A Love of Snow

Chapter 4

A Fruits Basket fanfic by Haneoka


"You know what they say about love," Shigure said, idly flipping through the newspaper in the midsummer heat.

Hatori, without looking up from his work, remarked, "I don't know want to know what you have to say about love. In fact, I don't want to know what you think at all."

"Hatori, so cruel." But it wasn't Shigure acting hurt, it was Kana speaking.

Hatori leapt up from his chair.

"Kana!"

Shigure continued quietly, though no one was looking at him, "It's better to have loved and lost then to have never loved at all. No?"

No one was listening. Shigure watched for a moment, and then discreetly left Hatori's office.

Kana and Hatori looked at each other for a long moment without speaking. Finally, they tried to speak at the same time.

"How are you—"

"How have you—"

They laughed awkwardly and stopped.

Hatori waited, thinking it best if Kana spoke first.

"I heard that you were looking to expand your practice. I was thinking of moving back to this area. Do you think that maybe you and I could work together again, this time not as doctor and assistant, but as colleagues?" Her enthusiasm was clear, but her eyes were serious.

Kana had a smile on her face, but it was a cautious one.

Hatori smiled back.

Somehow, after so many years, they had found themselves at the beginning again.

Somehow, it was inevitable.

Hatori responded calmly, though his heart was beating wildly. "That seems like a good idea."


As if by silent agreement, neither mentioned the two biggest events in their lives that had brought them to that point – the death of their significant others.

Not that they could avoid it completely. There was a picture of Hatori and Mayu on the corner of Hatori's desk. Kana's wedding ring was threaded on her necklace.

But for the most part, they simply worked together, efficiently but comfortably so. They quickly settled into a normal routine.

There were things that were different this time around. Before, when Kana had been an assistant, she had been studying much of the time. Now, however, she was actively researching, checking patients – mostly members of the Sohma family.

But the change that Hatori noticed the most was this time, Kana never showed more than a polite interest in him.

Back then, Kana had smiled at him with adoration and admiration clear in her eyes.

Now, she smiled at him mostly with respect and a friendly affection, with a deeper emotion perhaps lurking in her eyes, but it was so fleeting that Hatori could never quite identify what it really was.

It was almost similar to their last days together, after he had erased her memories and before she had left. Polite, restrained. Though they were both acting like everything was fine…underneath the surface, it was not.

Things had gone on thus for a number of weeks…until one day, Kana had left early, and Hatori was left unable to work, staring at the inanimate objects in his office, thinking that he had as much life in him as his desk chair, with no plans for the evening and no one to spend it with.

'Is this really how I want to spend the rest of my life?' he asked himself. 'Is this really what I want?'

The answer was, obviously, no.

Hatori, turning around in his chair, caught the picture of himself and Mayu on the corner of his desk. He leaned over and picked it up.

He looked at the picture of them from happier days. The grief had settled quietly in his heart, no longer quite as sharp and piercing as it had been before.

'How many years did Mayu and I waste, because she did not know how to tell me her feelings? Because I was unaware, and had no interest in life?'

'If there's one thing that I learned from Mayu…and one thing that I learned from Kana…is that you have to learn how to move on.'

Hatori had spent much of his life simply doing what others had told him. When he was ordered to erase the memories of people dear to the hearts of the Sohma family members, he did it.

When Kana first pursued him with single-minded adoration, he returned her feelings. When Shigure nudged him towards Mayu, and he realized that Mayu was interested in him, he obliged her by taking her out on a date.

Only later did he realize that she had cared for him for years.

When he thought about it, there wasn't much that he had initiated on his own. Everything he had done in life was in part a reaction to what others did first. Not because he had thought of it first.

Would he have fallen in love with Kana if she hadn't been so affectionate from the beginning? Maybe…or maybe he would have told himself it was impossible, and refrained from getting to know her any better.

Kana had been the first to break through his icy veneer. Deep down he had wanted her to, but there was no doubt that she had made the first move.

Would he have ended up with Mayu if it hadn't been for Shigure? If he hadn't suspected that she was already interested in him? The answer to that question was far sketchier.

'The past is past,' Hatori told himself. 'It doesn't matter.'

But it did matter in the sense that Hatori had lived his whole life reacting, not acting. Now, he was tired of waiting for someone else to make the first move. If Kana wasn't going to show any signs of interest in him…well, that left him with only one choice.

He would have to make the first move.

So, Hatori, once the hunted, became the hunter.