A/N: I looked again through the YYH section, as I haven't been through it in a long time. It's still rife with OC's (Not that that's inherently a bad thing...) but it's almost like looking back at my middle school days. I'm glad people still read and watch it, still are fans of it, even thought it's not like a lot of anime/manga nowadays getting remakes and new OVA's. Really says a lot about it!
School was never the easiest, but now it was harder than he remembered. The kids in Masaru's class liked to pretend he wasn't even there, while lumping on him all the chores. At first he stuttered and accepted it, but by the time they assigned him extra cleaning duty at the end of the day, he'd had enough.
"It's not my turn!" He snapped. "Do it yourself!"
He could tell he'd only made the girls angry. Their faces dark, they called after him when he bolted from the classroom.
Not everyone was horrible to him, but the others just stayed away or whispered. He thought he'd heard some pity from one, and it had shamed him. Maybe he shouldn't have gotten in that fight, but he didn't regret standing up for himself. His mother would understand, even if she wouldn't approve.
He stopped for a breather just inside the doors. He was going to go home, shove his bag away, and pretend school didn't exist for awhile. Yusuke would try to get him to do his homework – and Yusuke was really annoying when he wanted to be – but Masaru might sneak away to the arcade. Its not like he had club duties or chores anymore.
"Hey, Masaru!"
He glanced over his shoulder to see Satou, the boy he'd used his Spirit Gun on.
"Leave me alone," He said, quickly going for the door. There weren't as many people outside as he'd thought there would be, and a hand jerked his shoulder around, sending him stumbling.
"Masaru the crybaby is running away?" Satou frowned down at him. His friends looked various degrees of unfriendly. "What are you going to do, cry again?"
Masaru's nostril flared as he resisted the urge to point out that he'd done a lot more than cry, but then he felt a flash of guilt. That wasn't something to be proud of, he reminded himself. He'd betrayed Yusuke's trust and used something dangerous for something petty. S
"What do you want?" He asked sullenly. He wouldn't get into another fight... He'd messed up once. He didn't want to have to tell his mother it happened again.
"I want to know what you did," Satou demanded. "I know I didn't trip."
"I'm telling you, I saw a blue light," One of his friends muttered resentfully. Another one elbowed him in the ribs and hissed, "Don't be stupid! There was no light!"
"Maybe your feet are as big as your head," Masaru replied, hands sweating. "It sure looked like you tripped to me."
"I was pushed!" Satou exclaimed, stepping forward into his personal space threateningly. "I felt it! It was like somebody hit me over the head with a baseball bat! I had to go to the hospital, and I had a concussion for days! Do you know what kind of headache I had?"
He shoved Masaru for emphasis, and Masaru stumbled.
"Everyone saw I was too far away. I never touched you," He said, knowing he wasn't lying but still uneasy about it.
"Maybe he's a demon," One of the other boys, the one who denied there being a light, chuckled lowly. "Like the ones on TV, except he's not cute at all."
"I am not!" Masaru's voice rose. There was a small stab of panic at the thought of being believed to be a demon. He'd never thought – never considered – but they'd seen something strange so it wasn't so weird they thought maybe he wasn't human. But he wasn't! He never would be!
"Yeah?" Satou shoved him again. "Demons can do things like that though, can't they? And what if there really was a light? Yeah, I bet that's why. Is that what really happened to your mom, demon-kid?"
For a moment, Masaru didn't see anything, as if his eyes had gone blank with the noise crowding his head. Anger flooded him, weighing him down until his hands were lead and his feet were cemented to the ground, but then he felt the overwhelming need to move. To rush the other boy, knock him down, wipe that laughing smirk off his face and -
"Hey!" Someone shouted at them. "What are you doing over there?"
The boys that had half surrounded Masaru immediately backed up, and an older boy appeared that Masaru recognized instantly.
"We're talking," Satou said calmly. "What does it look like?"
"Not peacefully," Shuichi replied. "Why are you ganging up on him like that? Go on, before I get a teacher."
The other boy looked rebellious, obviously sizing him up and considering his options, but Shuichi was obviously older than them. They left with one last look at Masaru, and he knew with cold certainty that it wasn't the last time he'd heard that name.
"Are you alright?"
"I'm fine," He said through gritted teeth. His fists still trembled with his desire to use it.
"You don't look fine," Shuichi frowned, shifting his bag. "What was that all about?"
Masaru didn't want to talk about it, but Shuichi was the only kid close to his age that he talked to anymore. His friends had made up excuses, started avoiding him. Yusuke was nice to talk to but talking wasn't really his strong suit.
"They made fun of me. Of my mom," He said, shoulders drawing up. "We... We got into a fight, last week. They remember."
"Bullies," Shuichi snorted. "But obviously you did well, or else they wouldn't have needed so many more boys than you, don't you think?"
Masaru opened his mouth and then shut it. He hadn't thought of it like that.
"Thanks," He eventually managed. "But they're only going to keep bothering me."
The prospect made him glum. He was never that popular but he'd never been the focus of so much ill-will before. They way the others whispered, avoided him, subtly made things harder... And it wouldn't go away, no matter how much he pretended school didn't exist when he wasn't in it.
"Probably," Shuichi agreed after a slight hesitation. After a moment, he put a hand on Masaru's shoulder and began to lead him to the school gate. "Can I tell you a secret?"
Curiously, Masaru nodded.
"I understand what it's like," Shuichi said. "I've always gotten pretty good grades – especially once my brother started helping me – and they like to pick on kids like me. Bullies, that is. They're always there, no matter how old you are."
So, he could expect Satou, or boys like him, to always be around? Masaru didn't like the sound of that.
"If I was tougher, they wouldn't pick on me," He asserted, thinking of Yusuke, who he couldn't imagine ever being bullied. At least, not by anyone other than Keiko.
"The teachers don't like that," Shuichi shook his head. "If you stick out like a nail, they'll hammer you back down. I don't know the secret either. My brother... He's never bullied. He's so cool all his classmates love him. I asked him once how he does it, but he just smiled and said he'd never noticed. I thought maybe that was it – not caring about what other people think."
"Did it work for you?"
"No!" Shuichi laughed. "Not at all! It just made them angrier, and no matter how much I pretended I didn't care, it wasn't true."
"If you're trying to make me feel better..." Masaru trailed off with a frown.
"I'm probably doing a horrible job," Shuichi nodded. "I'm sorry. I'm not very good at giving advice like that, which I still have the problem too. But I have more friends now than I use to, and that's helped. It's not as bad anymore."
"I had friends. They don't talk to me anymore."
"Maybe you've outgrown them," He said. "Sometimes people grow, but not everyone around them does."
So, he needed new ones? Easier said than done when nobody else wanted to talk to him either, Masaru thought. They had kept walking, past the school gate, and he realized that he didn't recognize their route anymore. "I think I missed my turn."
"It's okay," Shuichi smiled. "Let's go to my house. We can play games again."
Masaru hesitated to accept, worried that he was being pitied again. He had just been talking about his lack of friends, but he didn't need someone to offer just because they felt bad for him. Especially not someone like Kurama's brother, who was older than him.
"We're friends, aren't we?" Shuichi asked when he didn't immediately answer. "You might have outgrown the others but I'm older than you. You'll be catching up to me yet."
"We've only talked twice," Masaru pointed out.
"Our brothers are friends. Why not be too?"
"Yusuke's not-" He stopped. "Okay."
So they went to Shuichi's house, just as prim and nice as before. It was strange, being there as an actual guest rather than a small tag-a-long. He wondered why Shuichi wasn't hanging out with his own friends, the ones he'd mentioned he had.
"Shuichi?" Mrs. Minamino appeared when they walked in and her son called out a greeting. "I thought you had club today?"
"I didn't want to go," Shuichi said, exchanging his shoes. "Half of them weren't going to be there today anyway, so nothing was going to get done. Masaru and I are going to play games in my room, okay?"
"Oh," She looked at Masaru as if just noticing him. She looked tired. "Alright, but only after you finish your homework."
Both boys heaved sighs, but she only smiled and disappeared. Masaru stopped long enough only to call Yusuke and let him know where he was before they started on the homework.
They worked on it together, and Masaru was lucky to have someone older there to help him. Yusuke was absolutely useless for it. It should be simple even for someone who'd never finished high school. He suspected that Yusuke skipped school more often than he had let on.
"My brother aces all his classes, all his tests," Shuichi confided. "I don't think he's ever gotten less than a perfect score. Mother never makes me feel bad when I don't, but sometimes..."
He didn't finish, but he didn't have to. Masaru sympathized, but his mother had never been as pushy as some of his classmate's. She helped him with his work, made sure he completed it and encouraged him, but she never got upset when he didn't get in the top percentiles.
Except that one time that he had completely and utterly failed a big test. She'd been angry then.
"Ku – Your brother seems really smart," He caught himself. Remembered that Kurama seemed to have some kind of connection that Yusuke relied on for information.
"He's awesome," Shuichi sighed. "He's smart, and handsome. Father cares for him like he was his natural born son. Sometimes he's a little hard to believe. Sometimes I wonder if he's got any flaws at all."
"He's not?" Masaru blinked. "Actually related, I mean."
"Of course not," Shuichi smiled despite himself. "Do you think I could be related to that? Besides, our parents have similar humor, but I don't think they would name both of their sons 'Shuichi' on purpose. They married a few years ago."
"Oh," Masaru said. Considered how Kurama stuck out sorely when compared to his family with his strange coloring. How oddly perfect his little brother saw him, and his impressive intelligence.
How was he connected to Yusuke, truly? He must have gotten involved at some point without his family's knowledge – and that meant he was sneaky enough to keep it from them while dealing with whatever had crossed his path. Yusuke seemed like a 'hit first, questions later' type of person, but not Kurama.
How did anyone get involved with demons? Was it through unfortunate circumstances, like himself? Was there some sort of hidden ring he just didn't know about?
How did one become a Spirit Detective, or whatever Yusuke was?
Eventually, he and Shuichi moved on to playing games. This time, Masaru could enjoy it much better. Last time he had been impatient, worried about his mother and waiting for Yusuke, who had set him away. He had forgotten Shuichi's impressive collection until he laid eyes on it again.
Mrs. Minamino came with snacks at one point – by then he was in the highest spirits he'd been in days – still looking tired but wearing a kind smile. While they played, she looked over their homework, sitting on her sons bed.
"You have very good handwriting for your age, Masaru," She said.
"Thanks," He pretended his cheeks weren't burning. It was just handwriting, after all. When she left after giving her seal of approval, he said, "Your mom is nice."
Shuichi agreed distractedly, too busy beating Masaru.
He didn't realize how fast time went by until he glanced over at the window and found the sun completely gone. The alarm clock by the other boys bed read just after eight.
"I didn't notice!" He exclaimed. "Yusuke hasn't even called? I should get back!"
"I'm sorry, I didn't notice either," Shuichi said, but Masaru didn't mind. He was proud that he'd done so well in the games that he'd been a good challenge to someone who could play almost whenever they wanted.
He usually never stayed out so late without talking to his mother beforehand. That Yusuke didn't even seem to mind, must not have if there was no sign of him, was strange. He would have thought he'd be excited, liberated at the freedom, but he didn't.
Downstairs, he went to put on his shoes as Shuichi went to find his mother and let her know, when he heard a loud, "Mother?!"
The alarm sent a chill down Masaru's spine. He set his shoes back down and cautiously followed the sound.
Mrs. Minamino was asleep at the dining room table. Perhaps it wouldn't have been strange, if she weren't so pale and Shuichi wasn't lightly shaking her shoulder. She moved around limply, as if separated from her body and unable to respond.
Masaru saw a flash of his mother, laying on the kitchen floor, and swallowed thickly.
"This is weird," Shuichi muttered, glancing at Masaru as if afraid to worry him but frightened despite himself. "I know she was tired, but she's always been such a light sleeper even when she's exhausted..."
"I think you should call your brother," Masaru said through a dry throat.
"Yeah. He'd know."
While Shuichi quickly picked up the phone and began to dial, Masaru came close enough to see her dark hair, falling into her face, move just barely with her breaths. He had no idea to check her condition, how to tell if she was suffering from the same thing his mother did.
By appearances alone, he would say she was, and that terrified him. Was it because of him? Because he was there?
There was a demon. There had to be. Somewhere in the house, there was a demon.
"Brother!" He heard Shuichi say in relief. "Listen, mother, there's something... I don't know, I can't wake her up, I'm not sure what to do."
There was a pause of listening, and if he concentrated, Masaru could hear the faint sound of Kurama's voice.
"No, we came downstairs – Masaru and I, he came to visit – and she was at the dining table. She's been tired all day but now I can't wake her even if I shake her. She looks pale, but... No... No... What? Why?... Shuichi...?... Brother...?"
Shuichi drew the phone to look at it blankly. He glanced over. "The call dropped."
Masaru swallowed again, and felt a prickle on the back of his neck.
