Word Count: 6073
Release Date: March 22nd, 2016. Updated it: 3/27/16 (Happy Birthday pop pop, I love you)
I own nothing
Pairing: YusukexKieko
"Yusuke what have you done!?," Botan dressed in her pink grim reaper kimono floated on her oar above it. One covered hand rose to her lips, her mouth forming a perfect 'o' in shock of the carnage in front of her. Of it. Of it. Of it.
Yusuke lazily stared at her, he'd waited for her to come after all. He knew she would, the grim reaper had once told him that over the city in which he lived, she was the grim reaper in charge of gathering the souls of the dead. Tears pooled at her eyes he noticed, not that she was sad or hurt, but tears of disbelief and shock.
Tears that she could not believe what he had done.
Yusuke almost grinned at her, his terrible tribal tattoos that came from Raizen were on display, his long hair full on display. It was rather shocking, to see them he noticed, he had not needed the power from Raizen at the moment.
The neck of a human snapped rather easily after all.
I run a ramen stand. It's not the most fantastic of jobs, but it gets me by. Least people don't suspect what I really am, how I really make my money. And I enjoy it, I enjoy watching the city go by around me, like the different kind of weirdos that come in. My customers aren't just humans after all, but demons too, as they try to make a life like me. Maybe that's why I don't hate 'em. Sometimes I'm called to bring an end to fights with humans and demons by pacifier breathe, sometimes I still can't believe he's now King of Spirit World. I'm happy that somethin' I did, turned out all right.
But I'm sad too.
It cost me a lot to make the world the way it is. I spent too much time off fightin', off chasin' things I shouldn't, off well just being off. I made a lot of mistakes. But in the end I can't really blame the job, though some days I do.
I lied to her.
So many times I lied to her. I was a big fat liar, so maybe when I tried to tell her it never happened again, there was no way for her to believe me. I mean I'd lied for so long, months honestly, about things, that it didn't happen, that I don't blame her for not trustin' me.
Trust is a fragile thing, least that's what Kurama says. I really should listen to him. Maybe if I had then things wouldn't ended up so damn fucked up between us.
Keiko Yukimara wasn't the woman of my dreams, well she was, but not like how most people think of normal. We were different, too different.
Keiko for starters actually liked school. The girl was the biggest fuckin' bookworm ever. And she nagged a lot, especially when I didn't go with her. And god bossy, demanding, and a big ol' pain in the ass when it came to making me go back. After I'd come home, we'd argued so damn much bout it, I was glad when she didn't push for college too. Hell, she liked school so much, she wanted to be a teacher and teach them little brats.
And I was damn proud of her for that.
Not that I'd admit it.
Keiko wanted kids. I did not. I'd only ever entertained the thought of having little brats with her. To make her happy. I was not authoritative, I was not fit to raise kids. I didn't know the first thing about shit like that. Hell when I'd held Koji the first time, I thought I'd drop the brat. He was so little, and I needed help, Kurama moving my arms to make sure he was held right. But Keiko, she'd taken him from me no problem, made it look easy as hell.
Even then the anger in her eyes had been there at me.
Keiko was sweet, bossy but sweet. Always going out of her to care bout a loser like me, hell she was the only reason I got through school in the first place. Always grabb' my ear and pullin' me everywhere. Jesus Christ, when she wanted her way she got it. Except I got real good at bailin' on her. God I knew how to sneak away like a ninja.
That was another reason why we weren't together, maybe.
I'm twenty eight. I run a ramen stand. And I'm single.
I wanted to be twenty eight. I didn't really care bout running the ramen stand. And I didn't want to be single.
But let's be honest I brought this on myself.
Years ago I cheated on Keiko. It had been the thing that tipped our relationship in the wrong direction, not that it was great, but ya know...
After all my years of sneakin' around and bailin' on her and shit, it wasn't surprising that one night of me being another woman fucked us. It didn't help that I hadn't come right out and told her. Kurama had told me I should be honest and admit I fucked up, that I was stupid, but I'd never wanted her to know. It was a one time thing. I'd gotten too drunk to think clearly, in my drunken state I'd though it was Keiko.
Fuck I was wrong.
But then again, Hiei had fucked up that same night too, so maybe I wasn't the only idiot.
Except Hiei was doin' okay, with Koji and Anisu. Someone how he'd gotten the greatest gift he'd ever gotten. Not that they were happy by all means, but they would get there, least what I thought. Whether Hiei wanted to realize it or not she loved him.
But back to Keiko.
When she did find out about what happened, well she blew up. Cried and screamed, gone all hormonal on me. I never quite forgave Mukuro for tellin' her.
We didn't talk for a long time, Keiko and me. Three years before she would even speak civilly to me. Before she let me back in her life, sure I'd seen her at birthday parties and functions where the whole group was involved, but she kept her distance, always sandwiching Yukina or Botan between us like human shields.
I was fuckin' miserable then, even more miserable than I am now.
Thank god, Hiei let me watch his brat so often. Hell I basically moved in at Genkai's, alternating between there and Kuwabara's. The apartment Keiko and me was going to move into before our split forgotten. I was real stupid back then, didn't give two fucks bout my life.
But then something fuckin' awesome happened.
Keiko came to Koji's third birthday party with a fuckin' engagement ring on her finger. I was twenty four.
I was so furious. Ended up really drunk that night too. Kuwabara had to carry me to bed.
I was even more furious when I found out she was pregnant.
The dude was everything Keiko could ever want.
He had money, he came from some good family. Kurama said they were powerful. He could spoil Keiko with money, she would never have to worry about anything.
I could do the same thing, but ya know whose comparing?
He was pretty handsome, least that's what Botan had exclaimed. He dressed nice in suits and shit, what was wrong with jeans?
I was furious and hurt and jealous.
He had graduated college at the top of his class, so he had brains on top of it, hardly seemed fair. I fuckin' hated him. Hated him so much that my blood literally boiled when ever I heard one of the girls talk about him. It was ridiculous, I had never been one of those people who hated someone for no reason, but god I fuckin' hated him.
Wished he'd get hit by a car a few times.
Once thought about using Kurama's car to do it too.
The women were whispering in the other room. They couldn't be quiet either. Man I wished they would. Somehow I had gotten drug into this whole fiasco. Yukina sent me a sympathetic glance though, I sent her a smile to know it was really okay. Shizuru and Botan were helping Kieko put on make up. I wasn't even sure why I was here.
Keiko and I had made some kind of peace. We weren't back together, fuck the giant rock on her left finger was proof of that, but she had been okay when I'd been the one assigned guard to watch over them as they made the trip to do some shopping.
For her fuckin' wedding dress and go over makeup and hair shit one more time.
This was fucking hell.
"Yusuke are you alright with all of this?," Yukina sat down gracefully beside me. Her eyes were so big, full of sadness and worry for me.
"I gotta be, don't I?," I grumpled, my demon hearing caught Keiko laughing at something Shizuru said.
"Kuwabara could have accompanied us," she said softly, her cool hand moving to hold my own. I allowed her too, resting my head against the wall behind me. I kept my senses wide open in case of an attack, these were dangerous times. Too many people going missing, too many people dying.
"Koji needed a babysitter, since Hiei's... occupied," I murmured, lucky Hiei, I'd rather have been in his place any day of the week than be here watching the girl I loved planning her wedding to another guy, "Kuwabara is better with him," I smiled a little at thoughts of the little boy. I wished I'd taken over babysitting duty.
But I couldn't miss this chance to see her.
When Genkai had suggested one of us go with the girls for protection, I'd jumped at the chance, claiming I was the strongest, had the best chance of protecting all of them. Hiei was the obvious choice to head to Demon World anyway, he knew it better than Kuawabara or me and Kurama was doing stuff with pacifier breathe. So I got shipped off with the girls to shop.
"Keiko still..." Yukina began, her face twisting in pain. She was Keiko's friend, always had been, but at the moment she looked more my friend. She seemed torn, between spillin' secrets and keeping her pretty mouth shut.
"It don't matter," I cut her off, I knew how Keiko felt. Regardless I always knew how Keiko felt. She was easy for me to read, I'd know her my whole life. God she was my whole life. I knew a part of her still loved me, but she'd moved on. She knew I wasn't worth it, wasn't wroth the effort. And any way she didn't trust me.
"It does matter Yusuke," she squeezed my hand a little, her voice causing me to focus on her. Yukina looked determined, "she's making a mistake," once again she looked torn, unable to make a decision to tell me something or not.
"A mistake?," I snorted loudly, "how? By marrying some stupid rich guy? Who loves her?,"
"Yusuke-," she tried to stop me but I was on the war path.
"Who gives her nice thing? Look at that fuckinn' rock! It's the size of my balls!," her face twisted a little, a small smile forming for a second, "okay maybe not the size of my balls, cause they're not that small, but ya know," I blushed a little, rubbing my finger under my nose while I tried to calm down. I hadn't alerted the other girls to my anger, thankfully.
"Trust me, Yusuke, she's making a mistake," she sounded really serious when she said it, her eyes darting to the door hiding the other girls, and than back at me.
"With an amazing guy at her side, why would she want me?," I stared down at the floor, sadness hitting me hard. I'd thought about this a lot, since Koji's party, when I found out she was getting married. I hadn't noticed at first, I was just so damn happy to see her, following her around the party. It'd been weird when she came up to me, I'd been tossing the ball I got Koji back and forth with him. Her face had looked a little pained. The words had slipped out of her mouth rather harshly.
"I'm getting married Yusuke," her left hand rose in front of her, between us like a wall. A wall I'd never cross now.
"Well that's stupid," Koji's ball hit me in the back of the head.
"Yusuke..." Yukina was saying, I'd slipped off in the memory of Keiko. An icy hand brushed against my cheek, fuck I hadn't realized I'd begun crying, "he isn't amazing," she said simply, her face falling into a hard look, as if she had finally decided something.
"Of course he is, if Keiko's going to marry him," I found myself saying, trying to pull myself together. I don't want to look like a pussy in front of the girls, I'd never hear the end of it. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. This was all so stupid.
"He beats her,"
"Well of course he beats her, that's what a good..."
WHAT?!
"What the fuck are you saying?," my demon energy boiled to the surface.
"Calm down," she looked alarmed, her hands going to both sides of my face. It kept me grounded for a few moments.
"What. Do. You. Mean. That. He. Beats. Her?," I growled every word.
"Do you remember when we found Keiko was being targeted, so we went to get her, while you went to get your mom and Shizuru?," I nodded for her, not trusting myself to speak, "he flipped out on her, he hit her hard, Hiei pulled him off of her. He broke her arm Yusuke, we only lied about it, because she asked us too," she paused a moment.
"So when Hiei apologized for allowing a demon to hurt her and I gave him shit, I really should have been going to that dirt bag and fucking killin' him?," I asked angrily, my fists clenched tight at my sides.
"We didn't want you going to Spirit World jail for violating the treaty," she said at last, her eyes begging me to calm down.
"No wonder Hiei left him there," I hoped those assholes looking for Keiko found and killed him instead.
"That wasn't the first time either," Yukina said softly after a moment, "he's very controlling, he beat her rather hadly when he found out she attended Koji's birthday and you were also in attendance," anger much like Hiei's flashed in her red eyes.
"Why doesn't she fuckin' leave?," breathe in and out, I told myelf. Best not to alarm everyone in the shop the the future and soon to be dead groom beat his beautiful bride. I tried to keep calm, my body shaking, once I looked down at my arms, I saw that my demon tats had popped up on my skin. I really hoped it wouldn' alarm the shop lady.
"She's pregnant Yusuke."
I had been so angry so long after that. I'd marched through the doors, yelled and screamed, cussed, and even threw a chair at the wall. I had been so angry.
Keiko of course was embarrassed. Horribly so. She actually slapped me across the face, I'll admit I liked it, told me it wasn't any of my business what happened between 'her fiance and her'. I was livid, so livid that I picked her up, gently so, not to harm her and carried her out the building Surprisingly none of the other women spoke up, not even a shop keeper, I told her to put it on the tab for the wedding.
Served the bastard right.
When we'd returned to the temple, shit had went down. Like end of the world shit, but of course we'd kept it from happening. Part of me was glad I was angry, fueled my soul to fight even harder.
Keiko came to me once during this time.
I was exhausted, I'd gotten a pretty shitastic burn on my right side and down my leg; it hurt like a bitch. Thanks Hiei. I wasn't allowed to get up. I think now that's why she came to me then, I didn't have the strength to fight her.
"How are you feeling Yusuke?," she asked, plopping down in the chair by my bed. Her long hair was pulled into two pig tails. I smiled a little, I'd always loved tugging on them.
"Nice pigtails, Keiko," I grinned up at her, whatever Kurama had given me for pain rocked. "Real junior high of you,"
"Oh Yusuke," she smiled softly, before lifting the bed sheet to see the bandages across my right side. Tears rolled down, I wanted desperately to wipe them away, but the shit Kurama gave me kept me pretty sedated.
"Shhhh," my words were becoming harder to say, "I don' like when ya cry," I frowned a little.
We sat like this for a while, me pretty high off the shit Kurama had given me, just watching her, and her sitting by my side big fat tears rolling down her face. I hadn't see her cry like this since I'd died the first time. It spoke volumes of the moment.
"How did we end up this way?," she asked finally, her eyes focusing on my sides.
"Well I fucked up badly," I began.
"No, before that Yusuke! We've never been the same since you got hit by that car!," she grew quiet a moment, "I always chased after you, but now I feel like I can't reach you, our worlds are too different now,"
"Do you wish I'd stayed dead?," I asked after a moment. She was right. We had never been the same, we couldn't be. My world was made up of demons and her's were school and tests. Keiko had never had a normal life after I'd died the first time.
"No, not at all," she cried a little more, shaking her head side to side, "I just wish I was enough for you,"
"You've always been enough Keiko," I tried to sit up, but nothing happened.
"Somehow I don't believe that," she smiled sadly at me, her hand patting mine. She stood to leave and despite Kurama's sedative, my blood pressure must have gone through the roof.
"Don't leave, I love you Keiko," I lifted a little, there I could see her better, she stared down at me in awe, "Marry me?," I slurred.
"Oh Yusuke," she smiled, this one even sadder than the first, before she bent down and kissed me.
Those few moments were heaven.
She broke up with that worthless piece of shit.
I still wanted to kill him, but for her sake, for the sake of her daughter, I chose not too.
I was there the night she was born, sitting in the hallway beside that horrible disgrace of a man. Someone I made it into the room before he did, I got to hold the little girl before her father ever did. The bastard had been pretty pissed about that. We got him kicked from the room when he grabbed Keiko too hard and demand why it wasn't a boy. I dragged him out myself; it was enough for me in those moments.
Keiko called her Mana.
I thought it fit her rather well. And while she wasn't mine, I cooed over her. She was the kid I knew I never would have. Even now I knew any brats of mine with a human had too much of a chance of living a short human lifespan and the only person I ever wanted to have brats with was human.
Keiko and I weren't together, and while at the time it didn't bother me, we were friends, it bothered me now. I knew neither of us could really break any further apart, we kept in each other's lives. It was something and part of me wondered if that was how our lives were supposed to go. I was supposed to watch over her as a friend, help her care for her daughter.
That bastard tried really hard to get custody of her, she hadn't even been born a week yet and a team of lawyers were serving Keiko papers. After she had called off the wedding, the bastard had kicked her out and then he used her money situation not being as great as his own to say he should have custody of their kid.
Thank god for Kurama. He ended up being Keiko's lawyer. It took months, but eventually Keiko was granted a restraining order, after the bastard choked her in a public place, I'd had to take the pictures of the assault for her, before we let Yukina heal her up. It was a rough time and I tried to support Keiko as much as possible, being by her side as a friend.
Part of me had hoped one day we could be together again.
Now that I'm a few years older I realize that we can't.
So here I am twenty eight, in love with a woman who won't be with me.
All because of a one time mistake.
I fuckin' hate it.
"Yusuke, I hate to call on such short notice," Keiko called me often, which was strange considering we weren't together, but made sense. It was one of the few times I wasn't mooping, as Hiei called it. "Could you watch Mana please? My babysitter is puking and I have parent teacher conferences in an hour," she sounded panicked.
"Sure, I have Koji too," I chuckled, guess it was drop the brats on Yusuke day. "I'll be right over," I didn't live far from her.
"Thank you so much!," she exclaimed over the phone, hanging up quickly.
Koji and me walked to Keiko's. After her custody battle with the bastard she'd bought a small house a few blocks away from a school she liked. I liked to think it was because she knew I was close by, but then again so were Kuwabara and Yukina. Koji jumped over puddles, remembering to hold my hand when we crossed the street like his mother had taught him. He was seven now.
When we reached Keiko's, I quickly got us inside, rain threatening to fall. I smiled despite everything when I saw Keiko. Her long hair was piled into a bun on the back of her head, her figure hadn't lost any of it's appeal after having Mana three years before, she looked damn good in her teacher clothes.
"I really appreciate this Yusuke," she said, smiling at me, her kitchen walls were blue, her favorite color. "Hello Koji," she bent down to ruffle his hair.
""Heya Keiko," he grinned at her, before running off to see Mana. She was his favorite person in the world. Hiei hated it; his son always wanted to see the little human girl.
"Don't worry bout it," I waved off her concerns, listening her nag over leftovers in the fridge and bath time and other small things. "I shouldn't be home too late, Yusuke," she smiled a little, before saying goodbye to Mana. The little girl looked everything like Keiko, my heart doing a flip flop when she held the kid in her arms.
This should be what I see every day.
She gave Koji a kiss goodbye too when he wanted one.
I could almost pretend it was normal when she kissed my cheek as she went out the door.
When Keiko didn't come home early, I didn't worry at first. Parent teacher meetings had always dragged on when I was a kid, but then again I'd been a little brat.
But by the time eleven rolled around, I was worried.
So worried that I woke the whole gang up, leaving the brats with Yukina. Kurama and Kuwabara joined me in the search for her. The school had been closed for hours, she wasn't there. Hiei finally helped us, once I'd gotten a hold of him in Demon World.
He was the one that found her.
Keiko was found beaten and bloody in a back alley. Upon admittance in the hospital, she had four broken ribs, one of them nearly had punctured a lung. Her leg was broken as well, her clothes torn and ripped.
They did a rape kit.
I stuck around long enough to make sure she was going to be okay, before leaving.
Murder on my mind.
I ripped the bastard out of a fancy bar downtown, braggin' to one of his friends about his ex bitch gettin'
what she deserved. His friends tried to fight me, but I knocked them over the bar, draggin' the fucking bastard outside.
I was going to fuckin' kill him.
He'd fucked with Keiko for way too long. I'd let him get away with him because Keiko had always looked up at me with those big brown eyes of her's and caved, let her have her way. But Keiko wasn't here right now, she wasn't here to save him this time. This wasn't the first time since their custody battle that he had come after her either.
He'd harassed her at work.
He'd sent her threatening letters, left phone calls.
Once he had hit her with a car, thankfully it hadn't been hard, but she had still gone to the hospital.
"I'm going to fuckin' kill you," I growled at him, my anger rolling off me in waves.
"She won't even have you, you dumb fuck," he laughed at me, "she's dating one of the teachers at the school where she works,"
I growled. I knew she was, and while I hated it, hated seeing her happy with someone else, it made me miserable, I'd accepted it. I was the one who ruined our relationship. I had to face the consequences of my actions. As I stood there watching him, I realized this bastard inferring with Keiko was a consequence of my cheating. If I had never cheated on Keiko or maybe told her sooner, like Kurama had told me too, then she would have never got with this dick head.
I felt my body shift, my hair growing long, the blue tats from Raizen flaring against my skin.
Kill him.
"So I got one last good fuck in," he was saying, "damn she was worth that shit, hopefully the bitch dies,"
I lost it.
Kill him.
Kill him.
Kill him.
Without realizing what I had done, I moved forward, my hands going around his neck-
Keiko's body in the hospital, my love for her, the image Hiei have shown me, her body cold and bloody, her skirt hiked around her hips, my love for her, god I loved Keiko Yukimura so much.
-snap.
And it was over.
I'd killed a human.
I ended up at Genkai's; they had deemed it a prison for now.
I knew where I was going, the punishment for killing a human was jail time, maybe death. I'd made that rule.
"Dimwit what were you thinking?," Genkai asked, her face neither approving or disapproving. That was one thing I liked about the old hag, she waited to listen to me before deciding judgment.
"I just couldn't let him hurt her anymore," I sat cross legged on the floor.
"Killing him wasn't the way to go about it," she grumbled, whacking me over the head once, before sitting beside me. She offered me a cigarette and a lighter.
"This is so stupid!," I exclaimed, pulling one long drag from the cigarette, before exhaling. Smoking calmed me and even though I had given it up years ago, I always went back to it.
Somehow I got off on parole, much like Hiei had before.
They said the human was wicked and I had been acting in self defense, even though we all knew the guy hadn't posed any threat to me. Pacifier breathe made swear to never call him anything baby related ever again, ya know for giving me such a light sentence.
It was almost stupid how light I had got off considering.
The only thing that sucked about my parole sentence was I wasn't allowed to leave Genkai's temple grounds for a few years. At first it had been twenty, but Kurama had argued it down to ten, but on good behavior I was allowed to have my case as the fox had said 're-evaluated'. Of course I was allowed to go Demon World, but in Human World I wasn't allowed to leave Genkai's.
Thankfully Genkai argued that her land encouraged the town at the bottom of her mountain and I set up a ramen cart there.
So there's my story of how I became a criminal serving time under house arrest at Genkai's. It's all kinds of stupid.
Hiei makes fun of it; the detective has become the criminal.
"Hello Yusuke," I bang my head at the sound of her voice, nearly spilling boiling water all down the front of me.
"Keiko?," I asked hesitantly, taking her in. She was a sight for sore eyes, beautiful as always, her long hair down and free, blowing gently in the breeze. A purple sun dress hugged her skin, and she smiled graciously at me.
"How are you?," she asked, sitting down at one of the stools, like no time at all had passed. It had been nearly a year since her attack, a year since I killed a human.
Now I grimaced when I thought about, guilt had begun to fill me in moments, because even if the bastard had deserved it, I had killed a man who couldn't defend himself against me.
But all the same I was glad he was dead, he couldn't harm Keiko anymore this way.
"Good, ya know taking care of Genkai," I whistled, grinning at her. I still remembered her favorite flavor of ramen. It didn't take long to make.
"Thank you," she spoke softly as I put the bowl in front of her.
"No problem," I was twenty nine years old and blushing like I was four and she was holding my hand again. I rubbed at my face with my finger. "It's just a bowl of ramen,"
"For killing him," she said at last, her brown eyes catching mine. She held me there for a moment, before, "I'm glad he isn't bothering us anymore," she looked down at her bowl, a tear leaking down her face.
"Keiko I told ya, I'd always take care of ya," I told her, reaching across the stall counter to wipe the few tears away.
"I know that," she smiled weakly at me, "I haven't been fair to you,"
"What ya mean?," I asked, confused.
"You're imprisoned here because of me," she gestured all around her, "and I haven't even been up to see you,"
I didn't say anything, I'd wondered if she would come here to see me, but had tried not to think on it.
"I should have come sooner," she whispered, "I just had things to sort out on my own,"
"It's okay," I said after a moment, unsure what to say. I wasn't good with words, never had been. I'd usually chosen to lie to her, because it was easier that way, then to admit my feelings. Admit my problems, admit what I did wrong. I always had a twenty foot wall keeping me from emotions, everyone had thought I'd climbed it years ago, but with Keiko I'd still remained scared.
Now that I was older I knew that, knew that I had put her through shit. Between the lies, never telling her what was really going on, how much danger I really was in. Bailin' on her because I couldn't accept disappointing her, I couldn't handle being in a serious relationship. I was a real asshole when we were younger, but I'd always loved her. I lied to spare her feelings, lied to protect her, when I should have been a little more honest.
"What happened to us?," I remembered the last time she asked that, when I'd been high off Kurama's plant meds.
"I dunno," I said, cleaning out a ramen bowl, I looked up at her. She looked rather sad, her chop sticks pushing around her noodles. "I guess I'm just stupid, I should have given you a bigger rock," I laughed at my poor attempt at a joke, she seemed to smile a little.
"Do you still think I'm worth it Yusuke?," she asked suddenly, never quite meeting my eyes.
"Duh," I poked her breast with a chop stick, before retreating quickly out of her reach.
"You are such a perv!," she laughed though, despite her anger. After a moment she asked, "Jokes aside, do you really think I'm still worth it to you," there was curiosity there, nerves. I wasn't sure. She wasn't the woman I remembered, but still familiar to me.
"I wouldn't be here if I didn't think so," I gestured to the ramen stand. I was on parole, stuck at Genkai's because I believed she was worth killing a human over, something that went so against who I was as a person, everything I believed in.
Keiko chose to think over it for a few moments, finishing her ramen as she ate. I watched her, wiping down the counter. He was as old as I was, but she was still so beautiful. Age hadn't caught up with her yet.
"Yusuke would you mind if Mana and I stay the Spring holiday at Genkai's? I think it would do her some good to get away from the city," Keiko was asking suddenly, she seemed nervous, "I-she misses you, you know,"
"She remembers me?," I grinned a little, choosing to ignore Keiko's talk of missing me. We were two people who probably would always love one another.
"Of course, asks for Yu-chan all the time," she smiled brightly, pulling pictures of her daughter out of her wallet. Two photos caught my eye and I pulled the wallet from her quickly.
One was a photo of all of us shortly after the Dark Tournament, the whole gang was there, the two of us were so close then. I remembered the day the photo was taken, I poked her ass once or twice. To think it had been nearly fifteen years since then.
The other photo had been a photo of me holding Mana the day she was born. Looking back, I didn't even remember the picture being taken, but I looked happy that day, holding the small kid in my arms. She was real little then.
"That's my favorite photo," she pointed at the one of me holding her daughter, "you two look almost related there,"
"I wish we were," the words slipped out, before I shoved the photos back at her.
It was awkward for a moment.
"So may we come for Spring break?," she asked finally to break the ice.
"Sure, sure," I waved my hand at her, the blush still there on my face as I turned to face the other direction.
I heard her get up, my body stilling.
"Well I have to get going, I'll see you next week," she smiled, mischief playing across her face. It had been so long since I'd seen that look.
"Goodbye Keiko," I watched her walk away, before noticing that she hadn't left any money for her food.
"Hey Keiko you're supposed to pay for your food!," I shouted at her, holding her empty bowl for her to see.
"Don't be so selfish Yusuke!," she laughed, waving at me, "family doesn't pay for their food! See you next week!,"
I would spend the rest of her life proving to Keiko that we were family until she died.
Okay I edited this a little better, I had some issues and I'm finally just now having time to re-edit this. Honestly I put this up the first time with little if at all editing. I am sooo sorry about that lol. But I really adore this pairing, even if to me if feels completely doomed lol. This will remain a oneshot for now... ;) Also I wonder if anyone caught the little moments in the story that seem unexplained! I promise this all is tied in together at one point and time! :D
-j.d.y.