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"So what did you come here to tell me to do?"

"I don't know what you mean. I came to keep you company for a little while. It's the first time you've lived on your own. Don't you miss Sano?"

"You didn't drive fifty miles in the rain after an eight hour work day to talk about Sano."

His sister sat down on the couch next to him. "You're right." She took the TV remote from him and turned off the television. "I know you won't like what I'm going to say," she began serenely, watching his eyes. "Since the wedding, I've been trying to think of a way to get you to do what I want you to do. But I can't. And after talking with Kamatari, I realized I can't protect you anymore." She paused and took his hands in hers. "But Kenshin, I'm going to try."

She certainly could work herself up emotionally; he'd always given her credit for that. It was scary, the way she got so calm while she spouted increasingly irrational things right in your face and expected you to believe them. Most of the time he wound up doing what as she asked-recommended-commanded, because she was his older sister and he both loved and respected her.

"Break up with Kaoru." She said, ever the picture of poise.

Most of the time he did.

"Kaoru Kamiya?" he asked, just to clarify and maybe postpone the argument she had ready for him. He should've known this would be the one time he didn't feel up to an argument, damn it was a miserable day, but he would have to argue.

"You don't know more than one Kaoru," she said, glaring at him in the way that reminded him that she was the bossy older sister and that he almost hated her when she forced him to do things against his will. Like that time when she was eight and he was five and she made him eat the worm she'd found in the yard. The thing was eight inches long!

"Why should I break up with Kaoru?" he asked, which was a legitimate reason, since he wasn't exactly going out with Kaoru.

"She's wrong for you. I glanced at her and knew right away what she was thinking. You don't need a woman that wears her emotions for the whole world to see. She obviously has no control over them."

Kenshin shrugged. "She's honest. I always know where I stand with her."

"She's immature. You can't spend your life waiting for her to grow up," Tomoe reasoned calmly.

"She's not immature. She's a straightforward, twenty-five year old woman, and moaning about her existence isn't going to change my opinion of her."

She believed him, he could see it in her eyes. She wasn't happy about it, but she knew she wasn't going to change his opinion of Kaoru by talking to him.

"Did you know she can't cook?" Tomoe tried. "Sano told me."

Kenshin laughed. "I can cook." He paused and met his sister's eyes. "Why don't you like her? You don't have a reason not to like her."

Tomoe looked down at their joined hands, bangs covering her dark eyes. "I saw you dancing with her at the wedding. You were a little drunk, and at first I looked so I could laugh at you later, but then I saw the way you were looking at her, and the way she was looking at you." She shrugged because she didn't seem to be able to do anything else. "You're the baby brother."

"I'm only three years younger than you."

"But you're the baby, and babies aren't supposed to be in love with strange women who their families don't know."

"I'm twenty-six, and Sano knows her."

"He's the middle child. He doesn't count," Tomoe told him with a faint smile.

"Don't judge her the next time you meet her," Kenshin said. "I think you would get along with her. She kind of," he paused to find the right word, "counter-balances you."

Tomoe laughed. "I really doubt that, Kenshin."

He sighed. His sister was stuck up in her own way, had always been stuck up, but it was one of the things he loved about her. "You staying for dinner?"

She smiled the classic Tomoe half-smile he'd seen on her face in the pictures of her as a baby, before Sano had been born even, and those two were only twelve months apart. His sister did have class.