*All messes can be cleaned up* *By: Its-me89*

*Chapter 4*

Ranma went to bed late that night and was the last one to arrive for breakfast the next morning.

Nobody was saying anything. Kasumi was trying to find something to talk about but eventually gave up.

Ranma sat down, took his bowl of rice and started eating. He dared to glare once at Akane, whose eyes looked angry but mostly hurt. He hated to see her like this and he especially hated the thought that it was probably his fault.

Suddenly, Akane stood up and excused herself from the table. Everyone's eyes followed her out of the room.

"What have you done now, boy?" Genma asked, as Akane was out of sight.

Ranma looked at him as if he had never heard anything more disgusting. He rose from the table and was about to walk out of the room when his father spoke again, "Don't you run away from my questioning!"

"Look, I'm not running away from anything," Ranma said angrily. He knew, of course, that it was a lie. He certainly was running away. From apologizing, from Akane, even from his father and the Tendo's. He just didn't want everyone to know and be involved in his problems.

He turned and walked towards the door.

"Don't you walk away before you have answered my question," His father said again.

"What question?"

"What did you do to Akane?"

"Dammit, I didn't do anything. She is not even my fiancée anymore so why blame it on me?" Ranma was starting to get really angry.

"But you do want her to be your fiancée," Nabiki suddenly said. Everyone's eyes turned towards a surprised Ranma.

He knew it was true. He did want Akane to be his fiancée. He wanted that more than anything else.

"I.I," He said quietly but he couldn't tell them. He couldn't explain his feelings.

He turned around and walked away, this time no one tried to stop him.

'That's what I thought,' Nabiki thought as she saw Ranma walk away.

Akane had been listening to everything.

'Ranma you jerk,' She thought. A tear made its way down her cheek but she quickly wiped it away with one hand. 'Don't you dare cry, Akane Tendo. You have been crying enough over him.'
She couldn't help thinking that maybe Ranma did want her as his fiancée.

*****
Ranma and Akane were walking home from school, Ranma on the fence and Akane on the sidewalk. None of them spoke to one another but they both knew that the person walking next to them had been having the worst day ever.

Everyone in Nerima knew Akane's act of breaking off the engagement between her and Ranma by now.

All the boys in school had been bothering Akane all day with "Date me, date me" 's like it had been before Ranma and his father came to live with the Tendo family.

Shampoo had been all over Ranma at lunchtime with hugs and kisses. When Ukyo had shown up with lunch for Ranma, she and Shampoo had started fighting over who would be the best wife for Ranma

Both, Ranma and Akane had been lucky enough to get away from school before and missed all students and non-students, who had been bothering them all day because their class had been dismissed a few minutes before the bell rang.

Akane didn't know whether to be angry with Ranma anymore since both of them had had such a bad day but decided not to say anything in case they got into a fight.

*****
When they got home, Ranma went to the dojo and Akane to her room.

She sat down at her desk and took out her books when there was a knock on the door.

"Come in," she said

Kasumi entered with a concerned smile on her face.

"Akane, are you okay?" she ask.

"Yes fine, thank you. Why?" 'Yeah right,' a voice in her head said.

"Well, you seemed very quiet at breakfast and you went straight to your room when you came back from school,"

"I'm sorry. I just wanted to start on my homework," Akane said, looking everywhere else than at Kasumi. She knew it was a bad excuse since it didn't cover her quietness at breakfast but she didn't know what else to say.

"Has this something to do with Ranma?" Kasumi asked

'How can she know,' Akane thought looking really surprised.

"I.it.um." She didn't know what to say. She couldn't explain it to Kasumi even though it was her sister. She just didn't know how too.

"Akane, did you want to break off the engagement between you and Ranma?"

"I don't know. I don't think so. But what does that matter. I did him a favor." Akane looked away from Kasumi again.

Kasumi could feel and hear in her sister's voice that it wasn't the right time to talk about Ranma so she quietly got up and walked out of the room.

As soon as Kasumi closed the door, Akane burst into tears. She couldn't hold them back anymore. She collapsed on her bed and fell a sleep, completely forgetting about the homework.

*****
"Ranma, could you go see if Akane is awake yet?" Kasumi asked. It had been five hours since Akane had fallen asleep and nobody had woken her at dinnertime since they thought she might need a nap.

Ranma went up the stairs and knocked gentle on the door.

"Akane, are you awake?" He asked.

He leaned his ear against the door and he could hear a low murmuring coming from inside Akane's room.

"Akane, I'm coming in so you better be dressed,"

He opened the door slowly and entered. He found Akane sleeping on her bed, still in her school uniform.

He kneeled down next to her bed and shook her gently. She said something in her sleep but he didn't catch the exact words.

She didn't wake up so he shook her again and this time it worked. She slowly opened her eyes, which widened in surprise as she saw Ranma.

"Whoa. Didn't mean to scare you," He said.

"No, it's ok. I just don't wake up to see you everyday," Akane said, and quickly looked away to hide her blush.

"Am I that ugly to look at" Ranma asked.

Akane opened her mouth but before any words could come out, Ranma said, "OK don't answer that."

Akane giggled slightly and her eyes met Ranma's.

The stared into each other eyes for a few minutes, searching.

Suddenly, Akane looked away as if Ranma had said something, which she couldn't or wouldn't believe.

"Kasumi send me up to ask if you wanted anything to eat," Ranma said.

"Thanks but I am not really hungry. I am just going to do my homework and then I will go down to the dojo."

Ranma nodded and left the room.

*****
I was quite late when Akane finally finished her homework but she decided to go down to the dojo anyway.

She tip-toed down the stairs to not wake anyone up.

*****
Ranma woke as he heard a slide open and close again.

He thought it was just Kasumi or Nabiki getting up to get a drink of water so he lay back down and closed his eyes.

Ten minutes later he gave up. He couldn't sleep, so he thought that he might get sleepy if he worked out for a while. He got up and sneaked out of the house, down to the dojo.

When he reached the entrance to the dojo he realized someone was in there and as he got closer he saw Akane.

'Wow, she is better than I thought,' he thought.

"Akane?" He said.

***** A/N: Sorry about this but I am going to stop here. but chapter 5 is coming really soon.pinky promise! Thanks for all the reviews! Keep it up!