Author's Note: So I got NO reviews for the last chapter which makes me worry...
Content-wise this is the worst chapter (hence the worrying). This is essentially rock bottom. You have been warned.
Chapter 16 (Not What It Seems)
Saturday passed. Sunday passed. The last vacation before finals started on Monday and the day simply passed also. It was strange to Kita, after having lived there for a month, seeing Akito everyday disregarding that one day after she had moved in and suddenly he had slipped into hiding.
He didn't ask to see her but she had wanted to see him. Sure, she was terrified to see him again considering that he may not have gotten over what has come to be known as 'the party incident' but her concern outweighed her fear. With all the time to herself, she had been thinking of what Hatori said about how Akito is dying and that he doesn't know how to control his anger. Somehow that information had kept her from getting mad at him. Every time she tried to get irritated, a memory would pop into her head of him telling her he loves her or of him comforting her when she was crying after the funeral and she would get sad instead.
On Sunday, she had come close to knocking on his door but Kureno saw her and stopped her, saying that Akito hasn't wanted to see anyone and that it would be safer to just let him be. Wanting to be alone just seemed so unlike him though. He hates feeling alone. Even when he's upset, he wants other people around to yell at.
Since Kita hadn't been leaving, she hadn't felt the need to cover the bruises or scrapes, the evidence of her misbehavior. Anyone who she would see walking around the main house wouldn't be too dismayed and especially wouldn't ask questions. They already knew.
She had tried to stay occupied but usually found herself sitting around thinking about Akito and then getting mad for not being able to get him off her mind. Then, once she had reached the peak of self-enragement, she would venture out to try to find someone to talk to. It had given her a chance to catch up and discuss the matters of the Sohma house with Hatori, Haru, and Kureno but hadn't covered up the little voice in the back of her head.
Since that day, she never turned off her cell phone. Hoshiko and Raidon called often asking her when she's free to hang out and what she will be doing on her birthday but Kita hadn't really thought much about her birthday this year. It used to be that every year her dad would throw her a 'surprise' party but there would be no matter for one this year. She wasn't even going to let herself get her hopes up at the prospect of gifts. It wasn't even a birthday. It was the passing of another year in her life; no need to attach words with positive connotations to it.
Kita woke up that Tuesday with the expectation of it being another day soon to be referred to as 'passed'.
After getting dressed in the first thing she pulled out of her drawers, Kita wandered into the kitchen and opened up the refrigerator, looking for milk without allowing her mind to register her surroundings outside of the thought of 'kitchen, fridge, need milk'.
"Good afternoon Kita." a voice said from behind an open newspaper.
Kita turned around and saw Shigure sitting at the table. He lowered the paper and smiled at her.
"Good afternoon. I haven't seen you in a while." she said, taking a glass down from the cabinet and pouring milk into it.
"Well, I was just in the mood to stop by and make sure everything has been pleasant around here." He said, his jovial expression not faltering for even a second.
Kita took a seat next to him and he put down the newspaper and lowered his reading glasses, his smile dropping to a sorrowful frown as his eyes fell from the scab under her lip to the bruises on her arms. Kita saw that he had noticed and tugged on the sleeves of her lime green t-shirt uncomfortably trying to hide the marks of Akito's rage.
"Yeah." she said, not really sure what she was agreeing to.
Shigure leaned into her, looking surprisingly serious.
"Are you okay?" he asked, expecting either an outright lie or a sugar-coated version of the truth.
"You'd sooner be at Akito's funeral than mine." she replied gravely as she took a sip from her glass.
Shigure was a little surprised by the comment at first thinking she meant she would sooner kill him than he kill her but then realized what she was really referring to.
"Oh, so you know about that now..."
"Yes. I asked Hatori." she said before he could get on to asking her about it.
Shigure nodded. He wanted to know where she got the bruises, well, actually why. He knew where. He wanted to ask her how she felt about Akito's inevitable demise. He wanted to ask her how she felt about Akito in general but she didn't seem to want to talk about any of that now.
The two sat quietly, Kita drinking her milk and Shigure studying Kita's face. He had never really looked at her features for such a long duration of time. Usually they were too busy talking for him to notice or he was looking somewhere else on her.
"Has anyone ever told you that you're pretty?" he asked her casually.
"Um, well, other than my parents, only Akito. I met Ren a little while ago and she said I was 'pretty but nowhere near gorgeous' but I don't really count that one either." she mumbled, wondering what he was getting at.
Shigure lifted an eyebrow. "Oh-kay." he said slowly. "Well, I think you're pretty." he said, smiling at her as he leaned closer to her and took her chin into his hand reminding her of when Akito did that after she had seen him after all those years. He pulled her face so far towards him that Kita had to rest her hand on something to keep from falling forward. Since his leg was the only thing close that would provide the stability she needed, she put her hand there, hoping he wouldn't think of it as a come-hither sort of move.
"You think all high school girls are pretty." Kita replied, trying to shrug off the compliment. The conversation was slipping into awkward territory that she really wanted to get away from.
"Just because that's true doesn't mean you aren't." Shigure said with a grin. She was making Shigure's efforts to cheer her up harder to do. "And you only have a month left of being a high school girl anyway," he added.
He tilted her face up a bit like he was analyzing her.
"You're a unique kind of pretty. You have those yellow-green eyes just like your mother's and that crazy hair like your father but a little coy smile that's all your own."
Kita's lips turned up a bit at the mention of her parents.
"See that's it!" Shigure said laughing. "It's a good thing I'm not actually attracted to you. Akito would have my head on a platter if I had feelings for you. I can just appreciate a pretty girl."
Kita internally let out a sigh of relief. It seemed like he might have been hitting on her for a second there. She was starting to get afraid of him making a move on her. She didn't like Shigure that way.
Suddenly, his laughter was cut off as he quickly let go of her chin and leaned as far away from her as he could. Confused by his drastic change in attitude, Kita looked to her left and saw Akito standing in the doorway, his expression both horrified and confounded at the same time. He looked like he had been dead for the past few years. His skin was so white Kita could practically see the blood flowing through his veins and he clearly hadn't been eating anything as his thin, fragile figure seemed to be in an even more critical state than it had been.
Dead. The very word caused Kita's blood to run cold as ice.
It must have looked like Shigure and I...oh no, she thought, wishing she could say something or, at the very least, move.
With an abnormally calm stride, Akito approached Shigure who held a fairly stoic expression. Akito gritted his teeth and clenched his fist tightly, hitting him directly in the eye with enough force to send him up against the wall. Shigure's head flew backwards but he stayed seated and throughout the attack, he said nothing.
Akito firmly grabbed Kita's arm and dragged her into his room, throwing her onto the ground.
"You've got some nerve Kita. Sleeping around behind my back." he said, leering over her and grabbing a fistful of hair in his hand. Her hair seemed longer to him now. Darker too. In fact, with the lack of light in the room it almost looked like Ren's hair. The thought made Akito sick.
"I didn't!" she practically yelled. "I haven't done anything!"
"Liar!" Akito accused, letting go of the purple tresses and kicking her.
He knelt down on the floor next to her and practically whispering in her ear, he added, "Everyone knows you're a liar, Kita."
"I'm telling the truth now." she said, her throat closing and the pressure in her eyes growing to obscene amounts. "And I've never lied to you."
Akito laughed dryly. "How stupid do you think I am?" he asked, rolling her onto her back. He swung his leg over hers, straddling her and pinning her hands down by her sides, careful to keep the sleeves of his yukata over his wrists.
"I've never lied to you and I haven't had sex with anyone. I swear." she said, her voice becoming childish with fear.
Akito scowled and moved up on her body, not believing a word coming out of her mouth. Lying was second nature to her, why would she suddenly decide to be truthful?
He placed her hands together above her head so he could hold both of them in one hand. He then forcefully pushed her skirt up and slid her underwear down her legs. Kita kicked and shouted in protest but her mouth was soon covered by his other hand.
"I'll bet you didn't fight like this for Shigure." he hissed wildly into her ear. "So how many were there anyway? That Raidon boy too? I saw you bring him inside the gates."
Kita's eyes broadened. I never told him about that, she thought. I had forgotten all about it. I can't believe he knew. What's the punishment for someone who brings an outsider inside the gates, even if it's only for a minute?
"You're so disobedient, Kita." he said as he started to undo his robes, answering Kita's nonverbal question. She closed her eyes, trying desperately to be that girl in the audience watching the show but she couldn't remove herself from what was happening. Akito brought out the only emotions she had left and they kept her from getting detached from the reality of life no matter how badly she wanted to get away.
Akito pushed himself into her mercilessly, a cry of agony rippling from her covered mouth.
"Oh, does that hurt?" he asked with feigned sympathy. "Did it hurt with that dog too?"
"I wouldn't know! I've never done this before!" she said loud enough for him to hear even with her voice muffled by his hand. This wasn't how she had pictured this happening. She was hoping it would be with someone she loved. For Akito she felt: fear of his power, sorrow for his fate, and, truthfully, heartfelt caring for that person he was beyond the tempestuous person he is, beyond the person sitting on her now. Whether or not there was any love there still remained unknown to everyone including herself.
Akito leaned forward as he pushed deeper, causing her to whimper in pain. He bit at her neck and jaw, an act she usually welcomed, but now it felt like ruthless torture. Bites not deep enough to draw blood but enough for it to intensify the hurt she was already in. Her cries were like an abandoned puppy as her fragile voice whined for him to stop.
Her innocent act was starting to really bother him. When she acted like that, it was harder for him to think of her sins and he could feel guilt creeping up on him. But then the thought of her with those other men made its way to the front of his mind, causing him to push harder into her, trying to expel the thoughts from his head and instead revel in his rapture.
When he finished, he didn't do her the courtesy of fixing her skirt or her underwear. He simply stood over her, declaring possessively, "You're mine and don't forget that again," and left the room with a bang of the door hitting its frame.
Kita calmly pulled up her underwear, trying to ignore the aching between her legs, and smoothed down her skirt. Her footsteps as petty as those of a fly crawling up a wall, she walked back to her room and fell onto the bed.
"Let me sleep away the rest of my life," she said to the ghosts of her room. "Did I want to feel again this badly?" she wondered out loud. "Is pain better than nothing?"