Right so. This is shorter and unedited and I had trouble coming up with an ending, but I'm generally satisfied by the amount of time it took me to produce this, what with a new computer and I can't find my software disc so this is written on Google Docs.
Did you guys not like my last chapter? Did I do something wrong? Not a single comment, flames, praise, or otherwise. It was kind of depressing. If you want me to make this story go away, I can…
Anyway, enjoy, and please review!
I didn't do anything special to hide what I did from the club. They, just as everyone else, know Kyoya was found unconscious in an abandoned classroom and know he's in the hospital now. Fingers have been pointed, but no one has directly said it was me. Walking down the halls, I hear the murmurs.
"It's the Aihana girl," they whisper.
"She beat up Kyoya!"
"She helped one of Haruhi's neighbors; she can't be all bad."
"That girl carries a gun!"
"I heard she seduced him."
"I heard her whole family died and she wasn't even sad. Do you think she killed them?"
It's always the same. The same whispers, the same corner-of-the-eye, wary, disapproving looks. I've always been with the type of group that gives those looks out. I've never been the kind to receive them. It irritates me to no end knowing that they know exactly what I did and still they whisper and murmur and look. It's the worst insult I can get, to finally be famous, rather, infamous, and get this kind of treatment.
I'll make you pay. I'll make you all pay.
X-***-X
"You came back," Tamaki breaks the tense silence that fell as soon as I'd entered the club room. Club activities had been cancelled due to certain "medicating circumstances", but I felt a strange pull towards this room, as if there's something that I'd forgotten to do.
Haruhi stares at me with wide eyes. Honey's normally innocent gaze is laden with sadness. Mori's is cold and calculating, his body gone stiff. Tamaki is gazing at me incredulously with his wide, sparkling violet eyes. What makes me almost regret coming is the twins' matching looks; their hazel eyes are swimming with stiff, blazing, predatory anger, their normally pride-swollen stances weighted with betrayal.
"There's no need acting like that," I sniff, crossing my arms stiffly and looking down my nose at them all, my gaze brushing weakly over the twins. "You all got exactly what's coming to you."
"What do you mean, Mizu-chan?" Honey-senpai asks innocently, tiredly, from atop Mori's shoulders.
"You know exactly what I mean!" I say crossly, realizing in my head that what I'm saying is dreadfully more than true. "If Kyoya hadn't brought me here, Kagami would never have come! Did you know that she died in a plane crash on her way back to my little brother's funeral?"
Silence. Wide-eyed silence.
"Did you know that my older brother Takumi shot himself because Kagami died? He thought I wasn't coming back."
Silence.
For what seems like a year, I stare them down, my vision suddenly blurry. I'm hardly able to breathe through the lump in my throat and the tightening bands around my chest. Admitting it to them suddenly made it real. This isn't an illusion any more. No one's playing tricks on me. This is real. My brothers and my sister are gone, dead, and they're not ever coming back.
I haven't cried.
"Mizu-chan," a small voice comes, penetrating my thoughts and dragging me out of them. My technicolor gaze turns to the speaker, the host king himself.
"Don't say you're sorry," I snap tonelessly. "Weren't you all the ones that asked Kagami to come? Weren't you the ones who kept me here?" My gaze narrows cruelly on Tamaki's face, growing steadily paler, more desperate, more lost as I continue.
"Weren't you the one who told me to come here, Tamaki?"
He lets out a gasp, a hiss through his teeth, and suddenly collapses into a sobbing mess. His jaw drops open even as tears spring into his eyes and spill down his cheeks. In a flash, I am engulfed in a flaming hug, firm yet gentle, and pressed into Tamaki's shoulder.
"What- What are you-!" My first instinct is to reach out, yank his hair back, and jab him firmly in the windpipe, but something stops me. My arms feel heavy, my eyelids suddenly too flimsy to hold up my lashes. I feel them drooping down, my head falling graciously against his sky blue blazer.
"It's okay to cry, Mizuki," he whispers softly into my hair. I'm certain everyone else can hear, but what do they care? Why should they care?
"I'm sorry."
And so, I cry.
X-***-X
The Hitachiins drive me back to their manor, where we pretend like everything's normal. I pack up my things in my duffle bag, the Hitachiins sitting cross legged on my borrowed bed, laughing and joking and acting. It would be nice, if not for the constant nagging at the base of my skull.
Slinging my bag over my shoulder, I am led once more back out to their car and joined.
"You two don't have to come," I say, wincing at the waver in my voice. I meant what I said, but I want them to come. What if I was right all along? What if he's still there?
"Sure we do," they say in unison.
"Why?" I ask as Hikaru closes the door and the chauffeur pulls out. "It'll be disgusting."
"Isn't it obvious?" Hikaru asks with a grin, leaning over Kaoru. "It's because we like you."
The rest of the drive is filled with meaningless talk, but a sort of cloud hangs over it all. The strings of tension are pulled taut, so thick that I can practically see them wavering in the air. I notice myself becoming more detached, sinking slowly into a pool of reticence as the drive progresses. My voice, higher pitched with nervousness, speaks up only to give the driver directions. My teeth unknowingly worry my bottom lip.
"We're here, masters," the chauffeur announces just as the car rolls to a sudden stop. I follow after Hikaru and Kaoru reluctantly, the grip on my bag tightening and my lip beginning to swell with the constant abuse. My feet crunch on the gravel drive, and the brisk winter air chills me to the bone.
The three of us reach the doorstep, and I release my lip as I ring the doorbell. It takes me only a brief second to realize that this is my house and I don't need to do that, but just as I'm reaching for the knob, the door swings open.
"Mizuki?"
"Takumi?"
