Hey! Sorry it so long to update, but this was a hard chapter write and balance with school. About two weeks ago I discovered 7th grade really sucks. Okay, so here's ch 8...this one will have 1,000 words per hour...I swear! (that's 8000+ words by the way) Oh, and the person they're sitting next to is kind of a really expensive "companion" so be ready for some references here. No lemon. This is entirely on the plane. Now, to begin my tale, as all writers do, with once upon a time...just kidding...
Disclaimer: I don't own Fruits Basket, but that could change, neh? (begins scribbling out evil plot)
Chapter 8: Ha! Told You There Wasn't A Title! Oh, Wait...Crud...
Entering the compact space of the plane, Tohru suddenly had a memory surface of her in the closet during a thunderstorm. Scared to death, she had locked her self in, and was stuck for an hour before her mom found her. Shaking her head, as if to be rid of the thoughts, she glanced at the tickets before saying, "We're way in the back, Yuki." The teen nodded, eyes scanning down the rows at the disheveled people. His eyes rested on the two seats in the very back, next to the bathroom. He pointed them out to Tohru, and she checked their tickets before confirming that the pair were their seats. At first, Tohru was playing nervously with her ribbon tied to her wrist, but then she calmed down a bit. Yuki reached his hand out and ran his index finger along the band of color. Tohru glanced down, but looked away, color predictably rising in her face. "I-I was just wearing it because it's pretty and it m-matches-" His index finger had moved to her lips without him realizing. Yuki smiled slightly, and whispered, "It's alright, Tohru. Whatever it means, I'm happy." An awkward voice next to them said cuttingly, "Excuse me, but where are your parents, young ladies?" Yuki swung his head to his right, and glared at the young woman next to them. "I'm a boy, miss. And they're up three rows." The lie slid of his tongue easily, but Tohru looked forward, her face flushed and her fingers twisting the ribbon again. The woman bowed her head, and declared, "My name is Hikari Nanomo. You're a boy? I would swear Yuki's a girl name." Yuki's fist clenched the arm rest, and he didn't bother replying. Instead, he turned back to Tohru, and said haltingly, "So, what do want to do now?" Tohru raised her eyes in thought, and exclaimed, "Let's play checkers!"
"Checkers?"
"Yep. I've got a portable set in my bag!"
"Alright..."
While waiting for the plane to fill up, the pair dived into a complex checkers game, their surroundings dissolving with each intensified move. But after a game, the speakers blared some crap about destination, weather, and procedures before the plane began to move. Tohru gasped, and she reached over to grip Yuki's arm. She shut her eyes and held her breath once the jet engines roared to life. But it was the speed that got to her. The plane turned onto the tarmac, and began to go faster and faster, until Yuki could barely hear the strangled gasping of Tohru and the other first-fliers on the plane. A part of him wanted to gasp as well, but he couldn't for fear of Tohru beginning to cry. Finally, the cabin almost whining with speed, the bulk disappeared and the plane rose of the ground into the sky. Calming down, Tohru glanced over at Yuki, and noticed her fingers locked around his arm. She tried to pry them from his arm, but she couldn't move. The silver-haired teen looked down, and gently disengaged her fingers from his sleeve, careful not leave snags in the fabric from her nails. Flustered, tohru turned to face the front, and thanked him. "Say Yuki, what do we do once we land?" Yuki shrugged, not noticing the two girls across the row watching his shoulders rise and fall, and said, "All I know is that we will want to sleep. By the way, do you have any clue where we're staying?"
"Didn't they tell you?"
"No..."
"Shigure told me we're staying at...The Michelangelo? Why would someone name a hotel the Michelangelo?"
"I don't know Tohru, but if Shigure picked it out, be prepared for some strange stuff..."
"What?"
"Nothing..."
"You're staying at the Michelangelo?"
Yuki and Tohru turned and stared at Hikari, who was listening to music through a walkman, her head bobbing to the beats. She glanced down at her lap, and her voice broke before she said, "That's odd. I was told to meet two people at the Michelangelo for a trio. That wouldn't be you two, would it?" She looked up half-expectantly, her green eyes for the first time scanning the two people next to her. Yuki cocked his head one moment before one of the lines from Shigure's novels drifted across his eyes. A trio consisting of three people who- He cut the sentence off there with a shudder. It would be just like Shigure to do something like that. The woman shook her head at the frozen teen boy and the brunette next to him blinking in oblivious confusion. Late pubescents, and still virgins. Why did I think it was those two anyway? The music sputtered in her ears, the fast beats scrambling her brain comfortably, but not impairing her hearing as the girl asked the she-male with the pretty eyes what a trio was. She smirked slightly as he stammered, avoiding the question by pulling out a similar walkman and offering one side of the headphones to the girl. Toying with her slightly curly hair, she wondered who she was really going to meet at that hotel.
Tohru and Yuki were leaning towards each other, their heads pressed side by side and the headphones stretched out all the way to reach the exposed ears. Yuki's eyes were half closed, his brain almost shut-down as the flute music lulled and twisted. Tohru, however, was humming along as she somehow began to knit once again, occasionally raising the knitting to the face of the sleeping teen who was next to her, to compare the empty gray eyes to the gray and blue striped scarf she was creating for him. Happy with what she saw, the brunette moved the knitting away from Yuki's face and continued to steadily work through row after row, changing the CD to an old Heavy Metal thing she had inherited from her mother. The first track always made her think of her mother, but she was too concentrated on the scarf to even worry about that. Eventually, the blazing noise gained a swelling quality, and Tohru drifted off to sleep as well. The clock on Hikari's cellphone struck eight, as the girl and the she-male curled together, wrapped in an embrace across an arm rest, her fingers tangled in his hair. Hikari shook her head, and removed the earphones before turning to watch the pair wake up and discover what they had unknowingly done. It was a stewardess who pried them apart, saying something about prohibition of public displays.
But the she-male nor the girl woke up, even though Hikari poked at the she-male's sleeve relentlessly for five minutes. Finally, after flicking Yuki's head, Hikari managed to wake up the rat, who was shocked to discover Tohru's hand still attached to his hair. Sighing, he removed it before gently shaking the brunette awake. Her eyes fluttered and she gasped, "Where am I?" Yuki waved his hand to catch her attention. She turned to him, her eyes wide and her mouth open. "Where am I?"
"We're on a plane, remember?"
"Oh. Right..."
"Um, did you just flick me in the head a while ago?"
"Nope. Hey Yuki, do you want to play cards?"
"Cards? Like what? We don't have enough people to play rich man poor man."
"No, I meant something like Go Fish."
Tohru searched in her bag for a moment before extracting a deck of cards. Instead, Yuki pulled out his History textbook, and said softly, "Tohru, it's really early for that. Why don't we wait until we have nothing else to do? And you said you needed help with World War II in History, so I brought along my textbook. Would you like some help?"
Tohru dropped the deck into her lap, and nodded before leaning against Yuki to read his book, which was spread before him. Patiently, he began reading aloud, his finger tracing the words on the page if Tohru desired to read along. Hikari leaned back on her seat and listened the unnaturally smooth voice work its way through the section, sparingly stopping to answer questions. It was better than music. He began slowly, keeping a steady pace.
"World War II first began with the tension remaining from World War I, and the drainage of Germany's power. Promising the return of the Fatherland, Adolph Hitler was elected Chancellor of Germany, then leader. Japan, wishing the resources from the Dutch East Indies, attacks Pearl Harbor on the morning of Sunday, December 7, 1941, causing The United States to declare War on Imperial Japan on December 8, 1941."
"Hey Yuki, why didn't everyone sit down and just talk about all this?"
"World Leaders normally just want power, and they don't want to sit down and talk. They want to become the greatest, at all costs."
"Well, that's stupid."
"Yeah. It is."
Tohru listened silently as Yuki carefully processed the horrors, every new battle bringing her closer to tears. Finally with the dropping of the bomb, she reached out and splayed her fingers across the page. Yuki looked over at her, registering the tears caught in the corners of her eyes, and closed the textbook. He said gently, "Too much?" Tohru nodded, her hands rubbing her eyes madly to be rid of the tears. Not knowing what to do, Yuki slipped the book back into his bag, and glared over at the two girls across the way who kept watching him. "What?" The two girls blushed and turned to each other, babbling. Groaning, he ran his fingers through his hair, and started flipping through the current class book. He'd read it before, but he may as well start again. After all, he had time to kill. But something tugged his sleeve again, He looked down, and then over at Tohru, who whispered, "Can you please read that aloud? I don't know why, but when you read, it sounds like every-thing's right. So...could you?" She turned red, and Yuki blinked down at her before smiling minutely and turning back to the beginning of the book. He began again, the words flying from the page to his mouth, and settling in Tohru's heart.
"Haiku, an anthology of rhythmic poetry, compiled by R. H. Blythe. Preface: The history of mankind, as a history of the human spirit, may be thought of as consisting of two elements: an escape from this world to another; and a return to it. Chronologically speaking, these two movements, the rise and fall, represent the whole human history; and these two take place microcosmically many times in peoples and nations. Hey Tohru, do you want to skip all of this? Well, I'm going to...um, this one's good...After it was dark; I begin to want to change; The way I grafted it...here's another one...The skylark; Its voice alone fell; Leaving nothing behind..." Tohru glanced up from her knitting when the melodic reading stopped, and softly she touched his elbow. He stared down, no, through her, his eyes unfocused in thought. Finally, Yuki whispered, "I'm a skylark..."
Tohru studied him for one second for murmuring, "Yuki, you do leave something behind. Just not what you think. You leave behind...a peace, a calm I can't shake off without leaving your presence. And I like that. I mean, I'm a little scattered, but you calm me down, and every-thing's cool and clear. It's beautiful."
Yuki smiled and was abruptly poked in the back of the head. He swung around and grit his teeth before saying almost impolitely, "Namodo-sama, what do you want?" The woman flipped her black hair behind her and said bluntly, "The girl over there with the neon green hair clip asked me to give you this." Yuki studied the folded piece of paper warily before taking it and reading it aloud, slowing down with every word.
"Hi! My name is Michi Hasho. I'm seventeen, blood type AB, I'm a Pisces, and I love guys like you. What's your name? Is it Tohru? And that girl next to you, is her name Yuki? Or is it the other way around, because that would be a little odd, since Yuki's a girl name and Tohru's a boy name...anyway, please write back."
Yuki crushed the piece of paper, and reopened it before writing carefully, "My name is Yuki. Tohru's my..." He paused, unsure what to write. Certainly not girlfriend or lover. He decided to leave the space blank. "...(blank), so I'm not interested. Nice try though. And how can you be sure that you like guys like me? I mean, you were judging that entirely off of what I look like, right? Usually, I'd try not to hurt your feelings, so if anything was done, excuse my rudeness. Have a nice time in America..."
He tossed it over to her, and watched her read the letter aloud to her friend, her eyes opening and her mouth forming a circle coated with lip-gloss. Michi glanced back over at him before almost bursting into tears, her friend clutching Michi's hands in hers. Yuki's eyes focused a little, and he noticed who Michi really was. It was that girl in class 4-B, the one who had confessed to him way back in his Freshman year. He hadn't even remembered her name of the girl he had almost allowed to hug him. Truly, his reflexes were faster, but she had caught him off guard, so he barely had saved himself and the Sohma curse. And he had thought she was pretty, in that normal way. Nothing like Tohru, but all these blasphemous thoughts were before he realized Tohru was his desire.
Slowly, Michi stood up, and stumbled across her friend to the aisle in between the row, and bowed. "I-I am sorry Yuki-kun, my friend wrote it, not me. It's just..."
Her long bangs covered her eyes, and she turned away, a ribbon of water droplets following her as she ran for the bathroom. Tohru stood up, and went to follow her, but was shoved aside by the friend. Yuki was frozen again. Dammit, why the fuck do I have to go and get frozen exactly when I have to be fucking mobile? Tohru turned to him, and said in a weak voice, "It's all my fault, isn't it? I mean, if I hadn't moved in with you and everyone, then maybe you would have gone back and said yes to her. And then because of me confessing, we meet up with her on the plane. It's my fault..." The teen couldn't move, but Hikari spoke up for him.
"Hon, you gotta realize what Shigure always says is true. Que sera sera. What will happen, will happen. And I believe you said something along the lines of "love happens" about two days ago."
"Hold up there, Namodo-sama, how do you know Shigure?"
Yuki had unfrozen, and was staring at the young woman next to him.
"Nanomo, Yun-Yun. Oh. He and I were old friends, from way back. I used to beat him up in elementary school."
"And that constitutes you as friends how?"
"He took my virginity. You must be Yun-Yun, his precious little cousin."
"He did what?"
Hikari ignored Yuki, and turned to Tohru, who was still blank.
"And you must be Tohru, the flower. I'm supposed to meet two people at the Michelangelo, that must be you two."
"No. I don't care what that stupid lecherous cur told you, I am not going to do-a-a trio or whatever."
Hikari looked at Yuki for one moment before bursting into laughter. She gasped, "You actually thought something like that? My god, you really are 'Gure's cousin. No, Ahoru, I was kidding. I'm meeting Aya and 'Gure for a trio." Yuki blanched before turning red and saying unevenly, "W-What."
"Yep. I'm there for She-male Senior and...what did you say...'stupid lecherous cur'."
"That's not the point. Why are those two hiring out prostitutes?"
"For starters, I'm a companion, and secondly-"
"That was rhetorical. Please. Don't answer."
"Hey Yuki, what's a trio?"
"Well..uh...hey, do you want to play Go Fish?"
The next moment expanded oddly before Tohru nodded, and struggled back into her seat. She reached for the deck of cards, but when she looked back up, Yuki's hand was supporting his chin, his eyes seeing a different place. She shook his shoulder a little, just to be sure he wasn't asleep. His gray eyes flickered over to her face for one second before closing. He sighed and stretched, his head hitting the headrest before the teen curled into his seat, his head falling onto Hikari's shoulder. With a look of minor amusement, Hikari shrugged his head off and pushed him towards Tohru, who caught him before he fell forward. Wow, Yuki's really knocked out. And my normal ribbons, they showed up about an hour before we left. Where did they go? She let Yuki slump against her, and she began a game of solitaire, to pass the silent time by. Her hand froze as Yuki spoke, "Mom...Nii-san...why d-don't you make him s-stop..." He shivered, his head falling from Tohru's shoulder to the crook of her extended arm. Another nightmare. Tohru stroked his hair, just once, before murmuring, "I'm sure, whatever you're seeing Yuki, it'll turn out fine." The rat's face relaxed and he stopped talking, falling into an uninterrupted sleep.
(Tohru plays several games of solitaire, and Yuki sleeps. Surprise surprise, neh?)
Yuki awoke to the sound of a strange song playing in his ear. Unable to put his finger on what language the song was in, he twitched and pulled himself off of whatever his head was on. He glanced down, wondering what could be so soft on an airplane. Of course. Tohru's lap. TOHRU'S LAP? He ripped away out of instinct, expecting to be a rat or even naked. But when he thrust his arms into his view, they were still human and covered by his shirt. Sighing with relief, he turned to Tohru and said calmly, "I fell asleep again, didn't I? How long was I out?" Tohru checked her watch before replying, "It's ten thirty am, Japanese time. About seven thirty am in America...right?"
"Well, nine thirty pm, but close enough."
"Right. When do we get there?"
"American or Japanese?"
"American."
"Five am or so. We're dropping thirteen hours once we cross over London, or maybe only twelve...anyway."
The song started again, and he recognized that stupid song Shigure had falling in love with a year or so ago. The idiotic Romanian one that got stuck in your head for days and days. It had taken him a month to get it out of his head, and there it was again, except in a strange language. Wait, that was English blaring in his ear. Shaking his head, Yuki pushed the cellphone away from his ear and groaned, "Whoever you are, I'm awake already." Hikari said calmly, "Of course you are. Just fall asleep and leave your girl to play solitaire while you just talk about some bad-ass parenting you got." Yuki's eyes widened and his pupils contracted with surprise. He raised his head off the the table, worried.
"I-I said what?"
"Aw, did She-male Jr. not know he talks in his sleep?"
"W-what did I say?"
"Oh, just some crap about your mom and Aya. Nothing really. But you did say something about making a certain 'him' stop. Hey, were you abused when you were a kid or something, or is your head screwed on wrong like all the other Sohmas I know?"
"Namodo-san, I really can't tell you that."
"Right. Just like whenever I tried to hug Gure or Aya. They pushed me away. Well, they stop me, only Tori pushed me away. Ah, the days of high school..."
Yuki glanced over at Tohru, who was peacefully finishing her solitaire game, and ran his fingers through his hair. How he had ended up in her lap was unknown, but the question really was what did she think about Michi. And if Shigure and Nii-san are hiring out girls, and sending them to NYC, I have a feeling that this vacation is going to be far from relaxing. Tohru slapped down the last card with a yelp of delight and turned to Yuki before exclaiming, "That's my third win today!" Yuki smiled back at her, but neglected to hide the perplexity in his eyes before Tohru noticed. Shyly, she reached up to brush some of his hair from his face to look into the teen's gray eyes, her cheeks spreading to a pink. Yuki stared down at her as she laid her hand at rest at the side of his face and said softly, "Yuki, what's wrong?"
"Nothing Tohru, just I'm really tired from getting up so early this morning."
"Should we play Go Fish?"
"Alright..."
"Can I play?"
Tohru jerked away from Yuki and looked past him at the woman on his other side, who had been listening in. "S-Sure, Hikari-san. Yuki, can you deal?" The rat took the deck of cards from Tohru and began to patiently shuffle. Hikari watched the pair glance at each other as Tohru poked around her bag for one moment before extracting two lollipops, one of which she offered to Yuki. He took it, but carefully laid it aside instead of opening the colorful wrapper. Just as Yuki finished passing the cards out, a voice burst from the speakers.
"This is a flight from Tokyo to JFK airport in New York City, New York. If you haven't heard folks, there will be some turbulence tonight, and we are awfully sorry about that. On the brighter note, our flight attendants will be passing out lunch very soon."
Another voice cut in, and translated the warm English into cold Japanese, making Yuki's eye-brows rise.
"This is a flight from Tokyo to JFK Airport in New York City, New York. There will be some turbulence. Lunch will be passed out soon. Thank you."
The speakers cut off as a blushing flight attendant ask Yuki what he wanted, Dim Sum or Sukiyaki. He didn't want either, just a glass of water with ice, please. The flight attendant left without ordering for anyone else, and returned with a plastic cup filled with liquid, which Yuki drank. He turned to Tohru and said softly, "Do you have any tens?"
"How can you tell?"
"You do?"
"Yeah. My mom says it's 13:1 chance against that you guess right at the beginning of a card game. How'd you know?"
"I can't tell you, or I'd lose my edge."
She passed the ten to the teen next to her, and glanced down at Hikari for one moment before saying cautiously, "Hey Hikari-san, do you have any fours?" The older woman shook her head and pointed to the deck in front of Yuki, which regretfully, Tohru reached for. But another hand shot out and snatched the deck away before Tohru could draw. Stunned, she looked up into the fiery abyss of a flight attendant. "NO. GAMBLING." Hikari shrank as far into her seat as possible, trying not to get into the fight. Another flight attendant crept up to the angry one and pointed at Yuki, mouth open, before nudging the other flight attendant, who swept away, grumbling. Without returning the deck of cards. Tohru laid the seven cards she had on her table, and sighed. Now what? Her thought was answered, almost creep-ily, by Michi emerging from the bathroom only to faint dead away into her friends arms. Glaring, Michi's friend set her into her seat, and sat down her self, stealing death wishes occasionally to hurl at the two teens next to her. To her intense disappointment neither of the two noticed. However, she did understand why Michi-chan had fallen for that guy. Yuki...right? He is pretty cute. Maybe I'll... Rude plans began forming, as her eyes glazed over. Her future love life with Yuki Whats-his-name painted her face red, and she fainted alongside her friend.
Yuki glared at them past Hikari's head as that flight attendant tripped over them with an uncharacteristic screech. Cussing quite colorfully, the flight attendant hauled the two girls into their seats and turned to the silver-haired boy to tell him off, but the look of amusement on his face stopped her short. "S-Sir, is there something funny?" The person looked up and said calmly, "You really are a hypocrite aren't you?" The flight attendant blinked, before retreating. How could she answer that?
--
Glaring, Hikari reluctantly pulled the earphones from her ear and exclaimed, "Yun-Yun! Could you keep it down? Tegomass really doesn't go with Beethoven." The rat flattened his bangs, irritated, before stiffly turning to Hikari and letting loose exactly what he'd been wanting to say for the last hour. "Well, if you don't think the two go together, stop listening into Tohru and mine's conversation. We both know the volume is low enough for you not to hear." Hikari crossed her arms, and said gruffly, "Frankly put pretty boy,you piss me off. How the hell did a Sohma like you end up with some girl like Tohru-chan?" Tohru flushed, her fingers shaking as she obediently continued the scarf, pretending she couldn't hear Yuki try to begin.
"It has-um...You see, we met when she pitched her tent out in the woods...no...uh..."
"Yun-Yun, if you can't explain how you two met, then something is wrong here. Very wrong. Right Tohru?"
Tohru bit her lip to remind herself that she was pretending she couldn't hear, and evenly continued her knitting. she wasn't missing a stitch even though her hands were shaking so badly see couldn't read the words inked in on her hand. An old habit of hers that she never could shake off. Think about the words on your hand, Tohru, and remember not to agree with Hikari-san, even though you are curious. Yuki now had his head caught in his hands on the table. How could he explain this without the curse?
"We go to the same school, and we're in the same class, and she living in a tent in the woods behind my house, and then she started living with Shigure, Kyo and I...and that was sort of three years ago or so...so, um, yeah."
He finished off rather flatly and Hikari shook her head. She leaned out past the boy to speak to Tohru, who had a look of relief on her face. "I'm so sorry for you, Tohru-chan. You know what happens when you fall for a Sohma? Your heart gets bro-" Suddenly a hand shot out and covered Hikari's mouth. Startled, Hikari stared at the hand, then almost fearfully over at it's owner. Yuki stated softly, but almost cruelly, "I would suggest you don't finish that. You don't know me from God. And I am sorry you fell for Hatori, but he's just like that anyway." He removed his hand and glanced over at the woman next to him. "Nanomo-san, are you alright?"
"H-How'd you know about 'Tori?"
"You're kidding. All of the girls in Hatori's class had a crush on him. Either that, or Nii-san, but Nii-san was just a little too creepy for most of them. Same with Shigure, who actually looks a lot like Hatori but is really a perv."
"I-I know that..."
"I know you know that, but that's not the point. Hatori's going to be in NYC with us. You ready to quote "do" Shigure and Nii-san on the same floor as Hatori?"
" 'Tori's coming? What about Kana?"
"What about her? She got married to someone else."
Hikari drew her hand to her chest and for one moment, looked exactly like a high school girl before whispering, "Really? Hatori-kun didn't tell me..." Yuki shrugged and replied, "He doesn't talk about it much. He really loved her." Hikari sighed, aging back to her actual age before going, "Oh." Now Yuki was interested. He asked, "Are you alright?" Hikari looked over at him, faking a smile before saying, "Yeah. I'm okay..." And then she turned away from him, facing the aisle, trying to sleep away her sorrow.
Oops. That was depressing. Sorry about that, I have this whole pairing up of the male Sohmas about to happen here, so this is the beginning...And, I am sorry, but I just can't write out anything more on the plane, but I managed a good 4790 words! So very sorry, but ch 9 will be about their first day in NYC! I will try to make it funny because this chapter was a little hard to swallow. The History Text excerpt I wrote and the other excerpt was from five-book set about Japanese Haiku, by who I said it was by.
