Early morning, January 30th..

I used to like coming into our backyard.

If you could call it a yard.

It's about the size of one and a half of my living rooms stacked one on top of the other, with a six foot tall wooden fence the only thing separating us from the street. A large tree dominates the north eastern corner, a monster that ripples the lawn with its roots and looms over our three story structure like an ogre.

It looks skeletal in the darkness, yellow light from the lamp on the corner across the street reflecting off its slick bark, wet with rain and fog like I am. The perpetual wind circling Rhy'Din teases my wet hair, blowing mist into my eyes, making me squint. I sniff as I let myself in through the back gate and rub my face with the back of my hand.

There are no lights on upstairs, not even the flicker of the the TV, barely discernible from the blinking neon signs of the convenience store even when it is on. It's too late for Emerill or Sher to be awake. I guess that the both of them have been asleep for at least two hours, hopefully deep enough under to keep from waking up and hearing what I'm doing.

Like I said, I used to like being in our back yard, but lately, it's been one of the banes of my existence. It's the place where I get my a*s handed to be every day by a girl I can't stop thinking about. My time here with her does nothing for my ego, but I can't bring myself to trade it for anything.

Even right now as I strip off my sweatshirt and let the true cold and wet of the night hit me, she's all I can think about. Her, and her girlfriend.

And what they must be doing together right now.

I don't get the bokken out of its basket fast enough to swing it around behind me like I'm warding off an unwanted touch. The yell I hold in burns in my chest, waiting to be released with everything else I'm currently feeling.

My wet fingers close tighter around the cloth wrapped hilt, reaffirming their grip, then my other hand joins the first and I have the wooden weapon locked in my grasp.

Just like I was taught.

I slide my right foot backward and turn sharply at my waist, the wooden blade slicing through the air with a satisfying whoosh, raindrops spraying against raindrops.

I imagine an attacker. One who is tall, wreathed in the most violent shade of purple, whose hair is long and body is thin. Who smoked. Who wouldn't shut up about loving Mayu.

Who carries a weapon just like mine.

A weapon that comes down straight for my head.

During my training, Mayu would always talk about a concept she called 'sensing the kill.' She explained it as feeling the oncoming killing blow from an enemy, anticipating what their movements are and blocking them or countering them. And it was all good and well when she explained it to me--a whole different story when we practiced.

Give me a video game, and I could plot out my next seven moves, each with a back-up to compensate for any attack.

Give me my life, and I have no idea what I'm doing.

Until now.

I feel the kill welling inside me like a filling water balloon. I don't know how I know, but this attack is going to split my head open. I don't question it. I just give in to the sensation, the knowledge I know I have.

Quickly, I throw up my own weapon in a bar across my face to catch the attack, shoving upward into the air to dislodge their momentum, knock them back, open them up for my own strike.

An uppercut that's meant to slice between their legs and up through their gut.

My blade gets knocked sideways and I spin along with it, remembering the many times Mayu had thrown me off my center just like that. I don't fight my own whirl, knowing that if I do I won't be fluid enough for the next attack.

That comes at my back.

I throw myself into a somersault, mud and wet grass squelching around me, sinking into my clothes. My shirt sticks to my back like gauze, feeling heavy, restricting me.

I swing outward, blindly, with my blade to ward off any advance. They'd be busy trying to counter the weapon to worry about my leg kicking at theirs.

I imagine them stumbling back, losing their center like they forced me to lose mine and that's when I go in for my own kill.

I leap forward, my blade raised above me like a stake, careening downward toward their chest. I imagine them shrieking, writhing beneath me, an undulating body of fear and agony.

They cannot fight me because I won't let them. I won't let them get up until they're no longer a threat to me.

Or to her.

It wouldn't happen like this, says an inner voice in the base of my skull. They'd knock you down before you even got one attack off. What can you, just a Human, a boy, do for her?

"I'll do something!" I say out loud. I know no one is here to hear me, no one is here to fight me, but I rise to meet another oncoming, invisible enemy.

This adrenaline has been burning inside of me all night. Ever since I heard Mayu quietly leave our house. She didn't sneak, but she was careful.

I lunge, sweep and kick at the air, not even bothering to disguise my grunts of exertion with anything else. If I keep trying to hold them in they'll burn a hole right through my chest.

I told her not to go. I told her to stay away from Lorelei. It didn't matter what had happened between them in the past, what matters is what happens now.

And I wasn't about to let her get pulled into a situation I knew--I knew in my gut and in my heart--was wrong.

It wouldn't make sense to anyone else but me, but I knew.

My last swing with the bokken takes me off course and I wind up on my side on the damp grass. I roll onto my back, my legs falling at a wide open angle. My chest works rapidly through air, my throat full of mist, threatening to make me cough. My limbs burn with the exertion of the last hour of nonstop movement.

I hadn't counted on needing to rest during my training, but now that I am, my thoughts come creeping in like a cold, murky tide.

I like her.

I like her a lot.

And I am ticked off that she likes someone else.

Another girl.

And they like her back.

And Robyn was wrong. I'm nowhere in that picture.

And I can't do a goddamned thing about it.

And it's been so long since I've felt this way about a girl that I'd forgotten the other side of the coin, the misery that goes with the bliss.

And I wish--I wish that I had the foggiest idea of what to do next.

I want someone to tell me what to do next.

I throw my hand over my face, trying to hide it from the sky above. If there is a God up there, or angels, I really would rather them see me in a few minutes.

"Toby?"

I jerk, clawing myself to an upright position. Looking up, I squint, but soon realize the rain is no longer hitting me.

My sister stands over me and I can't read her face. Her mouth looks like it wants to rip open and start yelling, but her eyes, black in the dark, are full of concern. Her hair is down, rippling around her shoulders in time with the breeze. She's wearing her white bathrobe with the pink and yellow sunflowers and she's holding an umbrella over my head.

I listen to the rain patter over the stretched vinyl for what feels like a year. Too many questions fight for first place on my tongue. How long has she been standing there? How much did she see? Why didn't she say anything before?

Looking away, I prepare to get up. "What are you doing here?" It comes out more shocked than pissed and that surprises me. I really don't want to take anything out on her, but now that she's here...

She scoffs. "I could ask you the same thing!" Here it comes. "Do you have any idea what time it is? And you're out here playing gladiator with yourself. Without a coat, no less! Do you want to catch pneumonia and die?"

Her arm comes underneath mine when my foot slips in the mud. I let her pull only because I'm not so sure I can get up on my own, but when I feel steady, I shove her off.

"What's wrong now?" I feel her eyes follow me as I retrieve the bokken and clean the dirt off of it with my palm. I whip mud off my knuckles, back to the ground.

And then she says it.

"Where's Mayu? She's not in her room either--"

"What makes you think I know or care?" I snap back at her.

Sher pulls her head back like a turtle retreating into its shell. I elbow past her and her umbrella but not before she grabs a fistful of my t shirt. It chokes me, so I turn to look at her. Slowly. Something on my face makes her let go.

"Well, aren't you going to go after her? Isn't that what you do now?"

I don't have the time to figure out why she sounds so bitter when she says that. This isn't the first time she's found me out after dark in various states of well being. Granted, I haven't run away from home or acted like I wanted to for the last couple years.

Maybe she's just tired of coming after me.

"What gives you that idea?"

"Toby--"

"Shut up, Sheridan," I yell, loud enough to echo. I want it to drown out the sound of her question in my head.

Because the truth was, that's what I did do now. I went after Mayu. No matter how stupid I knew it was or how much sense it didn't make.

No matter how many people told me not to and wished I wouldn't.

I didn't want my sister to know I knew she was right.

I might as well have slapped her for how she looked at me. She disguises her pain with a hard exhale and flounces past me, smelling of rain and raspberries. She sends the sliding door open with a push so hard the glass rattles.

"Fine. Have it your way. Don't track mud into the house. I'm not cleaning up after your episode."

I stare after her, listening to her fading stomps up the back stairs to the living room.

I feel what's left over of my resolve and while it doesn't burn as strongly as a pyre anymore, it's simmering, reminding me that it's still there.

It's not time to give up yet. It never will be.

A hot shower will give me time to think.

I toss the bokken into its basket under the patio to rest with Mayu's and lurch sloppily into my house.