Author's Notes:

I first began to write this as a one shot. It was a brief glance at Shizuru's past accompanied by a present analysis of why she fell for Natsuki. Readers suggested I continue, and so I decided to abide by their wishes.

On the second go-round I started to write a full-fledged fanfiction (my first). I deleted the accompanying paragraphs, and wrote eight more chapters. Each a small vignette of Shizuru's memory's and thoughts throughout her life and the HiME festival.

Many of the chapters will have slight to dramatic changes from the original eight chapters I wrote several months ago (if you should have happened to read them on Live Journal at that time).

A wonderful author I have the pleasure of knowing asked me what my motivation for writing this particular story was. At least this question was an easy one to answer. My intent was to provide a background for Shizuru's character, and the consequent motivating forces and psychological aspects that would help explain her later behaviors. In a way (to my mind), redeeming her, as I have seen many a scathing interpretation of her character. It may be that she is simply awful and selfish without justification other than she may have grown up taught that she could and should have whatever she wanted, this may have been the character designers idea when they created her. I find her to be one of the most compelling and mysterious characters none-the-less, and decide to think more kindly on her.

This takes place in an AU, thus not all facets are completely accurate in accordance with the HiME manga/anime.

There were several people who have found this particular story to be too angst-ridden when I originally posted it. If you don't like a dark sort of story, you probably won't want to read this.

'What did I do? Why am I to have a daughter instead of a son?! It's a curse, she's a curse...'

I'm not sure when I came to understand the words my father was saying, but those are the first words I remember understanding. I can suspect with quiet confidence that they were the first words that were ever spoken to me. I still hear them in my dreams, echoing, vibrating in my skull as the clang of a lead pipe hitting cement. The burning hatred in my father's eyes that would turn so quickly to pain made me believe that at any moment he might begin to cry openly. He never did. There were only footsteps moving away. My heart ached for him. I remember yearning so badly to take away that look, that pain I saw in him when I was near.

On an afternoon when I was younger, I returned home from school having borrowed some clothing from a male classmate. In my naivete, it had not occurred to me that there was much more in way of being a boy than to act and dress as one. For weeks I had observed carefully the mannerisms of boys and men, and this day I had felt certain I could be one for my father. He would see what I had done for him, and he would no longer be unhappy. For the first time he would smile at me instead of scowl. I have not yet had an experience to match the disappointment I felt on this day. I did not go inside to greet my mother as I would ordinarily. Instead, filled with hopeful thoughts, I waited in front of the house for my father to return home from his business.

My father is a powerful man. Our family is one of the oldest, and most respected in Kyoto. He heads a very prosperous business, and it had been his one desire to have a son who would one day take his place. They had tried for years to have children. It had been shameful to them, but they had even gone to see a specialist. They were told it was very unlikely they would ever have a child. Still my parents had continued to try, and for a brief moment they had believed a miracle had come to pass. The miracle was fleeting since it was I who was to be born, and not the son they so badly desired. I did not know all of this yet, and never heard from them personally. I learned it many years later from the daughter of my father's closest friend. She, who is much older than I, said she had heard our fathers speaking of it one evening while my mother was pregnant.

When my father saw me, he paused for a moment. Bowing deeply, I told him I would do my best to be an honorable son for him. There was no sound for a long time. I thought, surely he is too happy to speak. I raised my head hoping with all my being to see a smile, but there was no smile. His face was the shade of a japanese maple leaf, his eyes were dark, and he was shaking.

Before I could blink I felt a sharp pain on my scalp. I found myself scrambling to keep my feet under me as I was dragged into the house. My neck felt as if it would snap, and I gasped for breath as I thudded to the floor in front of my mother.

'What is this!", my father had hissed.

My mother looked at me for a moment, and then turned away. As I heard the thunder of my father's footsteps fade, I began to cry softly. When I tried to push myself up, a knifing pain seared through my entire arm. Yelping, my tears began to flow more freely.

'Okasan...', I called to my mother.

'You shame us,' she whispered.

At that moment, it felt as if every bit of life, every bit of blood in my body drained. I gave up. Wilting, I crumpled up on the floor like an old rag. I shed youth and left it there, a cicada's shell. The husk of a child.

'I wish you had never been born.'

She said this under her breath. Perhaps she thought that I couldn't hear. My thoughts raged through my mind as I padded silently to my quarters.

I wished it too, Okasan, I wished it too...