As Kasumi opened the window the first thing she noted was that it was cold, yet strangely not in a way that discouraged her. Instead the chill in the air, despite it being late spring, only invigorated her, in the same way one is refreshed when drinking a cold glass of water. She looked up at the sky, admiring how the lack of clouds was allowing the stars to shine a little brighter tonight. It was so rare to get a good view of the sky in Tokyo due to all the light from the city but tonight seemed special in some way.
She carefully climbed out onto the window ledge before twisting around and grabbing onto the roof. With grace remembered from her early days when her father began teaching her the art, she picked herself up and managed to climb up onto the roof tiles. She felt quite proud of her small achievement, almost adventurous in the way she had simply acted impulsively without any real thought. With a small giggle she realised this was what Ranma must feel all the time.
She noticed the boy further up on the roof with his arms crossed under his head, staring idly up at the moon, thinking Kami knows what. She thought about calling out to him but he looked so peaceful and serene just lying there, as if he hadn't a care in the world. It seemed her dilemma was solved for her as Ranma's eyes lazily looked her way, before snapping open as his body shot up in surprise.
She laughed a little, waving to the surprised boy and taking a step forward. Unfortunately she hadn't accounted for the thin layer of dew that had accumulated in the brisk night air and her foot slipped, immediately sending her stumbling backwards. Ranma was up faster than she could even follow him and before she could tumble over the edge of the roof he grabbed one of her hands, stopping what would have been a nasty fall.
Ranma was more than shocked to see Kasumi up on the roof, more so when she suddenly seemed to slip backwards, dangerously close to the edge. He was up in an instant, body moving on pure reflex and instinct as he closed the distance and latched onto her arm before gravity could take hold. He would remember looking at her, semi-stable on the edge of the roof, bathed in moonlight that seemed to make her skin glow; just thinking 'she's beautiful'. He would later tell himself he was imagining it but for one brief instance he had looked at the woman before him and realised just how attractive she was, not cute, but truly beautiful.
He pulled her up into the middle of the roof where she would be a bit safer from falling over the edge and she graciously sat down. She was smiling around her, appreciating everything about the chill night from the gleaming stars to the almost-full moon. It was strange to see her neighbourhood from such a different perspective, kind of like looking through one eye your entire life, only to open the other and see everything differently.
"Kasumi, what were you thinking coming up here? You could have gotten hurt." It wasn't scolding, it was merely a question. She looked up to him, still smiling at her sudden shift in perception.
"I heard you come up here and I was curious." He was taken off guard, not expecting the answer at all.
"C-Curious about what?" She looked away with a smile, seeming to think about the question herself.
"I'm not entirely sure, but I think I found it." As if to make her point she took another sweeping look at their surroundings. "It's beautiful up here."
"Yeah, it is." Ranma realised he had been looking right at Kasumi when he said it and turned around to hide his blush from the older girl. He scolded himself for thinking such things about Kasumi, that wasn't going to help him at all, only add fuel to the flames that were his life. Luckily she was enraptured by the view around them so she didn't notice and he managed to recompose himself before she turned around to look at him.
"Ranma, could we talk for a little bit?" He nodded slowly, still rather embarrassed about the way he had just acted. He sat down next to the older girl and they sat there for a while, both just enjoying the view of the neighbourhood, lit by the light of the moon and the hazy glow coming from the city centre. "Ranma, do you love Akane?" It didn't matter the circumstances or the asker, that type of question always put Ranma immediately on the defensive. Yet as he looked at the older girl, ready to deny all his feelings and hide the truth, he just found that he couldn't.
"I don't know." His whole body seemed to slump with the exertion of even admitting that much. At the same time it was like a small weight being lifted and he found the rest flowed with a bit more ease. "I used to, or at least, I think I used to. Pop never really did explain love and relationships or that kinda stuff." He looked up at the girl sadly, on one level he wasn't sure why he was able to say all of this stuff after bottling it up for so long, yet at the same time he realised it couldn't have been anybody else who could make him say it this easily.
"When we first met and she asked if I wanted to be her friend, I felt happier than I had in a long time. Since Ukyo there wasn't really anybody I could call a friend. Then we found out we were engaged and at first I almost thought it would be alright. For a long time I maintained that view, even through the criticisms and the names because I just thought she wasn't ready to get married, something I agreed with completely." Kasumi kept listening, allowing the boy to let it all out uninterrupted.
"Akane's great. She's strong, independent..." He smiled a little wistfully "...and she's cute when she smiles." His eyes grew a little darker again "Except it just kept going on, for two years she never changed. I kept trying to earn her trust, saving her time and time again, only to be told she didn't need saving. Then the times I didn't she asked why I didn't. It's like even she didn't know what she really wanted." He slumped down again, nearly making Kasumi move forward to catch him but he didn't fall, instead just staring at the tiles on the roof as if he could look through them if he stared hard enough.
"I guess I do still love her, maybe, but with every argument, every barbed insult or strike from that stupid mallet, I can feel that love start to drain away." He looked exhausted as if the air had been let out of him and he had just deflated. Kasumi was ready to cry, what he had said had been beautiful and she only wished Akane had heard it. Now more than ever she realised that if her sister didn't act soon she would in fact lose Ranma forever. She barely heard the part of her mind that asked why that would be so bad.
He looked up and Kasumi could tell he was saddened at hearing his own words, at finally admitting to himself the truth he had been hiding for so long. Yet, she could see his eyes were a little clearer and the corner of his mouth was already trying to curl into a smile, even if it wasn't quite succeeding. He suddenly turned to her, and this time his were the eyes that were searching, looking into hers for answers.
"What about you Kasumi?" She was a little startled by the sudden change.
"W-What about me?" She wasn't one to stumble over her words easily but here she was, unable to speak coherently under Ranma's penetrating gaze. She looked into his slate blue eyes, trying to find out just what he meant before he said it.
"I mean, I never see you with anybody." He spoke quietly. "What about Dr Tofu?" She looked away, not wanting him to see her as she wiped away a single tear that had managed to break through her many defences. It was direct, nobody had ever been that straightforward about the relationship between her and the good doctor.
"I, um, oh my, well I-" Once again she found herself unable to cobble together even the simplest sentence under his gaze. Yet his eyes weren't judging, or disapproving, they only encouraged her to carry on and let her own feelings out. If she would have allowed herself, she would have slumped forward in much the same manner as Ranma had only a few minutes ago. However she remained upright and kept her gaze with Ranma, drawing in a deep breath before continuing.
"Like you and Akane, I thought there may have been something there. Of course I saw his silly antics with the skeleton and the like for what they were and for a while they were amusing." Her head drooped imperceptibly. "I waited for him to stop, gave him plenty of opportunities, always going over to the clinic for this or that, hoping he'd get less flustered." She sighed and looked back up at Ranma. "But he never did. He never changed, never grew up." Ranma was starting to worry, seeing just how much this was saddening Kasumi.
"I couldn't even make the first move. He would never really listen to what I had to say, always flying off in one of his strange behaviours" She sighed deeply, if there was a more heartbreaking sound then Ranma hadn't heard it yet. "Then he disappeared for that spell, only to come back, suddenly with a fiancée that his mother had apparently found for him." Ranma was now curious, he hadn't heard this before, but he did remember when Dr Tofu was gone for a few months.
"So no, there can't be anything between Ono and me." She smiled up at him sadly from behind the hair that had fallen across her eyes. At that moment Ranma had the uncontrollable urge to reach across and brush the hair from her face, without fully understanding why. What he did do was slowly reach across to the older girl and pull her into a brief hug, trying to mimic what she had done for him as thanks for her day off.
He remembered how good it had made him feel at the time and now tried to pass along those same feelings to her. He pulled away and noticed she was smiling a little more, as well as having developed a small blush across the bridge of her nose. She was embarrassed because when he had been trying to comfort her with a hug she had only thought about the way his arms made her feel so safe and the feeling of his chest lightly pressing into her own.
Ranma looked around, anxiously awaiting the near-inevitable scream of 'RANMA!' from Akane or somebody else. When it never came he visibly relaxed, looking across at Kasumi who looked deep in thought over something. Once again, as the moonlight caught her hair and he sat, so focused on her own thoughts, Ranma couldn't help but notice just how beautiful the girl- no, woman before him was. She looked up and giggled with her hand over her mouth as he shook his head of the distracting thoughts, quite literally.
"Thank you for that Ranma, it helped." Her brow furrowed again before she smiled brightly. "Did I tell you that on my day off I met an old friend from school?" Ranma shook his head, confused at the sudden turn in the conversation. "She graduated from university with a degree in psychology and just set up a local practise. Maybe she could help you." Ranma was suddenly incredulous over the remark.
"Um, that's alright Kasumi. I don't think I need professional help." She looked up at him, once again with sadness tingeing her features.
"Ranma, do you remember your outburst?" He nodded, how could he forget such a thing? "Well what if it hadn't been me who came up to you? You might have hurt somebody." Suddenly all the fight left Ranma as he mulled over that one fact. His whole life he had been taught that the study of martial arts was for the good of those around him, to help and protect the people he cared about. If he started to use it to hurt innocent people; then he just couldn't live with himself after that.
"Well, if you really think it might help I guess it couldn't hurt." She smiled a little brighter, encouraging his own smile to form, he couldn't help it; the woman's attitude was just infectious. Suddenly he noticed Kasumi shiver and realised just how cold it had been getting. He carefully helped her back into her room before leaving for his own. It almost felt silly, a therapist, just how bad was his life getting if he needed a psychologist's help? Kasumi's face drifted over his thoughts suddenly. 'Well, not all bad.'
True to her word Kasumi scheduled a visit for Ranma with her friend for Saturday. He was nervous about it of course but at the same time a little excited. He of course told nobody else about it, mainly out of embarrassment but also because he didn't want this to get back to his parents. Genma he could handle, despite the childish tantrum he would go into about manliness there wasn't much he could do to stop Ranma. It was his mother he didn't want worrying about him.
He waited anxiously as Friday came and went without much incident but even Akane seemed to notice that he acted like he was waiting for something. She confronted him just as he was about to leave the house.
"Where are you going?" He turned nervously, having wanted to keep this between him and Kasumi, at least until he saw how the first session went. He thought about lying to Akane but quickly realised that would only give her more reason to be angry at him when she found out the truth, something that always seemed to happen eventually.
"I'm going out to see a friend of Kasumi's." There, that seemed neutral enough and it was completely true. Akane didn't seem to think so and her curiosity and suspicions were only piqued.
"Why?" Ranma groaned inwardly. 'Couldn't she just let one go?'
"Kasumi said it might be a good idea to talk to her 'cause she's a therapist." He was mumbling the last part but Akane managed to catch it.
"What? Why do you need to see a therapist?" Ranma shushed her quickly.
"Quiet, I don't want Mom finding out, she'll only worry. Like I said, Kasumi thought it would be a good idea." Akane made a note to confront her sister about this later, first she had acted strangely on Thursday night, now this.
"Yeah but wh-?" She looked up from her musings only to see that Ranma had already taken off without her noticing. She ran outside, hoping to catch the boy before he ran too far but he was already gone. 'Urrrgh, that baka'. She wandered back inside, intent on finding Kasumi and demanding an explanation.
She found her sister in the kitchen, happily chopping vegetables for a soup and for a minute Akane couldn't help but watch her wistfully, wondering why cooking couldn't come to her that easily. Of course cooking wasn't easy for Kasumi, at least at first. She had spent countless hours under her mother's tutelage working on recipe after recipe until she had the entire book perfected. But Akane couldn't know that, she was much too young at the time and her mind was on other things.
"Kasumi, why is Ranma going to see a therapist?" Kasumi nearly dropped the knife she was holding, like Ranma she had hoped that Akane wouldn't find out this early.
"I told him to." Well at least that confirmed Ranma's story somewhat but Akane was still suspicious.
"But why?" Kasumi finished up on the leek she was chopping before turning around, calmly placing the knife back in its holder.
"Ranma's been under a lot of stress lately what with his fiancées and fighting, not to mention that whole affair in China that seemed to change everybody somewhat. I thought that talking to somebody impartial might do him a world of good."
Akane watched her sister for a few moments 'Now why couldn't Ranma have just said that? It all makes so much sense when Kasumi says it.' "He wouldn't need a therapist if he just stopped stringing along those other girls"
Kasumi sighed again, not believing that she was having another of these conversations with her sister in such short a time. "Oh Akane, don't you see that Ranma has no choice?" One curious look later she continued. "He cares about Ukyo and Shampoo, possibly not in the way you think he does, but he cares nonetheless. If he just 'stopped stringing along those other girls' he would hurt their feelings." Akane didn't seem to mind that fact all that much and for a moment Kasumi was quite disappointed with her sister. "You know what Ranma's like around a crying girl, he'd do anything to make them stop. Do you really think he could do that to two people he cares about?"
Akane just huffed. "Well if he cared about me as much as you say he does then he would."
Again Kasumi looked down on her little sister with disbelief at how thoughtless she was for the feelings of those around her. "Akane, how can you say that?"
She looked indignantly back at her older sister before walking off in a strop as Kasumi looked on, shocked at her behaviour.
The building was nothing special, just a simple whitewashed four story apartment block. He walked up to the front door and cautiously peered through into the small corridor that had various mailboxes at one end for the tenants and a flight of stairs at the other. He looked over the intercom on one side of the door and tentatively pressed the button with the name Kasumi had given him. He was buzzed in without a word and soon he was standing in front of apartment 3A, hand raised ready to knock. He didn't have to as before he could put his hand forward the door opened from the inside and a kindly looking woman of Kasumi's age looked him over.
"Hello, you must be Ranma. Kasumi said you would be coming over today. I'm Dr Haruno; I want you to consider this as a safe place, somewhere where you can talk without fear of consequence or judgement." As she said it she stood aside to let Ranma by and he took in the small space. This obviously wasn't the woman's apartment; that much was obvious. It was warmly lit but the blinds were closed to the outside world. There was a couch in one corner with a chair at one end and a small table with a potted plant at the other.
"Please take a seat on the couch Ranma." Having missed many of the television tropes of the nineties until this point Ranma didn't realise just how clichéd the entire set up was. He happily, but cautiously went and sat down on the couch and Dr Haruno came and sat down on the chair next to him. He took a moment to look her over but there wasn't much to distinguish her from a normal twenty-something year old. She had jet black hair held back in a bun and she wore a light skirt with a matching blouse with a doctor's coat slung over top.
"I understand that Kasumi told you about me because of stress. What is it in your life that's causing you stress?"
Ranma chuckled. "I don't really think I could pinpoint it doc."
She smiled at him. "Please, call me Yuhi. If you can't think of one specific thing, let's try something a bit more general. Why don't you tell me about your life as a whole?"
Again Ranma laughed. "You want the long version or the longer version?" Yuhi smiled, it was common for people to make jokes when questioned and it was many people's first layer of defence against disapproval or just when they're nervous.
"Why not surprise me?" The doctor leaned back in her chair, indicating for Ranma to begin. What followed was Ranma's life in story form, he tried to shorten it by leaving out anything he considered fairly irrelevant or every-day but thought he at least covered all the major points. He told her about him being promised in marriage before he was born, the Seppuku contract and Genma taking him on the training trip. He talked about his years of intensive training including the Neko-ken and other methods his father had used. He slowed down a bit when he got to Jusenkyo and the Amazon village. Then he moved on to his experiences in Nerima, the chaos that surrounded his life from that point, the multiple fiancées and various relationships he formed. He talked about his rivals and enemies, people he had to fight on a daily basis and those who he only ever saw once. He finally finished by talking about his whole experience in China with the Musk and Saffron before the failed marriage and skimmed over the last couple of weeks.
The doctor took it all in with complete silence and a smile but Ranma could easily see her look of utter disbelief as his story went on. It made him uncomfortable, especially when she jotted things down on her clipboard and moved it away when he tried to see what she was writing. When he was finished with his tale he sat up, looking at her expectantly as he waited for her to finish scribbling notes. She looked up at him as well a few times and each time he could see she was trying to puzzle out if the boy in front of her was delusional or crazy and he eventually had enough.
"Okay, I can see you don't believe me, it's pretty understandable I guess." She smiled at him sheepishly but didn't acknowledge what he said. Instead he got up with a sigh and walked over to the water cooler she had in the corner of the room. He opened the tap and stuck his hand under the cold water as the doctor watched him curiously. Her intrigue turned to amazement as she saw the transformation first hand and soon she was scratching out many of the old notes she had made and was hurriedly scribbling down new ones in their place.
"Well at least now you can believe some of what I said, but I assure you it's all true." She nodded off handily as she continued to write, her face scrunched up in concentration as Ranma moved to sit back down on the couch. Suddenly she reached across and gently prodded Ranma in the chest, to which he immediately flinched back from.
"Hey, what are you doing?!"
The older woman smiled, embarrassed. "Sorry, I just had to make sure, but wow it really is real and everything." Ranma just sat back, grumbling to himself that nobody ever believed him. The doctor took a few more minutes writing down notes, allowing Ranma to make use of the small kitchen in the apartment to heat up some water and change back. He sat back down, shaking the water out of his hair and waited with increasing anxiety for Yuhi to start talking.
"Well, I'm sorry about not believing you before Ranma but now we have that dealt with I believe we can properly start this session." Ranma shot up from his seat.
"Hey, what was all that other stuff then?" She smirked at him from behind the clipboard.
"Oh that's just background information, the bare bones to let me get to know you a bit better. Now we go a bit more in depth. I've at least isolated that your main area of concern is the issue with your fiancées as well as almost the same problem with your rivalries and constant fighting. I would also say there are some underlying unresolved parental issues but those go deeper and won't help you right now." She gave him a very clear, very assertive look that almost made him think she was looking right through you.
"I think your main issue is trust Ranma." He looked at her strangely. "You were never taught basic emotional inhibition, that much I can tell from what you told me about your father." He continued the strange look, waiting for her to get to the point. "What I mean is essentially you are too trusting. While trust is not a bad attribute in its own right, too much trust is as bad as too little. Unlike others who may only expect the worst from others, in most cases you rarely do. You want to believe that if you hope for the best from another they will in time provide it. This has gotten you in more than a bit of trouble. It is this same problem with trust that is driving your problems with your fiancées."
"Hey I trust them because they're my friends!"
She smiled again. "That's exactly what I mean. You never learned when to put emotional distance between yourself and anybody you care about. I can see this as a textbook case with your fiancée..." She briefly consulted her notes "...Akane. You continue to put faith in her improving her behaviour despite her never extending the same courtesy. This only enables her to create a negative feedback loop that will only make things worse between the two of you." Ranma looked hopelessly out of his depth so Yuhi clarified.
"In essence, you allow her to hit you despite being fully able to stop it. This in turn gives her the feeling that you deserve what she does to you, making it easier and easier for her to simply hurt you with less and less cause."
He looked up, brow furrowed; the metaphorical steam could literally be seen coming out of his ears. "So wait, you're saying Akane hits me... just because I let her?"
She frowned. "Well it's not quite as black and white as that but essentially yes. If she has no reason to believe what she's doing is wrong or harmful, why would she have a reason to stop doing it? Akane herself seems quite interesting, classic anger management case, probably due to paranoia and self-esteem issues."
Ranma looked up, surprised. "What? Self-esteem?"
Yuhi looked up, realising she'd been rambling. "Oh, that's unimportant, we're here to talk about you. Anyway I wouldn't be in any position to judge somebody without actually talking to them first." She smiled at him, trying to cover up her little slip. "Anyway Ranma, I never really asked, what do you hope to gain out of these sessions?"
He looked around nervously, scratching the back of his head. "Um, well, they weren't really my idea so, um, I'm not really sure. I guess if I don't blow up again like last week that would be great." He smiled awkwardly.
"Ah yes, as I understand it Kasumi was the one to recommend me to you." She noted the quick expression that went across Ranma's features at the mention of Kasumi's name, so fast that even he mightn't have noticed it. "Ranma, what do you think made Kasumi do that?"
Again he gulped nervously before letting his head slump down. "She thought I might hurt somebody otherwise."
She nodded, pencil in mouth. "Yet last time you didn't hurt Kasumi, even though she approached you in your, what I can only describe as a feral attitude."
His head shot up in defiance. "Well of course not. It's Kasumi, I could never hurt her!"
She smirked, exactly the reaction she had been expecting. "And why is that? From what you told me, in your own words, you were ready to strike down anybody who came near you, regardless of who it was. What made you hesitate? And why Kasumi?"
Ranma was suddenly very nervous about this line of questioning. "Why are we suddenly talking about Kasumi?"
She smirked. 'They're always defensive.' "It's just a simple question Ranma."
He resigned himself, not even sure why he was fighting so defiantly in the first place. "Well, it's Kasumi. She's the only one who's always been there for me. She's like the only calm point that I can always be sure won't turn against me."
She smiled lightly again. 'And he never realised he had trust issues when he's ready to admit that?' "Do you think Kasumi returns these feelings?"
He once again nearly shot out the sofa. "What? How would I know?"
She tilted her head a little, trying to subconsciously make him see that she wasn't threatening him. When he didn't calm down she let up, he obviously wasn't ready to talk about that just yet. "Hmm, perhaps you should think about that." She turned and looked at the clock, they were almost out of time before her next patient had to come in. "Listen Ranma, you want some quick advice?" He nodded, enthusiastic about any shortcuts he could take. "It won't solve your problems, not by a long shot, but it'll quiet them down for a while." He looked on, expectant as ever. "Take a vacation." His brow immediately furrowed. "Nothing too big, just a few days away from everybody, but make sure they don't know where you're going." He nodded slowly.
"How's that supposed to help?"
She smirked again, not even bothering to hide it behind her clipboard. "It'll give you some quiet time to think about things, help you sort them out without others trying to tell you how to think or act. If anything it's just a few quiet days to allow everything to settle. Perhaps it will even do the people around you some good to not have you around, let them think about what part you play in their lives." She stood up and motioned for him to do the same. "If anything Ranma, just enjoy it. Someone like you, while resilient, can't have the world on their shoulders forever."
He nodded, not quite so sure. "Well, thanks Yuhi."
She smiled, the patients didn't usually start calling her by her first name in the first session. "Oh and Ranma, take Kasumi along with you." He turned, startled.
"W-Why Kasumi?"
She smiled secretively. "We didn't talk for very long but I'm a little concerned for her. It will do her just as much good as it will you. She'll refuse of course, she's that type, but just tell her that I recommend it." Again he nodded, perhaps even more confused than when he came in. Yuhi looked on at the young man as he left her practise. 'There's something special about that one, I just hope he can realise his feelings before too long or he won't be the only one that'll get hurt.'