I have no acceptable excuse for why it has taken me so appallingly long to upload this. To tell you the truth, I have been busy but I have also been unforgiveably lazy, and as a result this chapter is a sort of filler before we get to anything interesting. Anyway, I hope you like it. Sorry it took so long!

Hiro entered the studio ten minutes late to find that Shuichi still hadn't arrived yet. The frontman of Bad Luck was often a little late, but it was only when a good hour had passed with no sign of Shuichi that Hiro began to worry. He pulled his cell phone out of his jacket and found Shindou's number, but when he dialled it Shuichi didn't pick up.

Hiro frowned and looked up the number for the apartment Mr Yuki and Shuichi shared. Surely he would have left by now, but it was worth a try.

The phone had barely begun to ring when Shuichi snatched it up "Yuki?" His voice was high pitched with desperation, and Hiro understood why Shuichi wasn't at work. Of course, he and Yuki had had a fight.

"It's me Shuichi." He explained apologetically.

"Oh." The disappointment in the singer's voice was painful to listen to. "So you and Mr Yuki had a fight huh?" Hiro asked gently.

"He's gone Hiro!" Shuichi broke out into sobs. "He left last night!" Hiro's eyes widened.

"What do you mean?" Shuichi choked on his tears, "he just left."

"He'd been acting weird, talking about someone he ran into the other day who he'd known years ago, I didn't understand why he was so worried about it, but it turned out he felt really guilty about not seeing him for so long or something... Then he was gone all night and... and when I got home yesterday he said..." his words dissolved into sobs.

"He said what Shu?" Hiro pressed "what did he say?"

"He... he spent the night with Kyo! He left me for him! The stupid bastard!" Shuichi yelled, then, his voice softer "how could he do this to me... I love him Hiro."

Hiro couldn't find the right words. "Shu I... I'm so sorry buddy. I... I don't know what to say..."

"Maybe he'll come back..." He suggested limply.

"I don't think so," Shuichi whispered.

"Listen just... just get some rest, I'm coming over."

"Ok."

K was fuming when he hung up the phone, "I'm coming over?" He quoted, eyes narrowed, pistol levelled at Hiro's head.

"He's a mess. Yuki left him last night." Hiro explained distractedly, massaging the back of his neck.

Sakano dropped to his knees, sobbing. "Oh God... We won't see him for at least another week! Bad Luck has deadlines; we have at least another six tracks to finish before the end of the month!"

K swung the pistol around to aim it at Sakano's head. "Sakano, you don't even manage them anymore, leave this to me. Hiro – "he began, turning back to the guitarist, but Hiro was already gone. "Hmph" he muttered irritably, before blowing a hole in the plaster just to the right of the door frame. Fujisaki stood.

"We can't get anything done if nobody's here, I'm going home."

Kyo woke early as always, the sunlight pouring over his face and forcing his eyes open. He lay still for a few seconds, feeling Eiri's breath on the back of his neck. His eyes moved to the arm wrapped possessively around his waist, watching Eiri's fingers twitch almost imperceptibly in sleep. It was funny, he thought, how much you could tell about a person from their hands. Eiri's were slender; elegant, just like the rest of him, his fingers long and almost feminine. His skin was pale, contrasting with Kyo's, which was tanned a light brown. The paleness told him Eiri spent most of his time inside, probably writing, although there was no telltale groove in any of his fingers to show he wrote by hand.

Yet Kyo already knew all of these things. He gently lifted the hand from his stomach and placed it at Eiri's side, careful not to wake him. The awkwardness of facing him, after allowing Eiri to share his bed, was not something he cared to imagine.

He slid out from under the sheet and stood, rubbing his eyes, before crossing to the chest of drawers against the wall at the foot of the futon. He piled clothes into his arms and moved to the door that led straight through to the bathroom from his room. Something made him glance back as he opened the door; back at Eiri's sleeping face. The resemblance to the Eiri he remembered was more striking in sleep, once those cold eyes were hidden behind closed lids. It was a coldness that Kyo had recognised when he had met Eiri in the street that time just a few days ago.

He realised now that it was from his own reflection that he recognised it.

He tore his gaze away from Eiri's face and left the room, shaking his head. It was true what he'd said the night before, having Eiri around always made things more complicated. When he was alone, it was easy to drift through the days without having to feel anything, without having to worry about anything other than earning a living. But as long as Eiri was there, everything suddenly became so much more important, because suddenly he had something to lose.

He pulled off the thin grey pyjama pants he had slept in and stepped into the shower, turning the water up as hot as he could stand it. Under the steady stream, away from Eiri, it was easier to work things through; order his thoughts. Granted, there were certain things he didn't want to think about, and dwelling on the past few days wasn't helping him make any sense of things, but at least it left him just a little closer to forming some kind of solution.

He couldn't let this... this thing with Eiri move any further than it already had. He had been this way once before, and it had brought him only heartache. Eiri didn't want him; not really, he wanted Kitazawa, Shuichi Shindou, anyone but Kyo. People didn't want Kyo, people left him.

He sighed heavily and turned off the water before stepping out of the cubicle and grabbing a towel.

Eiri had to leave, eventually. But... maybe not just yet.

He pulled on yesterday's khaki combat pants over his boxer shorts and slipped into a black t- shirt before exiting the bathroom, scrubbing his wet hair with the towel. He was lighting a cigarette, the towel around his shoulders as he waited for the water to boil for his coffee, when Eiri came up behind him, wrapping his arms around Kyo's waist and resting his chin on his left shoulder.

Kyo stiffened. He removed the cigarette from his mouth and exhaled, "please tell me you're wearing pants."

"Nope."

Kyo closed his eyes. "Get the fuck off me."

Eiri laughed and released him, coming around one side to pour the hot water onto the coffee grains in Kyo's cup. The bed sheet was tied loosely around his hips. He picked up the coffee cup and re entered the bedroom.

"You are so irritating." Kyo sighed as he poured a second coffee for himself.

Shuichi hadn't locked the door, and Hiro let himself in. He went straight to the bedroom, knocking on the door just in case Mr Yuki had returned. He hadn't, Hiro could hear Shuichi sniffling in there. He stuck his head around the door and saw his friend, looking very small in the middle of the bed, and surrounded by screwed up tissues and candy wrappers.

"Shu?" Hiro choked.

"Hiro," was the wailed response as Shuichi looked up to see him standing awkwardly in the doorway. "He's gone!"

Hiro sat beside Shuichi on the bed and put an arm around him, "I know. I'm sorry Shuichi."

He sat stiffly while Shuichi cried into his shirt.

"Tell you what, I think I'll stay with you for a while if that's okay. I mean, someone has to keep an eye on you right? And maybe, when Ayaka comes to visit, you can come out with us?"

Shuichi's eyes seemed to be twice their regular size when he stared gratefully up at him, "oh Hiro thank you!" He gushed, hugging him a little too tightly for Hiro's comfort.

"You're welcome." He gasped.

Nami couldn't shift the lingering sense of guilt as she let herself into her flat that night; she felt as though Genji had tricked her. At the time, she couldn't see what was so important about Mr Yuki's visit to Kyousuke Kagasaki's apartment. But that was before she remembered Shuichi Shindou. Of course, she thought, if there was a suspicion that Mr Yuki had another lover, the press would be all over it in days. That said; Kagasaki had never struck her as quite the type to have those kinds of... relations with another man. Truthfully, she couldn't really imagine him having those kinds of relations with anybody; Nami had always had something of a crush on Mr Kagasaki, ever since he had arrived in Tokyo a few months ago.

He was very good looking, and there was an air of mystery about his coldness that had attracted her to him. His reserved nature seemed to push most people away, but it had only drawn Nami closer as she found herself wondering what could have made him that way. She used to bump into him in the hallway outside her apartment sometimes, and would always greet him. She had waited for weeks for him to smile back at her, but he never did. Kyousuke didn't have a lover as far as she knew, he didn't really seem to have... well, anybody. He didn't go away to visit family or friends, nobody ever entered his apartment except for himself...

She wondered if maybe there was something going on between Mr Yuki and Kyousuke. If Genji put it into the papers, Mr Yuki could be ruined, and Kyousuke... poor Kyousuke, who hated people, who wouldn't let himself get close to anybody... Nami leant against the door and sank to the ground, realising what she had done.