Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ Don't Call Me Onii-chan... Call Me Your Koibito ❯ Final Decision ( Chapter 3 )

Jou twisted his key into the lock, struggled with it a few moments, and entered the dark hallway.

"Mai?"

No answer.

Louder. "Mai?"

Silence.

"Mai Kujaku! Where are you?"

He shrugged, threw his jacket across the couch, and went upstairs. Everything was there as usual. Mai's clothes hanging clean and perfect as the day they were made, in the closet. His sneakers thrown carelessly across the floor, alongside a pair of day-old socks. Her gilded comb and brush set, neatly lined up next to several bottles of nail polish and an expensive manicuring set. His deodorant lying on its side next to a framed picture of him and Mai, taken a few months earlier. He picked up the picture and studied it.

He was giving his usual stupidly amusing grin, one arm lightly around Mai, who was winking seductively at the camera. Yugi had taken that picture, when he, Anzu, Honda, Miho, Mai and Jou had gone on a picnic over the summer.

As if by natural reaction, he dug into his jeans pocket and pulled out his wallet. He opened it, and took out thin piece of what seemed like paper. He turned it face up, and was looking at another picture of himself- only this time he was giving a genuine, frankly happy smile, and his arms were affectionately thrown around a girl's neck. And it wasn't Mai- it was Nakomi. She looked happy too, and was giving the camera her signature tilted-head smile. They were both squinting because Honda had taken the picture in nearly direct sunlight, that day they'd gone to the beach. Jou remembered Nakomi saying she loved the sound of waves crashing against the shore, the warm sand beneath her toes, the multi-colored glow of the sky before the sun slipped over the edge of the world.

He looked at the picture a long, long time. His heartache teetered on the edge of his eyelashes, threatening to splash over. "I miss you," he whispered into the stillness.

He looked around the room. Mai's things, his things. But it wasn't the way it should be. He and Mai didn't fit. Enough of this role-playing, this empty happiness, this fake life. Mechanically, he moved around the room, picking up all his belongings. He stuffed them back into the duffel bags he had used to bring them in. He scribbled a note for Mai, left it on the bed and was about to leave, when he caught sight of the picture of himself and Mai again. He carefully removed the picture, ripped the part with himself on it, out, and placed Mai's half back on the dresser-top, face down. "I'm sorry," he muttered, and resolutely walked out the front door.