(A/N: Yush! Moshi moshi, minna-san! Long time nothing new happened in this story!! -reminds me that Codename still has to be updated...- Anyway, this chapter has some SERIOUS fluff at the end, and I know you guys will probably wanna... oops! Not saying anything! You have to read it to find out! :P I just own the plot and my two characters -but neither appears here, so!- ENJOY!! :D)

Shōnen-Ai High School

Chapter 17

Yugi didn't give enough credit to what his ears had just heard.

Yami's best friend had killed himself while they were still in junior high… he couldn't imagine how hard it must had been for him.

The older one still held a hand to his eyes as if he were about to start crying.

"It was his 15th birthday, and I went to his house to at least apologize for yelling at him," said Yami after a while of being silent. "When I got there, the door was open, and I began to worry. There was no sign of 0either of his parents, so I went to his room. I opened the door, saw him… his neck was surrounded by a tight rope… and the rope was held by his ceiling fan."

The crimson-eyed sniffled, and Yugi could barely see a water drop that fell to the floor after trespassing his look-a-like's hand.

"After getting him down, I tried to bring him back…"

Yami ran to his best friend's aid, cutting the rope with a blade that he saw on Joshua's desk. He caught his body and put him down on the floor.

"Joshua, Joshua, wake up! Onegai, Joshua!" he yelled, tears filling his eyes as he applied pressure into the blonde's chest with his hands. "Don't leave me! I need you, Joshua, onegai!"

"Joshua-kun?!" The younger teenager turned his head to the door, and there were his friend's parents, his mother's shock shown totally on her face.

"Yami-kun, what happened?!" asked his father, running to his son's side. Yami couldn't answer; the truth was so hard to realize that he could not even speak.

"HE'S DEAD!" he yelled, crying. "He's dead, Joshua's dead!" he repeated, hugging the blonde's body tightly to his chest. "Why, Joshua?! I was here for you! Didn't you ever see me?!"

"Yami-kun, stop it!" said the woman, who was still at the door. "There's nothing else we can do!"

"IIE!" cried the heartbroken teenager. "Dammit, kisama! I was right here and you didn't ever notice me?! BAKARO!"

"His funeral was a week later," said Yami, crestfallen. "I stopped drawing, then, because every time I touched the paper with a pencil or pen, Joshua's face; the one he had when he died; appeared in my head, and I couldn't stand it."

"Sumimasen," mumbled Yugi, speaking for the first time. "I'm really sorry." He didn't know what else to say. No way had he gone through such a hard stage, so he couldn't really say 'I know how you feel.' "W- What about Kerii? S- She started living with you for a while, didn't she?" Yami said no thing.

Oh, no, thought the little one. I shouldn't have said that. I think I hurt his feelings…

"Hai, she did," spoke the older before Yugi could think something else. "Not so long after that, actually, I received a call from her. My parents weren't home those days, and I didn't recognize her voice, at first."

RING… RING…

"Moshi moshi?" asked Yami as he answered the phone.

"(Sob… sniffle…) E- Etto… h- hai, is A- Atemu Yami there?"

Who can it be? he wondered. "Who wants to talk with him?"

"(Pant… sob…) M- My name is S- Satori K- Kerii, I…m a c- cousin of his."

"Kerii?" he thought for a moment. Satori… of course! That was his late uncle's last name! "Kerii-chan, is that you?"

"Yami-kun? Oh, thank Ra!" Her voice sounded as if she had started crying harder. "I'm s- so glad I c- could contact you!"

"Kerii, what's wrong?" asked her cousin. "Is something the matter?"

"Could—Could I s- stay with you for a w- while (sob)?"

"H- Hai, Kerii-chan. Demo, I'd like to know what happened. Where's Toko? Are you with him? Is he okay?" Yami knew that her mother was not someone she could rely on now. That's why he didn't ask about her. But what about her brother? What could have happened between them to make the girl ask Yami to stay with him? They had a very good sibling relationship, it'd had to be something really bad.

Kerii's voice broke down into uncontrollable cries.

"Yami-kun, a- aniki is… aniki is…!"

(A/N: Just so you guys don't get confused, we've just ended the flashback n.n)

"I'll tell you that I almost hung up on her as soon as she told me about Toko's death," he said truthfully, removing his hand from his eyes, facing Yugi. "I wasn't willing to stand another loss… but I realized that Kerii needed me. And when she told me about her mom getting re-married and her husband being a total baka, I left it aside and assumed the role of the big brother she had just lost."

"I would've never thought about it," replied the boy, clutching the notebook tighter. "It must've been something really hard to deal with…"

"One way or the other, she started to live with me, and she did during a couple of months in which my parents were out because of business, until Emiya came for her. I'd rather not talk about him." For the second time since he had started talking, Yami smiled; not widely, not slightly; just a normal smile. "I guess I still haven't really answered your question."

Yugi tried to remember what his question had been in the first place.

"Oh, right," he added when finally remembering.

"The sketch—that sketch—was in the Art Club room because it seems like somebody rescued it from being thrown into the trash. I told Kojiha that I didn't want it anymore, but apparently, she did, and decided that it would stay."

"Why didn't you want it?" asked the boy. Yami let out a humorless laugh.

"Because that was the first sketch Joshua saw; the one that brought us together." Yugi gasped and looked down. "When I saw that you had found it and, it seemed that, you liked it, I couldn't help remembering him. The face that I had locked away in the deepest part of my mind during 5 years suddenly came to the surface again, and I didn't feel like I would be able to stand it."

The memory of the day they'd met came into the little one's mind.

"That's why you said that it didn't matter anymore to you, right?" Yami nodded.

"There was a part of me that totally wanted to believe that Joshua had somehow come back; however, the other one reminded it that he had died and that what it thought couldn't ever possibly happen," he explained.

"Why did you suddenly change your mind? I mean, after our encounter in the room, also," asked his smaller look-a-like, filled with curiosity. "Not that I minded, of course." Yami smiled again.

"Why, why, why?! Damn it!" cursed the crimson-eyed as he got out to the courtyard. He sat under a tree, his blank-paged notebook in hand. "Who does he think he is, anyway?"

For the second time in the day in 5 long years, the image of an old and late friend came to Yami's head.

"I- Iie! Go back to where you were!" he told himself, gripping tightly his head. "Don't come out!"

It was useless. Once again… Joshua had been set free. Yami shut his eyes as hard as he possibly could.

"Why does this kid remind me so much of you?" he questioned as he leaned his head on the tree's trunk. "Just because he said he liked that sketch?" He chuckled. "That makes no sense at all." The crimson-eyed opened his eyes. "But if it is really like that… did you send him, Joshua? Did you send this kid as some sort of replacement?" Yami held his breath and laughed at his own thought. Iie, I just need to give him a chance, he decided. He might remind me of Joshua, but he's not Joshua. If I only warm up to him and try to be friends with him… who knows what might result.

Being as happiest as he hadn't been in the past 5 years, Yami took his notebook, the pencil he was carrying with him—and started to draw. Instead of seeing Joshua's painful face, he now pictured him smiling… the same smile he'd had when returning the sketch to Yami.

Arigatou, Joshua, he thought before giving in to his drawing.

Now Yugi was really speechless. He felt his face warming up, and he prayed that he wasn't dearly blushing! Had Yami actually thought all of that?

"I- I didn't know…"

"Gomenasai," replied Yami. "Now I realize that Joshua did send you; not to be a replacement, but to help me, I guess."

"What do you mean?"

"To tell you the truth…" he looked deeply into the boy's eyes, "… you're the first one to know about Joshua." Yugi felt his face getting ever warmer.

"W- Why?" Yami smiled wider.

"Because there was no one else I could tell this to," he answered. "Definitely not my parents; they wouldn't care. Definitely not Kerii; she had suffered enough, too. Who else did I have left?" Now the boy was completely sure that he was blushing, so he looked down again. "I guess that somehow makes you special, ne?"

Before he could even realize it, as he lifted his head, Yugi noticed that Yami's face was even closer to his, crimson eyes deeply staring into amethyst ones, a smile across his lips. The older one was leaning closer, closer…

The boy felt like he couldn't breathe… and he closed his eyes.

(A/N: OHMYGOSH! OhMyGosh! OhMyGosh! -laughs- I'm such a meanie, aren't I? :D Shumimashen, I wanted to put up a scene like this LONG ago, didn't find the chance, saw this episode, said "hell, why not?", and TA-DAA!!

Are they gonna kiss? Will Yugi think twice about it? Will Yami think twice about it? OMG! What's gonna happen?! I know, of course :D but if you wanna know, you've got to r-e-v-i-e-w!! Onegai! n.n)