AUTHOR'S NOTES:  Ack!  I just read the fourth book, and everything in this fic is so wrong.  But now, there're no spoilers, right?  I'm going to use books 1-3 for this fic, and enter only the characters in those books.  I know that the stuff will be separate from the real story, but it's more fun this way, right?  Even so, this is an alternate universe fic; it can't be wrong, or can it?  Wanna hear something that is wrong?  My favorite pairing is Tatsuya and Kira!  *Dodges stones and bullets, not to mention threat notes and bombs*  I'm sorry!  I'm PROBABLY not going to make this Tatsuya/Kira, but that's my favorite.  Sei/Kira isn't too bad either, but everyone wants Rei/Kira.  So it could be that, too.  I won't be a conformist!  I'll do what I wish (because I don't really know where this fic is going)!  What do you guys think?

What Wasn't Meant to Be by Sushifishie

Chapter Four: Brother's Keeper

"So, you really moved out?" Kira asked Sei.  They were sitting at a table in the science lab, sketching a particularly interesting experiment.  There were flowers in glass cases growing next to different varieties of rotting fruit.  It didn't smell very good, but the flowers were a beautiful subject.

            "Of course," he replied with a grin.  "Rei was really happy about it, too.  He wanted to get out of that apartment as soon as possible.  The only reason that he was staying was because I was there with him.  It's not too bad living on our own, though."

            Kira smiled a little before saying, "You do the cooking, right?"

            "Naw," he said shaking his head.  "We don't really cook, mostly just microwaving and eating out.  I did make some cup ramen last night!"

            Giggling a little, Kira went back to her sketch.  It looked very different from Sei's point of view because they sat on different sides of the flower tank.  Not only was the lighting different, but also the perspective of where shadows and separate petals fell.  They were going to compare afterwards and discuss the properties of shadowing and smearing.  Coming from different schools, they each had different art experience and had fun sharing knowledge with each other.

            Sei offhandedly glanced at his watch and then let out a small gasp.  "Sorry," he said.  "I've got to go, at least to tell Rei that I'm going to stay late to finish this.  The flowers will have been shifted by tomorrow, don't you think?"

            "Probably," she agreed.

            "I'll come right back," he promised her, dashing out of the room.  He fled down the staircase and out into the front lawn.  Almost colliding with Tatsuya, he stopped himself just in time.  He looked around for his brother and couldn't find him.

            "If it's Rei you're looking for," Tatsuya began, "He left already with some 'Rika' girl.  I think they were going to a karaoke."

            Sei nodded his head in thanks and slumped back to the lab where Kira was packing up her things.  Seeing this, Sei asked, "Are you leaving me behind, too?"

            She looked at him in puzzlement for a moment before replying, "I've got to make dinner tonight, so I'm leaving now."

            Sei stared at her for a moment before asking, "Well, can we walk together, at least part of the way?"

            Kira smiled and bobbed her head, "Sure!"

            They went to their lockers and got their books before proceeding out of the school.  Once they were outside of the gate, conversation struck up again.  "So," Kira began.  "How exactly is it that you came to live on your own?"

            "Do you want the basic gist, or the long and complicated version?"

            "Umm, somewhere in between."

            Sei took a deep breath before beginning his tale, "Dad and Rei have never gotten along well at all.  Actually, they kind of hate each other.  Anyway, I think basically that it's just been rolling up into one big ball of hatred, and it's finally just burst.  Rei's always done stuff that makes Dad mad.  Once he threw a mud pie on my dad's suit and boy did he get it for that!"  Kira let out a little giggle and then gestured for him to move on.

            "Well, they've gotten more vicious in the past few months, ever since Rei got injured in the accident."

            "Accident?" Kira asked alarmed.

            Sei looked down and shook his head.  "He flipped over on his bike and broke his collarbone.  Dad's never been one to like racing, I mean, he practically forbade Rei from riding in the first place, but after that accident, he didn't want Rei to ever ride again!  In the hospital, he rested and eventually got into his normal patterns again, save the motorcycles.  But then our friend Kyoko, a motorcyclist, got married to a guy named Akitaka, who also is a biker."  Sei paused to take a breath and looked up at Kira.  Her attention was focused completely on him, and was obviously finding his speech incredibly interesting.  But, then, who wouldn't?

            "He met Dad one time when Kyoko and him visited our apartment, and he hated the guy.  He didn't even try to hide it from me or Rei, just open hatred.  This encouraged Rei to take a stand against Dad, or something, because he started secretly going back to the racetrack with Akitaka.  I covered for him and everything because I know how much he loves the circuit, but what could I say when the guy asked where my brother was, and that if I didn't tell him, he was calling the police?  So, Rei got in trouble with Dad then, too.

            "There were lots of other little instances where they pushed each other's buttons, but the most recent one was the worst.  Dad told us one night that we would be having a family dinner that evening.  In the afternoon, Rei and I were doing our homework, and he just had an outburst of," Sei tried to think of the write word for it, "something because he just got up and went to the race track.  I tried to warn him about Dad, I really did!  But he still left.  So then Dad comes home, asking where Rei went, and of course I had to tell him.  He goes there and yanks Rei into the car and forces him to come with us to a restaurant where we were to meet his new girlfriend."

            "Wait a minute," Kira held her hand in a stop position.  "He was committing adultery?"

            "Not really," Sei answered.  "Only in Rei's mind.  My mom's dead now."  Kira looked at him with the classic pitying stare and he added, "It's alright.  It was a long time ago and I'm over it now."  When she didn't stop with the weird face he said, "Just let me finish my story!"

            "Rei yelled at Dad for being disrespectful to Mom, and my dad got really mad.  He told Rei to get out of the car, and I didn't know what to do, so I went with him.  Then, there we were, standing in the middle of traffic.  Rei and I talked about moving out, and I talked to Dad, and that's how things were arranged."

            "THAT wasn't the complicated version?" she asked when she knew that Sei was finished.

            "We didn't have time for the complicated version," he said, gesturing at Kira's approaching apartment complex.  "I could have cited at least a dozen examples of Rei versus Dad moments."

            "Good thing you didn't, then," she agreed.  "Thanks for walking me home.  See you tomorrow," she smiled as she went inside.

            Sei grinned as he walked home.  He had been angry at Rei for leaving him behind, he still was a little bit, but at least something good had come out of it.  Now he had gotten a chance to talk to Kira for a little bit longer!  But, he would still raise some hell when he got home, just for kicks!  This is going to be fun, he thought, opening the door to his own apartment.

            "Rei!" he yelled to his hunched brother.  "You left me at school, you know?"

            A lipsticked Rei glanced up from his project and glared at his twin.  He turned to Rika and said, "Sorry, but you've got to go now.  The little brother wants a piece of me, too."

            "Can I have a piece of you to take with me?" she asked, stealing one more kiss from Rei.  She grabbed her jacket off of Rei's futon and hustled out the door.  She sneered at Sei on the way out, and blew a kiss to his twin before finally departing the scene.

            Once she had gone a distance away from the building, Rei let out a yell, "You idiot!  I was just getting to the good part until you walked in.  Jeez, didn't you see the 'do not disturb' note I stuck under the door?"

            "What note?" Sei asked, puzzled and angry at the same time.

            "It's right..." Rei glanced around outside the door, looking for the small slip of a paper that he had written on just moments before.  Not finding it, he added, "Well, you should knock at least before you come in, okay?"

            "Why should I knock?  It's my place too, Rei!  I'm paying half the rent here, too!  Besides, you left me at school; the least you can do is let me enter my own home!"

            "Maybe we shouldn't walk home together then!" Rei said, solving the problem so obviously.  "It's not my fault that you can't get a girl to take here!  You're just jealous of me and Rika!"

            "No," Sei let out an exasperated laugh.  "I'm really not.  I just hate how irresponsible you're being!"

            "Irresponsible?  I'm irresponsible?" Rei roared.  "You know what?  I'm tired of this.  See you later," he said, slamming the door as he left the apartment.

            Sei stared at the window for a minute, watching Rei's slowly fading figure.  After a few moments, he collapsed on his pillow and started crying.  Knowing what to do with these emotions, Sei wiped off his eyes.  Opening his bag, he dug out an art pencil and his sketch pad.

            He began to sketch as he continued to think about his brother.  It wasn't that he was weak; he just hated to be in a fight with Rei!  There were few times when the two got angry enough with each other to fight, and it was usually over something bigger than a silly mistake.  Normally, it would be a major clash of opinions, like when Rei threw a stone and killed a duck.  But not this time; this time, it was just a silly misunderstanding.  The psychologist had taught Sei some things at his appointments.  He'd taught about the five step process and a few other things.  But the thing that applied was the part about anger.  If a person can get angry about something so silly, then the anger probably goes deeper than surface would show.  To know that the anger goes deeper hurt Sei's soul.  It made him feel unwanted.

            Sei sighed and looked down at his drawing.  A surprising sight met his eyes.  Without even realizing it, he had been sketching Kira.

* * *

"Tell me what happened," the doctor prodded at the boy sitting in his dark blue office.  "Just in this most recent argument, what kinds of things did you do and say?"

            Rei groaned, still furious at his stupid brother.  "Basically, Sei walked in on me and a girl making out and got her to leave.  Then he tells me off for leaving him at school.  Hello!  It's not MY problem that my dorky brother can't get a girlfriend, the goody-two-shoes!  He still wishes that he were living with Dad!"

            "Tell me Rei," the doctor imputed, "did you use the five steps in this conflict?"

            Rolling his eyes, Rei admitted, "No."

            "Well, subconsciously, I think you will be happy to find out, you are using it right now!  Isn't the first step to calm down?  I don't think you're quite done with step one yet, so let's continue with this.  What makes you so angry with Sei?"

            "I don't know," Rei said, slowly releasing his anger, letting the doctor work his magic.  "I guess I feel like his mother or something.  I mean, he always has come to me with his problems, and I've only started to notice it or something.  With high school starting and everything, he's got to learn to grow up and stop leaning on me for support.  Making new friends would do him some good!"

            "Do you really believe that he doesn't have any friends besides you?"

            Rei thought for a moment.  "I guess that isn't entirely true.  He does talk about this Kira Aso person often enough.  I think he considers her a friend now."

            "Well, then," the doctor proved, "you seemed to have contradicted yourself, Kashino.  I'm happy to have you back to sanity.  Now, would you like to continue the process and work things out with your brother?"

            "Yes."

            "Then please, proceed," noticing that Rei didn't say anything, the doctor prompted him.  "How do you think Sei felt to walk in on the two of you?"

            Pondering this for awhile, the best answer that Rei could come up with was, "Probably kind of angry or something?"  After thinking for another minute, he remembered something else.  "He definitely WAS angry.  He was angry that I left him at school after I promised to walk home with him."

             "You seem to have done the second step," the doctor pointed out.  "The only thing left to do is to talk to your brother.  Hopefully, he'll have gone through this process also.  Please, tell me how this turns out when you stop in next."

            "Sure," Rei agreed, walking out of the office.  Now he'd just have to talk to his brother in the dreaded third step.  Oh, well, it had to be done sometime.

* * *

A few hours later, Rei had finally gotten up the courage to speak to his brother again.  A fight wasn't something that they normally did, and it would have to be solved as soon as possible.  Oh how that five step technique worked!  Far from being angry, Rei actually wanted to make up with his brother, even to give him a big hug!

            He opened the apartment door to the familiar cracking ceiling and leaning walls.  Sei was laying on his futon, staring at the ceiling.  Pondering something, he hardly looked up when Rei came in.  He didn't even flinch until Rei called out his name.

            "Oh, Rei!" he nodded in acknowledgment.  "Just the person I wanted to see.  Kira and I have been working on sketching flowers a lot recently.  It all started with that one science project the seniors were doing with the rotting fruit, remember that one?  Anyway, we found that they're very interesting subjects to work with.  I was getting kind of lonely and don't want to spend the rest of the evening by myself, so do you want to come with me to botanical gardens?"

            Rei stared at his brother in awe.  He had come here to apologize, all ready to feel sympathetic to his brother who was in obvious pain, and he was met with this?  His brother wasn't in pain; actually, he seemed rather happy, and uncaring about the earlier argument.  What a jerk!

            "No, Sei," he said, trying to control his temper, which was flaring to a peak.  "Just no."

            "Why not Rei?" he whined.  "I'm bored and there's no one else to go with me, please!"

            "Sei!  Don't be such a baby!  I'm not your freaking mother!  I'm getting sick of the way I've had to baby you so much recently.  We're in high school already, so just grow up!  I'm not taking you to the gardens so you can color with your crayons, and I'm not going to by you a freaking lollypop!  Just lay off, jeez!"

            Sei stared at his twin for a moment before grabbing his bag and dashing out the door.  Why was Rei acting like that?  Why?  All he had done was try to act like everything was normal.  It was such a petty argument; surely it didn't have to be fussed over, right?  Sei heard the slam of the door echo as he dashed down the hallway.  Strangely enough, he wasn't that sad.  Now that he stopped to think about it, he wasn't even that angry.  He wasn't feeling any particular emotion more than another and all he knew was that he had to stay away from Rei for a little while.  It was the only thing that could help him.

            Suddenly, he no longer felt like sketching.  Although he brought his notepad with him for that very reason, his inspiration was gone.  There was one place to spark up that imagination again, though.  That place was the art museum.

            In the middle of no where, it stood as a shining beacon, drawing spectators in for a look.  Sei loved the calming presence the building held.  It was almost a charismatic feeling, one filled with happy thoughts.  If there was any place that could calm someone down, or help them find themselves, the art museum was the place.

            He walked down a few halls filled with paintings, sculptures, and other works of art.  Stopping to look at the new displays, he lost himself in the art.  He was looking at a particularly interesting painting, a bland toned one with some specks of color in the lower right hand corner when a presence appeared beside him.  Not noticing it, he continued to look.

            The painting was an interesting shade of pinkish peach, not quite skin toned.  It was completely flat except for some rough strokes in the upper right, where the color was.  On the rough strokes were a few gold dots that stood out like a light house at night.  There were six of them, and Sei was having trouble understanding what the painting meant.

            "Sixth Vertex," the person next to Sei read aloud from the card next to the painting.  "The artist left a small explanation with it.  They said, 'Relationships aren't always in lines.  They can be in triangles, like when two people are in love with the same person.  They can be in squares, where two people love two people who love each other.  But even more exasperating than that are the relationships with a sixth vertex, the sixth point on the polygon and the last person in the relationship."

            "That's pretty interesting," Sei said, turning around to fully look at the dictator.

            Kira nodded in agreement, "Yeah, but I don't really get the colors.  Oh, well!  To each his own, I guess!"

            "When I have art here, I'll explain myself better," Sei decided.   "You know, in my summery."

            "Isn't that a bit cocky, to just assume that you're going to get art here?  It has to be a pretty inspirational piece to make it to a museum, Sei.  What kind of a piece would you do to get in here?"

            Sei thought for a minute, and then decided, "I've always wanted to do a famous sculpture, one that will be known in the coming centuries.  It wouldn't be of a person or anything; I'd make it of a tree or some other living thing besides a human.  You know, kind of an environmentalist statue.  That suits me well, don't you think?"

            "Definitely," Kira nodded.  "Personally, I've always wanted to paint my retirement home.  No, I don't already have a retirement house; I just imagined one a few years ago.  I've always wanted to live at the edge of a marsh.  I want a house on stilts above the murky waters, just a tiny one, but big enough that the front stoop opens out onto the marsh and the back porch looks out over the lake.  I can just imagine the dock leading up to my door, one with a kind of broken wooden frame.  Not just the door is broken, though.  The whole house looks like it's falling apart, but it's nothing that inconveniences me.  It just gives the place a rustic charm.

            "Sorry," she said, looking up at her listener, finally stopping her long speech.  "I guess I kind of went on for awhile there, huh?"

            "That sounds like a wonderful place to live," Sei encouraged.  "I really hope that you'll paint that picture someday, later though, when you get really good.  Not that you're bad now, but the reflections on the water will be very hard to pull off."

            "I know, and I was thinking the same thing that you were.  Do you think that the instructor will help me figure it out?"

            "I don't know," Sei admitted.  "But it's worth a shot anyway, isn't it?"

            "Yeah," she agreed, letting her mind drift.

            Sei let his go, too.  Looking at Kira, he'd remembered the sketch he'd done of her earlier.  "Have you ever done a portrait?" he wondered.

            Kira stopped to think.  She'd sketched people before, but no picture had ever become a painting.  People didn't tend to be her specialty.  Like Sei, she enjoyed different subjects than people.  "No," she replied finally.  "I really haven't painted a portrait yet. How about you, have you done one?"

            Sei remembered that time when he'd tried so hard.  The painting was to be of his mother as a gift to his brother, but he'd failed.  When he went to give her eyes life, she bled black ink all the way down her face, and down her neck where it left the canvas.  Looking up at Kira, with an honest gaze, he replied, "No, I haven't done one yet."       

            "I personally have always been looking for someone to paint.  You know, someone so perfect that they deserve all that effort to portray.  I've always wanted to meet that person, with perfect body structure and a beautiful face."

            Thinking about this for a moment, Sei asked, "Have you really done that?  No offense, but that sounds kind of vain, to be looking to paint only the most beautiful."

            "But artists have always painted beautiful people.  Have you ever taken an art history course?  My dad took me to one a very long time ago.  We learned the different styles used in different time periods, and the one I remember the most was in the American colonies.  They used to paint people without any depth, so a person ten feet behind you seemed like they were at your side.  They didn't have any shadows or anything either, but it's the portrait that I want to talk about.  No matter how ugly or how beautiful people were, the artist always improved.  You know how different some displays of Abraham Lincoln are from others?  That shows that artists embellished their paintings."

            "Well, I know that," Sei said.  "But why do you have to start out with someone beautiful?"

            Kira looked at him for a second, then replied, "So that I won't have to embellish.  I want to show it like it is, to capture the person's inner workings on a canvas."

            "Hearing you talk about that, I want to meet that person, too," Sei said, finally agreeing with Kira.

            "I think you've already met them," she said with an awkward smile.  When Sei gave her a look of puzzlement, she went on.  "Sei, would you please let me paint you?"

AUTHOR'S NOTES:  Yippy!!  Go Sei and Kira!!  Don't worry everyone, in the next chapter Rei gets a chance to meet his brother's current interest.  Won't that be exciting? (I know it's what you all are waiting for.)  This chapter was not as long as I had hoped, but it's still a decent length.  For those who care, I ordered book 5 and that should come to me sometime next week.  Hopefully I'll have the next chapter posted then for your enjoyment.  I thank my loyal fans at this moment, currently few in numbers.  C'mon the rest of you!  This is a good fic (I've been told)!  I've been rambling long enough, just barely reaching my goal length for this chapter (that's right, I make a goal length).  So I'll see you later, 'kay?  Look for chapter five, okay (wow, chapter five already)!