He moved down the hall as quickly as he could, eyes on the floor, not caring whether or not he ran into anything or anyone. For now...he needed to be alone....just for now....

Some how he found himself in the garden that was in the middle of the hospital. It was a place for the patients to move about freely and be back in nature.

Slowly he made his way over to a bench and plopped down on it covering his face with is hands. How could this have happened? He had been so close...so close to telling Seto exactly what he wanted him to know but....now his dreams were shattered into a million pictures. It was as if a sledgehammer had been taken to a window....now everything was in shards.

"Joey?" a familiar Australian accented voice asked.

He looked up, blinking tears from his eyes. "Bakura? What are you doing here?"

The white haired boy pointed across the garden to an elderly man puttering around and laughing. "That's my father. He has Alzheimer's Disease...."

"Oh...does he..."

Bakura shook his head. "He doesn't even remember my face. Sometimes he thinks that I am one of the nurses here. Once he thought I was here to give him a sponge bath..." Brown eyes shifted to the ground. "He doesn't even remember his own son's face."

"Bakura..." Joey whispered laying a hand on the Keeper of the Ring's shoulder. "I'm so sorry..."

"Eh..." the boy shrugged trying to seem indifferent. "No matter..." Before the blonde could say anything, he changed the subject. "So Joey what brings you to the hospital?"

Joey looked down at his toes. "A...a friend."

"It's not Serenity is it? I mean she is alright?" the white haired boy asked anxiously. He couldn't think of anyone else that would make Joey this sad. But...Yugi? Tristan? Téa maybe? No...he'd seen them this morning.

"Yeah..." Joey managed a thin smile. "My sis is just fine."

They sat in silence for a few moments, Bakura staring off at the elderly man who was now playing chess with another older man. Joey closed his eyes and imagined Seto...

"Joey," Bakura said breaking the silence. "I don't know who this 'friend' of yours is but it is fairly obvious that whatever is happening to him or her is bothering you too. And..." he looked at the ground and sighed.

The blonde looked up at his friend inquiringly.

"Once," Bakura began. "I had a sister. She was the best in the whole world. Kairi always got me treats when she went out and bought me the cloths I wanted and stuff like that. I think it was because my dad was never around and my mom died when I was little. Anyway she always felt responsable for me and always took care of me.

"Once while Dad was in Egypt we got in a really big fight over something that was no doubt really petty. I told her that I hated her and ran off. She...well I guess that she followed. The next thing that I remember was that I was crying in my tree fort and I heard sirens. Curiosity got the better of me and I followed the sirens." Bakura raised his eyes to the sky and sighed. Tears welled up in his eyes. "Kairi had been hit by a car when she was crossing the road to look for me. She was dead by the time I got there....and the worst part is that I never got to say that I was sorry..."

"Bakura..." Joey whispered.

"Then it was just me and my dad. About a week after he came back from Egypt and gave me the Ring---" he tapped the golden ring around his neck. "---Dad was diagnosed with Alzheimer's..."

"Bakura...Joey whispered. "I never knew..."

The white haired boy looked at Joey evenly. "No one does. You are the first person that I've told."

"Not even Yugi?"

"Not even Yugi."

Again they sat in silence, Joey rolling the new information around inside of his head and Bakura desperately holding back the tears that threatened to spill down his cheeks.

Finally Bakura spoke, quietly and evenly. "I guess....what I am trying to tell you is...I never got to apologize to my sister and now I wish sorely every day that I did." He turned his eyes up to Joey's. "Don't let the same thing happen to you Joey. Son't let whatever you need to say to this 'friend' of yours go unsaid. Don't make the same mistake that I did."

***

"Little brother..." Seto whispered hugging the young boy. Tristan, Yugi and Téa had left a few moments earlier but the older boy had forced the nurse to let Mokuba stay with him. "I missed you so much..."

"Me too Seto," Mokuba whispered. "I thought this time that you'd leave me."

"I'd never leave you Mokuba." /But you wanted to!/ his mind screamed.

The younger boy snuggled up against his brother's chest. "Everyone else was sad too."

"Huh?"

Mokuba nodded. "Téa and Yugi talked a lot and they were always sad looking. Tristan stayed with me and told me not to worry, but he was scared to. I could tell by the way that he said your name. And Joey..." the boy looked up at his brother with huge eyes. "Joey cried a lot."

"He did?" Seto asked. The feeling that he should know something that he could not remember washed over Seto again. And there at the mention of Joey. At the sound of his name....

He had been talking to Joey....he had been talking about...

With a sigh the older boy lay back. Mokuba snuggled next to his brother and when the nurse came in a few moments later, both refused to be seperated from the other.

Within an hour the young Kaiba was fast asleep, listening to the steadt heartbeat of his older brother.

***

He stood outside of the door. He stood totally still staring at the base of the door. Tears welled up in his chocolate brown eyes.

Why? Why were his dreams always denied. When he was six he had asked his parents for a Matchbox car that he had seen in a window. He had wanted it so very badly. He got a kite. When he was eleven he had a huge crush on this girl in his English class. He had foolishly asked her to go to the movies with him. She had laughed...loudly and crueling before walking away. It had broken his heart.

Every single time that he had gotton his hopes up for something or when he had begun to care for someone, they were ripped from is life. Serenity, his father, his mother.....Kaiba....

He raised his eyes to the doorknob and reached his hand out for it. The metal was cold beneath his hand. Tightening his hand around the metal, Joey took a deep breath and-

He began to shake.

He couldn't do it....he just could not face the disapointment that would occur if Kaiba said....if he said that he hated Joey. He just would not be able to bear that....

/I heard you. I heard you telling me why I had to come back and I don't understand. Why? After all I have put you through.../ Joey squeezed his eyes tightly shut.

/Loser. You are a pathetic dog. You don't deserve to call yourself a duelist. Go crawling home you barking chihuahua./

"No...."

/Well Kaiba, here I am again.../

/Joey?/

His hand slipped from the door knob and he stood, chin slipping down. Tears sprang from his eyes and ran down his cheeks as he sobbed silently.