I LIVE!

I'm finally back! First of all, I'm really super duper mega honest-to-God so sorry that I disappear without a word. It's my fault I admit so I'm really sorry! Honestly, you guys have to thank those who reviews even when I'm months late because it gave me the motivation that someone is still reading and waiting for this update so thank you to all of my reviewers!

Also, check out the song Fix You by Coldplay. The song reminds me of this story. Credits to I Am Legend Not Myth for suggesting it! ^.^

Now, without further ado, I give you, chapter 8!

The atmosphere seemed tense and awkward as silence descended upon the four people in the living room. However, the only woman present showed not even an ounce of discomfort, seemingly oblivious to the current atmosphere as she serenely sipped her tea.

Across her was the perfect gentleman who she had immediately approved when her only daughter claimed him to be her 'boyfriend'. Speaking of her daughter, Hiromi narrowed her eyes at Nagisa-chan when she made no signs to drink the tea. When she saw the dark glare directed towards her, she hastily took a dainty sip of her tea, exactly how a proper lady should be. Hiromi smiled in satisfaction before she continued drinking her own tea.

To be honest, she used to constantly fret about her daughter's love life. There were times when she acted disgracefully as a girl, when she insisted that she was uncomfortable wearing a skirt, and even had the gall to ruin those beautiful dresses that she had worked so hard to pay for!

So in her mind, it was completely justified that she would worry about her daughter's non-existent future husband! Especially when she only seen her with that rude red head menace! Her eyes narrowed dangerously at the uninvited delinquent sitting so casually beside her daughter's boyfriend while drinking his tea with less than acceptable manners!

She had hated him the first time he addressed her daughter a 'he'! And she knew, even when Nagisa-chan tried to convince her otherwise, that he was the reason that her perfect doll had changed!

She absolutely refused to acknowledge this insufferable hooligan!

And her perfect daughter was hers and hers alone!

Nagisa tensed when he felt the spike of anger from his mother beside him. He was wary when she turned to address him with a slightly strained smile on her lips,

"Nagisa-chan, mommy completely forgot to serve some biscuits for Asano-kun! Please be a dear and take some from the kitchen," she said pleasingly but being so near with her, he could see the unspoken danger glinting in her eyes, as if daring him to refuse. With a heavy heart, Nagisa slowly stood up and walked towards the kitchen.

"You must be getting really old if you can't even remember to serve your own guests some food when you clearly remember the tea~," Karma grinned a little darkly as he fixed his stare on her stiffen posture.

"Why don't you actually be useful and help her," she spat with venom and unconcealed disgust.

"Nah~! If I don't stay here, maybe you'll forget even more important things! For instance, the gender of your own child…"

Karma smirked darkly when he saw the sharp hateful glare directed towards him and he bravely challenged it with his own sinister smile.

A light tug from his sleeve broke him away from the heated staring contest. Nagisa was looking at him pleadingly as he slightly shook his head.

After a few seconds, Karma finally relented. He threw one last dirty look at the glaring woman before he followed Nagisa to the kitchen.

Asano fidgeted uncomfortable when Karma was out of view and the woman directed her eyes at him instead. Mentally, he cursed Akabane for leaving him alone with this questionable mental woman but he outwardly flashed her a smile.

The delighted smile he received in return did little to reassure him.

"So Asano-kun, I am under the impression that you are the same class as my daughter."

It was not a question but Asano nodded his head anyways.

"Yes I am."

Hiromi hummed in delight before she fired her next question that caught him completely off guard.

"So tell me, how did you fall in love with my daughter?"

Not for the first time, Asano mentally cursed Akabane Karma for dragging him into this mess. It was right there and then that Asano wanted to say the whole truth and be done with it but a gesture from the kitchen caught his eye.

There, standing in clear view from where Asano was sitting, was the mentioned devil grinning darkly at him while gesturing at his phone on his other hand. When Asano's eyes landed on the said phone, his blood ran cold.

There, being displayed proudly on the screen, was a scandalous picture of him playing with a sleeping Nagisa's hair at the library.

Asano's thoughts instantly went back to one of days that he and Nagisa had studied together at the library after school hours. That day, Asano was studying as usual when he realised the blue-haired teen had completely snoozed off. Asano didn't bother to wake him up but for some reason, he took a sudden interest towards Nagisa's hair.

He remembered vaguely that in the past, he had never seen Nagisa with long hair thanks to his twin ponytails concealing that fact. But now, seeing it so soft and silky looking, Asano couldn't help himself from lightly tugging on the hair to convince himself that the hair was real and not a wig that Nagisa wore to complete his cross-dressing look.

He didn't know how, but somehow, Karma managed to capture that moment at an angle that made him look as if he was playing with Nagisa's hair. If possible, Karma's grin widened and Asano immediately knew what he wanted. Grinding his teeth together in an effort to hide his mounting anger, he cast a strained smile at Hiromi's expectant face.

"I knew I was in love with her the moment she transferred to my class," Asano slightly choked on his words before he visibly forced himself to continue.

"It was love at first sight since she completely took my breath away. I admire Nagisa's efforts to study at the library even when the others had gone back. Her gentle personality and stunning looks had won me over and I knew she was the only one for me."

All the while, Asano felt like he was near vomiting as he shuddered at every word. Oblivious to the teen's struggle, Hiromi was smiling giddily like a love-struck teen. After a moment, the smile disappeared and was replaced with a slight dark frown.

"Nagisa-chan is truly a wonderful child. If only she had gotten the first place on the exam…"

Maybe because of his ego of being indirectly challenged at his rank in the first place or maybe he used to experience the same uncaring attitude from his own father towards his achievements when he had worked to his bones for them but his next words had surprised him,

"You should not degrade her so easily, Shiota-san. Her grades had earned her respect and acknowledgment from the whole school, and admittedly, even my own father, the school director. A feat that is not easily accomplish by anyone," he said with a hard edge to his tone.

For a brief moment, Asano saw the dark glare directed at him before it was replaced with a smile,

"You are right, Asano-kun. My Nagisa-chan is the perfect daughter! I'm sorry if I offended you in any way but it's just that I just bought the most beautiful necklace for her but she refused to wear it! You might say that it was a mother's hurt feeling towards the situation but in truth, I really am proud of my Nagisa-chan," Hiromi sighed sadly at the end of her sentence as her face contorted with hurt and sadness.

For a moment, Asano believed that the emotions were genuine but remembering Nagisa's own acting ability, he immediately banished the thought.

Dealing with the Shiotas was more dangerous than he initially thought.

"Mother, I've brought the biscuits for the guests."

Nagisa's soft voice was like music to his ears as he unknowingly prevented the line of conversation from continuing. He flashed a polite smile when Nagisa placed a plate of scones and biscuits in front of him. From the corner of his eye, he saw Hiromi glaring with dissatisfaction of being interrupted before she delicately took a bite from her own biscuit.

Internally, Asano sighed in relief.

Nagisa shifted uncomfortably under Karma's sharp glare. The three of them were currently inside Nagisa's room. His mother had long ago suggested that they 'have a talk' in his room but not without glaring angrily at Karma when he followed them.

At first, Nagisa was more than embarrassed when his own mother winked at him as they went to his room. But far too soon, the embarrassment died away and it was clear Karma was not going to be patient any longer.

Asano vaguely realised that Nagisa was wearing a necklace after his talk with Hiromi but immediately turned his attention when Nagisa let out a weary sigh.

"I always knew that you might find out. But I was hoping it wasn't this soon," he said with a tired smile before he cleared his throat.

At that moment, Asano realised just how exhausted the teen seemed to be. The effects of his fever from before had faded but still visible. The dark circles beneath his eyes showed how little sleep he was getting and it was made worse with the yellow bruise on his cheek that his mother had somehow forgotten about when they had talked earlier at the living room.

"What I said on the rooftop was the truth. I didn't lie. It's just that…. I didn't tell the whole truth. I guess, everything started when my father sudden appeared in front of our house and asked for a divorce. My mother got angry and started shouting at him, immediately making him run away from the house. But he didn't stop. Every so often, he would mail to us some divorce papers and mother would rip up the papers every time.

"The truth was he fell in love with another woman so he wanted mother to sign the divorce papers as soon as possible because he wanted to marry that woman. Since then, she was a little bit unstable, always crying and yelling for no reason at all. But the moment she completely changed was when she received my results from the school.

"After that, she turned normal. There was no more random breaking down or yelling but she was completely convinced that she only has one daughter, and she always call her Nagisa-chan."

At this point, Nagisa's tone turned bitter but when he cleared his throat before continuing, it was completely gone.

"And she thinks that Nagisa-chan is always a beautiful and smart girl. That's why she couldn't accept that Nagisa-chan wears the boy's school uniform and is in Class E. She forced her to wear dresses and skirts and went to meet the school director to transfer her to Class A. Nagisa-chan should always be the first in school so she forced her to study and threatened to disown her if she failed to get better results on the mock entrance exam."

While his eyes remained passive, Asano's fists tightened when he saw the detached expression and dead tone as Nagisa continued to tell the story from the third party's point of view, as if the mere thought of saying he was the main character in that story was enough acknowledgement for him to submit to insanity.

"So Nagisa-chan tried really hard to make her happy. She changed herself to be exactly like her ideal daughter. She changed the way she spoke, changed the way she moved, changed the way she acted around other people. She studied hard to get better grades.

She even went as far as to make her former classmates hate her, if only because she hoped that they won't force her back to her old class. Because do you know, deep in her heart, she doesn't want to change."

At that moment of weakness, Asano saw a fragile and vulnerable child who was so desperate for the acceptance of his only parent. The scream for help couldn't be any louder. But it was gone in a blink of an eye and Nagisa was looking at the both of them with trepidation and hidden wariness.

Karma took a moment before he answered. But his answer was completely not what he was expecting!

"Then, maybe Nagisa-chan doesn't deserve to live."

Asano heard the sharp intake of breath from Nagisa and he shakily let it out. But before he could say anything, Karma was already speaking again with his glare never leaving the teal-haired androgynous teen.

"Maybe Nagisa-chan shouldn't even be born. Because when Nagisa-chan lives, Nagisa-kun is dead. And only her mother wants Nagisa-chan to live. Everyone else wants Nagisa-kun and no one else." Karma said cruelly when Nagisa visibly flinched away from the words.

His body started to tremble since the moment Karma opened his mouth. His breathing was becoming faster and shallower and at the back of his mind, he knew he was going to hyperventilate soon.

But that was no excuse for him to violently shy away from Karma when he stepped closer towards him. A brief flash of hurt passed through his eyes that made Nagisa instantly guilty but it disappeared as fast as it appeared and left only a hard cold set of eyes in its awake.

"And if Nagisa-chan refused to die, then I will kill her myself."

Karma's ruthless words made Asano's blood ran cold as realisation dawned on him that Akabane was dead serious. Warning bells rang inside his mind as the situation was quickly becoming dangerous. Akabane had always been impulsive and Asano feared that he would start attacking Shiota if he didn't defuse the thick atmosphere.

I am Shiota Nagisa.

I am currently in Class A and is a former Class E student.

In front of me is my best friend, Akabane Karma.

He gave me two choices;

Betray my mother and be the real Shiota Nagisa,

Or

Betray him and be my mother's perfect Shiota Nagisa.