Title: Blindsided

By: Kibethan

Disclaimer: I no own, you no own...unless you're Maki Murakami...

Summary: Yuki isn't exactly a favorite in the public's eye, so his editor decides to shape him up to seem like a good guy by volunteering him to volunteer at a hospital. What will happen when he meets a particularly interesting patient by thename of Shindou Shuichi?

Half-warning: You have been warned. For what? You don't know...but that's okay...I like it that way...

Chapter 4

Second Impressions Aren't Always the Best

When Yuki got home that night he was so full! Because he had been so hungry when he left the mall he had stopped at a restaurant for dinner. Unfortunately, his eyes ordered for his stomach and there was way too much food for him to eat. However, since the food was so expensive he didn't want to waste it. The concept of "to go" didn't really hit him until after he had gotten home and by then it was too late.

It was late when he actually got home. The smartest thing for him to do was to go to bed. After all, he was going to have to be on his best behavior tomorrow and he didn't want being tired to affect him. He waddled down the hall and into his bedroom. Quickly stripping he slid into bed and promptly fell asleep.

That night he had more nightmares of what could happen tomorrow. Lately he'd been under a lot of stress and the nightmares were coming to him in droves. What if Shuichi didn't accept his apology? What would he do then? Forget about it? It seemed like it was impossible for Yuki to forget about Shuichi. For some reason Shuichi just stuck in his mind and wouldn't leave.

It was driving him insane and he was losing sleep because of it.

Yuki forced himself to think happy thoughts in hopes of maybe finally getting some good sleep. Thankfully, it worked and soon Yuki drifted into a dreamless sleep.

He woke up the next morning completely rested and ready to face the day. Shuichi was going to like the bear that Yuki had got for him and Shuichi was going to accept his apology. As long as he kept thinking like that then nothing could stop him!

He glanced over at the alarm clock on is bedside table. 8:00. He didn't have to be at the hospital until 9:00. No matter, he needed to get up anyway. He had to make himself look presentable and there was always that shower that he needed to take.

After he had finished taking his shower, Yuki found himself back in his bedroom getting dressed. As he was doing that, he glanced at the clock. It was 8:40. He had twenty minutes to get to the hospital. It had taken him so long to take a shower because he had wanted to make sure that he was very clean. He needed to make a good second impression with Shuichi.

He had almost worn a suit when he remembered that Ezaniya had told him that he was going to be playing with the kids. Maybe it would be better if he just hopped into jeans and a t-shirt instead. He could still look snappy in that, besides, Shuichi couldn't actually see him.

He decided that the jeans and a t-shirt were definitely the way to go.

He threw on his jacket and headed out the door. Thankfully, it didn't take him very long to get there. He had almost forgotten the teddy bear –my, how stupid that would have been- but luckily it had been sitting right by the front door for that exact reason.

Once he got to the hospital he headed to the elevator and right up to the fifth floor. The elevators doors dinged, announcing that they had reached their destination and the doors slid open. Yuki gracefully stepped out and walked to room 516 to tell Ezaniya that he had arrived.

Luckily, Ezaniya saw to Yuki quickly and they hurried on to the pediatric ward. The kids were getting restless and they needed something to do!

"Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to go to the children's playroom and play with the children that are in there. Do you accept it?" Ezaniya told him.

"Can I say no?" Yuki asked him dryly.

"Nope…"

"Then I guess you know my answer."

They continued walked towards the playroom. Yuki slowed downed dramatically as they passed Shuichi's room to see if he could sneak a peak in there. It did not go unnoticed by Ezaniya.

"Feeling a little bit bad for what you did to him two days ago?" he asked Yuki. Yuki pointed to the teddy bear.

"That's what the teddy bear is for. It's going to help me with my apology."

"So you are going to apologize to him? I always thought that you were a really cold hearted bastard," Ezaniya said, sounding surprised. Yuki furrowed his eyebrows.

"I may be a cold hearted bastard, but nobody is that cold hearted as to not apology to a blind boy."

"I don't know," Ezaniya said, teasingly, "You picked a fight with a blind kid. Isn't that cold hearted?"

A vein in Yuki's forehead throbbed. "I didn't pick a fight him! He picked a fight with me!"

"Okay, okay," Ezaniya said, "We're here." Yuki looked at the door that was the entrance to the playroom. It was colored very bright colors and it had painted handprints all over it. It was very obvious decorated by kids. It was kind of touching in a way. Too bad that Ezaniya was warning Yuki about how monstrous the kids could be while he was admiring the artwork. It kind of ruined the effect.

"And remember…" Ezaniya warned, "Kids are not always as harmless as they seem to be…now go have fun!"

Ezaniya opened the door and shoved Yuki into the room. All of the kids that were in the room immediately looked up at him when he entered. Their eyes were wide. They looked like they had never seen a grown-up before in their lives.

There were mass amounts of kids in there too. The oldest seemed to be maybe ten and the youngest was probably four. Thankfully, though, there were no babies to take care of. That would've been a nightmare! As it was, it was probably going to be hard enough.

Yuki awkwardly walked around the room, unsure of what to do. All of the kids looked like they were doing stuff and didn't want to be disturbed. It confused him a little bit to see all of them doing stuff alone instead of getting in a big group and playing together. Didn't kids like to have fun with friends? These kids were no different from other kids, so they should've liked to play with friends too. Maybe they were too shy.

Yuki sighed, he was going to have to take the initiative and try to get a game going. Not necessarily a game that could injure anybody –although, what better place to get injured than in a hospital- and not one that could endanger anybody, for example if someone was in the hospital for an asthma attack you wouldn't have that person running around.

Unfortunately, Yuki wasn't sure what each of their individual problems were, so he couldn't do anything to rambunctious, such as a game of tag. Unfortunately, he also didn't know the number one rule with kids.

Don't bring anything in that you don't intend to share. The first good trait that kids are taught when they're young is how to share. Because of that, they expected you to share everything of yours with them. In Yuki's case, that included the apology bear.

Whenever one of the kids got a glimpse of it, they would come running over to see if they could have it, or at least play with it. Yuki kept having to say, "no" and it made him feel a little bit bad, especially when a little girl who looked to be about seven started crying.

That wasn't how it was supposed to start! The kids were supposed to like him, not look at him like he was the most evil person in the world. If they did that then they could make this month a living hell. That was the last thing that he wanted. He needed to get back ontheir goodside.

Kids liked stories right? Maybe it was best if he told them the tale about why they weren't allowed to touch the teddy bear.

"Oi! Kids, come here!" Yuki called out. Much to his surprise, all of the kids came. He certainly hadn't been expecting that. Maybe he was a kid magnet after all! Or…maybe it was the fact that he was holding the teddy bear in the air and waving it around like a flag. Whatever the reason, at least it got the kids that hadn't been around Yuki, around Yuki.

"All of you want this bear, right?" Yuki asked the kids. Each and every single one of them nodded. "And I've told you all that you can't have it, right?" All of the children's eyes immediately turned to glares and Yuki –for a fleeting moment- wasn't sure if what he was going to do was it a good idea. Thankfully, the moment passed and he continued on.

"I think you all deserve an explanation as to why I won't let you play with the teddy bear, and I'm thinking that all of you are thinking the same thing. So I'm going to tell you the story about why you can't have this teddy bear. Are you ready?" They all nodded. For some strange reason they were all intently listening to Yuki. Perhaps while they were in the hospital they didn't get as many stories read to them as they needed and they were craving it.

"This teddy bear is for someone very special. He's in this hospital, just like you, and he's even in the pediatric ward, just like all of you." Immediately all of the kids started to look around, trying to discern whom the bear was for. "No, no," Yuki said, "He's not in this room. He's in a room right down the hall. You see, the problem with him is he's blind." A collective gasp was heard around the room. "A couple of days ago I went to visit him, and me and him got into a huge fight." All of the bigger kids around the room started to glare at Yuki and Yuki gulped. "But…" he quickly started up again, "I felt so bad about it that I bought this bear to help me apologize to him. Do you think it'll work?" he asked the group.

Every single one of the kids nodded.

"Yes," the seven-year-old girl said, "he will definitely like it. He'd have to be crazy not to."

"Thank you," Yuki said truthfully. He couldn't believe it. The children telling him that Shuichi would definitely accept his apology boosted his confidence about a hundred points. Which was a good thing, because when he had walked into the hospital he hadn't had any confidence at all.

"Have you practiced what to say?" a little boy asked him. "My daddy always does that whenever he has to apologize to mommy." Practicing hadn't even occurred to Yuki. Maybe that would be a good idea.

"Can I practice with you?" Yuki asked the boy. The boy nodded happily, happy to be able to help.

"Shuichi, I…" Yuki found himself not knowing exactly what to say. It was the weirdest feeling in the world for him too because he was a writer and always knew exactly what to say.

"Shuichi, I'm sorry…" a little girl with a broken leg filled in for him.

"…I'm sorry that I acted like such a jerk…" one of the boys added.

"…I didn't mean what I said. I was very stressed out and unfortunately you were the one that I took it out on…"

"…You didn't deserve it and I certainly don't deserve your forgiveness…"

"…but if you can find it in the bottom of your heart to forgive me…"

"…please do. I feel bad enough as it is. I don't want to have to live the rest of my life knowing that I hurt someone wrongly…"

"…so I ask again. Please, please forgive me."

One by one each of the kids contributed another line to the apology to the point where it was so fluffy that Yuki was gagging. There was no way in hell that he would be able to say all of that without cracking up. And like he thought before, that definitely isn't the best way to do an apology.

He was sorry, but he wasn't sorry enough to spout stuff like that. Shuichi would think that he was absolutely mad! Of course, he was asking kids for help. Maybe he was mad. That was it. He was just completely mad! He would just have to go in and apologize like himself.

So what if it came out a little bit mean? It was the thought that counted right? Right? Okay. So maybe apologizing exactly like himself wouldn't be the best idea. Perhaps, if he mixed some of himself with some of the fluffy crap that the kids had come up with he would get the perfect mixture and the perfect apology.

It was worth a try anything.

"Okay, kids, thank you so much for your help. It was greatly appreciated. I'm going to go test it out on the patient now. Wait right here, I'll be back as soon as I'm finished." With the kids cheering him on, he walked out the door and into the hallway. He walked towards Shuichi's room.

When he got to the outside of it, he paused, a little bit anxious to go inside. Slowly he opened the door, not sure what he would find. He was hoping that Shuichi would be asleep, but that hope was dashed. He hoped that his other hopes wouldn't be as well.

Shuichi had heard him coming in. He sat up in the bed, with his back rigid.

"What do you want?" Shuichi asked Yuki coldly. Yuki mildly wondered how Shuichi knew that it was him. He took a deep breath.

"I'm here to apologize," Yuki said calmly. Shuichi facefaulted. He hadn't been expecting that at all. "I had no right talking to you like that and I hope you'll forgive me," Yuki had made his apology a lot shorter than the ones that the kids were telling him to say. "I got you this teddy bear as a gift. Please accept my apology."

"Apology not accepted."

"What?" Yuki asked, thinking maybe he'd heard wrong.

"I said, 'Apology not accepted.' What you did to me hurt. It hurt worse than anything I'd ever had done to me in my life. If you think that a couple of words and a teddy bearyou probably found in the garbage is going to make it all better, then you are living in a fantasy world. I suggest you get your head out of the clouds and come back down to reality with the rest of us." Yuki was in shock. He wasn't being forgiven!

"I spent twelve hours looking for the perfect teddy bear to give you! It did not take me a couple of minutes!" Yuki practically yelled. He wanted to scream at Shuichi so bad, but he held it in. He was, after all, still trying to apologize. Shuichi's eyes softened a little when he heard that it had taken so long to find the perfect teddy bear, but they hardened right back up again.

"It doesn't matter! I still don't accept," Shuichi told him, calmly.

"You know what…fine! But keep the teddy bear. I also bought you him as a companion since lord knows you don't get many people in here and you probably won't ever again." With that, Yuki threw the teddy bear at Shuichi. It hit him in the stomach. Shuichi grabbed onto it, feeling its softness for the first time. Perhaps he felt a little bit bad, but not bad enough to call back to Yuki.

Yuki stormed out of the room and back to the children's playroom. By the time he got there he had calmed down a little bit. He entered the room. Instantly kids ambushed him, asking him questions.

"He didn't accept it," he said quietly. All of the kids looked at him in shock.

"What?"

"He didn't accept the apology. I told him to keep the bear anyway."

"Why?"

"As a companion. He never gets any visitors, and I'm never going to go back in there again."

End Chapter 4

Alright, so I'll be the first to admit that it's been a while since I've updated this story...almost two weeks. Yikes! I'll try to get chapters out more frequently. I was working on "The Twelve Days of Christmas", though, because that story has to get out a chapter a day to work...

Anyway...onto a review of review...TT There are so many...so happy:

goku-the-saru: I'm glad that you got the bear thing, Queen of the Paperclips: Sorry! Sorry! I'll try to make him less OOC, but it's so hard..., Soralover1: I did didn't I? I'm trying to make him less OOC!, robuddi: Yep...TT I have to go shopping today, dreading, Miserable Midori: Really? I've got from the 12/9 - 1/3..., CassiToTheStars: I'm really sorry! As I said before, it was totally screwing up! I have to go shopping today...not looking forward to it, Kloudy Reignfall: Most likely they will make another appearance, Little Fox Kit: Of course! It had to be there!, tokyo kitsune: Yeah, no kidding, ice-of-spades: Of course! I love writing!, clari chan: gomen, gomen! Those errors drive me insane!, Joonie: hehehe...twelve hours...can you imagine?, Lenora: YAY!!! I love your review: DarrkKatt: Funky name I'll tell you that. I gotta go to the mall today..., Wynjara: I agree, I want someone like K too, Megamie: hehehe...I know...how evil..., MC-88: Oh, I missed your reviews, na no da!!! Don't worry about it, na no da!!!, lemur130: I'm thinking about putting Hiro in it, Becky Burke: Yay! I'm glad you think so, mitzuki-kun: I'm glad that you like it!, Syaoran is kawaii: Oh!! That makes me so happy! (only 2 more days of TTDOC left...), Nekura-chan: other fic? EQ? finished!, Lily Avalon: Yay! I'm so glad...I've never written a Ryuichi before..., Sliefoxx: Of course, you and your beta senses...thank you for the critique: Reese Craven: Of course. There will be lots more to come!, Johnny-Depp-Luv: It wasn't forever then, it's forever now!, Haruna-Hakkai: no worries, I'm 100 Yu/Shu, and 1239 Yen is approx...$12-$13..., Tammy: If I need any help, you'll be the first person I ask, moony: I'm glad that you like!, Falcon Zanbandia of Nightmares: Wow...you are so lucky because I was updating soon from when you reviewed! Thank you for the three reviews!

Hurray! Phew...that was a lot! AND!!! I MADE MY GOAL of 75 reviews and passed it!!! I'm so happy!!! Perhaps maybe I can get at least 30 more reviews for this chapter for a total of over 110? Please :does Tsuzuki puppy face:

Anyway, it's kind ofthanksto Crazy 4 Grasper that I even updated today...I wasn't really planning on it. I was gonna wait until Christmas.

But...Merry Christmas everybody!

Have a Happy Holidays

And...until next update...(which will hopefully be relatively soon...)

Ja ne

Ki-chan