Suguru was rudely awakened the next morning by his cousin’s loud yelling in the living room. Taking a peek at the clock, it was not even eight yet. With a slight groan, he lifted himself out of bed, wondering what Tohma could be yelling at. He would have guessed Mika, but didn’t for two reasons, one, they never fight, and two, he could only hear Tohma’s voice, so it just narrowed down to a phone call fight. Suguru slipped some pants on and opened the door to the room, peeking his head out. He was right, Tohma was fiercely yelling into the phone, pacing back and forth quickly. He didn’t get much in, for Tohma clicked the power button on the cordless and threw the phone to the couch, luckily hitting something soft.

Suguru flinched. He had never seen Tohma this worked up before.

Mika had come from the direction of the kitchen, delivering Tohma his stress reliever: coffee. He thanked her with a bit of a growl and walked off into the kitchen. Curious to know who was on the phone, Suguru went the opposite way down the hall to their room to check on the caller ID, hoping that the person had called him and he hadn’t called them. Oddly enough, there was a number there, and it looked familiar. Relieved it wasn’t Hiro’s number, Suguru picked up the phone and hit redial.

---

“I have to tell Suguru,” Tohma said, sipping at his coffee. “He has to know.”

“Do you really think that’s a good idea?” Mika inquired softly.

“He’s going to find out eventually. They want him back. They want him back and I have no control over it! He’ll never be happy with them! He never was!”

Mika embraced her husband. After all this time, Suguru was leaving them.

---

Feeling queasy, Suguru slammed the phone back down on the cradle before it even had a chance to ring. Something else was eating at him and it upset his stomach a great deal.

Thinking that a cold drink would cure it, he walked out of their room and back down the hall to the kitchen where he witnessed Mika comforting Tohma.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, scaring the life out of the two. Tohma spun around to face his cousin with a loud gasp, nearly choking, while Mika just produced a tiny cry.

After Tohma could calm down, he shook his head. “Nothing’s wrong. Everything’s fine. Everything...fine.”

Mika placed her hand on his shoulder and softly talked him into suggesting he’d tell him.

“I heard you yelling on the phone Tohma. Are you in trouble?”

Suguru was only trying to protect his cousin, and was scared for him. Tohma gave a short nod and stepped forth. Suguru was attentive.

“That person on the phone...was your father, Suguru. He wants to take you back and there’s nothing I can do about it.”

“Do you remember him, Suguru?” Mika asked quietly, folding her arms. “You were very young at the time.”

Suguru nodded slightly.

“Well I remember perfectly and there’s no way I’m going to have you under his roof. Sober or not.”

Suguru had remembered when his father used to come home every night drunk and beat on him when he was no more than four. Finally, they granted custody to Tohma, but if it were ever proven Suguru’s father had gotten sober, he would have the ability to terminate the guardianship.

“As if things aren’t already going terrible for me! I’ve been a better father to Suguru than that asshole uncle of mine!”

Suguru had remembered how his father used to beat him when he came home drunk, but very vaguely. But when Suguru came to live with Tohma, he had his home here and didn’t want to leave. He then made up his mind in the next fraction of a second.

“I don’t have to go anywhere,” Suguru said, meeting eyes with Tohma. “I’m old enough to make my own decisions.”

Tohma looked away while Mika shook her head. “No Suguru. You’re still a minor. They’ll never allow it.”

“What would you want to do?” Tohma asked, immediately following Mika’s ending sentence.

“Tohma...” Mika said in her warning voice. Tohma held up a hand to silence her and looked to Suguru for the answer.

Suguru looked at the two individually, recalling his life growing up there. Tohma was always there for him, seeing him through the first day of kindergarten and even preschool for that matter. He got home every afternoon quickly, just to play the keyboards with Tohma before dinner, and after dinner, Tohma would help him with his homework, then end the evening with a bath and a bedtime story up until the age of seven. After that, Suguru started telling Tohma bedtime stories, because Suguru wanted to flaunt his reading skills. Then it just stopped all together. Tohma became too busy at NG and sometimes never even came home, and then Suguru joined the NG team, so the two were barely ever home, and Mika was gone most of the day, entertaining herself and whatnot. Regardless, Tohma gave Suguru a home and if he were still with his father, he’d probably be dead.

“I want to stay here,” Suguru said truthfully, unable to see his life anywhere else. If he were to live with his father, he’d have to move to his father’s current residence, which was Kyoto, two and a half hours away. There was no way he’d be able to go there and come back every single day to be with Bad Luck and resume his life here. He’d have to start all over again.

“It might not work out like that, Suguru,” Mika said honestly. “Don’t get your hopes up yet. Tohma made a promise to the courts that he’d only have custody of you while Kaori was in disposed with drinking and couldn’t provide a good household for you. If Kaori ever straightened up, you would be back with him.”

“No!” Suguru shouted, both of them looking over at him quickly.

This disturbed Suguru. He was a part of a band now and didn’t want to leave. He had friends and fans here. No one was going to get him to budge. He’d get his own place if he had to or move in with a friend.

Tohma looked back over at his cousin with a straight face. “Suguru...you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. If you want to stay here, you have to tell your father that.”

“Tohma...” Mika breathed in a small voice. She knew very well that wouldn’t work.

“Be quiet!” he snapped, making her flinch with a short gasp. “This doesn’t concern you!”

Suguru’s eyes went wide at the harshness in Tohma’s voice. Mika had fallen silent.

“If you don’t tell him Suguru, I will. That bastard isn’t going to get away with this! I always knew he was doing to get his sweet revenge on me. I knew it! I haven’t heard from him in thirteen years and here he is all of a sudden, clean and sober! I swear on my soul, he’s not getting his way!”

Tohma grabbed his coat and hat and charged out of the house, slamming the door behind him.

Mika didn’t even bother trying to stop him and Suguru stayed where he stood.

“I’m sorry I caused this, Mika.”

Mika shook her head. “No, we knew this would happen from the day we took you in. Kaori decided to come clean and now he wants his life back.”

Suguru shrugged it off, giving Mika the cold shoulder. “Well he’s going to have to find another way to get a life. He’s not ruining mine so he can be happy.”

Mika sighed. “Tohma could get into so much trouble for this...” she breathed.

“I still think I should have the right to have a say in it too. My life is here! Bad Luck, Hiro, Shuichi, NG, school, everything! It’s unfair for them to make me move somewhere where I don’t even know anyone!”

Mika nodded, fully understanding Suguru. “I’m sorry. If we had control over this, believe me, we would have it our way.”

Just the thought of leaving Hiro and Shuichi made Suguru want to go in for a kill. He hated Shuichi sometimes, but would hate it even more if he had to leave. Then there was Hiro...

Mika called after Suguru as he ran out the door in the next blink of a second. For some reason, the thought of leaving Hiro caused him to act in a way he never thought was possible. He HAD to see Hiro right now. It was so very early still, so Hiro would still be asleep. Something struck his chest. He put his hand over it as he ran. The consideration of not even being able to see him again, made his chest constrict. After spending so many sad moments with Hiro, the guitarist begun to grow on him.

“I will not leave Hiro...I refuse...”

---

It was amazing how fast loving someone could hit you. You don’t even know you do, and then bam, the thought of leaving them kills you.

Suguru approached Hiro’s door, running the entire way in tears. He refused to stop, even though his legs turned to jelly. Completely ignoring the conversation between them last night, and the episode last night, he knocked his hardest, which could be misinterpreted as a pound for dear life.

It was no more than about ten, so Hiro was most certainly sleeping, especially if he hadn’t gotten any last night. Since he was suspended from NG, and had nothing else to do with his time, Hiro had to have been home.

Suguru got worried when the door didn’t open at first.

“Hiro!” he yelled, hoping that it would attract his attention.

The door opened on cue, as if all he had to say was his name in the first place. There stood a confused, tired Hiro, rubbing his face. “What’s—”

He froze when a pair of arms wrapped tightly around his waist. He still didn’t know who it was until he took his hand off his face and looked downwards, surprised as all hell to see the person he never thought he’d get to see again, right here, sealed to him like no tomorrow.

“I have to move away, Hiro!” Suguru bawled, showing no signs in letting Hiro free.

“What do you mean you have to move away?” Hiro asked, surprised that all of this was occurring.

Hiro sat Suguru down and offered him a tissue, in which Suguru gladly took, dabbing his eyes.

“Remember why I came to live with Tohma in the first place?” Suguru asked, meeting eyes with Hiro just in time to see him nod.

“Well...the deal was if my father ever got sober and provided a secure residence, I’d have to move back with him. Tohma signed the contracts thirteen years ago and I became his, solemnly swearing in front of a court that he wouldn’t break the contract.”

“I’m sorry,” Hiro said. “Aren’t you old enough to make your own decisions?”

“I have to be eighteen to have a life it seems,” Suguru said, rubbing his eyes.

“But if you leave...”

“I’ll have to leave Bad Luck,” Suguru finished for him, meeting his eyes. “That and I’ll never see you or Shuichi again.”

Hiro placed his hand over Suguru’s. “You’re free to make your own decisions. If you want to stay with Tohma, you stay with him. They can’t throw you around like you’re some sort of toy. You’re free to make your own decisions.”

Hiro’s hand went to Suguru’s cheek, turning his face so they met eye to eye. Suguru’s thoughts melted away as he had the pleasure of looking into Hiro’s eyes, treasuring this moment, problems melting away.

“Is that what I did to your face?” Hiro asked in a small voice.

Suguru took Hiro’s hand in his, holding it tightly. “Don’t worry about that. In a few days, it’s not even going to matter. Things heal. Everything except the pain of loss that will be thrown to me.”

Hiro traced a tear line that streaked down Suguru’s face just seconds later.

“Please don’t cry,” Hiro whispered. “I can’t take it when you cry.”

“I can’t help it...” Suguru said, two tears running down the same trail line, one on each side. “I’m so scared.”

Hiro’s face itched closer, not taking his eyes off the beautiful hazel orbs that lie in front of him. Suguru closed his eyes as Hiro’s forefinger lifted up his chin and met their lips together sweetly, putting whatever fears Suguru had to rest.