You see, I'm somewhere in between

My life is falling to pieces

"Tsu. . .Don't cry. Please. . don't. . " Rui whispered in heartbroken tones, as he gently stroked Tsukushi's hair.

It was barely dawn. The first few pales rays of the sun were striving to climb over the jagged mountainsides to illuminate the chilled land. Inside the Hanazawa onsen retreat, almost all were asleep, save for the two unhappy teens.

Tsukushi lay curled up on her side, back to Rui, as she tried to stifle a seemingly endless flow of tears.

"How could I have been so stupid?" Tsukushi was consumed by guilt, "I betrayed him."

"Shh…" Rui crooned, as if soothing a wounded bird, or a skittish colt, "You didn't do anything wrong." No. It was he, himself, that was to blame. And he knew it. Tsukushi wasn't ready for this level of intimacy. Not by a long shot. Even more certainly, if she had been—it wouldn't have been him she would have chosen. That is, if she'd been in anything approaching a reasonable state of mind. He'd known better, really he had, but. . . It was too late now.

If he could have, Rui would almost gladly have accepted Tsukushi's hatred for what they had done. Anything to keep her from hating herself the way she did now. But he could do nothing, except hold her and try to calm her, while his guilt at his own selfishness gnawed at his soul.

He had Tsukushi now. For all the good that would do either of them.

And still, Tsukushi sobbed inconsolably. How could she have been stupid enough to believe that she could forget Tsukasa? Now all she could think of was how badly he'd be hurt—if he could only remember her. . . That was always the catch. And so she cried for what might have been; what could have been; what should have been—replaced now, by an act that could never be undone.

There was no going back now. For any of them.

Tsukushi cursed the weakness that had led her astray. The place in her heart that Rui always had had—the chink in her armor that only he knew how to find. Even Tsukasa had never managed to make her lose control so dramatically, or so thoroughly, (much as he had wished to).

As much as for anything, she cried for her lost innocence. Truly, she couldn't blame Rui. How could it be his fault for being male? No, she knew what he felt for her, and it was entirely her fault for letting things come to this pass. Still, his hand on her head, his voice in her ear, only reminded her of how those hands, those lips, had led her to her betrayal of Tsukasa.

She wanted to be alone for a while. But she could not bring herself to speak, to utter the cruel words that would send him from their bed. So, instead, she merely curled more tightly into herself and sniveled all the harder, the more he pled with her to listen to him.

In the end, Rui could take no more. He didn't know what to do. He understood Tsukushi—could almost read each thought coruscating through her brain as if she'd spoken aloud. But that didn't help tell him what to say, what to do to ease her misery. He needed help, desperately. Rui was no fool, though he may have been impulsive where Tsukushi was concerned. Tsukushi needed reassurance, support, friendship, from someone who wasn't him. Much as it hurt to think, Rui knew that right now, he was doing far more damage than good to the woman he loved.

Unwillingly then, but knowing the necessity, Rui slipped out of bed into the chill morning air. Hastily pulling on his pants, he retreated down the hallway, leaving Tsukushi alone with her pain, her guilt and her tears.

-------

**RIIINNNNNNG**

Akira was startled from his uneasy slumber by the piercing tones of Soujiro's cellphone. Groggily, he fumbled for the source of the earsplitting noise, intending to pummel it to a pulp for disturbing him from his rest. Admittedly, it wasn't much of a rest he'd been getting, sprawled out as he was on a couch in front of a now cold fireplace where he'd crashed last night, too unenthused even to crawl back to his own bed. Worse, he'd not been able to fall asleep until almost five. It couldn't now be more than six, and between the lack of sleep and the excessive amount of alcohol he'd forced into his system last night, Akira was in no mood to have his eardrums assaulted by the ringing of the goddamned phone.

His questing fingers finally found the hated device, and without opening his eyes, Akira lifted the phone to his ear and answered the call with a disgusted growl.

"Do you know what fucking time it is? Call back when I'm awake. Asshole."

"Akira." It was not a question.

Akira's eyes snapped open, as all traces of sleep fled at the sound of Rui's flat voice.

"Rui! Where the fuck are you? We've been trying to find you all weekend. . . And why the hell are you calling at this hour? Why are you even awake?" He couldn't keep track of all the questions he wanted answers to, so they all just tumbled out at once.

"I need your help." Rui's voice was quiet, but held an almost pleading edge to it.

"Eh? What for?" Akira sat up and tried to focus more fully on the voice at the other end of the line. It would really help if he were less groggy. He shook his head a few times to clear the last remaining shreds of sleep from it, and in so doing abruptly remembered that he was angry with Rui. "And why should we help you anyway? Where's Makino? How is she?"

"That's what I need your help with."

"Huh? Rui. . . What have you done?" Akira was suddenly very suspicious, as memories of how he'd seen the missing duo last flashed behind his eyes.

On the other end of the phone, a long silence ensued. . .

"Rui?. . . Hello? . . . Are you still there? Come on man, What the hell have you done? Talk to me!" Akira was frustrated with his friend's reticence.

"Ugh. . . What are you yelling about?" Soujiro, collapsed on an armchair across the room, raised bleary eyes at last. "Akira, who are you talking to?"

"Rui." Akira shrugged, "Come see if you can get some sense out of him. It's your phone, after all."

"Shit." Soujiro spat out the one word in disgust and stumbled over to take the cell from Akira, "Rui, what the fuck is going on?" He had no patience right now for games.

Finally, Rui sighed and answered sadly, "I need someone to talk to Tsukushi."

"Why the hell are you calling us? As I recall, you seemed quite happy to disappear with Makino all to yourself."

"I made a mistake." Rui's calm voice masked his inner turmoil, "Please. She won't stop crying. " Soujiro could almost hear Rui hanging his head as he started to explain.

"Rui! You asshole!" Soujiro summarized Rui's tale in three words.

"Aren't you the one who always said it was no big deal?"

"She's Tsukasa's girlfriend! You just don't do that!"

"It's a bit late for that now. Please, will you come?"

"Umm. . . "

"Have I ever asked you guys for a favor before? I wouldn't ask if I wasn't desperate. . . Please."

"For Makino, we'll come. Not for you." Soujiro sighed at last, still too pissed at Rui to agree to help him. "So where can we find you?"

-----

"So what the hell are we supposed to do, again?" Akira questioned as he started up a car. He and Soujiro had hastily washed and grabbed a quick breakfast before slipping out of the house.

Soujiro merely shrugged helplessly. "Cheer her up? Don't ask me."

"Umm." Akira was thoughtful as he raced the car skillfully along the twisted mountain roads. "And Rui?"

"He should have known better!" Soujiro spoke angrily. Sure, he was the playboy of the group. But even he knew that you just don't go and steal your best friend's girlfriend while their back is turned. And to Soujiro, that was essentially what had happened. Tsukasa's memory loss had to be temporary. It was only a matter of time before he snapped out of it. Rui had to know it too, but what did he do, but take advantage of Makino's weakened emotional state? It wasn't right.

"Do you think he planned it?" Akira, the practical one, was following his own train of thought.

"Huh?"

"Think for a sec. . . We're talking about Makino here. How the hell did Rui convince her to sleep with him? Remember how many times we've tried to get that girl to do something—Anything-- with Tsukasa? And Never-- Not once did we succeed. That girl has got to be the most repressed virgin I've ever met. But Rui essentially kidnaps her, and two days later they've had sex? It doesn't make any sense. Unless. . "

"Akira, you've got a suspicious little mind."

"No, just common sense."

"Maybe you're right." Soujiro shook his head, "I really hope you're not, though." He would hate to think that Rui had consciously set up a situation in which Tsukushi's defenses would be weakened enough to allow him to manipulate her so skillfully.

"Yeah." Akira turned his attention back to the road.

"Have you ever seduced someone and had her cry about it afterwards?" Soujiro spoke up again.

"No." Akira instantly replied, then, "Well, not that I'm aware of, anyway." Besides, he usually only dated married women who pursued him. It was a different scene entirely.

"Me neither." Soujiro rubbed his aching head, "Why do they act like it's such a big deal?"

"Makino's a freak." Akira replied dryly. As if that explained anything.

"Telling her that will really cheer her up." Soujiro snorted sarcastically.

"Umm. . . We're not going to leave them alone again, are we?"

"Hells no! You want Rui to try and vanish again? They're coming back with us."

"What about Tsukasa?"

"What about him?"

"What's he going to do when he finds out?"

"What does it matter? He's got amnesia. Besides, he seems to have developed a thing for Sakurako, remember?"

"Shit, yeah. Man, Makino's not going to like that."

Soujiro had no answer for that one.

I was a strange disjointed kind of conversation, for a strange, disjointed couple of days. The two boys rarely had to utter complete thoughts, understanding each other so well as they did. Still each managed to convey their concerns, and the strange anger they felt at Rui. Sure, Rui had tried to steal Tsukushi from Tsukasa before. But never so successfully, and it wasn't right. Not when things between Tsukushi and Tsukasa had almost been about to go so well.

The two boys had very firm ideas on the way things were supposed to be. It was perfectly fine to sleep with someone if they were in love with you, and you with them. Or if you both had no expectations of the other, and were only doing it for fun, that was ok too. But they strongly suspected that neither of those situations was the case here. They knew Tsukushi loved Tsukasa. Hell, everyone knew it. So what on earth was she doing Fucking Rui? It had to be his fault.

And it came as a surprise to no one that she was messed up over it.

So great, what were they supposed to do?

Tsukushi was almost like a little sister to the two boys. She had so easily slipped into their affections as the only outsider allowed to hang out with the F4 whenever she wanted to. She could always make them laugh at her ridiculously defiant attitude and at what they liked to call her 'commoner's quirks.' But still, they liked her for her caring heart, and innocent smile, and most especially, for her ability to tame Tsukasa. They wanted her to be happy. If she was truly in love with Rui, and happy with him, they mightn't have minded that. But that wasn't the case, and here they were now—just pulling into the drive leading to the Hanazawa retreat—on their mission of good cheer, still with no clear picture of just how they were to proceed.

Plainly, it was time to wing it.

As always, Soujiro had a 'clever' plan, which he outlined in the last minute of their drive.

Together, the two boys walked up to the heavy gates of the house.

It was showtime.

To be continued. . .