Notes: This is a direct continuation of the ending scene from the previous chapter. I never thought that I'd complete this fic, but I guess we never really can predict what happens in the future.

oOo

"I wanted to see the future where we were together."

"I wished for it, I wanted it so badly. That dream that I'd held so close to my chest for all those lonely years abroad. I just wanted to see your face again, and tell you all the things that I wanted to say."

She leans forward, until she's staring straight into his eyes, leaning over him with her hands planted on either side of his head.

He's caught in her gaze, unable to move a muscle; unable to do much more than breathe. Deep inside, something, or perhaps someone, is screaming at him.

This isn't right. Things weren't supposed to turn out like this.

But then… when did things in his life ever turn out the way they were supposed to?

"I love you, Hikigaya-kun. I've loved you for a very long time. Please… let me make the dreams that I held come true."

She leans forward, getting ever closer. There is a strangled sound that comes from his throat, but his arms are like lead and he finds that he cannot move them. She gives him plenty of time to pull away, but he doesn't. He doesn't resist her. Not as she approaches, not even when she's so close that he's able to count each and every fluttering eyelash as she closes her eyes.

And then his own eyes are closing and they're kissing. Despite his doubts, it's hard to ignore the way his heart is singing. His stomach is doing some weird acrobatic contortions that he's never experienced. Because if fucking Orimoto Kaori had only felt wrong, then kissing Yukinoshita Yukino could only be described as the opposite. It felt so right. It's a feeling akin to if he had finally broken through some writer's block and started writing again. The mix of triumph, of desire, and of pure unadulterated joy swirled together inside his chest; those heady emotions are so strong that by the time she pulls away at last, the both of them gasping for air, he feels

Yukinoshita has slipped fully into his lap during the course of their kiss, and now he's staring up at her; at those crystal blue eyes that he sees in his dreams and wondering if perhaps this too is also a dream. It's a rational thought, he argues to himself. After all, didn't this all seem like a dream? Even if he had been the most indefatigable optimist before this trip, he would never have expected Yukinoshita Yukino to be straddling his lap in a hotel room with bruised, well-kissed lips and eyes half-lidded with desire. And yet there she is, sitting in his lap; the softness of her body and her vanilla scent filling his senses.

It's entrancing and at first, he doesn't resist. For a moment, he allows himself to fall into the fantasy that is this Yukinoshita Yukino.

But then, the moment passes. They break apart. This dream… this mirror image of his deepest desires; it cracks apart.

There's something very wrong here. And the wave of nausea that hits him is as unexpected as it is overwhelming.

Why?

Why does he feel so disgusted with himself? Hasn't this exact moment been what he has been longing for, ever since he graduated from Soubu?

But not like this, he reminds himself.

Yukinoshita, despite all that she has said and done, is still married.

And so he reaches out and pushes Yukinoshita away from him, off his lap.

And even as her eyes widen and her expression crumples, he does not turn or change course. He steels his heart and his resolve.

This has to be the right thing to do.

When Yukinoshita finally speaks up once more, her voice is thick with tears. She utters only one word.

"Why?"

He stands up and walks to the window, drawing the curtains back to stare outside. His room is not on the top floor, but it is still high enough that he gets a decent glimpse of the city at night.

"You should know, right? Yukinoshita, you should know better than anyone why I cannot accept your feelings."

There's a sharp intake of breath, and then a long pause.

He doesn't dare turn around. He's scared. Terrified that if he turns around and sees her face, that he will not be able to stay true to himself. To what he is trying to convey.

Yukinoshita Yukino has always made him do irrational things.

There is a long pause. He can hear her behind him. The little sniffles as she attempts to stop herself from crying eats away at him.

But he holds his ground.

"You say that I should understand, Hikigaya-kun, how you feel. Why you cannot accept this… us. So right now, I will tell you that I do. I understand, Hikigaya-kun, exactly why you feel the way that you do. You think of me as selfish, or perhaps delusional, that I could be married to another and still claim to love you. Despite, or perhaps because of, your nature, you believe that my love holds no weight, because it's not pure or beautiful or special. Or what was the word that you used to use…?"

He gives no visible reaction, but the words find their mark. Just like Yukinoshita Yukino's words have always done. They cut deep, precisely because they are so accurate. It's as if she knows exactly how he feels. His thoughts, his emotions, the words he wanted to communicate. She can evoke them with pinpoint accuracy.

Not even Komachi could claim to understand him as well as this woman does.

It feels like only yesterday when I could confidently say that, outside of your family, I knew you the best.

She had always underestimated herself.

"The thing is, Hikigaya-kun, you and I… we shared these same views once. We looked at love in much the same way, with admiring naive eyes and an idealistic idea of what it was supposed to look like."

Her voice sounds closer. It sounds as if she is standing right behind him. Like a Siren, whispering in his ears.

"We were idealists, Hikigaya-kun. We wanted a world… a perfect world where we married for love and love only. But we both grew up, didn't we, Hikigaya-kun. We were forced to, by circumstance. And I… it causes me great shame to admit this, but I caved. I caved to the pressure and I married someone whom I knew could never hold a candle to you. But, at the time, I felt that you were so far out of my reach as to be unattainable."

Suddenly he feels a light weight settle against his back. As if she had leaned forward and laid her head against his back.

"I was never as strong as you, Hikigaya-kun. You could accept being alone if it meant that you needn't sacrifice your ideals, but I… once I found true friends for the first time in my life… once I found you… and Yuigahama-san… and Isshiki-san… and everyone else, I couldn't bear to be alone anymore. Loneliness… you don't notice it so much if you've never had much in the way of companionship in the first place. But I had you, Hikigaya-kun. I had someone very, very special to me. And once I lost him, I tried everything to fill that void that he left behind."

He clenches his fists around the shutter of the window, his eyes still staring dead ahead. Unmoving. Unblinking. He stands as rigid as a statue. The only thing he does… the only thing he is capable of doing is listening.

"And so I'm sorry," she says, and it's spoken softly, in a voice that warbles, as if it is on the verge of shattering completely. "I'm sorry that I couldn't stay as strong as you did at the prospect of being alone in a foreign country. I'm sorry for all of this… this selfish request of mine. I know that it's unfair of me to even ask. But Hikigaya-kun, you know me just as well as I know you. You understand me. So now let me ask you a question in return. The Yukinoshita Yukino that you remember… do you think she's the type of person to seek you out? That after all these years and despite all these obstacles, I would still be here before you? How… how strongly do you think these feelings that I hold for you must be? For me to forsake everything, to stand here before you and tell you that I love you… that I've loved you for all these years…"

"…Could I be expressing anything but my deepest, most honest feelings? Do you really think that this love wouldn't be… genuine?"

Her words slam into him with the force of a Hiratsuka-sensei punch. This time, it is his turn to gasp. Since the very first moment he met her, Yukinoshita's words had always left scars, in one way or another. And it seemed as though time has not changed a thing in this regard.

It hurts. His chest hurts so much that his breathing becomes laborious and he's a little dizzy. He wants to cry; there's pressure building behind his eyes and he feels the back of his throat closing up.

He's never felt like this before. Not with any of his previous girlfriends. And not with Yukinoshita. He's thought about her for years. He has dreamed about being together with her. But those had always seemed like pipe dreams to him. He always believed that, after high school, after she moved away, they were never really meant to be.

But hearing this, it changes things. Hearing the things she said, the way that this entire night has gone… it makes him wonder.

Isn't this cruel? These thoughts of what could have been.

He would have preferred the unrequited love. At least then, he wouldn't have suffered so much heartbreak.

An unrequited love that went on forever… wouldn't that have hurt less than a requited love that could never be?

"I hear what you're saying Yukinoshita." He says, and his voice comes out raspy. It's almost unrecognizable to him; his own voice.

"Like you said, it's not as if I don't understand you. Because I do. Even after all this time, I can still understand your sentiments."

"Then…-"

"But I think you're underestimating my feelings. Or perhaps you're simply disregarding them."

Yukinoshita presses a hand against her chest.

"You know that is simply a false statement. How could I claim to love you if I could disregard your feelings so easily, Hikigaya-kun?"

He whirls around, and for the first time in nearly half an hour, they are face to face once more.

"Is it? Is it really a false statement? Tell me, Yukinoshita Yukino. Tell me how I should feel. I've spent years. Years of my life writing and writing and writing, trying to express the feelings that I held through a medium that we both loved, and hoping against hope that one day, they would be returned."

He is almost shouting by the end. All of the pain and frustration; all of the self-loathing that he has felt because he couldn't move on from her… all of it is coming to the forefront now.

He's unable to hold the feelings back any longer.

"They are being returned, Hikigaya-kun." Her voice has risen as well, and her speech is slurring from her tears. "How can you not see that?"

"They're not! How can you say that my feelings are being returned when you… are… married? I tried, Yukinoshita. I tried so, so, so goddamn hard to move on. Don't you fucking realize?! Even now, even today, Yui still gives me those fucking eyes every time I see her. I'm ashamed that the thought ever even occurs to me, but if I had to guess, I'd say that I probably need only ask and I could be with her. And the thing is, I know that I wouldn't have been unhappy with her, or Isshiki, or Orimoto, or anyone else that I've spent time with!"

He takes a breath.

"But at the end of the day, I couldn't bring myself to do it. I couldn't bring myself to really be with them. Any of them. Because I realized that while being with them wouldn't have made me unhappy; they couldn't bring me true happiness. Because I didn't love them, or at least… I couldn't love them in the same way."

There's a sharp intake of breath. He doesn't even know if it comes from himself or the girl standing before him.

"Since I couldn't let myself be happy with them, then I had no right to steal their chance at happiness away as well. It's a choice. Do you see what I'm saying, Yukinoshita? We all have this choice that we can make. And you and I… we've made our choices. And those choices… it means that we can't walk the same path anymore."

He's never seen her like this. He's seen her shed tears before, but never like this. Full on crying. And he has to resist the urge to put an arm around her. To comfort her in the awkward way that he has always done.

"So that's what this all comes down to, then? My thoughts, my feelings, my words; all the love that I hold for you… they mean nothing to you at all? Because of a moment of weakness, a choice that I made out of desperation?"

They mean nothing to you at all.

Her voice echoes in his head.

Of course not.

That's what he wants to say. Because of course he's unable to stop his heart from pounding when he hears her words. When he hears her say I love you. Despite his ideals, despite his words, he's unable to lie to himself.

So instead of answering he asks her a question of his own.

"What if it had been me that had gotten married, Yukinoshita?"

"What?"

"Imagine that you've just returned to Japan. To Chiba, after eight long years abroad. Eight long years in which you have wondered and waited, hoping against hope that somehow, the person you love feels the same way about you. Someone that you should have forgotten years ago, that you should have moved on from years ago."

Yukinoshita flinches, but does not interrupt.

"You get a hotel room, or perhaps you return to your family's house. And then, you seek me out. You spend days walking around the city, seeing all the old places that we used to frequent, looking and searching and hoping that I'm still the boy that you remember. And then when you finally find me, when it feels like that dream that you held so close to your chest, almost like a lifeline, might finally come true, you suddenly discover that I'm married. Tell me…. how would you feel in that moment?"

"I… I would likely feel crushed."

"Exactly. You would feel as if your whole world has been upended. Would it matter to you then? If I'd told you I loved you? Would those feelings have mattered, in the face of the fact that I had chosen someone else?"

"You might think that I'm irrational," he continued. "And maybe I am. But I have to hold my ground. I have to… I have to tell you no. Because… because if I accepted your feelings now… it would have rendered my love for you…this love that I've held for all these years… worthless."

"I disagree with you, Hikigaya-kun. If I were in your shoes… even if you had been married… none of that would have mattered. People don't go through life only ever loving one person. And so, if you'd told me you loved me, if you wanted to be with me, if you chose me in the end, despite your marriage or whatever other attachments you may have held, I would have seen no reason to refuse you."

They stared at each other. Her eyes were wide, pleasing.

But he wouldn't budge.

"I want to be special to you, Yukinoshita. And I feel as if I can't ever be that to you. I can't ever be the only one in your heart."

She throws herself at him without warning. Her fists pound his chest, and although Yukinoshita Yukino is not particularly strong, the blows land and they hurt.

He's not sure if it's his chest that's hurting, however, or if it is his soul.

"Why?! Why are you so dead set on hurting yourself? On hurting us both? Isn't marriage just a title? Didn't you used to say it yourself, that marriage is the graveyard of life? You never took marriage seriously at all, with all those asinine jokes you used to make about being a house husband. Why does it only hold so much meaning for you now?"

"Because I'll always wonder, Yukinoshita! Even if we wound up together, I'd always doubt myself. I think I'd always wonder… do you really truly love me and only me? Every time we have a fight. Or every time things don't go well. I'll always have to look back and wonder. Would you have been happier if I hadn't come? Would your life have turned out better? Do I not make you happy? Or rather, do I not make you as happy as the other guy once did? Would you have preferred him instead?"

"Those are excuses, Hikigaya-kun. Excuses stemming from your own insecurities. Hikigaya-kun, if one day we realize that things won't work out between us… it wouldn't be too late to split then. Just like it isn't too late for us to find each other again now. Even if it's been eight years since we last met properly. Even if we've missed out on so much of each other's lives, we can make it all up. I can accept it if, in the end, our feelings for each other aren't as strong as we believed them to be. I can accept it if we tried our hardest to make this love work, but that it failed in the end. But do you know what I can't accept?"

She takes a deep breath. "I can't accept never finding out."

"I… I…" his voice cracks and his resolve wavers. In the face of her logic, his ideals seem so silly… so minute by comparison.

"Hikigaya-kun," her voice is soft, and surprisingly gentle. Her eyes are a million miles away; she's staring at him, but he thinks that she doesn't really see him. Or at least, not as he is right in this moment.

"I wanted to call you, you know? During those years here… I wanted to hear your voice. When I was staring up at the skies in the planetarium… or when I would wander into Kinokuniya and catch sight of one of those light novels that you so enjoyed back during the Service Club… I wanted to reach out to you. Just to catch up… to say hello… and maybe it would also have been to say… in a way… don't forget me. But you know what ultimately occurred? I took the coward's way out. I convinced myself that you were busy, or perhaps that you had moved on. I told myself that if you really cherished our connection with each other, that you would have reached out to me."

She takes a deep breath.

"You probably had similar thoughts, correct Hikigaya-kun? You probably thought that I'd moved on since I'd moved abroad, and that I would have reached out if I still carried a torch for you?"

He remains silent, but she already knows the answer to her own question.

"Maybe.. maybe all of this could have been avoided. Maybe because we created these expectations of each other… we also created our own heartbreak."

"You could be right, Yukinoshita," he finally speaks up. His voice comes out resigned, drained. "Maybe… maybe we let the happily ever after slip away from between our fingertips."

"Then…-"

"I'm sorry, Yukinoshita. I…I hear your feelings. And I'm happy to have heard them. My heart skips a beat, even to this day, knowing that my feelings weren't unrequited. But… I can't. I just can't. Maybe all of this is just in my head. Maybe you're eight, and I'm just an insecure fuck that's making the biggest mistake of his life. But at the end of the day, at this very moment… I can't accept your feelings."

"Why? If you can admit that you're making the exact same mistake we made all those years ago, why? Why do you wish to deliberately sabotage yourself?"

"No. I'm not… I'm not sabotaging anything. It's just... Yukinoshita… the reason why I can't accept your feelings… well, I think that if I accepted them as you are right now, I wouldn't be the Hikigaya Hachiman that you'd fallen in love with."

Yukinoshita falls silent. He's not sure what to say, and so the silence reigns over the room. The only reminder; the only sign that time is even passing is the soft tick tock of the clock that hangs above the bed, the second hand moving inexorably forward.

Finally, she breaks the silence. It's a small voice, bereft of all emotion. Cold.

Like the girl that he'd found, all those years ago when Hiratsuka sensei first slid open those sliding doors to what would become the Service Club.

"Well then, Hikigaya-kun, I suppose you've made your decision."

"I have."

"This is goodbye then."

"...Yes. Sayonara."

oOo

Day 4- Afternoon

When he wakes up, there's a terrible, wrenching feeling in his gut. It feels eerily familiar, and it takes him some time to place the feeling.

The last time that he's felt this way; he'd just graduated high school. It was on the ride back home after sending Yukinoshita off, when she left to study abroad.

He hadn't said anything to her back then, when she had left. Just wished her well and said some other perfunctory platitudes that always came with parting. He hadn't managed to muster up the courage, back then. After all, what was the point? She was leaving him behind. She'd probably find someone better. It was better if they parted ways. Those thoughts swirled around his head.

There had been a brief moment, however, when Yui had gone to the restroom, when they had been alone and he was sure that she had been about to say something. He remembered the way Yukinoshita had looked at him with a strange expression on her face, but he had been too afraid to properly meet her eyes.

In the years since, he'd often wondered about that moment. If he'd said something… anything at all… would things have been different?

But then the moment passed, Yui rejoined them, and before long, he was left watching Yukinoshita's form disappear through the barrier to customs.

It's that same feeling now. That same phantom pain that spreads throughout his chest, that makes it difficult to breathe and difficult to think about anything other than the fact that maybe he should call her. Tell her that he was wrong.

But the words that he'd said the night before; the ones that pushed her away… they vanish into thin air as soon as they cross his lips. He's unable to take them back. He can't take them back.

Maybe he was always destined to be this way. To be miserable and pining after someone. To sabotage his own happiness.

Maybe… just maybe… his life was always meant to be a tragedy.

He calls Komachi. Even if it's in the middle of the night. Even if she's asleep.

He calls her because whenever his life is at a crossroads; whenever he thinks he's made a mistake; whenever he just needs someone to talk to, his sister is always available.

Small wonder that she really is the greatest little sister in the world.

"Onii-chan!" She greets him with her usual cheer, a breath of fresh air in the cloud of doom and gloom that has permeated his hotel room. "How'd it go?"

He tells her. He tells her everything. From start to finish; from the moment he saw her in the cafe until the moment she slipped away from him the previous night. The entire long and confusing story. It honestly felt no different from a surreal dream.

When he is finished there is a long period of silence. So long, in fact, that he wonders if perhaps he is out of international minutes for his phone plan.

But then Komachi speaks up.

"You know, Onii-chan, I can tolerate a lot of your stupidity."

He makes a noise of protest, but she cuts him off swiftly.

"No. Shut up. For once, just shut up and listen to me."

He has never heard her speak to him this way. This angry and frustrated.

"All those years ago, when I told you that you would regret it if you didn't chase after Yukino-san, I didn't expect you to listen. Because I know you, Onii-chan. I know your passivity, your desire to avoid troubling the ones you truly care for. So I knew that you would let her go, thinking that she would be better off without you. But now that we've come to this point, I expect you to stop moping around feeling sorry for yourself. You still have the better part of your whole life in front of you. And Komachi… Komachi hates the fact that you're spending it drinking yourself into an early grave. I know that you don't care about yourself. But I care, god damn it. So if you care about me at all; then I want you to give up."

"G-give up?"

"Give up."

"I don't think I can-"

"There is nobody in this world that can't be replaced, Hachiman!" She shouts, and he shuts up when he hears her use his name. Komachi never uses his name.

There are five thousand variants of Onii-chan; all the different teasing nicknames she's given him, but never once has she called him by his first name.

"I know that it hurts, Onii-chan. Giving someone up. It hurts so much that all you're gonna want to do is curl up into a ball on your bed and wait to die. It'll feel like that today. It'll feel like that tomorrow. It'll feel like that in a week. But the thing is, Onii-chan, eventually it'll start to feel better. Eventually you'll be able to think back on Yukino-san with a smile. Maybe someday, far into the future, when you're happily married to someone else, you'll meet her again and you'll realize that it doesn't hurt. That all of the pain that you're feeling right now has been replaced; that you can look back at all the times you spent together, smile, and say hey, those were some really fun times we spent together, right?"

"But how does that help me now? What am I supposed to do about this… this…"

He doesn't even realize it until his fingernails are digging into his chest, right above his heart, that's he has balled up his shirt in his fist, as if he wants to rip the offending organ out of his body to remove the pain.

"There are things to do and people to spend time with, Onii-chan. Isn't there anything or anyone else that gives you even the slightest bit of happiness? I'm not trying to compare to Yukino-san right now. I know that nobody, not even Komachi, can hold a candle to the radiance that she shines with in your eyes. But… but Onii-chan…"

Komachi falters and he hears her sniffle. And for the first time, he realizes that she is crying.

"Onii-chan… I just want you to be happy. I've watched you struggle and spiral these last couple of years and… and… do you know how much that hurts me? You were always my hero; the big brother I could always rely on whenever Mom and Dad were too busy for us. So I don't want you to suffer like this. So please…I'm begging you… come home. Please trust me. You can still be happy. You still have the capacity for happiness. And I'll be here for you, with you, every step of the way, just like you were there for me when we were younger. I promise you… someday you'll find somebody that will make you forget her. You'll find someone that will shine even brighter than Yukino-san."

oOo

Day 5- Morning

His return flight to Tokyo is meant to depart at exactly 2:00 PM. He has spent the morning packing what little belongings he has brought with him on this little trip. It is only seven in the morning, but he is already ready to head to the airport. Of course, given that he still has an extra few hours before he truly needs to leave, his mind wanders.

After he and Komachi had finally said their farewells the previous day, he's committed himself.

He will listen to her, he decided to himself with as much conviction as he could muster up. He's going to listen to his sister because she has been the one constant throughout everything. Because she's the one person who has always been in his life, in his thoughts, and on his side, even longer than Yukinoshita Yukino. Because she's his beloved little sister and hearing her cry was agonizing to say the least.

…

No.

Those are all just excuses.

He's going to listen to her because she is right. Because her words ring true, despite their jagged sharpness which cuts into his skin.

It's not easy.

He still hates himself.

He hates himself so, so much. Because even though he has already decided to move on from Yukinoshita Yukino, a part of him, the selfish part of him that never wants to let go; that part of him wants to stay. To keep clinging onto those feelings.

He wants to believe that somehow, they are special; that they are inseparable. Hikigaya Hachiman and Yukinoshita Yukino were made for each other. If their life was a love story, then they are the deuteragonists. Even if the realities of life may become obstacles between them; there will never be a someone else.

This, he wants to believe in.

He closes his eyes.

He feels the sensation of falling. Falling and falling and falling, as if he'd been launched out of an airplane over the city.

As he hurtles towards the city, he can see her in his mind's eye.

She's back at Gregory's.

She's sitting there in that coffee shop alone, instead of at home with her husband. Editing a book or reading something new. Every so often she stares out the window as if she's waiting for someone. As if she's waiting for him. Waiting for his silhouette to appear around the corner.

Or… maybe there is a place where she is also closing her eyes. Maybe somewhere out there, she's also having similar thoughts to him right at this very moment. That maybe they've both made mistakes, but that their feelings remain true. That maybe with a night of sleep and time to think… they can still find each other. It's never too late… right?

The longer he stands there, the louder these thoughts become.

Hope is a terrifying emotion, he thinks to himself. It can compel people to do irrational, illogical things. And it's undeniable; no amount of logical thinking can tamp down on the way his heart beats faster whenever he thinks of her.

Komachi was right. He really does just want to curl up into a ball and wait. Wait to die, to be freed from this longing, this pain of parting.

But he can't do that. He has a flight to catch later. And so he needs to stand up.

Take a walk.

Do something.

Anything.

He needs to head out into the city.

He tries really really hard. Komachi's voice is echoing through his head.

You still have the capacity for happiness.

But it's like his body won't listen to him. Or maybe it's true.

The heart always wins over the head.

He's got time, right? A few hours.

Plenty of time.

And so he's retracing his footsteps, walking through the city under the brightness of the sun, shining down between the tall buildings and bathing the landscape in a warm orange glow.

It's a beautiful morning. He hasn't seen a single morning this entire trip, but maybe this is what it looks like. It must feel refreshing to be walking the streets at this hour.

Hikigaya Hachiman smiles as the familiar stretch of shops appear. As the familiar sign for that coffee shop comes into view.

That's right, he thinks to himself.

You ruined me, Yukinoshita Yukino.

But I'll still write you love letters.

oOo

Author's Notes:

Well there you have it. I finally finished an Oregairu fic. I really struggled with this one, and it probably shows. But I really liked this work, and it's why I tried over and over again to write this. I hope you enjoyed it.

I'm sure there will be a lot of questions. Not least of which would be what happens next? And to that, I don't have an answer. Or rather, I do have an answer, but that answer doesn't come from the perspective of a writer. It comes from my own desires as a fan of the series in general.