Something My Brother Said, a fruits basket fanfic

Something My Brother Said

As I wandered to the place where my plants grew, I could not get my brother's words out of my head.

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

What had he meant by that? It was baffling. Something that would not exist without him? I was relatively certain that almost everything he could think of would exist if he had never been here.

I pondered it as I tended the plants, making sure all was well. Several were dying, but that was unavoidable. It was fewer than usual, so I didn't fret in the least. I didn't even enjoy doing this. My brother did not understand why I do it if I don't like to. But the logic makes perfect sense to me.

I am trying to change, to become someone better than who I am now. Can I make the larger changes if I cannot even put up with the little things? By starting small, I can truly change for the better. And so I tend my plants.

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

Typical nii-san. Saying something that was sure to get on my nerves and never leave me alone. I should just ignore his latest bit of babble.

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

I stroked a plant, thinking. Though there were surely many others like it, would this particular plant exist without my care? Maybe. But maybe not. Was this what he had meant by something that would not exist without him? Something that he himself created, though it was not the only one of its kind? Was my brother actually making sense for once in his life?

It would be pointless to think about it like this. The only thing I would accomplish would be a stunning headache. I certainly didn't need one of those. It would serve no good.

Slamming a lid firmly on that chain of thought, I stood and walked back toward the house without the plants I had gone to fetch for Honda-san. Realizing this, I ran back to get them. It would be a bad idea to disappoint Honda-san. I had no desire to see her do anything but smile.

I returned that night to think. Sleep was a lost cause when the lid I had placed on the subject broke shortly after I went to bed. Besides, it was relaxing, listening to the cool breeze play through the trees and feeling it on my face.

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

There it was again. The source of my insomnia. That simple sentence that was surprising in the sense it made. It was especially surprising that nii-san had been the one to say it. Why did it make me think so much about what I am doing? Was it because in fighting myself, I was creating a new being? A new Yuki that would not exist without the efforts of the old? Why did this sentence resonate in my very core, the foundation of who I was and who I wanted to be?

The wind continued to blow, creating an almost musical sound as it passed through the wood. A softer response came from the plants as they bent in the breeze. The plants that, through my brother's surprising logic, I had created.

Why was it so hard to simply ignore the questions? That was normally so easy for me to do, slam a lid onto what I didn't want to face. So why couldn't I do it now? Was it because the logic that I would have accepted from almost anyone else was coming from the least logical person in my life? Was that why it was so hard to do as I normally would and either accept or ignore?

It wouldn't do to dwell on this much longer. Not tonight, anyway. I was by no means a morning person to begin with, and lack of sleep would only make that worse. Already I looked to the next morning with dread, fearing the exhaustion that I knew I would face. And so I made a compromise with myself.

For the moment, I would accept this strange logic. Maybe I would talk it over with someone else, someone that occasionally made sense. But I wanted to accept it, somewhere deep inside of me. It was the fact that nii-san had said it that was holding me back.

Then I remembered something else. I was trying to become a new person. I was making every effort to understand nii-san, what he did, what made him act as he did. Maybe this meant I had finally taken a step in the right direction. Maybe my struggles were finally bearing fruit.

Maybe… just maybe. It was possible that I had finally begun to understand nii-san. It wasn't likely that I would ever truly understand him, but maybe I could understand a little. After all, wasn't the reason I was doing all manner of things I detested because I wanted to create a new me, one that wouldn't exist otherwise?

The wind turned even more musical than before.

I didn't believe all that much in spirits, even though I possessed by the Rat. However, even I could take a hint. Maybe I was moving in the right direction for once.

I continued to move in the right direction by returning to my room and going to sleep. Judging from the position of the moon, it was going to be a long morning when I woke up. At least it was a Sunday, so I didn't have to go to school.

It had been almost a year since those words were uttered, and still I could not get them out of my head. Such simple logic has the tendency to stick with a person.

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

A year after he said it, I thought I knew what he meant. He was doing his best to guide me. To show me how to find the self I had been attempting to create. And it took me a year to accept that.

I have been working more with plants since then. In fact, I was walking to check on them. I stooped down to check a leaf here, water a plant there, thinking all the while. Since then, fewer and fewer of the plants I kept had died. None of them were in danger, so I sat among them to continue thinking.

Since that day, a melody had woven its leisurely way into my head. A beautiful one, one that reminds me of that night I spent thinking about nii-san's odd logic. I thought about it for a while.

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

This was another thing that would not exist without me, this melody in my head. I vaguely thought that I should write it out sometime. I knew how, after all, and it couldn't take too much time.

As I thought, someone approached the place where I sat. "Yuki-kun! There you are!"

I knew that voice and nodded in its general direction. "Honda-san." All this time had passed, and I still could not bring myself to call her anything else.

She smiled. "You know, it wouldn't hurt you to call me Tohru."

I grinned. "You never know. It just might… Honda-san."

She sighed and shook her head, but I could have sworn I saw a small smile on her face. "Anyways, what are you doing out here?"

"Just… thinking." About something nii-san said, I added internally. I would never say that part out loud. I'd never hear the end of it.

"Oh. Well, Shigure-san is concerned, I think, and Kyo-kun is convinced you couldn't take any more and ran off."

I chuckled. Typical Kyo, thinking he might actually win this battle of wits between us. He couldn't know he was totally unarmed. "Well, it's about time the stupid cat was disillusioned. Let's go." And we walked back to the house.

Maybe I would write out that melody. It would be about time.

As I worked into the night, I mentally cursed myself. I had thought—naively—that it would be simple to write out that melody. What I hadn't accounted for were the countless mistakes that are a part of not being absolutely tone-perfect. It looked like it was going to take me all night to finish it. But I was determined. Maybe by doing this I would truly understand what my brother had meant all those months ago.

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

A year had passed, and I still did not know exactly what he had meant. But maybe this exercise in pointlessness would help me find out.

Countless mistakes later, I finally looked at the pages. They were incredibly sloppy and I would have to rewrite them later to rid them of the parts I had scratched out, maybe adding a harmony line. But it was done. I was holding in my hands a creation of my own. Something that would not exist without me.

I finally knew what my brother had meant. I finally knew the joy he felt in seeing the work of his own two hands coming together. Because now…

I saw something that would not exist without me.

Music would still exist, I had no doubt about that. But the odds were slim that anyone else could create something exactly like what I had created. This was what nii-san had meant.

Suddenly I was incredibly tired. That didn't surprise me, once I saw exactly how late it was. It was going to be a long day when I finally got up. But it was worth it, just this once.

As another wave of exhaustion hit me, I fell asleep on the desk, not even bothering to walk the five feet to my bed. Would I regret it in the morning? Absolutely. But I had no energy left, so I was in no position to change that.

When I woke up, I realized exactly how little I had slept. The exhaustion hit instantaneously. But I had to go to school, and so I forced myself to move.

Kyo, as was his habit, attempted to attack me before we left. The annoyance was dealt with quickly, wasting as little energy as possible. Of course, this concerned Honda-san, as normally I wouldn't be quite so abrupt with him.

I was in for it now. "What's wrong, Yuki-kun? Didn't you sleep at all?"

"Not really." I was in no mood to elaborate.

However, her mood was not agreeing with mine, as she pressed on. "Why not? What's going on?"

"I was just… thinking."

"About what? It's not like you to stay up all night thinking."

Sometimes I honestly hated morning people. This was one of those times. "Nothing in particular."

I could tell she was suspicious, but I didn't elaborate. There was no need for anyone to know what I had thought about exactly. Besides, if the information ever got to nii-san…

I'd never hear the end of it. I shuddered just thinking about it.

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

There it was again. Strange, I hadn't thought about it quite as much since I had accepted it. But I shook the thought away. By no means would I allow myself to be philosophical at this ungodly hour of the morning.

I knew I'd have to talk to Honda-san eventually. Nothing can dissuade her once she gets her nose in something. Besides, maybe I was meant to talk about it with someone.

But that didn't mean I had to talk just then. Not when Honda-san's morning-person personality would only serve to annoy me. As much as Honda-san could ever annoy me, that is. Which wasn't very much at all.

She was still looking at me curiously. "I'll talk later, all right?"

She smiled. "OK, Yuki-kun!"

And so we set off to school. It was going to be a long day.

It took a full week before I had to explain myself to Honda-san. By that time, I had created a simple harmony to accompany the melody and had acquired a small piano amidst Shigure's junk. She found me playing a small part of what I had created to see how it sounded.

"I didn't know you could play, Yuki-kun." I jumped, startled. I hadn't known she was there.

"I've never tried before."

She stared at me. "I don't believe you. You have to have played before for it to sound that good."

It was my turn to stare. "You… thought it was… good?"

"More than good. It was beautiful."

I couldn't believe my ears. She thought that something I had created was good?

She looked at the music I was reading now. "This is handwritten. Who…?"

I was silent. What was I supposed to say? 'Oh, by the way, I've been working on writing music for the past week?'

Apparently I didn't need to say anything, because she was looking at the papers, then at me. "You did, didn't you? This is why you've been so tired lately?"

My silence was answer enough for her. She stared at me and asked, "Why didn't you tell somebody?"

"I didn't see a need to."

She had difficulty replying to that. Finally she discarded it and continued, "Well, it's really pretty. What… what made you do it?"

This question was harder for me to answer, but I could tell that she wasn't going to leave me alone until I did. "I was thinking about… something nii-san told me a while ago, about why he did what he did."

She looked genuinely surprised. "Oh? And what was that?"

For the first time, I repeated out loud the words that had been repeating in my head for the past year, ever since they had been uttered: "I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

For a while Honda-san just stood there, looking at me. Then I guess it finally sunk in just who I had been listening to, for she said, "Wait! You actually listened to something your nii-san said? Oh, I'm so happy! You two are finally getting to know each other better!" Then she proceeded to forget entirely about the Sohma family curse.

A few moments later, I was Yuki the Rat.

She was clearly flustered. "Oh, I'm sorry! It's just… I'm so happy you and your brother are finally getting along!" Then she left me where I was, presumably so that I could change back in privacy. I was grateful for that. It wouldn't do to transform back into a human in front of her.

Epilogue: 10 Years Later

I was straightening up my desk when I came across a few papers yellowing with age. Curious as to what they were, I took a closer look. Then I froze, unable to move, barely able to think.

It was the song I had written all those years ago. I truly was a pack rat (no pun intended) to have kept this.

There was no time to be sentimental, however. I was running late. And so I stuffed the papers unceremoniously into my briefcase and went off to work.

Ironically enough, I had become a music teacher. Tohru, previously Honda-san, had married Kyo and we were still on good terms, though I did not see either of them very often.

Again, I tore my mind from the subject as I walked to my lesson. This young boy was one of my favorite students. I guess in some respects he reminded me of myself. Maybe that was why I was so uncharacteristically fond of him.

After another successful lesson (the boy had talent, another probable reason I liked him as a student), he looked up at me. "Sohma-sensei?" he asked tentatively. It was the first attempt he had made at conversation outside of a lesson.

"Yes?" I replied, feeling that I should go along with it.

"How come you like music so much? What made you pick being a teacher for a job?"

That was the first time somebody had asked me that, and the first time I had thought about it in a while. I actually had to think about how to answer his question for a moment.

He took my silence as a refusal to answer. "I'm sorry, Sohma-sensei, I shouldn't have asked—"

I cut him off gently. "It's alright. I just had to think for a little while. I'm going to answer, don't worry."

He looked hopeful. "And?"

"Well… I guess you could say that it was a piece of advice given to me a long time ago, something my brother said."

The words echoed in my head a final time:

"I wanted to see something that would not exist without me."

A/N: You have my humble thanks for reading my first fanfic ever. If you liked it, please please please please PLEASE let me know. You can do it. Just click the review button. Please? And even if you didn't like it, let me know how I can improve as a writer and click that review button. Seeing that I have reviews makes me all warm and fuzzy inside, no matter who they're from or their contents. Just... please? Pretty please? And if you have any ideas for future fics you can let me know too. I'll write almost anything, as long as I've read the manga/seen the anime/read the book.

Thanks for making an author's day!

Ember of the mutant penguins