A bad father has never a good son. ~ Latin Proverb


This was it.

Seven months of living off Ramen Noodles and working overtime for both of his two jobs to save money for plane tickets had finally paid off. He was here in Egypt, again, (he reached for something in his shirt, only to realize it wasn't there and hadn't been for a long time) and was at his father's digging site. Here, he was finally, here.

Inhaling, Ryou took a step forward into the blazing Egyptian sun.

(He would not let that breath out until it was too late to go back.)

The dig site was packed with archeologists of all varieties; some tall and old, others young and skinny. But they all bore the same look of steely determination and childish excitement.

"Excuse me," Ryou said, pulling aside a man with dark hair who looked to be in his mid thirties, "Do you know where I might find Katashi Bakura?"

The man gave him a rather nasty look, obviously not fond of outsiders.

"I'm his son," Ryou added, giving the man a half hearted smile.

The man blinked and then realization dawned in his blue eyes, "Oh, oh I see,"

He grasped Ryou's arm and pulled him further away from the crowd, "Listen, kid I'm sure you've come a long way but honestly Bakura is not as young as he use to be. I don't think his heart could take this kind of surprise. I'm sure he would love to get to know his long lost son but –,"

"Excuse me?" Ryou hissed, jerking away his arm. "He knows very well of my existence and has every since the day I was born!"

The blue-eyed man in turned responded with a cruel sneer, "I've known that man for three years and never once has he mentioned his son,"

Ryou's eyes narrowed and he lost his façade (or was it gained an old one?).

"Perhaps that's why I am here," he took a step towards the man, who had suddenly lost his confident smirk, "You will tell me where he is or I'll find him myself,"

"He – I," the man stuttered and Ryou pushed passed him roughly.

"Idiot,"

Ryou scanned the crowd, looking for his father. He shouldn't be hard to find, his hair was blue for goodness sake.

Then, as if someone had shined a spotlight down, Ryou saw his father. Tall, slightly tanned, striking blue hair and he was laughing with another man and thoroughly seemed to be enjoying himself.

(And suddenly Ryou's heart was filled with rage and hate that had long ago been defeated.)

He let out the breath he had been holding in and tried to compose himself.

Ryou had come here to talk. Nothing more and nothing less.

Plastering a fake smile, he walked with his head up to his father.

"Hello," he said softly as he tapped his father's shoulder. (The way he did when he was young and he needed his father to reach something on the higher shelves.)

"Hello, do we know you?" said the man next to his father, who was considerably more good-humored then the other archeologist Ryou had meant. Quite older too, he would have made a good Santa Clause. His father then turned, and almost dropped the pot he was holding.

"Ry, Ry – Ryou!" he stuttered out in surprise, while trying to catch the pot. The man next to him let out a jolly laugh.

Ryou smiled softly and allowed his father to try and regain his self-composure.

"What are you doing here?" he accused.

"You're not happy to see your son?" Ryou pouted, playing up the hurt in his eyes for his father's friend to see. He wanted that man to hate his father like he hated his father.

(Hatehatehatehatehatehatehate. It was like an unquenchable fire, burning a hole into his heart. He needed this. Ryou needed to be free of this hurt, this festering hate burn.)

"Well of course I'm happy to see you," he added nervously at Santa Clauses' questioning stares. "It's just, how?" Clearly, his father was having a hard time being coherent.

"I've been saving my money for a while since you never visit," Ryou let his voice tremble out that, "I just wanted to see you!" he smiled hard and hopeful.

(It was painful to think how true that had been not even a year ago.)

"I didn't know you had a son, Bakura," His father let out another nervous laugh. It was so fake and pained. So satisfying to Ryou.

"What are you taking about Jerry?" Katashi Bakura pulled Ryou close to him, "I've must have mentioned Ryou here. He's my pride and joy!" Another laugh.

The man, Jerry, cocked a brow and Ryou's father continued on his rant.

"Yes, he has accomplished so much and couldn't ask for a better son! I mean his doing excellent in college; you know his majoring in…" Ryou's father trailed off, squirming under Jerry's intense gaze.

"I'm going to be a teacher, dad," Ryou said emphasizing the one thing he never thought his father was.

"Right! Of course. It's nothing really, my memory just is not what it used to be," Jerry nodded and gave Ryou's sweating father a small smile.

"Well I guess I leave you two alone, you must have so much to catch up on!"

"Oh that's not necessary, Jerry. Jerry!" Ryou's father called out to the man, but he was gone.

Ryou turned to his father, who face looked like he had just seen a ghost. That quickly turned into anger.

"Don't you think you could have given me a warning before you come to visit?" he snapped and Ryou pursued his lips.

"How do purpose I would I have warned you? You don't read the letters I send, you never answer my calls. Honestly it's a miracle I found you at all!"

Ryou's father could only stared, brown eyes wide with shock.

"Don't use that tone of voice with me, young man!" He scorned, puffing up his chest in a vain attempt to feel less intimidated by his own son. "Just what exactly did you pay for this trip anyway? I work hard for that money, and you are not spend it frivolous,"

Ryou let out a laugh that wasn't his own, but let it out anyway because he knew it would make his father's skin crawl.

"I bought the ticket with my own money, from the two jobs I work," Ryou said, voice returning to its monotone.

His father let out a small "Oh," sound. "What are you doing here?"

"I just wanted to see you," he said, sarcastically, truthfully, agonizingly.

Again, his father's face shaped that "Oh,"

"Is there something you need? I mean honestly, a letter would have sufficed,"

"I told you, you don't read them," Ryou sighed and for a second the hurt he had been hiding began to slip out.

"That's not true, I read them! It's just sometimes I don't have time to write back – ,"

"I haven't written to you in over a year," Ryou's words were like a blunt and dulled, like his eyes. "For all you know I could have been dead,"

Ryou's father's face lit up. "Ryou I – ,"

The boy (because he was just a boy in the end, just a desperate orphan searching the world for some kind of unconditional love) in question laughed. But it was more his laugh this time, more broken and pitiful.

"You really don't get it do you?" he said and all the rage, all the hate in his heart seem to melt away. It left him feeling emptier and hollower than ever before. Ryou turned away.

"You left me all alone," he muttered to himself.

Katashi Bakura placed a hand on his son's shoulder.

"I don't understand," he admitted, "Isn't it every child's dream to live on their own? Trust me, if you could you would chose to live by yourself Ryou – ,"

Ryou turned around sharply, grapping his father's wrist.

"No, I wouldn't have," and the words were said with so much truth and power, his father shrank away.

His father cringed and then shook it over with a laugh. "I'm sure you'll understand when your older, Ryou. You'll see how lucky you were,"

"I am older, and I don't understand," Ryou said, unmoved. "Coming here was a mistake; I don't know why I did,"

(What had he been expecting? To come here to see a monster dressed up as his father? Or perhaps a saint?)

Ryou, brown eyes wide and completely vulnerable, took one last glance at his father.

"Do you even love me?" (Say yes, please just say yes. I can forgive you for everything else, I want to forgive just say – .)

"What?" His father gasped sharply. "What kind of question is that? Of course, of course I do,"

(But, for once, both Ryou and his father knew the truth; he was lying.)

"I'm leaving,"

"Ryou, wait that came out wrong! Just – ,"

But Ryou's back was turned and (for better or worse) he was not ever going to look back again.


A/N Okay in my mind Ryou's family was like this. Ryou's mother was English with white hair and green eyes. Ryou's father is one half japanese, his mother was English as well and his father was Japanese and that's why their surname is japanese. So that would make Ryou one-quarter japanese? Does that work? Anyway, lame chapter is lame and I feel really bad about that because of all the amazing reviews I got last chapter! I loved them and just for anyway who is reading out there, I don't mind anon reviews at all. Drop me a review anyway you can!