Sorry

Written by: Chocho (chochowilliams)

Disclaimer: I do not own Gravitation or the characters from it.  I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Summary: AU.  He ran from Shuichi once.  Will he take this second chance or let his past keep him from true happiness?  Ryuichi/Shuichi, Shuichi/Eiri

Chapter summary:  Tohma confronts his old friend and gives him an ultimatum.

Warning: AU, Angst, drama, romance, language, m/m sexual content, Ryuichi/Shuichi, Shuichi/Eiri

Inserts:  --

A/N:  Thank you to pikeebo, lilgurlanima, mini-chan, CraZydr3aM3R, LEEANN2002, sun's and stars for your reviews and thank you to everyone else to put me on their alert and favorite list.  I love you all!

+--+--+--+

Chapter 3

(Present time - Friday Night – Tokyo, Japan)

With his legs folded underneath him, Ryuichi sat back on the couch with his hands wrapped around a steaming mug of hot cocoa.  He brought the cup to his face, inhaled the sweet, chocolaty aroma, and smiled.  He sighed before he took a sip, feeling the hot liquid trickle down his throat, but it did little to chase away the coldness that seemed to have taken up permanent residence within his bones.  As he leaned forward to set the cup on the coffee table, his eyes caught sight of the photograph of Shuichi and him that had fallen off the wall earlier and his heart gave a painful lurch.  Tears stun his eyes.  Unable to look at those large, innocent violet eyes smiling at him with love and complete faith, he grabbed the picture and flipped it over.  Grabbing a pillow, he hugged it to his chest.  Burying his face in the pillow, he sobbed quietly.

+--+--+

(Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania)

Hugging his legs to his chest, his heels resting on the edge of the couch, Shuichi leaned his chin on the pillow he was hugging and stared blankly out the window of his suite.  He knew he should go downstairs and join the guys for breakfast, but he was not in the mood for company or food right now.  The thought of food made him queasy and the idea of being among people was suffocating.  All he wanted was to be alone for a while.

With much difficulty, he tore his eyes away from the window and stared at his cellphone lying dormant on the coffee table.  He wished it would ring.  He willed it to ring, but it remained stubbornly silent.  Shuichi felt his soul cry out as the silence stretched on around him.  When a picture of Ryuichi flashed through his head, he felt a sharp pain in his chest.  Despair enveloped and washed over him.  He gasped out a sudden sob as tears stun his eyes, blurring his vision.  Squeezing his eyes shut, he tightened his hold on the pillow and scrunched into a tight ball in the corner of the couch.  Burying his face in the pillow, he wept silently.

Then as quickly as they came, the angst-filled tears streaming down his face turned into bitterness and hatred.  A sudden surge of anger raged through him.  Snarling low and dangerously, Shuichi jumped to his feet and whipped the pillow he had been hugging only moments ago across the room with all the strength he could muster.  He felt a thrilling rush of satisfaction as the square throw pillow sailed effortlessly across the suite and smacked into the coffee maker.  The white plastic machine along with the red-orange silk covered pillow tumbled to the floor.  Shuichi's breath came out in huffing pants as the sound of smashing plastic and shattering glass echoed in the silence of the room.

+--+--+

(Tokyo, Japan)

Sniffing, Ryuichi brushed his fingers across his wet cheeks as he crossed the living room towards the front door.  Another loud pounding echoed through the silence of the apartment.  It was almost eleven o'clock at night, who would be coming to visit him so late at night?  He was not expecting anyone.  He wondered who it could be.  Was it Tatsuha?  Had he forgotten something?  The thought of the young monk made his heart beat rapidly and his pulse race.  Butterflies fluttered nervously in his stomach.  He stopped before the apartment door and grabbing the hem of his pajama top, dried the last of his tears before sliding back the security chain and turning the dead bolt.  His hand on the doorknob, he took a deep breath to calm himself.  As much as he would love it to be Tatsuha, he doubted it was.  Tatsuha had a wedding ceremony in Kyoto to perform in the morning; otherwise, he would have stayed the night.

So, if it was not his favorite monk, then who could it be?  Shuichi was not due back until next week sometime.  Besides, he had his own key and he would have called to tell him that he was back.  Or, the information that Bad Luck was back in town would have been leaked by someone and it would be all over the news and the internet.  No, if Shuichi were back he would know.  He felt a stab of pain in his chest when he thought of his husband.  He shook off the feeling that was fast becoming all too familiar.

When he opened the door, Ryuichi was startled by whom he saw standing on the other side.  "Tohma!"

"Ryuichi."  Tohma kept his voice and face carefully blank as he studied his best friend.  That was when he noticed Ryuichi's damp cheeks.

Ryuichi stepped aside and waved his friend inside.  "What's up?" he asked, curiously.  When Tohma stepped inside, Ryuichi shut and locked the door behind him.  Turning around, he saw his old friend staring at him with a serious expression on his face.  That look was never a good thing.  "Tohma?  What's wrong?"

"We need to talk."

Ryuichi gulped.  Why was he suddenly getting an uneasy feeling?

+--+--+

Eiri sat staring at his computer screen blankly.  His hands lay idle on the keyboard.  The words on the screen blurred into splotches of color.  He could not remember what it was he just wrote.  Something about something having to do with something.  He did know he was supposed to be working on his doctoral thesis.  Everything else had disappeared behind a red haired singer with bright turquoise eyes that seemed nearly white against his dark olive complexion.

Sighing, he slumped back in the chair and combed his fingers through his hair.  Leaning his head against the back of the chair, he stared vacantly at the ceiling.

He wondered, not for the first time, what would have happened had he actually been there in that closet sized apartment when his angelic god woke up after having fallen into a deep exhausted sleep after they made love for several long, sweet hours a year ago.  Would he even now be with him as Bad Luck toured North America with several other bands on an anime convention tour?  Would he be the one Shuichi held hands with?  The one whose arm he clung to?  The one to hold him, kiss him and make love to him?  The one the Madonna-esque god sang to?  The one he wrote songs about?  The one the paparazzi caught him with?  Would Eiri wake up each morning to find his very own angel sleeping peacefully next to him?

Three months after he fled from the arms of his beloved, he had been invited to a party welcoming Bad Luck and some other band, which had since fizzled into nonexistence before they even were after a particularly acrimonious argument between two of the members, into the NG Pro family.  Tohma and Mika had both tried to get him to go to the party, saying it would do him some good for they had been increasingly worried about him.  They might not have known what had happened, but they had known something had happened that had sent an already reclusive man even deeper into hiding.  Of course, Eiri told them all to go to Hell and had sent his brother Tatsuha in his steed instead.

They say hindsight was twenty-twenty and they would be right.  As Eiri looked back on it now, he realized that might have been one of the biggest mistakes of his life.  He could not be absolutely certain if that was when it started, but he now knew that having Tatsuha go to that party instead of going himself had been the catalyst for this whole messed up affair.

No matter what the reason may be for his poor lack of judgment, the fact remained that he had abandoned Shuichi a year ago, which in turn caused Shuichi to turn to someone else.  So it was partially his fault that the love of his life became involved with a man who could not tell the difference between his ass and a hole in the ground, a man who did not realize he was in Heaven until he was dragged into Hell.  It made his heart hurt to think that he was the reason Shuichi was hurting.

Growling, he sat up and shook his head of all thoughts of that lithe, pink haired god.  Why was he so fascinated, so fixated by that kid anyway?  And why did he care about his love life?  He had not even talked to that damn baka in over a year and he was making his life a living hell.

"Damned brat," he muttered angrily as his fingers flew over the keyboard. 

+--+--+

"I want you to break it off with him," Tohma told his vocalist without any preamble.

Ryuichi froze mid-step.  Fear flashed across his face before he was able to school his face.  He swallowed his fright and forced himself to smile at his old friend.  He sat down on the opposite L of the couch from his long time friend.  "'Break it off with' whom?" he asked innocently.  He looked at a point to the left of Tohma's face as his pulse started racing and his heart beat faster.  His palms grew sweaty.

"You know whom, Ryuichi."  Tohma was in no mood to play games.

Ryuichi's mouth was suddenly parched.  "I have no idea what you're-"

"Then why can't you look me in the eye?" Tohma snapped.

Ryuichi sighed and hung his head.  He should have known he would not be able to hide anything from his best friend.  "How long have you known?" he finally asked.

He did not like to admit it but…"An hour," Tohma admitted truthfully.

Ryuichi chuckled. 

To Tohma it sounded a little hysterical.  "I saw you in the lobby downstairs."

Ryuichi groaned and buried his face in his hands.

Tohma had a brief urge to inform his friend that if he saw him then it was likely that he had not been the only one.  He had been a bit preoccupied being stunned (to say the least) at the time to notice if there had been paparazzi hidden outside the condominium.  Seeing Ryuichi was who he was, it would not surprise him if a huge photo of the two illicit lovers were splashed all over the papers and on TV when they woke up in the morning.  But it died a quick death.  It would serve his friend right if they had been present.  "Why, Ryu?"

Ryuichi shook his head.  He had been asking himself the same question ever since he allowed the boy to seduce him at that party just about nine months ago.  "I don't know why."

"Do you love him?"

Tears stun Ryuichi's eyes.  "Yes," he whispered, his voice strained.

Anger flared through the keyboardist.  "And Shuichi?"

Ryuichi shook his head.  "This has nothing to do with him."

Tohma narrowed his eye and glared at the singer.  "'Nothing to do with him'?" he echoed.  Had he truly heard him right?  "How the hell can you say that?  It has everything to do with him!  Shuichi is your husband!  Or did you forget that you were the one who asked him to marry you two months ago?  Did you already forget your commitment ceremony from just last month where you asked me to be your Best Man?  You've been married to Shuichi for a less than two months Ryu and you are gonna just sit there and tell me that your affair with my brother-in-law has nothing to do with him?"

Tears flowed freely down Ryuichi's face.  His heart hurt.  His felt nauseous as his emotions warred with one another.  "Don't Tohma," he whispered through his tears.

"Don't what?" Tohma hissed.  He was usually able to keep his cool no matter what, but for some reason this time he could not get a handle on his emotions as he listened to Ryuichi spout his nonsense and it was beyond exasperating.  "Tell you something you should already know?  Either you tell him about Tatsuha, or I will," he threatened.

Ryuichi gasped.  "But, but-!  I, I can't!  If I tell him…I don't want to hurt him!"

Tohma shook his head as he stood up.  "You should've thought of that before-"

"Tohma, please!"

"I'm sorry, Ryu."  He stood up.  "I consider Mr. Shindou a friend and I don't want to see him hurt."  The frame flipped upside down in the middle of the table did not escape his vision.  "It's either Tatsuha or Shuichi, Ryu.  Either way, you have to tell him."

+--+--+

The day was unseasonably cool.  The streets were strangely deserted.  A chill breeze blew through the parking lot, blowing a clear plastic wrapper into the street.  Tohma wrapped his black wool coat tighter around him and huddled within its warmth as he crossed the parking lot towards his car. 

Pulling out his keys from his coat pocket, he fumbled among the various keys and tags for the little black fob and unlocked his car doors.  The chin echoed loudly in the silence of the parking lot.  He rounded the car to the driver's side as he searched for his car key.  He paused besides the car door clutching the key in his hand and reached for the door handle, but froze.  He stared blankly at his hand on the door handle.  Tohma lifted his head to stare at the apartment his two top vocalists shared at the top of the condominium.  He sighed and dropped his head.  Ryuichi was his best friend and he loved the guy, but he was not going to cut him any slack on this.

Tohma opened the car door.  Lifting his leg into the cab, he lifted his head to take one last look at the apartment.  He knew Ryuichi was suffering.  He had seen it on his friend's face, but Tohma did not feel bad for the guy in the least.  Ryuichi made his bed and now he had to sleep in it.  He just hoped Ryuichi took his advice and talked to Shuichi, before Shuichi found out some other way.  He knew from past experience with the couple that if Shuichi found out about Ryuichi's affair from someone other than Ryuichi, it would make things much worse.

+--+--+

Sighing heavily, Ryuichi crossed his arms over his chest and leaning against the sliding glass doors, stared blankly out over the city.  He could not see Tokyo tower in the distance or the apartment building right across the street.  He was oblivious to everything but the ache in his head and the pain in his heart.  The clouds disbursed in the night sky, revealing a large full moon.  The moonlight reflected on Ryuichi's face, glistening off tears that trickled down his face.

+TBC+

Preview:  While Ryuichi's life is crashing down around him, Eiri makes a decision.