Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
Status: Incomplete
She awoke now, in the dead of night, sweat slicking up her spine, her mouth open in a scream. Her heart thundered in her chest, and she felt the dizzy, spiraling panic fill her chest up until she could scarcely breathe.
Her face was wet with tears, her eyes stinging.
Something had changed in the forest. Something had slotted back to where it shouldn't be, and now she felt it; the agonizing, desperate, clutching, clawing emptiness that filled her to the very brim. She could feel the chill of death coating her lips. How she stared and stared and stared, unblinking at the people in front of her, and yet came to life at the sight of the spirits.
She hung, unbalanced, between two worlds—betwixt, between.
Something had gone terribly wrong when she'd saved that boy—Uchiha Yuji. She didn't know how she'd stopped his body from dying, didn't know how she'd grasped his spirit with her very hands, but she'd felt it.
She remembered it like a fever-dream. Blue-green. Warm. Fluttering, like the little bird she'd found when she'd been little and kept it close to her breast as she brought it to her mother to fix it's wing.
She didn't remember if the bird had been in this lifetime or the last.
Unhinged, the villagers whispered when they thought she wasn't listening, and she thought they weren't very far off.
There were days when she thought her fingers turned too fair, too pale, and she could see the dirt path through them, and the beat in her throat lessened until she thought she couldn't feel the rush of her blood very much at all.
There were days now, where she was too cold, too still, and she sat underneath the sun, desperate to feel a flicker of warmth. Days where she thought the voices of the past hissed and curled in her head, and she wanted to scream aloud; days where she thought she would go insane, crazy, off-with-your-head-girl if she looked at the distorted image in watery puddles.
She'd finally looked at herself in the days after Yuji. Finally, she'd tilted her head and stared down into the puddles, hoping to catch a glimpse of the girl-before.
She didn't look like she should, and yet she was exactly as she should be.
Betwixt, between, falling through the cracks.
Pale skin had fallen away to a deep, reddish-brown tan. Clear blue eyes were now gray, dark, light, in between. Her hair was dark as night, so deep a black it turned blue, and as straight as sticks, but all she could recall was the white-blonde locks falling past her shoulders in corkscrew curls.
Her hands weren't as slender as they should've been. Compact, hard, untrained. She missed the keys of her instrument then, the low, alluring hum of the piano as she pressed her ear to it, to better hear the tune. She missed the sound of music flowing from her lips, her fingertips, her heart, her soul.
It made her sick to her stomach, nauseous, dizzy and trembling when she yearned for the shake of the boy's soul in her hands. The fluttering, warm pulse that beat desperately in her palms. The sickening thought of if she clutched it just a little too hard, it'd shatter into a million pieces.
Hitomi shut her eyes. Her chest was still rising, her heartbeat still throbbing. Her back was slick with sweat. Her knees trembled underneath the nightgown.
She lay there for an eternity, the ghost of heat in her hands, and she hoped she'd never truly wake again.
…
Outside, the swish of cat's tail could be heard, but the girl didn't listen.
…
She walked the streets, her arms by her sides, her eyes blank.
She felt dizzy, unbalanced. There was something worse about today. Maybe, she thought vacantly, it was the heat. She nearly laughed then, loud and clear and true—like she used to, for she hadn't felt anything since the yokai-cat had swallowed Hatsue's soul and Uchiha Yuji broke from his fevered sleep.
Her thoughts, usually so far away, so unreachable, whirled inside her mind, ripping through skyscrapers and carefully drawn-up imaginations, whispering, hissing, vengeful. She shook her head, muttering a nothing under her breath, and continued walking.
The sun was already high up in the sky, and there were no clouds for miles to see. It was the day of the market, and normally, her mother sent Hatsue to fetch the bread for the week, and the full-grain flour, and stacks of fish, but she had sent Hitomi instead.
Her mother fretted over her younger sister, barely looking up to give Hitomi the money before clicking her tongue once more and pressing a damp cloth to Hatsue's fevered brow. If Hitomi was her father's favored daughter, then Hatsue was her mother's.
Her father hadn't spoken to her for the entire week.
Something tugged and lurched in her chest at the thought. Unbidden, a face flitted before her, eyes dark and serious as night. Lips in a straight line. A chiseled jaw-line. Long hair tied back in a low ponytail.
Dad.
She stumbled over nothing. The breath felt like it had been kicked out of her chest. She shook, eyes open and wide, burning. Wet, hot tears ran down her cheeks.
Dad.
The face left as quickly as it came, and she reached her hands out, as if to catch it, but it slipped through her fingers, and only she remained; hands tilted up to the sky, eyes wet, a sob ripping through her lips.
She felt the cry build in her chest, locking in her throat until her neck strained from keeping it in, and her face screwed up tightly.
For the space between one heartbeat and the next, she thought she would scream. That she'd cry and pound the earth and bellow out her rage and loss and grief. That she'd finally feel it—the omnipresent shadow of terrifying fear racing up her spine.
Instead, she let out a single, whining croak and lowered her hands. She wiped her tears away with trembling hands. She slowly straightened, spine clicking into place.
Then she continued walking down the dirt road, eyes glazed over, mind a roar of wind.
…
It watched her, tilting its head, eyes glittering at the sight of her tears.
She'll come, the council had promised, eyes deep and sad and full of grief, she will come to you.
…
The boy was asking her name again.
His eyes glittered impatiently, a deep black that bordered on obsidian and she thought of the ones that had flitted before her. Her hands clenched in her lap. She watched him, eyes roving over his face—thin, but still carrying the weight of baby-fat, large, full-lashed eyes, a pretty unsmiling mouth.
He'd grow to be as pretty and fine-boned as Yasuo, she suspected.
His skin was pale, although tinted red because of the heat, and for once, she was infinitely glad she'd been born to carry the weight of the sun on her back, reddish-brown skin not as susceptible to burning.
"Don't you ever speak?" he snapped, frustrated. He scowled at her, and she couldn't help but remember others with the same furrow between their brow, the same glaring, clouding eyes—angry, scared.
An image of another boy—darker than this one, with shorter hair and narrower eyes—filled her mind and she thought she sucked in a breath. Her nails dug into her palms.
Elan, Elan, Elan, Elan—
She heard the angry snort of the boy before her, and she refocused, catching the last vestiges of worry in those tempestuous black eyes.
She watched him for another while. "No."
A flicker of what seemed like a smile tugged at those lips.
Then the boy glowered even harder, "Why won't you tell me your name?"
She tore her eyes away from his face, gaze going far. She looked at the sky, and felt the light breeze settling over her face. She watched the larks flying, heard the buzzing of the cicadas, smelt the wet, damp of rains to come.
Then she stood, bid him a farewell, and left the way she'd come.
In truth, she didn't know which one to give him.
…
She dreamed of it.
The rich, golden fields beckoning her. The barley and wheat weaved and bobbed in the wind as she stood before them. Her skin was pale again, hair trickling down her back in blonde curls. She wore a yukata. Her shoes were still sandals. Her hands were coarse, nails short and ragged from work.
Something swished at her legs and she looked down to find the cat staring up at her, chesire smile in place.
"You'll never be one or the other." It rumbled, and she felt the vibrations in her soul. "You can only ever be both—or none at all."
Its eyes glinted, mouth full of knives. "Your choice."
…
She woke much like the last time.
Sweating, eyes blurry with tears, chest heaving.
But this time, she rose and with shaking, trembling hands, she pushed on her sandals, her new overcoat, and walked out the door, to the bumpy dirt path.
She didn't look back.
Enjoy my cryptic update :)