Chapter 4
Kagura's POV
The first thing I heard as I came around was the incessant pounding of the rain. I used to love the rain but now I wasn't so sure any more.
My whole body ached and I felt as if I were dying. Shi-chan had told me dying was peaceful but this didn't seem so peaceful to me. My eyes still refused to open as I tried to forget the pain, the physical aspects of it and the emotional ones too.
But it wouldn't let me.
I groaned struggling to sit up, but a searing hot white light washed through my forehead and I felt my self sink down into the mud again. Let it claim me. I don't care anymore.
Rushing footsteps patted the ground, and my ears strained to pick up anymore sound. A cool pressure was felt onto my forehead and a similar one on my chest. I was dreaming again. I doubted whether the soft touches really existed or if they were another figment of my imagination. It was probably the latter.
But when gentle fingertips brushed the skin of my cheek, my eyes jolted open, surprised beyond belief.
And the first thing I found my self staring into was a green eye. That color of eyes could only belong to one person: Hatori. His hand instantly moved away from my cheek and to his side.
"Hatori…" his name came out as a whisper on my breath.
I tried to sit up again, and this time I achieved some what of an awkward sitting position. My cousin's hands came up behind me, supporting the small of my back.
"Ha'ri, I'm- I'm sorry…"
His confused face met mine.
"For what?"
"For causing you all this trouble, you're soaked to the bone because of me. I'm so sorry Ha-chan."
His eyes softened slightly and his hands moved to brush the wet hair out of my face.
"Don't be Kagura; it's not your fault."
"No…" My sentence died on my lips as I felt, tears starting to flow down my cheeks, covering Hatori's fingers as well.
The tears soon turned to sobs and my body started to shake uncontrollably with a sorrow that I had tried to bury away. My shoulders hunched forward and I felt myself being hugged to a warm yet wet body.
His arms were a protective case around me, holding me in. His white doctor's coat soon became soaked with my own tears, like imprints of my sadness. I hadn't cried like this in front of him since I was a child.
But Hatori offered a comfort that was hard to find and I needed that. I needed someone to understand what I was going through. I didn't want to trouble him any more than I already had but soon selfish desire drove those thoughts away.
Hatori's POV
The sentence that sprung from Kagura's lips surprised me beyond belief.
"Ha'ri I'm-I'm sorry…"
Sorry? What was she sorry for? I should be the one apologizing to her. Shigure had warned that if I didn't talk to her she would fall even deeper into the grave she was digging herself. And I couldn't help but feel he was right.
"For what?"
She looked up at me, her gray eyes swimming like big pools of liquid crystal.
"For causing you all this trouble, you're soaked the bone because of me. I'm so sorry Ha-chan."
It wasn't her fault that she ended up like this, that all of us ended up like this. It's hard to find love when you're cursed and yet a special few had broken this curse of loneliness.
"Don't be Kagura; it's not your fault."
What does it take to save a soul? Is it medicine, like the Tylenol pills I kept in my cupboard? Or maybe the best remedy is love.
Her eyes started to tear, and I found myself trying to brush them all away in fruitless effort. And soon sobs wracked Kagura's body, pushing her forward so that her head touched my chest.
I was at a loss for what to do. Shigure was good with people but I was not, his words rung in my brain as if giving advice.
Then do it Hatori, just talk to her.
And so I did.
My arms wrapped around my cousin, holding her close to my body heat. Her tears soaked into the fabric of my clothes but I could feel them burning on my skin.
"Shh, Kagura. Please don't cry I'm right here."
Her sobs gradually turned to soft cries and soon, those turned into whimpers. The rain had let up, just like her crying and only a light drizzle covered the earth. Kagura's body slumped against mine, exhausted from the day's events.
She lifted her head from its place on my shoulder, and looked at me, her eyes still shining with unshed tears.
"Why is it Ha-chan that we are so cursed? That it is almost impossible for us to find love?"
Her questions startled me, and again I was at a loss for words. Those questions were the same ones I asked my self everyday.
"I-I don't know."
The honest answer left my mouth. Truly, none of knew why we were so cursed. Had we committed such terrible crimes in our past life?
"Please, I want to know."
What could I tell her?
"Kagura, I don't know. But never is it impossible to find love. People are hurt by others but it is also possible for people to healed by others as well."
That was the way the world was supposed to work. What others took from you, others will replace for you. Still I never had Kana's love returned to me but there is always solace in the fact that one can have hope.
"And what about Kyou? He is love was never returned to me!" Her violent side was starting to emerge.
"He was the only one that mattered! Just being able to love him was the only thing that I cared about. And now, that has been robbed of me too."
What could I say to that?
"Kagura, we all love you. Each one of the Jyuunishi care for you, isn't that love?"
"No, it's not the same!!" Her words came out in a half sob, half shriek. "Loving Kyou was different, it mattered more than anything. It helped erase the pain Hatori! He helped me unknowingly…unwillingly…"
The hurt lashed through me, and it felt like her words stung more than a thousand knives piercing my skin. I knew she said things without meaning sometimes, but this…this hurt. Didn't she know we suffered too? That I still suffer?
Didn't she know that we cared? That I…care?
