Standard disclaimers apply.

PASSING SECRETS

By Cassandra's Destiny

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Abandoned by the others for unknown reasons, Fuuko and Raiha were left to train alone. He didn't mind. She got used to it already. He was happy to spend time with her. She saw this as an opportunity to get better. But after long hours of running and sweating, he grew bored. She got tired. He suggested taking a break. She said it's better to call it a day. And he knew what was to happen next. She always asked him to sit with her under the shade of a certain tree… and today was no different.

"I can't see it."

"Look closer."

He squinted his eyes. "Is it right there?"

"A little more to your left."

"Still nothing."

"Beside the ad board."

"That ad board?"

"Yea."

"I saw it."

Her eyes glittered with excitement. "Isn't it cool?"

"The corner of your house?"

"No."

Raiha raised a brow. "Then what is?"

"The fact that we can see the corner of my house from this small hill – that's cool."

"I see."

She pouted. "You're such a bore."

He snickered at her comment. "You were the one who asked me to spot the corner of your house. Sure, I'm a bore."

Fuuko punched his shoulder playfully, but with the strength she possessed, it was enough to make a twelve-year old cry.

But Raiha was no twelve-year old.

"So what do we do?"

"How about you tell me your secrets?"

She shot him a look. "You can't be serious."

"Why not?"

"They're called my secrets for a reason."

"How about we share other people's secrets?"

She had a sly smirk on her face. "Alright. You go first."

"Let me see…" He placed a finger on his chin thoughtfully.

"When Ganko was younger, she thought bears come out of cereal boxes."

"Eh?"

"And Winnie the Pooh came out of a giant box of coco pops."

She frowned. It wasn't the kind of dirt she wanted.

"Your turn."

What could she tell him?

"Er…"

And just like some miracle sent from above, in comes Domon in her line of vision, running away from a dog on the open street.

"You see that?"

"See what?"

"Domon. He's running away from that dog."

"Poor guy. He looks so scared of the giant mutt."

"Even though they're very similar."

"Similar?"

"You want to know a real secret? Here's a good one only I and the person involved knew about… Domon once drank from the toilet because the faucet wasn't working."

"You're kidding."

"He had chili fries for lunch… and I kind of, well, accidentally, busted the pipes when I tried to fix them."

"Oh. Well, I can think of a better one. I once caught Joker in his room wearing girl clothes."

She had to stifle a laugh.

"He was so shocked when I came in. I mean, I was surprised, yes, but I never said anything! In his embarrassment, he dropped the underwear I suppose he wanted to try on."

"What did he say?" Her words were a bit muffled by her continuous snickering.

He had to chuckle. "He says he wanted to know how it felt like wearing those things."

"Yea?"

"Then, trying to be serious and professional all of a sudden, he added something about wanting to know the discomforts of his female opponents so he'd know how to use those against them when in battle."

Fuuko openly laughed. The image of Joker wearing female clothing was just too funny. And a scene in her head involving Joker and a made up excuse of battle tactics against women and their lingerie was plain hilarious.

"Okay, my turn. Yanagi sings in the shower."

"Doesn't everybody?"

She looked at him wide-eyed. "You sing in the shower?"

He shut his mouth tight. There was no way he was going to admit to Fuuko he sings in the shower like a normal person.

"No fair." She turned her head from him.

"So what about Yanagi? Any dark secrets about her?" Fuuko pursed her lips and Raiha mentally sighed. If there was one thing he knew about Fuuko, it was that she was easily distracted.

"Yanagi talks to her food."

"She's too sane for that."

"Wanna bet?" Fuuko extended her arms slightly, as if balancing plates of food on both hands. Turning to the invisible plate on her right hand, Fuuko recited, "I'm sorry, Mr. Macaroni. I know you're really nice but I'm too hungry not to eat you." Then she turned her attention to her other hand. "Sir Cheese-a-lot, you go so well with Mr. Macaroni here. You two may not be good friends but your harmony never ceases to amaze me. And to both of you, I say my heartfelt farewell." She began to gobble the invisible macaroni and cheese. Raiha laughed at Fuuko's re-enactment of the bizarre practice of the girl with healing powers.

"I think she's been doing too many puppet shows for those pre-school kids she teaches."

"Amen."

"Sure, but let's see what you think of this one: One time, Kaoru found the cabinet where Miss Kurenai used to keep all her sweets. It turns out they weren't expired yet and had a long shelf-life. So Kaoru got most of them and ate all of it in his room."

"What's so funny about that?"

"Kaoru has a thing with sugar. Haven't you wondered why he's hyper all the time?"

Fuuko shook her head.

"You give him a bar of chocolate and he'd go crazy. What more if he'd eaten most of Miss Kurenai's sweets? Naturally, he was in constant high. He was running around the house in his underwear, scavenging for more candy. When you ask him what's wrong, he'd jump up and down and shake his head vigorously like he was going insane! For three days, he couldn't sleep, can't even sit still. He'd gotten large eye bags already and allowed people to bribe him with candy to wash the dishes!"

Conniving against Kaoru with a bar of chocolate to let him do her chores, Fuuko placed a hand over her tummy. All this laughing and scheming at the same time was giving her a stomachache.

"He went off like a busted light bulb on day three. It was weird; one minute he was rambling about chocolates 60 miles an hour; the next minute, he was down on the ground sleeping. I thought he was dead!"

"You should've kicked him in his sleep for all the trouble he's cost!"

"But I didn't… Maybe I wanted to…" There was a wily twinkle in his eyes but Fuuko didn't notice.

"Like I said, you're such a bore."

She sighed and crossed her arms.

"So what about—"

"—Look!" She slapped his head with her hand to make him face the direction her other hand was pointing at. Raiha thought it was a violent act. But to Fuuko, it might have been a display of affection.

"Is that Mii-chan… with that girl from Oto?"

"Yea, didn't you know?"

"Know what?"

"He's been seeing her for quite some time now. I believe they've met again once in a café somewhere near the mansion. From then on, he had been visiting her on a regular basis."

Her eyes went wide as saucers.

"Mii-chan… with a girl?"

"Look, I know he's not your type but is it that hard to believe?"

"I was beginning to think he was gay." She said, almost nonchalantly.

"Gay?"

"He's very popular in school. Girls ask him for dates all the time, but he spurns each of their advances. He just doesn't seem to mingle with the opposite sex that much. And you know… the long hair kind of gave me the idea."

He sniggered. "Miki says it's sexy."

"Oh, well…" She shrugged, until realization dawned to her.

"She what? What do you mean she thinks it's sexy? Are they… doing it?"

"What's it? Seeing each other?"

"Are you that clueless?"

"She just says it sexy and gives her something to… what was it? Oh yea, hold on to… I don't know what she meant by that though."

Fuuko blushed ten shades of red. "Raiha!"

He had to place his hands in front of him defensively. It was imperative that he braced himself – Fuuko was in a state of disbelief.

"You think I would know? I don't sneak into her room when Tokiya's staying in, and Miki doesn't exactly ask me to have a sleepover in her room so we can paint each other's nails and talk about our feelings."

She snorted.

"I was just asking."

"Asking about Tokiya and Miki's sex life? That's really not something to be nosey about."

With a grunt, Fuuko shot back. "Hmph, I was just concerned. Mii-chan can be a bastard. You don't know if he simply wants to screw her senseless or 'til she can't see no more, whichever comes first, then he'll leave her and continue obsessing about avenging his dead sister."

He slings an arm over her shoulder.

"If you're worried about that, it won't happen. Miki's a big girl, and she's an Uruha. If Tokiya proves to be a disgrace to the male population, she'd basically murder him in his sleep and make it look like a drug-related accident. She's an Uruha and a trained assassin after all."

She stuck a tongue out to him before looking away.

"Admit it. You feel bad your intuition was wrong. Tokiya is not gay."

"Bah, we're still not sure, you know. Maybe they're just doing the sleepover thing you were talking about."

"Sleepover?" He leaned closer to her ear. "I hear Tokiya's name being shouted at least three times on occasions he happens to sleep over; plus not-so-silent moans and whimpers have become part of the Uruha mansion's evening ambience."

Fuuko's cheeks were flushed. Her ears were red and she felt her face becoming hot.

"Ugh! Let's talk about people's wholesome secrets, okay?"

He smirked.

"Neon accidentally dyed her hair green once. She was taunted and called an alien from planet greenery for a whole week. She got so upset that she never bought any 'almost water resistant' products later. As a matter of fact, that 'almost water resistant' guarantee was true. If you'd look closely under all that red and orange, some strands of hair, the ones near the scalp, are still bright green."

Closing her eyes, she normalized her breathing. "At least it was wholesome." She noted mentally. "I remember when we were kids, Recca used to have an imaginary friend. It was a yellow unicorn with flaming bunnies near his legs. He called it Duke Warren Garren and had it until we were in elementary. Not many people knew about it so I insisted on being the absolute best person to call him a big baby every now and then." Beaming slightly, she opened her eyes to watch the clouds.

Raiha stared at her eyes. They were so fixated at the moving clouds, marveled by the many colors of the sky before dusk.

"So what's your secret?"

"My secret?" Came a soft sigh – an almost resigning one. "I used to have a crush on you back at the Ura Butou Satsujin tournament, right after you saved me."

"Really?"

"Mm-hmm…" She placed her head on his shoulder, body weary and eyes sleepy.

He mentally filed this piece of information under 'Revelations of Fuuko'. He was proud of himself, because at the end of the day, he did get to know her secret. But the next thing that happened was not quite something he expected from his sleepy companion.

"What's your secret, Raiha?" She drowsily asked, letting her lids fall slowly.

Raiha turned to face the setting sun. Lips curling into a smile, he whispered, "I can't tell you. It's called my secret for a reason."