Ayame was walking home peacfully enjoying the brilliant weather that afternoon. As he opened the

doors to Ayame Sohma, waiting for Mine's cheery voice of his arival, the shop was silent. A silent that

seems untouched for years, he dared not disturb such a silence and found Mine in the back. Her hands

buried her face.

"My dear? What's wrong?" Ayame sat next to her.

"It's...Yuki..." Mine dared not to look at him

"How is my otou-otou? I hope he's being polite to Tohru-kun."

"I'm sorry Ayame sir but Yuki's..."

"Well what is it darling?"

"He's dead...he became ill and passed away this morning, I got the call from Hatori...oh Aya..." she

freed her hands from the tear stained face.

Ayame turned pale, paler then pure white sheets.

"Yu...ki..." he gave an expression of a little boy trying not to cry; he failed and rushed into the bathroom Mine wasn't able to decide to comfort him or leave him be, sitting with a blank expression she walked up and flipped the sign to "closed" on the shop window.

The bathroom was spinning like a merry-go-round in overdrive. It wouldn't stop the words, the images, the voices. It was hours before he came out of the bathroom. He knew Mine would've left by now, he looked up at the clock... 9:55pm. He tried to cover the tears that were long gone from his face, but they never seemed to leave in his eyes.

"I've...ran out...of time..." he sighed and started the lock up the shop for the day.

"Time, It was right in my hands, all the time I could possibly need to make him truly my brother...death

took my time away, now he will never know how much I truly love him...Such a cruel thief time is, giving itself to me and taking him away in return..." Ayame spoke to the empty silence now haunting the store. He began the braid his hair, he always has before he left, plotting up another plan to win his brother's heart. Ayame went to the back room and grabbed the scissors.

"Yuki, why? I've been blessed with you. But now...now I..." tears swelled, he couldn't even finish his sentence. Aya held the scissors up to his braid, the hair he had grown twenty-seven years of memories.

Snip, the braid hit the floor.

Ayame didn't look back at the braid; he simply grabbed his coat and faked a smile until he reached the path to Shigure's house. He didn't want to go to Hatori, knowing Akito would be there. Ayame stealthily entered the house without getting caught and tried to open the door into his brother's room, it was locked. He heard footsteps coming up the stairs and dashed to Kyo's room, slipping into the closet and watched as Kyo flopped onto his bed.

"Why'd he have to go now? If he just waited until we we're older...maybe then I could've beaten him." he lay in his bed mumbling as he drifted off. Ayame finally realized they had never finished their goal; he waited a while for Kyo to fall completely asleep before crawling in the bed next to him. The next morning Kyo woke up with a man spooning him.

"GAH! WHAT THE HELL? NOT AGAIN!" Kyo was about to wake him but realized Ayame's hair was short; his pillow formed a puddle of drying tears. Kyo slipped out of Aya's spooning and closed the door behind him before retiring downstairs.

--Authors Note--

Ah I'm most sorry if this chapter wasn't a lot, but I have lots more to upload and I work quite hard on them. So please tell me what you think or not the world wont stop spinning if this fanfic isn't commented (oh btw I helped Kyo Sohma the Cat of his ff! silly kitty-kun!)