteshiyon.net. If anyone else would like it, please ask me first!
Fandom: Gravitation
Rating: R
Warnings: angst, bad language
Timeline: After the anime/manga finishes.
Characters: Yuki/Shuichi/Shindou family/Hiro/K/Suguru/Annette (OC)
Feedback: Feedback is always welcome! If I don’t get feedback, I don’t want to continue!
Summary: Just how far would Yuki go in search of Shuichi?
Author’s Notes: Sorry for the lengthy delay – I was working right up to Christmas Day, and I’m back into things on the 27th December so I haven’t had much spare time. Thank you for being patient to all my regular readers. One thing I would like to say – by all means have your opinions, I will always try to address all points raised in the context of the story, in relation to the characters and situations they are in. However, please do not use the reviews as an area to attack each other personally, it is not for that purpose. I trust that everyone had a lovely festive season – if you celebrate it.
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters, they belong to the creators of ‘Gravitation’, nor am I making any profits from this.


The Key to My Heart: Chapter 30


Yuki sat on the couch, the smoke from the cigarette between his lips curling towards the ceiling. He watched it spiral upwards, dissipating the higher it rose, before it faded completely from sight. He remained where he was, head leaning on the back of the couch, body relaxed, mind empty.

“Oh, there you are.” Shuichi’s voice behind made him start in surprise. He rolled his head back a little further to see an upside-down image of Shuichi standing in the doorway. The figure moved and came around the couch so Yuki was able to view the boy the right-side up now.

“I was beginning to think you weren’t going to show today.” Shuichi plopped himself down on the couch next to Yuki with a deep sigh. “I really couldn’t face meeting everyone else if you weren’t here as well.”

“Are you still feeing worried?” Yuki said, removing the cigarette from his mouth. “Thought I told you to stop being an idiot over it? It’ll be fine.”

Shuichi stuck his tongue out at him. “Easy for you to say.” he groused, bringing his knees up to his chest where he sat, arms circling them. It was such a familiar pose that Yuki could almost think they were back in their apartment in Japan.

“I know you and my family keep telling me how well I know these people, but I’m still not remembering anything about them.” Shuichi flicked a glance over towards Yuki. “I still don’t even remember everything about my own family - just little bits and pieces here and there - let alone remembering stuff about another bunch of people.”

Yuki took another drag on his cigarette, leaning his head back on the couch once more to contemplate the ceiling. Not that it was that fascinating, but it meant that he didn’t have to look into Shuichi’s eyes, and it was easier to fight the urge to kiss him when he wasn’t looking at him. “Give it some time.” Yuki yawned.

“You tired?” Shuichi asked.

“A little.”

“Sorry.”

“What are you apologizing for now?”

“Well, it’s because I keep asking you to meet me after work that you’re not getting enough sleep.”

“You can be such a dumb-ass sometimes.” Yuki said flatly, exhaling some more smoke. “I can sleep during the day, just the same as you, if I want to.”

“Oh, yes, I guess you can. I hadn’t really thought of that.”

“Not surprising. Thinking’s not one of your strong suites.”

“Hey!”

“What?”

“That’s a bit harsh, don’t you think?!”

“Are you saying otherwise? Thought your most recent attempt at a sorry-excuse of an apology would have amply demonstrated that point.”

“You know, you can be a right bastard sometimes!”

“So I’ve been told.”

“By me?”

“Many a time.”

“Well, then you’d think you would have got the message by now!”

Yuki shrugged and yawned again. “So I’m a slow learner.”

“Slow! Try completely stagnant! If you know what you’re like, why don’t you change?”

“It’s not my style.”

“Great. So just because you can’t be bothered everyone else has to suffer!”

“No. Not everyone. The people that matter accept me for the way that I am.”

“Just because I do, doesn’t mean that you can’t still make an effort!”

Yuki cast a swift look at the youth sitting next to him. Did Shuichi realize just what he had said? Was he referring to their past times together?

Shuichi was still sitting in his hunched up position and as Yuki watched, he tipped his head back and yawned widely, running a hand over his eyes and then through his hair. “I’m tired. All these late nights are catching up with me as well.”

“Probably all the excitement more than anything.” Yuki responded.

“Most likely.” Shuichi mumbled, resting his head back onto his knees.

There was silence in the room. Yuki went back to watching the smoke drift through the air. As the silence stretched, he searched for something to say to break it as Shuichi was staying uncharacteristically quiet.

“Hey…” he began, turning his head to the side, only to see Shuichi’s body tip slowly towards him to nestle against his shoulder. He froze in shock, looking down at the head resting there, the body snuggled up against his. He could hear Shuichi’s slow breaths. The brat had fallen asleep on him!

He looked down at the face, slightly upturned, running his eyes over the familiar features. He felt his own face soften in response. Shuichi looked so angelic when he was asleep. Yuki had often in the past come to bed late when he was writing, to see his young lover already curled up asleep in their bed. He would stand there, silently gazing down at the peaceful, relaxed face and the sight would always bring a smile to his lips.

His hand rose of its own volition, fingertips reaching out to touch that soft skin, to trace the fine cheekbones, those full sensual lips, brush over the long lashes that hid those large amethyst eyes that would open slowly to look up at him with trust and love.

The sound of the door opening behind jerked him back to reality, and his hand fell quickly. He turned his head to see Annette entering.

“Oh, is Shu….?” she began and stopped as she spotted the head resting on Yuki’s shoulder.

Yuki reached up and removed the cigarette from his lips, leaning forward and rising from the couch, carefully laying Shuichi down on the vacated area.

“He’s pretty tired obviously.” He stubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray and strode past Annette to the door. “I’m going to pick up the others. You might want to let him sleep before they get here.”

“Ah…sure.” He heard her say as he exited.

Annette stared after Yuki’s departing back then turned to gaze down at the slumbering form of Shuichi. He had been looking tired these last couple of days - Yuki was right about that. Shuichi had been staying out late each night, and he wasn’t sleeping in as he was spending as much time with his family as he could, so he was probably only getting a couple of hours of sleep each night. It wasn’t good for him.

She quietly walked over to the opposite couch and sat down, pulling a cushion into her lap and hugging it as she watched her sleeping boyfriend. She took a deep breath. She had to admit that she had felt a flash of jealousy when she had first walked in, seeing Shuichi sleeping so peacefully on Yuki’s shoulder, so trustingly. Yuki had seemed really relaxed as well, for probably the first time that she had known him. Most of the time it seemed the man was always on his guard, as though he was hiding something, yet Shuichi seemed to have complete faith in him. They must have been good friends before, for Shu to feel so comfortable with the man to just be able to fall asleep like that.

She settled down a little further in the couch. Yuki would be a while yet. It took some time to drive to the airport, wait for the other people to get through customs and get back here to the hotel. They would probably want to freshen up a little as well after the flight. So she’ll let Shuichi sleep till then.

“Oh, Annette, dear.” Annette looked up to see Shuichi’s mother leaning her head around the doorway. “Is Shuichi not here?”

Annette nodded and pointed silently towards the other couch. Frowning a little, Shuichi’s mother walked forward and gazed down at her son. A gentle smile spread across her face.

“He always did look wonderful when he was asleep.” she said softly, then looked over at Annette. “Of course, he was quite a handful when he was awake though! The number of times we would have to try and force him to go to sleep instead of playing with his music all night! Not to mention how loudly he would sing sometimes when he was taking a bath! His poor father had to buy earplugs so he could concentrate enough to read the paper!

He always was so passionate about his music and his dream though. No matter how frustrating it sometimes was, or how much I despaired at times, I was always very proud of him for having the dedication to make his dream come true, for truly believing in himself that way. It’s a very rare thing to find in people. He always did have such a stubborn streak, and he was never one to let himself be dragged down by anything- at least not for long!”

She looked back down at Shuichi, leaning over to gently brush an errant stand of hair back from his forehead. “I’m so glad that he’s back with us.” she whispered so softly that Annette almost couldn’t hear her. “I was so worried. I didn’t want to believe he was gone, none of us would believe it. Then Yuki went missing as well and we were completely frantic, until we got told that he was over here looking for Shuichi. That was such a relief! I was worried that we had lost both of them.”

She smiled warmly at the sleeping boy. “I’m so glad to have both my boys back.” She looked over to Annette, a heart-warming smile on her face even though her eyes were bright with tears, but the girl could tell they were more tears of happiness than sadness.

“What….do you mean by having your ‘boys’ back?” Annette queried a little hesitantly. “I thought Shuichi didn’t have a brother? Do you mean Yuki? Is he related to Shu?” That might explain the closeness that she sensed between the two of them – if they were related. But Yuki hadn’t said anything about that!

“Oh!” Shuichi’s mother looked a little flustered for a moment and Annette wondered why the question appeared to have upset her. It wasn’t what she had intended. “Well, in a way, but not really.” She absently smoothed the front of her skirt. “Yuki’s just very…close to the family, and has been for some time now. I’ve just become used to thinking of him like another….son.” She let out a light peal of laughter. “Don’t tell him that though, he would probably be embarrassed to hear it! It’s just a silly woman’s little foible after all! Don’t worry about it, dear!”

She turned to the door. “Well, I’ll leave him to sleep and I’ll go freshen up a little before Mr. Sakano and the others arrive. It will be lovely to see them, and I’m sure Shuichi will start to remember even more once he meets them. They are all very unique personalities.”

Annette watched as she gave a small parting wave with a bright smile before turning down the hall.

Now, that was….odd, Annette thought, looking at the now empty doorway.

**********************

“So you actually pulled it off?” Hiro said.

Yuki took the proffered hand and shook it, staring at the man before him. Hiro looked older, he thought. Obviously the stress of having Shuichi missing, and trying to be supportive to the Shindou family, had taken its toll on his friend.

Yuki looked over Hiro’s shoulder. “Where are the rest of the idiots?”

Hiro glanced back also. “They’re still coming. Oh, there’s Suguru. Hey!” he called out the last more loudly, raising a hand to wave. Fujisaki noticed and acknowledged with a far more discreet hand motion and began to make his way towards them, carrying his bag over his shoulder.

As he reached them, Hiro spoke again. “So, did you see what’s holding up the others?”

Suguru sighed and dropped his bag to the ground, stretching his back. “Last I saw was K being dragged off, cursing and swearing, to a private room by two burly airport security men, with Sakano scampering along behind, apologizing profusely. If I were to hazard a guess, I would say they might be a while.”

“What’s he done now, do you think?” Hiro ran an exasperated hand through his long locks, fingers snagging on knots from the long flight.

Suguru shrugged, not appearing particularly concerned. “Probably tried to bring some form of illegal weapon into this country, I imagine.”

“So what’s new?”

“Exactly.”

“Well, I suppose we had better wait for them.” Hiro said, looking back at the doors. He turned back to Yuki. “What do you think?”

“Fuck them.” Yuki answered bluntly. Hiro’s eyebrows rose. “I’m not waiting around here for those two fucking imbeciles.” Yuki turned on his heels, making his way to the exit doors. “If you’re coming, then come now, because I’m leaving.”

Hiro looked at Suguru. “What do you say?”

“Well,” Suguru answered, reaching down to pick up his bag. “I’d say that we may as well leave. We really don’t know how long they’ll keep K and Sakano, so we may as well go with Yuki. You keep him from leaving until I catch up with you.” He turned and began to walk briskly away.

“Hey, where are you going?”

Suguru looked back over his shoulder. “I’ll leave a message here to tell K that we’ve already gone on.”

“Oh, okay. Don’t take too much time. I don’t think I’ll be able delay Yuki for too long.”

“I won’t.”

Hiro hurried off in the direction that Yuki had disappeared, racing out into the car park, searching the tall blond form, and upon spotting it, quickly managed to catch up. Fujisaki wasn’t far behind, for which Hiro was extremely thankful as the expression on Yuki’s face didn’t bode well for anyone who happened to cross him in any way, shape or form that day.

Yuki was obviously having a baaaaad day!

They didn’t talk in the car on the way to the hotel which wasn’t really surprising, and didn’t feel particularly odd either. Both he and Fujisaki were tired from their flight, for even though they could afford to fly first class neither of them could sleep with the anticipation of finally seeing Shuichi again. Suguru had actually finally admitted to Hiro that he was feeling very nervous about seeing his lead singer once more; nervous and afraid that Shuichi would no longer be the person that they remembered. Hiro hadn’t had the courage to admit that he had much the same feelings. He felt it was his place to try and keep up the spirits of everyone else as he was concerned that Shuichi would pick up on their worries and respond negatively to them. He certainly didn’t want to risk that occurring!

So between their worries, he and Fujisaki had spent the entire flight playing video games against each other, which was at least a pleasant enough way to wile away the hours, but not conducive to getting a good rest so they arrived feeling fresh at the end of the trip!

So their tiredness was certainly a contributing factor to the silence that sat heavily in the car, but it wasn’t the only reason. Yuki had never spent lengthy periods talking with either Hiro or Suguru previously. Their conversations and meetings tended to be brief and to the point, and there had always been Shuichi there to act as a buffer zone. Generally, with Shuichi there, he would always keep the conversation flowing with ease, drawing everyone in almost against their wishes, but none of them could ever find the heart to fight against him.

Hiro cast a side-long glance at Yuki driving. Even now, after this many years, Hiro was still amazed at how so many different personalities could gravitate around his friend. Most people only attract like people; people with the same tastes, same views, same personalities, sometimes so they all seemed like little carbon copies of each other.

But not Shuichi. No, if there were people that could be more different than he in personality, they seemed to be the ones he gathered. From K and Sakano, or Tohma Seguchi and Fujisaki. Or even Hiro himself. They were all so different from Shuichi and from each other in, oh, so many ways, but they were all sucked into Shuichi’s wormhole to another world - the Shuichi Universe!

However, the oddest personality to be affected by Shuichi would have to be Yuki. Eiri Yuki; famous romance novelist, who was renowned as a real ladies man, and there had never been even a hint of him being interested in guys, yet almost immediately he fell against the unstoppable and invincible assault of Shuichi Shindou. Fell, crumbled like a cookie, rolled over and played dead; you name the metaphor and that’s the way it was. Oh, not right away perhaps – but even when Yuki was trying to fight Shuichi, he hadn’t figured it out yet. Shuichi had already won.

As they entered the hotel, Yuki strode quickly over to the reception and returned in a matter of moments. “Here,” he said, holding out two keys. “I didn’t think you would want to share.”

“Thanks.” Hiro said reaching out to take the keys, passing one to Fujisaki.

“I’ll have them call you when the other morons finally arrive. Unless their sorry asses have been thrown in jail for good this time.”

“Don’t say that, even if you are joking.” Suguru said, unsmiling. “If that happens we’re the ones that will have to try and sort out the mess. I, for one, do not want to waste my time doing so.”

“I’m sure it will be fine.” Hiro said calmly. “K can usually talk his way out of these things, one way or another.”

“As long as he doesn’t manage to kill anyone in the process!” Suguru muttered, turning and making his way to the elevator. “I’ll catch you later.”

“Come with me.” Yuki suddenly said to Hiro.

“Huh?”

“Come on.” Hiro followed Yuki, bemused. He waited as Yuki pulled out a key and opened up the door they finally stopped at. “Shut the door behind you.” Hiro did as he was asked.

He guessed this was Yuki’s room. “What’s up, man?”

“Wait.” as Yuki turned towards the wardrobe.

Hiro didn’t bother arguing. He knew perfectly well that he wasn’t going to get any further conversation out of Yuki unless the man wanted to say something to him. How Shuichi put up with it, he didn’t know. Then again, Shuichi usually talked so much that it probably didn’t matter if Yuki was a little less gregarious!

He watched Yuki pull a bag out of the bottom of the wardrobe and drop it on the end of the bed. He unzipped it and reached in, pulling out clothing. “I want you to take this and give it to him. Tell him you brought it over.”

“What….?” Hiro looked at the clothing now lying on the bed and immediately recognized some of the items. They were Shuichi’s! He looked quickly up at Yuki. Had the man been carrying this around with him the whole time? He must have been. He must have packed it when he first left Japan.

Yuki stared back at him with cold eyes; Hiro could read nothing in his expression. Not surprising - he thought that Shuichi was probably the only person that really understood Yuki and could tell what the man was thinking. Hiro knew that he certainly couldn’t most of the time, and this was no exception.

He didn’t know what to say. The man must have had such faith, right from the start, that he would eventually find Shuichi, which is why he packed the clothing. What must it have been like though, to have that constant reminder all this time? And now, with the way things were, what must the man have been thinking, feeling?

He glanced down at the clothing again. “What do you want me to do with it?”

“Give it to him.”

“Why don’t you?”

“It’d be better coming from you. Say you brought it over for him from his place.”

“His place? Oh, you mean that flat that Tohma said he’d organized.”

Yuki nodded, shrugging out of his jacket and tossing it over the back of a chair. “That’s right. Shuichi would just get confused why I would be carrying his things, but it wouldn’t be so strange coming from his best friend.” Yuki drew out a cigarette and lit it.

“It would look even less strange coming from his lover.” Hiro said quietly.

Yuki’s face lit demonically with the flare from the glowing end of the cigarette in the dimness of the curtain-enshrouded room. “He doesn’t know about that. He was never my lover. Understand?” Yuki’s voice dropped, sending a chill up Hiro’s spine as a sense of danger filled the air. “That is the story. So remember it.”

Hiro licked his lips nervously. He had seen Yuki look like this once before, a long time ago. That time he had exacted his revenge for the harm inflicted on Shuichi. It hadn’t been a pretty sight. Oh, yes, Yuki could be dangerous, and for all that he did seem to have changed somewhat over the time from being with Shuichi, he had not completely lost that wildness. He was tamed, but not fully domesticated.

“Okay.” Hiro said, holding out his hands, signaling his agreement. “For now, you win. I’ll give him the clothes.” He fixed Yuki with his own steely gaze. “But we’ll be talking about this later.”

“Fine.” Yuki drawled, taking another draw on his cigarette.

Hiro gathered the clothing and toiletries into his arms then turned to the door. “I might grab a quick nap while we’re waiting, so don’t forget to give us a call when the others turn up.”

************

Hiro came awake with a jolt for two reasons. One was the jarring ringing from the hotel phone on the bedside table right next to where his head rested on the pillow. The other reason was from the sound of a .45 magnum shooting a bullet directly through the wall above the said head. His wide eyes were glazed with fear as they glared up at the demon looming over him, flowing blond locks cascading over the shoulders as the gun took aim once more.

“I’m awake! I’m awake!” Hiro shouted in panic, desperately trying to forestall another volley.

“Ah, Nakano. Good to see you.”

Hiro sat up cautiously, checking for signs of bodily damage. Two arms, two legs, one head, no holes in any other portion of his anatomy either. He let out a deep sigh of relief, then glared at K as he perched comfortably on the arm of one of the chairs in Hiro’s room.

“Shit, man! When will you stop doing that kind of crap?!” K just smirked at him, absently twirling his gun in one hand. Hiro eyed it nervously. “And just how the hell did you get that thing through customs anyway? Last I heard you were being dragged off for interrogation.”

K stood, making his way over to the mini bar. He holstered his weapon before opening it and pulling out two cans of beer. He tossed one to Hiro who caught it easily. “Oh, I just had a little chat with them and they let me go.”

“With that?” Hiro nodded towards the gun.

“I explained I couldn’t just leave it behind. I’d miss it so much.” K reached up and lovingly stroked the grip. That action made Hiro go cold all over. It really gave him the creeps to see K getting all lovey-dovey with a gun! K looked at him and smirked, as though he could read Hiro’s thoughts. Damn bastard was doing it deliberately!

Hiro rolled his eyes as he opened his beer, taking a long swallow. “Then they must be just as mad over here as they are elsewhere to let a maniac like you around armed.”

K also took a drink from his beer, sitting back down in the chair. “I had expected you to be waiting for us. That would have been the polite thing to do.”

“Yuki wasn’t in any mood to wait. We were lucky he bothered picking us up at all.”

“Ah, so he was being a little difficult, was he?”

Hiro shrugged, drinking again. “No more than usual, I don’t think.”

Then he jumped as the phone began ringing again. That’s right, it had rung before but, in his attempt to get a grip on the waking nightmare that was K, he hadn’t been able to answer it. Now he reached over and picked up the receiver. “Hello? Oh, yes, thank you. If you can pass the message on that I’ll be down shortly. Thank you.” Hiro hung up.

“Who was that?” K asked.

“Reception. Apparently Yuki had said to call me when you and Sakano had arrived. So I gather you’ve just got here?”

“That’s right. It did take a little longer than I had thought to finalise things at the airport.”

“Where’s Sakano?”

“Probably going through the phone directory to try and find the closest psychiatrist. He was looking a little pale by the time we left. I don’t think he’s getting enough fibre in his diet.” An evil glint sparkled in K’s eyes. “Or perhaps he needs a little more iron.” he said in a low rasping voice as his hand reached towards his holstered weapon.

“That is more like lead!” Hiro said quickly, stopping the motion. “And you can die from lead poisoning!” Not to mention that copious holes in your body tends to be hazardous to your health also! Geez, how the hell did they end up with this lunatic as a manager again?!

K pouted at him. “You’re just no fun.” he moaned, standing and walking to look out the window. Hiro let out a breath. One more catastrophe averted.

“So has Yuki changed his mind?” K suddenly spoke up.

Hiro looked over at K’s back. “You mean about telling Shuichi about the two of them?”

“Yes.”

“No. He still seems adamant that he doesn’t want any of us telling Shuichi the truth about them.”

“Why do you think that is?”

“How should I know?” Hiro took another long drink and found he had reached the end of the can. Searching the room, he spotted an open-topped basket for rubbish in the far corner. Taking aim, he launched the empty beer can into the air and watched with satisfaction as it made a direct hit.

“You know them the best.” K said, turning to look at Hiro.

“I don’t know Yuki at all. Not really.” Hiro stated, drawing his knees up on the bed and clasping them with his hands.

K half shrugged. “May be, maybe not. You do, however, know Shuichi very well.”

“Well, yeah, we go way back.”

“So why wouldn’t Yuki want to tell Shuichi about their relationship?”

“You’re asking a question I can’t answer.” Hiro said. “Yes, I know Shuichi, but I don’t know Yuki’s mind.”

“Well, don’t you think Shuichi would want to know?”

“Yes, I do. But it’s also not my place to say it either. Yuki’s the one that’s been here with Shu, and it is their relationship. As much as I believe that Shu should know, I can’t be the one to tell him. And another thing,” He looked at K steadily. “Shuichi still doesn’t remember most things. Until I can meet him and see exactly what he is like now, I really don’t want to say anything too soon.”

“So you’re just going to go along with this lie?” K asked, walking across and dropping his empty can into the basket.

“For the moment. Until I determine if it would be best for Shuichi to know the truth now, or not.” Hiro swung his long legs off the bed and stood, turning to face K. He looked the American directly in the face. “No matter what - I won’t let anyone do anything to hurt Shuichi any more. If that means keeping the truth from him at the moment, or telling him now, what ever is the best for him, and anyone who tries to act for anything other than Shuichi’s best interests, will have to answer to me. Is that understood?”

K looked back at Hiro, his eyes unflinching. Then the corner of his mouth rose in a half smile. “Very well, Nakano. It’s your call.” He turned towards the door. “You’d better get yourself dressed. They are no doubt waiting for us downstairs. I’ll go check on Sakano in case he’s tried to throw himself off the balcony, or managed to slit his throat whilst shaving. See you shortly.” and the door shut behind him.

Hiro sat down heavily on the edge of the bed. He wasn’t feeling at all good about any of this. He wanted to see Shuichi so desperately. He had missed his friend terribly during this time. Maiko had called him every night to tell him how Shu was, what things he was remembering, all the things that he wasn’t. There was still so much more that he couldn’t remember, than what he could. Maiko would generally end up swinging from happiness at what her brother did recall, to tears when he couldn’t. Hiro was feeling this roller-coaster of emotions just as much.

When Tohma had informed them of the lie that Yuki had wanted to foster, he had been completely incensed. How dare that bastard think he has the right to hide such a thing from Shuichi! And to set up that fake apartment, not even give Shuichi his old home back?! That was really low! If Yuki had been back in Japan at that time, Hiro would have been around there in a flash to pummel some sense into the man’s thick skull! Since he wasn’t, Yuki had saved himself a beating.

Hiro had originally made up his mind that he didn’t give a damn what Yuki wanted, he would tell Shuichi the truth. He wasn’t going to start out lying to his best friend now, of all times!

However, after listening to Maiko each night, getting a better understanding of what the situation really was – now he wasn’t so sure that he should. He still hated the idea of lying to Shuichi, but was it necessarily the best thing to drop something like this on him right out of the blue?

Maiko had said that he had a girlfriend, that she seemed nice and the two of them seemed happy together. That had surprised Hiro a little. Bet that had been like a kick in the guts for Yuki though, he thought sympathetically. Couldn’t have been easy for the man to be here and seeing Shuichi getting all cozy with someone else, and a girl no less. No, that must have sucked big time!

So just what would it accomplish in telling Shuichi at this time that Yuki was his lover? Would it solve anything? He actually doubted it. It would probably just confuse the issue, not to mention hurt both Shuichi and his girlfriend. Just because Yuki had been Shuichi’s lover before, doesn’t mean that Shuichi was still in love with him. He is with this girl now, and he knew that his friend was never one to just get into a relationship lightly, so he must really care about this girl. So maybe he wasn’t in love with Yuki any more. So, by telling him of that past relationship, might only embarrass both Shuichi and Yuki.

Hiro scrubbed both hands over his face. His head hurt trying to think this through. What was the right thing to do? Leave Shuichi in peace to continue on with this new relationship? Tell him about his old relationship? What about the band? Would Shuichi even want to come back to ‘Bad Luck’? It was never about the fame and fortune for Shuichi, it was all about the music. Had that changed?

Until he finally had the chance to see Shuichi again, face to face, he couldn’t find the answer to any of these questions yet. So he would meet him, talk with him, determine how much of his old friend was still there, and how much was lost - and make a decision at that time.

And what ever decision he came to, he would do it only if he truly believed it was for the best for Shuichi himself – no matter what anyone else wanted.