Chapter sixteen: Epilogue

Soubi sat up in the unfamiliar bed and stretched, immediately noticing the empty spot next to him. He was at first confused on where he was and where Ritsuka was, but the memories from the previous night came back to Soubi quickly. He smiled, remembering everything they'd done the previous night, every little sound that Ritsuka had made.

It was more than a year after the entire ordeal in America. Ritsuka had survived and had come back home with Soubi. Ritsuka's mother had been placed at an institution for the criminally insane, after word got out about how she tried (and almost succeeded) in killing her own son.

Ritsuka had gone to live with Soubi then, in his small apartment. The previous night, though, the two had shared an intimate break from school in a hotel near the ocean. Ritsuka was fourteen, almost fifteen, so it was perfectly normal for him to lose his ears at his age. It had been an absolutely amazing night, and Soubi wouldn't take it back for anything.

Finally fully awake, Soubi got dressed and found Ritsuka out on the balcony of their room. He was wearing one of Soubi's old sweatshirts and a pair of fleece pants. The man came up behind him and wrapped his arms around Ritsuka. Leaning further down he whispered into his ear, "You look even cuter without your ears."

Red spread across his face, which was odd for an almost fifteen year-old, but it was attractive anyways.

"How are you feeling?" Soubi asked him, raising a hand to feel Ritsuka's forehead. This was an odd habit Soubi had taken to, and did it almost every day since Ritsuka had gotten out of the hospital. The Sacrifice would usually just playfully bat him away, just as he was doing now.

"Stop that," Ritsuka laughed, know that Soubi did it out of worry. "For the last time I'm not sick!"

"What's this?" Soubi finally noticed what sweatshirt of his Ritsuka was wearing. "Where'd you find this old thing?" Printed on the front of it was the Seven Voices school logo in big blue print.

"In the bottom of your bag," Ritsuka said, leaning against him. "I'm glad that you told me everything about your life back in the hospital. Otherwise, I would've never known."

"Yeah," Soubi murmured, holding Ritsuka around the waist. "You think it'd be a good idea to give House a call and tell him thanks for everything?"

They both laughed, knowing the reply that they'd get.

This is the actual end to this story.

This is my most reviewed and almost most viewed story. For most viewed, its a close second to 'A Death Note Fallen Into The Wrong Hands' which has both been up for much longer and has an extremely long title.

I enjoyed writing this story but the research was hard. The first thing I did was type in the symptom 'memory loss' into web MD. I had to start somewhere, so I thought, why not here? This is how I came up with Viral encephalitis. This was going to be my first final diagnosis, but then lupus came up so I took a look at that too. When I was researching Lupus I came across a section of diseases that it could be commonly mistaken for and then it hit me! Bam! Lead poisoning was listed as one, and I thought how perfect it that?!

So then I started asking 'can someone actually poison you by using lead?' turns out, its true if there's enough. I also took notes on 10-12 other diseases, too.

Special thanks to all the reviewers and my beta summer-flower-girl

Please go read my two new stories and keep up with my writing!

~Wolfie