I avoided running into the geek patrol for quite some time, I didn't need to face Katsuya, I didn't need to hear him laughing at me. I didn't need to hear his jokes and his spite, it would ruin me. It would tear me to pieces.

Yet it was impossible to put off the inevitable.

I could not avoid what was meant to happen, not while we lived so near to one another.

I bumped into Jounouchi Katsuya a few days later, while getting groceries.

I had hoped that he hadn't seen me, that he wouldn't notice me sizing up the fruits, but to my dismay, the Mutt came stomping over to me, cart in tow, hair an absolute fucking mess.

"A fruit checking out the fruits."

Mentally, I flinched at his statement. He was still how he always was, a downright tit. How I had managed to fall so deeply for him was beyond me. Maybe it was the lilt of his voice or the curve of his smile, it could have been any number of things, but whatever had caused the initial fall, it was far too late to reverse it.

"Save it Jounouci, I'm not in the mood for your flirtations."

However, he didn't laugh at this, he didn't even seem mildly entertained. He rested his weight on his shopping cart, cocked a brow.

"Something gotcha in a tizzy there Kaibabe?"

Who the fuck even spoke like that other than him? In all my time I have never once come across another human being who spoke in such a manner. Maybe his unique form of speech was yet another reason I fell for him.

"If something has me in a 'tizzy' it isn't any of your business, now is it?"

He gave a scoff, acted as though he were offended that I refused to immediately open up to him. What a fucking joke, he was the last person I would go to if something was bothering me. Especially since that something usually had to do with him, I wasn't very good with admitting my feelings, how would I do so to the source of them?

"We're friends, ya can talk to me."

As much as I hated the rivalry between us, I hated the idea of being friends more. I hated thinking that he considered me on the same level as everyone else. I wanted him to think higher of me, to view me as something else entirely. I wanted him to look at me and think what a fine person I was. Thanks to that, he hated me.

"We're not friends Mutt."

The face he pulled left my heart in pieces. He seemed to be upset by my words, just as his friends usually were. I hated letting him down, but I couldn't just be his friend, I wasn't the person to be able to stand that.

"Ya keep saying that, and yet ya get scared when I die in your dreams, which isn't, do you care or not?"

Without Mokuba here to defend me, I hadn't a choice but to move along. There wasn't a chance I was going to answer that question. I cared, and I cared deeply, but there was no way for me to rationalise my fear if I were to lie to him. I knew this action of running away wasn't particularly my style, but I couldn't find the words to express how much I could most definitely not care about that Mutt.

For whatever reason he had become so much to me, so much so, that whenever he left my side I felt a pain in my heart. A small tinge of pain echoed through me as I left him behind.

Yet he did not let me, he followed, repeated his question, again and again he repeated it as I tried to shop. I ignored him to the best of my ability, picking out foods for Mokuba and myself, wishing that the Mutt would just drop this and let me be.

But he wouldn't.

Eventually he grew tired of waiting for me to grow annoyed with him, he cornered me in the dairy aisle, right where the walls met, between the milk and eggs. He trapped me between the wall and himself.

He stared me down.

I tried not to let the fear which kept me shine through.

"Which is it Kaiba?"

His words were a slurry of the anger and confusion he held onto.

"We're in public Mutt, don't make a scene."

He scoffed.

"Unlike you, I don't care about that shit, answer my question and I wont."

He was treading on dangerous waters now.

"That isn't your business."

He didn't seem to get the message. He didn't think for even a second that my reluctance to tell him could mean what he hoped for. That I did care, that I cared much more than I'd ever like to admit. I didn't want to give him that weapon, but of course I couldn't lie, not while he had all this evidence. He was an idiot.

"Why won't you just say no so I can go back to my life?"

He didn't want me to make my emotions clear, he wanted me to lie. He didn't want to hear the truth, he wanted to think that he didn't need to worry about me. He was selfish, but so was I. He wanted to hear me reject the idea of it all, he wanted me to comfort him, to bring his mind some peace, but if it meant he was thinking about me, I didn't want to.

I wanted to be the reason he sat up at night, I wanted to be the reason he couldn't pay attention, I wanted to be in the deepest corners of his mind, haunting him. I knew it was a strange wish, but it was what I wanted, and if refusing to lie made that happen, I wanted to tell the truth.

"Because I can't."