|| In the Absence of Memory ||
by mikan

Chapter Three: Morning

The room was bright and airy, the sliding doors on the balcony opening onto an uninterrupted view of the sea. Sitting up from her futon, Tohru stared past the slats of the railing, catching a glimpse of the water glistening blue green in the strong morning sunlight. The breeze blowing lightly into their bedroom lifted her tangled hair from her face. Shifting her gaze, she studied one by one the things around her that had been shadowed the night before.

In the revealing daylight, she was pleased to find that her surroundings were a complete opposite of the filthy apartment in Sendai. The tatamis on the floor were a crisp, fresh yellow-green, and the rice paper on the shoji glowed a warm ivory. The room was not that large, but the vastness of sky peeking in at the sliding door to her right dispelled any impression of crampedness. Her fingers stroked the softness of the blanket draped over her body. The sheets were newly washed, scented with the outdoor air and the sun.

So this is our home.

She looked down at him, sleeping so peacefully beside her. He was on his side, in his own separate futon, but sometime in the night he had kicked the comforter into a tangle around his legs and had flung his arm carelessly onto her blanket. His head was turned towards her, away from the light. He had an arresting beauty in sleep -- his lashes dusky against his cheeks, his delicate mouth a hair's breadth parted, breath passing soundlessly through. His sleeping kimono had slipped off his shoulder, baring an expanse of white skin.

The persistence of the midmorning light soaked into his pale, blue-veined lids, awakening him. Slowly, his eyes opened, still drowsy with sleep. He stared at her, the beads of his pupils uncannily still and penetrating.

"You're awake," he murmured.

There was no hint of rancor in his voice, none of the brusque impatience which had laced his every word the day before. In fact, there seemed to be nothing in his raspy whisper but a lingering sleepiness. She averted her eyes from his gaze, her fingers curling into the blanket.

"It must be around ten in the morning already... you know," she said with hesitant familiarity.

He looked out the open sliding doors, squinting against the sunlight.

"Ten in the morning, huh? Ah, well... I was tired. The flight was bumpy."

She remembered the small twin-engine plane, its pitifully skinny hull unable to block out the terrifying hissing wind. Despite her fatigue, she had had enough energy to be acutely aware of fear. Past the cold glass of the windows, the water had stretched out underneath them like a great black mirror, ominous in its calm.

"It was quite a small plane," she said.

"We had no choice. The big airlines were all booked."

"Where did we go anyway -- before Sendai, I mean?" she asked suddenly. "Where were we driving from?"

Akito listened to the question, his eyes still on the palm tree waving past the veranda. Her asking did not bother him -- it was only natural, he told himself -- he could expect nothing less. She remembered nothing, possessed nothing to anchor her in reality except himself and whatever he chose to tell her. He was prepared, in any case, to placate her with neat explanations and conveniently vague answers. Nevertheless, there was a slight, disturbing feeling that he could not shrug off easily, much less identify. It lingered in the air, in the sound of her clear, innocent, questioning voice.

"You were sick," he answered, "so we were in Tokyo having you treated." He sat up slowly, reaching down and untangling the comforter from his legs. Feeling the breeze, he slid the collar of his robe back up over his bare shoulder and pushed his hair out of his eyes. He regarded her, his head tilting slightly.

"How are you feeling?" he asked. His voice was gentle, his eyes soft and solicitous.

Finding the absence of his previous moodiness somewhat heartening, she gave him a timid smile.

"Better, I think."

"Good. Shall we try standing up?"

He lifted the edge of his comforter and rose, his pale white hands collecting the folds of his long robe and wrapping them around his body. He extended one hand to her, palm up. She placed her hand in his. He helped her to her feet, his other hand catching hers as she stumbled upright. She found herself leaning into his chest, his slender, reed-like body steadying her, giving her balance.

He watched her carefully.

"Well? Can you manage by yourself?"

She felt him slowly letting go of her fingers. Curiously, the weakness which had afflicted her the day before now no longer weighed her legs down. She could feel her feet planted in the softness of the futon, her legs firmly upright. Suddenly she realized that she was already standing on her own, her fingers hovering in the space between them.

He pressed both corners of his lips outward, the line of his mouth curving slightly.

"Looks like you're fine," he noted with satisfaction.

His smile was not quite a smile, but it was nevertheless markedly different from the sardonic twisting lips she had seen the day before. She reached out and laid her fingers on his arm. He looked at her questioningly. She felt heat creep slowly up her cheeks.

"I, uh... " she began haltingly, "I think I'll be alright, it's just that... " She looked up at him and tried another hesitant smile. "Would you mind if I hold onto you like this? I feel... safer this way."

How charming, he thought. From the light blush in her cheeks, to the shy smile, she presented a perfectly enchanting picture of unguarded innocence. He took her hand and linked it through his elbow.

"Of course I wouldn't," he answered easily. "Come, I'll take you on a tour. You didn't get to see much of the house last night, did you? We'll go out on the porch and have a look around."

She gathered the loose collar of her yukata around her neck. "Maybe I should change first... "

He eyed the thin silk. "Are you cold?"

"No, just... not really dressed."

"My, aren't we modest," he murmured, his eyes sweeping her from head to toe. "There's no one here, you know. Just you and me and the ocean."

There was a knowing casualness in his gaze that reminded her he was intimately acquainted with the body under her robe. Suddenly the room seemed too small and he too close.

He's your husband, she told herself. There's no reason to feel uneasy at all.

He observed the blush flame bright red across her face to the tips of her ears. He was anticipating the hesitant withdrawal of her fingers from his arm. The moment he felt it, he trapped her arm firmly with his elbow, pulling it closer against his side.

"Don't think too much," he admonished her quietly. "Now come on. I want you to see this place. This is a new house, you know. I picked it out as a surprise for you."

Together they walked out of the room. He led her onto the veranda.

Before them lay the ocean in all its serene glory. A stretch of white sand sloped down gently from the back of the house to the water. Palm trees swayed here and there, their topmost heights bunched with heavy clumps of coconut. She scanned the beach. To their left and right, houses peeked out from behind well-manicured hedges, separated by well-planned lot spacing and several judiciously situated trees. On the whole length of the shore, there was not a single person to be seen.

"So this isn't where we lived?" she asked.

"We used to live in Tokyo."

"Why did we move?"

"Because this place is so much better for your health."

She turned to him, her eyes worried.

"But it must be outrageously expensive!"

Akito looked at her with genuine amusement. "What, do you think we're renting?"

Her eyes widened. "Are we?"

He threw his head back and laughed. The sound was clear and light -- it seemed to her to be the sound of the sunlight glinting off the water. She watched him. The wind threaded its fingers through his hair, sweeping tousled dark locks across his forehead. His shoulder was pressed against hers as they both leaned on the railing. He shot her a sidelong glance, then stared out at the sea.

"Do you wonder why there's no one walking on the beach?"

"I was starting to wonder," she admitted.

"Well," he turned back to her, his eyes suddenly gleaming, "that's because this is our beach, you see. Our house. Our trees. From that rock you see over there... " he pointed to a boulder much diminished by distance, "to where that house is over there... everything in between is ours."

The expanse of sand he had delimited comprised nearly three-fourths of the whole landscape before them. She stared at him, astounded.

"You don't believe me," he said with a smile. He shook his head. "Tohru, Tohru. Still distrusting me, aren't you?"

Gently he disengaged his arm from hers and moved behind her. She went perfectly still. He braced his arms on either side of her and leaned closer till his lips almost touched her ear.

"This is all for you, you know," he whispered. "Aren't you even a little bit pleased?"

She turned her head quickly to look up at him, wanting to hastily reassure him that of course she was pleased. More than pleased, in fact -- ecstatic, jubilant, flabbergasted even. Just needing some time for everything to sink in, that was all.

Instead, the words dissipated from her mouth, sucked up in her sharp intake of breath.

His face was very, very close. His hair teased her cheek.

Her lips remained parted -- her whole body waiting, suspended, at once afraid and yet keenly anticipating...

He leaned forward a fraction, and touched his lips to hers -- just once, very lightly, a touch as light and tentative as the tips of the palm leaves dipping in the breeze. Before her mind could acknowledge what was happening, the moment had ended. Slowly, he withdrew his head.

She felt as if the breath were being dragged out of her, the breath and the sudden sweetness that had unfurled where their lips had met. She stared at him, her lips still slightly parted. Her voice was trapped in a throat gone tight. And her mind felt like sand scattered on the wind.

His arms drew her into an embrace. He spoke softly, his face near her ear, his body warming her back.

"We're pretty well off, you know. I came into an inheritance recently. It won't last forever, but at least we're off to a good start."

She looked out at the spectacular view that lay untouched and waiting before them.

"I can't believe... " she finally whispered, a catch in her voice, "all this... "

With a touch so gentle she barely noticed it, he tucked her hair behind her ear. He smoothed down the tresses tangled by the wind and answered:

"All this is for you. All I ask in return is that you do your best to get better."

The beauty surrounding her and the earnestness in his voice coalesced into a core of unbearable brightness in her chest. With an impulsiveness that to her, somehow felt right, she turned around and flung her arms about his neck, clinging to him tightly.

For once Akito was taken by surprise.

Tohru held onto him with a subtle desperation, her face pressed against his shoulder. The darkly brooding man she had awoken to in the car the day before now seemed like a distant mistaken impression. She closed her eyes and welcomed the warmth enfolding her. Suddenly, the void in her mind ceased to be terrifying -- ceased, in fact, to be a void. In its forbidding emptiness now surfaced his face, with those still, calm eyes that assured her everything would be alright.

Even if he's all I have, all I know, it's alright.

She promised herself would regain everything. She would rake her mind, jolt it, force it into recollecting all that she had forgotten.

For his sake, she would try her hardest to remember everything.

Yuki checked his watch for the fourth time, and, also for the fourth time, redialed a number with painstaking deliberateness on his small cellular phone. He pressed the phone to his ear and waited.

He was staring out the train window so hard his gaze could have bored holes in the double-paned glass. He listened as the phone kept on ringing, his irritation mounting with each buzz. Gritting his teeth, he smashed the End button with his thumb and, for the fifth time, checked the number on the small slip of paper Hatori had given him.

He had dialed that number exactly four times already. Where was Kyou?

Exhaling heavily, he glared at the keypad on his phone and punched in three numbers. There was a pause, then a deafening, badly-selected clip of classical music assaulted his ear. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the lady next to him shoot another irate glance his way. Normally he would have apologized. Instead, he turned his head to the window and waited.

The music was finally, mercifully cut short.

"Directory assistance!" a perky female voice answered.

"Yes," he said crisply, "could you give me the number for Sohma Kazuma's dojo, please?"

"What city, please?"

How was he supposed to know? All that idiot Kyou ever said was that it was "in the mountains" somewhere.

"Uh... somewhere near Sapporo... maybe?"

Keys clacked faintly in the background, then the woman responded, just as ebulliently as before:

"Our apologies for the wait! The number will be given shortly. Thank you for your call!"

Yuki steeled the muscles near his ear and hoped that he would be spared later ear damage. The mechanical computerized voice came on the line, pronouncing the number syllable by agonizing syllable. It was the same number he had dialed four times already! He waited for the offer of automatic connection. At the prompt, he hit the key impatiently and listened as the ringing began.

Pick up... pick up...

Suddenly the ringing was cut off and a polite voice answered:

"Good morning, Sohma dojo."

Yuki gripped the phone.

"Can I speak to Sohma Kyou, please? It's an emergency."

There was a pause.

"Speaking," said the voice, now a touch suspicious.

Yuki hastily continued:

"Kyou! I -- "

In a flash the once-polite voice turned gratingly hostile.

"What the hell do you want? And how did you get this number anyway? I don't remember giving it to you!"

Yuki grit his teeth. It had been a while since they had spoken. He had forgotten just how difficult Kyou could be.

"Will you please just listen?"

"I'm missing practice right now answering this damn phone! It's been ringing off the hook for the past five minutes! Ah..." Kyou paused as the realization struck him, "...so that was you, wasn't it! Do you know what we're doing here? We're trying to meditate!"

"Shut up!" Yuki hissed into the phone, superhumanly restraining himself from shouting. "Listen to me. Tohru is missing!"

The stupefied silence that resulted on the other end gave him some satisfaction.

"What?" Kyou whispered, his voice suddenly faint.

"Akito kidnapped Tohru."

"I can't hear you! Your shitty phone's crapping out on me! Hello? Hello!"

Yuki held the phone away from his head. Kyou was screaming into it like a madman. He took a deep breath and said into the phone, slowly and clearly:

"Akito took Tohru. We need you here now."

There was a pause. He checked the LCD screen and was relieved to discover the signal strength steadily climbing. He pressed the phone back against his ear.

"Kyou? Hello, Kyou? Did you hear what I said?"

This time, the answer came through, firm and clear:

"I'll be there by tonight." The line clicked dead.

Yuki closed the flip phone and leaned back into his seat, acutely feeling the tension in his muscles. He closed his eyes, resting his temple against the square of white cotton covering the headrest of the seat. Fatigue throbbed underneath his lids. The subdued motion of the train was aggravating the migraine that was fiercely threatening to split his head in half. He plastered the back of his head against the headrest, wondering how the fatigue could fail to deaden the pain in his head.

He had had no sleep, having rushed straight to Sendai the night before. All through the night and into the morning, he had been led on a mad chase all over the city, doggedly following each clue as it turned up. Yet even after such exhausting effort, he found himself right back at the beginning, only with more questions this time.

A pile of cards stashed into the glove compartment of an abandoned car. An empty box of medication pre-ordered in bulk.

Beyond that, there was nothing. The trail went dead in Sendai.

What was Akito planning?

For the first time in his life, Yuki felt like wringing Hatori's neck. What had he been thinking -- letting her be taken out of the clinic, and by Akito, of all people! Of all people, him.

Tohru, my god, what is he doing to you? Yuki thought miserably. I'll be there, hang on. I'll find you.

Sohma Yuki sat, imprisoned by his own frustration, on the late morning Shinkansen to Tokyo. His head was pounding with all the I have to's that pummeled his conscience, driving the searing guilt in deeper. He had planned to go see her that night. But unfinished work had kept him so late in the office that he had decided to postpone his visit till the next evening.

If only I'd visited her. If only I'd gone.

I have to find her. I have to call the police, call the bank, call the airport. I have to find her...

. . . "He won't harm her."

Hatori's words suddenly cut into his thoughts. Yuki glared out the window, a vision of Hatori's calm, expressionless face surfacing against the tall grass that whizzed by.

He had better be right about that.

But about the other thing...

If he's right about the other thing, then god help us all.

She glanced at the plastic bags twirling in his hands as they walked quietly down the street. The thin pink bags were loaded with groceries, and due to their weight, the bulky bottoms had taken to spinning, causing the handles to dig into his palms. For the second time, she reached down and tried to pull a bag from his grasp.

He curled his fingers around the plastic and held the bags away from her.

"I told you, I'll carry them," he said.

"But they're so heavy!"

"Which is precisely why you can't carry them."

"Then let me carry the eggs," she said, reaching for the carton tucked under his arm.

He did not risk resisting, both of them keeping the welfare of the eggs in mind. She succeeded in extracting the tray from him, and with a satisfied smile, held it close to her body.

"So what's for dinner tonight?" she asked, looking up at him.

Akito would have liked an answer to that question himself. In his life, he had never, not once, gone near the kitchen, much less touched a ladle or switched on a stove. The thought of handling blood-drenched, uncooked meat sickened him. He had been careful to buy only vegetables and fruit, along with some rice he figured he could throw in the rice cooker.

Maybe I shouldn't have told her I'd do all the cooking.

"I'll warn you, I don't have extensive experience in the kitchen," he muttered.

She arched a brow. "This from the man who so sternly forbids me to cook?"

"I don't want you to tire yourself out."

She shook her head and said with a sweet smile, "I don't want you to burn our beautiful house down, darling. Just let me do the cooking. It's not that tiring, you know. And besides, what kind of wife would I be if I just lie around like a log all day long?"

He was staring at her with undisguised surprise. She continued on walking, the smile on her face tinged with the same shyness that had so charmed him earlier. Her words hung in his mind.

Anata. It was the first time she had ever called him that. It was the first time in his life he had ever heard an endearment addressed to him.

The silence was broken by a sudden cry.

"Hello there!"

Akito and Tohru both looked up to find a jolly-looking middle-aged couple waving to them from the front step of a house to their right.

Tohru responded with a ready smile.

"Good afternoon!" she greeted, bowing to them.

Akito inclined his head politely, his face impassive as he watched the couple walk down to their front gate, which opened onto the street.

"You're the new neighbors, aren't you?" the man went on, grinning jovially. "Forgive me for being so nosy, but I noticed your arrival last night. I'm Shibata Masao, and this is my wife Akemi."

The woman bowed, the smile on her face so expansive that her eyes nearly disappeared into her the folds of her cheeks.

"Won't you come in for tea?" she invited, gesturing for them to enter.

By the time Akito realized what was going on, Tohru had agreed and was already starting up the path. He managed a tight little smile, then stepped inside the gate and followed the two women, who were already engaged in animated conversation, to the front door.

The Shibatas, being in truth exiled Tokyoites, put great store into keeping up an indigenous appearance. They were both dressed in bright, garish floral print outfits, their faces and arms tanned a deep brown by the ever-present southern sun. Their house, fabulously large and modern as it was, looked and felt like a Polynesian tiki hut. The fake green vines hanging from the rafters, and the humongous silk hothouse flowers threaded into the rattan paneling constituted such an assault on Akito's refined sensibilities that he found himself incapable of speech for a few moments after his entry into the house. He sat down mutely next to Tohru on a ridiculously large, lime green floor cushion and wondered how long he would have to endure such distasteful surroundings.

Then the friendly -- in his opinion, apallingly nosy -- interrogation began. He answered for Tohru as much as he could, especially when the conversation took its inevitable turn into their background and their past. When he could no longer tolerate the inanity, he glanced at his watch and said with perfunctory regret:

"I'm afraid we've got to get going -- "

Mr. Shibata's eyebrows shot up incredulously.

"Going already? But we haven't even welcomed you properly!"

Akito clamped down on his jaw, hiding the strain on his face with another smile. "No, really, we've intruded enough -- "

"At least have some sake!" Shibata persisted, gesturing hastily to his wife. The woman scurried to her feet and rushed into the kitchen, returning an instant later with a trayful of clattering cups and a flask of sake.

Mr. Shibata expertly filled the cups and held them out. Then he lifted his in a toast to the young couple.

"To your new life here," he intoned graciously.

Tohru smiled wholeheartedly at him, raising her cup and bringing it to her lips.

Without warning, Akito plucked the cup out of her hand and placed it back on the table. The movement was swift and smooth, not a drop spilled.

Tohru gaped at him as if he had lost his mind. The Shibatas stared blankly at the cup, then at him.

With easy elegance, Akito picked up his own cup and lifted it, inclining his head slightly towards his hosts.

"Thank you," he murmured, taking a sip of the wine. He set the cup down carefully onto the table, then gave the dumbfounded couple an apologetic smile. "I do hope you'll forgive my rudeness and not take offense. My wife, you see, has quite a severe allergy to alcohol. Regrettably, the fact tends to slip her mind on occasion. I apologize for having neglected to mention this sooner."

After sufficient time had elapsed for them to digest the explanation, the Shibatas were instantly sympathetic.

"Oh no, the fault is ours!" the wife insisted hastily. "Poor dear! Oh well, alcohol really is unhealthy, anyway! What it does to your liver and all that! You're much, much better off not touching a drop of the stuff! Here, how about another cup of tea... "

When he had finally succeeded in extricating the two of them from the Shibatas' clutches, Akito took a deep breath, ridiculously elated to be out in the open street. Walking on, he gazed off into the distance, fixing his eyes on the wrought iron gate of their house.

Tohru was suddenly too quiet. He glanced at her.

"They're interesting people," he remarked.

She nodded and said nothing.

He felt his patience being pricked.

"What is it now?" he asked, sighing. "What, you're really bothered that you can't drink, is that it? You happen to be a life-long non-drinker, you know. At least you were when I met you."

"I don't care about that."

Her tone was petulant, whiny to his ears.

"Well, what is bothering you?" he snapped, irritated now, all pretense of patience gone. His feet hurt. He was tired. On top of that, the blasted shopping bags were gouging gashes into his palms. And she chose this time to turn pesky on him.

"What is bothering me?" she echoed incredulously. "How can you even ask me that? Don't you already know? I don't remember anything! Shouldn't that bother me?"

Akito took a long, hard look at her.

As irritated as he was, he could see that she was falling apart. He sighed.

Forcibly reining in his temper, he went quietly to her side.

"I'm sorry," he said, making no attempt to touch her. "But Tohru -- this isn't where we should be talking about this. Let's go home, okay? Let's go home and we'll talk about it."

His voice had dropped to a low, soothing, tone that, paired with his dark eyes, had a strange, hypnotic quality. She bowed her head and clutched the egg carton to her chest.

"Come on." He turned and began walking once more towards the house, aware that she lingered a few steps behind. When he finally reached the gate, he stopped and reached past the bars to unhook the latch.

"It's just that I've forgotten so much," came the quiet words from behind him.

He pushed the gate open, then looked at her.

"Don't you trust me, Tohru?" he asked her softly. "Don't you trust that I'd tell you anything you need to know?"

She stared back at him, her face pained. "I need to know everything, don't you see? I want to remember everything."

He was silent for a moment.

"Everything is too much at once," he finally answered. "But you're right -- there are some things that you need to know now."