Author: merrow - PG-13 - English - Drama - Reviews: 89
"Yuki-kun?"
His eyes opened again, and saw Tooru holding out something to his lips. He was lying flat again, and he didn't remember getting that way. He had something smelly rubbed into his chest that made him want to take deep breaths. Something medicinal in the smell seemed to keep him from coughing. "Yuki-kun, please drink this." Still half-asleep, he took the draught from her and drained it. It tasted nasty, and he gagged a little. Tooru hurried to give him a sip of water, then he lay back again trying to wake up. Something felt wrong in the attitude in the room. Kyou sat tense at the table. Honda was silent at the hearth.
"Honda-san?" he longed to have something hot. "Is there any tea?" He felt chilled and the fire looked as if it had just recently been built up. He moved to sit up.
Honda grabbed the teapot. "Aha...! I'll make some! Please don't get up! I'll get some water!" Tooru ran out of the room.
Yuki turned on his side to watch her leave, and caught Kyou looking after her with worry. "Something happened, didn't it? Were you seen?"
Kyou glared at him and banged the table, "OF course not! I'm not an idiot!" He looked down and clenched his fist again, looking like he wanted to pummel something. "There was a girl, in the market..." he opened and closed his fist, frustration evident. "She was showing off her school uniform."
Nothing more needed to be said. Yuki knew as well as Kyou how that would make her feel. The boys looked at each other, knowing that they were responsible, but at a loss as to how to fix the situation.
That night Yuki offered to move his pallet away from the others so they wouldn't catch his fever. Kyou's ears perked in surprise, but it Tooru who pointed out that he needed the additional heat more than any of them. The boys lay rigid staring at opposite walls. Tension had been building throughout the evening. Tooru pretended like there was nothing wrong, but both boys could tell otherwise. Afraid to make things worse, the best they could do was try not to bicker with each other. Honda started to tell Yuki of their trip into town. But when she mentioned meeting Kin, and the story of the boys at the pharmacy came out, Yuki snapped at Kyou asking where he'd been. Kyou started to snap back but glanced at Honda and bit it back. Any other conversation suffered the same fate, with both of them realizing they didn't know how to talk to each other with out fighting. As he stared at the wall opposite, Kyou wondered what Tooru was thinking. He knew she was in pain, but he never knew what was going on in her head. Yuki fixed his attention on the grooves of the boards that made up the shack and tried to think of some solution. He'd told Tooru that they were coming up here to think of something, but he'd hardly put any thought to it. He'd failed her and now she was hurting. Tooru finally slipped off to sleep and the boys soon followed.
The next morning Yuki awoke to find that she'd turned on her side to face him. He was surprised to see that she still asleep. Kyou was gone from his pallet, a look to the hearth told him he'd probably gone out for more wood. He took a moment to study her, and didn't like what he saw. There were faint streaks of dirt about her face and jaw, and dark smudges under her eyes. She looked thinner as well. Tooru was trying hard, but living in a shack on a mountain wasn't easy and it was beginning to tell on her. She was so susceptible to fevers; he worried what might happen if she fell ill.
Her eyes fluttered open, and she gazed at him as she struggled to fully wake. He smiled and felt his tender heart swell, "Good Morning, Honda-san."
* * *
"Honda-san." Tooru looked up from the breakfast she was making to Yuki, sitting at the table. Kyou looked inside from where he'd been doing his daily workout. They'd all been more or less silent since they'd awoken. "Honda-san, is there anywhere you'd like to go?" "Go?" Tooru blinked.
Yuki smiled gently, and tried to ignore Kyou's stare boring into his back. "Yes..." he took a sip of his tea, "I was wondering...if there was any place you ever wished you could go to, if you could go anywhere."
Tooru smiled, "I've been to so many places I never thought I'd get to go to. I've been to a lake, a hot spring, and now a mountain side!" She went back to stirring. "I can't think of any place else I'd like to go."
"Ahh..." Yuki glanced at Kyou, neck tense from trying to pick out just the right words, from trying to find just the right way to say this without hurting Tooru's already fragile feelings. Having the baka neko stare at him like he was trying to pull something wasn't helping. He sighed, and plowed on. "I meant more as if there was a place you've ever dreamed of living, if you could live anywhere."
"Live?" Tooru looked into her pot and stirred a moment, considering. "I'm where I want to be, with Yuki-kun and Kyou-kun." She beamed and began to serve breakfast.
Yuki looked up as she placed a bowl in front of him, and felt his breath catch in his throat. She smiled joyfully as she laid out breakfast, a soft fall of hair almost sliding off her shoulder. She wore the yellow ribbons he'd given her and one end fluttered a bit in the breeze from outside. Did they really make her so happy, just being with her? Could it really be that simple? He ate a bite of his breakfast and looked up to see Kyou glaring at him, and sighed. No, of course it could never be that simple, as long as the baka neko was involved.
After breakfast, Tooru went to the river to wash out the morning dishes. Kyou hung back watching Yuki. Yuki tried to be calm as he tidied a bit around the shack before going out to scrounge for food. The task had become easier as spring had really started to take hold of mountain. When Tooru had finally fallen out of sight he straightened and met Kyou's demanding glower.
Kyou met the challenge instantly. "What was that all about? What did you think you were doing?"
"Haven't you realized it yet, baka neko?" Yuki said carelessly, crossing and arm over his chest and slouching into an artfully casual pose. "We can't stay here forever. Soon the spring rains will come, and you said yourself the roof leaks."
Kyou drew back and flushed glancing over his shoulder to where Tooru had gone. Yuki continued, drawing his attention back, "Can you really expect her to continue living like this? What right do we have to ask that of her? We've got the money we withdrew from our bank accounts but that won't last us forever. We have to remember why we came here, to think of some solution."
"Solution? What solution!" Kyou exploded, "We can't go back, because if we do Hatori will-" he stopped and swore, he glared up at Yuki, "and if we go anywhere else...you know they'll find us. Do you really think they'll ever stop looking for us? That we could just set up house somewhere and be left alone?" He grabbed a hold of Yuki's collar and glared at him. "It doesn't work that way and you know it."
"So we just-" Yuki broke off and looked over the cat's shoulder. Kyou looked back automatically and saw Tooru looking at them in consternation, forgotten dishes dangling from her hands. Stepping back he looked at Yuki out of the corner of his eye, then down at his feet.
"We can't go back?" She looked back and forth between the two. "Not ever?"
Kyou reddened but couldn't meet her eyes. He knew that Tooru wasn't one to look forward, but surely she'd realized-
-that they couldn't go back? Yuki took a step forward, and spread his hands in explanation, "If we go back...Honda-san, they won't allow us to be together anymore. Your memories, they'll be erased. Because we disobeyed...Kyou and I..." Yuki broke off, he hadn't really thought past Tooru's memories being erased. Akito...Akito would be *furious* with him for running away. Already pale by nature, Yuki's face lost all color, and he felt the ice advancing through him.
"Yuki would probably be forced to move back to the main house," Kyou picked up, feeling him falter. Tooru turned to look at him, her eyes blankly staring, and he found himself similarly at a loss for words. Tooru's memories would be erased, Yuki would be isolated again at the main compound, which would leave him where? Out in the cold again. Outside again. Alone again. He drew his lip back in soundless grimace, and looked away.
"We'll think of something!" The boys looked up in surprise to see Honda's determined face. Clutching the still damp dishes to her chest, she closed her eyes and spoke quickly and emphatically. "Yuki-kun and Kyou-kun are both very smart, and I know we'll think of something. There are two sides to everything, good and bad! There's got to be a way. I know we'll find it. Mother taught me to believe, and I trust that we'll find a way, to be together." She opened her eyes and smiled tearily at them. "Together with Yuki-kun, and Kyou-kun, that's where I want to be. In a tent, in shack, in a house...together."
Yuki felt warm tendrils floating through is veins, connecting them all again, and found himself smiling back at her. Amazed himself at the reassurance he heard in his voice he said, "I understand."
"We'll find it. A way." Kyou found the determination in himself as he spoke the words aloud. A way...they'd find it, for sure.
* * *
Kyou awoke later that night knowing something was wrong. Something was out of place...something was missing. He looked at the wall and tried to place what it was. A chill up his spine caused him to roll over. Tooru wasn't there! She was gone! He moved to throw back the blankets and sit up when something grabbed his hand. He froze and looked over to see Yuki laying on his side staring at him. He had reached over the span where Tooru usually slept to grab him. He started to shake the mouse's disgusting touch off when Yuki held a finger to his lips and motioned with his eyes towards the hearth. Glancing up involuntarily he froze again, Tooru sat by the fire with her mother's picture in her lap. Her shoulders shook, and he knew she was crying.
"Mother," she whispered, and Kyou's heart constricted, "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry." She sniffled, "Kyou-kun and Yuki-kun, they are both trying so hard. I want to be with them, more and more, I want to talk with them and learn about them. But, Mother..." She wiped her eyes, "My goal was to become a high school student for you, Mother. I'm working hard, Mother; I'm trying to do as you taught me. I know I'm doing the right thing...but...I'm sorry...." Her hair trembled as she continued to shake.
"Tooru..." he whispered, and the girl turned in surprise. From the bed Kyou and Yuki looked up at her, concern and worry evident. She hid her face in her hands and shook her head. She hadn't wanted them to see this. Not even glancing at each other Kyou and Yuki slid from beneath the blankets and sat on either side of her. "Tooru..." Kyou said softly again, and rested his hand heavily on her head. She seemed to shrink, burying her face deeper into her hands.
"Honda-san," Yuki murmured, drawing her hair back away from her face and letting it run through his fingers. "Sshhh..." He continued to comb out her hair with his fingers as she cried the way a girl cries when she realizes that a dream is gone. She rubbed at her eyes with one hand, while her other dropped to splay loosely against the photo in her lap.
Kyou let his arm drop so that his hand rested on the crown of her head and the rest of his arm lay boneless and loose around her head and neck. Automatically she leaned her head towards him, lifting her chin. He lay his cheek down across her head, and closed his eyes, "You..." he sighed into her hair, lips tickling the back of her ear. "you don't always have to be strong."
Yuki lifted the hand in her lap as his other hand tangled in the hair by her waist. He rested his weight on an arm crossing over her legs, his shoulder leaning into hers. He kissed her wrist gently, and the hollow of her elbow before looking into her wide damp eyes. He laid his cheek against hers and breathed into her other ear, "Honda-san can do things slowly and in her own way." He curled her hand around his and held it to his chest.
Tooru sat between them, the warmth of their bodies seeping into her chilled form. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the pressure of the boys leaning into her. The boys felt a whoosh of tension blow out of Tooru as she released a breath she hadn't even realized she'd been holding. The three felt themselves go fluid and slack as the pressure flowed out of them. Feeling himself falling asleep, Yuki leaned back and looked into her face. Her eyes fluttered open then closed again, he looked up to meet Kyou's sleepy slitted look over the top of her head. Feeling languid and indolent, Kyou lifted his head and kissed the back of Tooru's ear. "Lets go back to bed..." She sighed a drowsy agreement and the three slid into their places in bed. With the creeping warmth flowing in and about them, the boys lay facing her, relaxed and unassuming. Tooru lay on her stomach, her hands flat against the pillow. With hardly a conscious thought the two boys each took a hand and drew it close as the three slid into sleep the heat streaming through them, making their hearts thrum to the same sleeping beat.
