New Moon Bride
Once Upon a Time
The Kamiyas had been well established in the area long before Kaoru had been born. After years of struggle, sweat and blood, a respectable temple and dojo were built their name in the Western part of Kyoto. The family line was an ancient one that consisted of several very affluent and influential people. At one point in time, the Kamiya name was considered to be blessed by good fortune. No one ever suspected that one small, dark haired, blue eyed girl of the family would be the source of such misfortune.
Things remained steadfast in the Kamiya household until one fateful morning when Kaoru turned ten. That year, there was an accident on an overpass bridge which resulted in one pedestrian fatality. Visitors of the temple and students of the dojo noticed the sad look in the older Kamiya's eyes as he went about his duties that day, uninterrupted by his overly cheerful wife. Kaoru never asked how it happened, but knew, while her mother was being rushed to the hospital, that she would not see her again.
After a long day at school filled with the relentless questions of children, Kaoru returned home with tears in her eyes. She ran to her father and asked why her mother had to be the one to pass away, hurt and angry tears streaming down her face. With a watery smile, he answered that she had been called away early to go to heaven. He was unable to say anything else while staring into the vulnerable face of his daughter.
As Kaoru grew up, she outgrew the stories her dear mother once read to her, as well as the childish explanation offered by her father. His once tearful smiles filled with a profound sorrow began to turn into scowls accompanied by biting and callous words. He began to divulge with hateful sneers that the accident had been caused by an animal crossing the overpass her mother had been walking on. A driver swerved to avoid hitting it and instead end up hitting Kaoru's mother.
Kaoru quickly learned that it was not a topic open for discussion and came to the bitter conclusion that not all endings were happy ones.
(-)
Kaoru paced around her room, glancing nervously at the clock that hung on her otherwise bare walls. The cordless phone she gripped in her hand rang once before she answered it. "Misao. It's me, Kaoru," she said into the receiver, nails clicking against the plastic as she drummed her fingers over the phone.
"Oh! Hey, Kao!" A high, crystalline female voice sounded from the other end of the line. "Funny thing you should call… I was just out shopping and I saw this gorgeous man walking-"
"I have to make this quick because of the time," Kaoru interjected, forgoing the manners instilled into her by her strict father. "Can I spend the night at your place?" she asked, tone hopeful.
There was a small hum of understanding before Misao spoke again. "So it's a new moon again?" she was inquiring more to herself than to Kaoru, who smiled timidly over the phone. "You know you're always welcome over here." Misao nodded her head, despite knowing that Kaoru would be unable to see the movement. "I mean…" she pondered, plopping down on the turquoise comforter on her bed. "You've been coming over since… How long?" she asked.
"Since I was ten," Kaoru answered hurriedly, looking at the clock once more. "I have to go. I have some chores to finish before I head over to your place," she mumbled, picking up a light duffel bag from the floor and swinging it over her shoulder.
"Man! Your dad sure is superstitious!" Misao chatted away, taking sudden interest in her freshly painted toenails.
Kaoru had to agree. "I think too many years of bowing down to statues have finally affected his brain," she joked, switching off the lights in her room. She made her way down the hall, phone tucked expertly between her cheek and shoulder.
Misao gave an exasperated groan, rolling over onto her stomach to glare at the calendar hanging over her computer desk. A while back she bought it and marked every day a new moon would occur with a big, bright pink pen. It was her favorite color, after all…
"I suspect the same thing, but to take away all the mirrors in your house?" Misao whined. "That's just plain cruel! How can a young woman live without knowing how she looks before walking out the door?" She finished with a sympathetic noise.
Rolling her eyes, Kaoru used the hand that was not occupied with the duffel bag to slide open the shoji door leading out to the courtyard of the temple. "I manage just fine, thank you very much. I think the only one who would suffer would be you, Misao," Kaoru retorted. "He has good intentions."
"I guess you could blame your lack of fashion sense on it… There's a plus!" Kaoru heard whispered over the other end.
"I have no mirrors! Get over it already!" Kaoru growled, at the same time walking to the storage room where she could find the broom she needed. Her father had suggestively mentioned that the steps leading up to the temple's entrance were a bit dirty.
"Do those statues explain why you always come to my house when there's a new moon?" Misao argued.
"I don't have to come over to your house," Kaoru commented with a lifted brow.
"Now, don't get all cranky with me." Misao's lecturing voice was light and playful. She got up from her bed and picked up a permanent marker from her desk. Deftly, she made a neat heart over that day's date. When Kaoru had asked her about the peculiar manner in which she marked her calendar, Misao returned that crossing something out was not as nearly fun as drawing flowers of hearts around something. "I was just pointing out the peculiarities of your old man."
Kaoru put her bag on the ground as she pushed open another pair of shoji doors. Dust flew out at her, tickling her nose. Quickly, she switched the phone to her other shoulder to prevent a kink in her neck. Sneezing, Kaoru reached into the dark room and pulled out the broom used for outdoor cleaning, quite familiar with the way things were organized in there and not needing a light to get what she needed. The worn handle fit comfortably in her palm, weathered with time and use. Walking across the vast courtyard and over to the steps, Kaoru began her arduous task. "I'm hanging up now, Misao. I have a job to do and not a lot of time to do it in." Kaoru huffed, sweeping the ground in long, practiced strokes.
"Alright, but you have to hear about that guy I was talking about! He was-"
"Handsome. Right. Got it." Kaoru rolled her eyes. "See you later," she prompted.
Misao's laughter came through the speaker of the phone clearly. "Bye, Kao."
Kaoru hung up the phone, bending down to set it gently on the top step of the stairs before continuing to sweep. Slow and methodical, Kaoru worked her way down, taking her time on each step. By the time she had reached the bottom, a brilliant pink and majestic purple sunset painted the sky overhead. Cursing, Kaoru clenched the broom tightly and dashed up the steps, taking two at a time.
'Shoot. I need to leave. Now.' she thought to herself, leaping over the last few giant steps.
From the main worship entrance her father stepped out into the fleeting rays of the sun, spotting his daughter darting toward the storage shed. "You haven't left yet?" he asked, eyes flickering in the direction of the setting sun.
Kaoru flung the broom into the shed with more energy than necessary, turning to scoop up her bag into her arms. "I'm practically gone," she shouted over her shoulder as she ran back to the stairs, ready to leave. Spotting the phone she left on the steps earlier, Kaoru twisted to ask her father if he would take it into the house for her. Not paying attention to where she was stepping, she tripped and fell forward. Years of training in the neighboring dojo run by her father kept her from having a broken nose, though it didn't save the skin on her knees and palms.
"Are you alright?" Having seen the fall, her father moved forward, offering help. He stopped when he saw Kaoru stand up, pick up that ridiculous duffel bag and continue on down the steps.
"Fine!" Kaoru yelled loud enough for him to hear, slowing her speed a bit to examine her injuries. A trickle of blood ran down her calf from a rather large scrape on her right knee, acquired from her fall on the steps. "That hurt…" she murmured, making a mental note to ask Misao for bandages when she got to the girl's house.
(-)
The door swung open to reveal an impatient Misao tapping her foot against the linoleum tile in her entryway. "Took you long enough," she grumbled, stepping aside to let her friend in. As Kaoru moved past, Misao noticed a line of blood drying on the back of Kaoru's leg. "Kao! What happened?" she asked, kneeling to get a closer look at the wound.
Kaoru grinned sheepishly, offering one of her torn up palms for Misao to inspect. "I fell," she admitted.
"Down a flight of stairs?" Misao exaggerated.
"Almost." Kaoru laughed at the expression on Misao's face as she shook her head and went, no doubt, to go get some band aids and peroxide. "I'll be in your room!" she shouted, walking slowly up the staircase in front of her, bag bumping into the back of her legs with each step. The small grumble about clumsy idiots from Misao's direction let Kaoru know she had been heard.
Beside her own, Misao's room was one of the more familiar sights in Kaoru's life. Bright, happy, and yet soothing tea green walls greeted her as she entered the room. A splash of color called out from the opposing wall, happening to be the bed that Kaoru had spent many nights sleeping in. Kaoru took in a deep breath and felt herself relaxing instantly. It was as good as home. Perhaps even better, since there was no restriction on mirrors in this house.
Dropping her bag on the floor, Kaoru all but skipped over toward the mounted mirror on a nearby wall. When she came face to face with her reflection, Kaoru was not prepared for the view.
Since the last time she had been there, her face seemed to have not tanned even after countless hours under the sun, but had rather become an even more milky ivory color. Deep blue eyes that spoke levels of maturity and wisdom stared out at her beneath ink black bangs that hugged the contours of her heart shaped face. She was… rather beautiful.
Feeling vain, Kaoru swatted at the mirror, causing it to tilt on the nail that kept it anchored to the wall. She reached out her sore hands to resettle the frame, sighing as the cool metal touched her sore palms. The pain subsided slightly from the cold touch of the metal.
'Forget peroxide. Give me a metal mirror frame any day...' Kaoru joked to herself.
"Whatcha doing?" Misao's voice called out from behind her.
Startled, Kaoru looked up into the mirror, gasping when she stared into the face of an unfamiliar man and not her own reflection. She took an immediate step backward, her foot catching on the chair situated at Misao's desk. Before Kaoru could even blink, she was on the ground, staring up at the ceiling.
In the next instant, Misao was knelt beside her, eyes wide with concern. "Are you intentionally trying to give me a heart attack?" Misao shouted, wanting to shake some much needed balance into the girl. "Do you know how close you were to hitting the edge of my desk?" she asked, eyes still panicky from having seen her friend almost crack open the back of her skull.
Kaoru twisted to look behind her, noting the mere inches she had come from a late night trip to the emergency room. Not that Misao would appreciate a nice blood stain on her carpet either…
Near tears from a set of badly frayed nerves, Misao stood up and offered Kaoru a hand. "I'm in bad need of sugar right now."
With a sheepish grin, Kaoru took the small hand and pulled herself up. "Sorry?"
"Get your butt downstairs and help me get something sweet to eat this instant."
Kaoru followed Misao out of the room, brushing off what she had seen as a weird refraction of the light against the mirror.
(-)
Three bags of popcorn, one and a half gallons of ice cream, two sappy romance movies that Misao had already memorized by heart, and a shared chocolate bar later, the two were completely full and ready to sleep. Well… Kaoru was.
"So! I was just thinking of how amazing it would be to give each other a makeover!" Misao blurted out, speaking so fast that most of her words were jumbled into a confusing mass.
Kaoru groaned, grabbing a pillow off the bed they were laying on and rolled over, placing the pillow over her head. "How old are we?" she asked sarcastically, the pillow muffling her question.
"Never too old to have fun."
"Answer the question, weasel."
Misao pouted. "Nineteen…" She glanced down at her bright colored comforter. "I hate that nickname," she grumbled. The resemblance to a little kid being scolded by their parents would have had Kaoru laughing hysterically if she hadn't currently been hiding from the insanity. Though the tone of absolute dejection had her in near hysterics. Or maybe it was the ton of sugar she put into her system…
"It suits you perfectly, though." Kaoru laughed under the pillow, finally pushing it off of her head, in need of some air. "Wouldn't that constitute being too old to do makeovers?" Kaoru suggested with a small grin, reverting back to the original conversation.
"We're not even in college yet, though," Misao pointed out, grabbing another piece of chocolate and popping it into her mouth.
Rolling her eyes, Kaoru slapped away one of Misao's hands that was reaching for another piece of the demolished chocolate bar. "You wanted the ice cream," she reminded whenever Misao sent her a dirty glare. "As for the whole college thing..." She sighed, fiddling with a strand of her loose hair. "I'm not sure if I can go," Kaoru admitted.
"You've got the grades."
"But not the resources," Kaoru countered, handing over the rest of the chocolate bar. Her hunger for sweets had long since been fulfilled.
"We can think of something." Misao shrugged easily, snapping off another piece of the bar and placing it in her mouth.
Kaoru paused. "We?" she asked for clarification.
Misao paused in her feasting for a moment and stared back at the raven headed girl. "Kaoru Kamiya!" Her face turned down right indignant. "You think that I'm going to let you go off into the world by yourself," she spat the word like it had a disgusting taste to it, "when we've been together since birth?"
"Third grade," Kaoru corrected.
"Close enough."
Count on Misao to pull the drama card at every opportunity presented. "I was taken back. That's all." Kaoru smiled and leaned over to give Misao a friendly tap on the arm. "I thought you would have been sick of me by now," she half joked, eyes drifting down to an empty ice cream carton at the end of the bed by her feet.
"One of these days, Kaoru," the smaller of the two huffed, resembling a puffed up mother hen, "someone other than me will change that negative Nancy attitude of yours." Her promise was accompanied by a confident nod.
Kaoru tossed a pillow at Misao. "Negative Nancy?" she asked with a huge grin on her face at seeing the pillow hit its mark.
"What else can I call you? Positive Patty?" Misao returned, readying herself to throw a small decorative cushion. "You're not exactly the sunshiny type."
"Just pass the popcorn, weasel."
"I'm not a weasel."
(-)
In the dim light provided by the muted television, Kaoru reached over the sleeping form of Misao to get to her bag. She groped around in it for awhile until she felt the familiar surface of a well worn book. She pulled out the paperback, its dog eared corners flopping open on various colored pictures.
It was a children's book and one of Kaoru's most prized possessions. She did not have an explanation for why she grabbed it at the last minute when she packed.
Situating herself back in the covers formed to make a makeshift bed on the floor, Kaoru flipped open the book to the back. An intricate drawing of a fox glowed underneath the TV's light, and Kaoru found herself tracing its outline silently, trying to remember exactly how her mother once read it to her.
"I miss you…" she whispered, closing the book and putting her head next to it on the pillow.
'Sleep.' A distant voice of a memory called out to her, a song like tenor to it. Her mother had always made sure she was asleep before leaving the room.
Kaoru smiled and closed her eyes, grateful to get some rest.
Author's Note (7/25/10): Minute changes occurred mostly at the very beginning of the chapter. Enjoy!
Luv,
K
