What You Don't Know

"What are you thinking?" he asked softly. I raised my eyes from the floor to his face. Finding that his eyes were already resting upon me, instinctively I swiftly turned my eyes away. "What were you thinking?" he asked, changing his question since he knew my thoughts had already moved on.

"Why do you ask?" I asked, not wanting to answer, especially since I knew he already knew my answer.

"Because you had the same look in your eyes just now as you did that time,” he responded, being direct but not blunt.

“Why do you ask when you already know the answer?” I asked, still not wanting to admit aloud what we both already knew was my answer, “Rather, why don’t you ask what you really want to ask?”

He shrugged, leaning back in his seat now as the third part of our party returned from the kitchen with the drinks. “Alright, I figured I’d be more polite, but I guess there’s no point. So, I’ll ask you pointblank: why the Hell did you call me? I mean, I know I left you guys my number, but I did it more thinking it would somehow be reassuring to you guys than thinking you’d actually call me up,” he said, “Seriously, what with the way we met, that’s not exactly the kind of thing friendships form from, even if I did sort of save you, Aru.”

“You didn’t “sort of” save him. You did save him. You may not have necessarily saved his life, but you didn’t necessarily not save his life. After all, we have know way of knowing what that bastard Tsuaki would have done when he had finished having his way with Aru,” Yuki said, speaking calmly but coldly. This was the calmest that he had been when discussing…that. It was probably only because he had been preparing himself for this conversation since several days ago, though.

“You’re right. We have no way of knowing. So, for all you know, he would’ve just gotten up and gone, same as he did with me swooping in to save Aru, save for the couple bruises I gave him. I know that this isn’t the thing to say, but you should try to be more positive about this. See, you’re thinking of how it could have been even worse, not being thankful that it wasn’t even worse than it was. You’re looking at the right thing, but from the wrong perspective, with the wrong attitude. You’ve got to be positive, not negative. It’ll only make it worse, dwelling in how it could have been worse,” said our company.

“And that’s exactly why we called you up, Robert,” I stated softly. He looked at me, tilting his head just slightly with curiosity. While my eyes had been drawn back to him when he was speaking, I again found myself looking away almost right away when our eyes found each other‘s. “We have not told anyone—our families, our friends—about that incident,” I went on only after looking away, “I know you know we originally decided to keep it secret. After thinking about it during this past week, though, we realized that we can’t put it in our past, can’t get past it, if we don’t first let those close to us know about it.”

“Ah, I see. So you want me to help you see things from a different, more positive perspective before you dare try to tell the people you care about, about what happened,” he said.

“Actually, we would like you to be with us when we break the news to them,” Yuki stated. I looked back at Robert now, seeing shock on his face. “We know it is a lot to ask—more than we should ask, when you’ve already gone out of your way to help us. But we really think that it might help things go better and help our family members and friends to be willing to put this in the past, as we hope to do,” Yuki added now.

The shock had gone from Robert’s face, leaving only to make room for something of a grim grin. “Ah, now I really see,” he said, “You want them to forget about the villain, but having them focus on the victim wouldn’t be very effective, so you want to introduce them to the savior in the hopes that the hero is more interesting than the horrible.”

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to. We’ll understand if you won’t. After all, you hardly know us. And, as you said, this sort of event isn’t exactly what friendships form from,” I said now, “I’m not just saying that to guilt you or anything, either, just so you know.”

“Oh, I know,” he said, his grim grin turning into a small smile, “Tell you what, I will do it. If I didn’t want to get involved in a lot of drama, I would never have gotten involved in this. If I didn’t want to step into the spotlight, I would never have stepped in to save you. No hero goes unknown, you know. I don’t mind being the centerpiece to your masterpiece—or, rather, your disasterpiece.”

Yuki frowned for a moment before drawing his mouth into a tight line. “You really are undeniably upbeat,” he said, not quite complimenting the other man.

“I can’t help it. I’m cursed with incurable enthusiasm. Which, I guess, is a small something in this case, since upbeat is exactly what you want me to be,” the other returned, “Let’s just avoid more crying, though, okay? Even I have a hard time seeing the upside and being able to turn my frown upside-down when there’s tears pouring down like a waterfall.”

“Sorry,” I said quickly, pretty much blurting that out on an instant instinct.

“Don’t be,” he said simply, smiling a bit more now as he turned his eyes to me. As per my usual, I had to look away from him the moment he looked at me. He looked away again quickly, though I wasn’t sure if it was because he knew I couldn’t meet his gaze or not. “So, what’s the plan? Are we just going to gather all those that need to know and make a party out of it, or are we going to divide and conquer?” he asked now.

“Divide and conquer. We’re not sure how much we need to divide them up to conquer them, though. Our families obviously can’t both be told together, but even separate they’re both quite a lot to handle. Our friends are easier to deal with in way of numbers, being that there are only two that need to know and that we want to tell,” Yuki informed him.

“Okay, well, let’s start with your friends, then. Bringing them into the loop first will not only allow us to ease into this, but it will allow them to be there to be on our side when we bring in each of your families separately to tell them,” Robert said, making it sound all too simple and casual.

“It’s not going to be that easy,” I said softly. Yuki didn't acknowledge my words, as he already knew what I meant. Our new friend, however, turned his curious gaze my way again. “…The friends we want to tell are my childhood friends and two best friends. They’ve been fully in the loop about every last thing throughout my relationship with Yuki. This is the first time they have ever been in the dark about anything involving me, honestly,” I explained my words only partially.

“Well, that might make them meeting me a bit rocky, but I’m sure they’ll be understanding enough not to get mad over some stranger knowing what they didn’t, since that stranger is your savior,” he said lightly.

“One of them is the one who told Tsuaki our new address, on the very day of the attack. Mia telling him is actually the inciting incident. Or, at least, it allowed the inciting incident to actually lead to action. Either way, she’s going to take it very hard to know her budding friendship with that fiend caused such a thing to happen to her best friend,” Yuki informed him of what I hadn’t. I just couldn’t bring myself to say that Mia would blame herself—because I knew she would, even after she knew I didn’t.

Robert’s eyes went wide with surprise at this additional information. “Is that so? Then that’s all the more reason to tell them—to tell her first and as soon as possible! If everyone else who is going to learn about this knows about it before she does, she’ll only feel that much worse about not having known on her own, not having realized!” he exclaimed.

Well, that wasn’t exactly the kind of thing I wanted to hear. It made me feel even worse about not having let her in on this already, about having even briefly thought about keeping this from her. At least it showed that he was really being serious about all of this, though. Not that I doubted he was, but Yuki undoubtedly had had some doubts about him.

Speaking of which, Yuki was now reflecting Robert’s surprise, showing that he hadn’t expected him to seem so worried or worked up. “Do you mean as soon as possible from this second, or as soon as possible as soon as we’re psyched up enough to do this?” he asked, staying on the ball even when he was caught off-guard.

“As soon as possible as in as soon as possible!” the other declared.

“I can call Mia up right now, if you want,” I said worriedly and uncertainly.

“No! Something like this can’t be over the phone! You may be able to tell someone good news without being there in person, but you don’t break bad news to someone via a phone call or an email or a letter! That only makes it even worse! That’s what we’re trying to avoid!” he exclaimed, looking absolutely aghast at the idea.

“Okay. Sorry. In that case, I’ll just call Elliot and tell him to nab her and hop the next train here,” I said.

“Make sure to let him know it’s urgent, but don’t say anything that will worry them. If they’re anticipating bad news and imagining what it could be the entire train ride, that also might make it worse,” he said.

“Is there any way to not make it worse? Or, rather, is there any way to make it better?” Yuki asked, almost sounding annoyed.

Robert seemed to immediately regain his cool at Yuki’s rather cool tone of voice. He slid a flat gaze in the other’s direction. His mouth was drawn into a line now, but not quite the kind of tight line that showed disapproval. “….By working to keep the situation from becoming worse, we are, in effect, making it better,” he stated, his tone mostly matching his stare in its flatness, “In an answer to what you actually meant to ask: no. There is no way to make it good. Bad situations do not become good situations. They just become better situations.”

Yuki said nothing in reply, and did nothing to acknowledge the other’s words. Unless, of course, continuing to seem somewhat and somehow annoyed was an acknowledgement. “…I’ll call Elliot now, then,” I said only after several minutes of silence, pulling out my cell phone. They both gave a nod in my direction, but neither of them said anything or even looked at me. Perhaps preparing first would have been the wiser thing to do in this situation and in regard to how to handle this situation.



“So…Robert, was it?” Elliot asked, giving the newly introduced man a quick once-over. For about the fiftieth time.

“It was,” Robert returned shortly, looking Mia over, rather than Elliot.

“How did you meet Aru and Yuki, exactly?” Elliot asked, almost sounding suspicious.

All at once, Mia exploded. “I can‘t take it anymore! That’s not important right now! Elliot, you said Aru said it was an emergency!” she exclaimed.

“I didn’t tell you it was an emergency. I told you it was urgent,” I said quickly.

“Urgency, emergency, same difference!” Elliot said to me, then turning to Mia, “And that’s exactly why it’s important how this guy knows Aru! We’ve never seen him before or heard Aru mention him, so it’s kind of suspicious and strange that he’s here when Aru called us here for an urgent emergency! You don’t exactly invite your neighbors over for supper when you’ve already phoned your best friends with something urgent!”

“Well, maybe they didn’t invite him. Maybe he came over to borrow a cup of sugar or something. You don’t know. Don’t automatically go treating everyone you don’t know with suspicion. It’ll leave a bad first impression. And it’s your bad first impressions on people that make you incapable of having a steady girlfriend,” Mia snapped.

“Why does every argument we have end with you pointing out another reason I don’t have a girlfriend?!” Elliot demanded.

“Alright, that’s enough!” I declared, stepping between the two of them and holding up my hands to hush them and hold them back, “While I agree that Elliot’s incapability of keeping a steady is alarming, it’s not an emergency. There are more urgent things to argue about—er, I mean, more pressing things to discuss right now.”

Elliot simply looked away as he stepped back, glaring at the wall as though it had also said something about his lack of a girlfriend. Mia, on the other hand, swiftly dropped her snappish attitude. “We’re sorry, Aru. It was just a really tense train ride,” she said, “Which is, of course, the fault of the stupid, single person scowling at the wall, since he was the one who said you had an emergency happening, not an important matter to discuss.”

“So much for not making it worse,” Yuki muttered, speaking under his breath and mostly to himself.

“Well, since we’re all as calm as we’re going to get now, I guess I should mention that it is worth mentioning and is important how I made Aru’s acquaintance,” Robert said.

“Ha! See! Told you!” Elliot blurted out, giving Mia a haughtily triumphant look.

“This is not going to go well,” Yuki muttered under his breath, this time speaking to me.

Ignoring him for the most part, I now cleared my throat to gain my friends’ attention. Robert, Yuki, and I had talked tactics while waiting for Mia and Elliot to arrive. It had been decided that it would be best if I were the one to break the news to them. “Now…. Before anyone else asks anymore questions, I need to ask… Mia, have you….heard from M-Merit…since the third…?” I asked, working very hard to keep my voice from wavering.

“Merit? No. I did call him to tell him about you inviting your families over for a pre-birthday party for Yuki, but he didn’t answer,” she answered, “Why do you ask? Does he need to be here for this urgent discussion, too?” Yuki gave off a soft sound sort of like choking, and I had to quickly clear my throat again both to keep my friends from paying him any attention and to keep him from exploding in a rage.

“Can we focus less on that dumb dickhead and more on this dude?” Elliot grunted, gesturing to Robert.

“Would you stop calling Merit nasty names? It’s mean!” Mia snapped, narrowing her eyes at him just slightly.

Again I cleared my throat as I now slid a nervous look Yuki’s way. He looked like it was taking all of his self-restraint to keep from flying into a rage and calling Merit things a lot nastier than Elliot just had. “Ahem. Eli, Mia, I…the…the reason…there is a reason…a very good reason…only it’s not really a good…there’s a very bad reason…why Robert met Yuki and I…except, I mean, our meeting was kind of a bad thing…but it happened for a good reason…or, no, our meeting was a good thing, but it happened for a bad reason…” I said, obviously struggling with finding the right way to put it.

“The situation in which we met was a bad one, but it is a very good thing that we did meet,” Robert offered helpfully.

“Y-Yes. That’s it. It was nice to meet him, but it was under terrible circumstances which we did meet,” I agreed quickly.

“…Aru, why don’t you just say how you guys met?” Mia asked softly, watching me with worried eyes. She wasn’t stupid. She could tell that such hesitation and awkwardness on my part meant that the as of yet untold story was not as casual as I was attempting to make it seem.

I swallowed hard, nodding my head weakly as I ignored the instinct to look away. I had to look her in the face, look her in the eyes when I told her. I had to make it clear that I truly didn’t feel she was responsible, even before she knew what it was that I didn’t want her blaming herself for. “…I just want you to know now that I blame him,” I said.

“Him? Him, who? Him?” Elliot asked, sliding his gaze to Robert.

“No. Not him,” I said, shaking my head, “…There’s something you don’t know. Something both of you aren’t aware of. Something I would never have you know, if you didn’t absolutely need to. It’s necessary for you to know, though, so….” I trailed off as my eyes strayed from my friends just a bit. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I couldn’t bring myself to say it. I had confided in both of them about everything in my life before now, but I couldn’t manage to confess this one terrible thing.

“What you don’t know is that it wasn’t me at the door when Aru hung up the phone to run and answer the door on the third,” Yuki said all of the sudden, either unable to stand the suspense or incapable of standing by while I struggled to tell my closest friends of something I really just wanted to forget.

Mia and Elliot both looked quite startled and confused at that statement. “What? It wasn’t? So, who was it, then? Robert here? How‘s that a bad thing?” the latter of the two asked.

“I did meet them on the third, but the door was wide open when I came into the picture and into the house,” the person in question said lightly.

“Wide open…? Aru, what’s going on? What are you trying to tell us?” Mia asked.

“M…M-Merit paid me a visit that day,” I said, now blinking rapidly as I felt the tingle of tears beginning to well up. Crap. I couldn’t cry. Not now. Crying wasn’t exactly the way to appear calm and keep everyone else calm.

Before the tears that were threatening to fall could even fully form, Yuki had hooked his hand around my neck, dragged me around and dragged me against him. “Robert arrived a bit after. I didn’t return until awhile later. He stayed with Aru, though, thankfully. You two are the first ones we have told,” he stated flatly.

There was a silence now, save for the sound of me struggling to keep from crying and Mia struggling to keep breathing. “…You…You can’t mean…. You’re not saying…. Are you…? Aru?” she asked after several minutes, unable to complete the sentences that she could barely breathe out.

“…We weren’t going to tell anyone at all, at first… Yuki has had trouble handling it, though… I just want to forget it ever happened, but he needs to be able to talk about it. We figured, if we were going to tell anyone, it would only be fair that we tell everyone who needs to know, everyone that deserves to know. ….And the both of you obviously both needed and deserved to know first,” I said softly, unable to bring myself to look at my friends even as I spoke to them.

“Oh, Aru—” Mia began to exclaim, but Elliot cut her off.

“That means you haven’t told either of your families or any family members yet, correct?” he interjected.

“Correctamundo!” Robert declared, his regular enthusiasm having returned.

“Alright. We’ll hang around until they come around, and help you tell them of this unfortunate friendship you‘ve formed with this guy,” Elliot said, jerking his thumb in Robert’s direction.

“Why do you have to make it sound like I’m the bad guy here, exactly?” he asked, arching an eyebrow at Elliot.

“Because you’re still suspicious, if you ask me,” Elliot responded flatly.

“Well, Elliot, that’s exactly why nobody asked you,” Mia snapped.

“Well, it’s not like anybody asked you, either!” he exclaimed, shooting her a glare. I couldn’t help but let out a soft sigh of relief and smile weakly to myself. Undoubtedly, my friends wanted to talk about this just as badly as my fiancé did. Just like Yuki, though, they were willing to at least try to shrug it off in my presence. I felt a bit bad, forcing them to treat it like it meant nothing when it definitely deeply affected us all. The only way I could cope with this, though, was by not coping with it.



“Stop touching me!” Yusa snapped.

“I’m not touching you,” Yutan stated.

“You are so!” Yusa exclaimed.

“I’m not,” Yutan repeated.

“Yue, is he or isn’t he touching me?!” Yusa demanded of their other brother.

“He’s totally touching you,” Yue said.

“I’m hardly touching him!” Yutan exclaimed.

“But you are touching him, when you said you weren‘t,” Yue pointed out.

“So stop touching me!” Yusa ordered.

“Brothers can touch each other,” Yutan said matter-of-factly.

“Mom, Yutan’s being incestuous!” Yusa screamed.

“You know, I think Yutan’s been hanging around Noi too much,” Yue said thoughtfully, “Either that, or this is the result of him being forbidden from feeling up other people‘s fiancées. Either way, it’s somehow linked to Aru.”

“Robert, Mia, Elliot, dears, what with this being your first official time meeting Yuki’s family and our first actual time meeting Aru‘s friends, I would just like you to know that they normally don’t act this way,” Tia said, this being the only sign of acknowledgement she gave to her sons’ antics.

“It’s alright, Mrs. Hiyo. We’ve been around Aru’s family a lot, so we’re used to this sort of behavior,” Mia said lightly.

“Well, some of us may be, but others of us aren‘t,” Elliot said, sliding Robert a not-so-subtle look.

“Just be glad they’re not feeling you up, Eli,” Robert said, smirking softly as he slid Elliot a look in return.

“I wasn’t talking about me! I’m used to watching guys feeling other guys up!” Elliot blurted out. All conversations currently being held halted immediately as everyone turned to stare at him. After running what he had just shouted out back through his head, he realized what exactly he had just said. Naturally, a burning blush came storming across his face. “I meant I’m used to incest!” he blurted out in an attempt to correct himself. We all just continued to stare at him, rather startled by what he was saying even though we knew it wasn’t what he meant.

“Want to try again, or are we going to leave it at that?” Robert asked, his smirk by no means small or soft now.

“I don’t like you,” Elliot hissed at him, absolutely seething with fury and furious embarrassment.

“Am I not your type? What kind of guy do you go for, then?” he asked, looking endlessly pleased with himself.

“I go for the type that are girls, thank you very much! Now shut up! I wasn’t talking to you in the first place!” my second best friend snapped.

“So now you go for girly men, Elliot?” my first best friend asked. It was actually an innocent question. Or, rather, she wasn’t making fun of him or being sarcastic. She was serious. In her mind, it was perfectly plausible and logically likely that he would suddenly and without warning switch his sexuality from hetero to homo. Then again, considering he was so comfortable around groups of gay guys, maybe Mia was on to something…

“Damnit, Mia!” Elliot blurted out, for lack of a better response.

“That’s no way to talk around women,” Yusan stated.

“That’s no way to talk around a mother!” Tia snapped.

“Watch out, she smacks when she snaps,” Yusa said.

“Can we all please focus on the conversation we called you here to have!?” Yuki snapped all of the sudden. All conversations currently being held halted immediately as everyone turned to stare at him. Seeing that he had all of their attention, he took a deep breath to calm himself and cleared his throat to collect himself before proceeding. “…Okay, mother, father, brothers, you all recall the acquaintance of Aru’s that I spoke to you of when I dropped by home on the third…” he started, trailing off as he waited for confirmation of this statement.

“Yeah! That motherfucking Merit!” Yusa blurted out. Yue immediately slapped his hand over his younger brother’s mouth, but it was too late. An instant later, Tia had slapped all four of her sons upside the head.

“Ow! Why’d you hit me?! He said it!” Yue exclaimed, removing his hand from his brother’s mouth to rub his own sore head.

“You were trying to cover for him,” she stated, staring at him flatly.

“Why’d I get hit?” Yuki asked.

“You’re the one who inspired him to refer to that Merit person in such a way,” she stated, sliding him a look much like the one she had given Yue.

“What did I do to deserve being hit?” Yutan inquired.

“I just didn’t want you to feel left out,” she replied lightly. Yutan now wore a flat look much like his mother had had moments ago as Yue and Yusa both failed to stop themselves from snorting and snickering at him.

“Ahem. Anyway, as I was saying…” Yuki said, drawing all eyes and attention back to himself, “What you don’t know is that, at that time, as we were standing around discussing that despicable, deplorable, disgusting, disgraceful, damnable—”

“Yuki!” I hissed, giving him a weak glare.

“…Right. Sorry. At any rate, at that same time, the same exact person—if you can even call him a person—that we were discussing was…paying Aru a rather unexpected and unpleasant visit,” he continued, the strain of restraining himself evident in his expression and voice, “Before I go any further or into any form of detail, I will tell you now that we are telling you only now because we originally intended not to tell you at all. However, in light of recent reactions I have had to other persons due to this event, we have decided to disclose information about it to our closest friends and our families.”

“….Yuki, what the Hell are you talking about? You sound like a  lawyer, what with how you’re diligently dodging around actually saying what the subject of this conversation is to leave us all dumbfounded and confounded. Can’t you just tell us directly what you’re trying to say to us?” Yutan asked after a short silence.

Yuki didn’t immediately answer or even acknowledge the question. He just silently stared at his family for a moment, and then slid his eyes over to me in an unspoken question of his own. I caught and held his gaze briefly, looking away only as I nodded my head softly. Summoning up the courage to state outright what had happened, he turned his eyes back to his family.

“Tsuaki successfully sexually assaulted Aru. I say he was successful because he not only managed to get through it, but because he also managed to get away with it. While we were lucky enough that Robert happened along and helped Aru, Aru asked that he let Tsuaki go. And he did. Then, when I came home and discovered all of this, Aru asked me to let it go. And I did. Or, at least, I attempted to. I, however, have not been half so successful as that scum,” he stated as calmly as he could.

There was now a dead silence as Yuki’s family stared at him, seeming very much incapable of processing what he had just said. It was only after almost ten minutes of silent staring that someone spoke, that someone being Yuki‘s father. “…Define “sexually assaulted”, if you would, please. Do you mean something along the lines of what your brothers and brother-in-law do to Aru, or…?” Yusan asked, trailing off before he speculated on things he’d rather not think of.

“I mean, were it not for Aru’s specific request that I not commit a felony, this conversation right now would likely be taking place in a police station or court room,” Yuki informed his family quite coolly.

“Which would probably be why he’s talking in such a lawyer-like manner. I imagine he would be representing himself, were he not restraining himself,” Robert added lightly.

“You can’t be saying…” Yusan said slowly, again unable to say what he was thinking aloud.

“You can’t be serious…” Yutan said, unable to even think what his father was thinking.

“Do you honestly think they would joke about such a thing?” Robert asked, arching an eyebrow questioningly even though he already knew the answer was no.

There now another dead silence, but this one lasted only long enough for all of Yuki’s family to slide their gazes to me. Apparently, just a single second of looking at my expression confirmed beyond a doubt that this was the truth. Practically all of them began talking at once, some of them literally jumping to get the first word in. “Yuki, why didn’t you say anything?!?” Tia demanded, being one of the ones to jump to her feet as she spoke.

“I can’t believe you didn’t say something!” Yutan shouted at the same time as their mother spoke.

“Why would you wait until now?!” Yusan exclaimed.

“What the fuck exactly did that fucker do!?” Yue shouted almost at the top of his lungs.

“I knew I was right when I said he was a motherfucker!” Yusa declared furiously.

“Everybody calm the Hell down!” Yuki shouted, not exactly sounding all that calm himself. I couldn’t really blame him, though. Of course he would end up exploding when his family were all exploding as well. Neither Yuki nor any of his family calmed down, all of them continuing to try out-talk each other so that they could say their piece as Yuki tried to keep the peace—or, rather, reestablish the peace.

The closer everyone got to outright fighting, the closer I felt to outright fainting. Finally, when Yuki wasn‘t able to get everyone to shut up after thirteen minutes, I decided to give him a hand. I grabbed the nearest person to me—Elliot, as it were—and mashed my lips to his in a kiss. Being that I was something of the subject of the conversation at hand, it was natural that everyone noticed quite quickly what I had done. And, as I had hoped, it shut them all up real good.

Having regained their attention and restored the peace, I ended the abrupt kiss. “Sorry, Elliot. Everyone, now that we’ve completed this conversation, it’s time for you to be on your way,” I said in as casual a manner as I could manage.

“What do you completed this conversation?! It’s barely even begun! There‘s—” Yutan started to shout, but Yuki swiftly and smoothly cut him short.

“There’s nothing to discuss. Because this is not a discussion. This is a conversation. And now that we have given you the information which we intended to, this conversation is closed. You must take your leave, as there is another half of this family that we have yet to inform of this unfortunate situation,” Yuki stated flatly, having become calm again. His family looked surprised at this, quite naturally. They probably hadn’t even thought about whether or not my own family knew of this information.

“I will see you all to the door,” Mia said, stepping forward now. This was, of course, part of the plan we had worked out. We had decided that after informing our respective families, if they didn’t desire to say anything to Robert, Yuki and I would give them a reason they needed to go, then Mia and Elliot would see them to the door, taking the opportunity to fill in a couple of the details, such as the fact that they shouldn’t ever try to bring this up with me again, but that they could feel free to discuss it at a later date with Yuki.

While Mia had stepped up to the plate as planned, Elliot rather…didn’t. He just sort of stood there, still completely overcome with shock at the sudden kiss from before, his hands switching between clasped to and running over his mouth as though trying to feel whether or not another guy—his best friend, no less—had actually just kissed him. “…Ah, I’ll help you see them out!” Robert exclaimed only after taking a moment to take in the devastated Elliot.

Yuki’s family now silently and uncertainly allowed the pair to lead them away, each and every one of them throwing a questioning look back at us at one point as they departed. It was only after they were gone that Yuki and I turned our own gazes to each other, both of us now wearing the same questioning expression his family had been. “…You know, I’m not sure if I’m going to be able to keep my cool when my family comes and it comes time to tell them, so I do hope that you keep your cool better then than you did this time,” I said.

“…You know, I’m not sure if I’m going to be able to keep my cool when your family comes, either, but I do hope I do, because I don’t think Elliot will have regained his cool enough that you can kiss him again to regain control of the situation,” he replied, unable to keep the smallest of smirks from creeping onto his face by the second half of that sentence.

I glanced over at my friend, a bit of a smirk creeping onto my face as well. “Hey, Eli, you going to survive?” I asked.

“No, he won’t. Some people have the kiss of life, but you, Aru, have the kiss of death,” Yuki joked.

“Hey! See if I ever kiss you again!” I exclaimed, working hard to hide my smirk and look offended.

His smirk grew as he grabbed me by the hand, dragging me to and against him. “Aw, come on, Aru. I’m just joking. You know your kisses give me a reason to live, so that means you have the kiss of life,” he murmured against my lips. I was unable to keep from smiling through the kiss. Actually, in all honesty, I didn‘t even try to not smile. After all, I never had been one to hide my happiness.

“Goddamnit!” Elliot blurted out, out of the blue, “That prat had better not insinuate that being kissed by a guy makes me gay!”