The next Wednesday, he was there. The next Wednesday, too, and after that, he turned up or not in an unpredictable pattern. Rei liked that. She didn't want any pressure for him to come, and she did need to be alone with he mother sometimes.

Not that he was much of a disturbance. He mostly just leaned somewhere, smoking, or sat on one of the benches. He didn't look so lost that Rei had the feeling he was waiting for her to come over to him, although she eventually would. They didn't talk much, but they did talk.

Only once or twice, they visited the other graves. Once, Rei even brought some ice tea for Mio.

"I'm sure she hated it," she assured Jadeite with a smile. "Everyone would, that stuff is disgusting."

He grinned.

Today, Jadeite wasn't there. Rei wasn't certain if he'd come. He had only once been late before.

It would have been nice to sit in the sun together, taking in the peaceful atmosphere of the place, watch him smoke, maybe talk a bit. But if he was busy, Rei couldn't do anything about it.

She decided to do a little tour on the cemetary on her own, to see if he had been there earlier.

She visited Mio, just to stare grimly at her name for a while.

Then she wanted to walk over to the part where Jadeite had given the Shitennou a place to commemorate their human lives. She didn't pay much attention to the way, she was deeply in thought.

A young man came her direction, and automatically she made way for him to pass. But he didn't want to pass. He intentionally blocked her way.

"What are you doing here, Sailor Mars?" he asked.

She looked up, startled. For a second, she honestly had no idea who he was. Spiky brown hair, combed into his face, brown eyes, jeans and a white tshirt... it was the little frown he had between his eyebrows that suddenly made her realize who she was looking at, and old memories made her jump back.

Zoisite - and he was angry!

But then she told herself to calm down.

Not enemies any more, Usagi's mantra.

And she remembered Jadeite's warning not to run into any of the other guys here. She sure would have avoided an encounter with Zoisite if she had ever known she had to look out for him in a human form. But now she couldn't change anything about it. All she could do was stare at him, because she couldn't come up with any words to say.

That didn't help Zoisite's mood at all.

"You shouldn't come here," said Zoisite sharply. "This hanging out on cemetaries with Jadeite, it's not like you do him a favor if you allow him to be stuck in the past. Your princess buried him under tons of rocks. The earlier he forgets about it, the better."

For a moment, this brought an unbearable picture to Rei's imagination. Horrfied, she stared at Zoisite. Then she spun around and ran.

She made it to her mother's place before the tears came. She dropped on her knees, on the only place she felt safe, her mother's name in front of her eyes, and here she cried. It started slow, but then it overwhelmed her, and she couldn't stop any more.

She heard someone approaching.

Zoisite wouldn't dare to come after her and see her like this...?

"Rei, what's wrong?"

Jadeite's voice. Rei wanted to tell him how relieved she was that it was him. But what she did instead was scream out the words burning her from inside.

"How dare he? How dare he come here? This is where my mama rests. She has nowhere else to go. How dare he come here and pick a fight with me! Here, of all places?"

"Who did that?" asked Jadeite worried. He had to put a hand on her shoulder to calm her down enough so she could sob out the name.

"Zoisite!"

For a moment, Jadeite looked shocked, but then he got angry. His face hardened, and his blue eyes went cold.

"Wait here!" he snarled and a wave of subspace interference washing over her told Rei that he had teleported right out of the cemetary.

Jadeite was only gone a short time, when he return in another teleport, this time bringing the human Zoisite with him by a firm grip on his arm.

Zoisite tried to break free, but Jadeite just dragged him with him and pushed him in front of Rei.

"Explain!" he demanded.

Rei looked up into Zoisite's face. Zoisite clearly hadn't expected to see her like this. He dropped down on his knee before her, changing into the silverwhite guardian she knew. Not that his Shitennou form as such had a very calming effect on Rei, but it sure added emphasize to the gesture.

"I'm sorry, Rei," he said softly. "I didn't want to scare you."

It took a few more apologies in Zoisite's warm voice to calm Rei down. It also helped to see Jadeite look down on Zoisite with a look of satisfaction. She had a feeling this kind of excuses weren't given very often by Zoisite.

Rei's sobbing finally died down and she accepted the handkerchief Jadeite handed her.

"It's okay, Zoisite," she told him after she had tried her face. "I know you didn't mean it the way it came out. You were probably just startled to run into me unexpectedly."

No need to mention why he was here, and Zoisite seemed to be glad about it.

"Something like that," he admitted and smiled at her. That made Rei feel a lot better.

"I don't usually freak out like this", she said. "I'm very touchy when it comes to my mother."

"Your mother?" asked Zoisite astonished.

Rei pointed to the gravestone they were sitting in front of.

"She's here, Zoisite."

Now Zoisite was actually blushing.

"So that's why... I didn't know that. Rei, again, I'm really sorry about how I behaved. I thought when you came here, you were doing this for Jadeite."

"No", said Rei. "He's doing this for me."

She looked at Jadeite, who returned a small, reserved smile, his eyes sparkling with pride.

"Jadeite," she said. "Can you bring me home?"