I can do this! Tai stood at Soras front door. He winced. I think. He hadn't seen or heard from Sora in a few days but according to the groups schedule, it was his turn to come and give Sora a hand. His cell phone beeped, a text from Sora, telling him that she was fine and didn't need any help. Typical, Sora, he thought to himself but they couldn't go on avoiding each other, he had to talk to her. As he went to ring the doorbell, he saw the nameplate next to it and his stomach dropped. Ishida Residence. Ishida. Ishida. Ishida. Panic set over the man, his heart began to beat faster.

The front door suddenly opened."Sora!" He gasped, "How did you know I was here?"

She smiled nervously, "I heard your cell phone go off after I text you."

"Oh!" He blushed, "Don't worry, I'm just here to drop off some groceries for you. Mimi gave me a list." Tai held up the grocery bag, trying to hand it over to her so he could make a swift exit.

Sora stepped back, "Its okay you can come in. Hiro is having a nap," sensing his hesitation, she quickly added, "Please Tai?"

He couldn't refuse her request. The spiky haired man nodded and headed inside.

…

Sora dumped the shopping bag onto the kitchen counter and turned to face her friend. "Tai, I'm so sorry about the other night," she looked down at her hands and nervously wrung them together. "when you... went to leave... I started to panic, I just wanted you to stay with me because I think I was scared of feeling lonely again. It was selfish of me."

"No, Sora it's my fault." He shook his head, "You were really vulnerable that night. It was totally wrong of me." He sighed. "It's just seeing you so sad crushed me and I just… wanted to fix it somehow."

"I know.." Sora leaned against the counter and her hand ran down her bump.

His fists tightened up. "You know, that day we walked home together from the station? T.K warned me about things being weird between us."

"He said the same thing to me too." Sora sighed. They stood in silence for a while, lost in thought. The redhead shifted on her feet, "Do you think we can still be friends, Tai? Is that even possible anymore?"

Tai instinctively grabbed her by the arm, "Of course it is, even if things are weird right now, I'll always be here for you, no matter what!" Their eyes met for a moment but Sora quickly looked away. "I mean it, Sora." She put her hand onto his and nodded, grateful for his kind words. The sound of the grocery bag slipping off the counter and hitting the floor sprung the pair apart. "Oh man, we gotta stop doing that!"

Sora felt her cheeks burning. "We sure do!"

"I blame you, maybe you're giving off pheromones or something…" Tai grumbled and leaned himself over to pick up the groceries.

She laughed loudly, "Me?! What about you! I've never known you to be so nice to me!"

"It's because of the pheromones!" He cried out in desperation.

"Alright Tai I'll make sure to stay at least 5 feet away at all times, okay?"

Tai began to laugh too. To his relief, the awkwardness between them had dissipated. Maybe if he just kept his distance and let the others take over from now on, things would be okay.

…

Later that afternoon, Tai stopped by Izzy and Mimi's place. Tai sat at the kitchen table and watched Izzy tapping away at his keyboard.

"Gee I wish I could work from home like you, Izzy" Tai grumbled.

"And aren't you supposed to be at work too?"

"Nope, I'll be travelling to Kyoto tonight for a conference."

"I see." Izzy didn't take his eyes off the computer, Tai didn't mind though, it reminded him of the good old days and it was nice. Izzy was the only one who Tai had confided in about what happened between him and Sora, it was times like this he was grateful to have such a good friend. Tai kicked back and enjoyed his coffee. Izzy finally closed his laptop. "How was Sora? Did you guys talk?"

"Yeah…" Tai put his cup down, "Hopefully things will get back to normal now."

"That's a relief. You had me really worried the other night." Izzy frowned.

"Do you think… Sora will say something to Matt?"

"I'm not sure but even if she does, Matt will understand." The computer whiz crossed his arms and leaned back into his chair.

Tai gave a sideways glance, "You say that now but I'm pretty sure I'll be the one getting a big punch in the face when he gets back."

"Well, you deserve it." He said not missing a beat.

"I know," Tai slid down the table so his head was buried into his arms, he felt defeated.

He sighed at the sorry state of his best friend, "Don't worry, you're going away for the rest of the week, you can leave Sora to us now. The only thing you have to do now is call Matt and tell him about Sora. Her depression I mean."

"You're right." Tai stood up, "I'll email him now to see when he's around."

Izzy wandered into the kitchen to make some more coffee for them both. He jumped out of his skin and ran back when he heard Tai suddenly yell. "What's the matter?!"

"I just texted him and he's calling me back straight away!" Tai was breaking out in sweat. "He knows!"

"You're being paranoid! How could you know that?!" Tai didn't respond, he was just staring at his cell phone. "Answer it, Tai!"

The spiky haired man gulped and slid his finger across the screen to answer the call. "M-Matt?" Tai quickly made his way over to the sofa and sat down, Izzy followed him.

All Izzy could make out was barrage of shouting from the cell phone's speaker. He couldn't hear what was being said but it was clear Matt was furious. Tai was right after all.

"Listen Matt, I'm sorry! I can explain!" The pair looked at each other, completely aghast. Another plethora of shouting came from the phone, Izzy leaned in. "I've got Izzy here as a witness! So if you send a missile down to my house to kill me, he'll know it was you!"

Izzy gave him a hard shove, "Tai! That's not helping your case! Be serious!"

"Ow!" Tai exclaimed, then stopped to tune into Matt's yelling again, "No, Izzy will not kick my ass for you! Right…?!" He looked to his friend with pleading eyes.

The computer whiz rolled his eyes, he grabbed Tai's phone from him and put it on speaker. "Now, you guys-"

Though Izzy had planned to start mediations, it was clear Matt wasn't done yet. "I can't believe you would DO this, Tai! I asked you to look out for her not to take advantage of her! Sora is my WIFE. She's carrying MY child! And you thought it would be okay for you to put your disgusting hands all over her! In MY home with my CHILDREN there!" Tai buried his head in his hands, completely overwhelmed by the situation unfolding before him. He had never felt so awful in his entire life, he opened his mouth to talk but Matt still raged on. "I'm going to KILL you, Tai!"

Nervous wasn't the word for how Izzy felt but he tried his best to fight on for his friend."Now try and calm down, Matt. From my understanding, there wasn't anything... indecent going on."

"Don't defend him! Be a man Tai and speak for yourself!" Matt shouted back.

"I'm not defending him, Matt, believe me, I'm not."

"Yes you are!"

"Fine! I give up!" Izzy huffed.

"He's right," Tai finally spoke up,"Matt, please just listen to me for a minute, then when you get back to Earth you can kick my ass, okay?"

"Fine."

Tai trembled, "Okay. I don't know what Sora told you-"

"She told me you guys almost kissed!"

His heart was pounding out of his chest, "She's right. We did. Almost. But… In some messed up way I was trying to be there for her. She was upset, I was upset for her. It didn't mean anything! I promise!" He waited for Matt to respond but the line was silent. "Matt, please tell me you and Sora are going to be okay?"

"Of course we are…" Matt let out a heavy sigh.

"You didn't yell at Sora, did you?"

"Why would I yell at Sora? Don't make me out to be a bad guy! You're the one creeping on her!"

"Hey come on! That's too far!" Tai belted out.

"I trusted you, man!" Matt shot back.

Tai winced, the truth stung. "I'm sorry… Matt. I really am." His voice broke a little.

Putting a hand on his friend's shoulder, Izzy moved in to mediate again, "Look, I know this situation is really messed up right now but Tai is just as upset as you are about this." Neither man spoke, so he continued, "It's probably got something to do with the reason we wanted to speak to you in the first place. Sora hasn't been doing so great, she's been really depressed."

"I know." Matt interrupted, "My brother called me last night, he was with Sora. They told me everything. We're going to get her help. In fact I need to go. I need to call control and talk to my boss."

Tai felt like his world was crumbling around him, his heart was beating so fast. T.K knew too. He grimaced and leant forward, tears fell fast and hard down onto his lap, each drop leaving their mark on his trousers. "Matt. I-I want to fix this."

"Please Tai, just leave my wife alone from now on." He sounded exasperated, tired of the situation and without warning he hung up.

A sigh escaped Izzy, he gripped onto his friends phone. "Everything will be okay. I know it."

"He was supposed to leave it to me. I was supposed to help Sora. I was supposed to fix all of this but I've made it worse for everyone." Tai hid his face in his hands. "T.K came to me too, he knew something was going on between Sora and me but I told him everything was fine but it wasn't. I was even a jerk to him about it."

Izzy wasn't exactly sure about what Tai was talking about but he put his arm around his friend. He usually wasn't very touchy-feely but his heart felt heavy too. They jumped when they heard a pair of keys fall onto the floor, they turned around to see Mimi standing there, completely frozen.

"Wah! How long have you been standing there?!" Izzy bolted up off of the sofa, taking a defensive stance.

"What the hell is going on here?!" Mimi shouted and pointed to her husband and then to Tai. "You and Sora?!"

Tai stood up and rushed towards the front door, "I can't do this right now."

"No, please don't go, I'm sorry I didn't mean to eavesdrop but trust me there was no good time to interrupt!" Mimi pleaded with him. "And plus I can't let you leave, you're too upset." It was too late, the front door slammed shut. Izzy set off running after him.

As he reached the waterfront, Izzy stopped running, he had found Tai. Just as he stepped on to the sand, he saw another figure approaching his friend. It was Kari. She pulled her brother into a big hug, Tai was burying his head into her shoulder. Izzy breathed a sigh of relief, just in time.

….

The sun was setting and the siblings were sat in the sand, looking out onto the water.

"I'm sorry you've come all the way here, to console your stupid brother." Tai ran his hand through his hair, embarrassed at the entire situation but Kari smiled at him reassuringly.

"Hey it's no big deal, what kind of sister would I be if I wasn't here for you?"

The Digidestined furrowed his brows, "Does T.K know you're here?"

"Yep." She said without missing a beat.

"He can't be happy about that…"

Kari leaned back onto her hands, letting the sand slip over her fingers. "Yeah but he can't tell me what to do. You're my brother, Tai, if he wants to play the 'family comes first' game then I will too." She said, an air of stubbornness about her.

"So I've made you guys fight too, huh? Wow. I've really been ruining everybody's lives and I haven't even told Meiko yet and ruined my own."

"Tai, you need to talk to her, she can't be the last person to know."

He sighed, "It's already too late for that. I'm screwed." There was a moment of silence between them. "Kari, I saw Sora today and she didn't mention a thing. Is it wrong to be upset about that? I thought she would have at least warned me she told Matt."

"Well, I think if she wants to keep her marriage together she can't be sneaking around behind Matt's back, plus T.K told me they're focusing on getting help right now." Kari stretched out her legs and crossed one over the other, she had to admit the situation was very bad. Very, very bad. This would affect the entire dynamic of her family. Her and T.K were used to Matt and Tai fighting but this was a whole other ball park. Her husband, understandably was fighting in Matt's corner while he was gone. Kari understood that T.K saw Sora as a sister of his own but she couldn't get on board the hate Tai train, it wasn't fair to her or her brother, Sora was a great person but she was at fault in this too. Too bad she couldn't get T.K to even consider that possibility, he was protecting her 100 percent. It couldn't be helped, she thought and just hoped everything would blow over soon.

"Yeah, I get it…" he conceded.

"I can't believe this is happening now, I always thought this would happen in high school. Remember that Christmas? You were so bummed out that Sora asked Matt out."

Tai focused his gaze back on the water, "This is different. Meiko is my wife and the mother of my son. I love her more than anything, I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I was just…"

He felt her hand on his, she gave it a reassuring squeeze. "Don't worry Tai, I believe you. Now go talk to Meiko, haven't you got to get the Shinkansen tonight?"

Tai looked to Kari and nodded with determination. The secret had spilled and spreading faster then he could contain. it was time to tell his wife.