changed the summary because the old one was embarrassing me lol. unless someone liked the old one. I dunno.

It'd been a while since he'd had such a good sleep. He couldn't remember the last time he'd woken up feeling refreshed, without a creaky pain in his back. He thought only old people had to deal with back pain, but apparently not.

It was fitting that he wake up refreshed on his first day after graduating high school.

He swung his arm out to his bedside table, feeling for his phone, but was met with only the table's flat wood surface. He groggily raised his head to check and saw that his phone wasn't there. Weird. He always left his phone there as he slept, every night since he'd first gotten it in tenth grade.

He concentrated, trying to remember if he'd left it somewhere last night. He remembered getting home from the graduation ceremony, goofing off with the PS4 before his mom arrived, and then when she did she took him out for dinner, which was rare because they didn't normally have the money for that sort of thing, but she insisted because his graduation was a special occasion, apparently. He remembered LINEing Kaito or someone on the way home from the restaurant, then when he got home he talked with his mom a bit, then she went to bed, and then he snuck some ice cream, and then he got into bed too and surfed the web on his phone before falling asleep. Yes, if he'd gotten into bed with his phone, he undoubtedly would've left it on the bedside table.

Maybe his mom came in and took it? That was the only explanation, as she was the only other person living in this house. But he couldn't imagine why.

He'd ask her about it later. For now, though, he could always check Twitter on his desktop.

After waiting around boredly for it to boot (his computer wasn't the newest model) he got onto the Twitter website and robotically typed in his username and password. Only to be met with the message:

The username and password you entered did not match our records. Please double-check and try again.

Figuring he made a typo, he tried again, but was only given the error message once more. After trying two more times, he finally got the feeling something was wrong. Did someone hack into his account and change his password? Some assholes liked to do that. So he clicked the Forgot your password? link and entered his username.

We couldn't find your account with that information.

He tried it again.

We couldn't find your account with that information.

And again.

We couldn't find your account with that information.

Maybe the hacker changed his username too. (Though he couldn't imagine why someone would go through the trouble.) So he typed in his email (We couldn't find your account with that information.) and then his phone number (We couldn't find your account with that information.).

We couldn't find your account with that information.

The words glared red into his eyes.

This was weird.

But before he could investigate further, his mom called him from downstairs.

"Len! Wake up already!"

After staring at the message one more time (We couldn't find your account with that information.) he put the computer to sleep and went downstairs. He was greeted with the smell of a complete Western breakfast: the eggs, the bacon, the toast, the fried tomatoes, all the like. His mom was at the stove, pushing the last of the bacon onto a plate.

A smile tugged at his lips. "Mom, it's the morning after. You don't have to…"

She'd already cooked his celebratory graduation breakfast yesterday. The fact that she was doing it again was sweet, but unnecessary.

"What are you talking about?"

When she met his eyes, Len felt suddenly uneasy. She looked tired. More tired than she'd been in a long time. But she was so full of energy yesterday. She'd been so happy for him yesterday…

"Are you okay?" he asked uncertainly.

"I'm very okay, why?" There was no acid in her tone; in fact, if she was stressed at all, it was obvious she was trying to hide it.

"Nothing. It's just that you look a bit tired."

She laughed, a breathy laugh like a sigh in slim disguise. "Ah, not really. I feel the same as usual, today."

"If you say so…" Len said, though he didn't believe her.

"Thanks, though, for asking, Len," she said as she began to set the table. "You're so good, you know."

"Well, you're my mother. That's why I asked and that's why I'm good."

She laughed, curiosity in her eyes. "You're strangely… gentlemanly this morning, Len. Did something happen?"

He got that feeling again. The feeling when couldn't log into his Twitter account, and when he reached to his bedside table to find his phone had disappeared.

He wasn't acting any differently from normal. Ever since her divorce from his father, he'd made it a habit to say those kinds of things to her, the things an ideal son would say, because she was hurt and hearing those things helped her heal.

"Hey, mom," he said suddenly. "Do you know where my phone is?"

"The phone's where it's always been. Do you need to call someone?"

"No, not the phone. My phone. My cellphone."

She frowned. "Cellphone? You don't have a cellphone, dear."

There was a funny feeling in his stomach.

"I do have a cellphone, what are you talking about? Don't you remember? You came with me to get one, like two years ago…"

She shook her head slowly. "Is something wrong, Len? We never did. You don't have a phone."

"D-Don't you remember yesterday, on the train home from dinner? I was on my phone then…"

"…We didn't go out for dinner yesterday, dear," she said gently.

Something was wrong.

She looked at him worriedly as she pushed food onto the plates. "Are you okay, Len? Do you… have a fever…?"

Something was wrong…

"No. I'm fine. I just… Something feels wrong. You don't remember what I remember…"

Concern flushed his mother's face.

"Okay, mom," he said quickly, holding up a hand. "What did we have for dinner yesterday, then?"

"I made curry."

"You didn't make anything special for my graduation dinner?"

She raised a brow. "Your graduation is next week, Len. We'll go out for dinner then."

Next week?

His heart was about to jump out of his chest.

Did he just go back in time, or something?

"Mom. Mom, what's the date today?"

"March nineteenth."

Okay, then he didn't go back in time. His graduation ceremony was definitely yesterday, March eighteenth. He felt slightly relieved that he hadn't been suddenly plunged into a movie script, but then again, he kind of was.

What the heck was happening?!

"My graduation was yesterday, mom. It was on the eighteenth."

Having finished setting the table, she came over and put her hands on his shoulders. Her touch was fluttering, lighter than usual. "Your graduation is next week, on the twenty-fourth. Yesterday, you went to school as usual."

"No…" he said weakly, "I…" He saw the concern swimming in his mother's eyes, and drew back. Pressed two fingers to his temple as he shook his head. "Okay, you know what, let's just eat."

He sat down in his usual seat, and Lola sat down in hers, but just as he was about to put his fork in the bacon, she stopped him.

"Len, dear, we should wait for your father."

He froze with his fork midair, the hair on the back of his neck rising with his heart rate.

"Father?"

It was like he plunged down the hill of a roller coaster just then, as he realized that Lola had set the table for three.

"Morning." A low, smooth voice. Firm like ocean waves at night, but soft like the wind. A voice he hadn't heard in three years.

"Good morning, Leon," his mother said quietly.

Len just stared as the man, somehow dignified even in his bedclothes, took his place at the table, a place that Len was far too used to having empty. He couldn't find it in himself to leap out of his chair and point and demand what the hell was going on, what kind of prank is this—that's what he would have liked to do, but he'd never been able to act outrageous like that in front of Leon. Len always had that little desire to impress him, and it seemed that desire never did vanish after three years apart.

So he kept his raging worries locked inside as the three of them started breakfast; the tasty, full sort of breakfast he and his mother never had the money for on their own.

Breakfast passed in complete silence. Len took the opportunity to feast not on the food, but on his thoughts like white water rapids. What the hell's going on? What the hell is going on? I'm dreaming. I've got to be dreaming. But he pinched himself and his father was still there, chewing his food slowly and calmly as if he had every right to sit in that seat.

They met eyes, and Len quickly looked down.

He wondered if he was the only one who could feel the tension. It was a bit like someone in your class, who no one really likes, asking to eat lunch with your friend group. Someone who didn't belong, trying to belong. But his mom didn't look uncomfortable, per se; just tired.

This scenario, the three of them being together, it was so foreign. But also nostalgic, in a way. It's like he'd been shoved back into his childhood…

His… childhood…

Len quickly and quietly excused himself, leaving his food half-finished. His mom admonished him lightly, but she let him go, concerned as she was for him.

Back in his room, Len shut the door and practically stabbed his computer's power button, wincing as his finger objected to the unprecedented force. He tapped his foot impatiently as he waited for the ancient machine to wake up. Once his desktop appeared on the screen, he pushed his chair aside and leaned into the clock in the bottom-right corner of the monitor, and suddenly, like being pushed off a cliff, it all made total sense.

Or rather, everything stopped making sense.

Because the date displayed on the screen was March 19, 2012.

It was 2015 before he went to bed yesterday.

He opened his closet.

There was his middle school uniform hanging there. No sign of his high school uniform. All of his clothes were clothes he remembered wearing in middle school: too-bright colours and wow, they were all really freaking small. He glanced at the full-length mirror on the back of his closet door and noticed with a pang that all of the inches he'd put on during his mid-puberty streak were gone.

He smiled slightly. He wasn't that short as a fifteen-year-old, was he? He didn't remember being so short.

His cheeks were also a good deal chubbier than he remembered. He felt his face, and was surprised by how smooth his skin was.

So he had gone back in time, but only his mind. His body was still as fifteen as a fifteen-year-old could be.

Unless this was all some sort of extremely elaborate prank. Which was unlikely.

Why? Just, why? Why him?

It couldn't have been a coincidence that he was brought back exactly three years, just to the beginning of high school. If this were the work of Fate or a god of some sort, if they wanted something from him, it must've been something that started with the start of high school…

If this were a movie, he'd be one of those guys with burning regrets, regrets of having done something or not having done something. Not confessing to a crush, ruining a good friendship. And he'd be dying of gratefulness for this chance to get it right the second time. But Len didn't have any regrets, not really. He was happy to be done with high school, eager to move on with his life.

But now… if this was permanent… he'd just gained three years, but he'd also lost three years.

He heaved a sigh and pulled on his (middle school) uniform.

"I wonder what was wrong with Len this morning…" Lola thought aloud as she washed the breakfast dishes.

"Len?" Leon asked as he placed his empty plate in the sink.

"Mm. Before you came down, he was acting strange." She took Leon's plate and rinsed it. "He was saying things like, where is his cellphone, and that his graduation ceremony was yesterday. His memories seemed all out of whack. I'm worried he hit his head somewhere."

"Huh. You're sure he wasn't trying to mess with you? Joking around? Kids tend to do that, you know."

"He seemed very serious, even distressed," Lola said, a bit frostily. "I would know, he's my son."

"He seemed normal at breakfast."

"He doesn't talk about these things with you because you make yourself so hard to talk to," Lola said, trying and failing to keep the tremor out of her voice.

Leon was quiet for a while, watching as Lola finished the dishes. Wiped the counter. Then he said, "I thought we were talking about Len. Why do you always make it about me?"

"Because you're his father. But not a good one," Lola said, as if for the umpteenth time—it was the umpteenth time.

"Come on. How can you call me that? I don't hit him. I don't yell at him."

"You completely ignore him!"

"I don't! We do talk—sometimes. It's just usually him that won't come to me."

"Because you're so cold to him! If he comes to you with a problem you'll just say 'don't worry about it', and that's it! How is that supposed to help him? How can you just tell him not to worry about the things that eat at him, day after day…"

She'd always been a bit too emotional for him. He liked that about her at first, but now… "I've never been good at giving advice. That's why I leave it to you."

She whirled to face him fully. "You leave it all to me. You're never here! In fact, shouldn't you be going now? You'll be late for work."

Leon crossed his arms. "I can't believe you're accusing me like this. I'm the one who brings all the money home! You don't know what it's like to have a job—it's not easy, you know? You just sit here all day—"

"I cook, and clean, and take care of Len! That's more than enough to be a job on its own! And, and…" Her voice crumpled a bit; suddenly she was ashamed.

She'd always wanted to be an artist; that was what she'd written on all her future career questionnaires as a child. But she'd never been able to sell her work. Leon's job helped pay for her paints.

It wasn't like she was lazy and didn't want to go out and find work. She still painted a little every day.

Besides, they had Len now. She had to stay home and be with him.

"Len's fifteen!" Leon broke into the silence. "He's old enough to get along without you."

"You wouldn't know!" Lola accused. "You don't know him. He needs me, you know."

"You're suffocating him," Leon said. "He needs space, and you don't give it to him…"

"He's very open to me! He tells me everything! Unlike you!"

Leon stared at her for a moment, then said quietly, "Why are we fighting? We don't need to worry about this anymore. This is all the past."

"Right," said Lola, remembering. They'd already started planning their divorce. Their life as a family of three was pretty much over, so their wasting energy fighting was wholly useless.

"Just…" Leon began, then shakes his head. He closed his eyes, willing the unsaid words back down to his heart. "Never mind." And he walked out of the kitchen but stopped abruptly at the corner.

"Len?"

He gaped at the boy, who'd stumbled backwards, surprised at being caught eavesdropping. "I thought you already left for school."

Len opened his mouth, closed it, opened it. It'd slipped his mind that Nishizawasan Middle School was much further from the house than Harinoyama High School, so he didn't leave early, which meant that his parents didn't know he was home as they began to raise their voices.

"Len!" his mother's face was white. "Y-You didn't…"

"I heard," Len said carefully. "But it's okay. I… didn't learn anything I didn't already know."

He could basically see Lola's heart dripping from her chest, and it was painful for sure. He looked away as she turned to her (soon to be ex) husband.

"Leon! This is, this is…" She couldn't say it was his fault, because she was the one who'd raised her voice first. "Oh, Len, I'm sorry…"

"Mom, don't worry. It's fine."

He never did witness one of their fights before. Lola was always careful to keep them behind the scenes. But he'd always kind of just known what their fights were about.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry…" his mother kept saying.

"Come on, Lola, look at him, he's fine. Stop sobbing like that, you're just making it worse."

"I don't want him to see us like this."

"He's not a kid anymore, Lola. What makes you think he can't handle something as small as his parents fighting?"

"H-He's right, mom. You know, you don't have to shelter me all the time. I-I can handle more than you think I can, you know?"

His mother just stared at him.

Leon looked between his wife and son, then, as if steeling himself, squared his feet and spoke. It came out faint at first, but then grew louder, truly like waves coming to shore. "You've gotten very mature, Len. I'm proud."

Len squinted at his father, as if trying to identify a silhouette in the fog. Part of him felt odd, the kind of odd you feel when you're complimented by a stranger on the street. Another part of him agreed with his father that yeah, he was mature, or so he liked to think; he had three years more life experience than either of his parents knew. And then, another small part of him was… happy. To be recognized by someone he never tried to please, never realizing that he wanted to please him.

He smiled rigidly at his father, who also happened to be sporting a tight smile. Well, their relationship was nothing if not awkward.

Len might've been slightly intimidated by Leon Kagamine, at one point, but reflecting on it now, he really wasn't that bad of a man. His wariness of his father might have been amplified by his mother's constant refrain of "don't end up like your father," but now, he could see more clearly. His father wasn't right all the time, but neither was his mother.

"Mom…" They looked at each other, and it was stark, the difference between his father's stiff gaze and the softness of his mother's teary eyes. "I wanted to ask you…" He paused. This was something he'd been wanting to say for a long time now, but never could bring up. Because he'd never wanted to hurt her. And also because he'd gotten the feeling that even if he tried to tell her, she wouldn't listen, because she believed her judgement as a mother was clearer than his judgement as a child. She took pride in how he always confided in her, but growing problem was that she never did take him seriously. Treat him like he was more than her son. But now, he felt like he could say what he wanted to say, because his father had said the same. And because right now, that man was here. "I want you to treat me more like my age. Less like a kid. There's nothing wrong with the way you've been raising me," he added hurriedly, "but sometimes I just want to do things on my own, you know? Don't try so hard to protect me. Let me get hurt. I want to know how it feels to be hurt. Because that's how you grow up, right? You get hurt, you get stronger."

If Leon were any other man, he would've started a slow clap. But Leon was Leon, so instead he met Len in the eye and his lips curved up the slightest bit.

Len found himself doing the same, giving the same imperceptible, edge-of-the-mouth smile. He never realized that that was a habit of his until Rin pointed it out one day: "You always smile like that," she said. "You wouldn't be able to see it if you weren't watching carefully. But I've known you for a while, so I can tell. It's a secretive kind of smile. Like you don't want anyone else to see it. Like it's private between you and whoever you're smiling at. Or maybe it's just to yourself." He never put much thought into it; just dismissed it as one of his Len-quirks, but now he realized he must've picked it up from his father.

It really was strange, seeing this man again after three years. It was almost like he'd come back from the dead. Sentimental in that way.

He turned to his mother.

There were tear tracks carved into her cheeks.

"I never wanted to hurt you, Len… Why…"

"I never said you hurt me. I just want some space, is all."

"But all I've been trying to do is protect you… I want you to understand that I'm your mother, I'm always thinking of what's best for you…"

"I know, I know that—"

"You don't have to do this to yourself—"

"Mom, this is what I want. I want to—"

"You don't have to listen to your father—"

He clenched his teeth. "He has nothing to do with this. This has to do with you and me."

She seemed to catch wind of his irritation, however subtle it may have been. "No, no, please Len, don't be angry with me. I just want you to know that I'll always be there for you… and that whatever you're going through, you don't have to go through it alone… You can always—"

"Lola," Leon cut in, coldly but effectively, "it's almost nine. He's going to be late for school."

Lola shut her mouth. Len wanted to say something, but he couldn't think of anything that he could say comfortably with his father around, so he didn't say anything at all.

"We're both definitely going to be late at this rate," Leon said to Len. "Just let me call work to let them know, and I'll drive you to school."

So the two of them left together, and Lola lowered herself into a chair as she watched them go.

Car rides had the real ability to make things awkward. Forcing people into a small, quiet space for periods of time would always end in some sort of awkwardness, unless the people in question were close enough to have the 'pleasant, enjoying-each-others'-company silence' ability. Leon and Len… didn't.

So, to break the silence, Len decided to talk.

"So you're getting divorced."

"Yeah. We were going to tell you after your graduation."

He remembered them telling him the first time around, a few days after his middle school graduation. He wasn't all that upset. They never had felt like a happy family to him, anyway.

"Did you love her at one point?" he asked, genuinely curious. They always acted so distant to each other, it was almost unimaginable that they were once two parts of one.

"Of course," Leon said nonchalantly. "Why else would I have married her?" His tone was controlled, but there was something about how he stared ahead at the road that stirred in Len's mind.

"What happened, then?"

"Are you really asking this now?" That smile again, a bit wry this time.

"Well, we never really took the chance to talk before," Len said honestly, "but we have some time now."

"Right." Leon twisted the wheel and the car turned. They were still pretty far from the school. He took a breath. He never did speak with his son much, but for some reason, Leon felt strong today. "We've always argued a lot, you know. But it wasn't real arguing. It was couples' arguing. You know?"

For some reason, he thought of Rin. "Yeah."

"But somewhere along the line, the arguments became real. We started to mean the things we said. I'm not even sure what happened myself. But everything she did, the small things and the big things, started to irritate me. I tried not to show it much. But a while ago, I came to the realization that we just weren't meant to be."

"Meant to be."

"On a fundamental level. She's too… emotionally… needy. She needs a lot of attention. And I'm not the right person for her. I need my space. You know?"

Of course he knew. He was the one left filling the void that his father left. "Why don't you just talk to her about it? I'm sure you could work it out."

Leon continued to stare blankly ahead. "I told you, we just don't work on a fundamental level. We can try to talk about it. We can try to understand each other. We can understand each other completely. But we'll never be able to be happy with each other. Because what she needs is different from what I can give, and what I need is different from what she can give." He turned the wheel again, pausing to think as he did so. "You'll come to understand, Len, that not everyone can get along with everyone. Some people fit together so well they're just meant to be, and some people find that their whole relationship was a mistake."

"So… it's about you as people. You don't really hate each other."

"I don't hate her," Leon said quietly. "But I'm not sure if she hates me. I think she thinks I'm cold. She didn't understand when I told her what I just told you."

"Didn't understand?"

"More like, she didn't accept it. She said, she said exactly what you said, Len. 'I'm sure we can work it out.' But she was adamant about it. She believes that love is some powerful, almighty thing that always triumphs in the end." He might've laughed a little. "But like I said, the problem between us is fundamental. She just can't back up enough to see things logically. Not everything can be worked out. Some things can never be solved." He turned the wheel again. "You can talk some people's heads into the ground, but if what you're saying goes against their fundamental beliefs, then you're talking to a wall. It's pointless to try to get your ideas across. You can talk as loud as you want, but they're on a completely different frequency. Your words will never reach them."

Suddenly, the car stopped. Len had been concentrating so hard on his father's speech, he hadn't realized that they'd been nearing the school.

He'd been sitting, but he almost had to catch his breath.

He felt kind of bad. For all the things he didn't know and never bothered to find out.

"I understand," Len said simply, slowly as he pulled his bag on his shoulder. Opened the door. Got out and stood there a moment as his father prepared to pull back out. "I understand," he said again, to make sure he was heard.

He realized after a second that he was doing the smile thing again, and that Leon was mirroring it.

As he watched his father's car shrink down the road, Len came to a decision. A decision that hurt his heart as much as it strengthened it. But the more he thought about it, the firmer he believed that it was for the best.

—chapter 1—

she'll miss him more than he realizes.

.

つづく

AUTHOR'S NOTES

save me from school hell ;_;

school is HELL it makes me ANGRY I don't want to DO IT ANYMORE I CRY

friday at school was like the Worst Day of My Life, I hate I hate I hate so much, please just free me already, I cannot deal anymore.

so sad, so angry

please just end it

in other news, new chapter :D I didn't expect it of myself either. so I'm assuming you can guess how it's gonna play out from here? I hope it makes sense now. Please stay tuned, Rin will appear in the next chapter! ...which won't be out in a few weeks. I need to do... math... cries

I named the schools after two of my favourite vocaloid producers~ Harry and Tokotoko, please support them! also shoutout to ota-kun for making great writing piano music, please check out otattemita on youtube ok, it's great music, he calls it bad but it's great!

Reviews will help me get through school hell ; u ;