Oranges and Leeks - Kyoru

[fireblazie]

OK, it's my first time posting! I hope this goes right.. ^^;;;

Disclaimer: I don't own Fruits Basket.

Oranges and Leeks (4/18/04 - 4/20/04)

It was raining.

The water poured relentlessly against the roof Kyou had just patched up a few hours ago. She sat, half-listening to the program on television, but more listening to the sounds of nature outside. The gushing of the wind, the scraping of the tree's branches against the house.

Shigure had gone to meet with his editor, and Akito had requested Yuki's presence at the main house for some reason or other. But Kyou had nothing to do, and, on Shigure's orders, had stayed home with her.

"He's probably sleeping," she murmured to herself, grabbing the remote and switching from channel to channel. He deserved the sleep, though, after all the fighting he did with Yuki. "I wonder what he'd like for dinner..."

"I don't care." Tohru jumped at the sound of his voice. "You know what I like and what I don't." His voice sounded slightly bitter.

She stared down, unsure of what to say. Kyou had gotten beat up rather badly by Yuki earlier that morning, and Tohru didn't want to add any more insult to injury.

Finally: "I'll -- I'll start dinner," she stuttered weakly. She stood up and walked past him into the kitchen.

It was raining.

---

When did it get so hard to talk to him?

Even now, no words were said. They sat on opposite sides of the table, eating silently, avoiding each other's eyes. Kyou stuffed forkfuls of rice in his mouth, and Tohru sipped her miso contentedly.

"How was your day, Kyou-kun?" Tohru asked, pasting a smile on her face. The silence needed to be filled in quickly, and now. There was nothing else she could say...

"Feh. The same."

Tohru shut her mouth, and the silence descended upon them again. He must have taken his defeat very seriously, she thought, but why did this particular defeat make him so angry? He always lost, no matter what..

"There are leeks in the miso," Kyou said, jerking Tohru out of her reverie. He held his chopsticks, which were full of leeks, at arm's length. He frowned at it in disgust.

"I'm so sorry!" Tohru sprang up. She did the first thing that came to mind, and immediately began to fish out all the leeks she could find, dumping them in her bowl. Her face flared up. How could she have forgotten? Kyou hated leeks, he hated them, hated them...

"Stop." His hands clasped gently over her own. Tohru lifted her head dazedly. "I'll just eat something else."

"But, Kyou-kun --" She fell silent as he turned to look at her. She swallowed. "I'm sorry. I know you don't like leeks."

He shook his head, dismissing her concern. "It's no big deal."

Tohru realized, very suddenly, as Kyou shuffled over to the refrigerator, that he was quite tall. His bright orange hair stood out noticeably against the white appliances in the kitchen. With quick, short movements, Kyou downed the carton of milk, taking the leftover fish from the fridge.

Why was it so hard to talk to him?

Kyou sat back down at his place, peeling off the plastic wrap on the plate and stabbing his fork rather moodily into the fish. Tohru wondered why he was in such a grumpy mood.

She finished her dinner quickly, but instead of piling the dishes into the sink, she remained at her seat for awhile, watching Kyou finish his dinner.

"...what?" he snapped. A few seconds later, he shot her a half bewildered, half apologetic look. It was his way of apologizing, Tohru knew, and didn't pry. She shook her head quickly, saying,

"It's nothing, Kyou-kun. I'm sorry."

She was saying sorry an awful lot of times for things she had no control over.

She wanted to get closer to him. She wanted to get to know the real Kyou-kun, not whom he pretended to be. And there were times when she was sure that she had seen slight glimpses of him -- only to be shot down and disappointed.

"I'll -- I'll wash the dishes now," she said softly. Then, said in a joking manner accompanied with a smile, "Maybe you can help me dry them."

He picked the remaining meat off the fishbone, threw it away, added his plate to the stack of dirty dishes, and did exactly that.

---

Tohru would scrub at the dishes furiously with the sponge, then rinse them thoroughly, one by one, in the warm water. Then she would hand them, always with a smile, to Kyou, who would dry them absently with the thick, green cloth and shove them in the cabinets. Tohru had asked him, lightly, to be more careful, and there had been a noticeable improvement in his force.

The mood had lightened, but there was a definite hint of darkness in the air. Outside, the thunder rumbled, casting streaks of lightning in the sky. She handed the last plate to Kyou when a loud clap of thunder burst, taking both of them by surprise.

The plate fell.

Kyou's head was bent downwards as he knelt down to pick up the broken shards. Tohru followed suit, beginning to take the fragments in her hands.

"I can't do anything right," he said flatly.

Tohru jerked in surprise. "It's only a plate, Kyou-kun."

He didn't say anything else for the next five minutes. He merely looked at her, and then went back to picking up the broken pieces and dumping them into the trash.

And then she saw a fresh new cut on the palm of his right hand, still bleeding. Bending over the fragments in the trash, it registered in her mind.

"Kyou-kun!" She called hastily after him as he tried to make a quick escape. She faltered when he looked at her -- she always did, for some reason -- and continued, "You're bleeding."

He glanced down carelessly at the cut on his palm and stated, "It's just a small cut."

"It's bleeding." She stood her ground.

"I can take care of it myself." So did he.

"Kyou-kun." She stared at him imploringly, and as a dark red flush rose on his cheeks, she wrung her hands. He hates me, doesn't he, she thought furiously, but why, why does he hate me, I haven't done anything to him --

He plopped down on the chair, extending his right arm, giving her a clear view of the cut. It extended from the middle of his palm down to where his hand met his wrist. A scowl crossed his face.

"It won't take long, Kyou-kun," she promised, and went to fetch the first-aid kid. She returned quickly, that same smile on her face. She dabbed the antiseptic on, from time to time gazing at his face.

He has a natural poker face, she decided to herself, and that makes it so hard for me to figure out what he's thinking! He always looks the same way; I can't tell if he's happy or sad or angry..

"Kyou-kun," she said softly, applying the the band-aid precisely onto the cut, "I wish you would let me get closer to you."

He started.

"I know this must sound so rude," Tohru continued apologetically, "but you always seem to push everyone away. I know it must be a habit, or maybe something that you want to do, something that you do on purpose. But I want to get to know you. The real you. Not 'the cat,' but Kyou-kun. Just Kyou-kun."

Kyou's eyes widened, and then went back to normal, an almost knowing look in his eyes. He opened his hand, then closed it. "Figures you would say something like that..."

Then he smiled, so suddenly. A clumsy, awkward smile.

Tohru smiled back.

---

"Kyou-kun, would you like an orange?"

Kyou furrowed his brow at the sudden and strange remark. But Tohru held out the orange, smiling in the way only she could. He shrugged. "I guess."

Tohru handed him the fruit and watched as Kyou ripped apart the hard skin, tossing it carelessly aside. Then he bit straight into the orange, pausing to turn his back on her and spitting the seeds into the trash. There was a small smile on his face as he said, "It's good."

Tohru was surprised that he would smile so easily. "Is it?" She peeled off the skin from her own orange and took a piece off and bit into it. "It is, isn't it?" Then, as she ate another piece, she added, "It looks like your hair."

Kyou faltered, staring at the orange skins and tugging at his orange locks. "I guess it does."

"Shigure-san once told me that you liked oranges," Tohru stated, cocking her head slightly to the side. When Kyou gave a shrug, which, in his language, meant 'Yes,' she went on, "but that you hate leeks with a passion."

"...." He didn't answer. Which, Tohru had come to learn, meant, 'Go on.'

"I think.." Tohru paused thoughtfully, chewing on her third orange, "that if you think of leeks as the bad things in your life, then you could say that everyone has some leeks in their life. Things they despise. Things that get in their way. Roadblocks." She paused to catch Kyou's eye, and was happy to see that she had his attention. "But, if you think about oranges as the good things in life, then you could say that despite all the leeks, you still have some oranges. Right?"

Kyou didn't say anything as he reached for another orange and peeled it. For a moment, Tohru worried that she had offended him somehow.

"You..." he trailed off. "...always find the weirdest things to say."

"I'm sorry," she said quickly, "these things just pop into my head, and I thought maybe you'd like it, because you hate leeks and you like oranges --"

"But," he cut her off, determinedly avoiding her eyes, "I like that."

"Ah --" She stopped.

And smiled.

"Could I have an orange slice?" she asked.

"Sure.."

And as he bit into his orange, he scowled, maybe because it had been sour. A scowl, a sour, angry scowl.

His scowl.

She hardly knew what she was doing, but she said it: "Won't you smile
for me?"

He twitched convulsively, and Tohru opened her mouth to apologize, but he cut her off.

"You... really are weird, you know that?"

Tohru didn't know if she should feel insulted. With Kyou, one could never tell.

"I'm sorry," she found herself saying, "I don't know what --"

He suddenly smiled.

An awkward, clumsy smile.

His smile.

Because after all, life was full of many things, all tangled up into one giant heaping mess. But, as you travel on this tangled road of life, you could run into many things, like maybe a sour leek...

But, if you look hard enough, you just might find yourself an orange.

Underneath a patched-up roof on a stormy night, the girl and the cat talked and grew closer, ignoring the leeks and eating the oranges.

-- owari: the end --

A.N. Ehe... weird, random analogies/metaphors... got that thing from in Volume 2, where Tohru talks about how everybody's like an onigiri with an umeboshi stuck to their back.. @_@ Heh..

[Kaili Charmer]

Ironic...fruits basket, talking about oranges...heh, i'm a loser i know. This was cute! Don't be shy! If you have more, post post post! I love kyorus! :razz:

[blackrose]

Awww, it was cute! I thought it was appropriate and in-character. Though who knows why he started off in a mood this time...

Kyo: I heard that!

Rose: ^____^

*hugs* Thanks for sharing!

[Vampiric]

Oooh, that's adorable and very in-character! -applauds- Wonderful job. ^_^

[sailorDH]

Exactly what everyone else here said: both were in-character, cute story, and appropirate. Loved the whole orange/leek concept! It's something tohru would think of, and something kyo would like, but would hide behind his, 'you're really strange.'