You can't believe this is happening. You can't believe this is real. That life had this in store for you. You pray to every god that you can think of that this is a dream-a nightmare that you will soon wake from.
You can't stand this. You think that you will go crazy. Never did you want to see your friends like this. Never. You would give anything to be able to take back your mistake. The one mistake that left your world crooked, broken, and bleeding. Just one tiny, little mistake.
Atobe is standing there-right in front of you- a blank look on his face. It is wiped clean. No hint of his arrogance or conceit. Just his eyes staring blankly at the spot in front of him. Whiter then you have ever seen him.
Kabaji stands behind him like always, but it's not right. Always before he would be standing straight and tall, ready to answer any order Atobe might give him. Now, now his shoulders are bent like the weight of the world rest on them.
Yelling catches your attention. Curses screamed at you. Loud and desperate as Gakuto unleashes his temper on you. He's getting more and more creative with every word. Louder and louder until Yuushi lays a hand on his shoulder and draws him closer. Telling him to hush now, there's a good boy.
Jirou makes a noise you've never heard before, a noise you never want to hear again. You've never seen him so still. He is always in motion while a wake-but here there are no twitches, no yawns, no excited jumping. Just stillness as if he doesn't know how to move anymore. It matches his eyes which are large, wounded, and lost. He looks lost. You made him look lost.
Finally your eyes land on the one person you know you've hurt the most. He's there in the middle of all the rest. Chocolate eyes so dark they look black - a blank look that matches Atobe's. You know he sat there that night you were supposed to have met. He sat there and waited but you never showed. He had been so excited to show you the paper saying he had gotten into that music school he wanted so badly to go to. He had said it wouldn't be real until you had seen it. But you had never made it. You can't stand to look at his blank face any longer so you turn a way.
You notice Hiyoshi and Taki also there with your friends. A couple people from school that you don't really know- and then you see your parents. They look like they've aged ten years since you last saw them. Your father holds your mother offering comfort when none can be taken.
Then there's your brother. Your stupid older brother who does nothing but tease you and take your stuff and make your life miserable. He's sitting there next to your parents crying as if his heart will never stop hurting. You've never seen him cry before- not even when he broke his leg or when the girl he'd been dating for three years broke up with him.
It makes you sick that you've sick that you've done this to the people you love. So much hurt because of you. You can't stand it.
Gakuto starts swearing again, and this time Yuushi's hand doesn't stop him. He stalks to that spot that Atobe is still staring at. You've never seen him so angry before. His fist clench in rage as he yells curses at you. Yuushi pulls him back, tells him to stop, but he wont listen. He screams and rages, and hits Yuushi's hands a way.
Then Choutarou is there-telling him to stop because it wasn't your fault, it was his, and he's so sorry. He's apologizing to everyone as he sobs out that it is his fault.
You yell. You yell that it wasn't his fault. It was yours. Choutarou wasn't guilty. He had nothing to apologize for. It was not his fault. It WAS NOT his fault, so he can just STOP damn it!
You are still yelling out denials and curses as Atobe walks forward and engulfs Choutarou in a hug, telling him that it wasn't his fault. That there was nothing that anyone could have done. No one could have known what would happen, not even someone with as much insight as Atobe. All they could do now was mourn and then move on. Gakuto's fallen to his knees, tears running down his face as he finally accepts Yuushi's hug.
It hurts so much that they're hurting. There is nothing that you can do to ever make them stop. You know none of them will ever be able to exactly who they were again. You've hurt them and you've changed them.
If only you had walked faster to Choutarou's house that night. If only you hadn't waited to the last minute with that project, you could have left earlier. You should have never looked back.
You don't even know why you did. You didn't hear anything. You hadn't seen anything. You only got the urge to look back the way you had come. And when you did, you saw something that you wish you could unsee.
Looking over your shoulder you saw the man stab the other with the knife. You made eye contact with the wielder as the body fell without a sound.
You were half a block a way. You should have been fine, traumatized by watching some one die but fine. You were the dash specialist. He was an old man with a knife. Luck had abandoned you that night. The man not only had the knife, but also a gun.
Choutarou's scud serve had been compared to a bullet, but you would have been happy with out knowing just how different the two really were. You had been knocked down by his scud serve dozens of times and you had always managed to get back up- but you knew as soon as it hit, there was no getting up from this, especially as the second and third one followed so close behind.
You tried though. You tried to will your blood from spilling, tried to will your heart to keep pumping. You tried to make your lungs work and your brain from feeling fuzzy. Your will just wasn't enough this time to make a difference, your body had no more it could give, for with every frantic beat of your heart more blood left it.
Now your friends are here, attending your funeral, and there is nothing anyone can do. You feel tears streaming down your face. You don't want to leave them. It hurts too much to leave them like this.
This wasn't what you planned. You were suppose to die of old age holding Choutarou's hand, as the rest of your friends told you it was about time you knocked off. Not now, not at nineteen, not when you had just confessed to Choutarou and the two of you were just starting the serious stuff.
One sentence runs through your mind over and over again.
You should never have looked back.