A/N: Hey, it's been a while. I guess I haven't been inspired to write, no other reason like that. I recommend listening to Within Temptation's "What Have You Done" while reading this, because it fits. 'Course you don't have to.
Countless twisting, convoluted, poisonous thoughts running through Kyo's mind as he had raced away from the house, from Shishou, from…Tohru was "What have you done? What have you done, letting people get close to you? Can't let her see. Can't let her see the monster in you." Never mind that she wouldn't want to see him any more, not looking like this. All that they had was a distant friendship and the curse, the curse…a stupid "bond" needlessly chaining innocent people to an insane, maniacal tyrant who revelsin other's pain, and God knows he's loved inflicting pain on those who he's supposed to love the most.
Sure, Kyo's heard the rumors floating around when he lived with Shishou about Akito being raised rather controversially by Ren, in contrast to the previous head of the Sohma family's wishes, but he never believed a word. Akito was mean-spirited from the beginning, or at least as long as he'd known him, and being the cursed Cat, he didn't get very many opportunities to understand Akito's character. Now he didn't want to. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he wondered if Akito had something to do with Shishou pulling the beads from his wrist. It would be like him to hover close by, see the pain and damage inflicted, and then slink off to gloat over Kyo.
When Kyo was forced into the Cat's other form, he'd expected Tohru to act with disdain like Kagura had as a little girl, or with disgust as Akito had. It was to be expected. Anyone who had ever seen that hideous, bent form that smelled of thousands of rotting corpses had, especially his own mother. But no, Tohru was different, but Kyo had tried to force her away. Surely she was in shock from laying eyes upon him, because there was no way as long as Hell was still a molten inferno that she would voluntarily follow him, especially looking as bad as she did. His heart had sunk when he'd glanced at her clammy, green-tinged, beautiful face and come to the realization that she'd emptied her stomach of dinner. Such a waste of good food, he'd thought briefly.
And so, despite her words of assurance, he did what he did best: slash out at the one person who could have healed his heart, and the scent of blood heavily saturated around them. He knew right then and there that anything they could have had was over; ignoring the curse and his imminent confinement, Kyo had felt like he really could be falling in love with Tohru, or had he already? Either way, there was no way that she would ever want him now that he'd hurt her so badly, and that was his intention. Because, who could ever learn to love a monster, or so that sappy movie she'd made them watch once had said. Something along those lines.
A little piece of Kyo's heart had broken off at that moment, but then when she had returned and embraced both his hideous Other and regular human body, a larger part had healed over, and he knew why Shishou had wanted him to continue living at Shigure's house: Tohru was slowly, but steadily healing his heart from the long years of emotional abuse at the hands of the Sohmas, and the traumatic shock of seeing Kyoko killed right in front of his eyes. Such guilt he'd felt after the latter event, but now it was faded. The only real issue at hand was, of course, the Sohma family.
Now, he couldn't blame a lot of the family because he either didn't know them or they were also members of the Zodiac who—while not completely understanding his situation—knew what it was like to be on the outskirts of society. Yuki, especially, but he was a whole other matter entirely.
Yes, while he wasn't completely happy with how his life had gone, and how it was appearing to go, he was content enough to drift for a little while with Tohru and just enjoy life.
By the way, he loved being held as a cat in Tohru's arms. It felt like heaven.