The day that Jounochi noticed them was a memory that would stick with him, he was sure of it. He was never one to let things go.
It always made him angry when he thought back on it; he should have been far more observant and intervened earlier. Sure, he was glad that he had done anything at all, but the fact that he didn't notice made him terribly angry.
He had to admit that he was pretty stupid and slow to pick things up; he liked to look at things without studying them. Yugi's bracelets for instance. They were gigantic. They were at least three inches wide, and they were blue (he thought) and weren't there buckles or something? Anyway, he hardly took the things off. Not even in the pool or the bath. Jounochi looked at them a lot and couldn't figure out why they kept his interest.
Jounochi always felt oddly about Yugi's school jacket. He wore it often. Outside of school even. And it was a little too big. Yugi liked to pull the sleeves over his hands and he would smile nervously when he did it. Jounochi always grinned when he saw the oversized Jacket almost touching the tips of Yugi's minuscule, never-stuck-up middle fingers like he was a grade school kid or something.
He didn't wear it in the spring though. Jounochi was sure of that because he remembered vividly that he went to hang out with Yugi after school one day. He didn't remember the date, but he remembed every normally overlooked detail of that day.
They were in Yugi's room, talking about capumon, and Yugi was sitting cross-legged on his bed. Jounochi couldn't help looking at all of the bracelets on Yugi's shelf.
"How do you even put that one on?" Jounochi was talking about a large studded bracelet that had to weigh at least three pounds.
"It's simple, Jounochi-kun," Yugi mused. He slipped off his usual blue- or- whatever- color bracelet and snapped the other bracelet on. Jounochi loved it. It was hardcore. Way hardcore for someone so puny.
But as Yugi began to put his usual bracelet back on, Jounochi spotted them. They were long, and pink.
Jounochi was not one to ask questions, but this one burned in the back of his skull until he finally couldn't take it. "Oi, Yugi. Those aren't what I think, are they?"
Yugi sat still. He shrugged quickly and stood up. "Jounochi-kun, are you thirsty?"
Jounochi shook his head and watched his friend cross the room. From some unknown place deep inside of him Jounochi felt panic, he grabbed onto Yugi's elbow. Before he could protest, Jounochi unbuckled the leather strap and threw it to the floor.
Jounochi's head was swimming. There they were, too many of them, and it hurt to look at. Tiny pink scars a lined up neatly along Yugi's wrist. Jounochi's grip loosened, and Yugi sat down again, his other small hand wrapped shamefully around his work.
The silence rested heavily in the room. The sound of the clock ticking was uncomfortably loud. Jounochi finally looked up again. He steadied his voice.
"How long have you been… doing that to yourself, Yugi?"
Yugi sighed and parted his fingers slightly, glancing at the pink lines. "Since… I don't know… a while,"
Jounochi spoke again, not moving his eyes from Yugi's wrists. "And, those, right there. They're new aren't they?"
Yugi hesitated, and then nodded. "Before you and Honda-kun became my friends."
That was barely a month ago. And in the month before that, Jounochi had…
"And how many of those… how many of those came from me?" Jounochi looked into Yugi's eyes, prying for an answer. Yugi glanced at the scars, as if making a mental count. Jounochi followed his eyes.
"Those are all… because of me?"
Yugi snapped his head up, alarmed. He shook his head vigorously.
"No, no Jounochi-kun! I- I didn't do that because…" Yugi looked away again, defeated. "I'm sorry, Jounochi- kun."
Jounochi leaned over and wrapped his arms around his much smaller friend. "Shut up. I'm the one who should be sorry." Yugi tried to interrupt, but Jounochi cut him off.
"I—all of that time, I was awful to you. And before that, I was awful to everyone else. I can't stand that I was ever that way. And, I'm such a fucking dumbass, I…" Jounochi buried his head in Yugi's hair. His voice was shaking. "I made you do that to yourself, and don't lie to me and tell me that I didn't. Those scars on your wrists are the ones that I put there. I don't ever want to do that to you or anyone else again."
"Shit." Jounochi, being the tough guy that he was, didn't like to show weakness, but he never felt as weak as he did at that moment. He never cried, not even in front of his little sister. He turned away from Yugi to wipe away the tears that danced on his eyelashes.
"Jounochi- kun," Yugi turned to his friend and put his small arms around his waist. "When I look at my wrists every night before I go to sleep, I am sad that I put them there. But each day that I spend with you, and Anzu, and Honda- kun is a new memory to cover up all of those bad things. I almost have no sad scars left. And when I look at them now, I have something else to remember."
Yugi took the other bracelet off of his wrist. "I made some bad memories with these. But you are helping me to make them better every single day, Jounochi- kun. And I won't ever do it again because I know now that I have friends that will help me, and never leave me. That's what I wanted; it was all I wished for every single time I put a blade on my skin."
"Well, you have it now," Jounochi promised with a sniffle. "I'm going to be here for you no matter what. And I'll never leave your side. Promise me that there won't be any more of it."
Jounochi remembered it. He remembered that they used their right pinkies to promise on. And he remembered that Yugi said he squeezed a little too tight.
And he remembered it now as he watched Yugi arranging his deck, no longer wearing the bracelets that he hid behind so often. Jounochi smiled.
He couldn't even see the pink anymore.