My Monster

Disclaimer: I don't own Fruits Basket.

Parts with breaks like this: -x-x-x-x-x-x- are flashbacks, daydreams, ect.

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Chapter 9:

Dreaming of You

"Kyou-kun! Kyou-kun, please wake up!" she pleaded, shaking his shoulders. The rain from last night still poured outside, more lightly than before. A clap of thunder sent her into a ball, covering her head. She slowly looked up at the sleeping boy as her eyes became glassy and she sat up, holding his shoulders.

"Monster!" he yelled in his sleep, batting her away with his arm. She sat on her knees a few feet away from the boy, watching him as he slept fitfully, shaking his limp head as he yelled. "Damn monster!!" She yelped, holding her hands to her mouth with wide eyes. Spreading her fingers, she spoke his name.

"Kyou-kun…" She crawled closer, her heart beating quickly. She sat next to him, examining his face in the dim light of an early rainy afternoon. Her fingers brushed against his face, the boy twitching in return. Her fingers traveled across his forehead, beads of sweat clinging to her cold fingers as they reached his knitted brows. Leaning into his ear, she whispered "Kyou-kun…" her breath came quickly from fear of the storm, another clap of thunder sending her cowering closer to him. "Wake up!" she whispered frantically, looking at his flinching eyes for relief. "Please, wake up!"

"No!" he suddenly screamed, glaring angrily into her scared and glassy eyes. Reality began to sink in and he absorbed where he was, what he did… and who he was with.

"A-are you okay?" she asked worriedly, slowly crawling back toward him with quivering lips. She reached for his shoulder, leaning ever closer as she searched his eyes for whatever inner turmoil he was feeling. "Wh-"

"Don't touch me!" he screamed, just before her hand would have made contact with him. His yell was in unison with the thunder, his back straight against the dresser he was leaning against. In the same instant, she instinctively yelped and threw herself into his chest, clinging to his shirt for protection. He wrapped his arms around her upon instinct, his arms wrapped too tightly around her for either of them to remember the nightmare for this short while. They shook in each other's arms for each of their own reasons; neither being able to explain it. She cried silently, hugging herself even more closely to him and he tightened his arms around her small waist.

"A-are you… angry, Kyou-kun?" she finally asked, looking into his eyes in the dimness. He sighed, brushing his knuckles against her temple. He hugged her and sat up with her protest, turning on the light beside her bed. She stood up with him, looking up at him through her bangs in a shameful way. He contemplated this, remembering the dream he had. The emotions… they had felt so real. Everything was so accurate.

During those dreams, he was of an age where he had lost his memory. He was told that there was a terrible car accident that sent him into a coma for years. 'Could it be possible that I knew her before?' he asked himself, still staring down at her. He lifted her chin, staring into her eyes. "I'm not… but I want to ask you something." She merely nodded her head, a fearful look in her eyes. "Tohru, did you know me when I was a child?" he asked, feeling stupid for even thinking so. It wasn't in his nature to make such spontaneous conclusions, but since the first time he saw her, even in his un-collective conscious, he felt attached. He felt like she was something… no, someone that would show him happiness. He never doubted the joy that she could bring him.

She took her time answering, and finally shook her head. "No," she muttered, looking to the floor. "Kyou-kun… may I ask you something?" He nodded his head, and she sat on her bed, patting the spot next to her in contemplation. He followed her command, sitting and waiting as patiently as he could for her to say something. "What was your nightmare about?" she asked, biting her lip as she looked up at him.

"Nightmare?" he questioned, feigning cluelessness. Her unusual expression told him that she wasn't buying it. "You wouldn't want to know." he muttered.

"But I do, Kyou-kun. You… you were calling me a monster. Something bad must have happened."

"Nothing did, you're just being paranoid." He got off of her bed and walked to her door.

"Kyou-kun!" she called, the boy turning around to her. "I want to care. And I do, so why can't I help you?"

"You don't see them!" he answered, an angry tone about his voice.

"See what?" she asked, curiously walking toward him.

"Don't you dream? Don't you dream about what happened? Huh, Tohru?"

"What happened?" she asked innocently, trying hard to find the answers.

"We knew each other! We knew each other and you abandoned me."

"What? Kyou-kun, that never happened to us. It won't. Are you feeling well?" She reached for his forehead but he backed away.

"I'm fine. I've just remembered."

"Remembered what?" she asked desperately, reaching for his arm and holding tightly. She knew he'd try to run away. "I don't understand, Kyou-kun."

"I know you don't." he muttered, looking away. His position slackened as he calmed down. "That didn't feel like just any dream. I don't know how or why or when, but something had to have happened between us before. We knew each other." She looked contemplatively into his eyes, smiling slightly.

"That's not possible, Kyou-kun. I could never forget you."

"You said that in my dream," he muttered, walking from the room.

"Are you-"

"I'm not leaving. Just… leave me alone for a while." he muttered, retreating into the living room as she stayed where she stood. Her hands shook with confusion and fear. She didn't want Kyou to leave her; not now. And he said that they knew each other before – could he be right? She wanted desperately to know, to know how she forgot such a wonderful person. Her memories were few, but she felt close to him already. Could that be because she really did know him? She thought back to the night before, when she was scared so badly that she couldn't move; just cling to his shirt. The storm wasn't as strong now, so why did she still want to lie in his arms? Tohru sighed, falling to the floor on her knees in mental exhaustion.

The light patter of the rain made her tired, but she didn't want to go to sleep again. Instead, Tohru got off of the floor and tried to keep herself busy. 'Kyou-kun told me to leave him alone… should I ask him if he wants lunch anyway?' she thought, peeking around the corner to the boy on the couch. The television was on, but she could tell that his eyes were blindly staring at it. 'I guess I'll leave him alone. I've bothered him enough today.' Her heard skipped a beat at that; she didn't want to cause him trouble. He was already such a troubled person. She wanted to know what else about him – and maybe herself – that had been kept a secret from them.

"Tohru?" his sudden voice came, his intense gaze set forward. She could tell that he was hardly listening to her, that whatever she said, he wouldn't have much of a reaction to. "What's on your mind?" She couldn't tell him. He'd think that she thought he was lying about them knowing each other – which she didn't; it was just hard to digest. Tohru walked over to him, staring down as he kept his eyes from her.

"I'm worried, Kyou-kun." she muttered, him nodding his head. She sighed, tempting herself to cry. Instead though, she wouldn't bother him with her tears. She walked from the room and went into her own. She picked up the cordless phone next to her bed, beginning to dial her house number. As she did so, her thoughts swirled around in her mind. 'I can't talk to Kyou-kun about this. He'll get mad. He's as scared as me… I just know that something's going to happen. This isn't turning out right!' She sighed, dialing the last three numbers. 'Just a week ago he was a cat, and now-" She stopped herself short, remembering the things that her mother knew. The phone rang once, and she quickly hung it up with both hands, pulling them to her eyes. 'There's no one to go to!' she thought, crying. 'No one knows about Kyou-kun, and if they find out, they'll… they'll take me away. Kyou-kun will be alone! All… alone.'

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"Hello, Shigure." A woman smiled, Tohru looking from her child-like perspective up at the woman that looked like her mother. "We've come for Kyou." Tohru turned back to the man, smiling with tears in her eyes.

"But Kyouko-san, you've already decided that you don't want to baby sit him. You quit." The woman shook her head, smiling.

"I did quit, and I thought that I no longer wanted anything to do with him, but that's no longer true. Tohru and I love Kyou with all our hearts and I've decided to take the job on once more." The man frowned, shaking his head.

"You were his last chance, Kyouko-san, and you've failed him. He's gone through ten people already, and Akito has had enough. No one wants him, so he'll stay here."

"That's not right!" she protested, stepping forward and pushing Tohru to the side. "I made a mistake! Kyou has no one except for us!"

"He has you no longer," he replied in a cool tone.

"He'll be miserable! It's not right! The entire family hates him. He deserves a chance at happiness!"

"A boy like him doesn't deserve to live," he replied, his voice equally cool and detached, adding more venom to the words. Tohru's eyes began to well with tears.

"How can you say that? He's done nothing-"

"He killed his own mother!"

"That was no homicide!" she protested, her voice cracking at the volume. People were beginning to stop and stare and Tohru hugged to her mother. "He's an innocent child! You're putting her suicide on him just because you hate him!"

"That's not it!"

"I don't care! I'm going to get him." She pushed passed the man and stomped quickly through the large hallway, slamming open doors in search for the boy. Tohru followed quickly with her. "Tohru, you go to the other side of the house. We're finding Kyou. If you do, just leave as quickly as you can. Run!" Tohru obeyed, running through the hall passed people trying to catch her. She heard her mother protesting a group of men trying to restrain her, but the girl couldn't give up.

'Kyou-kun is all alone,' she thought, slamming doors open and finding empty rooms.

"There she is!" Someone yelled, running after her. She panicked, running into a random room and shutting the door behind her. The room was pitch black, and very cold.

"Who's there?" ordered a gruff voice, and she kept silent and whimpered. "I said who's there?" the voice ordered again, their footsteps coming toward her. She heard a slap in the room followed by the noise of something being thrown into what she suspected to be the wall. The person came toward her and she dodged their hands, running to the left and tripping on something soft. "Get out of here!" the enraged voice yelled in the pitch blackness. Tohru ran her hands along the floor, panting in fear. They ran into a soft pile on the floor, a sticky substance rubbing onto her hands. She smelled blood. Her eyes widened in tears, her hands rubbing over the person's back.

"Are you okay?" she asked instinctively, finding the sides of their face. She leaned closer, trying to see if their eyes were open.

"Who are you?" the person yelled, punching a wall and stumbling into the darkness. Tohru couldn't see their eyes, and she rested her ear on their chest, rising and falling slowly.

The person swung the door open, the light from the hall intruding on the darkness of the room. The light that escaped the door frame barely reached herself and the person she was with, and when her eyes fell onto his body, she screamed. "Kyou-kun!" She began sobbing, unable to take her eyes off of his bloody and bruised body. His face was of shades of purple, scratches running everywhere from a beating. His arm looked broken, and he was bleeding profusely from his side.

A pair of hands pulled her away, but her hands clung to her friend's shirt. He was unconscious. Her arms wrapped around his shoulders as she sobbed into his bloody head. The person lifted her from the ground with her arms weakly holding him to her. "Kyou-kun! Kyou-kun! Please wake up, Kyou-kun!" His blood, lightly smeared on small parts of a wall and the floor where he landed, was making her sick. "Kyou-kun!" His eyes flittered open as the person began separating the two.

"T-Tohru?" he asked, one eye swollen shut from the beating. He was about to say something more, but the person holding Tohru succeeded in tearing them apart, and held him by the shirt in one hand, throwing him into the wall and allowing him to plop to the ground.

"KYOOOOOOU!!" she screamed, reaching for him, though he did not get up. The person transferred her into another set of arms, and she fought with all her might to get free.

"Oh my god! Kyou!!" her mother screamed, and Tohru looked back, teary eyed to the woman.

'That's right, mom will save him!' she thought, watching her mother fight helplessly against the two people restraining her. 'Mom will save him… mom will save him…' she repeated it in her mind, but it never helped; her mother continued fighting but could not escape the men's arms. "Mom, save him!" she screamed. One of the men punched Kyouko in the stomach and she doubled over, her short fiery hair covering her tearful eyes.

"Take them away. Have their memories erased." A voice commanded, and Tohru felt herself being carried away as she watched Kyou bleed on the ground.

"Kyou-kun! No! Let me go, please!! Please, Kyou-kun, wake up!"

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"Kyou-kun! Wake up! Wake up, Kyou-kun, don't die!!" she screamed in the arms of the boy in her dream, his eyes wide with worry.

"Tohru, it's just a dream!" She was shaking in his arms, crying and screaming at the top of her lungs. He knew what she was dreaming, he remembered those few moments when he was awake. His tears fell onto her cheeks as he pleaded with her, shaking her shoulders. "I'm right here, Tohru! Don't worry, I'm alive!" He pulled her closer, into a tight embrace as he whispered into her ear. "Tohru, I'm right here. Tohru, wake up! Wake up!"

She screamed into his ear and he flinched, though kept his hold tight in her. She slackened in his hold for a moment, and her arms slowly rose around his neck. "Kyou-kun… oh, Kyou-kun… Kyou-kun…" she muttered, hugging him tightly as she still cried. "Such a bad dream," she said through tears, digging her face into his shoulder. He sighed, crying as well, putting his face into her hair.

"Not a dream, Tohru." he said, and she shook in his arms.

"But you died," she whimpered, pulling away and looking into his sad eyes. She shivered at the look he was giving her.

"Almost," he muttered, wiping the tears from her cheeks. She felt herself breaking even more under the truth as she tried to keep on a strong front, wiping away his tears as well.

"I'm so sorry," she said, shaking her head, as if doing so would take away the pain. Her head swam in confusion, and fresh tears fell from her eyes. She felt as if her head was filled to the rim with never-ending tears, and her eyes could only let out a small amount. "I'm so sorry, Kyou-kun! I… I didn't-"

"Don't do this to yourself," he ordered, pulling her close and rubbing her back, one hand running through her hair. "It's not your fault; you were tricked. Your mother took a job babysitting me, and when she didn't quit the job like expected, Akito lied to her. We were ripped apart by her."

"You were so hurt," she muttered, crying into his chest. She didn't need to be comforted; he did. They cried together for the longest time before Tohru pulled herself away, looking into his eyes.

"Kyou-kun, how often did it happen?" she asked, meeting his puzzled face.

"The beatings?" She nodded her head, gulping. "Before I met you, it was random. When you and Kyouko came into my life, less, and when you left, more." Tohru frowned, sighing against more tears.

"We've always loved you, Kyou-kun. We wanted you to come back."

"I wanted to go back. I was locked in a small room, no windows or light. The door was locked from the outside." He looked at her, holding her face in his hands. "None of this is your fault, and it's certainly not your mothers. You know that."

"But, you lived with us for two years. It could have stayed like that if-"

"If nothing!"

"But your mother committed suicide and Hatori told us that you did that! He said that you talked about killing us, too!" She shook her head, looking away. He dropped his hands. "I was so afraid of you, and for nothing. If Haru hadn't said anything, I wonder if I'd ever forget that fear." She wiped more tears from her eyes. "I can't believe I loved you so much and threw it away just because of something I heard. I'm so sorry, Kyou-kun."

He shook his head, smiling slightly. "It's been my life story, Tohru. It stopped hurting." She shook her head with wide eyes.

"You're a liar." she muttered, holding his hands in hers. "Don't try to make me feel better, Kyou-kun. You want to cry as much as I do." His expression broke at that, and she pulled him into her arms this time. She had to be strong, just this once, for him. When he calmed down, she began to speak again, holding him closely to her. "They can say and do all they want, but I won't let you go back there."

"No," he muttered, her arms loosening around him. She looked down at him, her eyes worried. He pulled away from her and sat up straight, looking down into her eyes sadly. "You're not going through this again. Now that I've remembered, I'm not letting you get hurt. I'm leaving tonight. I'm sorry for bringing it back, Tohru."

"No! Kyou-kun!" He stood and walked from her room, and at first she couldn't move. Her legs were stuck to the bed. "Kyou-kun, don't leave me!" She found her strength and stood up, the rain from the long storm coming back and pounding outside. She ran through the hall and caught him as he walked out the door. She flew toward him, catching up just as she tripped and clung to his back just outside of the door. "Don't leave me, please!"

He turned around, holding her in place as he stared into her teary eyes. "I don't care about what pain I'll go through! As long as you're here with me I can endure! I can do anything as long as you're here with me, Kyou-kun! I d-" She was cut off by his lips on hers, urgent and needing. Her eyes widened and closed shut as her heart sped up, his hand holding her tightly to him by her waist, other tangled into her wet hair. She clung to him, his urgency only making her more worried.

'A farewell kiss,' she thought hopelessly, just as he pulled away from her. Tears fell down her cheeks and he smiled ruefully at her, saying something that her sorrow and the thunder blocked out. She merely stared incoherently at his moving lips. She fell to the ground in fear and sorrow, her hair hanging over her face as she stared at him. He wrapped his fingers around the beads on his wrist, quickly pulling them off, dropping them to the ground.

She stared in horror as he transformed, a horrible odor filling the air that made her gag. She barely got a glimpse of a brown and boney grotesque creature before he ran into the forest. She held her head to the side and threw up, falling backwards in the mud as she cried herself to sleep. She didn't have the strength anymore to move.

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;/ I lost my keys, which hold my jump drive. Haha! Aren't I a smart one?