I didn't understand the strange excitement welling up in the pit of my stomach. I hated sports. I hated them in Egypt as a child and I hated them in modern times. I always preferred games to athletics, but Kek's fight was the next night and I was excited for him, or maybe I was excited about the fact that Ryou was about to surprise him with the robe and shorts he made Kek for the match. We all took the night off from work (and the next for the fight, but Kek didn't know that detail).

I was used to gifts coming with a terrible cost. Zorc Necrophades promised to gift me with power and I lost my mind because of it. And in return, any gift I ever tried to give- say, turning certain friends into dolls for a certain landlord- was twisted, just as I had been twisted by the Ring. So this, giving a gift for the sake of it, without dark motives, without hidden costs, was novel to me, and therefore interesting.

I sat on the couch, on arm slung around the back and one leg stretched out on the cushions. Ryou knelt on the floor in front of a long, unadorned, ivory-colored box. Kek wandered out from the kitchen with his cup of protein-laced oatmeal, rubbing his bleary eyes with a fist. He reminded me of an angry, cartoon lion trying to wake up.

"Sit down, Kek." Ryou patted the floor beside him.

Kek nodded, his spikes of hair bobbed with the gesture, and he sat cross-legged next to Ryou.

"Yeah, we need to talk, anyway." He sat his oatmeal aside and drew on the carpet with a finger. "I'm sorry, and if you're mad it's okay because I should have told you weeks ago. I suppose I should have told you that day, but . . . I'm not, I mean I didn't, I can't—"

A soft look lit up Ryou's face. He really did look like a fallen angel at times, pure white with hair glowing platinum from the morning sun spilling through the window.

"Open the box, Kek."

He snorted. "You're going to want to hit me with that box in a second."

"I might surprise you."

He plucked at the carpet, as if the beige fibers were blades of grass. Kek took the box, stalling his confession.

"Ryou, you should know that tomorrow . . . I'm going to—"

Ryou pressed his finger to Kek's thick lips. "Shhh, open the box."

"But this is important—"

Ryou pressed a kiss into his lips. "It's okay, trust me and open the box."

I smirked, keeping my mouth shut. Kek gave up and removed the lid. His eyes widened at the sight of the glossy, dark purple fabric. Ryou insisted the color was eggplant, looked dark purple to me.

"What's… this?" he asked.

"It was Bakura's idea. I've been working on it all week."

Kek lifted the robe out of the box and fondled the silky material. His fingers traced the golden phoenix embroidered on the back. We tried to make it look like his cloak from battle city – reborn as a boxing robe. Intimidation was useful before a match, and I remembered the sight of him during our Shadow Duel . . . intimidating, yeah, he can pull that look off well, as well as I can pull off snarky, facetious confidence.

"You . . . made this?"

Ryou smiled wide and nodded his head. "Mmm-hmm, for your bout tomorrow."

He looked at Ryou, surprised. Then he turned and glared at me.

"You told him?"

I shrugged. "He thought you had Orthorexia."

"Oh." Kek sighed and looked back at Ryou. "I didn't want you to worry, but all I did was make you worry about the wrong thing."

"I was angry at first," Ryou admitted. "Not because you agreed to fight, but because you didn't tell me." Ryou toyed with his fingers, visually nervous. "Can I watch you fight?"

Kek frowned. "You don't want to watch that."

"Yes I do."

"I could get hurt . . . or hurt someone else. Not- not because I want to, not like I wanted to hurt people before, but it's still a fight, so..."

Ryou nodded. "I know, but I want to cheer for you either way."

Kek worked the carpet with his toe as well as his fingers. "You're not . . . afraid?"

Ryou scooted closer. "Are you afraid? Do you think fight will make you miss hurting people?"

Kek stared at his hands, like the first day we came back. It was like he was trying to fathom that he had his own body that he didn't have to share, like he was trying to learn how to make his own decisions for himself.

"I thought about that. I was worried my first few weeks but not anymore."

"Then let me cheer for you."

Kek wrapped the robe around Ryou's shoulders and pulled him close. He nodded and they kissed. I was glad to be on the sofa. It was fun to watch them, but it was too lovey-dovey for my taste. What I wouldn't have given for a nice, infuriating argument at that moment, but not with either them.

I settled for asking Kek, "what about your hair?"

He broke out of his Ryou-kissy-trance and scratched his scalp. "I was just going to put it up in a band."

I shook my head. I tried, damn hard, not to listen to their sports mumbo-jumbo when we drank, but I still knew that his hair had to be out of his face, and a simple band might not work when the fight got started. I rolled my eyes.

"Bring me a comb and some of Ryou's hair ties."

He looked suspicious. "What are you going to do?"

That made me play with the carpet, digging my toes into the fibers. Why can't the idiot just do what I asked? I didn't want to admit to doing something nice.

"Maybe you could go somewhere to get it done?" Ryou suggested.

I snorted and crouched beside them, taking a different lock of their hair in each hand.

"Have you ever noticed the difference in texture?"

I had. My fingers had yanked and tugged and pulled at both of their hair on too many nights to count. Ryou's hair was soft, silky, like spider threads. Kek's hair was also soft, but like willow rods. You could move it, but it'd only whip back in place the second you let go.

"Just because you can embroider silk doesn't mean you know how to felt wool. No one in Domino City is going to know what to do with your hair, Kek," I said.

"And you do?" Ryou laughed.

I let go of his hair and coughed into my fist. "My mother used to braid my sister's hair. I only watched, but I bet I can do a better job than some chatty, Japanese hairdresser."

They were quiet, and they stared at me. I never talked about my family before, not specifics. Kek broke the moment by getting up then and fetching the comb and hair ties. I sat back on the couch and he sat on the floor in front of me.

It was hard to admit that I fucking cared enough to try braiding his hair. You'd think I would have accepted my own feelings after two months, but it was still hard to admit that they were close to me. It was still hard to admit that my life had gained some semblance of normality. It was still hard to admit that I was happy. Marik remained a continuous, gentle ache in the back of my mind, but he was more like a dream I had at night while Ryou and Kek filled my days.

I ran my fingers through Kek's hair a few times, massaging his scalp. On a weird impulse, I leaned forward and inhaled the scent of his hair just for the joy of doing it before I started sectioning his hair into rows. Tilting his head sideways, I began at his hairline and selected a strip at the front of the row and split it into three strands. I braided it close to the scalp, supplementing additional hair to the three strips as I worked my way back.

Kek admired his robe as he let my fingers twist order into the chaos of his locks. "Why a phoenix?"

"Well," Ryou answered, "you were the only one to merge with Ra. It seemed to suit you- um, Bakura, are you corn-rowing Kek's hair?"

He asked in English so it took me a moment to understand what he said. I worked on the third row, my fingers fast a dexterous. They hadn't forgotten at all, even after three thousand years, picking locks, disabling traps, lifting jewels off of nobels for no other purpose than the bitter satisfaction the moment of pettiness gave me, my fingers remembered how to move fast. And I remembered how my mother's fingers wove just as quickly through my sister's hair- not white like ours, but black wool. Our mother said it was the hair of her mother, from deeper south in Kemet.

"I don't know?" I said to Ryou. "My mother called it braiding."

"Yeah, but it's – wow. Wow. I need a video of this."

I scowled but kept my fingers working as Ryou pointed his phone at me.

"Seriously, what is with you and your video fetish?"

"I need a video of this or I'll never believed it actually happened."

I started on the fourth row. "He can't fight with his hair in his eyes and a stray punch can knock a band loose."

"My oatmeal." Kek folded the robe back into the box and took his bowl, trying to hold still while I tamed the wiry mess of yellow into cultivated rows.

I snatched a peevish look at Ryou's camera. "I bet you still have the first video."

"I erased it from my phone."

"After copying it to your computer?"

"More than once in case you decided to delete it."

"I still don't understand why this entertains you."

"I don't think I can explain." Ryou gestured with his free hand as if movement could explain better than words. "It's . . . not what I'd ever expected."

"When I'm done, I'm stabbing your other hand through a game tower."

"Kek will protect me."

"Bakura, I 'd rather not kick your ass the day before my bout. Just play Monster World instead of stabbing him."

"But that's how we play Monster World."

"He's kinda telling the truth." Ryou said from behind his camera.

I was halfway through the mess of yellow. It was relaxing, weaving and sorting and weaving more. I think Kek felt the same way, because after his oatmeal he closed his eyes and breathed deeply as I continued to twist my fingers through his hair. I had the most stupid urges to kiss his forehead, but I was in a rhythm and refused to break it until every last strand was locked away in braids. I pulled all of them together and tied them up to keep them out of Kek's face. Because his hair was stiff, the braids stuck out of the ponytail in a spray of braided gold.

"Done."

Ryou turned off the camera and touched Kek's hair. "It feels neat."

Kek patted his own head. "It kinda does."

With his hair braided back, I realized his features were broader than Marik's, his nose a touch more flat and his eyebrows and lips were thicker. For some reason I was glad that the gods made him different. He deserved it; he was too good to be a copy.

And, although I told myself not to think it, I couldn't help noting that -when I finally saw Marik again, when I touched his face although I've touched Kek's face a hundred times- everything was going to feel new.