As the first handful of dirt was thrown down onto the black lacquer caskets, the sun sank below the horizon. A gentle wind was blowing, moving each blade of grass sweetly. People walked past Tskui somberly. A person would squeeze her shoulder as they passed, perhaps mumbling a few words of condolence. All of them were thinking: 'How sad, so young …and no family now…'

Tskui had sat at the funeral quietly. She didn't feel Aidan's arm around her, his voice murmuring into her ear. Tskui cringed away from the attempts at kindness. She shrunk from even the kindest of words. She knew that these people meant well, but she couldn't bear to be around them. They wouldn't pity her if they had known that it was her fault. Her mind was numb with guilt.

The only person she would let near her was Aidan, and her hand was held tightly in his.

Everyone was gone now, leaving her alone with Aidan and her parents for a final farewell. She dropped to her knees. Ignoring the cold dew on her knees, she took two white roses and crushed the petals in her small pale hands. The fragrance of roses, her mother's favorite scent, wafted on the dusky breeze as she dropped them onto the shiny black surfaces.

Her eyes felt hot, but she had no tears left to cry. She felt Aidan's warm hands fall upon her shoulders. The warmth from his fingertips seeped through the silk of her blouse, and she was glad for it, bringing up one hand to rest on his. As the first star peeked thought the curtain of night, Tskui said her last goodbyes.

"Mama, Papa, in death, may you find peace… Oyasumi…"

Kissing her palm, she laid it on the smooth white marble of their marker, and stood. Aidan wrapped his arms around her, and smoothed her hair.

"All right there, 'Kui?" he asked softly.

Tskui looked up at him, and her lavender eyes welled with tears. Her hear felt near to breaking, and Aidan had been her rock over the last week. She melted into him, burying her face in his chest as her body wracked with sobs.

So cold… her body felt so cold and her soul felt alone. She couldn't bear to spend the night alone in her parent's house. It had been cleaned of all the physical evidence… but the horrors still resided there.

"Please," whispered Tskui into his jacket, "I- I need…" She looked up. "Can I stay with you tonight?"

Aidan looked down at the girl he had loved from the moment they had met, and his heart ached to see her look so lost. He brushed back a strand of hair and tucked it behind her ear, watching the rising moon illuminate her tear-streaked face. In this moment, he couldn't deny her anything. He nodded.

"Come on," he said, leaning so close he could feel her warm breath against his face. "Lets go home."

For Tskui, that kiss was the beginning of the end.

--

Aidan gazed at the angel sleeping beside him and felt his heart swell. Outside, it was still dark and a soft rain was falling against the windowpane. The silky trails of water on the glass painted soft shadows across the small of her back. His fingertips explored the small patterns, swirling around the tattoo on her right shoulder blade, identical to his. Her silky skin looked like milk in that light.

He loved her. He would do anything for her, but he felt that even now, when they had been as close as two can be, that he was losing her to her darkness.

He wanted to hold her and keep her close. He wanted to protect her from all the hurts of the world. As she moved a little in sleep and whimpered, he wrapped his arms around her, trying to soothe her back to peaceful slumber.

He fought off his own drowsiness, holding her head close to his heart. But soon, he too nodded off to sleep and awoke to light splashing liquid gold over his Tskui's ivory face. Her eyes opened slowly; sleepy lavender orbs. She smiled sweetly and snuggled closer into his embrace. They stayed that way for a long moment before she moved.

Planting a kiss on his forehead, Tskui reluctantly reached for the bedspread. She stood up and was uncaring of her nudity.  She lazily searched about  for her clothes on the floor. In the late morning light, the small pink scars from her recent ordeal were visible as she walked. She still felt stiff and sore if she moved a certain way. She slipped her panties on over her hips and pulled her camisole on over her head. She was already hunting for her skirt when Aidan saw fit to awaken fully.

"Morning." She whispered softly, not wanting to wake his parents if they were home.

"Morning," he yawned, standing up and wrapping his arms around her. Tskui dropped the sock she was holding and kissed him briefly on the lips.

"Enough of that!" She laughed, swatting playfully at Aidan's hand, which was creeping slowly toward her bottom.

Aidan smiled. He was glad to see some of the old Tskui returning, even if slowly.

 "Now, you going to feed me or what?" she teased.

--

It was another week before Tskui felt comfortable to return to school. And as she walked through the double doors, the normally loud and lively bedlam of the commons went quiet. Whispers echoed in the building and one or two people came up to her to offer condolences.

She swallowed past the lump in her throat and made her way to the cafeteria, where she had arranged to meet Anna and Aidan for breakfast. When she arrived the two of them were deep in conversation. She had to clear her throat loudly for Anna to look up from her workbooks. Tskui had expected at least a smile or a pat from her best friend, but all she got was a curt nod.

 "What's wrong with her?" She thought mildly annoyed. But then Aidan looked up at her and his lopsided grin sent butterflies through her and she forgot everything else. Almost.

That day was one of the hardest days of her life. In Orchestra it was a free day, and so Tskui couldn't lose herself in the music. Her classmates continued coming up to her, the nice ones anyway, to offer condolences. This only continued to remind her of her loss, and by lunch, she was very much ready to go home. Her small support group of friends gathered around her during lunch, fending off the curious as she sat and picked at her lunch. She hardly even tasted the little she even consumed and was grateful for Aidan's comforting arm around her.

Her friends distracted her so well she didn't even notice that Anna was absent from the meal.

It wasn't until fourth period, the last of the day, that Tskui heard the whispers about her. Now that the shock of having a murder in the community, the cruel hearted-ness of others shined through. A girl in her class, not usually known to spread gossip, whispered a little to loudly to the boy behind her.

"Have you heard?" she whispered.

"Huh?" the boy replied in his normal voice.

"I heard that the police are watching Tskui's every move. They think she is the one who killed her folks."

"No way!" said the boy loudly. He was hushed quickly when Tskui turned her head to look at the two of them with barely contained tears. Her hands were shaking and her throat felt tight. If this is what people were saying while she was in the room… what were they saying when she wasn't there? Tskui gathered her things and ran from the room, despite the teacher's protestations.

Tskui ran through the halls of the school, searching for a sanctuary. She knew from what Aidan always said that the computer labs had no fourth period classes, and as she reached the science and mathematics wing, she saw by the darkened rooms it was so. She ducked into the Comp-Sci lab and closed the door noiselessly behind her. Expecting to see the room empty, she turned to see Aidan with his back to her and Anna in front of him, facing him.

Anna caught Tskui's eye and one corner of her mouth turned up into a smirk as she leaned in, wrapped her arms around the tall redhead, and kissed him passionately. Aidan's arms moved up to her shoulders, and Tskui turned and left the room quickly, her mind spinning.  Anna's golden laughter could be heard nipping at her heels as she hurried away.

My god… not them… together... how could I have been so damn stupid? All those times when they had to 'study' for programming. And to think I- him- we… after all we shared he did this to me… I gotta get out of here.

Tskui felt as if she was going to be sick.

This was too much… just too much. She ran from the school entirely, tripping and falling over

herself. She didn't feel the pain as she scraped both knees. She didn't know where she was going, blinded as she was by her own tears, but she ran and ran until she found herself in

Kinnear Park. Collapsing against a tall pine tree, she lowered herself to the ground and sank into the damp grass. Her breathing was uneven and difficult.

She couldn't believe that he could do that to her. That she could do that to her. Her best friend and her first love, her first everything. Her mind refused to accept the concept of life without her parents and out-and-out rebelled against the thought of life without love and friendship.

She wanted to die, but she was too much of a coward to hurt herself. If a bolt of lighting had come from the sky and struck her down, she would have been glad.

It was in this moment of darkness that she remembered the letter she had gotten the day before her parents died. It had been an offer to send her to Tokyo as an exchange student. She still had the letter in her binder, and she took it out to re-read it and all it's fine print. She had to send a reply postmarked no later than March 19th, 1995. That was today.

In moments, she had filled out the required information and begun her walk towards the nearest post-office. She wouldn't have to see anyone here ever again.

She was going to Japan.