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Chapter 1

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Yuuki lay in bed the first night back and stared at the ceiling. She had always been good with jetlag, but this time it was as if the process of recovery was in slow motion. Her mind hadn't let up; she was back and couldn't decide if she wanted to be, if she was ready. The girl rolled onto her side and picked her phone up from the bedside table, scrolling through the numbers she found what she was looking for. A single name. Yuuki stared at it, not pressing call but not unwilling to either.

Shang Cunxin.

She couldn't even list him as dad or father. It hurt, Yuuki had loved her father, she had been his princess, his angel, the smile on his face. They had been close until the day her mother took her riding. Every tower he had built her toppled that day, every dream they had built collapsed into a mountain range of rubble. The girl had hated him for crushing her, she had wanted to play the piano but because it reminded her father of his wife, she was forbidden to. She had wanted to read books from the library, but her mother had always sat in the window seat and poured over novels, so that was a no-go zone. But she was allowed to ride. Yuuki was allowed to compete because it was her father's way of keeping his love alive, his purgatory for letting her die.

She needed to try and get that back, if she could get part of her old life back then maybe the new one would begin looking up. Maybe it would hurt less after she had proved herself worthy of someone's love. Basic love. A fathers love.

The girl pressed call.

"Hello?" a gruff voice answered on the third ring. It was late.

"Hi, dad." Yuuki replied, cautiously.

There was a long pause. "I have no daughter."

"Don't hang up." The girl said quickly before waiting to see if he had. He hadn't. "You can't say you don't have a daughter when I am half of you. Of you. You can't divorce that, even if you try."

"You signed the papers Yuuki." His words stung, they brought back memories Yuuki wanted to keep in storage.

"Yeah, well, you sent them. It was your idea. Don't you dare pin that on me like you pinned everything else you failed at."

"Failed at?" He was waking up.

"At being a father. It wasn't my fault mom died, it wasn't yours. She's gone now. You can't fix that so stop trying to."

"Excuse me?"

"Dad. I never stopped loving you, alright. Not once. Not when you forced me out of school and then called me inept because I didn't know how to socialise and stupid because I couldn't do math. Not when you threw me into riding like an investment rather than a daughter. Not when you kept blaming me for mom's death. Never. Because, I'm smart dad. I can do things beside ride horses. I came second in some of my subjects and got honours when I graduated. You weren't there."

"Why did you call, Yuuki?"

The girl stared at the opposite wall. "Because...I need to move on with life and I need you to know I was never what you deemed me to be. I was better than that." And, more than anything else, she needed someone to love and to love her now that she had been shattered. Shattered by others and by herself.

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"That's what I said."

Yuuki felt the last pieces of her heart crack apart. No I love you too; no I was wrong, nothing. "You're not going to say anything?"

"What do you want me to say? I love you, I was wrong? Because I'm not going to for either because I'm not a liar."

The girl slackened her grip on her phone and stared blankly at a fly as it clambered up the opposite wall.

"If you're done ranting and raving to a man you're not even related to, then, I'm going to sleep." Click.

Yuuki listened to the dial tone, refusing to cry. The darkness enveloped her and it felt like someone had tied a weight to what was left of her heart and dropped it into the deepest part of the ocean. It was cold, bleak, black, murky and the light was fading fast. The light from the past. Something she was reaching for, fighting to swim to, but finding she didn't have the strength to even tread water anymore.

-

In the following weeks, the girl threw herself into training. She had closed herself off entirely from the world, in a place where no one could get to her. Yuuki would smile, be social, go out, but she would not confide in anyone but the darkness. Even Zero became something that hurt to look at. He was owned by the very person who had caused her pain, who had started the fire that continuously burned her from the inside. Yuuki shut off, she would not become a damsel in distress. She was young, she had potential, she would win. The Olympics became her prize, her goal. A glow at the end of a tunnel.

Yuuki couldn't work out why it had been so easy to be used as a doormat. Surely she had not put herself there. Yuuki wondered everyday when things began to get bad and couldn't place it. She didn't want to place it, knowing that if she did it would destroy one of the moments she was clinging to. Maybe the night on the balcony in the snow, Christmas, even falling off Zero. Each had led her to a place that she had found joy in, and each had been abused, mistreated and stored as they were the last fragments of a past tarnished with hurt Yuuki could find joy in.

Her necklace sat at her throat, binding her to the memories. A constant reminder to keep going, to push through the pain, that there once had been more than this. There had once been more than a desert of devastation, there had once been love, happiness, laughter, moments to cherish and adoration. Even if some of it had been fake, Kyoya could not have held a facade like that for so long without having felt something. Surely he couldn't have.

And she loved him. Still. She loved him for having cared. For being her shelter from the storm. For understanding. For being. For respecting. For loving her too.

-

Kyoya's father called him to his study. The man stood in the doorway and waited to be summoned.

"Come." One word and he moved.

Sitting, he looked at his father.

Mr Ootori began to speak. "Kyoya, how do you feel about the Olympics?"

"As one should. It is a display of human engineering in its rawest, physical form. Competition and a hunger to win at all costs."

"You can relate to that?"

"Somewhat."

"What would you say if I handed the sponsorship of the Ootori group over the Olympics, to you? We've undertaken the health checks this side of the boarder. Good advertising."

"I would be honoured." He could not say no, the workload was too much with university and his other endeavours.

"Good." Mr Ootori leaned back in his chair. "You have well surpassed your brothers. They're both to busy making their own wealth and having families now."

Kyoya's eldest brother had just married and his sister had given birth to her first child. The second Ootori was engaged. He was the last one left, the last piece standing. The only one fully available to his father's capitalist dictatorship.

There was a moment of silence, the oldest Ootori scrutinised his son. "What ever happened to that...Cunxin...girl?"

Kyoya's head shot up; surprised that he remembered her. "She went to London."

"To study?"

"I don't know."

Mr Ootori looked over his glasses at Kyoya. "You don't know?"

"No."

"Why?"

"She never told me."

"Is she coming back?"

Kyoya paused. "I don't know."

His father crossed his arms. "That's disappointing." He didn't say whether to Kyoya's ignorance or to Yuuki's move.

The son made no reply.

"I was hoping she would be a future bride. Minor problem, easily resolved." He meant that he would find another woman.

Kyoya stared. "I don't want to get married. Not yet."

"Oh?"

"Yes."

There was a long pause. "You can go." Mr Ootori leaned back into his desk and turned to his computer, ignoring his son completely.

Kyoya stood and left the room, shutting the door behind him. He ran a hand over his face and pulled walked out the front door, headed for the garage. The man got into his car and pulled into the street, trying to escape the ball of stress and half expectations his life had become. Kyoya hated the game he had once found interesting, it was only good until he won. Won the match at least.

-

Yuuki rummaged through her bathroom bag, thanks to the new airport laws she now had no shampoo. Not yet undressed, the girl decided to head to the old supermarket and explore the grounds she had never seen whilst in Japan. The upper classes were so predictable, and she was looking for change. Yuuki pulled on some casual clothes; ballet flats and a white dress cut to the knee. It was different to her usual attire, lighter, fresh, free almost. If one could not feel those things internally, they would seek them externally.

The girl grabbed her wallet and phone and asked the stable hand where to go. He told her to catch the number six bus to the supermarket and the four home. Simple as that. Almost. Yuuki had never been on a bus. She tentatively took her seat, surprised at how little it cost, and looked around. There were a lot of youths, some old people and one, inevitable, screaming child. Yuuki's maternal feelings ducked further into non-existence. It was one of her first commoner experiences without someone else, and Yuuki felt slightly liberated, independent. Even so, once at the supermarket, she had trouble finding out where things were. There was cold fruit and vegetables on one side and cold, frozen fruit and vegetables on the other. She wondered why they couldn't be put together, surely that would be easier. But she wasn't here for food. The hygiene isle was a mile long and stocked with so many products the girl didn't know what to do.

There was shampoo in a pink bottle, blue bottle, purple bottle, white bottle, black bottle. It gave volume, nourishment, moisture, de-frizzing, colour stay and normal options all within a meter of each other. Another girl came up beside Yuuki and took a bottle, read the back and moved on. Yuuki watched her leave, how was it that easy to make a choice from so much variety? She envied the girl who had been raised to understand the simple things, the necessary things, whereas she had been taught how to dance and eat with numerous items of cutlery. It hardly helped. Growing up she had been given salon shampoo that were typed according to hair colour. In the end, Yuuki closed her eyes and grabbed a bottle. It was conditioner. She sighed and read what it did.

Conditioner, for normal hair. Yuuki found the matching shampoo. What was normal hair anyway? Was her hair normal? She had tied it in a messy bun because of its dirty state and couldn't tell. The girl gave up and bought the product anyway.

At the counter the woman stared at her, obviously remembering her from somewhere but not really knowing.

"Have I seen you someplace, love?" She asked, her friendly smile beaming.

"Not in person, probably not." Yuuki replied, taking the bag.

There was a pause as the woman scrutinised, her face suddenly lit up. "I know! My niece has a picture of you on her wall, you're that equestrian hey?"

"Yes. I guess I am." The girl smiled and put her wallet and phone in her shopping bag.

The check-out lady was besotted. "She'd be so happy to know I met you. Could I get an autograph for her?"

Yuuki didn't really have any place to go, and her celebrity was not large at all, the occasional recognition had never been a problem. "Sure."

"Do you have any paper?" The woman asked.

Surely they have paper at a supermarket, Yuuki thought. She pulled her wallet out again and extracted an expired Jockey Club membership card. The girl took the permanent marker the woman was holding out and signed across the ID number before handing both back, smiling courteously.

"Thank you!" The lady cooed.

Yuuki nodded her goodbye and walked out the door so that no one would think she was some huge star and begin asking questions. No one was supposed to know she was back.

Not yet.

-

Kyoya drove as far away as he could from his house, right down into the lower districts. The university was close, Tamaki and Haruhi were attending. The former studying business and foreign politics while the latter attained a law degree. The suburbs slowly became commercial, various stores appeared and houses started to fade.

He was angry. His father obviously wanted him to marry, even after saying that it was a pity his older brothers were. Kyoya was the heir, the youngest son, now resented by his older brothers. He was the successful, the one who had been told not to surpass the others but had. He was carrying around a burden that came with his achievements, carrying a loss. Kyoya blinked and her face flew onto the front of his eye-lids annoyingly. He couldn't get rid of her.

The man wanted to, he wanted to move on, it hurt too much to dwell where he was; treading water and trying to stay afloat. There was nowhere to swim to. Nothing in sight.

Yuuki put her walking brace down on an icy patch and slipped. She braced herself for a hard landing on a cold surface, she didn't even cry out. The hand slid from the small of her back and firmly rested on her waist, the arm attached sitting where the hand had been. Kyoya caught her fall and pulled her up, Yuuki crashed into him instead of crashing into the floor. They stood as they had been before when they were dancing, only her feet were on the floor and her hands gripped to the fabric on his shoulders in fright. Yuuki let go of her grasp on Kyoya's suit. She glanced up surprised to find his face so close to hers.

The image haunted him. The night it all began. The night it all began to go terribly wrong. The night he started to fall for her.

"Everyone needs a family Kyoya. Even you know that. I don't have anything now. What do I do on their birthdays? Father's day? Just forget? People don't just forget. You just wanted your precious capitalist empire. Everyone needs a family! But it looks like you needed to get rid of a discrepancy more than you needed to look after me. You lied to me. You cheated me. You used me!"

"Yuuki, calm down." Kyoya did not like being woken up, but he didn't like not having his bearings even more.

"You know, you always thought yourself second rate and I never believed it. Not until now. This minute." Yuuki used her finger to point at the ground, indicating that moment.

The words followed him, speaking truth into everything he did. Challenging him. He would be better, because she had thought him worse. He would be the best, for her. Not for himself anymore, but to prove to Yuuki he could be more than what she had left thinking he was.

He clambered to the backseat to be on the same side of the car that the plane was on. Pulling his phone out, he dialled her. All there was, was a disabled tone, her phone was off. She was watching them, her fingers pressed to the glass. Her face written with grief. It was like she had lost a loved one, like someone had died...Kyoya stared in horror as the wheels of the plane lifted off the ground, first just a few centimetres and then a meter.

Two...

Three...

Four...

Kyoya gripped the steering wheel, furious at himself. He was a jerk. An absolute failure as a human. All he had ever been was a calculating machine and when he finally found a heart, he had already misused it.

The man glared out the front window. He was heading up to a bus stop that served the local shopping centre, the speed limit dropped. There were a few people out, it was late afternoon and the sun was starting to set. Everything looked better at sunset, but everything ended there to.

Kyoya people watched as he always did, his eyes casually scrutinising everyone on the sidewalk. A length of white material caught his eye. The person within looked familiar. The wind blew into the dress and it billowed around the girl's legs, she reached down self-consciously and smoothed the material – even though it hadn't been revealing at all. Her act was too high-toned to fit in with the lower classes around her; she was too conscious of how others would perceive her.

The girl turned slightly, she was now directly side on to Kyoya. Her profile was familiar, the high cheekbones, the straight nose, the softness about her features. He stiffened. It was her.

Her name was too hard to say now that she was standing so close. It hurt too much to say, to think, to know it was lost and yet so near. She was in Japan.

The girl dug in her shopping bag and pulled out a wallet, the interlocking C's grabbed the attention of another teen beside her. It was obviously authentic and an object of envy. She walked up to a bus, now parked in the lane and disappeared within it.

Kyoya realised he hadn't been breathing. He hadn't been moving either and there was not a pile-up behind him. The man snapped out of his daydream and accelerated past the bus.

It hadn't been her.

She would never have come back.

She would never have cared to come back.

Suddenly, Kyoya realised just how much he missed her, just how much he had been denying his loss. It had always been there, but numbed from emotion. How could he have imagined her there? Was he finally loosing it?

The man turned his car around and drove back home. Kyoya searched for comfort in his work, if he was going to drown, he would do it surrounded by papers.

-

I did a lot; I know you say
I've got to get away.
"The world is not yours for the taking"
Is all you ever say.
I know I'm not the best for you,
But promise that you'll stay.
'Cause if I watch you go,
You'll see me wasting, you'll see me wasted away

'Cause today, you walked out of my life
'Cause today, your words felt like a knife
I'm not living this life.

Goodbyes are meant for lonely people standing in the rain
And no matter where I go it's always pouring all the same.
These streets are filled with memories
Both perfect and in pain
And all I wanna do is love you
But I'm the only one to blame.

'Cause today, you walked out of my life
'Cause today, your words felt like a knife
I'm not living this life.

But what do I know, if you're leaving
All you did was stop the bleeding.
But these scars will stay forever,
These scars will stay forever
And these words have no meaning
If we cannot find the feeling
That we held on to together
Try your hardest to remember

Stay with me,
Or watch me bleed,
I need you just to breathe.

'Cause today, you walked out of my life
(Stay with me, or watch me bleed)
'Cause today, your words felt like a knife
I need you just to breathe.
I'm not living this life.

(Like a knife, Secondhand Serenade)

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Alright, it has officially begun.

Tell me what you thought, honestly.

You know the drill, rate and review.

Thanks for reading.

-pp