I am so very sorry for updating late. I've been busy lately since it was the first week of school and this week, well i have sore eyes which i won't be attending school for a week maybe. (that sucks. i h8 missing school, really). Stupid freaking sore eyes! No wonder I have sore eyes, all of my cousins here have-i mean had sore eyes and now i'm the last target!

heartbreaker: "papanu mo papasalamatan ang tao kung ngayon mo lang naiintindihan?"

I hope that i will be able to update sooner or later...pray for my sore eyes to fade away guyz cuz i really hate missing school/lessons. please and thanks!

Takuya grimaced briefly, and then he composed his face and leaned around Zoe. She glowered back.

"I hope you're hand feels better soon. I'm really sorry you're hurt."

Childish, she turned her face away from him.

She didn't look up again as Takuya walked around the table and climbed on its side, so she didn't know if Koji went to the clinic or listening behind the cafeteria's door.

"How do you feel?' Takuya asked.

"Irritated."

He chuckled. "I meant your hand."

She shrugged. "I've had worse.

"True," he agreed, and frowned.

JP and Koichi walked in the cafeteria. JP sat on the other table. JP and Koichi watched curiously as Takuya rubbed Zoe's injured hand carefully. His eyes zeroed on the hand she cradled against his chest.

JP grinned. "Fall down again, Zoe?"

She glared at him fiercely. "No, JP. Austin squeezed my hand so tight like there's no room for air."

JP and Koichi blinked, and then burst into roar of laughter.

"Shinya's going to win the bet," Koichi said smugly.

JP's laughter stopped at once, and he studied Zoe with appraising eyes.

"What bet?" She demanded, pausing.

"What's taking Koji so long?" Takuya questioned. He was staring at JP. His head shook infinitesimally.

"What bet?" Zoe insisted as she turned on him.

"Thanks, Koichi," he muttered as he massaged her hand.

"Takuya…," she grumbled.

"It's infantile," he shrugged. "JP and Shinya like to gamble now."

"JP will tell me." She turned to JP.

Koichi sighed. "They're betting on how many times you…slip up in the first year."

"Oh." Zoe grimaced.

Takuya squeezed her.

Zoe groaned, and Takuya, thinking it was the pain in her hand that bothered her.

Her hand was broken, but there wasn't any serious damage, just a tiny fissure in one knuckle. She didn't want a cast and Koji said she'd be fine in a brace if she promised to keep it on. She promised.

Takuya could tell she was out of it as Koji worked to fit a brace carefully to her hand. He worried aloud a few times that she was in pain, but she assured him that that wasn't it.

She stared at his face while he watched Koji fix her hand.

After the Party

"That had to be the longest party in the history of the world," Zoe complained.

Takuya didn't seem to disagree. "It's over now," he said, rubbing her arm soothingly.

They'd all reassured her; Koichi reached up to pat her head as she left, eyeing Takuya meaningfully until a flood of peace swirled around Zoe, Koji kissing her cheeks and promising her to get in touch, JP laughing boisterously and asking why she didn't fight with Austin…Takuya's speech had them all relaxed, almost euphoric after the long weeks of stress. Doubt had been replaced with confidence. The party had ended on a note of true celebration.

Not for Zoe.

Bad enough—horrible—that she might not be able to see any of her friends anymore. It already felt like more that she could bear.

Not Koji, too. Not Takuya's foolish, and his eager brother. Her nerves felt frayed and exposed. She didn't know how much longer she could restrain the urge to scream out loud.

She whispered now, to keep her voice under control while they're walking to Zoe's home. "I'll miss you even though we argue a lot."

"Zoe, you I will, too."

"How come you let Koji kiss you?"

As if that didn't make Zoe all the more anxious to go. "It was just a friendly kiss."

"But why not me?"

"I like Koji better."

His eyes tightened. That was a lob blow, and she knew it.

He didn't answer; they were at Nathan's house now. The front light was on.

"See ya when I see ya," she muttered.

Before she opened the front door she run to Takuya and kissed him on the cheek.

"Good night," he grinned.

Zoe grinned back and tiptoed in the front door. Nathan was asleep in the living room, overflowing the too-small sofa, and snoring loudly she could have ripped the chainsaw to life and it wouldn't have wakened him.

She shook his shoulder vigorously.

"Dad!"

He grumbled, eye still closed.

"I'm home now—you're going to hurt your back sleeping like that. C'mon, time to move."

It took a few more shakes, and his eyes never did open all the way, but she managed to get him off the couch. She helped him up on his bed, where he collapsed on the tip of the covers, fully dressed, and started snoring again.

He wasn't going to be look for her anytime soon.

Then she drifted away when get to bed. Maybe Takuya was right and she was tired enough to stay awake.

Takuya's House

"We're going to Los Angeles…," Takuya told to his little brother.

Shinya spit the water he was drinking.

"But…I'm…Get…I mean…what?" He spluttered. "You're impossible," he said.

Takuya laughed once—a hard laugh, frustrated. "How can I put this so that you'll come with me?"

"I'm not asleep, am I? And I'm not dead, am I?"

"You're wide awake and you're obviously not dead."

"Then why are we moving to Los Angeles?"

"There are a lot of universities located within the city limits, I was thinking of taking the exam of the California State University," Takuya explained. "There's also a high school near that school."

"I was wrong," he muttered. "This is the very blackest kind of blasphemy of my life!"

"Shinya, we're brothers, if you're sixteen then I would live you here if you want to but you're only thirteen."

"Are you insane?"

"No. Insanity is when a little brother disagrees with his big brother whom his big brother knows what's best his little brother."

"My life is just getting better here, I have a lot of buddies here, and I was born here, dammit!"

"Don't' you use that word to me, Shinya," he cautioned.

"Well, at least a rabbit is better than you."

Takuya groaned. "You could be a pain sometimes."

"I'd rather be treated like a pest than to move out."

Takuya grinned. "You know Shinya, I'd do anything for you to come with me."

"I'm not listening," Shinya whistled.

"If it takes me to be a working student, I'll do it."

"Toys are old schools."

"I'll work as a student."

"So…?"

"I'll buy you an IPod, laptop, blackberry, PSP and I've already found an apartment just for us."

Shinya snapped his eyes wide. "You should've said that earlier—when are we leaving?"

"Then you've got yourself a deal," he said as he shook hands with Shinya.

"Good bye Shibuya, hello California!" He exclaimed as he ran upstairs.

"It never made sense for Shinya to love me," Takuya chuckled, his voice breaking twice. "I always knew him better than him."

Later in the Morning (after three days)

Zoe sprinted down the stairs with her last baggage behind her. Nathan was standing about six feet back from her, his nose wrinkled in distaste, but his face otherwise smooth—masklike. He didn't fool her.

Hostility rolled off of him in waves. It brought back that awful afternoon when she broke up with Takuya, and she felt her chin jerk up defensively in response.

"I've already call the airlines," Nathan rubbed his neck.

Zoe hugged Nathan tightly.

"Dad," she said. "This time I need to stand on my own feet. If I'm in trouble, I'll handle it. You can ground me when I got an accident. I know it's a bad time. So sorry. Love you so much."

"Don't go," Nathan whispered.

Zoe wasn't about to waste time arguing with him. "Please, please, please take care of yourself," she said.

"Do you have your wallet—check your ID. Please tell me you have your passport with you."

Zoe nodded and then raced up the stairs to get her passport and wallet, her knees weak with gratitude that her mother had wanted to marry Nathan on a beach in Mexico. Of course, like all her plans, it had fallen through. But not before she'd made all the practical arrangements she could for her.

Zoe tore through her room. She stuffed her new wallet, and then grabbed her toothbrush. She hurled herself back down the stairs. The sense of déjà vu was nearly stifling by this point.

Nathan threw the door open for her.

The Taxi idled by the curb. Nathan helped Zoe put her two big suitcases in the trunk of the cab.

Nathan caught her arm. "Call me when you made it to California, okay?"

His green eyes were glistening with tears. A lump filled her throat.

"Dad, don't give me that mode of—"

"I can't help it. I really can't. Stay safe. Stay alive. For me."

The engine of the cab purred.

She shook her head, tears splattering her eyes with the sharp motion. She pulled her arm free, and he didn't fight her.

"Don't die, Zoe," he choked out. "Get Ready. Get set. Go."

The thought pushed her past the silent tears; a sob broke out her chest. She threw her arms around his waist and hugged for one too-short moment, burying her tear-wet face against his chest. He put his big hand on the back of her hair, as if to hold her there.

"Bye, Dad." She pulled her hand from her hair, and kissed his cheek. She couldn't bear to look at his face. "Sorry," she whispered.

Then she spun and walked for the car. The door on the passenger side was open and waiting. She threw her backpack over the headrest and slid in, slamming the door behind her.

"Take care Dad!" She turned to shout out the window.

She made her flight with minutes to spare. It's a twelve-hour flight from Shibuya to California, and then an hour drive to her simple but elegant apartment. Flying doesn't bother her; the hour in the Taxi, though, she was a little worried.

When she landed in California, it was sunny. Her primary motivation behind a buying a car, despite the scarcity of her funds, was that she refused to be driven around town in a car.

Eventually she made it to her new home sweet home. She lived in the small, one-bedroom house that Nathan bought with her mother in the early days of their marriage. It took only one trip to get all her stuff inside her apartment. She got the west apartment that faced out over the city. The room was familiar; it had been belonged to her since she was born. The tiled floor, the light blue walls, the rounded ceiling, the yellowed lace curtains around the window—these were all a part of her childhood. The only change Nathan had ever made was adding a desk as she grew. The desk now held a secondhand computer, with the phone line for the modern stapled along the floor to the nearest phone jack. This was stipulation from her father, so that they could stay in touch easily. The rocking chair from her baby days was still in the corner.

There was only one bathroom. She was trying not to dwell too much on that fact.

She unpack and get settled, a feat that would have been altogether impossible for her father. It was nice to be alone, not to have to smile and look pleased; a relief to stare dejectedly out the window at the sun rising and let just a few tears escape. She wasn't on the mood to go on a real crying jag. She would save that for bedtime, when she would have to think about the coming evening.

Takuya and Shinya's Apartment

"Are you sure we're on the right place?" Shinya whispered.

Their apartment was not large. It was bright room, perfectly round like a huge castle turret…which was probably exactly what it was. Two stories up, long window slits threw rectangle of bright sunlight onto the stone floor below. There were no artificial lights. The furniture in the room were several massive sofas that were spaced unevenly, desk with a flat screen desktop. In the very center of the circle, in a slight depression, was a TV, flat screen TV.

One good for five kitchen, two bathrooms and two bedrooms.

"What kind of an idiotic question is that?" Takuya asked.

"Just answer it. Please."

Takuya stared at Shinya darkly for a long moment. "The way you feel about this room will never change. Well, that depends of course. Of course this is ours—and there's nothing you can do about it!"

"That's all I needed to hear."

Shinya jumped as he sat on the sofa and turned on the TV.

"Hey, hey. What did I tell you before we got here?"

"Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We unpack our own things," he replied without taking his eyes off the screen.

"By the way," Takuya said in a casual tone. "We gotta leave."

Shinya didn't say anything, and Takuya seemed to hear skepticism in Shinya's silence while watching.

"Shinya!" Takuya called over.

Shinya lifted his face then turned off the TV. "Okay, okay. I'm unpacking," he said more seriously. "Can I get the west bedroom?"

"I want the west bedroom," Takuya quickly said.

"Why do you want the west bedroom anyway?"

"It has a good view."

"Good point."

If Takuya let himself hope, and it came to nothing…that would kill him. Competition glinted metallic in his brown eyes.

"But—"

"Let's leave it to fate. Heads, I get the west bedroom; Tails, you get the west bedroom.

He flips the coin and it landed heads.

"See ya around," Takuya run quickly with his stuffs in his bedroom but before he steps in his new bedroom, he threw the coin to Shinya. Shinya caught it.

"Hold on to my coin, Shinya." Then Shinya was alone in the front room.

"Coin—some lock, huh." He shook his head, trying to think it through coherently.

After they unpack everything, they followed the right hallway around the corner then rode to the first set of elevators, they were two floors down to the lobby. Before the elevator close, someone caught up.

At first Takuya thought it was a young boy. The newcomer was as tall as Zoe, with lank, pale brown hair trimmed short. The body under the sleeveless jacket—which was darker, almost black—was slim and androgynous. But the face was too pretty for a boy. The wide-eyed, full lipped face would make a Botticelli angel look like a gargoyle. Even allowing for the dull crimson irises.

Her size was so insignificant that the reaction to her appearance confused Takuya and Shinya.

"You?" he exclaimed in recognition and resignation.

Shinya folded his arms across his chest, his expression impassive.

"Me?" the girl finally spoke, her childish voice a monotone.

"Him. Her. Them." Shinya muttered.

"Oh. My. Gosh." The girl pulled Takuya into a hug, he hugged back as well.

"What are you doing here?" Takuya sighed.

"I leave here."

"Shinya and I leave here as well."

"Oh, Shinya, I've missed you so much," Kate squeezed Shinya.

"Do I know her?" Shinya raised an eyebrow.

"Remember Kate? Our childhood friend?" Takuya snapped.

"Oh."

"It's been nearly sixteen years since we last met," Kate chuckled.

"Where does the time go?" Takuya asked himself.

"No doubt you've got some fun planned for yourselves. Right Shinya?"

"I only agreed to come with him for my prize," Shinya admitted.

"Where are you going?" Takuya and Kate said at the same moment.

"I'm going to find a job, find a school near California State University for Shinya, then know my entrance exam for CSU," Takuya explained.

"I'll go with you, besides, I'm also planning to study in CSU," Kate replied quickly.

The elevator ride was long; they stepped out into what looked like a posh office reception area. The walls were paneled in white walls, the floors carpeted in thick, deep green. There were large windows. Pale leather couches were arranged in cozy groupings, and the glossy tables held crystal vases fill of vibrantly colored bouquets. The flowers smell reminded of a funeral home.

In the middle of the room was a high, polished mahogany counter. Takuya gawked in astonishment as the woman behind it.

She was tall, with dark skin and green eyes. She would have been very pretty in any other company—but not here.

She smiled politely welcome. "Good afternoon, Kate," she said. There was no surprise in her face as she glanced at Kate's company. Not Takuya.

Kate nodded. "Gina." She continued toward a set of double doors in the back of the room, and Takuya followed.

As Shinya passed the desk, he winked at the girl at his same age, and she giggled.

"How long have you been here?" Takuya asked.

"Two years," she responded, embracing Takuya. She kissed his cheeks on both sides. Then she looked at Shinya. "I've missed you so much."

"Me, too…" he looked at Kate. "Nice work with the hair."

She laughed—the sound sparkled with delight like a baby's cooing.

"Welcome to hell, Shinya," Shinya greeted himself. "You seem in a better mood, big brother."

"Marginally," Takuya agreed in a flat voice. Kate glanced at Takuya's hard face, and wondered his mood could have been darker before.

Shinya chuckled, and examined Kate as she clung to Takuya's side. "And this is the cause of your mood?" he asked skeptical.

Takuya only smiled, his expression contemptuous. Then he froze.

"Dibs," Shinya called casually from behind.

Takuya turned. Shinya smiled—his hand raised, palm up; he curled his fingers twice, inviting Takuya forward.

Kate touched Takuya's arm. "Still the same," she told them.

They exchanged a long glance. Takuya turned back to Kate.

"I am really pleased to see you again," Kate said, as if nothing had passed.

"Let's not keep my new school waiting," Shinya suggested.

Takuya nodded once.

Takuya and Kate holding hands, led the way down yet another wide, ornate hall—would there ver be an end?

They ignored the doors at the end of the hall—doors entirely sheathed in gold—stopping halfway down the hall and sliding aside a piece of the paneling to expose a plain glass door. Takuya help it open for Kate.

Then when Kate called a Taxi, Takuya held the door open for Kate again.

Shinya wanted to groan when Takuya sat beside Kate making Shinya sit in front.

Kate said the address of where they're going.

"I know the exact school for Shinya to study near the CSU," Kate snapped.

"You know I'm sorry I didn't have the chance to say goodbye to you before I left you in the first place," Takuya said seriously.

"Don't worry I still had a happy life."

Takuya and Kate were both chatting to each other on how their lives went all the way until they reach Shinya's new school.

California High School had a frightening totally of only one thousand, three hundred fifty seven students; there were more than seven hundred people in Shinya's sophomore class. Shinya would be the new boy from the big city, a curiosity, a freak.

"Shinya, you looked like a boy from Shibuya, you could work this to your advantage," Takuya patted Shinya's head.

"But physically, I'd never fit in anywhere."

"Oh c'mon you two! Both of you are tan, sporty, brunette—a soccer player—"

"I don't play soccer anymore," Takuya interrupted.

"But you will this year. Both of you will. Both of you love soccer, don't you?"

"All that things can go with living in the valley of the sun," Shinya said.

Instead, Takuya remembered Zoe's emerald eyes. She had always been slender, obviously an athlete; she have the necessary hand-eye coordination to play sports without humiliating herself—nad harming both herself and anyone else who stood close.