I jolt awake, my eyes opening to vacant honey-brown ones. Violently slapping the hand on my shoulder away, I back up in my seat and press myself against the wall. I look around in a frenzy, taking in the brightly lit classroom and the hunched backs of the students in front of me, breathing hard as I try to escape my daze. A second passes, and my math teacher's monotone voice floats into my ear, calming my nerves. Dream. Fuck.

I veer sharply to my right and fix my half-dead bastard of a benchmate with a glare. He doesn't react, keeps his impassive eyes trained on the teacher. Another second passes. "I didn't fucking ask you to wake me up, so don't expect any gratitude, got that?" I couldn't catch much sleep last night because of the shouting, but I hate owing anything to people like him.

His gaze briefly lands on me before flicking back to the front, and the sight of that blankness in Kurumi-senpai's eyes pisses me off. It's impossible that they're so closely related. Her kindness, her vitality-he doesn't have even a fourth of it. Cocky fucker thinks he's too good to grace me with a response.

"Tch." I cross my arms and fix my eyes on the window, the very sight of that loser sending a pang of annoyance down my spine. The near-choking tie, the coarse, chunky, and incredibly itchy-looking ugly light blue sweater, and most of all, the wrongness of Kurumi-senpai's features on his face, all make me feel extremely unsettled. I'm very familiar with his particular breed of assholes. Unfeeling, self-centred, adamant, and cold. Puppets to ambition. Fucking robot.

The teacher drones on, and I don't feel like listening, so I lean forward and distractedly drum my knuckles against the desk before me, ignoring the sting that travels up my fingers, only to catch a slight movement from my right. He's looking straight at my scraped and bruised knuckles, a small crease forming between his eyebrows. I knew it. Weak.

I peel at the raw skin on the back of my hand, satisfaction climbing within me as I watch the crease on his face deepen. A memory flares up in my mind-of my mother pushing my younger body into foreign hands, diverting her eyes from my bloodied knee. I can't look. I can't look. Beads of blood form on my joints as I pluck harder at the wound, a different but more familiar sort of irritation creeping in. Weak.

"Stop."

Shaking fingers suddenly close around my wrist, halting my movements, and I finally raise my head to stare him down. "What are you doing?" he asks impatiently. I twist my hand out of his grip. "Don't touch me," I spit. "Bastard."

He turns his face away, breathing raggedly into his lap. Can't even stomach the sight of a little blood. Fucking loser. A moment later, he lifts his head without looking at me, and I scowl, confused, as I watch his hand shoot up into the air. The teacher adjusts his glasses before giving him the go-ahead. "What the fuck are you-" I hiss, panic seizing my breathing, but he stands up like he doesn't hear my protests at all.

"Sensei, Ren is bleeding," he says, eyes hollow and voice clear. "Please allow him to go to the infirmary."

I almost laugh. This punk never fails to disappoint any of my expectations. He's doing everything she would do. If there's something you can't deal with, send it away. It's as easy as that, right? The teacher's gaze shifts to me. "Ichijo, come here." I do as he says without sparing another glance for the loser. Seriously, just fuck him. Fuck him.

A concerned grimace shows on my teacher's face as he takes in my injured hands. "Oh my, how did-"

"I fell," I lie. I punched a wall bare-fisted on my way home yesterday because I couldn't think of a better way to pour my frustration out and punish myself at the same time.

He nods. "You can't take care of this yourself; take someone with you." Dread stirs dangerously in my stomach as his eyes travel back towards my seat. Shit. "Aki-" he starts, but doesn't get to finish.

"Sensei, I'll go!"

We turn in sync to look at a girl standing up in the sea of heads, her hands eagerly splayed on her desk. My brows knit together as her shoulder-length black hair and almost-grey eyes click in my mind. She's the so-called best friend that Kurumi-senpai introduced to me. Rubi Amari. The girl who's been there to witness all of my fuckups and how they've irrevocably hurt Senpai. My stomach churns.

She doesn't like me.

I look back at my teacher, frantic. "It's fine-"

"I'm experienced with first aid!" she offers, her smile growing. I glare at her in disbelief. What the fuck?

Sensei considers this. "Alright, alright. Don't be long."

"We won't," she reassures, before grabbing my sleeve and tugging me out of the classroom.

*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:

The infirmary is two rooms down the hall. Amari tightly grasps my sleeve all the way there, as if I might shake her off and bolt the first chance I get. She drags me into the room and pushes me into a sitting position on one of the stainless white beds. I'm too confused to react appropriately, so I settle for a slow and wide glare. It's usually sufficient to get the message across: Back the fuck off.

Not this time, though.

I keep a watchful eye on her as she grabs a first aid kit from the bedside table and sets it on her lap, the mattress beside me dipping from her weight. I cautiously shift away. "You should wash the wound with antiseptic first, right?" she asks, examining a bottle from the box.

I frown at the question. "How should I know? You said you knew what you were doing." She looks up at me sheepishly. "I might have stretched the truth a little bit," she admits with a shrug. I stare at her with a mixture of disbelief and uncertainty. This girl resents me. She has for as long as she's known me, and I've never had a reason to believe otherwise. I've seen the way she looks at me, like I'm a piece of dog crap on the sidewalk. Something isn't right.

She unfurls a swath of cotton and dabs some antiseptic onto it. "Give me your hand."

"I don't need your help," I growl, and snatch the wad of cotton from her, tightly pressing it down on my hand to elicit a sharp pain that doesn't quite register. Next to me, Amari unwraps a bandage roll, stretching it out without a hint of the usual tension in her posture. She's just sitting here, stripped of all her hostility, and it doesn't make any fucking sense. I know that I'm a bigger piece of shit than she gives me credit for.

Time to cut the crap. "What the fuck do you want from me?"

She drops the roll, startled, then huffs out a small sigh. "I just wanted to chat a bit."

"Like hell you did." I'm not an idiot. I know how much she hates me. There's more to this.

She holds up a strip of the bandage and fixes me with a stern look. "First things first." I don't move. "Come on," she urges. Fucking hell. I cross my arms and defiantly turn my face away. I don't need that shit; I need answers. "Fine!" she announces, throwing her arms up in the air. "We can just wait here all day if that's what you want. Neither of us care much for class, do we?" I ignore her. She sighs, rubbing the bridge of her nose. "Gosh, you're such a piece of work."

My fingers clench tightly around the bedsheet. I know that. I fucking know that I'm hard to be around and that I'm a real piece of work. The house I return to every day is reminder enough. The fact that Kurumi-senpai isn't here with me instead is reminder enough.

"Hey," Amari says gently, placing a tentative hand on my arm. "Ren, Sensei will notice if we go back without covering it."

I shrug her off and grudgingly shove my hand into her face. "Fine, shut up and get it over with." She starts to wrap the bandage around my hand with an exaggerated eye roll, her lips spreading in an uneven smile. Again, I'm swathed in discomfort and a sense of wrongness.

"How did you fall?" she asks after a short while, her hands working on my wound.

"None of your business," I mutter, averting my gaze.

She looks at me for a moment. "Why did you run away the other day?"

"What?"

"When Kurumi-senpai called you out," she elaborates. "You said you loved her, and then you just..." I feel every muscle in my body harden. I don't look at her as she shifts in the bed to face me further. "Is that what you did back then too? When you first stopped speaking to each other?"

"None of your business," I repeat tersely, my heartbeat quickening.

I expect her to keep going, but her face steadily starts to droop. "I guess not," she murmurs, dejected. Huh?

Her eyes flick upwards and catch me watching her, my brow furrowed. Fuck. "You're really important to her, you know that?" She starts, the edges of her voice quivering. "If you just stayed, you could have easily persuaded her. All this time, she's just been waiting for you to come to her, and the last thing you should have done was leave again. Ren, there's no way she would have turned you away. She doesn't turn anyone away." The words tumble out of her, messy and slippery with pent-up emotion.

I feel numb. "She was crying."

"It was just a lot for her to take in, okay? You should have helped her through it."

"What if I made things worse?" I ask hoarsely. I don't trust myself enough to go speak with her anymore. I messed up by telling her what I should have told her a year ago when she didn't want to hear it anymore. I don't know what I'm supposed to say now, if there is anything I could even say to bring her back to me after everything I did. I don't want to go near her and say the wrong thing again. I don't want to see her cry.

"Ren," she says, firmly hooking my gaze. "You don't leave the one you love."

I feel pressure building in my chest, and I curse loudly. I do love her. She's kind, even to me. I've never really seen her grow impatient or angry, so I thought, if it was her, she could...fuck, she could care about someone like me too. It always seemed like she truly enjoyed being with me. When we were together, she wasn't putting up with me; she liked it too. That's why she was special. With her, I could always just be myself without constantly staying on the lookout for irritated eyes and ticking mouths. She never let my heart catch fire.

And I let her go. Idiot.

Amari finishes bandaging my fingers with one final tug, the fresh jolt of pain that travels up my arm rooting me back down to the infirmary. "Too tight?" she inquires. I shake my head. She nods.

"I just want you to know that it's not too late, even now," she mumbles, her eyes downcast. "So...don't give up, Ren. Give it your best shot. But don't you dare hurt her again. She might forgive you someday if that happens, but I won't," she adds, a warning in her eyes-the malice that I'm used to receiving from her finally resurfacing.

She's wrong. It's been too late for a while now. Things can only get worse from here.

I'm scared.

*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:

Darkness has taken over the sky. I stare at the two silvery cars parked on both sides of my gate as I approach my house, the sight bringing a bitter taste to my tongue. My parents are home. There's not one fucking scratch on those machines-all wiped down, fueled up, and fixed without delay every time there's a malfunction.

They're not responsible for the good condition that the cars are in, because there's no way in hell that those two incapable, reliant fucking individuals can take care of anything on their own. They appointed people to maintain the cars for them, just like they do for everything from housekeeping to cooking my meals, because, heck, there's not much difference between a car and a son, is there?

I pause outside the door and peel my bandages off, stuffing the cloth into my pockets. My father doesn't like it when I get hurt, and I'm already cutting it close with him by coming home this late. Oh, it's not because he's worried about me, God forbid. It's just that if my wound were to get infected, he'd have no choice but to take me to a hospital, and on the days that I don't come home on time, he has an obligation to look for me, both of which are exceptional wastes of his time.

I brace myself, then silently step into my house, ensuring the door clicks shut behind me softly, before walking in on the daily scene of my parents bent over the table, discussing work stuff. My father keeps his eyes glued to the papers, but my mother lifts her head, regarding me, her utter disappointment of a son, with cool and indifferent eyes.

A different pair of eyes, like frosted glass, flash in my mind-honey gold instead of midnight black-younger. He's just like them. I soundlessly cross the foyer and go into my room upstairs, my fingers crushing the bandages in my pocket. They're living together now, aren't they? What if this is what Kurumi-senpai returns home to? A cold house and a dangerous silence

The thought makes me sick.

END OF CHAPTER