Chapter Ten
That Came Out Wrong

"What could you have possibly been doing for three hours after dusk?"

"It was only two hours and forty-five minutes."

"Close enough! What were you doing? I've been worried!"

"Ryou, you're acting like the parent of a teenager. I took care of myself five thousand years ago: I'm fairly sure I can take care of myself now."

"But…but…now there are cars...and…and…there are guns…and cars…"

"You've already mentioned…" Bakura recalled their first conversation. "Oh."

Ryou nodded.

So there was another thing he was afraid of: losing someone else he cared about to a car accident. "I'm really sorry. I lost track of time."

"But you had to notice that it was getting dark!"

"Yes, well…" Have to tell him sooner or later. He gave an almost nervous laugh. "I got stuck on the roof of a docking house."

For a few moments, all Ryou could do was stare in wonder. Finally, he regained his voice. "You got what?"

Bakura sighed. "Story time, I suppose. All right, in the note, I told you I was going out. I decided to go out because Marik came here last night. He sort of challenged me to a fistfight—"

"A what? Why?"

He grinned. "I called him weak. Anyway, we made bets, and mine was that he stop breaking in—"

"Wait," Ryou interjected, a terrified expression crossing his face. "You mean you haven't been letting him in?"

Bakura's eyes widened. "I thought you knew." Of course he didn't know. Twice Marik's come in at night, and the other time I had just gone downstairs to leave. Of course Ryou would have convinced himself that I've been letting Marik in.

"Marik's been breaking in? How? How has he been breaking in? Do the locks work? Did he get in through a window? HOW?!"

"Teleportation?" he tried.

Ryou jumped up and ran to the front door, and the back door, and every window, searching for any possible way Marik may have gotten in. Eventually, he returned to the couch, where Bakura had patiently remained. "There's no sign of forced entry."

"You see? It's fine."

"No! It's worse not knowing! What if someone else were to get in the same way?"

"Ryou, I hardly think that…" The look on the boy's face stopped him. Ryou was honestly afraid. "Why are you so worried about someone breaking in?"

He looked down. "Because I'm always alone. If it were to happen, there would be no one to help me."

Bakura frowned. "You're not always alone. Just yesterday we were still sharing a body."

"But we're not anymore!"

"You were afraid, even before."

"I didn't trust you before."

"Then…" Bakura stopped as Ryou's words sank in. "You trust me?"

The boy nodded. "Why wouldn't I?"

For a few moments, Bakura was speechless. He'd thought about Ryou's faith in the people he knew. But it had never really crossed his mind that he—a five-thousand-year-old thief—was really one of them. "People generally break in at night," Bakura said quickly, changing the subject. "Except for Marik," he muttered under his breath, "who seems to come in whenever he pleases."

"What's your point?"

"If it would really make you feel better, I'll stay in the house at night, dark to dawn."

Ryou blinked. "You would?"

"Yes."

"Did you ever go to sleep last night?"

Bakura hadn't even thought about it, but now that he did… "No. I'm not even remotely tired. Though my arms do hurt from that rope."

"What rope?"

"Now that we've gotten past Marik breaking in, I'll continue. My bet was that he stop breaking into the house, and I won. Out of curiosity, I asked him what his bet had been. He would have sooner had me wrench it from his cold dead hands than hand it over. I finally got it, and he had—you'll love this—indirectly bet me going out with him."

"What's so bad about…wait, what?" Ryou tried to give the words another meaning, but couldn't' find one. "You mean, like a date?"

"Yes, I mean like a date. Technically I had no reason to go, but I was bored, so I did. We climbed some crates and a crane to get to the top of the docking house, and sat up there until dawn. He fell asleep; I had a few hours to myself; I complained about being hungry; he forced me to go to a restaurant; he annoyed me into letting him buy me something to distinguish myself from you—"

"Huh?"

Bakura reached down beside the couch and pulled the clothes out of the shopping bag. Between himself and Ryou, he laid a pair of black jeans, a gray t-shirt, and a black jacket. "People shouldn't be able to confuse us now."

The boy tilted his head in wonder. He saw a correlation between the clothes and their owner: dark, with a lighter side that would remain almost completely hidden.

"What is it?"

Ryou didn't want to admit what he was really thinking, so he hurriedly replied, "There's no red. I thought you said red was your favorite color."

"I think my eyes have it covered. In case you haven't realized, I'm very proud of my eye color. I wouldn't want to draw attention away from them by…Ra, I sound like a woman. But you remember Sunday…wow, just yesterday…you remember that the first thing I wanted was to know my eyes were red? I like my eyes." He copied Ryou's tilted head. "But that's not what you were thinking about."

"What?" Ryou asked, trying to maintain a steady tone. "Even if I hadn't been thinking about it, how would you have known?"

"Your aura changed when I asked. And now it's even more obvious that you're lying. Just tell me." He stared at the boy with raised eyebrows. "Trust me, Ryou, you can't top Marik's bet by honestly saying anything less than that you're actually a serial killer in hiding."

True… "I noticed the similarity between the clothes and your personality."

"Is that all?" Bakura chuckled. Why would he be so reluctant to tell me that? "I'll finish my story. It was seven o'clock when I realized I'd left my blue jacket on the roof, so we went back to get it. While we were up there, the crane moved more than half the crates and parked quite a few buildings away."

"And you didn't notice this until after the fact?"

"Oh, we noticed. But there really wasn't much we could do about it. So I climbed down Marik's backup: the rope. I got to the arcade and was attacked by one of your fangirls."

It had taken him a moment to notice, but Ryou suddenly realized that something was missing. "Where's your other jacket?"

"Let me continue. Marik saved me from the attack; it was lucky I'd been in so much of a rush to get back here that I left the clothes at the docks. We didn't know which way to go from the arcade, so we went all the way to the museum. Apparently you have to pass the park to get to your house from there—"

"The party…" Ryou muttered.

"Yes, the party. Marik and I ducked into an alley, where I gave him the jacket. He got the girls to follow him. So then I was lost again. Finally, I came across the game shop. So, that is what I could have possibly been doing for three hours after dusk."

"Won't you get bored sitting here from dark to dawn?"

"What?" Bakura asked, taken by surprise by the unexpected question. Good thing I don't have any tea.

"You said you aren't even tired, even though you haven't slept yet. Won't you get bored just sitting here for eight or nine hours?"

"I can entertain myself."

"How?"

"You have a full bookshelf."

"Bakura, I know you well enough to know you can't sit reading a book for eight or nine hours."

"I won't have to. You'll be awake for three or four of those hours."

Ryou's face clearly showed his shock at the comment, not so much at the words themselves, but at the subtle sinister tone he'd heard in Bakura's voice that made all the difference in the connotation. "What?" What is he implying? Maybe, answered the other half of his mind, he wasn't just making sure you didn't fall again. Maybe, it said, you were WRONG. He suppressed a wistful sigh. Don't I wish?

Damn. I didn't mean to say that. And certainly not that way. "That…that came out wrong," he lied. "I meant to say that…I meant…" There was no way to twist his words to be any less suggestive. He groaned. Stupid, stupid, stupid. His other mind spoke up. Or was it? Pay closer attention. You were just using his aura earlier. Use it again. Annoying as the voice—he imagined it to be like either the angel or the devil, probably devil, sitting on his shoulder—was, it had a point. Bakura focused on Ryou.

His concentration was broken by an all too familiar voice. "Ryou, your fangirls are absolutely terrifying."

Bakura whipped around to see Marik leaning against the wall, still wearing his jacket. He jumped up. "Three things, Marik: What the hell are you doing here, when the hell did you get here, and how the hell did you get in?!" Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Ryou cringe with every hell. If he hadn't been so furious, he would have felt bad. But Marik had picked the wrong time to break in.

Marik shrank back. "Um…I'm returning your jacket, just now, and I used the key."

Ryou's eyes flashed. "What key?"

"There's a key over your door." He held it out to Ryou, whose hand flashed out to take it. "Your father left some sort of note on it."

"A note?" He turned the key in his palm and saw words engraved into it.

I know you'll probably end up locking yourself out at some point, so I'm leaving this for you so it doesn't end up being so big of a problem. --Father

"Wh-why would he…? I have a—"

"Ryou, I don't think he realizes that you keep it clipped to your belt loop. Though I can see you losing it anyway."

Ryou looked up at Bakura. "How do you know that I—"

"We shared a body for quite a while. I think I've had time to pick up on most of your quirks." He looked at the clock. "It's eleven. You should probably make your tea and go to bed."

"What? Why?" He hurried out of the room when Bakura shot a just-do-it glance at him.

Bakura waited until he was sure Ryou wouldn't be able to hear him before speaking. "You know that you've had him terrified, don't you?"

Slowly, Marik came closer, once again looking like he expected to get his throat slit. "How?"

"By letting yourself in. I told you he's scared of someone breaking in."

"I didn't know that until this morning."

"You did it again, just now."

"I thought he would be asleep. I didn't want to wake him up by ringing the doorbell."

"Every light in the house is on, and you thought that he was asleep?"

Marik shrugged. "I can sleep with the sun in my face. I figured Ryou might have fallen asleep waiting for you."

"Bakura," came Ryou's voice from the kitchen. "Where did you put the teapot?"

Marik snickered. "You made tea?"

With a growl, Bakura replied, "Yes, I made tea. Just a minute!" he called before turning away from Marik and entering the kitchen, where Ryou had opened every cabinet.

"It's not in any of them," he said as Bakura walked in.

"Are you sure? I could have sworn it was in this one…" Bakura reached up over Ryou's shoulder; he placed his other hand on the counter to keep his balance, effectively trapping the boy between the counter and himself.

Ryou tensed as Bakura leaned closer, trying to see the higher shelves. He tried not to think about it. He didn't want his aura giving him away again, however that worked. But it was impossible to slow his heart as Bakura came back down with the teapot in his hand.

"Sorry. I guess I slid it too far back." He set it on the counter. "There you go." Bakura could see a slight flush to the boy's face. Only then did he notice how near they were. NOW! his other voice shouted. You can find out what he was thinking earlier NOW. But he ignored the voice's suggestion. Who cares what he's thinking? This is just too easy. Bakura fought against himself. It would be so simple just to lean forward and take advantage of Ryou's mild disposition. But he's just a kid, he told himself. So is Marik, retorted the other voice. Marik is a very different kid. You were thinking that he's just as childlike as Ryou. In his own way. I think they may share this aspect of their innocence. Which side are you on? The side that says, "Go for it." How did I know? He stepped back and turned away. Not here, not now, if ever, he thought. Wuss, scoffed the other voice. Bakura was so lost within his mind he ran straight into Marik as he turned the corner. He shook his head to clear it before looking up at the boy. "What are you doing standing here?"

"Um…here's your jacket?" he tried.

Bakura grabbed the front of Marik's shirt and pulled him along. "Ryou, I'll be out back if you need me!" he called over his shoulder.