Yin and Yang had always been close growing up. As children, they shared a bedroom and there was hardly a point where they were separated, even at school. They played together, laughed together, at times cried together, and if one needed help the other was there without a second thought, even if that meant the occasional lie to a parent or teacher.

Even as they grew older they were as close as two sisters could be. They shared the same friends, if something was wrong, one would put everything on hold to help the other, clothes changed hands so often that even they couldn't tell who originally owned them.

"That all started to change at some point during junior high," Yang explained.

Even for twins, it was impossible for two people to be truly identical, and as they grew older these differences began to show. Making new friends that the other didn't like, finding hobbies that the other couldn't see as interesting, as well as different personal capabilities.

Whereas Yin was the perfect student, Yang began to lag behind. She was by no means an idiot but being compared to Yin only made matters worse.

"I mean, it was kind of nice when we were kids." A small smile started to pull on the corners of Yang's lips. "Everything was easy back then so both of us were coming home with perfect scores, our mom would tell us what a great job we did." The smile disappeared in an instant. "But the classes just kept getting harder and I couldn't keep up. At first, I tried studying with Sis or going to cram school, but it always felt like torture. I have no idea how she can just sit and read textbooks for an hour and memorize the whole thing; meanwhile, I can spend a week reading and rereading the damn thing and forget all of it.

Yang had always been stubborn, and although it was difficult she had thrown herself into her studies. She would read and re-read her notes and course material, stay up for hours to cram for exams, she even fell out of touch with most of her friends because of how hard she tried. Despite all the effort, her grades wouldn't improve, and some even continued to slip. At first, she was still scoring in the low 90s or high 80s, but by her second year of junior high, she was averaging the low 80s.

During this time, Yin couldn't have been more supportive. She gave Yang her notes whenever they shared a class, they crammed for exams together, Yin even brought her sister food on multiple occasions when she tried to skip eating to have more time to study. Unfortunately, their parents, though initially supportive of their daughter's efforts, were quickly becoming scornful.

"They wouldn't let me hear the end of it. 'How could you mess up such an easy question,' or 'Maybe if you studied more it wouldn't be so difficult,' and the kicker 'Why can't you be more like Yin.'," she said, holding her head in frustration. "I was always getting compared to her, and because she was basically perfect I was never good enough. Pretty soon they realized that I was actually giving my all, but when that wasn't enough they just became disappointed."

If Yang only had to deal with the intense studying, perhaps she could have continued, and even the arguments with her parents made Yang want to try harder, if only out of spite; but seeing her parents decide that she couldn't meet their expectations was the nail in the coffin.

By the time the girls had reached high school, Yang had given up. She didn't even attempt to study anymore, and even in class she just barely paid attention. Her somewhat acceptable grades were now just passing. Having lost contact with most of her friends from junior high, the new groups she hung around were delinquents, who shared her lack of concern for school and authority. Perhaps she could have been with Yin more, shared friends with her again but....

"When mom and dad saw that her grades were slipping too, they decided that it was my fault. They weren't exactly wrong; when Yin was helping me with my studying she wasn't as focused on herself. They started demanding that I 'stop holding her back' and stay away from her. I think.... I think that's where everything started to go wrong."

While Yang had given up, Yin still wanted to help her sister. Even as Yang stopped studying Yin constantly tried to remain a presence in her sister's life, despite Yang trying to avoid her. While this happened, Yin would have the occasional mistake in school or at home. These slip-ups were the fault of no one, Yin was not truly perfect after all, but their parents could only ever see their golden child as infallible, and so the blame was heaped onto Yang.

When her parents scolded Yang for her shortcomings she learned to despise them, and now that they berated her for Yin's failings, Yang began to hate her as well. Yin's kindness was mistaken for condescension, Yin's joy for her own success seemed to be mocking Yang for her failures, and Yin's calm acceptance when Yang began to shout and scream at her was seen as arrogance.

"Sis was always just trying to help. At one point I even caught her complaining to our parents about how they were treating me." Yang let out a derisive laugh. "It might've actually helped if I hadn't barged in and started yelling at her. She was just trying to help but I took it as an insult; like she was saying that I couldn't handle the situation myself."

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Loran watched as Yang buried her face in her folded arms. She made no sound and it seemed as if the entire world had gone silent in that one moment, waiting for her to continue. When she next spoke her voice was on the verge of breaking.

"About a month after we had that fight is when everything, everything, went to shit."

~~~~~

"Fuck those assholes," Yoshiko swore under her breath, looking back at the karaoke bar she had just stormed out of. One of the employees at the bar was willing to sell them alcohol despite being minors, so it was a place where they hung out regularly. Tonight was different though.

She had been held up after school today and showed up about 20 minutes late, when she did everyone had been acting strange and the room smelled even worse than normal. At first, she thought that they had somehow managed to get drunk even faster than usual but then one of the guys, some college jock that one of her friends was sleeping with, tried handing her some kind of pill. Yoshiko might've been okay with underage drinking, even though she was quite the lightweight, but taking drugs was a line that felt too far even for her. At first, she was going to just stay for the drinks and pass on the pill, but everyone kept insisting that she take it.

She had managed to get through one beer before the college asshole started getting handsy with her, demanding that she take the pill. She got up to leave and the guy grabbed her by the wrist and twisted it forcefully. Fortunately, whatever that pill was left him pretty uncoordinated. One firm punch to the jaw and a swift kick between the legs and Yoshiko was out the door, pissed off and feeling the slightest buzz from her beer kicking in.

She didn't have clue where she was going once she left, but muscle memory kicked in and she started heading in the direction of her house. When she finally calmed down enough to figure out where she was, she had just stepped off a side street onto one of the city's main roadways, a few blocks from the train that would get her home. Before she could make the choice between heading home or finding something else to do while still in the city, Yoshiko heard a voice call out to her.

"Yoshiko! What are you doing here?"

Yoshiko turned around to see her sister, Tomoko, walking up behind her from the direction of their school. 'Shit! Alright, don't think about where you were.' The last thing she wanted to deal with was her sister doing her mind-reading trick and chewing her out. "Same to you," Yoshiko said, trying to be as unreadable as possible. "Don't you usually have practice right now?"

"The coach was feeling unwell. We would have simply gone home but by the time the coach decided he was too sick to supervise we had all prepared our bows and protective gear," she explained with a shrug. "Clean up took some time and a number of us decided to get in a few practice shots regardless. But what were you doing down that road?"

"Nothing," Yoshiko said hastily, "I was going to hang out with some friends but one of them brought their asshole boyfriend and ruined it."

"Yoshiko, can you please not use language like that?"

"Fuck that."

Tomoko sighed. "Very well, let us just-" Tomoko suddenly stopped and took a deep breath through her nose. "Why do you smell like alcohol?"

'How the fuck did she smell that?! I only had one beer?!'

"You've been drinking!?" Tomoko said, trying to be quiet and not cause a scene. "What are you thinking!?"

"I don't need to tell you a damn thing," Yoshiko said loudly, drawing a few stares.

"Yoshiko, I know our parents and school have been difficult but this will not help you. You are only going to make the situation worse."

"I don't care,"

"Please listen to me, I only want to help!"

"I said I don't care," she said, quickly turning to stare directly into Tomoko's eyes.

Even as Tomoko could see a veritable hurricane of emotions in her sister, Yoshiko's voice and face were shockingly calm. Tomoko took in a quick breath as she read the words within what her sister was feeling.

'Mom, dad, the teachers, sis, everyone has been telling me what to do and yelling at me when I can't or try something else. Making things worse? Good, at least I'm the one calling the shots.'

"Yoshiko, please," Tomoko pleaded, slow and quiet, "I just want to help, I just-"

Yoshiko put a hand on her sister's shoulder, silencing her.

"I don't care."

'Fuck off.'

Yoshiko shoved her sister back and turned to walk home, but through her storm of emotions, she heard a shout and realized that the people around her were staring at something, probably Tomoko.

'Even strangers pity her more than me.' Yoshiko knew that she was clearly more aggressive than Tomoko during that argument, but that wasn't going to calm her down at the moment. For some reason, she decided to turn around, even knowing that just looking at Tomoko was going to piss her off even more.

When Yoshiko turned around she saw.... a wall?

Extremely confused, Yoshiko reflexively took a step back before realizing it wasn't a wall.

It was a truck.

Her head turned on its own towards the front of the truck, where Tomoko lay sprawled on the ground. She wasn't moving.

Yoshiko's anger vanished in an instant. She wasn't sad, she wasn't scared, she didn't think or feel anything. Her body acted on its own.

She watched as her body bolted to her sister's side.

She watched as she screamed Tomoko's name until her voice was hoarse.

She watched as the paramedics drove them to the hospital.

She watched as her mother smacked her, demanding an explanation.

She watched as the doctor told her that Tomoko was comatose and that they didn't know when she would wake up.

She watched as her father roared at her, warning her of what would happen if Tomoko didn't wake up.

Yoshiko could only watch, desperately trying to understand where everything went so wrong.