My sister requested that I extend the fiction to a few more chapters so nope, I won't finish the fic just yet. *sweatdrops as the readers booed* Ok, sorry again for the sudden change of fic plans!

Chapter 20: The Tragedy Behind a Lonely Man's Unseeing Eyes

Tohru opened her eyes and found herself staring at an unfamiliar ceiling. Frowning, she sat up, but discovered that she felt really weak. She laid her body down again and moaned softly.

"Don't move too much, Honda Tohru. The tranquilizer's side effect is still there," instructed a man's voice. It was Hatori, sitting down on a chair at the foot of her bed. "You'll feel a little malaise here and there, and drowsiness, but after a few hours, you'll be fine," he finished.

"W-Where am I?" she asked.

"In the main house of the Sohma clan," he replied. "I brought you here."

"But why?" she asked again.

"Akito wants to talk to you again."

"Akito-san?" Her heartbeat froze. The fateful rainy night memories flooded her memories again.

"He's still resting, but I'll bring him to you in just a little while," he said.

She panicked and sat up, despite the sudden lurch she felt in her throat. "N-No, have mercy. Please-"

"I'm sorry, Honda Tohru, but I cannot defy the head of the clan," he said coldly.

Kyo opened his eyes and found his fellow actors grinning at him.

"Good morning, Sleeping Beauty! Had a nice hundred year slumber?" asked one actor who played the sheep mascot.

He sat up and scratched his head, annoyed. "What the hell was in that apple?"

The propsman grinned sheepishly. "Er, let's just say it was done realistically for art's sake."

"The play? What happened to the play?" he asked.

"It's done."

"But how did the play end without me?"

"Someone else took over the job for you," explained Mayu-sensei. "Fortunately, Tohru knew the lines, so she acted for you."

"But you can only imagine the wrath the Princess Fan club unleashed upon learning that it wasn't you whom the Prince kissed, but Tohru," grinned another actor dressed in a dog costume.

"I dare not ask," said Kyo dryly. "So where's Tohru?"

The actors shrugged. "We don't know. She didn't join us when we bowed again, so we had to make Mayu-sensei wear the Princess costume and make her pretend that she's Tohru."

"She simply disappeared," agreed another.

Kyo frowned. "That's weird."

He then remembered again how unhappy Tohru was these past few days ever since she disappeared the first time in the woods. Neither she nor Yuki told him what happened, but he noticed that they were both drenched physically and drowned emotionally.

Somehow, is this connected with that?

He hurried out of the dressing room and started to search for his cousins. He found Shigure being interviewed by the press people.

"Of course we can have the play be made into a motion picture. My royalty fee is affordable." Shigure gave the cameras an award-winning smile. "In fact, I can even make a cameo appearance in it. Again, my talent fee is affordable."

"Shigure!" hissed Kyo.

"Not now! I'm presently answering the eager questions of the masses!" complained the dog.

"It's Tohru! She's missing!"

Shigure frowned, then turned to the media people. "Maybe we can continue this some other time." He threw them his calling cards. "Call me!" He then pulled his cousin away. "What's this about Tohru missing?"

"I don't know!" cried the neko. "I asked everyone where Tohru is, but they didn't know either."

The novelist looked really worried. "Did you see Hatori or Akito?"

"Why should I look for those-" He stopped as realization dawned in him. "You think?"

"No, I don't think. I know."

Tohru then noticed a picture frame on Hatori's desk. She stood up and went there to take a closer look. The doctor didn't say anything to stop her. He merely watched as she picked the frame up and looked at it curiously.

"She's very pretty," she whispered softly.

"Her name is Kana," he replied shortly.

"Your wife?" she asked.

"How should my answer benefit you, Honda Tohru?" he asked curtly.

"Ah, I was just asking." She placed the picture frame back and smiled at him. "Because I can feel this woman is very special to you."

"Hmm?"

"I placed the picture of my deceased mother in a frame too, because I can feel that this is the only way I can keep her memory sacred and alive."

"She's still alive," said Hatori.

"Ah! Then where is she?" she asked.

"I don't think I'm obliged to answer you that, Honda Tohru."

"Ah, I was just asking. Don't be mad!" she said, laughing uneasily. She looked at the picture again. "Really pretty."

To that, Hatori smiled secretly to himself.

"I think so too," he said at last.

"Eh?" She looked up.

"Kana is a lovely woman, with such admirable values and strength." He stood up and took the pack of cigarette on his desk. "She's very kind."

"I knew it! Her eyes say it!" exclaimed Tohru, clapping her hands in delight.

He looked surprised. "You mean you can tell a person's personality in his or her eyes? That's medically impossible. All you see are just a pupil, retina-"

"Ah!" Tohru beamed. "You are a doctor who was reared in the science of medicine, but you must also learn that there are some things that medicine can never explain." She looked at Kana's picture again. "For instance, ophthalmologists can never explain the delighted twinkle in her eyes, because all they care about are the veins behind her lovely, laughing eyes."

Hatori was silenced.

Such wisdom…from such a young girl. How can be that possible?

Suddenly, he remembered how Ayame told him that Tohru was like a nurse to all of them. She treated each Sohma's emotional wounds lovingly, like a mother, making the introverted Kisa smile again, and sarcastic Hiro soften. She understood Haru's split personality, and Ayame's pains with his younger brother. She gave Shigure the respect of a child to a father – something he had never earned before. She befriended Kagura despite the latter's lethal possessiveness of Kyo. She mellowed Kyo's notorious temper, and she taught Yuki how to trust others and himself, especially himself, again.

He smiled ruefully. And all these time, I was calling myself a doctor. My abilities aren't comparable to hers.

"Hatori-san?"

He blinked. "Yes, Honda Tohru?"

"May I ask why you…" she blushed. "…your hair is always covering that part of your eye."

He raised a brow.

"Not that it's unattractive, in fact, it's cool in an enigmatic way," she said quickly. "But I saw your picture here, and…" She showed him the picture taken in a beach, with him and Kana holding hands. The ocean breeze was blowing on his bangs, and his eyes, as Tohru described, were "laughing".

When was the last time that I smiled that way anyway?

I don't remember.

Ever since she disappeared in my life, I forgot how to smile again.

"You're much handsome when your bangs is not that long," she finished.

"I do not remember you being a hair expert," he said.

"Ah!" She blushed profusely. "I'm sorry!"

"But Kana told me that too," he finished, a nostalgic look on his eyes.

"Eh?"

He lit his cigarette and blew a perfect ring in the smoke. "Would you like to see what hides beneath my bangs?""he asked.

"Ah…"

He threw the unfinished cigarette on the floor and crushed it with the sole of his shoes. He seized her hand and pressed it on his bangs. "Look," he ordered.

Her fingers trembling, she combed his bangs away.

And found an unseeing eye.

Yuki sighed, relieved. At last, the crowd was dispersed already. His hand was cramped already from too much autograph signing.

"Hey Princey, time for the victory party!" called one of his fellow actors.

He nodded. "I'll catch up later. I'll just find-"

The boy raised his hand up. "Don't tell me. Honda Tohru, right?"

"How did you know?"

"Kyo was looking for her too. She's the favorite among the Sohmas nowadays, huh?"

Yuki didn't reply. He started to find Kyo.

Tohru stepped back, eyes shaking. "Your left eye!"

He nodded and brushed his bangs back. "Blinded."

"But why? Who did this to you?"

He looked down.

She looked at him. "Hatori-san?" She walked towards him, but tripped on her blanket. She landed on Hatori.

Poof!

"Yaaah! Hatori-san, I'm so sorry!" She sweatdropped when she saw a dizzy seahorse lying on top of the doctor's robe.

"I don't know where she went," said Kyo when Yuki confronted him. "I hope that Shigure's wrong."

"What did Shigure say?" demanded Yuki, although deep inside he knew the answer.

"He didn't see Hatori anywhere after the play, so he thinks that Hatori kidnapped Tohru."

Hatori the seahorse was lying on Tohru's bed as the girl looked at him, puzzled.

"There's no seahorse in the Juunishi," she said.

"I'm supposed to be a dragon," he said dryly.

"W-Well, you kinda look like a dragon," she said comfortingly. "Um, a little. The, um, scales. Yeah, the scales. And the eyes."

"Thanks," he said wryly.

"I'm so sorry again," she apologized.

"You….really remind me of her." The seahorse gazed at her. "The panicked look on the face. Exact replica."

"You don't have to tell me about her if you don't want to," she said gently.

"Ayame's right," he said. "You are one of a kind."

She beamed shyly.

Just like a dam long keeping his tragic tale, his story suddenly crashed out in the open. About Kana. About their love, which started like a fairy tale romance at first but ended in tragedy, because of Akito. She learned that Akito blinded Hatori's eye and ordered him to erase Kana's memories.

"S-So where is she now?" she asked.

"She married somebody else, and does not remember me anymore," he said sadly. "I just look after her from afar, just making sure that she's happy with her new life."

Tohru's eyes shook. "I-It's so unfair…you two loved each other very much. Why does it have to end that way?" A tear escaped from her eye. "So unfair…"

"That's life," he said. "C'est la vie."

"But it's wrong. No one has the right to meddle with someone else' life!" She hugged the seahorse to her chest. "I'm so sorry."

"But…" He couldn't understand if she was apologizing or sharing his pain. The latter perhaps.

He smiled.

Kana, she's just as kind as you. Ayame, now I understand why you called her a nurse. A nurse, she is.

Suddenly he poofed into a human.

Tohru blinked when she felt his warm naked chest beside her face. Burning, she stepped away and turned her back on him. "Oops."

His mouth twitched, and then suddenly, the room was filled with delighted laughter.

Tohru turned around and found Hatori laughing.

Hatori-san…

That unseeing eye is nothing compared to the true love you lost.

But will that happen to me too now that I love Yuki-kun?

Maybe…maybe it's not right to love him.

Maybe I should just forget him.

Maybe…since it's for the best.

tsuzuku