"Kyo, come here," Kazuma said gently. "There's something I have to talk to you about."

"What is it?" Kyo asked as he sat across from him.

"How do you feel about Noa?"

Kyo's face reddened a touch and he looked away. "She's okay, I guess."

Kazuma smiled a little. "So you like her?"

"Yeah, she's fine. Why are you asking me about this anyway?"

"Well, because…I really like her."

Kyo's eyes widened. "Really?"

"Yes. However…you are a very important part of my life. And I don't want anything to move forward without the two of you accepting one another."

"I'm pretty sure she accepts me already. I mean, she already knows about the curse."

"Yes, but I mean that I want her to…fully accept you."

Kyo looked at him in horror when he understood Kazuma's meaning. "You mean you…you want her to see my true form?!"

"Kyo, calm down."

"No, how could you ask something like that?! How could you think I'd want her to see that?! She'll never accept me if she sees what I really am!"

"You haven't even given her a chance."

Kyo stood up and slammed his fist against the wall. "I don't need to! Forget it! I never want to see that woman again!"

He raced out of the room as Kazuma sighed. He had had a feeling that question wouldn't go over well with him, but he knew that he could never hope to form any kind of relationship with Noa if she didn't accept his son for every part of him.

Kyo ran into Shigure's house, knocking down the shoji for the millionth time.

"Kyo, I hope you know you're going to be fixing that," Shigure teased.

"SHUT UP!" Kyo yelled back.

"I see you're in one of your moods again."

"I said shut up!"

"No need to take it out on me. What's your problem?"

"None of your business!"

"Kyo?" a sweet voice called.

Kyo spun around to find Tohru in the entranceway to the kitchen with a bowl in her hand.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"It's…it's nothing," Kyo stammered.

Why did he always have such a hard time talking to her? Something about her always made his stomach twist into knots whenever she got near him. He usually never felt guilty about how he talked to people, but whenever he accidently snapped at her, he absolutely hated himself for it.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, you don't need to worry about me."

Tohru reluctantly returned to the kitchen.

Shigure leaned in close behind him. "Someone's in love," he sang.

Kyo jumped a foot in the air. "Will you butt out?!"

While Shigure kept singing 'Kyo's in love', Kyo went up to the roof.

How could Kazuma, the man he had come to call his own father, ask such a horrible request of him? He knew how much he detested his true form and for good reason. His true form was disgusting and repulsive and seemed to be life's way of laughing in his face. As if turning into a cat whenever he was tired or hugged by a girl wasn't bad enough, he also had the unfortunate pleasure of turning into a hideous monster.

Why would Kazuma ever ask him to reveal that darkest part of himself to another person? He had already done so with Tohru and even if things ended up working out, he still wasn't happy about having that whole incident sprung upon him with no warning. Why would he want to put him through something like that again?

"Kyo, are you up here?" Tohru called.

Kyo sighed heavily. "What gave it away?"

"You looked upset, so I knew you'd be on the roof. Um, may I ask what happened to make you so mad?"

Kyo knew there was no point in lying. Tohru had a way of always knowing when he was being less than truthful. Besides, maybe she would know how to make him feel less horrible about what had gone on that afternoon.

"It's, uh…it's Master."

"Oh, Mr. Kazuma?" Tohru asked with sparkles in her eyes. "How's he doing?"

"He's fine. He actually told me…that he likes Noa."

"What?!" she exclaimed with a smile as she clasped her hands together. "That's so cute! And they would be so perfect together! Has he told her yet?"

"Well, no, not exactly. He said that he didn't want anything to happen with her unless she accepted me for who I am."

"She already does, doesn't she? I mean, she knows about the curse."

"No, I mean…he wanted to show her my true form."

"Oh…"

"How could he ask me that…? That's the one part of myself that I absolutely hate. I want to forget that it's who I am, and he wants me to show it to someone else?"

"Um…I think it's just because Mr. Kazuma cares so much about you that it matters to him that someone he likes also likes you. He knows how much you hate your true form, so he would never ask you something like this if it wasn't really important to him."

"But…how could someone ever accept that ugly and monstrous part of me?"

"…I did."

Kyo looked over at the girl who stared back at him with earnest eyes. He wondered if it was possible for her to get really angry about something.

"But what if…Noa sees me like that…and hates me? Master has never shown any interest in another woman before, at least not that I know of. What if he ends up losing the first woman he's ever liked…because of me?"

"Miss Noa doesn't seem like the kind of person who abandons someone so easily. Do you really think she'll just give up on you like that?"

"I don't know. What if she sees me and only pretends to accept me just so she can stay with Master? She'll never look at me the same way again. I…don't know if I could handle that."

"Miss Noa has seen a lot ever since she started becoming involved with your family. She's seen Yuki transform into a rat, she's seen Akito at his angriest and still managed to get him to like her, she's known that Akito is considered a god amongst the family. Miss Noa…chooses to accept people for who they truly are. And, um, I think she'll do the same with you."

Kyo sighed again.

Tohru placed her hand on his shoulder. "Don't you want to have Miss Noa accept you?"

He blushed under her touch. "…Yes."

Tohru smiled warmly. "Then I think…it'll be okay."

She returned downstairs, leaving Kyo alone with her words.

"All right, Noa…" he said softly. "You better prepare yourself."

After spending a few more minutes on the roof in an attempt to face the fears surrounding him, Kyo returned to Kazuma's home.

"I'll do it," he said quietly.

Kazuma came over to Kyo and gently hugged him.

Noa made her way to Kazuma's house and found him outside sitting on his porch.

"Hi, Noa," he smiled.

"Hi," she smiled back, feeling butterflies in her stomach.

Ever since her conversation with Yuta, she suddenly became even more nervous whenever she was around Kazuma. She wondered if he liked her the same way she liked him.

"Noa…there's something important I need to tell you," he said as he stood up from the porch.

Noa's heart skipped a beat. "What is it?"

He turned back to the house. "Kyo?"

The orange-haired boy stepped outside to join them. He looked like he was about to throw up, but for what reason, she had no idea.

"Yuki neglected to tell you something about Kyo," Kazuma told her.

She rarely ever saw the man so serious and it was starting to really throw her off.

"The thing about the Cat is that…he has two forms."

Noa stayed silent, wondering where all this was going and why Yuki hadn't told her about this.

"The reason why has been distorted over the years, but every person cursed by the Cat has it. You need to see it."

Avoiding her eyes, Kyo yanked off the black-and-white bracelet he wore.

Noa winced when he began screaming in agony and fell to the ground. Smoke poured from his body as it started to change.

His eyes enlarged and became a deep purple color while his pupils narrowed into slits. His skin took on a brown and leathery appearance. All of his limbs stretched out into unnatural proportions. His teeth sharpened into a predator's.

His screams joined together with inhuman screeches and growls.

Noa involuntarily gagged as a putrid smell hit her nose and she placed her hand to it in a useless attempt to mask the awful scent, feeling like she was going to vomit.

The smoke cleared and Noa finally saw Kyo's true form clearly.

She took a couple of ragged breaths as her mind tried to process the…thing that was in front of her.

She had seen and heard a lot of things since becoming involved with the Sohma family, but this…this…

There were no words.

Seeing her expression, Kyo growled in her face before taking off through the forest.

"Kyo!" Noa called.

Without a second thought, she took off after him.

It took several minutes for her to catch up with him since he ran at a ridiculously fast pace in this form.

"Kyo!" she called again breathlessly.

He turned and growled at her again with a viciousness that truly frightened her.

I hate this! Kyo thought angrily when he saw the fear in her eyes. All I do is wreck everything! Master cares so much for her and because of me, she'll never talk to him again! Why…? Why does it have to be like this…?

"Kyo," Noa said gently, falling to her knees. "I can't even…imagine what it must be like to change into this form. To always worry about your bracelet falling off. To wonder what will happen if someone sees you like this. To worry if people will look at you differently if they see it. To have all those people…constantly judging you for something you have no control over."

Kyo looked away from her in shame as he growled lowly.

"No one truly knows what it's like for you to shoulder this burden either. You must feel so alone."

He did. He did feel alone with this form always on his back. No one knew that.

Except her.

Noa could feel her eyes filling with tears, and she wasn't sure why. "But…if this is a part of you, then it's a part of you! And I promise…to accept every part of you. If you will accept every part of me."

Kyo couldn't believe what he was hearing. She saw him in this hideous, disgusting form…and she asked him to accept her?

He slowly ambled over to her with his disproportionate limbs. He could see tears on her face which struck straight into his core. Why was she crying?

Noa slowly reached her hand out towards him. He growled a little which caused her to flinch, but he didn't move.

She lightly pressed his hand to the side of his head. It felt just as leathery as it looked, but it wasn't repulsive for her to touch him.

Kyo found himself leaning into her touch.

Noa smiled a little.

Smoke surrounded his body once again, and in mere seconds, he had changed back to his human form. She was surprised to find him crying as well.

Kyo's heart hurt. It was one thing for Tohru to accept him as he was. He had already admitted to himself by this point that he was in love with her. She had accepted him as a friend and as a man.

But with Noa…it felt different. It felt like…she made up for everything his own mother did wrong. It felt like…he had a mother again. A mother who accepted him fully, disgusting form and all. Instead of accepting him as a man, she accepted him as a son.

Noa gently reached out and wiped his tears away. Then she stood up and extended her hand. "Let's go home."

It was probably the most beautiful three words he had ever heard from a woman.

Kazuma watched his adoptive son and the woman he had become so close to return hand in hand.

Both of them were crying, but they didn't look sad.

It warmed his heart to see how well Noa interacted with Kyo even after everything that had just happened.

For so long, he had given Kyo everything he could, but there were some things that were just impossible for him to give. Motherly affection was one of them. He had always wanted to find someone Kyo could look up to who would shower him with love. He hoped Noa could finally be that someone.

Noa looked up and smiled a little when she met Kazuma's eyes.

She lightly rubbed Kyo's hair before he took off into the house.

"I'm sorry to give you such a shock," Kazuma said quietly.

"It's all right."

"There's…a reason I wanted to show you Kyo's form. I needed to see how you would react."

"Why?"

"Because…Kyo is a very important part of my life, and I love him more than if he were my own son."

"Well, I already knew that."

"I needed to know that you fully accepted him for who he is. Because…you are very important to me as well."

Noa felt her heartbeat pick up. "Um…I feel the same way about you."

Kazuma took her hand in his own which only made her heart beat faster. "I care very much for you. I know you have a son of your own, and I want you to know that I care for him too. And I know that you have been married before. I don't presume to make light of that marriage or make you feel like you're replacing your late husband. But if you will allow me, I want to do what I can to protect you and care for you."

Noa's head spun at his sentimental words and she felt more tears coming to her eyes. "Kazuma, you don't know how much it means to me to hear you say these things. I like you very much. I also care deeply for Kyo, and I promise that I always will regardless of what happens between us. I'll be honest, getting into a relationship won't be easy for me at first because of my previous marriage…but I'm willing to try."

Kazuma smiled warmly. "If you want to go slow, we can go slow. I don't mind at all. But I hope you won't be angry if I do this."

He leaned towards her and placed a soft kiss on her cheek.

Noa felt her face get hot. "Um…no. That doesn't make me angry at all."

The two of them smiled at one another and headed inside to make some dinner.

"Hey, Noa," Kyo said to her just as she was about to leave Kazuma's house.

She noticed he looked really nervous, but she had no idea what could possibly be more stressful than showing her his true form.

Kyo couldn't believe he was about to ask this, but after what had just happened, he knew that he didn't want to ask anyone else.

"I…I need to go see my father," he finally said.

Oh.

That could be more stressful.

"I need to do it alone, but I was wondering if you could…you know, maybe…just stand outside?"

Noa smiled warmly. "Of course."

So the next day, they both found themselves outside of Kyo's childhood home. Noa placed a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"You don't have to do this."

"Yes, I do."

"Okay. I'll just be right out here for you."

"Thanks."

Kyo slowly walked inside, and Noa waited anxiously by the gate for him to come out. Shortly after he had gone in, she could hear loud yelling from inside that wasn't Kyo's voice. She had half a mind to march in there and pull Kyo away from his father, but Kyo had been adamant that he was to face this alone. Noa understood his reasoning and wanted to respect it, but her motherly instincts were about to take over.

Finally, Kyo exited the house and came out of the gate.

Noa looked at him in concern. "Are you all right?"

Kyo promptly began vomiting against the brick wall.

"Oh, honey!"

Noa rushed over to him and gently rubbed comforting circles on his back as he continued to heave.

Once he had emptied the contents of his stomach, Kyo weakly stood back up.

Noa took a napkin out of her purse and handed it to him. "You okay?"

Kyo nodded as he wiped his mouth with the napkin.

"I'm so proud of you. That took guts."

"My guts are lying on the sidewalk."

Noa laughed lightly. "Okay, I walked right into that one."

Kyo awkwardly rubbed his arm. "Thanks though. You know, for being here."

"That's what moms are for."

Kyo's heart panged in his chest. She was here, supporting him, looking out for him, smiling at him, just like a mother should. For the tiniest moment, he almost…almost wished he could hug her.