Disclaimer: I'm going to form the assumption that, seeing as how you've clicked on this, you are fairly familiar with the manga, Fruits Basket. Then you should already understand that I do not own said manga. Fruits Basket belongs to Takaya Natsuki; I am merely borrowing Kureno... for a night or two. Or three.
Also, it would be fair to warn you that this fic will contain spoilers for chapters 97 + in the manga. Just throwing that out there.
Delicate snowflakes drifted down onto the city streets, only scattered, whispy winds to alter their course. The faint, beautiful ringing of the bells at the Shinto shrine rang through the air: one hundred and eight to relieve the masses of their sins, their human nature; voices, turned to forgiveness.
Yasukawa Yume hated New Years. She hated everything about it, from the memories it brought back to the wounds it reopened. Even the moon, a brilliant, gleaming pearl, full of beauty and calming, could not take away the horrible flashes, the terrible recollections of a broken girl. The memories of that boy.
She hardly remembered him, really, except for the few, painful moments she'd burned subconsciously into her psyche. But she remembered his shape, his beautiful, russet eyes, his soft, nervous voice... She remembered the way she loved him, for as much as she understood what love really was.
She remembered his secret, too. And the day he went away. The day he told her that he couldn't like her anymore...
As much as she wanted to, she could never really forget. How could she? That boy, beautiful, enigmatic, tranquil... He was everything she wanted, everything she needed. Everything she needed in someone else, everything she couldn't have in herself.
Souma Kureno: The boy with wings.
Souma Kureno could hear the bells ringing, the voices from inside the banquet hall; he could still hear the sounds of the koto playing in his mind, beautiful and mocking. He could still feel Shigure's hands dragging him through their dance like a burden that he couldn't wait to cast away.
Outside in the cold, frozen world, he sat on the porch, snowflakes headed on a soft, steady descent, his breath coming out as steam in the frigid winters chill. In the back of his mind, he wondered how it was going inside. He wondered if Akito noticed he was missing, or if she didn't even care. He supposed it didn't matter, though... Whatever made her happy was fine with him.
Inside of his mind, there were so many memories of past banquets, both good and bad. Every year, it was always the same, though, and it had been since he was thirteen: the feeling of being an outsider, no longer belonging to their intimate circle, no longer mattering...Terrible, lonely feelings.
Memories of banquets from before his curse lifted were much, much different: The feeling of inclusion and sometimes even happiness, sometimes even content. Even if he was just normal back then, just like any of the others...
He'd only missed one banquet in his life, when he was eight. That was the year her parent's died; Yasukawa-chan's parents. He'd stayed with her in the park until she'd stopped crying... until he stopped crying, too.
He remembered her so vividly it was as though he saw her every day. Even so... it had been fourteen years. Far too long to consider themselves to still be friends, but not long enough to consider themselves strangers. Not long enough, not yet.
A maid stepped onto the porch- he could tell by the sound their shoes made. "Kureno-san, what are you doing out here? You'll catch cold... Come inside, now. Akito-san wants you with him."
He still saw her in his mind, even past Akito, even if the thought of that really being true absolutely alarmed him. She was still there... It wasn't too late, was it?
Was it?