Author's Notes: This is probably going to be one of the few couples that I write that's not one of my personal favorites. Rather, this was a present to a friend on her birthday that I was never able to start on – until now! In any case, I hope you enjoy this fanfic (and review of course, hehe). I don't own YuuGiOh, either.

Twin Tendencies

By LilyChan

Chapter One

Ryou sighed as he finally placed down his mechanical pencil. His hands were throbbing from two hours of copying down notes. It wasn't his fault that his twin brother, Bakura, couldn't read the blurry text. It was quiet, being it 10:00 in the evening, aside from the pit-pat of the rain against the roof, window, and other things that had the misfortune of being outside. He leaned back in his seat and exhaled. It really had been a long night. Heck, it had been a long day!

First, he was late for school because his loving brother thought it would be funny to toss out his alarm clock out the 30th story window in the middle of the night. Then dear old brother used all the hot water and took away his clothes!

When Ryou had gotten out and went to pick out a new outfit for the day, but the only outfits that were left were the dorkiest sweater and Bakura's Halloween outfit. Thankfully Ryou had more pride so he picked the dorky sweater.

However, the shirt was made out of real wool, thus it was itchy on his sensitive skin to the max. Bakura ate the last piece of toast; he had gotten soaked by some passerby; and he had caught his friend Joey and his boyfriend doing something they shouldn't have been doing at a school bathroom – much less in public. Though, he's probably never going to use the hand soap the same way again.

Thankfully his teacher loved him (maybe a little too much at that) so he didn't get a tardy. Ryou sat down next to his brother who was flirting with some guy that he had never seen before.

The lecture was, as usual, boring and Ryou doodled. When the teacher said to choose a partner, Ryou cringed. He knew that he was going to be stuck with Bakura and the work. However, as soon as he got to his desk, Bakura was talking up a storm with one of his current boyfriends.

Thank goodness!

Better him then me, Ryou thought. Of course, normally, Ryou wouldn't think those thoughts. But if you had a brother like Bakura – and your twin on top of that, then would be different. He turned to the teacher and walked to him unaware that someone was staring at him.

"Um, Mr. Takikawa, I don't have a partner." Ryou stated as he looked at the Japanese teacher. The stout man refused to look at him in the eye but Ryou didn't mind. In fact, he was actually pretty thankful for it.

Mr. Takikawa has a thing for pretty schoolboys and girls. And it just so happens Ryou (as well as Bakura – much to Ryou's dismay) himself is a pretty boy.

The teacher fumbled around as he, again, tried to avoid eye contact with Ryou or any of the beautiful students that were there to torture him. Ryou crossed his arms as he tried to scratch his armpits – or anywhere for that matter, without being too obvious. The teacher took a while before he got out his class list. He glanced up and down at the paper and the students. The white-haired boy leaned on one side and tapped his foot.

He was wasting precious time!

Soon the teacher had arrived with the class roister and he looked triumphant. Ryou was a bit nervous, but he had faith in his teacher who, unlike others, also understood what it's like to be partnered with people who would make them do the work.

Ryou was eager to find out his partner, but when he said the name, he wished someone – or something, would go and smite him to nothing but ashes.

"Malik Ishtar."

So he listened to the blond Egyptian rant and rave on how boring the museum business with his sister, Isis, was and about the latest trends and how much Bakura irritated him…

However, he tried to escape his wrath when the bell rang but it was to no avail. The blond stalked him throughout the school to nag him about the notes he had to copy.

"Yes, yes." He'd say to him. "I got it copied. I just got to get ten cents for the copy machine in case Bakura, well you know. You've dated him once before."

The blond crossed his arms to give him a short glare.

"Well you better make sure you get it done before the end of the week."

Ryou narrowed his brown eyes in irritation. "Of course. I'm not like him."

He shrugged and left Ryou alone.

The rest of the day was boring, but his friends (especially Joey and Tristan) teased him about his sweater. He couldn't really say anything because he would then be forced to tell them what was in the closet other then the sweater.

And he was in no mood to traumatize, much less scare, anyone for the rest of the year. Besides, they would probably remember the Halloween incident anyway just at the mere mention of it – in which Ryou did not encourage. It only brought back memories. He shuddered at the mere thought, despite him being warm in the sweater.

"Is it too cold for you, Mr. Ryou?" asked the teacher who looked mildly irritated. He shook his head; however it only caused the grouchy teacher to turn up the heat in the room. Everyone glared at him and jeered at him for the rest of the day.

When Ryou blinked his baby brown eyes, he realized that he had just finished the notes. He sighed as he tossed himself over the table, his wrists to the point of just hunching over and stops functioning. His eyes drooped as he felt more and more tired from the day. Although he was sure the next would be just as terrible or worse the way it was going week.

Ryou groaned. He didn't want to think about it. He should be positive! At least he wasn't stuck with Bakura and all the work. Instead, he had found some other hopeless sap to fawn over Bakura long enough to do the work and pull off a decent grade. Well, Ryou just tagged the last part so he could feel better about having Bakura fawn over someone else, like he usually does every time he would get a new boyfriend.

It wasn't jealousy Ryou had. It was envy. The mere thought of breaking one heart and making one happy, however, didn't seem like fun. Chances were he would stay with that person until they tire of him.

Perhaps that's what kept him single longer then his dearest twin brother. Instead of them tiring of Bakura, he would tire of them and he would throw them out on the streets! For that Ryou didn't have any sympathy for him. It could also be because he had never seen his brother ever be the dumped – instead of the person who would dump others. The boy sighed tiredly. It was late and he had another long day the next day even though he was thankful to have finally found his clothes. And they will be clean and in his dresser chest until he needed it. Bakura merely laughed at his brother's misfortune and Ryou had the familiar urge to at least tell him how he felt about his pranks, especially on how he treated other people and how he would take advantage of other people's love.

It's not that Bakura would beat him up whenever he dares to think such thoughts; that just wasn't Ryou's character. He didn't want to bring problems onto himself for the sake of others because he had learned a long time ago that wasn't a wise thing to do. It didn't help that whenever the two were alone Bakura would play mother hen on him. He could understand, but he would like to prove to him that one day he could walk on his own two feet.

As it were, it seemed that he was taking care of himself decently in the new school they had arrived at the beginning of the year. Though it did feel like Bakura was drifting away, but that was expected. They were going to be 17 in a few months, and the older twin had started to look into apartments for himself. The boy sighed again as his eyes dropped further.

Stupid Bakura, he thought as he forced himself up. He packed the notes in their proper places (his notes in his notebook while Bakura's notes would be in his notebook) and turned off the lamp. He placed the mechanical pencil down. The white-haired boy grabbed his sore shoulder to rub it slightly, but a yawn escaped.

"Oh dear," he said as he realized how late it was. He was never one to stay up past 9:30.

"Early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise," Ryou recited over and over. Though when he gave him that quote by Mr. Benjamin Franklin, Bakura made a snide remark.

"Or more like, early to rise and early to bed makes a male healthy and wealthy and dead!" he snickered. Naturally Ryou was offended on that remark, but he didn't say anything. He merely crossed his arms and gave his brother a glare, which only resulted in him rolling his eyes and sticking out his tongue.

Ryou slightly growled but he realized he couldn't be dwelling on his brother's immaturity at this particular point in time. He had to go to sleep.

oooooo

Ending Notes: Huzzah! I finished this first chapter finally. In any case, I know where exactly I'm going with this. And I've estimated on how many chapters this thing might have. Ten to fifteen chapters is the estimate. I hope I keep to my word. I also hope my muse is nice enough to let me continue to write this present. In any case, I hope you enjoyed the first chapter, Kiri. :3