Fruits Basket Fan Fiction ❯ Exploring the Gap ❯ Gap ( Chapter 1 )

Author note: I had trouble coming up with a title for this, but settled on `Exploring the Gap' (probably because it sounds like really bad porn.) Many, Many thanks to kira who has helped me a lot with beta-ing and just encouraging me in this story as well as a lot of others. [So sorry I forgot to thank you on hachigatsu no yoru so I will thank you twice here Good luck with `Cold Comfort' it deserves to win something.]

`Fruits Basket' rightfully belongs to the creative genius Natsuki Takaya and anyone she has granted license to. No one pays me to play in Takaya-sensei's world; I just hang out there for fun.

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“Ayame, why do you insist on bugging Hatori with this?” asked Yuki on one of his infrequent visits to the shop. “After all he couldn't possibly be interested in what the shopkeeper two doors down wore to work today.”

Ayame didn't pause while pressing the buttons on his phone sending a text message his friend; breathing something offhand about, “nevertheless `Tori needs to know.” After all, nobody really understood and no one ever would, so why try to explain.

`Why is this man so impossible? Doesn't he have any common sense?' Yuki asked himself. He wasn't in the best of moods to start with. Student council had been especially draining with elections coming up. He had missed an easy answer on one of his assignments due to reading the question wrong, and to top it off, Shigure had forced him to return a borrowed item to his brother after school.

Okay, forced was too strong a word; but he had asked him in front of Tohru, knowing Yuki would accept, before she could volunteer and add one more thing onto her long list of chores for the day. He hadn't even bothered to look into the paper bag Shigure gave him; sure he did not want to know what the dog could have borrowed from Ayame. He just wanted to drop the sack off and leave, but of course his brother insisted he stay for a cup of tea. No sooner had they sat down than Ayame had spotted the fashion faux pas he was currently texting his long time friend about.

“Stop it, Ayame, you are constantly bothering Hatori with useless things, and he is a busy man. He is just too polite to tell you to leave him alone himself,” Yuki said, exasperated.

“Bothering him? Is that what you think?” Ayame asked, looking up from his texting. “Well, I suppose it could be seen that way, of course, but I prefer to think of it as sharing a piece of the outside world with `Tori. He spends so much time cooped up in that dreary place. He has been looking after Akito and the rest of the junishi there without much of a real life of his own since Kana left him.” After a brief pause he continued, “Do you really think `Tori is upset by it? He hasn't ever said anything to me about not wanting to be contacted so much. I would have listened if he had, he knows that.” He waved the possibility off dismissively. “Maybe it is a little extreme to interrupt his day so often with small things. But it's my way of making sure he sees some of life away from the main house, even if it's only through my eyes. Well and the eyes of my new camera-phone of course. Ha-ha-ha,” he finished with his typical booming laugh, while snapping a picture of Yuki with said item. “I will file-send him a copy of this when I tell him all about your visit later on instant messenger.”

`Text, call, file-send?' “Ayame, how many ways do you contact Hatori in a given day anyway?” Yuki asked his curiosity piqued.

“Well, I call in the evening after his office closes, but sometimes Akito is sick and needs him then. So if I get no answer, I text him. I use text messaging during the day when he is seeing patients too. I text him each time I see something interesting, and he can reply whenever he gets a chance to that way. I send some things on instant messenger at night after he is at home because then I can send pictures as well. Also if he has gone to sleep it won't wake him like the phone would. I don't use his pager unless I am really sick, or it is an emergency. I only did that once… And let's see, I send cards for major holidays and write long poetic love letters signed `from your secret admirer' on April first every year. It's a long story. He still thinks its Shigure. Shhh, don't tell him, okay? Hmmmn, I think that's it. I used to send emails but they kept going to his spam filter by mistake. He tried to fix it, but he isn't exactly a computer expert and it never worked right. So I gave up on that.”

“That many times; and yet, you don't think you are annoying him somehow?” Yuki asked, simply amazed by the thought.

“Well, maybe I don't care if it does annoy him,” Ayame said, turning unexpectedly serious. “What we need and what we want are two different things, Yuki. For example, I hate needles. However, if I am sick, he would give me an injection whether I want it or not because it will make me better. I see him closing himself off, trying to insulate himself from the rest of the world. He'd spend day after day alone in the main house with nothing but sad memories and sickness to occupy him. If I let him withdraw too much, I fear he will quit caring about anything but his work. He would slowly cease to be the man I have always admired so much, and I just can't let that happen. Maybe it is too much, but everyone else just goes there to see him and doesn't even try to get him out into the world. I haven't seen anyone else but myself and Momiji try to pull him out of his shell until recently.”

Many thoughts went through Yuki's head as he absorbed this information. “Until recently?” he echoed, without actually meaning to speak aloud.

“Oh yes, there is a gleaming ray of hope on the horizon for my dear `Tori in the person of one Mayuko-chan. I so hope things work out for them. It would be nice indeed to see him truly smile again…” Ayame trailed off; smiling dreamily at something only he could see.

Yuki looked at his brother, unsure of what to think. He had always assumed that the constant contact with Hatori was something Ayame did for his own selfish reasons. He had often wondered how Hatori put up with him and, to a lesser extent, Shigure. But it seemed now that Ayame had been trying, in his own odd way, to be some sort of a lifeline between Hatori and the world outside of the main house. This didn't work at all with his image of his brother as selfish, egotistical and thoughtless. It was hard to digest. He knew Ayame was a terrible brother who had abandoned him when he needed him most. That fact couldn't be changed. But maybe he wasn't all bad. A horrible brother, yes, but maybe not so bad as a friend. He felt a twinge of jealousy. `Why did Ayame care for them, his friends, more than his own brother?'

“Oh! Yuki, I must apologize, I was hoping to spend this time, getting to know my wonderful younger brother better, and here I have spent so long talking about myself. It is unforgivable. Tell me, how are things at school? Have you asked the fair Princess Tohru to be your own yet?” Ayame was back to his normal irritating self.

Okay, jealousy gone; gratitude reigning supreme. “I really should be getting home now. It's getting late. Tohru will be holding dinner for me,” Yuki said, standing and, quickly leaving.

Ayame jumped up and followed him to the door. “If you say so; Yuki, please do stop by any time. And thank Shigure for returning the magazines so promptly for me,” he yodeled at the retreating figure, adding softly; “You don't know how much this time together means to me.”

Yuki cringed and walked faster, trying not to think about what kind of magazines he had probably harbored in his book bag at school all day. He hoped they were just fashion related. Shigure would need reference for describing costumes in his period pieces, right? Even the dog wouldn't risk ruining Yuki's reputation as part of a practical joke, would he? Okay, moving on. Go home eat dinner, and then go tend the garden. The leeks should be ready soon. The stupid cat would just have to suffer once they were ready for harvest; everyone else in the house liked them. Thoughts of torturing Kyou with a heaping plateful of the hated vegetable filled his head.

Ayame smiled and waved until Yuki disappeared around the corner. Humming happily to himself, he pulled the door shut as he stepped back into the store, straightening displays as he made his way back to the register. The gap between them was still there. But they hadn't fought much at all, and he felt that it was a very good start to mending things between them.