Chapter Thirty-Four

You Never Loved Me, You Just Wanted . . .

Rin and Iroha didn't notice Yuki and Piko enter, and the serious vibe inside the room prompted them both to stay silent. Aria was downstairs making a phone call after picking them up after school.

"It turns out that the reason Len and I took so long to get back together was probably that he felt too guilty after sleeping with Gumi to face me," Rin murmured to Iroha. Yuki's face went red as she heard them referencing sex, but she knew this was too serious a moment for her to get too embarrassed. Still, listening to them talk about that with Piko standing beside her was incredibly uncomfortable. "And I guess he lied to me, too, when I asked him if I was his first time, too."

"He probably wanted to forget it ever happened," Iroha replied in an attempt to comfort Rin. "After all, who would ever want to remember sleeping with Gumi?" Iroha shuddered with a joking smile to try to break the tension, but, seeing that Rin couldn't be cheered up, her face grew sombre once more.

"It's my fault, really," Rin murmured, hugging her knees tightly to her chest. "We'd made a promise before the Gumi thing that it was how we'd celebrate making it to two years, so of course it would be frustrating for him that I wouldn't let him anywhere near me after that night."

Piko was fidgeting uncomfortably, but Yuki was suddenly too caught up in her thoughts to feel awkward. Len and her auntie had slept together? Didn't that mean that Len cheated on Rin? Yuki had never thought he'd do something like that. He didn't seem to be the type at all.

"It really sucks, though," Rin continued. "I mean, it can't be helped, but I really thought I was his first time. I should've just gotten over it and kept my promise to him."

"Rin, you can't be blamed for being skittish afterward," Iroha reasoned. "No one should have expected you to be fine after something like that."

"He was right, though," Rin argued. "I didn't trust him anymore. I couldn't trust anyone after that. I didn't trust you, Len, Aria, Leon, anyone, and that wasn't fair of me. Just because Gumi had broken my trust didn't give me a right to stop believing in everyone around me, people who had done nothing wrong."

"Len still shouldn't have . . ." But Iroha trailed off, seeing that Rin had fallen to silence with a contemplative look in her eyes. "What is it, Rin?"

Rin smiled bitterly and left a simple statement with an implication anyone, even Ryuto, could've inferred. "Len was too frustrated to bother taking any precautions before they did it."

Iroha blinked for a while. She obviously couldn't believe what she was hearing. Yuki couldn't, either. Was Rin saying that Gumi got . . . pregnant? Or was Yuki just severely confused? Piko's widened eyes said that she wasn't, if he and she were both understanding correctly.

"You mean Ryuto?" Iroha questioned. "But he . . ." She went silent again, because Rin was shaking her head.

"Not Ryuto," Rin responded slowly. She smiled, this time a touch of sweetness to the bitter, and continued, "Let's just say that Len's final gift to me meant more to him than I ever really realized."

Iroha had gone silent, understanding immediately. Yuki had no idea what they were talking about, so she looked to Piko. He was staring at her in disbelief, causing her to become even more confused. "What?" she mouthed to him. What was Len's last gift? She didn't understand at all. Iroha cleared it up in an instant, though.

"You mean Yuki is . . . ?" she gasped, gazing wide-eyed at her roommate. Rin nodded in response, and Yuki understood. Len and her auntie. There was a reason they'd always visited her. She wasn't just some kid. She was their kid.

"Gumi put her up for adoption. She didn't tell Len until Yuki was three or four, at which point Len had wracked up too many debts from school to even consider adopting her."

"No," Iroha murmured, shaking her head as a panic filed her head. "No, no, no." She grabbed Rin by the should and begged, "Please, Rin, tell me that you're lying. Tell me this is all just a joke."

Rin smiled resentfully and responded, "I wish it was."

Iroha's head fell then and, still gripping Rin's shoulders, she murmured, "Rin, we're going to lose Yuki."

Rin's confusion mirror Yuki's own as a cold chill ran through the young girl. They were going to lose her? What did Iroha mean? Rin searched for the answer with a simple, "What?"

"When I chased after Gumi that day, she told me that she was going to take Yuki from you. I didn't take her seriously then, but if Gumi is her biological mother than maybe that means she can take her back."

Everyone fell into silence then. Yuki listened to the clock ticking. Tick tick tick. Her auntie was going to take her? Tick tick tick. She wouldn't get to stay with Rin and Iroha anymore? Tick tick tick. They were going to let her be taken away? Tick tick tick. She was going to lose them, like she lost Len? Plip plip plip. No! It wasn't fair!

Once Yuki noticed she was crying, she couldn't stop herself from breaking into sobs in the doorway. Rin and Iroha finally noticed she and Piko standing there then and ran to comfort her, though Piko was already holding her and comforting her.

It wasn't fair. She was going to be all alone again. Gumi was going to take her mothers away from her. It wasn't fair! She wanted to be with Iroha and Rin! She felt so completely helpless, because, just like with Len, there was nothing she could do about it. She was stuck with a fate she could do nothing to control, and she was going to lose everything she loved for the second time in a year.

. . .

"Yuki, come back! You're gonna get in trouble!" Neru hissed quietly as Yuki climbed the chain-link fence that circled the schoolyard as she and her friends were meant to be playing at recess the next day.

"But there's something I gotta do," Yuki responded back to Neru, who had luckily been the only one to notice her slipping away. "Tell everyone I went to the bathroom, okay?"

Neru shook her head violently and wondered, "Did that awful woman do something to you? 'Cause running away ain't gonna solve anything."

Yuki frowned back at her friend once she'd hopped to the other side of the gate and could lower her gaze to meet Neru's. "Mom didn't do anything. There's an actual awful woman who's trying to, though, and I gotta stop her."

"Well you can't go alone," Neru reasoned, and before Yuki could stop her, the smaller girl was already halfway up the fence.

"W-what are you doing?" Yuki questioned, widening her eyes at Neru as the other girl hopped over the fence and into the snow below.

Neru grinned a toothy smile and responded, "I'm coming with you of course. It's too dangerous for you to go alone."

Yuki pouted but didn't try to stop her from following. She knew Neru would cause a fuss if she did and cause Yuki to get caught. Instead, she simply accepted this fate and told Neru, "We're going to my adoption agency. I gotta talk to Miku."

Neru blinked at her for a moment and then exclaimed, "Aha! So the awful woman did do something!"

Yuki shook her head and insisted, "No, it's another really bad woman."

Neru stopped speaking for a while to consider this and then wondered, "So it's the other woman that always come to get you?"

Yuki blinked at her and questioned, "Iroha or Aria?"

Neru seemed to choose one at random. "Iroha."

Yuki responded immediately. "No."

"Aria, then."

Yuki was silent for a bit, because she admittedly still didn't have much affection for Aria given how Piko wouldn't shut up about how pretty she was, but it still didn't merit her being called an awful woman. "No."

Neru groaned in irritation and questioned, "Who is it, then?"

"Ryu-chan's mom."

With that statement, Yuki decided to share with Neru everything that had been going on lately as they walked. In the end, she was actually quite relieved that Neru had insisted on coming along with her. It was a comfort to know that her friend was with her. She hadn't wanted to admit it, but she had been incredibly nervous about doing this. Not only was she afraid of getting lost (Neru was good with directions), but she didn't know what she was supposed to say when she arrived, and she probably would have gotten shy and backed out the moment she got told down. With Neru there, though, she knew the other girl would keep pushing and help her along. It really was a great help to her.

It was mid-afternoon when they found their way to the agency, but Miku came to them straight away when she heard that Yuki had come without her parents. However, to Yuki's surprise, her anxious behaviour had nothing to do with Yuki having come alone (Neru didn't count as accompaniment apparently) and, rather, she dropped to her knees at eye level with Yuki with a concern Yuki found vastly unmerited.

"Did she do something again, Yuki?" Miku questioned right off the bat. "Don't worry, we'll get you out of there as soon as possible. Please just bear with it for a little bit longer, sweetie."

Yuki narrowed her eyes in confusion and wondered, "What are you talking about?" She obviously wasn't talking about Yuki's auntie.

"Your teacher told me about those cuts from before," Miku informed her, stroking Yuki's arm in a misguided attempt to comfort her. The cuts? Was she talking about that time Rin threw the plate? But that was so long ago. "You'll never guess what happened, though, Yuki." She grinned broadly, expecting her enthusiasm to pass on to the child, but Yuki was only growing more and more tense. Neru sensed this and had decided to remain quiet for once. "Remember that nice woman that always came to visit you? We've been talking, and she'd love to take you in. You'd have a little brother, too."

Yuki jerked away from Miku. No. She wanted to give her to Gumi? "I wanna stay with Rin and Iroha," Yuki informed her.

Confusion crossed Miku's gaze, then sympathy. "No, sweetie, it's okay. They won't be able to hurt you anymore. I'll make sure of it."

"They've never hurt me!" Yuki yelled, knowing that wasn't entirely true, but still. Neru took over then, probably noticing that Yuki had started shaking.

Grabbing Yuki's hand to guide her away, Neru snapped at Miku, "You adults are all the same. You don't understand anything, do you?"

Thus ended their short, fruitless expedition, because Neru pulled Yuki back outside, telling her not to talk to Miku as Miku tried to get her to come back and talk to her. Yuki was in a state of disbelief. Miku was trying to give her to Gumi? What hope was there, then? Yuki was going to lose her family. She knew she was about to cry, so she stared down at her feet and let her bangs fall in front of her eyes.

"Hey, watch it!" Neru snapped, and Yuki suddenly felt herself being jerked away. "Let go of her!"

Yuki was too terrified to scream, though she tried to. She couldn't get a sound to part from her lips, though, until a voice pierced through her eyes. "Calm down, you brat. I'm her mother."

Yuki felt anger flush through her, and she glared up at Gumi, joining Neru as the other girl shouted, "You're not her mother!"

"Rin and Iroha are my mothers!" Yuki snapped.

Gumi just glared at her, and Yuki lost her ability to speak once more. That was the look of a monster, she thought, and she found herself cowering in fear as Neru placed herself between them. "What were you two doing just now?" Gumi asked. They were a fair bit from the agency, so she couldn't have known anything, right?

"We were going for a walk," Neru spat back as Yuki mouthed words, unable to get past that. Why couldn't she find her voice?

"I meant at the agency," Gumi said coldly, narrowing her gaze further.

"Yuki doesn't wanna go with you," Neru argued, ignoring the question.

"Well there's not much you can do about that," replied Gumi, shoving Neru harshly out of the way. In a flash, Yuki saw stars, her vision going black as she squeezed her eyes shut on sight of an oncoming hand. She felt the skin on her cheek rip. A moment later, she felt her sleeve being pushed up, and a sudden onslaught of heat fell over her arm and splashed onto the ground below her. The harsh scent of black coffee hit her nose as she opened her eyes to see Gumi's blank expression gazing at her, and empty, disposable coffee cup in the hand that wasn't holding up Yuki's sleeve. "I mean, look how much harm Rin has done to you."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Neru exclaimed, scrambling to her feet and tearing Yuki away. "You did that! I saw it!"

Gumi's face morphed into a sinister one with a dark smile as she looked straight at Yuki while she responded to Neru, "No one will believe you, though, after everything that Rin's done." Her gaze softened a little as she told Yuki, "I truly am sorry that you had to get involved in this though, Yuki. I don't care for you one way or another. It's Rin that I've truly wanted all along."

With that, Gumi turned and walked slowly and deliberately away. Neru didn't part from Yuki, but she did shout abuse at Gumi the entire time the woman was in earshot. Yuki, however, couldn't seem to find a single word to say to represent the deep cut Gumi had lain on her heart.

Author's Note: Gumi was wearing a ring, btw, which is how she cut Yuki's cheek. Also shout-out to Nekofan123, the one who's nagged me time and time again to write this story and is the only reason I never discontinued it :) Thanks for always messaging me about the story!