Chapter Seven

"I love you."

Yuki turned in his sleep, mumbling indistinguishable words as he rolled on his stomach. Shuichi smiled and blew a kiss behind him as he walked out the bedroom door, down the hall, and to the outside world with a sigh. It was a numb period now. The calm period of care-free ease before guilt set in. Before he would feel like he'd just broken some sacred vow. Before he'd feel hurt again.

For now, he just wanted to go to work, and forget it ever happened.

At first his friends had harassed him for details. K had told everyone about the encounter with Yuki the night before, and Hiro was immediately on top of his friend wondering what had transpired. Shuichi didn't let on. He kept saying

"Nothing, we just talked." And after a while, began to believe the lie himself.

Hiro didn't believe it though, nor did K and Fujisaki. But the day continued and the interrogation ended. Shuichi sang hard on that sunny afternoon, trying to forget anything had ever happened. Trying to forget the problems he'd have to face, come five o' clock, he'd have nothing to do be go home and think.

But when five o'clock rolled around, he was met at the glass front doors of NG Studios, by none other than the person he wanted to forget. Eiri Yuki.

"Hey."

"Hey." Shuichi hesitantly stopped in front of him. An awkward space of silence passed. He scuffed his shoes against the side-walk.

"So. You left this morning."

"Yeah, I had work today and…" Shuichi shrugged. "I wanted to let you sleep."

"I see." Yuki began to turn away, Shuichi noticed his high-polish Mercury Lexus sitting in the parking spaces. He started towards it.

"Yuki. What happened?"

The tall blond stopped dead, and turned his head over his shoulder. "We fell in love all over again."

Shuichi smiled at the answer. "What happened before? What happened six months ago, when you walked away?"

"I forgot how much you meant to me, and it distorted my thinking."

"You left."

"I did. And I regretted it for six months of my life."

Shuichi walked forward, hugged Yuki around the middle.

"Are you coming home?"

"Where's home?"

"Back where we started."

Yuki smirked and opened the driver-side door. "Lead the way brat."

End-7

A/N: Stay tuned for the epilogue!