Two weeks later, Yugi and his friends had finally finished their second to last year of High School. "Alright!" Joey jumped in the air. "Good bye school and hello summer!" He got into a victory pose.
"I can't believe you actually passed all those tests." Tristan sighed, scratching his head.
"Hey! I study! Not often, but I do." Joey growled at his friend.
"Hey now you two, relax." Tea smiled and put her hands on her hips. "Be glad we all made it through another year."
"Yeah Tea is right. We all made it and now we can enjoy our summer before school starts back up." Yugi himself was excited to be out of school but he was also more excited that he got to spend the entire summer with the Pharaoh.
"Hey Yugi got any plans this weekend?" Joey asked his friend.
"Actually I do." Yugi looked away embarrassed. "I actually am going to be helping the Pharaoh make a list."
"A list?" Tea questioned.
"Yeah a list of things he wants to do. Like with us or by himself. For the summer, ya know?" Yugi looked up at his friends who all were smiling at him.
"That's great! Make sure he puts down that we are having a BBQ at my place and he needs to actually eat some of my famous ribs." Tristan added.
"Oh for sure!" Yugi nodded. "One thing he wants to do is actually do something with me for my birthday. Usually he just lets me go and do my own thing, but this year, he wants to do something." Yugi sighed. "He keeps mentioning it's his last this or last that. Kinda makes me sad."
"Than tell him." Joey said putting his arms around Yugi's shoulders. "Tell him that you don't want to think of this as his last but more of your first."
"I was going to tonight." Yugi looked down at the ground. "Who's hungry?" He asked.
"I am!" Tristan and Joey both spoke at the same time.
"I am down for something." Tea smiled.
"Alright, let's go get some dinner, my treat." The whole gang went to Burger World and had a early dinner, since they didn't get a chance to eat due to prep work for graduation, they were starving. As usual Yugi ordered the burger and fries. Tea ordered a chicken salad with fresh strawberries. Tristan got himself a steak, after all Yugi said he was paying. Joey got himself a chicken sandwich with extra pickles. For some reason Joey liked pickles. They mostly just ate and talked about what they were looking forward to this summer and what the new school year would bring.
"I have to get my portfolio ready this summer." Tea said. She placed her fork down and pushed her bowl away. "I got to get it ready to submit for the abroad program. If I want to be able to travel to New York, I gotta get all that submitted quickly." She smiled looking at the friends around the table.
"You'll get in! No issues at all." Yugi smiled.
"Sometimes I hope that I don't get in." She admitted out loud.
"What do you mean?" Joey asked swallowing a bite of food. "I thought you wanted to be a dancer?"
Tea held her hands up in defense. "I do! It's just sometimes I get scared knowing how alone I will be when I get there. Not seeing you all." A small blush came to her face and she looked down. A hand was placed on her shoulder.
"You'll do great." The Pharaoh gave her a reassuring smile.
"Ah. Pharaoh." Tea blushed deeper. "Thank you."
"I know how it feels." The Pharaoh admitted. "It's one reason I chose not to go to Egypt right now." He looked around at everyone. "I'm not ready to regain my memories. It feels like that would just make me lonely. I fear that if I regain my memories, that I will lose the ones I made with you all." He smiled looking at everyone that sat at the table. "But knowing that I can make these memories with you all, for you." He nodded. "Than I know that even if I forget, you all will not."
Tristan looked at the Pharaoh and sighed. "I always have to be the Debbie downer don't I?" He closed his eyes and hung his shoulders. "You're dead, we all know it." Everyone looked at Tristan shocked, except for the Pharaoh. "Egypt has a president now and has not been ruled by a Pharaoh in over a thousand years. You and Yugi share a body, which means that one of you has to be dead. I've seen Yugi for years at school, so that means you're the dead one."
The Pharaoh sighed. "Yes, I am dead. What I do know about my past, though little, is that I had to die in order to protect Egypt and the world from a powerful force. After that though, it's cloudy." He looked at Tristan.
"So that means you'll leave us, before we're ready?" Tea asked.
"Yes. I am destined to not remain here. Eventually, I will move on." The Pharaoh looked down at his hands, Yugi's hands, and sighed.
"Thanks Tristan. Now I don't want to eat anymore." Joey said pushing his plate away from him. "I like the Pharaoh, he's like totally awesome! He did after all save our butts many times and we all know how he feels about Yugi." He leaned back, putting his hands behind his head. "I don't really want to think about him leaving, about him dying. Just as much as I don't want to think of Tea leaving. But at the same time, it's part of growing up. We are born, we grow up, we live, we die." He sighed. "Whatever you did Pharaoh. You obviously chose to save your people, knowing what that meant."
The Pharaoh nodded.
"So that means your life came and went." Joey wiped a tear from his eye. "Thank you man." He held out his hand, which the Pharaoh took. "Thank you for allowing us all to have a chance at life and for picking Yugi to bring you to us."
The Pharaoh smiled looking at Joey as they shook hands. He didn't realize how much of an impact his past did for his friends. They were alive because of what he did, even if he didn't remember it. They all had a chance to grow up and follow their dreams. Yugi was able to be born and complete the puzzle, so that they could meet. He closed his eyes. "I couldn't have picked a better partner or friend." He said to himself.
"Alright enough sap!" Tea butted in. "Let's talk about Yugi's birthday since he isn't here right now!" She smiled and pulled out a piece of paper. "Since the Pharaoh has dibs on him for his actual birthday I say we all get him on the fifth, a day later." She began to write something and they all started fighting over what they wanted to do with Yugi. The Pharaoh laughed as they all fought over who got Yugi at what time. "I'll miss them so much."
The Pharaoh was walking home. Yugi allowed him privacy to talk to their friends and to hang out for a while. Which he was pleased with, Joey slipped up and said that they all knew his feelings for Yugi. Though he hated to admit it, he knew that he loved Yugi, even though he knew i wouldn't be possible for them to be together. "Pharaoh?" Yugi spoke through their mind link.
"Hm?" The Pharaoh blinked out of his thoughts and looked around. "Yugi?" He called out softly. With that Yugi appeared next to him, in spirit form. It gave him the creeps sometimes, to see Yugi as a spirit meant that he was, dead. Well sorta, Yugi was alive but his spirit was taken out of his body to be replaced by the Pharaoh's. "Everything ok?" He asked, pushing the thoughts to the far back of his mind.
"Yeah I was just wandering how was everything?" Yugi smiled looking up at the Pharaoh as they walked.
"It was nice. I appreciate you letting me talk to Tea." The Pharaoh returned the smile.
"When you said you knew what to say, it was no problem. Helping two friends at once." Yugi chuckled. "I've been feeling pretty depressed about this whole thing myself." He admitted.
"I know you have. I can sense it. I heard what you told Joey." The Pharaoh sighed. He put his hands in his pockets and stopped walking. "I wasn't trying to hurt your feeling. For that I am sorry. But it also has been hurting me to think of all the things we used to do, that we won't be doing anymore."
Yugi had looked at his friend with sad eyes. "You're right." He sighed. "When you go to Egypt to get your memories back, you won't be coming back with me, will you?" Tears formed in his eyes, though he was a spirit, he could still cry.
The Pharaoh just nodded, he couldn't look at Yugi and tell him what he thought would happen. What he knew was going to happen. It was obvious and even Joey knew that. They all knew it was coming but no one wanted to admit it, including himself. "If I had my way Yugi." He finally spoke looking back at Yugi who was crying silently. The Pharaoh sighed and wiped the tears from his face. "If I had my way, I would stay here. Maybe I could work at the game shop with your grandpa. You could finish school and I would figure out how to get into college with you and maybe we could even get a place of our own. Have Joey be our roommate." He chuckled as Yugi's smile grew big.
"I love those ideas!"
"I knew you would." The Pharaoh began to walk again and Yugi followed behind him. "Please understand that these lasts, no, these firsts, will be the best memories I ever have. From the day I met you Yugi and until the day we part, any memory made will be the ones I cherish the most." He kept his head down but a smile was on his face.
"Same!" Yugi nodded and than disappeared.
The Pharaoh made it the game shop, since Yugi wasn't answering his mental calls, he decided to grab a bowl of ice cream and head up to their room. He got into something comfortable, which was different from Yugi's idea of comfortable, and sat on the bed with a book. "Whatcha reading?" Yugi finally appeared.
The Pharaoh had just taken a bite of the ice cream and rolled his eyes. "A book." He smirked swallowing.
"Haha. Smart ass." Yugi sat across from the Pharaoh on the bed. His legs and arms crossed. "What kind of book?"
"Just one of your random mangas." The Pharaoh sat on Yugi's bed with his legs crossed and the book in his lap. The bowl of ice cream he held in his hands.
Yugi looked him over, noticing that he was wearing a t-shirt and some of Yugi's yoga pants. "Nice outfit." He giggled.
"Hey." the Pharaoh swallowed another bite of ice cream. "When I got home you didn't answer me to switch, that gives me free dibs to put on whatever I want. That also includes I get to eat whatever I want." He smiled and took another bite.
Yugi chuckled. "Okay, okay. I was only teasing. I didn't hear you by the way. I was lost in my thoughts."
"Care to share?"
"No, it's random stuff. Like my birthday, my parents, life, school. Just boring random teen angst stuff."
The Pharaoh had finished his ice cream and sat it down on the desk, located next to Yugi's bed. "I get it." He stretched and yawned. "I think it's time for some sleep. Do you want to take over?"
"No actually. I think I will let you sleep tonight." Yugi stood up from his bed and was about to vanish.
"Are you sure? I don't want you to stay up all night thinking about randomness." The Pharaoh got himself situated into bed. "You are more than welcome to lay down." He tapped the empty spot near the bed.
Yugi smiled. "Thanks, I will take you up on that offer in a little while. I just want to be alone, if that's okay?"
"Yes that's perfectly fine." The Pharaoh turned the light off and crawled back into bed. He sighed when he noticed Yugi was gone. "Good night Yugi." He said as he closed his eyes.
"Good night Pharaoh." Yugi said before turning himself off from the Pharaoh.
Later that night Yugi finally crawled into the bed next to the sleeping pharaoh. He smiled when he noticed that his mouth was open, a tad bit of drool was coming from his mouth, and he snored slightly. "He doesn't realize how tired he really is till he let's himself sleep." Yugi snickered and closed his eyes, enjoying the sound of the deep voice gurgle through the snores. "I sure am going to miss you." He said just before sleep took him as well.