Creeping Up On You

CHAPTER 7

Some call me a loser
Some call me a cheater
Some say I\'m a selfish untalented dreamer
Cause all\'s I try to do is keep my dream alive
But it\'s so hard to do when your working 9 to 5
I\'ve never been one afraid to die
But I\'m afraid to leave behind
The precious life that grows through the sands of time
Cause now I\'ve got two daughters
And I know they need their father
To help them make it through all of the devious things that people do
Cause every moment counts from the good times to the bad
I don\'t have time to envy those that got things I\'ve never had
Cause the one thing most important is the one we take for granted
And until your life is on that line I think it\'s the way god had planned it
To open up your eyes and make you realize
That to some life is money
But what\'s money without life
Cause all\'s I need is the air that I breathe
And my friends and family to believe in me

(Hook)
As deep as the abyss where the waters run
As deep as the land of the rising sun
You know I\'m down
And even when them odds are against us
It doesn\'t even matter
Nothing else matters

We bleed the same blood
We cry the same tears
We have the same fears
We pass the same years
We see the same stars
Under the same skies
We pass the same time
We all live and die
Cause friends and family wash thicker than blood
And if ya\' never felt love than I feel for you cuz\'
Cuz\' lives pass above us in 747\'s
Deceased dwell below us
Before they go to heaven
Everything in between will hassle me
Some stay connected while other keep dreaming
Looking for that meaning but the lost can\'t be found
Drop to your caps and pray
Now can ya\' hear the sound?
Do ya\' feel it?
Now do ya\' feel it comin\'?
Two triple zero the hunters are the hunted
Electrical currents conflict with the spirits
Ah do ya\' hear it ah or do ya\' feel it?
Deep like seven leagues life intrigues intelligence
Got no time for clutter, you\'re late if there\'s hesitance
Put your foot forward and there will be a helping hand
Take a step back and your stuck in the quick sand
Ingesting toxins keeps us locked in, a mental jail trap
99\' where\'s your family at

(Bridge)
Oh, and I might fail
Oh, I might succeed
Whatever the outcome is
Just keep your faith in me
Just believe in me
And I will be there (repeat hook)

Trik turner – “Friends and family”


I was surprised by their reactions. I had informed my friends what I had planned to do with Yahiko and Tsubame after I left the kitchen. No one really seemed to express remorse for the deaths of Shishio nad Yumi, but the kids were completely different.

Aoshi informed me of a 6th grade teacher opening in the city. Hiko mentioned that he knew just where we could live. I get the feeling that he meant all of us, not just Yahiko, Mae and I. Meg and Mia offered to babysit if I ever needed it, they love Yahiko and couldn’t wait to meet Mae. Sano was Sano and offered to be my best friend through it all. He made me laugh when I was still in tears over Yumi and Shishio and the kindness of my friends. Their attitudes were changing and I felt freer, yet they were still there. That thought made me smile and hold the tears of grief at bay for a long time.

~!@##$%^&*()_+_)(*&^%$#@!~ HIM

That a girl, show them who is boss. The time is coming when there is no way you can escape me. You are playing right into it.

I almost think you want to come back to me, taking the risks you had, especially last night. He followed you home and you didn’t even realize it. He was going to hurt you again and you almost seem to beckon him with your ignorance of his presence. I think you are going to need to be punished for that. You are mine and mine alone, but the time to remind you of that fact is coming. Not much longer now and Misao is going to help me. Soon, my Amei, very soon now, and who knows, maybe I will get rid of a few other obstacles on your path back to me…

~!@#$%^&*()_++_)((*&^%$#@!~KAY

I placed a call to Yumi’s house and got Dr. Gensai, a friend of my father and the family doctor. He put Yahiko on the phone as soon as he knew it was me. It had been a while since I had talked to either Dr. Gensai or Yahiko. They both reminded me of my younger days, of better days, of days devoid of fear.

“Kay? Is it really you? Hey, Ugly, what’s the big idea not calling me for months now?! Are we going to live with you now? Mae doesn’t think you will let us, but I told her you would. Did you know she is scared to meet you? She thinks you are going to hate her, but I told her you wouldn’t do that. You love kids and she is a very good, very smart kid and she is only five! How is it going? I mean aside from what Shish tried last night? I want to hear all about Meg and Mia and Sano and Ken and those other two guys. Is every one treating you ok Kay?” He kept firing off questions and other info that you really couldn’t tell that he had just lost the only parent he had ever known.

His comments about Mae made me feel guilty for not making time to meet her, for avoiding her, for not giving her the benefit of a doubt although she was the product of Yumi and Shishio or Shish as Yahiko called him. “Hey, hey slow down a minute, what are you a teenager? Do me a favor and put Mae on the line ok? I promise I will answer all your questions some time after that, ok?”

“K. Oh and Kay? Please be nice to her, mom and Shish never were.”

I was struck by how he watched over his little sister, like Ken had for me and I some times had for him. It made me wish I could change the past, I would make it better for him, and for her. “I will, I promise. No worries, now go put her on the phone.”

“No worries, Kay.” I smiled, I could hear the shuffling as Yahiko fetched his little sister, he didn’t have far to go so I suspect she had been standing right there, though I couldn’t tell you for how long.

A timid, “Hello?” came over the line. She has a soft voice, very soothing and sweet. “Hello Tsubame?”

“Yeah, I’m Tsubame, and you are Kaoru.” There seemed to be such hope in her statement.

“Yes I am, but call me Kay. Can I call you Mae?” Even over the phone I could feel her start to warm up to me even just a little. “Ok.”

“Hey Mae, did you know that I have done a very bad thing? You see there is this big girl I haven’t met yet, though her brother tells me she is really cool and I must meet her cuz she is so much like me that he thinks we will get along just great. But I haven’t met her yet. I have done a bad thing in not meeting her yet. Do you know why? I was scared. Do you know who I am supposed to meet?”

“Me?” She said it with hope in her voice. I could feel a smile a mile wide forming on my face. She really is a bright child. “That’s right, you, now if you don’t mind, I have to pick up Yahiko this afternoon, did you want to come with? I would love to meet you and have you with us. We are going to be moving together. Is that ok with you?” I wanted her to feel as if she was truly wanted, as if her decision on the matter really meant something. To me it did, it let me know what I had to work with. It would also let me know how much like me she really could be. Ken had told me that she and Yahiko have been up to some of the same tricks I pulled as a child.

“Yeah!” I had her excited. I could still hear the confusion as to the change in her life, but she seemed to just go with the flow. I heard Yahiko in the background, telling her to do something, though I couldn’t tell what. “Um..Kay?”

“Yeah?”

Yahiko told me to ask, why?” I laughed. I can see Yahiko trying to get her to play the why game.

“Because I need to get to know you.” I left it at that waiting for the next round.

“Why?” there it was, I knew it was coming. Yahiko and I used to play this one all the time. He just wanted to know everything.

“Because you are my sister.”

“Why?”

I chuckled, “because there is so much I have missed and I want to make it up to you. Now no more questions, I want you to be ready when I get there in an hour, ok?”

“Ok, Kay, do you want Yahiko now?”

“If you would please, yes.” Again I didn’t have to wait long for some one to talk to me. This time I had an extra listener, I heard the other extension pick up.

“Yahiko? I need you to have a couple weeks worth of clothes packed for both you and Mae, you guys are going to be living with me from now on. Watch after our little sister, I get the feeling she is more like you and I then her mom ever wanted to admit. How long has she been playing the why game?”

“Um..hehe, since she was about three, so nearly three years now. Ken taught it to her, he told her he taught it to you when you were little, too. She thought that was great. She’s really good too, never gives up.” I could hear the pride in his voice, I get the feeling he taught her to be obnoxious about it, he was always good at that. I couldn’t help but grin more.

“That is good to know, I will just have to see how long I can hold out against her, then huh?”

“She will question you to the ground. Hey, Kay? Can I talk to you when you get here?” I could hear something in his voice, I couldn’t tell if it was fear or something else.

“Sure, about anything, I’ll see you in an hour, and tell our sister to stay out of the cookie jar, I have a treat for you two if she does.” I could hear the squeal of happiness at the other end of the line. “Talk to you two soon!”

“Bye, Kay!”

“Bye, Kay!”

“Did I just hear an echo? How cute, bye you two, see you in an hour.”

“Bye!” this time in unison. I hung up and gathered what I needed for the car ride to Yumi’s.

Despite how I might have sounded to the kids, my life was anything but fine and dandy. There were many things on my mind, one of the few things were what to do with my friends. And the kids I was about to take in. it was true, I love kids, but I wasn’t lying when I told Mae that I was afraid to meet her. It wasn’t her fault at all, I just had this fear, and it was completely irrational. I was afraid she would trigger something, what I couldn’t tell you though.

I snapped myself back to the present when the cab I was using as transport pulled up to my father’s house. I was assaulted by memories. Ken chasing me around the yard. Sano, Meg, Mia and I having birthday parties in the back by the pool. Me showing Yahiko what I was working on with my kendo lessons. Dad and I sitting on the porch watching a storm as it raged around us. Yumi and I, on one of the rare occasions that we were civil to each other, planning my Dad’s last birthday party. I could feel the tears that threatened to spill, all the happy memories that reminded me life wasn’t all bad or just average.

Yahiko and a little girl I assumed was Mae came tearing down the porch stairs after they had nearly knocked the front door off it’s hinges. I was glomped by both of the kids. Yahiko was getting tall and lanky, much like Sano, and was even styling his hair much the same. I gave them both hugs before I pulled back a bit to actually get a good look at them.

“Well this beautiful young lady must be Mae. Am I right?” I smiled at her. She’s going to be a heartbreaker when she grows up. Her hair was only chin length, but was as black as a starry night, so black it had a blue sheen to it as mine does. Her eyes, they’re large blue pools that will have men drowning in them when she gets older. Her skin was tinted gold but it complimented her eyes and hair, and she has rosy cheeks. She is proud as well. I could see that in her stance, straight, looking head on to what ever she faced. I could also tell by the tilt to her chin that she is stubborn. I could tell that she would be graceful as well, everything about her movements were fluid and delicate with an undertone of strength. The guys were right, she did remind me of myself in a few tiny ways.

“Yes, that’s me! I’m Mae!” She seemed to be a mentally healthy girl despite what she had been forced to do. I wondered if it was ever really explained to her what she was doing. She jumped up and tackled me to the soft grass of the front lawn. I couldn’t help but laugh, she is just too cute. Her smile is just like her fathers. Something in me froze at that though. Shishio’s smile had never looked like that, her smile was nothing like her parents, but I knew that thought to be true. At the same time that I was mentally cowering in fear of her, she filled a void in my heart that I really hadn’t realized was there. I don’t know how but she did. I pushed back all thoughts that would put a damper on this meeting and introduced my self to the huggle bear with arms around my neck.

“I am Kay, nice to meet you Mae. I see you are a huggle monster just like me and our brothers.” She giggled at that. “Have you been a good girl for Yahiko?” She nodded her head vigorously. “Ok in the back seat is a present for you, why don’t you go take it inside and open it, ok?”

She was off me in a flash, heading for the cab I had asked to wait for me while I collected my siblings and their things. I turned to Yahiko, my smile dropped instantly as I stood up and enveloped him in my arms against my chest. He cried. He would never admit it, but he did. He had just lost nearly everything he had known in the space of a few hours. My baby brother just held on to me as if I was his life line and I think that I was. He was mine as well. The last bit of my father left, my last blood relative left.

“Ok, Yahiko, what did you want to talk to me about?” I kept my voice soft.

His eyes darted around nervously, looking, searching making sure we were truly alone. “Can we go to the back? The little gazebo?” I knew the one he was talking about. It had been our special place, just for the two of us when we were younger. It had been mine and Dad’s before that. I nodded and followed his lead. To the east side of the house, set off a little ways from the more popular places around the house, stood a little gazebo. The structure was no more then thirty six square feet. It was made of wood, a light wood that seemed to glow despite the fact that it had weathered many years outside. There were slats on the north and south sides of it, not a wall, but more like an ornate fence and the east and west sides were left open. Grape vines twisted their way around the slats and pillers that held up the roof of the gazebo. It was a quiet, shady place, set near a grove of trees. The grove of trees had a hollowed tree that hide my treasures from the world. Things that I think it is time for Yahiko and Mae to have.

I sat on the wooden floor of the gazebo, it had been raised a foot off the ground. I looked up at Yahiko. His eyes shifted again. He was looking everywhere but at me. This wasn’t a good sign. Yahiko is a very straight forward kid. Tact is almost a foreign word to him, honest to a fault more often then not described him. “Um, Kay…I heard Mother and Shish…Um, Mae is…Please treat Mae nicely, Mother and Shishio never did. Um, do I have to continue what Shish had me doing?” His eyes suddenly focused on me and I knew that neither was exactly what he had really wanted to talk about, but I let it slide. Yahiko would tell me in his own time.

I played dumb on this one, “What did he have you doing?” I remember when Yahiko had called me and told me he had a job. I wasn’t too happy to hear this as he was only ten then. I had stopped at the house a few weeks later and heard Yumi and Shishio talking about Yahiko’s job and how it was working beautifully. No one would expect a ten year old kid of identity theft. He never told me what it was then, he didn’t seem happy talking about it after that call. Yahiko looked down at the floor before he answered.

“Shishio had me pick pocketing, Mae was a distraction for the targets.” While I had already known this, it pissed me off to hear such things from my little brother, it made it more real coming from him. I answered him honestly, “No Yahiko, never again, and that goes for you too Mae.” I glanced through the vines and saw her beautiful blue eyes. “Come here, both of you.” They came to me quietly, slowly and I grabbed them in a hug. I wanted to bring Shishio back to life to kill him for making children do his dirty work.

“Come on, I know two very good siblings that deserve something special. So what shall it be and it can be almost anything.” I looked to them to tell me what they wanted, some people say that kids don’t know what they want, well I can tell you these two did.

To my left and right, at the same time I heard, “Ice cream!”

I laughed, “Wow, in stereo, nice jobs guys. Ok, Head to the cab, we have to get your stuff in it and we go for ice cream before dinner.” I got a chorus of yays and was left in the dust by two excited kids. My smile was leeched from my face as headed to the grove of trees near by. I searched for my tree, finding it by the marking Kay+Sano. I had a crush on him when we were much younger but had long since outgrown it. I fished in the hole in the trunk of the tall oak. I found what I had been searching for, a box. It stood only six inches tall and was a foot and a half tall and six inches wide. All of my treasures had been kept in this metal box. I unlocked it using a key on my key chain. I only opened it long enough to grab a book my dad used to read to me and a doll of a character from that book. I slammed shut the box and made sure it was locked. I was terrified by what else could have been in there. I knew I had some of my old school papers and things that dad and I made together, but there were a few official looking papers that I didn’t want to look at. Something told me they would change my life forever if I took the time to look at them, besides, I could always look at them when I was alone.

I jogged back to the cab where Yahiko was hoisting what seemed to be the last bag into the trunk of the car. “Got it all in there, Kay!” I nodded and said, “Ok, one of you get in, then I can sit in the middle between my two favorite people, ok?”

“Cool!” Was Yahiko’s reply as he got in one the left. I got in on the right and Mae climbed in after me. “Hey, Kay?”

“Hhhmm?”

Can we go to Ken’s place to get the ice cream?” Yahiko gave me his best puppy dog look and it was just too cute to ignore. I laughed before I answered. “Yeah, we can do that.” I heard a giggle out of Mae o my other side. Have you been there before hun?”

She shook her head no. “That place is so much fun! Just you wait, when we get there I can call everyone and get them down there to join us. Would you like that? To meet some of my other friends?”

“Really?” her eyes shined and I nodded. “Ok” she replied. She gave me the feeling that Yumi and Shishio didn’t do what they said they would, when it was something she might like…

~!@#$%^&*()_++_)(*&^%$#@!~

Mwahahahah! thasi weekend didnt kill me like i thought it would! in celebration i posted again, as you can tell. ok, now for my reviewers

Twishinky- nice guess, what makes you think that?

And to all you others that have geven me a guess, why do you think so?

please let me know, an dht enext chapter is projected to be out before th eend of the week.