Part Two: His Secret

Chapter Seven: Burning bridges

The events of the past ten days had been such a whirlwind for Kari Kamiya, that she could scarcely believe that so much time had passed when she woke up on Monday morning of a week later. At school, after her long conversation with Yolei on Tuesday, the pair had slotted back into their old friendship like the last year had never happened. Well, almost. When they had met up in homeroom the following day, they had started the process of getting each other up to speed on their lives from the in-between time. Or at least Yolei had. Kari, on the other hand, had said there was little she wanted to share, due to having been severely depressed for the duration. However, she had taken the opportunity to explain that she hated chick films, loved clothes from , now listened to instrumental music and was a crack shot with a green turtle shell.

Following that, she'd spoke with Davis, who had said, "no sweat," without the need for an explanation. She had given it to him anyway; the same version of the truth she'd told Yolei. It had been necessary in order for her to ask him to forgive TK. After some thought and a few questions, he had agreed. However, on the condition that TK first apologised to her. While that would not likely happen, it was at least a start. She had briefly spoken to Cody too and between herself and Yolei, arranged for the four of them plus Ken to meet up the weekend after next. If she had not personally lived through it, Kari would not have believed any of this possible when sitting by the river ten days ago. Even her mom had cooled down slightly over the whole hair issue; dinner plus alcohol having helped settle her mood. She still hated her daughter's hair and wardrobe choices, but Kari reckoned she might eventually come around. All in all, things could not possibly have been better in her life. However, one problem still persisted; TK. She had given it a lot of thought over the weekend and decided that the time had come to confront him.

Kari walked through the deserted hallway to the classroom the creative writing group used for their weekly after school meeting. Yolei had suggested it as a good time and place to find TK, for it would give her some privacy should things go south. While Davis had offered to come along as back up, just in case TK got nasty and tried to 'lay his hands' on her again. She had declined the offer. This was something she needed to do by herself. Coming to a stop outside an empty room, Kari took a few steadying breaths. In truth, she did not expect this to go well. In fact, she would probably consider TK opening his mouth to tell her to fuck off a success. At least that way he would have bothered to speak to her; something he had not done in over a year. In the deathly silence of the empty corridor, she waited.

Five minutes passed before a door slightly further down the hallway opened and a few individuals wandered out. Bracing herself, Kari took a few tentative steps forward. A moment later the blonde hair of Takeru Takaishi appeared through the doorway, mid-conversation with someone she did not recognise. Here goes nothing…

"TK," Kari called out.

She saw the boy visibly stiffen, look at his friend and say, "I'll catch up with you." He then turned around to face her. His expression, usually so light and cheerful, had been twisted into one of sour contempt. "What do you want, Kamiya?" he barked at her, perhaps hoping to scare her off.

Kari, well prepared for this eventuality, stood her ground. "I wanted to talk to you."

"Yeah, TK scoffed, "well now you have, so leave me alone." Hearing his words she could not help but feel like she was talking to his older brother Matt. So cold and offhandedly uncaring that they were. Not at all like the tender, caring person she knew him to be. He turned to walk away.

"TK," she called out as she quickly closed the distance between them, "I need to talk to you."

The boy let out a snort of derision, "it's a little late for that, Kamiya."

"That's not what I wanted to talk about," Kari replied firmly, not letting his abrasive tone repel her. "I'm sorry for what happened between us and I can't apologise enough for breaking your heart but…"

TK spun around his normally soft blue eyes ablaze with fury. "You're damn right you can't apologise enough!"

Kari sucked in a slow breath as she met his gaze; reddish-brown vs icy blue. She had hated herself more than enough over the past year that nothing he could say would possibly make her feel worse. So if that was his intention, he would be sorely disappointed. "You're not going to hurt me, TK. I know you still feel angry and I understand why you might want to hurt me, but it's not going to work. I'm sorry for breaking your heart and I'm sorry for not telling you sooner. However, I was too scared to… too weak."

"Yeah, you were. And even when you did finally decide to rip my heart out, you were too weak to tell me the real reason why. So go on, Kamiya, why don't you tell me now. I'm listening."

Kari could see in TK's eyes the pain, the hurt… the anger that still haunted him one year on. Only time had caused it to fester. And, from his perspective, not knowing the truth was central to it. Regardless, whether he would believe it or not, she had told him the truth. Minus, of course, the identity of the person she was in love with. Involuntarily, Kari felt her fists clench and the feelings of anger that she had felt towards him for refusing to accept the truth slowly rise from their grave. "What I told you that night was true, TK. I had fallen in love with someone else."

"Don't give me that bullshit, Kamiya," he replied hotly. "You shacked up with Davis a few weeks later, but you clearly weren't in love with him either as you ditched him quickly enough."

"I was angry, TK," Kari spat back. "While I might have been the one to break off our relationship, your refusal to believe the truth and what happened between you and Tai hurt me a lot. I was angry, stupid and reactionary. I wanted to hurt you and thought hooking up with Davis would do just that."

"What, so breaking my heart wasn't enough for you?"

Kari felt her body shake with rage upon hearing the accusation. It transpired that she had not fully worked through her feelings towards him, simply buried them beneath everything else she had felt over the past year in regards to her brother. "I never wanted to break your heart. Believe me, if I could have done things any other way I would have."

"Then why didn't you give me a chance to make things right?" A loud thud accompanied TK's words as he slammed his fist against the wall. The boy's shoulders had hunched over and Kari could hear his breathing come in laboured pants through gritted teeth. That must have hurt… a lot.

Without thinking, she moved to stand in front of him. "TK, your hand," she exclaimed, the feelings of anger that had filled her moments prior washed away in a flood of compassion and concern. She reached out a hand and touched his shaking arm. "Here, let me help you."

"I don't want your help, Kamiya," he barked, sounding much like she would imagine an injured dog would when cornered by someone it did not know.

There was a time when Kari would have instinctively shrank away from such a response and tried the calming from a distance approach. That would not work in this case. Using the voice she sometimes had to in order to rouse Tai from his slumber, she said, "Takeru Takaishi, stop being an idiot and let me look at that wrist!"

TK's mouth fell open at hearing her authoritative, no-nonsense voice. While he remained stunned, Kari took the opportunity to take hold of his upper arm in a firm grip.

"OW! That hurt," he grimaced when she rotated his wrist. He tried to pull away, but she refused to relinquish her grip. "AH!"

"I think you might have broken your wrist," Kari then said after manipulating the joint a few more times to the sound of grimaced hissing.

Again TK tried to free his arm. "It'll be fine."

"You're right," Kari replied airily, then shifted her tone back to one of authority, "it will be fine. Once I take you to get it checked over."

"Why are you doing this?" TK asked as she used her free hand to take off her sailor collar.

"Because contrary to what you might think, I don't hate you and I certainly don't want to see you in pain." Slipping his forearm through the collar, Kari undid the knot and then re-tied it behind his neck. "The school nurse will probably already have gone home, so we'll have to go to the emergency room."

Taking a firm grip on his free hand, Kari led him down the hallway and towards the nearest exit. He tried to shrug her off but to no avail. She was used to dragging her brother out of bed or to the shower and he was a lot bigger and stronger than TK.

"I can manage by myself, Kari," the boy protested for the umpteenth time when they finally left the school building.

She let out a small chuckle.

Her response seemed to get his dander up again for he barked, "what's so funny?"

"You called me Kari," she replied in amusement.

The look that spread across his face told her that he hadn't even realised that he'd done it. "Yeah, well so what, Kamiya."

His forced use of her family name caused her to burst out laughing.

"Knock it off! It's not funny!"

"It's perfectly funny," Kari replied sweetly.

"And why's that?"

She gave him a smile, "because it means that you don't hate me as much as you think."

He looked her straight in the eyes and though she could see that he wanted to and replied, "I'm pretty sure I do," Kari knew he was lying to both of them.

"You forget how well I know you, TK," she said as she matched his stare. "Whether you want to admit it or not, deep down you still care about me."

He broke off the stare and they walked in silence for a while. However, slowly Kari could feel the resistance in his arm begin to wane. Eventually, when they were in sight of the hospital, TK spoke once more. "I never stopped loving you, Kari."

She turned and looked up at him, surprised that he'd actually been willing to admit it.

However, his eyes were fixed dead ahead. "But believe me when I say that I tried."

She felt his hand grip her own, though detected no malice.

"I tried everything to forget about you, Kari, everything. Spending time with friends, dating other girls… listening to Matt's band in the hopes that their sheer noise would drive you from my mind. I even wrote a short story about you that I'm… not proud of."

Kari raised her free hand and turned his cheek so that he faced her. "You had every right to hate me. I led you down a false trail because I was too scared to admit to you that I didn't feel the same way."

TK said nothing as they made their way inside the building. At the front desk, they spoke to the attendant who directed them to the waiting area.

"You don't need to wait with me," TK said as he found an empty chair.

"It's the least I can do," Kari replied as she sat down beside him. "It was technically my fault."

The silence between them was uncomfortable, but she shouldn't have expected it to be anything other. Had he not injured his hand, TK would probably have left soon after hitting the wall. After about fifteen minutes a doctor came over and escorted them to an exam room. A quick examination revealed that it was indeed broken. After which the doctor decided to send the boy for an X-ray.

"I'll be fine from here, Kari," TK said as the doctor indicated for him to follow. "I'll call Matt to come pick me up once I'm done."

"Are you sure?" she asked. TK nodded and handed her back her sailor collar. Kari took it from him and re-tied it around her neck. "It was nice talking to you again," she then said as he turned to walk away. "If you like, the old gang are going to hang out on Saturday if you want to come." It was a long shot to ask him, but it had been the motivation to talk to him again.

"...Sorry, I'm busy," he replied without turning back around to look at her.

Kari hung her head. "Ok..." she said glumly as she watched him walk away.

When he disappeared from view, she turned and made her way back out of the hospital. As she walked back to school to fetch her bike, she played the whole conversation between them over in her head. They had both gotten angry and had it not been for his fit of rage, things would probably have turned ugly. And while it was clear that TK still loved her, he held a lot of hate and resentment too. By the time she reached her destination, Kari was unsure whether the conversation had helped matters, or if any future effort would simply turn into the fight fate had somehow prevented today. Maybe some bridges were destined to remain burned.