Author: merrow - PG-13 - English - Drama - Reviews: 89
Tooru felt as if her bones where lined with lead. She felt like she gained a 100 pounds while she slept. It took a supreme effort to raise her head off the pillow and force her weighted eyelids to open. For once she was the last one to wake. Yuki sat in the back of the shack at the table staring into a cup of untouched tea before him. Someone had pulled back the dripping blanket over the door, and weak sunlight fell through it. Kyou stood out side, going through his morning work out. Both boys seemed to be resolutely ignoring the others presence. The same heavy feeling hung heavy over the shack. Tooru felt like she was drowning in it, being dragged down by its cumbersome weight. Maneuvering herself up onto her elbow, Tooru resolutely wiped the sleep out of her eyes.
"I'm sorry, I overslept. I'll get up right away and make breakfast."
"Ah, Honda-san," Yuki turned and gave her a smile, "Its okay for you to sleep in. I'll make breakfast." He stood and picked up a couple of the rain catchers they'd laid down the night before. They'd need to be emptied and washed before anything else could be cooked.
"Yeah, and then we'll all die..." Kyou muttered punching at the air. If he'd had cat ears they'd have been flat against his skull. He glared at the scenery opposite him, and put a bit more energy into his next punch.
"Did you say something, Baka Neko?" Yuki's voice was frosty as he walked to the doorway. Leaning against it with artificial casualness he sent a challenging glare out at the cat.
All too eager to respond, Kyou turned to face him, fists clenched. "You know as well as I that you can't cook worth spit. You want to make something of it?"
Letting his mouth twitch up into a slight parody of a smile, Yuki stepped forward and with a quick flick of his wrist cast the cold water from the containers in his hands over Kyou. "It's too early to be so hot headed. Why don't you cool down?" He closed his eyes and made to walk past the cat towards the stream. Kyou stood for a second in amazement, icy water dripping down him. He wiped a hand over his face and looked at the wetness on his hands in astonishment. He couldn't believe that the damn mouse had just done that!
His face contorted with rage and he leaned forward to grab Yuki's shoulder, "KUSO NEZUMI!" He spun Yuki to face him, and knew as he threw his punch that today, finally, he'd get him right in the face, right between the eyes, a nice satisfying crunch. Instead Yuki used his momentum against him stepping just enough for the side for the punch to whiz by. Again. But something didn't go according to his plan. The ground was soft and mushy from the rain the day before, and the foot the mouse had rested most of his weight upon suddenly found itself in squishy muddy patch. His feet slid out from under him and fell heavily on his side, banging into Kyou's legs as he went.
Kyou felt his legs cut out from beneath him and he too tumbled to the ground on top of Yuki. Both slimy with mud, the cat was the first to recover. Realizing the mouse was trapped below him he brought his fist up and pounded it down. It connected with a solid thump against Yuki's face, though not as hard as Kyou would have liked due to lack of leverage. Yuki pushed up against Kyou knocking him back and not even bothering to get up he threw a punch of his own. It knocked Kyou's head back, but he quickly snapped it around to glare at Yuki. Yuki glared back, deliberately not getting up, baiting Kyou to attack. He obliged lunging at the mouse even faster than he had expected him to. They grappled viciously in the mud. This was different from their other fights. Before they had been full of grace and almost methodical, controlled. This was a *brawl*. This wasn't a fight to see who could win, to see who was better, this was a fight to inflict as much damage as possible on the other person. They didn't bother with the usual slings and gibes; the fight was terrifyingly silent. The air was filled with thick meaty thuds, and gasps of breath. Tooru had run to the doorway as the fight began, shocked and befuddled. Kyou-kun and Yuki-kun were hurting each other, really hurting each other! She couldn't bear to watch it.
She ran out of the shack, and hesitantly moved towards them. This was scary. She couldn't help but wince as she heard another punishing smack against some bit of tender flesh. She opened eyes she hadn't realized she'd squeezed shut. "Ano..." Her voice quavered, "Yuki...kun...Kyou...kun," The boys didn't seem to be aware of her at all. She reached a trembling hand towards them, but held it back. They were both coated with mud churned up from below them. It seemed to transform them into dark frantic strangers squirming and struggling. She had to stop this. "Ano..." she stepped forward.
Kyou reared back, fist poised to ram down on Yuki's slight form below him. Tooru barely managed to avoid an elbow to the face, she didn't manage to escape Yuki's foot as it lashed out from beneath Kyou looking for leverage to throw the boy off. With a surprised shriek she felt her feet slid out behind her. Landing face down with a hard "smack!" in the mud, she lay unmoving.
Yuki and Kyou looked at her in shock. Completely forgetting their fight, they scrambled through the slippery mud towards her. Each grasped one of her arms and helped her to sit up. They helped to support her as she coughed, and spat out bits of mud and grass. Apparently her mouth had been wide open when she fell. Pulling her hands away and bracing them against the ground she took a deep breath and coughed again. She made an awful face and spit tried to spit the last few stubborn pieces of grass out of her mouth, making little "Pthspt" noises. She heard Kyou make a sputtering coughing noise, and forced her mud-caked eyes open. She looked at wonder at the boys before her. Even under the mud they were a mess, their clothes were torn, and their hair stuck out at all angles. Both boys sported bruises, scratches, swellings and goose eggs. Kyou had a terrific start to a black eye, and Yuki's nose was bleeding. But that wasn't the amazing thing. Kyou looked like he was holding his breath and was about to pass out from lack of oxygen. Yuki couldn't seem to meet her eyes, looking past her shoulder with a glazed look. He held a curled finger over his mouth, seemingly to keep his lips shut.
Tooru suddenly realized what she must look like. Her front looked as if someone had taken a giant paint roller and coated her with muck. Her hair was sloppy with loose, dripping mud and bits of grass. Even her eyelashes were caked with it. She felt a bit of mud and grass fall from the tip of her nose.
She slapped her hands down in front of her in the mire with sticky "splorps". Touching her forehead to the ground in a formal bow, she blurted. "I'm sorry!" Not waiting on an answer or seeming to care that her hair splayed out in the gooey muck, she kept her head down let out a rush of words. "I'm sorry I was so careless yesterday morning! I'm sorry I laughed! I'm sorry I made Yuki-kun and Kyou-kun uncomfortable! Please laugh at me now in compensation!" She seemed to press herself lower, "Please! I want Kyou-kun and Yuki-kun to feel comfortable again! I'm sorry I'm such an idiot and keep making a mess of things-"
"Honda-san," Yuki's voice had a laughing lilt to it. "Honda-san please get up." He leaned back on one arm and started to run his hand through his hair but stopped when it got stuck in the mud there. "Honda-san did nothing wrong, you don't make us uncomfortable."
Tooru lifted her head out of the mud with a loud sucking noise and looked up at the boys, "Really?" There was a thick clump of mud now securely fastened to her forehead, looking like a little horn.
Yuki choked, and sputtered and then finally gave in and let out a laugh. "Yes, really." He sat back in the mud, legs splayed out and hands between his knees and smiled. It was the first honest and true smile Tooru had seen in days. She couldn't help but respond and smiled happily back at him.
"You..." Tooru turned to look at Kyou. He too had made himself comfortable, his legs folded loosely in front of him, he rested his weight on a hand behind him. He wiped down his face with one hand and flicked bits of mud off of his face. He flashed a surprisingly white smile out of his dirty streaked face, "You...I don't understand how you think at all."
Tooru cocked her head to the side, and touched her cheek with a thoughtful finger, "Am I really so strange?" Her little mud horn started to tilt and slide down the side of her face.
* * *
Once the humor had worn off they were left with the problem on how to deal with the mess they'd made. The boy's clothes had mud practically ground into it. Yuki's shirt was deemed as unsalvageable. The big rents that had been torn in it during the fight were too difficult and large to bother repairing. Besides getting the clothes clean there was the problem of getting themselves clean. Before now they'd been washing up in the icy stream, doing as much as they could without being able to take a full bath. Nothing would do but to fully douse themselves and scrub to get the sticky mud off. The three looked at the stream in dread. Tooru shivered. It originated somewhere further up the mountain, and it was *cold*!
Yuki saw her shiver and instantly knew what she was thinking. "Perhaps we could boil some water..." he suggested. It would be a lot of hard work to get enough water from the stream to the shack though, and they didn't have anything big enough to bathe in anyway.
Kyou coughed, blushed furiously and said, "well, there is a place..." then trailed off.
"A place?" Yuki asked, trying not to itch one of the long scratches on his arm. He couldn't recall when he'd ever gotten this beat up while fighting with the baka neko. He'd certainly never gotten this dirty.
"A hot springs, a little up the mountains..." Kyou blushed some more, and spoke to Yuki, "Its kind of...small." He carefully avoided looking at Tooru, picking at a piece of mud his leg.
"Oh, small." Yuki thought wistfully of a nice hot bath. But small meant, he glanced at Tooru. Small meant too close.
Tooru clapped her hands and smiled. "I'll got get some towels, and some clean clothes. I wish I had some plastic bags, then I could take Mother to a hot spring again." She scampered off leaving two bemused boys behind. They looked at each other, then away, unwilling to share a common feeling even if it was embarrassment.
"How small is small?" Yuki asked Kyou as they resignedly, and with no little trepidation, started up to the hot springs.
Kyou looked back at Tooru who was studying each step she took carefully while trying to keep up with the boys at the same time. As a result she kept lagging further and further behind. "There are two springs really, but they're in plain sight of each other." Yuki and Kyou were leaving a trail of flaking mud behind them. Awkward or no they were both looking forward to getting the itchy grime off of them. Kyou scratched his ear, and looked sideways at Yuki. "That person..." he checked to make sure Tooru wasn't too far behind them and paused at tree to let her catch up a bit. "...just doesn't think things through."
"If she did, she wouldn't be here." Yuki said and dropped back to help Tooru who had gotten her foot caught between a couple of roots.
They came up to the springs hidden deep in the in the forest on the mountain. It was barely midday, but it was dark with the sun shining weakly through the trees thick with new leaves. There were two springs, a small one above that flowed in a tiny waterfall into a small pool just below. Steam rose from the spring making the air sparkle and waver.
"Uwaaah!" Tooru stood between the boys smiling happily at the springs. "We can wash up in the bottom spring then soak in the top spring without getting the water dirty!" She smiled up at the boys looking back and forth between them. "If we leave our muddy clothes soaking under the waterfall they'll be easier to wash later on."
Yuki smiled down at her, "Honda-san can go first." He absently picked at some mud in his hair. "We'll wait until your done."
"But-" Tooru started.
"Don't worry. We won't peep. We're not like Shigure." Kyou blushed and looked away. He cursed the heat rushing to his face. He may say he wasn't like that perverted dog, but his own face was betraying him.
"Ok." Tooru shone at the boys, "I'll wash up first, then go up to the top. When Kyou-kun and Yuki-kun finished washing up..." she paused and blushed, "you can come to the top to soak too. I'll leave the towels here." She laid the towels a little back from the spring, near a rock that was an easy step up to the second spring. She looked at the two boys expectantly. They looked back at her with glowing faces. She'd brought enough towels that they'd be able to wear the towels into the spring. But they'd still be practically...*naked*. They looked at each other for a long moment.
"Umn.." Tooru flushed and looked down, fiddling with a button on her soiled sleepwear. "I'm going in now."
"Ah, of course, Honda-san." Yuki smiled and grabbed Kyou's arm. "We'll wait over here." Kyou quickly shook off his arm but followed Yuki to a rock under a clump of trees. They steadfastly stared at the trees as they heard a rustle of clothes. Kyou felt like his skin was stretched tight over his frame. He was sure that if someone tried they could bounce a coin off of him. Yuki shivered as he heard a small, pleased noise that indicated Tooru had entered the heated waters. He shivered again as he listened to her splash in the small spring. He felt like he was over-heating but he couldn't stop the tremors the little sounds made. Both boys felt like their stomachs were filled with a kettle full of moths.
"Ah!"
Kyou started to turn at the slight cry of pain. Yuki's hand lashed out and grabbed his shoulder. "DON'T LOOK." Kyou looked at the other boy and stopped. The mouse's face was blank, and he looked like he was going to shatter. Kyou wondered if he looked as strange as him, he certainly felt it. "Are you alright, Honda-san?" Kyou had to give the mouse credit, he only sounded a little strained. Kyou felt like he was going to fly into a million pieces.
"Yes!" Tooru's voice sounded a little pained. "I just stubbed my toe on a rock. Sorry for being so clumsy. I'm almost done!" Yuki and Kyou shared another long look, for the moment willing to suffer together.
Kyou made a disgusted noise under his breath, "She can't be serious."
"Honda-san..." Yuki sighed and looked up into the trees, "Honda-san doesn't make jokes."
"Che...I know that." Kyou looked at Yuki, "but we can't really..." he looked back down at his feet, "we just can't."
Yuki caught Kyou's eye and raised a wry eyebrow, "Are you going to tell Honda-san that?" A ridiculous question, like either of them could ever say no to her. But then, that was the point wasn't it?
* * *
Tooru slid carefully into the top pool, and checked to make sure her towel hadn't slipped as she settled in. "Mother," she thought, "I'm afraid." She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair, she wasn't used to it hanging wet as she soaked. Usually she tied it up, but she'd forgotten her ribbons. "I don't want what happened this morning to happen again." She thought again of the boys roiling in the mud. Their fight had been chilling and desperate. She didn't understand what made them want to fight that way. Sometimes it felt like she was learning so much about them and getting so close. And then...then something like today happened. "Mother, I'm so confused."
Keeping her back carefully turned away from the little spring below her she called to the boys. "Yuki-kun and Kyou-kun can come in now."
Yuki and Kyou looked up to make sure that she was truly looking away and then quickly shucked off their muddy clothes. Quickly stepping into the warm water, the dunked and scrubbed themselves to rid themselves finally of the mud. When they at last felt refreshed and squeakily clean the boys glanced at each other and at the towels. Kyou swallowed, it was time to go up *there*. Well, he wasn't going first; he didn't want to seem too eager. Let the Prince look like he was about to pounce. Yuki lifted himself from the water with a sigh, he glanced at Honda's back where she sat plaiting her hair. They couldn't just leave her sitting there. He wrapped a towel around himself and walked up to the little spring. Kyou scrambled to follow.
"Honda-san, we're coming up now."
Tooru started at Yuki's voice and glanced down, half finished braid in her hair. The boys were looking down at the rocks careful not to slip on the slippery stones and clutching their towels to keep them from falling. Tooru blushed and looked back at the water. She didn't know why she should be embarrassed. She'd been able to see more of them in their swim trunks. She self-consciously adjusted her towel. And she'd certainly seen more of them whenever they transformed. Kyou and Yuki quickly slid into the obscuring water. The top spring was smaller than the bottom one, and it was obviously where the hot water was coming up. It burbled and steamed like a little hot tub. All three were carefully not looking at each other as they let the hot water relax their aching bodies. Yuki let out a little gasp as he dropped one of his arms into the water. He lifted it out quickly. That stung!
"Ah! Yuki-kun is bleeding!" Tooru scootched forward to examine his arm. The long scratches that Kyou had given him on his arm were loosening in the hot water and beginning to ooze a little blood. Yuki blushed furiously at her proximity. She looked up at him from the scratches, "Yuki-kun is all red! Is the water too hot? Maybe you should sit on the edge for a minute to cool down."
Yuki smiled weakly, "N-no, no. I'm alright." He made to take back his arm from Tooru's grasp, but she didn't let go.
"Let me wash out your cuts, we don't want them to get infected." She reached over and grabbed one of the left over towels on the bank. Tearing a strip off she wet it and began to clean Yuki's wound.
Well, *she* didn't want it to get infected. Kyou hoped it would swell up and rot off the mouse's whole damn arm. He glowered at his hands. His knuckles were cracked and split. He hadn't even started the fight this time. And his eye hurt, damn it. He glanced up, and stared at the two across from him. Tooru's face looked so gentle as she carefully bathed Yuki's hurts. Kyou slid further into the water, till his nose rested just above the surface. She finished daubing up and down Yuki's arm and moved to a spot on his collarbone that had been abraded. The simple concentration and concern that radiated from her face as she worked made something go funny in Kyou's stomach. He found himself staring at her long fingers as they gently moved from hurt to hurt over Yuki's pale skin. He could almost feel ghost fingers touching him in those same spots his concentration was so high. He glanced at Yuki and felt a shiver go through him. He'd never seen the mouse look so unguarded, ever. Not even when they were children. Yuki was following Tooru with his eyes a gentle smile playing about his lips. His eyes didn't seem to leave her face and she didn't notice his stare in her focus on his injuries.
"There." Tooru sat back and smiled at Yuki. "All done."
"Thank you, Honda-san." Yuki's blush had faded, leaving burning spots on his cheeks. He felt so deliciously warm. He smiled back at her, he thought he must look foolish, but he couldn't keep the grin away.
Tooru looked over her shoulder and beamed at Kyou. "Kyou-kun's turn!"
Kyou sat up straight. "What?!" He backed up a bit as Tooru advanced. "I'm fine!" He put a hand up in a "keep back" gesture.
"Kyou-kun was hurt too." She took his hand in hers, and ran her fingers over his split knuckles. She gently held it just over the water and used her little cloth to clean out the cuts and abrasions. Kyou sucked in his breath as she moved closer to attend to some scratches on his shoulder. "Ah!" She looked up at him, "Did I hurt you?"
"N-no. It's fine." He knew he had to be glowing in the dark his blush was so bright. Tooru bent her head and went back to work. She carefully catalogued and cleaned out every hurt. Kyou couldn't keep his eyes off her. Her skin seemed to shine. Now he knew what kept Yuki's fascination. It was like she was made out of spun gold. It was like she wasn't real. Her face had an inward look of concentration. She didn't seem to be aware of him as a person at all. The things she was doing, the places she was touching, was so intimate. But the casualness was what took his breath away. Is this how it was with other people? Did normal people get to have this all the time? She sat closer and began daubing at the painful bruise around his eye. He closed his eyes and enjoyed her light touch on his face. He tried to remember if he'd ever been touched that way before. He opened his eyes as she pulled away after daubing at a small cut over his bruised eye. He found himself looking straight into her face. His eyes flicked over her face, and finally back to her eyes. "All done?"
Surprised at the frankness of the stare, Tooru flushed and nodded. "Yes, all done."
"Your turn!" Kyou plucked the cloth out of Tooru's hands.
"EH?" Tooru backed up in the water quickly. She felt hands on her shoulders and looked back at Yuki. He peered close at her face.
"I thought so from before." His eyes flicked to Kyou's. "A little scratch, here." His delicate fingers lifted up the bangs above her eyes and pointed out a small red scratch.
"And here." Kyou grabbed a wrist, and showed Yuki a thin scratch going up the arm. "I think she got it from one of the bushes on the way up here."
Tooru stammered and protested, eyes wide, but the boys wouldn't hear anything of it. Kyou set to work with the little cloth, washing out her little scrapes and cuts. "We don't want these to get infected." He threw her words gently in her face.
"Ah, Honda-san, a piece of grass." Yuki plucked a small fragment out of her hair. "Hold still, there's more." He gently un-plaited her hair, and ran his fingers through it, catching bits and pieces of debris that she had missed. Both boys felt as if this was the most natural thing to do. Something had loosened in them as Tooru tended to their wounds, some healing had gone on more than she had intended. Each had felt precious, perhaps for the first time in their lives. Yuki thought back to Kyou's face when Tooru had tended him. He had felt languid and loose, all his muscles slack. He felt half awake like those dreaming times when he wandered around the house still asleep. He felt careless and free. He had watched Honda tend to the cats wounds and had been caught up in light dappling through the trees in her hair. He's glanced up to Kyou and had been caught by something else entirely. Kyou had looked.... amazed, wondering, awed. Awed, that was it exactly. Yuki had felt a sudden strong connection with the cat. When he looked at her, he felt *awed*. Awed that someone like her existed, that someone like her was by his side. That someone like her cared...for him. For us, a little voice in his head. She cares for me, she cares for him, we care for her. It was logical. It made sense. He knew the cat was feeling it too, the warmth, the freedom. He tried to braid her hair back up but fumbled with it. Losing track of which way the hair folded a time or too he finally he managed to finish it off. It was messy, but it was done. He sighed.
"Sorry Honda-san, I'm no good at this kind of thing." Tooru sat with her eyes squeezed shut and her shoulders hunched. She had a scrunched up but pleased look on her face.
Kyou made a tsking sound looking at Yuki out of the corner of his eye, "You need more training." He sat back, and flicked his eyes over Tooru before rolling his eyes towards the trees. "I think I've gotten everything. You've got to be more careful. You're too clumsy," he scolded. "Most of those scratches weren't from today." He tossed the cloth up onto the rocks outside the pool. Somehow they'd all slid close. Kyou's arms rested on the rock ledge behind them, his elbow just behind Tooru's head. Yuki leaned back against the rocks behind him, his hands limp in his lap. All it would take was a little lean to the right and his shoulder would be leaning against hers.
"I was scared." The boys froze, Kyou staring at the trees Yuki looking into the water. Perhaps they'd been too forward? But it had been so comfortable... Her shoulders hunched a little as she slid herself a little further down in the water. "Kyou-kun and Yuki-kun...looked so strange." Kyou lightly touched a bruise spreading across his chest. Yes, today's fight had been different. Yuki lifted his head to look at the branches swaying above them. Honda kept her head down, face red. "When Yuki-kun and Kyou-kun fight...my heart beats fast. But today," Tooru's head ducked down lower, and tears pricked in her eyes, "my heart felt like it stopped." She covered her heart with her hand, "I don't know how to talk about this, I'm afraid that I may be saying something I shouldn't...but...Kyou-kun and Yuki-kun were so scary. I thought that someone was going to get very hurt, and I was afraid. I don't understand..." Kyou slid his arm off the ledge and into the water. He watched her tremble as his hand almost touched the back of her neck. He glanced at Yuki, but the mouse was staring fixedly into the trees. Kyou looked back at Tooru, and saw her bite her lip, "I wish I could understand. I want to understand Kyou-kun and Yuki-kun. I want to know all about them. I know that I don't always know how to act, and that I sometimes make you uncomfortable...but..." She shook her head. "I'm sorry."
"Honda-san," Yuki started, then stopped looking down into the water, he sighed and forced himself to continue. "Honda-san doesn't make us feel uncomfortable. Honda-san is a great comfort." A comfort? She was everything to them. How could she not see that? "Don't ever doubt that."
"You..." Tooru looked up at Kyou. He glared down at her, "Not everything is your fault! Sometimes we get into a bad mood or fight, but that doesn't mean that you did something wrong." Why did she always try to take everything on her shoulders? "Che" He dropped a heavy hand on her bowed head, "Idiot."
Yuki leaned his head on her shoulder, feeling tired. How could she be so honest? Each time he tried to tell her something of how he felt for her, it was like a huge effort. Like dredging up rocks from the bottom of a deep dark mine. He sighed she was worth the effort. "I'm sorry if we scared you. Honda-san," he could get the words out, he was sure of it. He knew he didn't have the right to say them. That he didn't deserve someone like her to be with him. But the warmth spreading between them had loosened something inside him; some door inside had come open. He didn't even care if the baka neko was listening. Wasn't this what he had been working towards saying? He closed his eyes and let his weight lean against her a little more. "Honda-san is the most important person to me."
Kyou looked at Yuki in shock. He couldn't believe the mouse had so much courage. Tooru's head moved under his hand as she leaned to rest it against Yuki's. Her face was bright and flushed, but she looked happy. Kyou started to draw back, his hand sliding away from her head. Tooru took hold of it and lifted her head to rest against it against her cheek.
"Kyou-kun..." She said softly, a dreamy look on her face, her eyes slid away from Kyou back to Yuki, her face red and glowing, "...and Yuki-kun...are the...*most* important people...to me." She smiled again, then fainted and fell face first into the water.
