Ryuto

It felt oddly lonely without my sister. A few days passed since the night of the carnival when she came home and said she made up her mind. The same night, we had an argument about it and as I sat in the group of my friends, I remembered it exactly.

When I demanded where she had been earlier, she said she was thinking about moving back to Japan. She told me she called our father and he agreed to her decision to leave Switzerland and head back for Japan to finish school there. She said that it was decided that I'd stay when she left since I had friends and Lily at Gakuen.

In reply, I told her that she couldn't leave. That was when she started yelling at me, screaming that I wasn't the one to make her decisions and that she was old enough to go back to Japan by herself. She started crying then and I didn't know what to do. All I did was run up to my room and lock myself inside, angry at her for not telling me earlier.

"Hey, are you okay, Ryuto?" Alfred asked me, looking up at me. He was squatting in front of me while I sat on a bench with the others surrounding me. "You're looking…mad or worried and you're usually…not mad…but you're mostly worried and…well. You know. "

I shook my head. "I'm fine, Alfred," I said. "Thanks for…worrying about me, though."

Alfred grinned at me, making my stomach twist with guilt. "Oh, phew. I thought you were because your sister's sick."

"Oh, yeah. Probably."

The bell rang at that moment, signaling for first hour and everyone scattered. I picked up my bag and saw that Kiku was waiting for me.

"Is your sister still packing?" he asked me.

Unlike the others, I only told Kiku, Matthew, and Lily because they were the only ones that I could trust not to freak out on me. A few of them—like mainly Alfred, and Francis—would definitely start yelling. I didn't know if Ludwig knew because he wouldn't talk to anyone except for Feliciano and Kiku. Gilbert was mad at his brother and would start yelling at him for some reason. Feliciano would definitely start crying if he found out and Lovino would start screaming at him to grow up. I didn't want to pop the others' bubbles by telling them my sister was leaving because they'd probably start bugging me about it over and over again. And so, I was left to trust only three people to do the exact opposite of what my friends would do.

When I told Lily, she said she respected my sister's decision but that she should stick it out for a while longer to see what would happen. Matthew said that he admired Hikaru for going alone without me. And Kiku told me that she'd be happier back in Japan.

"Yes," I said. "She's taking her clothes with her and we're sending her things later on. She's supposed to come back today to transfer her credits out of Gakuen."

"When does she leave?"

"Today after school," I told him. "Will you come?"

Kiku nodded.

I smiled at my friend. "Thanks, Kiku. It means a lot."

A few hours later after school ended, we dropped Hikaru off to the airport where she would wait for her plane. When we got home, I decided that every other day, I spend inside to try to get used to the silence. In the other days, I'd invite a friend over or go out with Lily for a picnic or for a walk. I'd try to busy myself while trying to get rid of the guilty feelings in my stomach.

I started playing the violin for a while, guiding the bow over the strings. Before I knew it, I recognized that the song I was playing was the one that Hikaru and I had played together before. Even though it was the same song, there was a female and a male version of it and we'd sing it together while playing our instruments to anyone who'd listen to us at the time.

I stopped suddenly, cutting off the song before it ended and stared at the empty piano. In my stomach, I felt another twist of guilt like before when Alfred grinned at me.

"Oh, don't stop playing," said Francis's voice. "It was so sweet. Didn't it make you want to cry, Gilbert?"

I turned around to see the group crowding the doorway, looking at me.

"Yes, Francis," Gilbert said. "It really made me want to cry. It's just that I'm too upset with Ryuto to even think about crying."

I stared at him for a moment and turned back to playing my violin. "I don't know what you're talking about," I said over the music.

"Maybe you know that your sister is leaving," Antonio said.

"So? It's her decision," I told them. "If she wants to leave then it's fine by me."

"What about us then?" asked Feliciano. "You're being really selfish, Ryuto."

The bow scraped across the violin strings, causing a noise like nails scratching a chalkboard. "Selfish?" I shouted, spinning around to face them. "I'm the selfish one? Why don't you go and talk to Hikaru to see for yourself who the selfish one is here! She'sleaving because of your brother, Gilbert. So now who's the s—"

Suddenly, I felt Gilbert yank on my shoulder and start dragging me downstairs.

"Where the hell are you taking me!" I shouted, trying to release myself out of his grip but he kept going.

"We'll be right back !" Gilbert shouted to Auntie as we passed her on our way out. He pushed me into the backseat of his car where it was waiting outside the house with all the other's cars.

Ludwig was already sitting in the passenger seat with a book in his lap but he wasn't reading it. Instead, he was looking out the window towards nothing. Even though his face was expressionless at that moment, his eyes gave him away. The look in his eyes was something that Hikaru sometimes wore when she was thinking about something that she lost and that she really wanted back.

But before I could say anything to him, Gilbert got in and started the car. I didn't say anything to protest as Gilbert pulled the car out of the driveway. He sped down the street and I knew the others were following behind us.

"Where are we going?" I asked.

Gilbert looked at me through the rearview mirror and glanced over to his brother. "The airport," he said and he pulled into the International Airport of Switzerland where we dropped my sister off earlier.

When we got out of the car, Francis and Antonio pushed me while Ivan was practically dragging an unwilling Ludwig inside the airport as if we were prisoners.

"Hikaru's plane leaves in about ten minutes so we have some time," Alfred said to the others. "Come on, everyone! We got ourselves a friend to take back!"

"How do you know when she leaves?" I demanded as we ran past security.

"That, my friend, is confidential," Antonio said, grinning.

"No it isn't, you bastard," Lovino shouted. "Kiku told us!"

"What!" I shouted, glancing over to Kiku who gave me an embarrassed smile.

"There's no time, you twits," Arthur yelled.

"Yeah, Hikaru's going to leave and we'll never get to see her again!" Feliciano cried, making us run faster.

Finally, we got to the area where we left Hikaru before to see that she was still there. She was sitting by herself with her suitcase at her feet and her earphones plugged into her ears. From where we stood, we could see that she was humming to a song as she watched a plane departing from the airport. My twin was staring at the planes with her expression and it made my stomach churn with guilt again. The guilt rose to my throat and at that moment, I felt like barfing it out along with the lunch I had earlier.

I looked at Ludwig and he caught my eyes. "You know," I said, gulping down my guilt. "It's not your fault, Ludwig. I…I'm sorry about what I did. I thought I was…protecting my sister. And…she really does love you, even if she hasn't told you. I can tell."

Ludwig stared at me and then he looked back at Hikaru. For a second, I thought he was going to say something but he started walking towards my sister with his hands in his pockets. I turned around to the others to see them sigh with relief. Feliciano was jumping up and down, and he almost shouted but we pulled him to an ice-cream bar. There we sat on the stools and watched Hikaru jump up from her seat with a yelp as Ludwig greeted her.

We watched as Ludwig started talking to Hikaru, making her sit down while he knelt in front of her, gesturing to her. She spoke to him and I saw Francis's eyes nearly bulge out of their sockets as she covered her eyes with her hands. Ludwig pulled her hands away from her face and kissed her. He put his arms around her and was saying something to her while she cried in his arms. She started nodding and I could tell that she was saying 'yes' over and over again.

"It sure as hell isn't his fault," Gilbert said angrily as the others started celebrating, ordering ice-cream from the clerk behind the bar. "What were you thinking before this ever happened? I thought we had an agreement. Dammit, Ryuto. You need to make up your mind. You and your sister have problems but everyone else in the group has them, too. Heck, everyone in the whole school has a problem. That's why you two belong at school. Besides, your sister really likes my brother. I can tell because—"

"Because he gave you a bruise," I said, getting irritated from Feliciano's shouts in Italian that were coming from behind us. "I know."

"I was going to say because of the way they look at each other. You should see them at my house or at least pay attention to them whenever they're together."

Gilbert looked over to his brother again. At that moment, I could tell how much Gilbert loved his brother. His expression told me he'd go through anything—perhaps everything—to make Ludwig happy. I was always thinking that Gilbert was a selfish, self-claimed awesome idiot and yet, I felt just like him—trying to make my sister happy by doing anything for her.

I sighed and sunk in my seat. "I hate you so much," I muttered and I ordered ice-cream for the both of us.

Gilbert laughed. "Glad you understand, Ryuto," he said. "But mein gott. It gets annoying when they're cuddled together and for some reason, Mutti absolutely loves it. She's probably planning their wedding right now."

When I got it, I shoved my spoon into my ice-cream and stuffed it into my mouth. Surprisingly, my stomach handled the dairy product very well since I apologized to Ludwig. "Tell me about it," I said when I swallowed. "Father's been calling and asking about what they like and stuff. I think he's arranging their marriage or something."

The albino sucked in a breath and slapped me on the back as he grinned like a maniac. "And in the end, if they do get married, we'd be brothers! Oh, then you'd have to meet our older brothers, too, and Mutti and Vati and—"

"I'm not the one getting married to your brother so—"

"You'd still have to meet them," said my sister's voice.

I turned around to see Hikaru and Ludwig standing behind us as they held hands. Ludwig was pulling Hikaru's suitcase. Feliciano ran up to them and hugged them both, still crying in Italian.

"I'm not going anywhere, Feliciano," Hikaru said, patting his back. "Shh, it'll be okay."

"So you're staying?" I asked her.

My twin smiled at me. "Yeah, I decided to. I called Papa and he said it was fine. Turns out he was expecting someone to change my mind about going back home." Her eyes flickered over to Ludwig, who was dealing with Feliciano at that moment, and a slight blush came over her face. "I'm…really glad you came for me. I was…I was already thinking about staying…and…"

"But you're staying, Hikaru-chan," Kiku said. "That's what matters."

"Yeah!" Alfred shouted. "We can't have one Sohma without the other."
"I can't believe I'm saying this," Arthur said, "but Alfred's right. You two are twins and it wouldn't seem right. It's like having biscuits without tea. It can be very bland and boring."

Hikaru and I stared at Arthur.

"Yeah, I still have no idea what biscuits are," I said.

"But it's still very nice of you guys to get me, so I'm going to stay here," Hikaru said.

"Hey, didn't you transfer your credits out of school already?" Yao asked Hikaru. "You aren't a student anymore, right?"

Hikaru shook her head. "I was actually planning to go to Japan, find a school, and then transfer my credits out of Gakuen," she said. "So technically, I'm still a student there."

"And what about you two?" Francis asked with his eyes still bulging like a frog's. "Are you dating again?"

"Yes," Ludwig said. "What about it?"

Francis shouted and started yelling in French. Antonio and Gilbert joined their friend, yelling in Spanish and in German at the same time.

"So what now?" I asked. "You two are back together, everyone else is going crazy, and the world's still spinning. What's going to happen next?"

Hikaru and Ludwig smiled at each other.

"Life," Hikaru answered as she leaned on his chest and she gave me a smile "Life is going to happen next, Ryuto."

A Note from your Author:

The end! *laughs* Nah. Not yet. I still have one more chapter to go…or shall we say epilogue, honhonhon? (Oh, goodness. Francis is getting to me.) But no worries! After the epilogue, I promised short stories and there will be short stories! That's if, I remember… But I probably will since school's out! Yeah, I'm a free bird! I'm like a bird, I dream of flying awaaaay. Oops. Sorry. I got carried away… *laughs* However, I still have to do summer homework for my AP US History for next school year and read books for my AP English 11, too…which really sucks and I'll probably procrastinate about it until the end of vacation or something…

Anyway, as the author of "Gakuen Academy" I can say the ending is CHEESY! Cheesy, cheesy, cheesy as hell! *laughs* But I do love cheese…and I love this story. My first story and I'm already ending it… 。ﾟ(ﾟﾉД｀ﾟ)ﾟ｡ I'm so sad, so very, very sad...but I must wait until I have written the epilogue to be sad. And then I'll cry. And be sad…very…very…sad.

On the other hand, I'll try to get the short stories done so I'll keep updating until I have written a short story for the other characters! Suggestions are welcome (even though no one sends them in) and I'll take it and go voila with it! The short stories will probably take place before and after this whole plot/crap happens or probably even during it…like "Iggy in Love." Read it yet? It's under a separate story title but I'll delete that and put it under this one later (so if you're reading this after I deleted it, you can just click on the 'next chapter' button).

And before I go, I should say/ask several things:

I know Hikaru's acting selfish but I accidentally made her that way

Does she really sound selfish to you guys as the readers?

I have no idea what the traffic laws and airports in Switzerland look like so sorry…

Biscuits are British cookies and crumpets are British biscuits…get it?

It took me a long time to understand what the difference between British biscuits and American biscuits were. I was born in America so yeah.

I wanted this epic fight scene to happen between Hikaru and Natalia/Belarus but then I realized that I never said anything about Hikaru being a fighter.

Upon the above statement, I started writing a parallel meeting between the Sohma twins and the Hetalia gang where the twins are these famous Japanese martial artists and when they arrive at Gakuen, Rome (who would have been the principal but I forgot to mention that somewhere) and Germania (the probable vice-principal) tested them in a fight scene and the twins had to fight Rome and Germania… It was really interesting.

Also, I wrote this other parallel meeting where Hikaru and Ryuto are a little tougher than they are now and they're invited to play soccer by Alfred and they beat the rest…

One last statement… I FINALLY WROTE A LONG CHAPTER FOR RYUTO AND I'M SUPER PROUD OF MYSELF FOR DOING THAT SO YEAH! o(´^｀)o

So thanks for reading and enjoy this lovely bear…I mean enjoy this story!

(●￣(ｴ)￣●) I wish it was a panda…