Fruits Basket Fan Fiction ❯ Ebony and Ivory ❯ Supernatural Curses ( Chapter 4 )

CHAPTER 4: Supernatural Curses

 

“Saito-san?” Yuki was at the door.

 

Saito smiled warmly. The boy was well dressed for cold. “Ready to go ice-skating?”

 

Yuki broke into a smile. The man had brought his skates and those of his wife. They weren't really feminine. More just nice. They fit Yuki, who had remarkably small feet for a boy. “Well, that saves us the trouble of renting some,” Saito said. He hesitated, but then handed the skates to Yuki. “I think she would want them to be used again.”

 

“Are you sure?”

 

“Absolutely.”

 

They walked to a frozen lake. There were a few others skating, but not very many. Saito helped Yuki put on the skates, and demonstrated how to move on the ice. At last, Yuki nervously walked toward the ice, staring at his feet the entire time, until he had clasped Saito's hand. Saito realized suddenly that he'd said almost nothing since they'd arrived.

 

“You're very quiet,” he commented as Yuki, clinging to his hand, slid his feet tentatively across the ice.

 

“I don't usually have anyone to talk to, except Shigure,” he said apologetically. “And Shigure and I usually don't have anything to talk about.” He took a few steps on his own, but lost his balance and grasped hold of Saito before he fell.

 

“Careful,” Saito said with a smile. “Do you know how to use roller blades?”

 

“No.”

 

Saito was surprised. Most boys Yuki's age were very familiar with these types of things. “What do you like to do, Yuki?”

 

“Play… the piano,” Yuki said, almost falling again but catching himself. He finally let go of Saito's hand, but stayed close. “And… I like to garden sometimes. And read.”

 

“Any sports?”

 

He shrugged a little. “I don't know. I used to like martial arts.”

 

“What made you stop?”

 

“My annoying—” he fell, catching himself on his hands. Saito went over to help him up. “Cousin,” Yuki finished, brushing himself off.

 

“Do you have a large family?”

 

“I don't know.”

 

“A lot of cousins?”

 

“I guess so.”

 

“Any your age?”

 

“A few.” Yuki was beginning to look a little nervous.

 

“I'm sorry. Would you prefer that I not ask about your family?”

 

Yuki started to shrug, then almost fell, but caught himself. At last, he let go of Saito's hand. “I think… I can do it now.” He skated out, wobbling a little, but regaining his balance. Saito had the distinct impression that he would have preferred someone to hold onto, but was more afraid of Saito's questions than he was of falling. Saito went after him, easily catching up.

 

“Yuki-kun?” Yuki started and almost fell, but Saito managed to catch him. “I'm sorry,” Saito continued. “I wasn't thinking. I won't ask you any more questions about your family if you don't want. And if I ask you a question you don't want to answer, you don't have to, okay?”

 

Yuki looked uncertain, but nodded a little. “Okay.” He took hold of Saito's hand again.

 

“What type of books do you like?” Saito asked after a few minutes, hoping this was a safe topic.

 

Yuki smiled. “History, and sometimes historical fiction if it's good. And… I like old books.”

 

“Old books?”

 

“Ones that were written a long time ago. Like… Confucius. To help with English, I like to read Shakespeare, but my teacher said it's not a good idea, since the English language has changed so much. He said I would look funny going to America or something and talking like I lived three centuries ago. I guess it would be a better idea to read it in Japanese, but I've tried it and I don't like it as much. All I can find are modern translations, and it takes away from it, somehow.” He shrugged a little.

 

Saito smiled. “I think that's the most words I've ever heard you use at one time.”

 

Yuki laughed a little. “Sorry.”

 

“No, it's all right. So tell me about Shakespeare. An interesting choice for a Japanese fourteen-year-old, don't you think?”

 

Yuki shrugged, and blushed slightly. “I don't know.”

 

“He was a playwright, ne? Which is your favorite play?”

 

“Well, I haven't read very many. So far… I think Hamlet, maybe. Or Macbeth.” He sighed a little. “I think I'm going to start on the comedies eventually. The tragedies are depressing.”

 

“It's funny, though,” Saito commented, “I've heard that people are more cheered up by tragedies than by comedies, because tragedies make their own problems seem minor in comparison.”

 

Yuki smiled wanly. “I guess so.” He fell silent for a moment. “I hated Romeo and Juliet. Hated it.” He sighed. “I know they were stupid, but… but I was on their side.”

 

There was a short, awkward silence. At least, Saito felt awkward. He found himself wondering suddenly whether Yuki's problems actually were minor in comparison to Shakespeare's tragedies. He always seemed afraid to talk about his family, or at least avoidant. Saito wondered again if he were being abused, and whether he, Saito, should do something about it.

 

“I think I've got it now,” said Yuki after a moment. “Do you mind if I try it on my own for a little while?”

 

“Not at all. Just let me know if you need any help, okay?”

 

Yuki smiled and nodded, and skated off. Saito watched him for a while, in the midst of his own skating. He finally came to the obvious conclusion that the tragedies had to be worse than Yuki's life. After all, they dealt with supernatural curses, and things like that. Hard to beat that.

 

After a while, he found himself thinking of his wife. She had liked to read, only she had always preferred Japanese literature. She had also painted, but only in her spare time. She always planned on taking a class after the baby was weaned, just for an hour a week.

“Saito-san…” Yuki's voice sounded nervous, and far away. Saito looked toward him and his heart skipped a beat. Yuki was near the middle, where the ice was thinnest. Saito had forgotten to warn him. Of course he couldn't know.

 

“Yuki, come back this way,” he called. “Hurry up.” He tried to look calm so Yuki didn't panic.

 

“O… okay…” Yuki started back, slowly, then froze again. The ice underneath him had flexed. “S-saito-sa…”

 

“Okay, just stay still. I'm coming.”

 

Yuki stood frozen as Saito approached.

 

“Try to… kneel down, or something. So your weight is more spread out.”

 

Yuki nodded, and began to lower himself. Then there was a crack. “Saito-san!”

 

“Don't move!” he cried, but too late. Yuki had flailed his arms and fallen through the ice. Saito froze for a second in sheer panic, until Yuki came back up, paper-white.

 

“Saito… sa…”

 

“Hold onto the ice on the side! Don't panic. I'm coming.” Yuki held onto the ice, shaking. Saito had his skates off in an instant and was on his stomach, moving toward the boy. He felt the ice flex underneath him. “Take the skates off!” he called.

 

“I…c-can't… can't… move… my feet!”

 

“Okay, hold on.” Another skater had stopped to help, and now grabbed Saito by the ankles. At last, after nearly fifteen minutes, Saito managed to pull Yuki out. As soon as they were on thicker ice, he took off Yuki's coat and gave him his own. “I'm sorry. I forgot about ice being thinner toward the middle.”

 

“The s-s-skates… sorry…”

 

He was worried about the skates? “Don't worry about them. Are you all right? Did you swallow any water?”

 

“N-n-no.”

 

“We'll need an ambulance.”

 

“No!”

 

Saito blinked, surprised at the boy's vehemence. “Yuki…”

 

“I'll… be… fine…” He was shaking violently, and his eyes were bright with something between fear and sheer stubbornness. He hugged the coat around him.

 

“Okay… my house is nearby. I'll take you there. But I may have to call the hospital.”

 

“No… hospital!” Yuki said, desperately. “Akito… Hatori… consent… can't… tell them.” He tried to stand and collapsed into Saito's arms.

 

Saito removed the skates, thinking. Suddenly he understood. “Oh, you're afraid they'll find out about… I see.” He sighed, and lifted Yuki into his arms, shocked at how light he was. Someone offered a blanket, and Saito wrapped it around them both and carried Yuki off the ice, and down to the street where he, Saito, lived. Yuki was still conscious, but his breathing was labored. Saito wondered if Yuki had asthma, and was having a mild attack. He certainly seemed about to faint from hypothermia and exhaustion. Suddenly he began to whisper, gasping. Saito could barely hear it, but he just caught the words.

 

“Don't change, don't change, please don't change…”

 

“I beg your pardon?”

 

Then there was an explosion and Yuki was gone, leaving his clothes in Saito's arms. Saito cried out and dropped them. He heard a muffled whimper, and he gathered up the clothes again. “Yuki?” He looked around him. “Yuki-kun!”

 

Then he heard a soft crying coming from the clothes. “I'm sorry,” the clothes whispered weakly. “I'm sorry, Saito-san.” And then the crying continued.

 

“Yuki-kun, where are you?”

 

Something moved inside the clothes, and Saito saw a nose stick out—a rodent nose, followed by a rat's body. Saito stifled the instinct to scream, drop it, and run away.

“Yuki? Is that you?”

 

“Yes,” the rat whispered. “I'm sorry.” Saito simply stared for several seconds, open-mouthed. This sort of thing… happened in children's books, and fairy tales. Not in real life. “Please… Saito-san…” the rat whispered. It was shaking badly, from cold and fear. “I need… to get warm.”

 

“Of… of course,” Saito stammered. He wrapped the Yuki-rat in the clothes and ran on to his house. He got an electric blanket and wrapped it around the rodent, putting it on a low setting. Then he collapsed onto the floor, his head in his hands. “I'm not a vet,” he said at last. “I don't know what to do for you.”

 

“It's okay. I just need to wait until I'm strong enough to change back.”

 

“You'll change back?” Saito felt a wave of relief. How would he have explained it to Yuki's family? “Excuse me, ma'am, but I think I accidentally turned your son into a rat”? He had enough to explain as it was.

 

The rat looked at him curiously. “Did you think this was the first time this happened to me?”

 

Saito considered. “Well you don't seem very fazed.”

 

The rat made a motion that looked like it might have been a shrug on a human. “I can't do anything about it.” He sighed. “You might as well call my doctor. I'll need to tell Akito. He'll be angry. Especially about the piano.” He seemed to be half talking to himself, and looked away. “I thought it would be okay since you're a man…”

 

“What does that have to do with it?”

 

“This happens if I'm hugged by a girl, too.”

 

“Really? Why?”

 

“It's a curse,” the rat began, but then there was another explosion, and Yuki was sitting on the floor, stark naked. “Sorry,” he said, calmly covering himself with the electric blanket to the extent that he could. “There's no way to predict when I change back.”

 

Saito told himself not to panic and found Yuki some of his own clothes to wear. He turned away while Yuki dressed. “A curse?”

 

“Yes. I'll need to tell Shigure… or someone. I guess I probably don't need to call Hatori, since I'm feeling better. Kind of weird, the rat form actually helping. Anyway, they'll probably erase your memories of me. I'm sorry. I'm dressed.”

 

Saito turned, sighing. Then he looked at Yuki's face and started. Yuki's countenance was calm, but eerily so, like that of a prisoner resigned to execution. Something in what Yuki had said caught his attention. “Erase my memories?”

 

“Well, it's really only suppression. It's like hypnotism, or something.”

 

“Is this… common procedure?”

 

“When someone finds out. Hatori, or whoever is the dragon does it. For hundreds of years. That's why nobody knows except us.”

 

“The dragon?”

 

“It's too hard to explain.”

 

“Is it… a hard and fast rule? Can't anybody know about it? What if I promise not to tell anyone else?”

 

Yuki sat back against the couch with a sigh. “I don't think that would make a difference.”

 

Saito felt a growing sense of alarm. What would that be like? To just… forget about Yuki? Forget about this strange, wonderful child who had awakened so much in him that had died with his wife? No more music, or cocoa and donuts, or… “But I don't want them to!” Saito said. “Don't I have some choice in the matter?”

 

There were tears in Yuki's eyes as he looked away. “I'm so sorry,” he said. “But there's nothing we can do.” He buried his forehead in his hands. “It was too good to last,” he whispered. “I should have known it was too good to last.”

 

But Saito wasn't giving up. “If they erase my memories, can't you just come back and reintroduce yourself?”

 

“You don't understand. Akito will make sure I never see you again. It's necessary, you see. So you don't accidentally remember.”

 

“Then don't tell him.”

 

Yuki looked up, wide-eyed. He blinked once or twice, then tensed up. “But… but I have to.”

 

“Why?”

 

“Something will happen. Akito will find out. If he finds out and knows I didn't tell, he'll…”

 

“He'll what?”

 

Yuki's face was white. He took a deep breath and sighed. “Saito-san, it's a simple procedure. And you don't want to associate with someone like me. I'm cursed. I'm a freak. And it's not just me. My whole family…”

 

“They turn into rats? Or dragons?”

 

Yuki put a hand to his forehead. “It's too hard to explain. I've already said too much.”

 

“Yuki-kun, who is Akito?”

 

“The head of my family.”

 

“Is he crazy or something?”

 

Yuki closed his eyes. “I don't know. But he must be obeyed.”

 

“Yuki-kun, I understand that you feel loyalty to your family, but if he's going to hurt you if you tell…”

 

Yuki gave a bitter laugh. “I don't feel any loyalty toward them. If I could, I'd run away and never go back. But the curse would go with me. I can't escape.”

 

“You act like this man is god.”

 

A slight, ironic smile appeared on Yuki's lips for a mere instant, then faded. “I'm sorry, Saito-san.”

 

They were silent for several minutes, during which time Saito wrapped a blanket around Yuki's shoulders. “You will be able to play piano again, right?” Saito asked at last. “I'm all right with forgetting if you can play the piano again.”

 

Yuki shrugged. “Maybe. Someday. Not right away. Who cares? Of course there are plenty of places with pianos, and I can avoid getting caught. I wanted to be in that shop with you. You were the only adult I'd ever met who liked me for me.”

 

“Liked? I still like you, Yuki-kun.”

 

Yuki's face was expressionless. “Saito-san, you just saw me turn into a rat. You hate rats.”

 

“What gives you that impression?”

 

“There's a rat trap behind your stereo system.”

 

Saito looked, saw it, and felt a stab of guilt. There had been rats, a few years before. There were none now. Saito had killed three. He had never thought to remove the trap. “But you're not a rat. I mean, right? You were just a human in rat form.” He blinked. “Or are you a rat in human form right now? I haven't killed any of your relatives, have I? And besides, I didn't hate them. It was only that they frightened my wife, and they kept getting into the food in the cupboard… I'm sorry.”

 

Yuki laughed a little. “It's okay. I'm not mad at you for having a rat trap.”

 

“Well I don't want you to feel bad. I mean, it's not as though those rats play piano and chat with me over cocoa and donuts.” Saito felt himself blushing at how foolish he sounded. “I'm sorry. I'm probably not helping.”

 

“I'll have to let them know that that's the way to avoid getting caught,” Yuki said, smiling. Then he sighed. “I should call Shigure.” He rose, leaving the blanket. “Would you walk me home?”

 

“Of course.” He touched Yuki's shoulder as he passed. “I'll miss you.” He felt his own eyes mist.

 

Yuki threw his arms around Saito for a moment, and Saito tightly hugged him back. “I won't forget you,” he whispered, before finally letting go. Then he walked to the phone and dialed home. “Shigure?” he said after a moment. “Yes, this is Yuki… no, I'm fine… I had something I needed to tell you… I was… on the ice.” His eyes widened as he suddenly saw an escape from the piano problem. “See, this squirrel had fallen through, and… yes, I know there aren't very many squirrels out this time of year. It was a fluke. But I wanted to help it, and I didn't think about the ice being too thin even for the squirrel… yes, it was stupid. I fell in… Yes, I'm fine. A man named Saito-san helped me… he took me to his house to get me warmed up… because I didn't want to bother him. And I wasn't in for very long… no, I feel fine.” A smile touched his face. “The squirrel is fine too. It jumped on my head and onto thicker ice, without so much as a `thank you'… Yes, squirrels are usually pretty impolite. Rats are much more well-mannered…”

 

Yuki closed his eyes, apparently at a question that was asked. He bit his lip. “Yes, I'm still here. Sorry; Saito-san asked me a question. No, I didn't. Everything's fine… Yeah… Is it okay if I stay for a while longer? My clothes are still wet…” He closed his eyes, this time in annoyance. “No, Shigure, I'm not naked. I'm borrowing Saito-san's. Seriously, you are such a pervert… Okay, so I should be home by dinner time?… No, I'll be fine. I don't feel very weak… Thanks. See you in a while.” He hung up, eyes closed. “That's probably the most stupid thing I've ever done. But Shigure will forgive me if I tell him later. If I decide to. I couldn't.” He leaned against the wall.

 

“Is there anything I can do?” Saito asked.

 

Yuki silently looked at him with those amazing eyes for several minutes, until Saito was uncomfortable. “If you tell anyone,” he said at last, “I'll have to tell Akito.”

Saito felt a flood of relief and joy that brought unexpected tears to his eyes. “Don't worry. I won't.”

 

The rest of the afternoon passed uneventfully. Yuki stayed for hot chocolate, and then Saito walked him home. He thought Shigure seemed a friendly person. Although Yuki obviously did not fully trust him, he seemed to feel comfortable around him, and Saito felt a bit relieved. He was beginning to wonder if Yuki ought to be completely removed from the family. But he seemed at least reasonably safe here. And with the curse, there weren't a lot of other places he would be safe. So Saito smiled and waved goodbye. Neither he nor Yuki had mentioned the piano, and, after walking quite a distance toward his home, Saito realized that neither Yuki nor Shigure had mentioned their last name. He laughed a little. That was just like Yuki.

 

As he walked home, it occurred to him what they had been talking about earlier. Tragedies. Yuki found them depressing. Did this curse make his life a tragedy? Always being afraid that someone would find out, and losing everyone who did? He still could barely believe what had happened, and kept convincing himself that it had been his imagination. But there were wet animal hairs on the electric blanket on the sofa when he arrived home. Saito shivered. How was it possible?