DIS: Thanks, as always, to everyone that has been reviewing. It's amazing how long I've been working on this story. I'm a disgustingly slow updater. But here we are with the next chapter – enjoy!
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Chapter Twenty, Sometimes one must wonder
Mai was sitting at the table when Anzu arrived. Except for when Anzu had called her earlier that day inquiring as to where her mother's new home was, she hadn't spoken to her. Mai would never have considered calling Anzu that night if not for that brief phone call from her. She had controlled her emotions better with using the business-like tone she always held when it came to clients. The second phone call was more difficult, not only because she had initiated the call, but because she really did want some female companionship. It was strange because only now did she realize how much she craved such companionship from another woman. Shizuka was too naïve to understand some things and although Anzu was bordering on that naiveté, her lifestyle and some of the hardships she had to face proved that she was not.
"You brought a bathing suit, I hope?" Mai asked Anzu as soon as she entered the kitchen. Anzu nodded. "I'll help you take your things upstairs to my room." Mai picked up a bag while Anzu took the other and the two of them quietly ascended the stairs. Behind Mai, Anzu was watching the older female with a furrowed brow. She could see by the weak slump in her shoulders that something was bothering Mai more than she was letting on. The blonde pushed open a door and flipped a switch nearby. "I'll get undressed downstairs. You can change in here." She set her bag by the bed and retrieved her bathing suit from the dresser. Mai paused at the doorway, smiling slightly. "Thank you, Anzu."
"No, thank you," Anzu returned with a hasty smile. "I'll only be a minute." Mai shut the door after giving a nod. Anzu stood in the middle of the room for a moment, looking around her thoughtfully. The room was immaculate with few pictures on the walls and the only ones that were happened to be that of landscapes. On Mai's desk was a picture set down with the bare back sticking up. Curious in spite of herself, Anzu moved to the desk and briefly took notice of all the childish pictures that Rena had drawn. In all of them, there were three people, two women and a man. Anzu picked up the picture and sighed at what it was. I don't think either her or Jounouchi have really moved on, Anzu thought to herself, cradling the small picture in her hands. Rena was a newborn in this picture and Jounouchi and Mai were grinning at the camera, Jounouchi bent slightly over them in a protective gesture.
Setting the picture back in its original position, Anzu turned away from the desk and began to dig through her bag for her bathing suit. She undressed and put it on, taking a towel she had brought from home and wrapping it around her. She paused to fold her clothes by her bag and then left the room. She navigated through the dim light downstairs and to the kitchen, where Mai was. "Oh, wine," Anzu said with a smile. Mai turned from the counter where she was pouring wine and smiled. "Always a good drink for a private moment." Mai chuckled and handed her a glass. She, too, was in a towel.
"Wine is good regardless of the situation, hon," she told her. "Let's go." She took her own glass and a bucket of ice that the wine bottle was situated in, leading Anzu outside to the back. The hot tub was in a wooden protective covering for when it rained or snowed. The top was already off, the water bubbling from the jets. Mai set the bucket and her wine glass on the deck and slipped out of her towel, setting it to the side. Anzu followed suit, gradually sliding into the hot water. "I only bought the hot tub for when I became stressed," Mai conversationally told her, settling in the water faster than Anzu. "It works for easing the tension in your muscles."
"It's very relaxing," Anzu agreed, taking a drink of her wine and subtly peering at Mai beneath her lashes. She felt a deep pang of admiration for Mai. She was beautiful without even seeming to be aware of it. Her hair was piled upon her head, the curly blonde tendrils falling gracefully out of her bun to frame her face. Even without any cosmetics, Mai managed to look lovely. Anzu was not the type of girl to feel jealous of another simply because of looks, nor did she wallow in self-pity if she felt she was not as good looking. There was nothing unattractive about Mai's looks, though, and she imagined that she was lucky to naturally look that way. However, that was as far as she went with thinking that Mai was lucky. It was clear by her constant misery that Mai was not all that lucky. "When did you see Jounouchi, Mai?" Anzu hesitantly asked.
"Today," Mai answered, holding her wine glass with both of her hands, turning the glass this way and that. "He dropped Rena off and..." She sighed, closing her eyes and dropping her head back. "For one second, I almost told him how much I missed him, how much I wanted him to come back...I almost showed him how weak I've become since he's left me. I stopped myself in time. I hurt Jounouchi badly and not even admitting that I was wrong in doing it would bring him back to me." She opened her eyes and looked at Anzu with a small smile. "Rena loves him so much, Anzu, and she does love me...But because she sees him less, she shows it to him a lot more clearly. I know this, but I just feel so awful when I see them together. They're...perfect. I'm just the misfit."
"I don't think it's anything like that. You're not the misfit – "
"But I am!" Mai interrupted in anguish, lurching forward and spilling some wine in the water. "You don't see the way they look at me. No matter what I do, it's never enough to make Rena really love me. She doesn't even cry when she's with me, Anzu, so I can never comfort her. She doesn't hug me except reluctantly at night. And sometimes...sometimes I am reluctant to hug her because I am always thinking that if Jounouchi were there with me, I could be truly happy and someone could hold me in their arms like I want." Anzu's eyes softened and she moved around the hot tub to sit next to Mai, groping in the water for her hand. Mai blinked and looked at her in some surprise.
"You don't have any parents that you can talk to about this?"
"No, my parents are the last people I would ever want to speak to of this. They hate me because I chose to marry Jounouchi, someone they had always disapproved of because he was in a lower social class. I've always been butting heads with them anyway." She took a drink of her wine. "I grew up without any real companionship and it was only in my teens that I began to rebel. Maybe that's why I do such stupid things like when I was married with Jounouchi."
"Marrying him wasn't a stupid thing, though," Anzu consoled.
"It was the best thing that ever happened to me, Anzu. Even if I'm hurting now, meeting him and falling in love was the only thing that went right in my life. Jounouchi is such a sweet, overprotective guy. He would do anything for those that he loves. He gave me a second chance because he trusted me so much." She stared down at her wine, a bitter smile crossing her lips. "And all I did was betray that trust and break his heart. I can never forgive myself for that."
"Mai...Can I ask you something?"
"Of course, hon," Mai replied readily enough. "I have nothing to hide."
"Why is it that people who...hurt others...never realize how much they love them until after the hurt has been inflicted?" Anzu glanced at Mai, to make certain that she was not treading on forbidden ground. Mai, contrary to what Anzu was expecting, looked thoughtful. There was still a hint of the sadness she had been experiencing earlier, but she seemed to be occupied by Anzu's question.
"I guess it's that old phrase that comes into play," Mai said after a moment of contemplation. "You never know what you have until it's gone. Some people..." She frowned and released a sigh through her nose. "Some people take everything for granted and then when they don't have it, they throw a fit. It's like a child with a toy. They don't play with a toy that much but once someone else has it, they get upset and want it back. Even when they have it back, they don't really cherish it, but ignore it. For me, I want Jounouchi back both because I love him and because Rena is desperate to have her father in her life as much as she has me in it. Occasional visits aren't good enough for her. If Jounouchi returned, I wouldn't be that child that ignored their toy once they had it returned...I would watch over it like I would my favorite toy." She paused, a sudden realization coming upon her. "Is there any particular reason why you asked, Anzu?"
"I did say that I was having a problem and it kind of has to do with that." It was only then that Anzu understood why she wanted to talk to Mai about her mother. Mai was almost like her mother, without all the sticky details that were involved in Sakura's ordeal. Sakura was claiming to miss Anzu and Seiji, but she had caused her own problems by her actions and she did not show much remorse. Mai, in contrast, had atoned for her affair from what Otogi told Anzu. She no longer dated and lived ideally for Rena. Sakura showed no such change. "I went to see my mother today with Yami."
"And there is yet another thing that you and I need to discuss," Mai said, her face hardening. Anzu blinked at the mom-like, overprotective expression. "Yami. I knew that you had something going on with him and that breathless, girly voice of yours over the phone did not imply that anything innocent had happened before I called you." One of Mai's perfect eyebrows rose in question. To avoid the question, Anzu drank the rest of her wine a bit too quickly. "You were with him, right?"
"Well. Yes. But we weren't doing anything as bad as you're making it out," Anzu hastily assured her, sidetracked from the conversation she had originally been intending. Mai's lips curled upward in an honest smile. She filled their glasses with wine again before speaking.
"He must be a very good kisser to get that kind of reaction, then. Either that or you're very inexperienced." Anzu chose not to say anything to the last assumption. "I've always liked Yami. He's different than most guys, very down to Earth and reserved. Polite, too, which is always good. I'm sure you know a lot more about him than I ever could. I think I remember you praising him when we went out shopping." She winked at Anzu, who sat a bit helplessly. Mai took a drink of her wine and then stared down at it, her smile decreasing a bit. "Jounouchi isn't anything like that. He's very lovable, though, and you can't help but like him because of it. When we first started dating, he worked at a dinky little restaurant as a waiter and got paid hardly anything and the tips didn't help much, either. He wasn't what a girl would want: sloppy, perverted, with no car or any real intelligence. But he was a sweetheart. He was always buying me things and bringing me things that he found or wanted me to have."
"That's so romantic."
"He didn't even stop it when we got married. This one morning..." Mai tapped her wine glass, as though debating with herself. Shrugging, she continued, "I had a hard day the day before and so when I woke up, I went downstairs and he had made me a huge breakfast and had gone out and bought me flowers. I looked terrible because I didn't get enough sleep...But he called me beautiful and nothing could have made my week better than that one breakfast." Mai smiled faintly as she stared ahead of her, lost in her memories. Anzu sipped at her wine, stretching her legs out in the water. "I started doing little things for him after that. I didn't think it was fair that he always treated me and I never treated him. Has Yami ever done that for you?" Mai turned to her inquiringly.
"Well, not exactly. He doesn't buy me things – he does things that are enough. In almost every rough patch I've hit since I've come to Domino, he's been right there to support me. He brought in one of his dancer friends, Ryou, to help me with my dancing and has just been...so kind and helpful."
"It's not often that you can find a guy that treats you well, hon. Keep him close if you really like him. Now...Why did you go see your mom? I was under the impression you would have hated her after all that she had done to you. I suppose it was your mother who bought that house, then?"
"Yes, it was. It's a long story, I'm not sure you'll want to listen to it."
"That's why I invited you over, isn't it?" Mai asked, suddenly raising her hand that was still clasped in Anzu's. "We're friends now, right?" Anzu looked at their intertwined hands and then smiled.
"Right."
Anzu explained everything to Mai, including Malik without saying his name – just in case – and telling her all about the woman that she thought was her mother and what she knew Sakura now was. There were a few times where she faltered, uncertain, but Mai encouraged her. Her eyes were earnest and she listened attentively. It was amazing because from what Anzu knew, Mai was a fairly impatient woman who had control of everything when it came to working and tried to do that with her relationships. It seemed that she had finally learned that being the controlling member of the party was the not the wisest – or best – position to hold.
"My God," Mai breathed after Anzu had gone silent. She raised her wine glass and then frowned, seeing that both hers and Anzu's were empty. She refilled them and took a generous drink from her glass, staring off to the side in deep thought. "My God," she repeated, closing her eyes briefly. "But...This is frightening, Anzu." She opened her eyes to look at Anzu and the younger of the two was startled at the fearful panic in Mai's violet gaze. "What kind of mother could do that? How could she even begin to think that she is worthy of your forgiveness after causing such trouble?" Mai's grip tightened on her glass. Anzu knew that the situation bothered Mai more than it ought to have more because of her own motherhood than anything else. "This woman...she is a snake, Anzu," she said after another pause.
"I know," Anzu quietly said. "She told me that she loved me and papa, that she had regretted it."
"Regret," Mai sighed. "What a very human emotion. Of her claim of regretting it...I know that you will say that if she truly regretted it, she wouldn't have done it. You know, Anzu, I used to say that to Jounouchi. I told him that if he was really sorry for doing this or that, he wouldn't hurt me like he did and then he turned those words on me. He said that if I truly felt bad for being with other men, I would have learned after the first time. Regret...is something that you don't feel until you really lose something. You don't feel it in the act of doing something. Like..." Mai struggled for a moment and then continued with her example, "Like when you hit a person at work. You don't regret it then or an hour later. Once you lose your job, though, and are starving and can't afford your rent or anything else, that's when you really regret punching that person. Maybe she does feel remorse, but that means nothing. Just because you feel bad about doing something to a person and realizing that you lost what was the better alternative doesn't mean you aren't still a snake."
"...Did Jounouchi ever call you that? – A snake?"
Mai smiled sadly. "He called me a poisonous cobra. That was one of the worst fights we had after the divorce. We said so many horrible things to each other. But he was right. Almost everything he said to me was right. The things that I said were petty compared to his words. Maybe I am a cobra, but his words were poison, fueling me." She shook her head and drained her glass of wine. "Sometimes you have to just...let things go. I'm trying, I really am. He doesn't try because he doesn't want to. He's trying to avoid fights, though, and I respect him for that."
"Jounouchi is like my papa," Anzu musingly told her. "He's calm, but can be riled up by something. He's hurting, just like Jounouchi is. I don't think that kind of hurt can ever be forgotten, Mai."
"No, neither do I," she agreed. "Well. Enough of that. I'm started to get tired, both from the wine and from the water. Shall we eat something and then go to sleep?" Anzu nodded her agreement with that. The two of them exited the hot tub with sharp inhales of breath from the cool air. The two of them shut off the hot tub and put the cover on it, securing it carefully. Satisfied, they collected their towels, cups, and the bucket with the nearly finished wine inside it. Once they deposited their things in the kitchen, they dried off and got dressed in loose clothing as pajamas. "Do you think it's possible to be happy, hon?" Mai asked thoughtfully as she cooked them a huge ham and cheese omelet they planned on sharing.
"If you're with the right people," Anzu replied. Mai turned slightly to look at her and they exchanged a smile.
After eating and drinking milk, their stomachs were full and they moved upstairs to Mai's bedroom. Climbing into bed, both females gave a sigh. "Goodnight, Mai," Anzu said.
"Goodnight." This time, Mai groped for Anzu's hand and reassuringly squeezed her hand. "Sweet dreams, hon."
But as Anzu drifted off to sleep, the face of Jiiro Hanazawa rose in her mind: smiling, charming, and every bit as warm and delightful as Yami's own face was. It was not the face of a murderer, but of a man who loved to create music and who seemed to adore her mother with the way his eyes had been fixed on her. He did not look as she imagined with his fair skin and black hair that was long and framed his face, barely hitting his shoulders. His green eyes had unnerved her because they were every bit as innocent as a young boy's. When she saw that photograph, she thought that it was a joke, that her mother was mistaken.
It only showed that no matter how innocent a person may look, they could do unspeakable things...
X
In another part of Domino, despite the late hour, there was a house brightly lit up. Inside, the slow rumble of a song could be heard from the concert Steinway inside. Ryuichi Sakamoto's Forbidden Colours was one of Yami's favorites out of the pianist's songs. It was slow, with the play of multiple keys and at some points it was pianissimo, other times forte; overall it was a song meant to relax the pianist and the audience. Yami needed something relaxing. He had made sure not to show anyone, most especially Anzu, how distressed he was with the meeting with Sakura. She had roused unpleasant memories, had reminded him that he was still hiding from a part of himself that he had pretended no longer existed.
A shudder passed through his body and as his eyes flew open, his fingers crashed onto the wrong notes and his winced, jerking his hands away from the keys and holding a hand to his mouth. His stomach churned and bile rose in his throat. He swallowed it with a grimace and closed his eyes, breathing deeply through the nose until the sickness passed. Once it had, he lowered his hands to his lap and stared down at them. He considered going to the cupboard where his alcohol was, but dismissed the idea promptly. He recalled how worried Anzu had been the last time he literally drunk himself into a stupor.
An abrupt knock on the door startled him and he rose to his feet in alarm. There was a ridiculous urge to run that he hastily quelled. He allowed himself a second for his heartbeat to calm and then cautiously left the room to answer the door. As he pulled it inward, he relaxed at the familiar features of Malik Ishtar. The blonde tilted his head to the side and raised an eyebrow at Yami. "Can I come in or will you have me standing here all morning?"
"It is morning, isn't it?" Yami faintly murmured. Malik's eyes narrowed on him and he stepped inside. Yami shut the door and checked the clock on a table in the foyer and released a small smile. "It's almost three. Why are you here, Malik? I know that the cabs run this late, but I'm a little surprised to see you wasting money on a cab just to come see me."
"It's not as if it's a friendly social call, Yami," Malik coldly returned. "It's a good thing that Anzu is naïve or else I'm sure she would be the one knocking on your door." Yami ignored him and returned to the room where his piano was. "Then again, she has her own problems to deal with at the moment so I doubt she would have noticed anyway. You shouldn't let what that bitch said bother you. It'll eat away at you day and night until you can't sleep." Yami's fingers hesitated above the keys of his piano and he turned his head to look at Malik. The dancer simply stood a few feet behind him, his arms folded across his chest. Yami often forgot with Malik's flippant, arrogant attitude how bothered he was with his state of business. It wasn't that Malik didn't enjoy being involved in the underworld, but he had always been very careful that no one knew about it because he was ashamed of it for his own personal reasons. Out of everyone, Malik knew Yami the best and only because they had met through an accident in the underworld.
"Sometimes," Yami quietly said, "I think I've finally got it out of my life and then it comes back. Anzu accepts this part of me now, but I wonder if she'll begin to hate me as I've begun to hate myself."
"That's the problem with you melodramatic musicians," Malik sighed irritably. "For God's sake, Yami, the girl wouldn't judge you even if you had killed a guy." There was a pregnant pause in which Yami turned around to completely face Malik. The two of them stared at each for a long moment and then Malik lowered his eyes, his mouth taut. "I'm not trying to dredge up the past, but this is something you have to work out. Don't think I don't know what Kaiba was telling you. He's right, Yami. You're getting too involved with her. You need to figure out what's going on and come clean with her. I might not be the expert on relationships, but I know women. They don't like secrets."
"There are many things I haven't told Otogi or Kaiba or anyone else that you know simply because of a mistake, Malik."
"And there are some things that you should tell them. What you have with the people in your life is a farce of a relationship and until you realize that, you're always going to continue being the self-pitying moron that you've been since you left Hanazawa's tutorship. Now, I don't really want to take a cab back to Ryou's, so where can I sleep?"
"...The couch," Yami bit out and then turned back to the piano and returned to playing Forbidden Colours. Malik made a disgusted sound in the back of his throat and then left Yami.
Before leaving Ryou's, Malik had a serious debate with himself whether he wanted to provoke Yami in the manner that he just had. He knew better than to bring up anything in Yami's past. His parents had been hunting after him ever since he finished his requirements in the underworld and had fled from Hanazawa and the life they had forced him into. He had made a successful life as a moving pianist, working in several different countries, yet only a few spare people knew the real reason for that. On the outside, he appeared to enjoy himself by taking interested women to bed, enjoying the parties that he was invited to, and seeming to be completely at ease with himself. Yami purposely remained away from the dancing community in order to avoid Malik, as he was just another reminder of what he was hiding from.
I had to contact him to get him to acknowledge me again, Malik thought, taking pillows from another couch and putting them on the more comfortable of the two. He needed someone who knew what his parents were up to and I was willing to keep him updated only because our positions were similar. We had to protect our pasts from everyone so that our careers would not be tarnished. Yami, as obtuse as he is at times, loves being a pianist. Playing the piano is his life. If he didn't love it so much, I think he might have given it up since Hanazawa introduced it to him in the first place. Malik dropped onto the couch, shifting so that he could get into a comfortable position. It's been ages since Yami last saw Hanazawa...
(Flashback)
Malik hated this type of business. It was one of the aspects of the underworld that made him loathe it so. The highs were always high and the lows an unbeatable low. There were no mediums when involved in this business, something that Malik intensely disliked. He pushed his hair from his face with a sigh as he turned a corner of the massive building that was Jiiro Hanazawa's home. A mansion protected by trees and only his private home. His public home that was open to fellow pianists that had nothing to do with the underworld was a nice town apartment. His mansion was outside the city limits and therefore very few people knew who entered and exited it. Malik wished that he did not have to make such a long trip to the man's place. It would make this deal a lot easier.
As he moved down the hall with his hands in his pockets, he spotted a familiar male exiting a room. Yami's face was ashen and there was a feverish, panicked look in his eyes. From the moment that he met him, Malik knew that Yami was not in this world willingly. Shortly following him was his father, a renowned violinist. Malik paused in his steps as his father put a hand on his shoulder. Yami whipped around, slapping it away. "Don't you dare touch me again," he hissed. "I don't want you or your damned wife near me!"
"My wife?" the elder male murmured thoughtfully. "Mmm, that is not a very polite way to address or speak of your mother, Yami." Rei Mutou was completely unmoved, staring at Yami with cold, unfeeling eyes. The familial ties that Rei was trying to establish meant little to him, as both Yami and the quiet spectator, Malik, knew. "Continue to speak that way of her and I may have to...inspire...some respect in you." His face hardened and Yami hesitated for a second too long. Rei's hand sent him flying to the ground. He spit out blood from the blow to his mouth. "You knew what was required of you, Yami. You knew what it was that we expected of you and you have let us down. Hanazawa has forgiven you simply because you're his pet – his treasured pianist." He sneered the last two words with contempt. "He will not be able to avoid punishing you next time. Follow your orders. Do as you're told."
"I will not have my hands sullied with murder!" Yami screamed violently. "You and your filthy friends have your hands covered in blood up to your elbows. I won't be like that! I'm not a killer!"
Rei's body tensed, as if he were about to cause more harm. Malik hastily made his presence known and Rei's head snapped to the side and he took a step away from Yami. His son was stumbling to his feet, keeping a hand braced on the wall. Although Malik and Yami had never liked each other much, Malik felt pity for him right then. "Ishtar. Have you been lurking in hallways, again?" Rei and Malik, however, did not have any ounce of respect for each other. Rei had always despised Malik. Rei was older and had been in the underworld longer, yet Malik knew how to play the games and manipulate things and people far more easily than he and many others could.
"I'm not sure I would call it that," Malik replied, his mouth curving into a suave smile. "I have business with Hanazawa. Perhaps you ought to scurry away to where rats like you hide out, huh?" Rei sent him a resentful stare and then stalked past him, ignoring Yami completely. Once he was out of earshot, Malik turned to Yami and queried, "Anything broken or is it just a split lip?" Yami released a bitter laugh and shook his head.
"No...He knows better than to break anything." He ran his tongue over his lip, his brow furrowed.
"What happened? You're not usually stupid enough to cause a fight in Hanazawa's own house. I assume you were asked to kill someone?" Yami had been gingerly touching his lip with his fingers, stopping when Malik said that and raising his eyes to his face. "Don't start shit with me, Yami, I'm trying to be helpful here, got it?" Yami sucked in his lip, his gaze sliding to the side contemplatively. Malik frowned.
"Do you remember how we met, Malik? Hanazawa introduced us. He's well acquainted with both dancers and pianists. You were ready to slit my throat if I was competition." Yami returned his gaze to Malik. "I'm not like you. I can't kill a man. I know that some of the things that I do could cause a man's death, but I can't take a gun or a knife or something like that and kill him. I would never be able to leave this...thing that is supposed to be my life. If I lose the last shred of humanity that I have left, I'll go mad. I'll kill myself. To end another person's life...I could never do it."
"You really are so dramatic, Yami," was all Malik said in response to this.
"I imagine if you and I continue to see each other, you will always call me that. I prefer to think that I'm a realist."
"Think whatever the hell you want. You have bigger problems on your hands other than your conscience, though."
"I know...I have one more task, Malik, and then I can leave."
"Then leave, Yami," Malik suggested shortly. "The more you pull at the chains your old man has tied to you, the more problems you cause for yourself. Once you have the requirements fulfilled, leave. If you don't, he will kill you."
"You think I am unaware of that fact?" Yami raised an eyebrow. The fight had faded from his eyes and Malik could see he was in possession of himself again. He was not shaking with rage and his swollen lip did not seem to be bothering him any longer. He looked calm, collected, just as Malik recalled when they first met. Even when Yami had acknowledged Malik's desire to kill him if he were a competitor, his face had not changed. The chilling fact was that it was so much like his father. Rei could hide any emotion until he wanted someone to know of it; Yami was the exact same. "I won't let you follow me outside this place, Malik."
"Oh, but you're so fun," Malik said with a smirk.
---
"Malik, thank you for coming," Hanazawa greeted a few weeks later. Yami, as he had vowed, had left the underworld and Hanazawa's tutorship as well. "Rei and his wife, Harumi, are worried about their son disappearing." He raised his unusually wide, emerald eyes to Malik's lavender ones. "I am not about to ask you to pursue him. Yami was never meant for this kind of life, that I have known all along. The only thing that truly made him happy was the piano." He ran a hand over the piano he was standing beside. "He makes beautiful music. I am glad to have found him and you, one of the best dancers I will ever meet. Your talents will flourish. Someday...I hope that I will be able to see him play in concert."
"Rei isn't going to give up, Hanazawa," Malik said flatly. "You know that as well as anyone else."
"Yes...He asked me to kill him. To kill his son. Normally, I would have not cared. But I have always wanted a son of my own. In my line of work, you can never have family in fear that they will turn against you or be used against you. You learned that the hard way, didn't you?" Hanazawa looked to Malik, who stared at him blankly. If the man dared to bring his sister or elder brother's name into the picture...Perhaps he knew better because he let that thought safely drift away. Malik was now just another pawn on a chessboard after Hanazawa had his family taken care of quite swiftly. If his brother had been wiser, he would have remained alive. But then, he had never been all that cautious.
"Will you pursue Yami, then?"
"No...I have killed many people and ruined many lives, but Yami deserves better. It is his right to leave this world, anyway. Our code dictates it. He will have to figure out a way to avoid his parents on his own, though." He sighed and settled at the bench of the piano, sliding his fingertips along the keys, applying no pressure. "I could kill his parents, but that would be helping him and I help no one when it comes to such matters. It's a pity the situation was not more like yours."
"A pity," Malik echoed hollowly.
"If only he was more heartless."
"Like you?"
"I am not heartless," Hanazawa quietly said, "simply unfortunate."
"That is a matter of opinion, Hanazawa."
(End Flashback)
Malik opened his eyes when he heard the piano music from the other room halt. There was the sound of a light switch being hit and then, very faintly, bare feet on the floor. Yami appeared in the doorway of the den a few minutes later, staring around the room thoughtfully before looking at Malik. He rose up slightly on his elbow, frowning at Yami in question. "I just thought of something," Yami said. "You always went in and out of Hanazawa's house but I never thought anything except that you had dealings with him back then...And yet you continued to have dealings with him and he shoved his debts on you when he died. Why is that?"
"Because my father fucked him over," Malik bluntly answered. "He killed my sister and brother and only kept me alive so that I could suffer. The debts were just another addition."
"Hm...But why didn't I realize this before?"
"At the time, you had more things to worry about than why I was hanging around Hanazawa. There are some things that are best let untouched, Yami, and this is one of those things. I don't want to talk about what that bastard did to my family, so leave my past out of yours."
"I can't, Malik, not when Anzu could end up becoming involved. I have to straighten everything out and you are going to help me." Malik stared at Yami's determined expression. He didn't look as though he were staring through a fog as he had when he first entered the house. It seemed that he had finally understood the consequences of his past life. It was harder for Yami since he had not willingly corrupted himself. He sighed and fell onto the couch, rubbing his forehead in annoyance. "Malik?"
"I have bigger fish to fry. Get her through Swan Lake, start her on her career, and maybe start a relationship with her. Then let's talk. I should have my finances more stable by then."
"Fine, fine, that sounds fine to me."
"Now go to sleep already or else bring out the alcohol and get us some hookers." He glanced at Yami's glowering expression and smirked. "I am, of course, just kidding."
"...Right. Goodnight, then."
"Goodnight."
Yami shut the light off as he left and Malik turned on his side, smiling contentedly to himself. That's much better, he thought cheerfully enough.
X
DIS: You could consider this a sort of filler chapter. It was also meant to give stabilize Malik's position in the story. It seemed like you guys weren't all that certain why he was introduced in the first place, so I felt I ought to give some insight into his and Yami's past together. Anyway, next chapter will be a bit more interesting. Please leave a review telling me how you liked it! Any suggestions to make the story better? Tell me! Ciao!
