Author note: Returning to flashbacks and first-person, and this time it's Quatre's turn, with the Shadow Girls to act as his chorus.

A strange sense of relief flowed through him the moment he hit the mattress. It seemed to hold him as he curled on his side. How nice it would be, Quatre thought as his cheek lay against the momentarily cool sheets, if he could just melt away like that. After all he had done to dig himself deeper into his hole, if he could just leave it all behind in the morning like a dream.

A tear tickled his cheek, though, and he was reminded this was no dream. It continued to roll, wetting the sheet underneath him, and then another drop ran down over his nose. He hadn't realized how much his stomach hurt until now, and he brought his knees up, wrapped his arms tightly around himself. He felt like he was going to be sick, but it was nothing he had eaten. It was a sharp pain that seemed to start in the very center of his body. It was difficult to breathe around it.

Or rather, if he breathed the sob that lay waiting in the back of his throat would come out and give him away. Quatre hadn't cried in four years. The experience was foreign to him again, uncertain and dreaded. He was a stronger person now, and certainly wasn't going to start all over again over something as petty as this.

A choked whimper escaped him, and he knew he wouldn't win.

•

"Sir—dear sir—why do you lie there so pathetic on your bed?"

"Why do you clutch you side so? Why do tears wet your pillow so?
Don't you know grown boys don't cry?"

"What is it that plagues you so? Sir—dear sir—tell us what."

"Sir—dear sir—tell us why."

I can't tell you, I'm afraid, only that I wish I could die.

"To join someone recently departed from us?"

If only it were that simple, perhaps my heart wouldn't hurt the way it does.

"Is it terminal, this disease? Is it contagious?"

"Have you been stabbed? Assaulted? I see no blood.
Or is it hunger that makes you act so wretched?"

Hunger . . . I suppose, but not for food.

"Then why, dear sir, do you suffer so? Tell us why."

So, you're determined to have it out of me.
What should I do? If I tell you, perhaps it will help ease some of this ache
To have out what I want to say, even if you can find in your hearts no sympathy.
But if I tell you, tomorrow I will hear my same words whispered in girls' ears
And meet with the boys' hostility everywhere—'You've deceived us.'
If I tell you, you'll just make fun of me—but I guess I can stand that
If you promise what I say never leaves this room.

"We promise, cross our hearts and hope to die. Stick a needle in our eyes."

"We won't tell. Just tell us, sir, tell us why."

Because my dearest friend, whom I love most in all the world
Hates me.

You see, he was the boy down the street, the person I had always admired most, my best friend since elementary school. My everything—at one time, at least. Our parents were, while I wouldn't say friends, on good terms, if not the same social standing. Their relationship was mutually beneficial, and so they encouraged ours, mine and his, with sleepovers, with model trains and rockets, and trips to the zoo. Things boys of ten like to do.

Then one day, in the year following his mother's death, I kissed him on the lips as a joke. We were alone in my house—as it seemed we often found ourselves—and sneaking a sip of father's Bordeaux. To my surprise, he kissed me back. But he was serious.

We were never the same after that.

It was nearing the date for the district's fencing tournament, and a crowd had gathered in the gym to watch the club practice. Quatre heard them applauding as Dorothy scored a touch in Quatre's side with apparent ease. "C'est la guerre," she teased with her throaty laugh. "I believe that's what you would say."

They took off their masks and shook hands, and Quatre acquiesced with a short chuckle of his own, "You've got me there." Then together they moved toward the sidelines, passing Heero and Trowa, engaged in their own bout, along the way.

At the bleachers, they were accosted by a gaggle of seventh-grade girls, who giggled as they cautiously approached. "Hey, Quatre," called one of the bolder ones with a rather wide grin on her face, and his futile hopes that they might have been Dorothy's fans instead came to a crashing halt. "Maria wanted to ask you something."

The girl in question blushed furiously and stammered, "I did not," while her friends relentlessly prodded her on.

Beside him, he heard Dorothy sigh with exaggerated impatience.

"All right, fine," said the one who had first spoken up. "I'll ask him. You're a friend of Heero's, right?" she asked Quatre.

"Yeah," he said. "What's up?"

"Well, Maria here was just wondering—" And here Maria turned such a bright shade of red that Quatre almost worried she might explode. "—if you would know if Heero already had a date for the Spring Ball. . . ."

"As a matter of fact, he does," Dorothy answered for him over his shoulder. Her look was indignant, but he knew she enjoyed giving the girls a hard time. She would laugh about it when they had left and insist they had never been like that when they were in the seventh grade. "He's going with Relena." Quatre could tell Dorothy was jealous of that fact, though that was no excuse to take her disappointments out on him. She grinned and pointed her thumb at him. "Quatre on the other hand . . ."

The girls' hopes skyrocketed before they even had time to sink. "You mean you haven't asked anyone yet?" A dozen twinkling eyes turned on him, no longer pretending they had really come to hear about Heero.

"Ah . . . no," Quatre said as he gave Dorothy a dark look. If he had played his cards right, he could have gotten away without saying anything. Think up something, quick. He decided to go for the riposte. "Because I was going to ask Dorothy."

Blocked! Her expression told him right off she wasn't even going to play along; he was on his own. "Waiting for the right moment, I suppose? Well, I'm sorry to break it to you like this, in front of everyone," she said, "but I'm going with Wufei Chang."

"No, you're not! When did he ask you?"

"He hasn't. But I was going to go ask him right about now."

She flashed Quatre a triumphant smile, and the seventh-graders giggled at his rejection. Now Dorothy was just being cruel, and she knew it. In fact, it was just her style to say something like that to see if it would fluster Quatre in front of the others. Or maybe it was to see how fast he could think on his feet. But his instincts kept him from doing anything but smiling unaffectedly. Dorothy shrugged.

But to soften the blow, she added quietly, "Hey. All's fair in love and war. Right? Wufei!" Wufei looked up from where he was tying his shoelaces. "Wanna spar?"

He snorted, and taking that as an affirmative, Dorothy left Quatre all alone.

On second though, not alone at all. Alone would have been a godsend.

"I can't believe you don't have a date yet," one of the girls beside Quatre said.

"Yeah, someone as popular as you," said another.

"You must at least have someone in mind."

He did. That person was fencing with Heero just a few yards in front of them. He wondered about what Dorothy had said to him just before taking off after Wufei. Was that a piece of advice? Should he tell the girls he couldn't take any of them to the ball because he was going with Trowa?

But when Quatre was confronted with that prospect, his heart leapt into his throat and his mouth refused to work. A defensive instinct. What was he afraid of? He told himself it wasn't shame that kept him quiet. At worst they would be disgusted with him if they knew and stop bothering him with silly questions about his availability—which would be a relief, come to think of it. But was it really worth the tradeoff?

Was it worth giving up something that felt so sacred?

"I heard Sylvia Noventa was going with Walker—even though he's two grades ahead of her and they have, like, nothing in common."

Quatre smiled. Was that a hint?

"Well, she is in AP Italian. . . ."

"Come on, Quatre!" said the first girl with a flirty laugh, leaning toward him. He swore she was loud enough for half the gym to hear. "Give us some idea so we'll know whether to keep our options open. You aren't taken yet, are you?"

A loud squeak startled them.

Trowa had lost his balance halfway through a lunge and nearly fallen on his face. His fumble allowed Heero a chance to score against him, but it was half-heartedly and with some visible concern for his opponent.

When Quatre looked his way, Trowa had already turned away and was nodding his reassurance to Heero; but despite the opaque mask, Quatre could sense Trowa's mood by his stance. In his mind's eye he could see the guarded, troubled look on his friend's face, as clearly as though there was no mesh to hide it. Quatre had seen it a hundred times before. He knew Trowa wasn't deaf.

The girls laughed.

"What a klutz."

"Yeah. But he is really cute. Maybe Maria should ask him out."

"Yeah, right. He'd probably say he was too busy studying or something to go. Anyway, I don't think he cares much about girls. . . ."

Quatre hated them then. They didn't know what they were saying, it was just careless teenage girls' banter, but he hated them nonetheless. Their mocking tone cut him to the bone, as though it had been meant for him by association. He felt terrible for Trowa, whether he hadn't heard or, worse, if he had. Quatre should have done something, for his friend's sake. He should have told the girls off. He should have told them that they were wrong about Trowa, and he, Quatre, should know. He should have gotten up and left them without another word so they knew exactly how much he appreciated their attitude. They would have deserved it a hundred times over.

But he didn't. And because of that, he loathed himself.

"Are you coming to watch the tournament next week?" he said kindly instead, desperate to change the subject.

It worked, and the girls were soon talking about fencing—though they knew next to nothing about the sport other than that they liked to see Quatre and some of the other boys doing it. It was agony when all he wanted to be was far away, with Trowa, proving to his friend how all they said were lies.

They raced each other to the hill, and to that spot on it on the far side where no one could see them. Hampered by his books and a violin case, Quatre was no match for Trowa, who waited for him patiently, his own bag thrown on the grass, a demure smile in his green eyes obscured every now and then by the breeze ruffling his hair.

It was that image that kept Quatre from going mad as he waited for class to end, gazing with longing out the classroom windows at the perfect spring weather. Catching his breath, he laid a chaste kiss on his friend's lips, and saw Trowa's eyelashes flutter as he breathed against Quatre.

Then he pulled away, and where Quatre thought he had seen a smile there was a coldness that defied the weather.

"How can you do that so . . . easily?"

"What do you mean?"

"Doesn't it feel weird? I mean, you were just flirting with those girls."

"I wasn't flirting."

A sideways glance made Quatre reconsider.

"Well, I didn't mean anything by it. I can't just ignore them, though. That would be rude."

"Now that you put it that way. . . ."

Trowa's sarcastic remark was interrupted by his plopping down on the grass with a deep sigh, and Quatre soon joined him. He had waited so long, it seemed, for this moment to arrive. Didn't Trowa know that? Quatre didn't want to have to think about anything or anyone else anymore.

"If I was flirting," Quatre at last consented, "it was only because I was thinking of you." They exchanged coy smiles and everything was right again. It didn't cross his mind that Trowa might have doubted his sincerity.

The afternoon passed slowly, the sunlight pressing down on them. Their jackets were draped over the lawn beside them, the sleeves of their shirts rolled up and their ties lying loose around their necks. Quatre lay on his side reading poems, his eyelids feeling heavier with each one. "Yes, and I left there fired by your charm, Licinius," the poet wrote, "and wit, so food gave poor me no pleasure nor could I rest my eyes in sleep—"

He felt as though the author were speaking for him, as though he had sat in this same spot long ago, lying beside that Licinius as he set down the words, and Quatre smiled as he read them silently.

His downcast eyes must have seemed closed in sleep to Trowa, who had stopped his scribbling a while ago and was tying knots in stalks of grass as he watched him. "You know an African lion sleeps an average of twenty hours a day?" he said.

The randomness made Quatre chuckle and he looked up sleepily. "That's the life."

Trowa lay down, scooting his body down to Quatre's latitude. He nodded. "But all they have to worry about is eating and passing on their genes."

Quatre closed the book and moved it above their heads out of the way. He was wide awake now. He raised himself on one elbow, looking for a sign that that invitation had not been all in his head.

But quite unexpectedly, Trowa said, "Let's go to Africa."

Quatre laughed. "Now?"

"What do you think?" Trowa smiled. "When we graduate."

Quatre laid his head on his stretched-out arm. The glimpse of skin beneath Trowa's untucked shirt tempted him and the smell of the grass was suddenly an aphrodisiac, but he merely stared with an ascetic masochism. Somehow, something in the way Trowa looked made Quatre feel he was no longer deserving of this prize.

Perhaps I should have noticed. Perhaps I did notice.

But if he really was that jealous of the attention I attracted, if he really didn't believe me when I said I didn't care about anyone else, all he had to do was say so, instead of leading me around. It wasn't like I hadn't experienced the same feelings myself. It hurts to be jealous of your own best friend. The guilt can just about kill you.

Heero didn't deserve the bitterness I felt toward him, I who had so long admired and looked up to him. It was no fault of his own he made Trowa laugh when I couldn't.

There was no denying the teachers adored Heero, always the top student and gifted to boot. In that way he and Trowa were two sides of the same coin, except one might say Heero's side always landed up. He played the organ in weekly mass, and practiced with us, I on the violin and Trowa on his flute. Together, the three of us were invincible. Solid as a triangle. But somehow I was always the one given the most credit for the performance. I was the one who received the attention that was rightly due the three of us equally.

The other two didn't seem to mind; acclaim never seemed that important to them. And I can't deny that I enjoyed being in the spotlight alone, and even began to believe in certain moods that I deserved it. I'm sure now that it was only because of my family name, rather than actual talent. But perhaps I felt the way I did because, deep down, my being singled out for praise only confirmed my distance from the other two.

Sure, Trowa had his friends among the scholarship students, and Heero it seemed preferred to associate with the high school kids when he wasn't following Relena around. But put them together and it was like they were in their own little world of taciturnity—of which I was not a part. Just a stranger looking in.

It was my fault I let it get to that point. I had plenty of opportunities outside the clubs to join them. But for some reason whenever I tried, fear would seize me. Fear that I would be intruding, or embarrassment to be seen with them by the wrong crowd in the wrong setting.

I don't know.

So maybe I couldn't help it. I was used to getting what I wanted the way I wanted it. I was weak. All I knew then was that I had to do something about it, even if it was something that affected only the three of us.

I hope you'll forgive me, Heero, for using our sessions together so selfishly. For turning everything between us into a competition. Don't blame Trowa, even though he shares the responsibility; it was my idea to start with.

We should have been there, watching and listening and providing our support while you performed your solo like friends are supposed to. We were listening, at least, you can count on that. We heard you playing very clearly in the next room, and your music was so strong, your hands moved so quickly with such mathematical accuracy it made my head spin each time Trowa kissed me. I only started it because I wanted him to know he was mine. And he responded so passionately, like when we played a piece together just the two of us, that for a moment I believed he was the one manipulating me.

Why did I have to go and question his motives? That's half the start of all this trouble, isn't it? It's just that you inspired something in him I never quite could. His pace, the way he'd move his hands over me—it seemed he was only imitating your music.

We thought as long as your playing drowned everything else out . . .

I thought maybe I could steal him from the world, from you, and nothing would have to change, and you wouldn't mind if I used you to do it.

Perhaps it was inevitable. That I would buy into Ohtori's nebulous promises and the illusion of the rose, the illusion of power that only binds me tighter to it, a vicious cycle like a serpent with its tail in its mouth waiting for the End of the World. It appealed to something in me, something that believed secrets could stay hidden indefinitely, if I only proved myself worthy of the perfection of my lies. Something that believed, if I only tried hard enough, I could win this game that I had started and take it all.

Not realizing I would only become trapped in this dream and not want to give it up. When did I start believing St. Gabriels was just a fond memory? Something existing on a separate plane from the life I had before? When Trowa arrived, it seemed as though no time had passed at all. But at the same time, it seemed like so long ago it might as well have been another lifetime, or the Paleozoic.

He had no right to come here and force our past on me like this. What was done can't be undone.

I don't understand why, then, if I had that impossible choice to make all over again, I would go back to the way things were, blindness and all. Lies and all. Jealousy and all. Perhaps I did notice before that everything was not right. But at least we could pretend we were happy back then, couldn't we?

I don't think even you could help us now, though. We might have all gotten along better with you there, our middleman, but now I wonder if your presence would have only made this animosity between me and Trowa more painful, with both of us wanting you on our side. At least this pain is real. At least this is genuine.

Is that why you left? They say animals can sense disasters before they happen. Did you sense this, Heero?

Two grand pianos played in the music room of St. Gabriels academy, bathed in the warm sunlight that shone bright through the spent rain clouds. It was difficult to keep track of the fast, complicated melody, and easy to get swept away. Quatre felt giddy as he raced to catch up with Heero, and in turn challenged his friend to match his own tempo.

Between them, Trowa paced, watching the hammers bouncing under the open lids like they were prize horses on a racetrack. He didn't give away the exhilaration he felt inside, as they all did, at the contest of skill. Eventually, it became too much for Quatre and he gave up in laughter, fingers tired out.

Heero and Trowa glanced his way, twin expressions of silent amusement on their faces.

It was different at home. Those weekends Trowa spent over on their holidays, they could sit for hours through the morning at the grand piano, tea growing cold on the table and the scent of wisteria drifting in from the veranda. The tone was different. Now Quatre played Debussys instead of Mozarts with Trowa sitting beside him on the bench, Chopins instead of Bachs. When there was a pause between songs, Trowa would shyly tap out a melody he had learned for flute, passing the time as though in a dream as they played—music or tennis or chess or video games, it didn't matter—waiting patiently for nightfall.

There was, in fact, no need to wait. Quatre's father was away on a business trip, his seven older sisters all out of the house at college, abroad, or with homes and families of their own. The large house was empty once again. Everyone trusted them enough to leave them on their own. After all, Trowa had been sleeping over since he was ten. No one suspected the context of their relationship might have changed since then.

No one suspected that those nights alone in that house, that quiet, straight-and-narrow boy would be stretched out on Quatre's bed, arching and sighing under him in the dark. He was content to let Quatre do anything. His breathing, steady and deep, was seductive in itself, his eyes half-closed, staring at nothing as he relished every sensation, falling within himself.

As many times as they were together, Quatre had to admit nothing had diminished since he had first realized he loved Trowa as more than a friend. The same nuances still created butterflies in his stomach: the subtle glances, the tension of a muscle, the touches that tried to be demure and platonic but mostly failed. Quatre never ceased to feel satisfied and privileged at moments like that, when he felt more needed and at home than in his own house—in his own world, with Trowa's arms around him, Trowa's voice whispering his name. Just knowing it was all for him. Every secret smile.

I never really did forget about him like I made it sound. But I suppose some things, some memories, fade with time while others grow out of proportion like an untended garden—especially the ones you least want to. When your back is turned and you don't notice, or perhaps when it's just too hard to care.

Trowa was never so cruel as when he was absent. When he was unable to defend himself from my accusations with that self-pitying manner of his that would have made me take it all back in a heartbeat. In my mind he was a villain, a part he played so well last weekend I felt quite justified in my casting him in it the year before. No doubt that was his intention. It would be just like him to play the Devil's advocate—the betrayed, righteous underdog of a Devil's advocate. To turn the crowd against the hero they once loved with those victim eyes. He knew just how to play his looks, and he knew just how much that riled me. He always had a melodramatic streak.

It was always so hard to tell what was real and what's a mask. Even when you think you have a person all figured out. . . .

I wonder if he thought the same about me.

It's funny how time can seem to overlap when you're least aware of it. How some days after I came here, I would find myself smiling as though he had just cracked one of his dry jokes, or turning to show him something that would have interested him, automatically, only to be disappointed to see no one, and to have to remind myself why he wasn't there.

Some nights I would almost swear Trowa was there with me, in my bed, resting beside me and teasing me with kisses that disappeared when I leaned into them. I could hear him saying my name more clearly than when I tried to remember his voice, and would catch glimpses of him everywhere. Sometimes just pieces: the curve of his lips, the hollow of his throat, those sadly smiling eyes. . . .

And then I'd open my eyes. It would all be a dream and I would be left lying there wide awake and ashamed all over again, only my own breathing whispered back to me from the creases in my pillow. It was a miracle I ever slept properly. I was pathetic.

I knew it was no ghost that was torturing me like this. No special telepathic connection spanning the distance. Nothing like that. It's just that I missed him so much.

Why can't I ever just tell him that?

At leisure yesterday
We'd much fun with my writing-tablets
As we'd agreed to be frivolous.
Each of us writing light verses
Played now with this metre, now that,
Capping each other's jokes and toasts.
Yes, and I left there fired by your charm and wit,
So food gave poor me no pleasure
Nor could I rest my eyes in sleep
But wildly excited turned and tossed over the bed, longing for daylight
That I might be with you and talk.
But after my tired aching limbs were lying on the couch half dead,
I made this poem for you, the charmer,
So you could spot my trouble from it.

"Quoting some else's poetry. Is that all you're good for?"

"Can't you come up with anything original?"

As if I hadn't heard that before.
And what would you have me do?
Tell me and I'll play your puppet, your fool.
God knows I am one already.

"What are you talking about? What's the point
Of all this namby-pamby—
This flagrant, vagrant sexual innuendo?"

"To get us excited, to gain our pity?
Because all you've made us feel is dirty."

"It's much more than we care to know."

"And you think, dear sir, that we've learned anything new
In all this time we've been here listening to you?"

But you haven't been listening! You asked for the truth, but you won't take me seriously. This is not something trivial for your amusement. I'm not trying to shock you.

Why do you think I've kept quiet for so long? I told you you wouldn't understand. No one does.

Apparently, not even I.

He was awake before dawn. Sitting up in bed, indecision kept him from doing anything else. The wind had stopped outside the dormitory window, but he could still hear the gentle hush of rain falling on the pavement below.

Beside him, tangled in his own sheets, Trowa slept like the dead. The shadows traced tattoos on his exposed back, his tousled hair spilled over his pillow like a mask that had slipped off.

Quatre felt an ache piercing his heart as he gazed at his friend's peaceful face. He could feel the combined heat their bodies had created in the night underneath him, and he wanted to melt back into it, even though sleep was the farthest thing from him. There was still time before morning.

He slid out of bed. The air was cold and he shivered under goosebumps. He fumbled for his clothes, tried to discern his uniform from Trowa's in the dark. He took it slow, as though hungover from everything earlier. There was still time to get out before morning.

Before anyone realized whose room he had spent the night in.

The funeral was one to be envied, if such could be said about funerals. No expense was spared to honor the deceased. The magnificent ceremony, the uniform transportation, the grand organ and choir that echoed in the rented-out church, the musicians and catering afterwards, the abundant white wreaths that looked as though they would tip over the tripods on which they were mounted—all were fit for a noblewoman, which Mrs. Barton had been in spirit if not by birth. This was how Winners honored their friends. This was how they grieved, by opening their pocketbooks and closing their hearts in ritualistic tradition, so the whole community could see for itself how dearly the deceased had been loved in life.

So many people had shown up, most of whom Quatre didn't recognize. They had probably seen the Winner name and come to take advantage of the Winner hospitality. Most probably didn't know the deceased at all: a piano teacher, by the name of Barton. Who among them could truly understand what she had been to his family?

Seeing his father, dressed in black, so grave, his sisters' reverence and grace when it came to greeting the guests, Quatre tried to imagine that he and his family, who were usually so distant from one another, were at least connected by their grief. But in reality, he was no more than a thin shadow of that tall, powerful man who kept his emotions in check so perfectly. It was Trowa's mother who had really bound them, and she was gone now.

He glanced at Trowa during the mass and saw his father's impassiveness mirrored there. Quatre's heart ached for his friend, more than he could bear. The bundle of white oriental lilies he held in his hand, promising the spirit's rebirth, were more an offering to him than the woman whose memory he would give them to. It wasn't the dead who needed comforting, after all.

There was a young woman present to whom Trowa spoke. She had come alone, sent with a black town car and driver. Her simple black dress might as well have been her Easter finest the way she wore it. The thin straps tied in bows on her shoulder, a white corsage pinned at the seam of one, little silver stars twinkling cheerfully from behind her curls. One of the eccentric Blooms. She was perhaps the only one who smiled through the entire affair, a sad smile of long acceptance and closure that set her apart from the rest. Her forget-me-not blue eyes and curly auburn hair, with no hat or veil to hide their youthfulness, were just as Mrs. Barton's would have been in her adolescence.

Quatre knew as he watched the two from a distance that they were related, but he didn't know how closely at that time. At that time, he didn't know that she was there to mourn the mother who had left her for a new family when she was only four years old. Perhaps if he had, he would have understood a little better.

Perhaps Quatre would have dreaded it when he saw her and Trowa together near the car, instead of watching with indifference, had he known it would have foreshadowed the boy down the street moving to the country far away.

They didn't mention the girl, the two boys, as they sat together later on a bench in the hall. As they removed themselves from the guests mingling over drinks and hors d'oeuvres. Not a word was said nor a look passed between them as they each sat in their own thoughts and muddled emotions. The lilies sat on his lap—Quatre had forgotten to lay them at the grave in his grief. It seemed so ironic, that something that smelled so sweet should be bought as a symbol for something so terrible, such utter emptiness.

"Your father's done so much for us," Trowa said at one point as he studied his shoes that had been polished to an obsidian luster. "She would have really appreciated it."

Quatre wanted to respond. Then, failing that, he tried to nod his agreement, but even that proved too much. Best not to move, he thought, as though it was merely a pulled muscle nagging him. But hot tears flooded his downcast eyes and sobs gathered in his throat.

He wasn't sure if it was a noise that gave him away, but Trowa turned to him instantly. Perhaps they were connected in some way, as they had often joked, that they could sense things about each other without needing to look or hear. In any case, Quatre saw the concern in his friend's olive green eyes—the concern for him and him alone, so pure and complete. It was more than he could bear.

And then Trowa asked him, "Are you all right?"

Lying crossed Quatre's mind on instinct. However, he shook his head, not trusting himself to speak. And when Trowa laid a hand on his arm, Quatre turned and clung to him.

He buried his face in Trowa's shoulder as the tears flowed, burning his cheeks and soaking the black wool of Trowa's jacket. Silent sobs wracked Quatre's body, until he was forced to take a breath and it gave his cries voice. This too he tried to bury. It was shameful to cry. But this was a funeral and no one was crying. He thought of his father, keeping his emotions in constant check so well. He thought of that Bloom girl and her Buddha smile, even Trowa sitting beside him. A mother and dear friend had died and not even her own children were crying for her.

Trowa's arms wrapped around him, holding him tight as though he'd never let go, and Quatre no longer cared about how he sounded. He could feel Trowa's loss in his embrace, in the heart beating under his, and it made his own suffering so much worse, doubling his burden.

"I'm sorry," Quatre said between sobs. "I'm so sorry." He didn't know what he was apologizing for. His words came out either too soft to be heard or, choked, echoed in the hall.

I never knew my mother. Perhaps that's why it was easy for me to put Mrs. Barton in that role. It was as though I had two parents who lived in separate houses: one who looked like me but was a stranger; the other, a trusted friend. She was always there—unlike my father. I remember being envious of Trowa sometimes, wishing we could trade parents. Thinking he wouldn't have minded too much: He and Father are so alike. In those few years—strange how that short time seemed like eternity and the years after to fly by—it felt almost like we were brothers. Maybe that's why there was never any awkwardness between us.

I didn't learn until some time later, when Irea told me, that Father's feelings for Mrs. Barton went deeper than they appeared. I'm not sure if he would ever admit it to his children—or if he even had to himself. Widow and widower—I've heard romances often spring up that way. But she was a good wife, faithful to her husband even after his death.

Her second husband, I should say. I considered her like a mother to me, yet it turned out I didn't even know her while she was alive. Not that that should come as a surprise. I hardly even know my own father.

I envied Trowa after the funeral, too. It was terrible of me to do so. But in my mind he was free.

And it wasn't fair.

It was after his mother's death that everything began to change: my relationship with myself, and with Trowa, and with my father. I began to think he would have rather had Trowa for a son over me. In the back of my mind I always knew that, though he still loved me more than he showed, I reminded him too much and too painfully of my mother. It wasn't that Father blamed me for her death, but . . . Well, we might as well face the fact: She isn't here because I am.

But that was no reason to take Trowa from me. My most important thing.

Why couldn't I have gotten a perfect score on my biology test like Trowa? Why couldn't I have won first place in the art fair like Trowa? Why couldn't I run as fast as Trowa's?

Never mind the times I actually out-competed him. Never mind our fencing bouts. I wanted to be able to show Father—to show everyone—there was one thing I could always beat Trowa at, no matter what, one thing they couldn't make me feel inferior about. Something neither he nor Trowa could take away.

But did he care?

Swordfighting was violent, Father said, and if there was one thing he hated, violence was it. If there hadn't actually been a club for it, he would have seen my passion for the sport as a symptom of a volatile personality that needed treatment. If Trowa hadn't been so excited to sign up—

I am the only son of a well-respected businessman with political ambitions, I remind myself. This pressure isn't just natural, it's justified. Certain things are expected of me, and falling in love with my best friend to whom my father constantly compares me is not one of them.

So, you see? I had to keep it a secret. For Father's sake, because his sake was mine and Trowa's.

And I was afraid.

There, I've said it.

I was afraid that no one would understand. I was afraid that if the truth was known, I would lose everything we had, everything I held so dear. Like walking a tightrope, the more people on it the harder it gets to keep your balance. The easier it becomes to slip, and just one little slip can ruin everything. And there I was, just trying not to fall, too focused on that to realize what was going on around me.

So I made it seem at school like I hardly knew Trowa as anything more than an acquaintance. Like our childhood get-togethers were simply for our parents' convenience, something we grew out of long ago. Like I didn't need to say more than a word to him in public.

Nor did I want to, but not because of any fault of his. I didn't think it was necessary. I thought he was in on the joke, that the two of us understood one another beyond the need for words.

Another lie I told myself.

I betrayed him. I know that now. I knew it then. Even though I would have denied it, I knew it in the back of my mind. Thou art truly a villain for that, Quatre. Foolishly I believed my denial was mine and mine alone. But does a man who denies his friends so that he might survive the rack really believe his heart can remain untainted? Does he really believe he can get away with it?

I honestly never thought that all the while I was trying to save what we had, I was destroying it.

What, that still doesn't explain why I left?

Don't you understand yet? I was trapped! I had to get away somehow. I was stuck carrying the weight of our relationship, and all the pressures that went with it, and I had to get out from under it just to survive. Anyone would have done the same thing.

. . . Wouldn't they?

Laughter across the courtyard made Quatre look up.

One of the voices without a doubt belonged to Duo, who, with his friends, had his lunch laid out on the steps leading up to the Humanities buildings. It was an unseasonably dry and pleasant October day and everyone who was anyone was eating outside.

The other voice that had puzzled him, he saw, belonged to a young man their age Quatre had never seen before. He was wearing a sky blue gakuran and was accompanied by a girl in a matching, rather revealing seifuku with puffy sleeves that made her stick out like a sore thumb among the conservative gray and maroon of St. Gabriels. The other boys, and most of the girls as well, were staring at the two of them, and Trowa said something that made the girl blush.

"Who are they?" Quatre asked, pretending only mild interest. "I haven't seen them before."

He didn't need to specify because the two girls had had their eye on the pair all morning.

"Oh, those two," said Dorothy. "They're exchange students. Just arrived today."

"They're from Ohtori," Relena added. By her look, Quatre got the feeling the name should have struck a bell. But it didn't. "Really nice people. You'd think they'd be kind of stuck up, but I didn't get that impression at all. Did you?" she asked, turning to Heero.

"That school has the highest standards for enrollment, according to everything I've read," was his ambiguous response as he rolled his lunch around with his spork. "They only accept students with exceptional talents or leadership potential. As long as their parents can afford it, that is."

"Don't be so negative," Dorothy said. "It's not like you'd have anything to worry about if you applied."

Heero merely shrugged as he stuffed a bite of salad into his mouth.

"I had phys. ed. with the girl," Relena said, "and she said it's not as strict as everyone makes it out to be. It might be worth looking into, doing some kind of exchange for a year or two."

Feeling left out, Quatre ventured: "And what is Ohtori exactly?"

"Come on, Quatre," Dorothy said with exaggerated shock, "don't tell me you haven't heard of the Ohtori Peers Academy! It's only one of the top-five highest rated private schools in the world. Very hard to get into and very worth it." He shrugged and she shook her head. "You're hopeless, you know that?"

Quatre nodded absently, for his mind was already beginning to drift again. It sounded like just the kind of school his father would want him to attend, and for that reason he was reluctant to be seen speaking to the exchange students. It bothered him that Trowa, on the other hand, who was normally so shy, was being so friendly with them.

There was something about them, however, that was so noble and cryptic that Quatre's interest was piqued, like they had come not from halfway around the world but from out of a different time.

Ohtori. He wouldn't forget that name.

When Dorothy caught him staring at the pair, she mistook his meaning. "They're getting normal uniforms tomorrow," she said, leaning toward him. "Too bad, too. I kind of like those ones."

"You would," said Relena. "I wouldn't be caught dead in a skirt like that. It's degrading."

"Yes, it is awfully distracting. Isn't it, Heero?"

Heero pretended he hadn't heard, but his cheeks colored faintly.

So I made a mistake. You can damn me all you want. I guess I've earned it. But I can't say it will do any good.

I can't see that there's anything I can do about it anymore.

Quatre managed to convince his father to hold the going-away party at their home. Of course, his father was either out or in his home office for most of the affair, leaving everything to Quatre's sisters and the recent graduates, who he preferred over Quatre and his classmates when it was time for him to make obligatory conversation. It was somewhat embarrassing, but the least of Quatre's worries. He could not enjoy himself, no matter what he tried, and constantly found himself back on the couch by the window with no memory of what he had been doing before, simply waiting.

In the kitchen, Une and Sally chatted with Quatre's sisters about starting classes at the university in the fall, and Dorothy teased an uncomfortable Nichol, whom she had known since childhood as the godson of her grandfather, Representative Dermail. Relena was trying to make conversation with Duo and his girlfriend, Heero and Wufei sitting awkwardly in the middle, only really excited when they could contribute some technobabble to the conversation.

But they were all having fun, the looks on their faces told, especially when Mr. Howard, everyone's favorite teacher, showed up in the afternoon with graduation and going-away presents—as though this was just a carefree party like any other, not a time for farewells.

Someone turned on the stereo, there was laughter, and Quatre looked up to see Hilde asking him if he wanted to dance. It was a pity invitation, and he appreciated her concern though he declined.

"When's Trowa going to get here?" she asked with a sigh, and Quatre felt sorry for her, because he had invited her as a favor to his friend and she hardly knew anyone at the party well besides Duo and Wufei.

"He'll be here," Quatre told her, hardly in answer to her question.

Barely a minute later, he heard the hum of an engine, and car doors slamming outside. His sudden excitement must have shown through his veneer of indifference, but Quatre didn't care as he hurried to the foyer. His heart was racing despite himself with anticipation.

But when he saw the tall young man who came through the door, long blond hair in a loose ponytail, sporting expensive clothes and shades, the keys to an expensive convertible dangling from his fingers, the sudden disappointment hurt almost more than Quatre could bear straight-faced.

"Hey, Mr. Winner, we're here!" the senior called into the house as Noin shut the door behind him.

"Milliardo," Quatre's father called back from the kitchen, "did you get more ice?"

"I bought two bags, just in case."

"Let me take them," Quatre offered. If he made himself look busy, maybe they wouldn't notice his mood.

But it was too late. "You okay? You look pale," Milliardo remarked when he had taken off his sunglasses.

"Nerves," Quatre lied. He forced a smile, at which the other nodded with understanding and pushed a gift-wrapped hardcover into his other hand.

"Our going-away present," Milliardo explained. "Relena says you love the Classics. It's a limited edition printing."

"Thanks," Quatre said, feeling that one word incredibly insufficient. He set the gift on the table, taking Noin's bag of ice off her hands, and noticing a flicker of gold on her left hand before she could hide it. As Quatre went to the kitchen, he glanced over his shoulder as Milliardo hugged his little sister, received a hearty, congratulatory handshake from Quatre's father, and made himself perfectly at home.

Presently the sparkling cider came out, and over an early dinner the conversation became animated, the memories flowing as easily as the drinks for toasts.

Watching their faces, Quatre once again felt like a stranger in his own home. It was a plague on his mind he had often tried to cure by willing himself to cheer up—he felt guilty for not giving his classmates enough in return for their friendship—but any success was only temporary. Out of the context of school, he didn't know how to act around them. He was at a loss when Wufei tried to strike up a conversation with him, or Duo, even though that amiable young man had always made Quatre feel welcome into their circle.

His real reason for inviting them Quatre couldn't admit, just as he couldn't tell Relena and Dorothy why he had insisted on hosting the party himself: He had hoped it would make Trowa feel obligated to show up. After all, Trowa had promised he would. It was the most direct thing he had managed to say to Quatre since the night of the spring ball, so it had to be true.

Or so Quatre told himself. Repeatedly. He wasn't used to his plans falling through.

Dinner came and went, but there was always dessert. A dramatic entrance was what was needed, at sunset, last-minute when no one expected it. Stepping in to handshakes and hugs and toasts. Trowa smiling. The crowd moving to the backyard for final good wishes before they would all go their separate ways.

But dessert came and went as well, and eventually so did the guests. The last stragglers helped Quatre and his sisters clean up while his father sat on the veranda with Mr. Howard and Milliardo. Relena had gone home earlier with Dorothy, and Noin could only give Quatre sympathetic glances every now and then, lately afflicted by some strange shyness he knew was connected to that band of gold he had only managed to glimpse.

At this melancholy part of the day, it was a good time for a late arrival, for disappointment turning to joy like the switch of a light. Having to spend the night because of the time, because the taxi driver had gotten lost and he was out of money, or too tired from riding his bike the whole way. No need for apologies for one night, it would be the last in too long a time.

Quatre should have known better than to get his hopes up.

"I wonder what happened to Trowa," Irea said later as she wiped the last of the dishes. A late-night variety show could be heard in the next room over. The glasses clinked against each other as she placed them in the cupboard. "Do you think maybe he came down with something? It's not like him not to call."

Her words, however kindly meant, cut deep. Quatre wasn't sure what time it was when he finally went to bed.

•

It was late. That was all he knew.

And he was wide awake. The tears he had shed—how long ago was that? a few minutes? an hour?—had soaked into the bedsheets as the sweat soaked his skin. No cool breeze to evaporate it. Quatre wasn't getting to sleep any faster lying still, stuck to his clothes, but he hardly had the energy or will power to move. His eyes focused on the stereo display still glowing, still playing classical music he had given up listening to. If it stayed on all night and he slept through his alarm . . .

Feeling numb, as if in a dream, he slowly raised himself into a sitting position. He turned off the stereo.

Then stopped. The Moroccan-bound book Relena's brother had given him a year ago lay on the table next to it, innocently. Tauntingly. Quatre couldn't remember putting it there. But he must have. There was no one else here to move it.

He opened it with a sense of dread and excitement both, yet could not stop himself—like a man who, though aware of the terrible consequences, finds himself unable to do anything but walk through the door leading to his own doom.

Familiar words assaulted him. Odi et amo. I hate and love.

"I hate and love," Quatre read silently. "Perhaps you're asking why I do that? I don't know, but I feel it happening and am tortured."

They had read that piece together so many times, he and Trowa, marveling at the depth of emotion described with such simplicity, not thinking much of it, so that the page in Quatre's old paperback edition had become creased.

Now it seemed to him like an old friend stabbing him in the gut. He had been afraid to let the words sink in; now he had no choice but to face their brutal truth. Quatre had spent so long thinking up excuses, building up his reasoning because that was just the kind of person he was; but in the end those carefully erected reasons only left him feeling even less justified and less sincere. Hiding behind them had not made him stronger. Quite the opposite. He had been so immature, to think he could blame everyone else for his own mistakes. Or that he should blame anyone at all for his feelings. Yet to be able to accept that what had happened was his own fault seemed intolerable.

It seemed like the end.

Quatre rubbed his eyes, which were painfully dry now. He let his arms fall into his lap as he stared at the far corner of the room. At the open books on the desk, the white uniform clinging to the foot of the bed, the large single room with the large bed he didn't deserve any more than anyone else did, just because he had been appointed class representative. He didn't even know what that meant, now that he thought about it.

For the first time in almost a year Quatre asked himself, What am I doing here?

For the first time, he couldn't come up with an answer.

Chapter notes: "At leisure, Licinius, yesterday . . ." is Catullus #50 as translated by Guy Lee. Quatre quotes it twice, but leaves out the name the second time. Like the one in part 3 it is spoken to a male friend. The ending lines go like this: "Now don't be rash, please—don't reject/Our prayers, we implore you, precious/Lest Nemesis make you pay for it./She's a drastic Goddess. Don't provoke her."

"Odi et amo. . . ." is Catullus #85.