Memories of the Past, Pains of the Present Disclaimer: I do not own, nor claim to own, any characters in this Fanfiction that relate to the anime and/or manga of Maria-Sama Ga Miteru. The only thing I own here are the characters called Sakura and Mizuki...On with the fiction!
Chapter Three: A Secret Past
Yumi sat on a park bench, the same one Sakura was sitting on the day she and Yumi met for the first time, as she listened to her best friend tell her all the horrible things that had happened to her when she was but a child.
"So," Sakura was saying "You have probably already figured out that Sachiko-sama and I are sisters, Sachiko being the older sibling."
"Yea," Yumi nodded in confirmation. "Demo, I don't understand how, you two look nothing alike."
Sakura gave a half-hearted laugh at that. "That's because, after I was disowned and moved in with Mizuki Kusumoto, I dyed my hair and got violet-coloured contacts."
"But why?" Yumi persisted, not understanding why Sakura would not want to look as beautiful as her elder sister, not that Sakura wasn't already beautiful; it just confused Yumi why she would not want to look like her sister, her own flesh and blood for crying out loud.
"Because I wanted nothing to do with the Ogasawara name, nor with Sachiko-sama, not after what they did to me."
"What exactly did they do to you though?" Asked Yumi. "I mean, you probably had a pretty good life if you were an Ogasawara."
Sakura gave another half-hearted laugh. "Yes I did have a fairly good life, better than most people's anyway," Sakura explained. "I had a caring father and mother and an onee-chan whom I adored, and thought adored me too, demo, I was wrong. You see one day I was wandering around the house at night, believe me or not when I tell you this, but I was lost when I got up to get a drink of water. Anyway, I was wandering around trying to get back to my room, when I passed a crack in an open door and heard Tou-san, my uncle, Suguru's father, and Oyaji-san talking."
"What were they talking about? Wasn't it just old man talk that happens between a father and a grandfather?" Yumi asked, confused as to why a conversation between two men would set Sakura up for hardship and, later, disownment from her own family.
"That's what I thought it was at first, so I paid no attention to it, that is, until I heard the word 'murder' come from Oyaji-san's mouth."
"Murder?" Yumi asked in surprise.
"Mmm." Sakura said, nodding her head in affirmation of her claim. "I listened more attentively after that and, with a five-year-old's brain, figured out that they were plotting some assassinations to get back at, and hopefully beat down, a rival company."
"No!" Yumi gasped. "So what happened then? What did you do?"
"I did the only thing I thought I could do." Sakura replied heavily, "I ran, and told everything, to my onee-sama."
*Flashback*
"Onee- chan, onee- chan!" Sakura called as she knocked on her sister, Sachiko's, bedroom door. It amazed her that she had been able to find her sister's room and not her own in the dark hallways of the Ogasawara Mansion.
"Mmm..." was the reply Sakura got, so she went in and closed the door behind her.
"Onee- chan, onee- chan!" Sakura said as she gently shook her elder sister, trying to get her to wake up.
"Mmm...Sakura-chan!" Sachiko said, poking her bed-head out from beneath the covers and giving her little sister an annoyed look. "What is it now? Did you get lost again?" Sachiko then looked at the clock on her bedside table, noticing that it was two in the morning, and groaned again. "Do you have any idea what time it is?" She asked her sister, rather annoyed that Sakura seemed to never be able to find her own room in the dark but somehow managed to always find Sachiko's room.
"Onee- chan..." Sakura said, looking up at her sister with fearful, tear-stained eyes, a colour that matched Sachiko's own tired, irritated ones, that Sachiko had never seen on her little sister before.
"Sa-chan..." Sachiko said, her voice softening and laced with real concern as she used the nickname that she, and only she, used for Sakura. "What's wrong? Come sit up here and tell me." She said, and Sakura climbed into the bed and snuggled up close to Sachiko, tears beginning to leak from her eyes.
"Onee-chan..." With that Sakura burst into tears, much to the surprise and dismay of Sachiko who just let her cry until she was calmed down enough to make coherent sentences.
"There, there," Sachiko said, as she rubbed the back of her little sister in an attempt to calm the hysterical five-year-old. Sachiko was only a year older than Sakura, but she acted as though she was seven or eight years older. "Now tell me what's wrong." She said as Sakura's sobs ceased and she was able to talk without sobbing. Immediately she told her sister everything that she had gleaned from the accidental overheard conversation between their father, uncle and grandfather about the murders and assassinations planned for the next week. All throughout Sakura's explanation Sachiko did not once look surprised, nor did she ask any questions. "Go back to bed." Sachiko ordered once her sister had finished. "And do not tell anyone what you have just told me."
"Demo..." Sakura began, then stopped at the expression on Sachiko's face. She had never seen this expression on her onee-chan before, it was a look of terror, pure and utter terror. Whether it was for Sakura or herself, Sakura did not ask. Instead, she left the room and did as her onee-sama told her to do.
*End Flashback*
"So?" Yumi asked. "What happened after that?"
"What else?" Sakura replied. "I did as onee-chan told me to. I went back to bed and kept my mouth shut. Neither of us talked about it at all, we acted like it had never had happened."
Sakura sighed. "We thought we were home-free as nobody confronted us about it, at least not until that day."
"That day?" Yumi asked, repeating the words her friend had just said.
"Mmm." Sakura nodded her head. "That day, three nights after I had heard the murder plans, all hell broke loose. I was pulled away from my piano lesson with onee-sama by Kaa-san who said that Tou-san wanted to talk to me. I found out that when Kaa-san said that Tou-san wanted to talk to me, she meant that he wanted to beat me then explain that Suguru had overheard me tell onee-chan everything I had heard by accident and had run and told his father, my father's brother, who immediately told Tou-san that I was a bad girl and had been eaves-dropping on their conversation three nights previously."
"He beat you?" Yumi asked, not liking the direction her friend's story was taking at all.
"Yeup, that day, the day after, the day after that. Soon his beating of me, to make me keep my mouth shut, became a daily habit, just a painful part of my everyday life. What hurt the most was not the whip or the cane, it was the fact that onee-chan and Kaa-san knew about it and did nothing to stop it."
"That's horrible!" Yumi exclaimed "they're your family, they should have done something."
"Mmm, onee-chan wanted to do something but Kaa-san forbade her to even talk to me until the matter was resolved, and I kind of agreed with her once onee-chan told me, secretly of course, what Kaa-san had told her."
"Why?" Yumi asked "Why would you agree with her if contact with your onee-sama was forbidden?"
"Because," Sakura explained. "If onee-chan did anything to stand up for me, she would be given the same treatment."
"Soka, so you were beat on a daily basis, what happened next?"
"Well, that's the worse part." Sakura said, sighing.
"There's something worse than what was happening to you at that time?" Yumi asked incredulously.
Sakura sighed again. "Yea, well I began to get really scared, I was beaten on a daily basis for at least two years and I wanted to tell someone about what was happening to me, and who was responsible for the murders of at least ten workers and two businessmen."
"So, did you?" Yumi asked.
"Mmm...I did." Sakura affirmed as she continued to stare at the ceiling.
*Flashback*
Sakura was sitting on a swing in the neighbourhood park, crying, with new cuts and bruises on her face and back. She was just about to get up and go home when she saw a pair of black dress shoes come into her field of view. Sakura looked to see the face of a young woman, maybe seventeen or eighteen, dressed in slacks and a blazer, her long blonde hair hung in front of her dark violet eyes that looked pityingly down at Sakura.
"What's the matter sweetie?" The woman asked. "You shouldn't be in this place this late at night." When Sakura didn't answer the woman just sat on the swing beside Sakura's and the two of them sat there in silence.
"Sakura..." Sakura said, breaking the silence.
"Hmm?" The woman asked, looking at Sakura and, for the first time, getting a good look at her bruised, tear-stained face.
"Watashi...Sakura." Sakura repeated, giving the woman her name. "Anata?" She asked, looking at the woman with her ocean-blue eyes that matched her sister's.
"Watashi Mizuki, Mizuki Kusumoto." The woman replied. Sakura merely nodded and looked back at the ground.
"What happened to you?" Mizuki asked Sakura, whose head shot up and her eyes filled with fear. "It's okay," Mizuki assured her, seeing the look of terror on the seven-year-old's face. "You can trust me."
"Can I?" Sakura asked. "You won't tell anyone?" She persisted at the look of confusion on Mizuki's face.
"No, I won't tell anyone." Mizuki assured her.
*End Flashback*
"So, what happened then?" Yumi asked her friend as she finished telling her about the first time she met her foster-sister.
"I told her everything." Sakura stated simply.
"Everything?"
"Everything. The murder plans, the actual murder and everything that had been happening to me for the past two years."
"What did she do then?"
"Well, she was not about to let this go unanswered for, so we started to meet in secret and she came up with a plan. I found out that she was a free-lance reporter for the Tokyo Times newspaper. She started poking around, probably in places where she shouldn't have been, and came up with enough factual evidence to write a column in the next issue on what was going on in the Ogasawara household. Obviously, Tou-san figured out that I was the one who told Mizuki most of what she was going to write and I knew this."
"So what did you do?" Yumi asked.
"The only thing I could do." Sakura replied. "I moved in with Mizuki until the matter could be sorted out. It didn't work out quite the way we planned though."
"What do you mean?"
Sakura sighed again. "I was out walking one day, heading towards Mizuki's apartment, when I was grabbed from behind and gagged. I was pulled into a black BMW and we drove off. As we were moving, we began to slow down one of the men in black who had grabbed me opened the door of the vehicle while the other man threw me out of the car."
"They threw you out of the car while it was moving?"
"Hai, they threw me out and drove off. I had no idea where I was, I knew I was still somewhere in Tokyo, but I didn't know where exactly I was. I took my gag off and began to wander around trying to get my bearings. Unfortunately for me that didn't happen. I don't know from where they came, but I immediately heard gunshots and felt the bullets dig into my flesh."
"No way!" Yumi exclaimed, unable to believe the fact that, when her best friend was only seven or eight, she was shot at.
"Hai, I was shot at and then left alone after another group of men, wearing exactly the same thing as the men who captured me in the first place, came and beat me up and left me in the street to die. Somehow I managed to get myself back to Mizuki's apartment and collapsed outside her door."
"So what happened after that?" Yumi asked, fearing the worst for her friend.
"Well, when I came to, I was in a hospital and Mizuki was sitting beside my bed. She told me that she had found me bruised and bleeding in front of her door and took me to the hospital where they told her that I had been beaten and shot at. She said I was lucky that the bullets they used were rubber and that I was lucky to be alive; I had lost so much blood that I almost died."
"No!"
"Yes, after I got out of the hospital Mizuki did some more digging and found out that it was my father who had ordered that I be attacked and killed. She added that to her unpublished column and once it was published I hid and we waited until the hearing."
"Hearing?"
"Hai, once the press and many others found out about what was happening to me and who the murderers of the workers and businessmen were, the public demanded that the Ogasawara men go to a formal, public hearing."
"To prove that what was happening to you and that the three Ogasawara men were the murderers?" Yumi asked.
"Exactly." Sakura stated.
"So? How did the trial go?"
"Better than either I or Mizuki expected it to. The Ogasawara's were tried, Mizuki and I testified against them, and they were found guilty under the charges of murder and child abuse. Of course, our testifying against them caused more harm than help when it came to me."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning that after the hearing was over, the Ogasawara's got their hands on me while I waited for Mizuki to come out. I was beaten, yelled at and immediately disowned, onee-chan watched and didn't do anything about it and that's what hurt me the most. After that Mizuki became my guardian, I cut off all ties with my family, changed my appearance to pass off as Mizuki's younger sister and I never saw onee-chan again, not until that day that she fixed your scarf for you."
"I'm sorry," Yumi said, now looking at the floor. "I didn't mean to cause you so much pain."
"It's not your fault," Sakura sighed as she finally sat up. "I should have told you sooner. I just didn't expect her to be at the same school as me after such a long period of time." Yumi reached over and hugged her best friend who was in so much pain and Sakura hugged her back.
"I won't become her petite soeur if you don't want me to." Yumi said as Sakura buried her face in Yumi's shoulder. "I don't want to cause you any more pain than you've already endured." Sakura looked up at her friend who was smiling down at her.
"No," Sakura said as she pulled herself out of the hug. "Become her petit soeur, it is what you want right? Don't worry about me, now I know that she's at my school I'm going to have to live with it."
"And by 'live with it' you mean 'completely avoid'." Yumi said, knowing what her friend was like.
"Like the plague." Sakura said smiling as she stood up from the bench. "I'll see you tomorrow at school Yumi-chan." With that Sakura left her best friend sitting there on the bench where she met her best friend, not knowing the pain and suffering she had gone through before they met.
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A/N: Another short chapter. Rate and Review, constructive critism is welcome. Stay tuned for chapter four (i honestly have no idea how long this thing is going to be)
