Title: The Map of Her Body
Author: Ysabet MacFarlane
Pairing: Sohma Hatsuharu and Sohma Isuzu (Rin)
Fandom: Fruits Basket
Theme: #20 (the road home)
Disclaimer: Fruits Basket belongs to Takaya Natsuki and Hakusensha;
English-language versions by FUNimation (anime) and Tokyopop (manga).
Notes:  Set at some unspecified time past ch. 107; no explicit spoilers.

********

on the map of her body
she comes from low land
she's coming to you
she's from hiding
waiting for you
waiting for you

--Tori Amos, "Seaside" (March 3/03 improv.)

********

Rin's skin is cold when he touches her, and he wonders if he should gather the
blankets back around her where she's thrown them off.  She curls up around
herself as if huddling for warmth or hiding from her own dreams, and the bones
of her spine cast low shadows in the moonlight.  Haru stares at them, running
his fingers through the air over her back, tracing the familiar contours.

She eats, these days--not quite enough to make him happy, but enough that her
bones are mostly hidden again, tucked safely back where they belong.  Haru runs
his knuckle along her spine, spreading his hand to touch the slight spaces under
her shoulder blades.  Everything about her body fascinates him: the unfamiliar
vulnerability of her neck, the twist of scar tissue that breaks the smoothness
of her skin, the bones that surface like shoals when sickness leaves her unable
to eat.


*


"You always look at what's wrong with me," she says once, when his eyes linger
on a too-sharp wrist.

"I'm worried."

"I know."  She kisses his shoulder, as high as she can reach without arching up
on her toes; her lips are cool and soft against his skin, and Haru bends down to
kiss her properly.  "But that's not all it is," she murmurs into his mouth.

He tries to watch her less when she is awake to notice, ignoring the mild
exasperation that flickers into her eyes whenever she catches him.


*


He dreams about her crying--not the quickly-suppressed weeping of nightmares,
hidden behind tremulous smiles, but the despairing plea for forgiveness, as if
she was the one who'd betrayed him.  More than her tears, what haunts him is the
way her head felt when he touched her hair, the tension vibrating through her
skull.  It exposes her in a way that makes him shake, seeing everything but her
skin laid bare.  In his dreams, it tangles with the first time he saw her naked:
desire mixed with astonishment at the vulnerability hidden under the layers she
shows the world.

When he wakes in the dead of night, he curves his hand over her neck, waiting
for the next heartbeat against his fingers, reminding himself of the terrible
fragility of her life.


*


It's different now than it used to be, when every touch, every glance, was a
secret too dangerous to share.

At first, he's sometimes hesitant to be the one to reach out for anything but
holding her, but as Rin begins to compensate, he finds that he likes the
changes.  She has always, always responded to his touch, but having her demand
it rather than surrendering to it (still wordlessly, but with an unmistakable
boldness in the way she kisses him) is a pleasure all its own.  He willingly
loses himself in her body when she takes him to her bed, looking for the
oblivion that pleasure offers, taking her down with him.

And he begins to find himself again.


*


He memorizes her body's imperfections silently, the things that she hides from
other eyes when she feels insecure, or displays in defiance.  She's still the
loveliest girl he's ever seen--and it's not as if he's never looked at others,
although none of them compare to the shining darkness of her eyes, the sleek
lines of her throat and hips, the graceful way her hands move--but beauty is
only beauty, a birthright of their family.  The flaws are different, are _hers_,
history embedded in flesh and bone, meant to be cherished.  *Here, this happened
here, and you're still walking and unbroken.*

Rin blushes and turns away when he tries to explain, and he lets her snap at him
to cover her embarrassment; later, she nestles into his arms in silent apology,
and he holds her close, mapping her body with his hands.


[fin]