Yuki had not brought anyone home in three years.
Her parents had noticed.
They had noticed the way parents notice things their children don't tell them — not through being told, but through the accumulation of small signals. The way she held herself at family dinners. The way she answered questions about school with information but not feeling. The way she had become, somewhere around second year of high school, quieter in a specific direction.
Not sad. Not broken. Just — contained. A door closed that had previously been open.
They had asked, once, carefully.
She had said: "I'm fine. School is busy."
They had believed the first part and not pushed on the second.
They were her parents. They had learned, over seventeen years, that Yuki's doors opened on her schedule and not anyone else's.
They had waited.
Three years.
She told them on a Sunday morning.
