The guilt had never fully left, even months after Yoru had given her blessing.
Saori had settled into the household, had grown comfortable with the teasing rhythm she'd established with everyone, had even allowed herself, slowly, to acknowledge her feelings for Kaito openly rather than hiding them. But something in the back of her mind kept returning, periodically, to the same uncomfortable question: was she allowed to actually be happy about this, given who she'd fallen for and through what doorway she'd entered this family?
It surfaced again on an ordinary evening, watching Yoru and Kaito in the kitchen, easy and affectionate in the particular way of people whose relationship had survived a confession and an alley and months of quiet building. Something tightened in Saori's chest, watching it — not jealousy exactly, but a renewed flare of the old guilt, the sense that her own feelings were an intrusion on something that had already been complete before she arrived.
