[[The Ultimate Sacrifice]] - (Hatori Sohma)

You couldn’t shake off the chills. You wrapped your arms around yourself to try to regain your warmth. You had to be careful to not get blood on your sleeve as you rubbed your hands against your arms, hoping that the friction could fight off the cold. It didn’t help at all.

“Just wash off your hand first, Akina-san,” Hatori instructed you from the corner, where he was preparing for your stitches. You noticed that the sink was on the side opposite Hatori. You stood up slowly, trying not to look at the doctor, and you did as he said. You turned the cold water on so that it was barely a drizzle. This was for two reasons; one being that you didn’t want an unnecessary force on your hand, and the other was that you didn’t need any extra noise. You reached for the soap pump that was off to the side of the countertop. “Unless you want to cause yourself even more pain, I suggest that you don’t use soap on it just yet.” You pivoted around and saw that Hatori hadn’t even looked at you. He just knew.

“Okay,” you replied softly. You continued to gently wash the stubborn dried blood off of your hand. It didn’t help that fresh blood kept pulsing out of the wound. The cool water felt nice on your burning skin. It was soothing and comforting, and just for a moment, you forgot where you were, and who you were with. No, you snapped yourself back, I can’t loose my focus. You were trying your very hardest to stay alert; why was it so difficult for you? You had once known a time when you weren’t so stupid, but you could hardly remember it anymore.

“I’m ready to start your stitches now, is your hand cleaned up?” Hatori’s sudden question surprised you. You jumped, and accidentally knocked over the nearby roll of paper towels into the sink. The cold water drenched them in only a second.

“Uh, yeah,” you remembered to answer as you tried in vain to save the paper towels. Hatori sighed, and he felt much closer than he should have been. His sigh sounded like it had come from right behind you, and you could have sworn that you felt his breath across the very top of your hair. Yet, it still surprised you when his long arm came out from behind you and turned the water off, grabbed the saturated paper towel roll, and threw it in the trashcan in one swift movement.

“Pleas, try to refrain from destroying everything,” he said as he took your arm and gently pulled you over to the table where he had been preparing for your stitches. You knew that he hadn’t been completely serious, but it didn’t seem like much of a joke. He pulled up a cold metal chair behind you, and sat himself down in an identical chair on the opposite side of the table. He stared up at you for a moment, as if he was waiting for you to do something. It took you a minute to realize that he meant for you to sit down. You slowly lowered yourself down into the seat and placed your mostly clean hand onto the table. You looked up at Hatori, waiting for any kind of instructions, but he didn’t give you any. Instead, you caught his gaze, and for once, it wasn’t stone cold. It was much worse. His eyes were the same eyes that you hadn’t been able to escape since your parents’ death. They followed you everywhere; every person that you encountered wore those pitiful eyes. In some, those who you saw on a daily basis, the look had faded, but it was still there. You didn’t need pity, you didn’t want pity, but it kept showing up. Now it seemed that even ice-cold Hatori couldn’t fight back the urge to feel sorry for you.

“Stop it,” you surprised yourself by how strong you sounded as you broke eye-contact with Hatori. “I get enough pity, I don’t need it from you too.”

“I’m sorry Akina-san,” he spoke slowly, bowing his head.

“What are you appol-” you stopped yourself from asking, because it hit you. He was sorry. The matter at hand was not why he was sorry, but that he was. He wasn’t cold and unfeeling, as you had expected. He was apologizing to you. “No, no,” you shook your head. “You didn’t do anything, you have nothing to apologize for.” You had to accept the truth. “It’s not your fault.”

At this, he looked back up at you, and for a second, the faint signs of an uncomfortable sadness were in his eyes. “I still wish I could have done more them, Akina-san, they really were beautiful people.”

“I miss them,” you admitted, out loud, for the first time. He gently took you hand with some kind of cloth that had a strong smelling liquid in it. For once, his touch wasn’t giving you the chills, and if your hand hurt, you didn’t notice. You watched your doctor’s hands skillfully begin to stitch your wound closed. All you felt was the gentle tugging of the surgical thread as it slipped in and out of your torn skin. However, even pain-free, your hand was still trembling.

“Would you like me to get you some medication?” Hatori offered as he finished your stitches.

“No, I’m fine,” you replied. “It doesn’t hurt at all anymore.” The fact seemed to surprise him more than it surprised you.

“Well, here,” he pulled open a nearby drawer and fished through it for a moment. He took a rolled-up ace bandage and a small bottle of pills. “We’ll keep your hand wrapped up for a couple of days, and you can take these pills home in case the pain starts to resurface.” He handed you the pills and carefully wrapped up your hand. “Just keep the pills away from Shigure. These are a lot stronger than anything I’ve ever given him, and I don’t want him getting any ideas.” You felt the strong urge to laugh at that remark, but Hatori had such a serious aura about him, it seemed wrong.

Hatori started to clean up the table. “You hand is good for now. I’ll stop by Shigure’s in a few days to make sure that it’s not infected.” He finished clearing off the table and reached for his medical bag. “Could you move over to the cot over there?” he asked, pointing at the wall behind you. You had almost forgotten about your check-up. You slowly got up out of your chair and shifted over to your new seat. Hatori had to search through a drawer for a moment before he pulled out your file and opened it on the countertop. He scanned it over before he stepped forward and stooped down in front of you. He removed his stethoscope from its place around his neck and placed it into his ears. “I’m going listen to your heart and lungs first, okay?” You nodded in response. He took a hold of the cold metal end of the instrument and placed it beneath your shirt.

He’s a doctor, you hissed inside your head as soon as you felt his fingers brush against your skin. Your heart had fluttered at his touch, and you knew that he would have heard it.

“Your heart is going crazy,” he observed, repositioning the metal. “You know, you have nothing to be nervous about.” He slipped the instrument around to your back. “Now, take a nice, deep breath, and let it out slowly.” You obeyed, but you could feel your heart beating even faster. Hatori let the metal fall back, and rolled his chair away from you to get his clipboard. He scribbled a few words onto it, and turned back to you. “You seem fine, other than you heart rate, but that’s probably just from nerves. You haven’t been having any problems, right? No trouble sleeping? Appetite’s normal?”

“I feel fine,” you replied quietly. “Everything’s normal.” That was a half-truth. Everything was normal until he showed up.

He nodded. “Alright then.” He removed his stethoscope and places it on the counter. “Would you like me to drive you home, or would you rather walk?”

“I’ll walk her home,” a voice from nowhere volunteered. You turned to see Haru standing in the doorway. Both he and Hatori looked at you, waiting for a response.

“That’s fine, I guess,” you shrugged. You’d certainly be more comfortable with Haru, but maybe you didn’t want to be comfortable anymore. You were becoming somewhat curious; maybe you could learn to function around Hatori. You had enough of the unexpected for one day though, so you let Haru walk you home.

“So, how’d it go?” he asked as he led you down the hallway, leaving Hatori alone in his office.

“Fine, no big,” you replied, shrugging. “I’m not dying, at least not yet.”

“Good to know,” he chuckled, “but I was actually referring to you dealing with Hatori. I was trying to save you back there, I was afraid that you were being tortured.”

“Hardly,” you said with a laugh. “Granted, it was pretty awkward, but I was surviving.”

“So, you’ll come on your own next time?” he questioned. You honestly didn’t know if you would. You’d probably just end up forgetting about it.

“We’ll see,” you decided on a vague, no guarantee answer. “It depends.”

“You don’t hate him anymore,” he observed in a bored tone. “Or you wouldn’t have let him take you.” Haru was gazing out into space, not paying attention to where he was going. You laughed at him as he narrowly missed walking straight into a large tree“You do know where you should be going, right?” he questioned, remembering his tendency to get lost.

“Um,” you did know where you were supposed to be going, but you hadn’t been paying any attention to where you actually had been going. “Crap.”

“We’ll get there eventually,” Haru commented. You didn’t like that.

“Uh, Haru, I’m enough of a space-case when I do know where I’m going, not knowing is pretty heavy self-endangerment,” he tried to interrupt you, but you anticipated his comment. “And even with someone, it’s stupid for me to be wandering,” you paused. “And you know, you aren’t exactly the world’s best escort, if you know what I’m saying…”

He nodded in agreement. “Yeah.”

“You don’t care at all, do you?” you questioned, finally realizing that you should stop walking. You turned to Haru and raised an eyebrow to emphasize your question.

“Not really, but I guess you’ll want to call somebody,” he replied, pulling out his black chocolate and handing it to you. He probably has his phone on him every time he gets lost and just doesn’t feel like calling for anyone, you thought as you took it. You slid it open and began to dial Shigure’s home number. After five rings, someone finally picked up.

“What do you want punk?” It was Kyo, assuming that you were Haru.

“It’s Akina. Is Yuki there?” you asked, ignoring his rude greeting.

“Nope,” he replied without apologizing for him mistake.

“What about Tohru?”

“Nope.”

“Shigure?”

“Nope.”

“Where are they then?!” his apathetic attitude was so aggravating.

“Dunno…” You took a few deep breaths to hold back your frustration. “Calm down, you spaz, I’m not messing with you, I really don’t have the slightest idea where they are.”

This put you in a tight spot, a spot that you really didn’t want to be in. You put on your most pathetic sounding voice, and cringed as you forced yourself to be polite to Kyo. “Um, maybe you could help me, well, me and Haru,” Haru shook his head in disagreement. “Or, no, just me. I need help.”

“Don’t tell me, he got you lost, right?” he said impatiently. You could hear his footsteps going down the stairs.

“Yeah, kinda,” it hurt to agree with him.

“Turn around,” he groaned. “Are you really that stupid?” You did a one-eighty spin, and almost dropped Haru’s phone. Yeah, you really were that stupid. You and Kyo both hung up. There was no need to say goodbye, even if you had enough courtesy towards each other to do so, which you didn’t.

“Congratulations,” he shouted from the porch. “You’ve won the most oblivious girl in Japan award, how do you feel?”

“Like an idiot, thanks for asking,” you shouted back as you stormed up to him. Was Haru still with you? Did it matter? Your cheeks were burning red from the chagrin. “And I’m getting sick of your attitude.” You clenched your fists, and instantly felt a surge of pain run through your damaged hand.

“Same here,” he replied. “Girl or not, I’d probably hit you if you weren’t hurt already.”

“I’ll hit you anyway.” He had no time to react. You punched him in the gut as hard as you could. Usually you weren’t a fighter. You were humiliated and angry, and the only reason that he had staggered back was because he was so shocked that you had actually punched him.

“Bitch,” he mumbled as he shook his head out. He reached his arm out to push you over, but he couldn’t seem to actually go through with the action. “Forget it,” he mumbled, and he walked off to the side of the porch, and proceeded to climb up onto the roof, leaving you stunned.

To be continued...