We Were

By hye-kyo

Disclaimer: Nope, RK isn’t mine…

Author’s Notes: So this is a new fic. I am not really sure how long this will go, but it won’t probably run for too long. This is based on the manga, well…a scene was taken from the series…you’ll know what scene in the next chapters…anyway, some of the scenes here were invented…I hope you’ll like it and please tell me what you think about it…

Chapter One: Falling

--

When I first saw him I knew then and there that there was something special about him. Like fate. Like a butterfly coming out from a cocoon. Or like an oasis in a desert. Yes, it was special.

How I managed to still get on with my plan on attacking the beast destroying my dojo’s name while my heart palpitated wildly, I could not understand. You see someone using the name of a feared assassin of the Bakumatsu era, not to mention that that someone had been using my father’s developed kenjutsu, had been killing people thus causing our dojo a bad reputation.

The economy’s not doing so good the past years and living off teaching kenjutsu at a time when peace is slowly being ushered in brings little money. And so the decline in the number of students enrolling at the dojo until there were none left dealt a really heavy blow on the dojo and on my purse.

And so it was on that fated day that I decided to hunt down the rogue bearing the name of Battousai. I had been doing patrol every evening, trying to catch him but to no avail. And as I heard from someone that he was at the marketplace causing a ruckus I quickly rushed, grabbed my bokken and in my training gear readied myself for a battle that I knew would not be easy.

And so that was when I saw him. No not the rogue. But the beautiful man in ratty clothing with a rusty looking scabbard at his side. It took me a couple of heartbeats to finally realize that I was already in the middle of a dangerous fight and concentration being the key in any battle I was sure I was destined to lose.

I need not elaborate any further that this man with red hair saved me from the rogue. And my heart did some somersaults which I thought then was only the result of adrenaline rushing to my veins and which I learned later was the result of something more. Something more than adrenaline, yet something less scientific than it.

I was certain that this fancy was passing, knowing for sure that the probability of crossing paths with him again was more or less…next to nothing. So that when I found him barging through the wooden double doors of the dojo while Gohei, only later had I known that the rogue wasn’t really the feared Battousai after all but a past student of the Kasshin Ryu, fended me off like I was an insect, I was surprised. Shocked to be exact.

The speed with which he beat those men, including Gohei himself was something I couldn’t describe. It was only after the fight that I realized who I was dealing with. He was no simple wanderer as he claimed. He was the real deal. The real Battousai of the Bakumatsu.

But then again I was not really the logical type. I was more or less crude, simple-minded, a simpleton to put it bluntly. And so before I could even think about it I had asked this man, this man who I now knew was Battousai, if he would mind living in the dojo.

And he said he wouldn’t.

--

I told him my name is Kamiya Kaoru. He told me his name was Himura Kenshin. Aside from that and from the fact that he used to be known as the most feared assassin of the Bakumatsu I know little of him. I wasn’t the prying type though of course I was itching to ask him many things about himself. And because I wasn’t the prying type I didn’t ask. The things I know now about him came from the quiet, sometimes funny, conversations we had many times.

“Kenshin,” I said as I brought the remaining laundry to him.

“Yes Kaoru-dono,” he asked. You see that he uses kenjougo, a polite form of speaking that people nowadays do not use anymore.

“How did you learn to cook?” I asked. He was better than me at most things.

“Survival is not a simple game. You are forced to learn things by yourself because in the end you will only be left with no one but yourself.”

And that’s how I learned that he used to be a Darwinian. “So you learned it all by yourself?”

“When I was working for Choushu I had to go on certain solo missions, live in certain places alone with nothing but nature around me. I had to make something out of the things around me.”

That is how Kenshin talks to me. He is very cryptic. Sometimes I get the feeling that I was back in calligraphy school which I attended for five years. My sensei used to talk to us in such abstract words. It was only now that I began regretting not bothering to listen.

--

He first touched my hand when we went to a bazaar in the marketplace. It started raining, the ground becoming soft, slippery and muddy from the water. Some small puddles gathered at the dirt path leading home. I grimaced at the thought of having my new tabi soaked in mud and rainwater.

“Here,” he said as he held the umbrella.

I looked at him, the rain clouding my vision. It was only then that I noticed how deep an amethyst his eyes were. So deep that they were starting to look dark and more like indigo.

“Kaoru-dono,” he smiled.

I first saw his smile when he saved me from Gohei. At first it troubled me, how someone such as him, with nothing but ratty clothes and a rusty sword could smile so carefree like nothing in the world matters but the moment that he was living in. But as days became months I became more acquainted with the smile leading me to ask myself whether his smile was true. Because there were moments when his eyes would look glassy and seem as if he was staring into something far, far like it was in some other time or dimension. I wasn’t really good at those science fiction things so that I couldn’t very well explain.

By the time I realized he was talking to me the rain had started to pour down harder, threatening to soak my new tabi.

“Kaoru-dono,” he extended his hand, smiled at me again and said, “Give me your hand.”

And my heart thumped. But nevertheless I gave him my hand. And he led me through the puddles to avoid soaking my new ankle socks. He had held my hand lightly, like he was touching it but not really. I was puzzled, with the way he smiled and with the way he touched my hand.

And then we reached home and he had to let go of my hand. But my heart went even wilder.

--

Many days I would just sat on the porch while he did the laundry. I admire him, his strength, his quietness, his heart. He was strong but there was something in him that seemed so vulnerable, so fragile. It was probably something in his past. I began asking myself that if I would ask him about his past would he answer?

I was loud and responsible but really I was a coward. I love taking responsibilities, they give me a sense of accomplishment, a sense of being needed, a sense of something I couldn’t quite place. But usually I leave a mess by taking those responsibilities. Because there were times when I quitted in the middle of something. Because I was a coward. And because I was a coward I simply quit when things go out of hand. And so those thoughts, about asking him that is, remained simply in my head.

“You and I are very different Kenshin,” I told him as he placed lunch before me.

He laughed, “What made you say so Kaoru-dono?”

“You look irresponsible,” I looked at him and he seemed to have pouted, “But you know what you want to do and how to do it.”

“I don’t think that’s any different from you Kaoru-dono,” he said, putting rice into my bowl.

“I, on the other hand, am a coward.”

He laughed again, “You are very strong-spirited.”

I grimaced. He had seen me at my worst. At the fight with Gohei, at the numerous sales at the marketplace, at the fight with a policeman who tried arresting Kenshin for carrying a sword. I was always the loud one.

“I don’t think you are a coward.”

I frowned, “No, I don’t mean it that way.”

“Then how?”

I thought. I couldn’t explain it to him, our differences.

“I know you are very strong Kaoru-dono.”

I simply nodded, saving the discussion for later after I have thought more about it.

--

My own little world grew from being inhabited by one person, that is me, to being inhabited by two, that would be Kenshin, to three and then to four and finally to five. The later inclusion would come later. But right now let me tell you the beginning of a growing family.

The first inclusion came by the name of Myoujin Yahiko, a child from a family of samurais. He was a pickpocket, forced to work as such by a group of gangsters. We saved him, or at least Kenshin did save him with very little help from me, even though I was the one who started the idea of saving Yahiko. From then on he started staying at the dojo and began his training under me, the shihondai of Kamiya Kasshin Ryu.

A couple of days later a rooster-looking guy calling himself Sagara Sanosuke joined us. I thought he was simply a street punk, challenging Kenshin in a duel that resulted to his defeat and which later on resulted to him starting to loiter more frequently at the dojo. Until finally, even before I could protest, he was starting to eat at my table, sleep at my porch and eat at the Akebeko using my name.

And last came Takani Megumi. She was a very pretty woman, who tried having a go at Kenshin at whatever opportunity she could snag. Well, to make the long story short Kenshin saved her from Kanryuu, a dirty and evil-minded businessman who forced her to concoct opium.

As I look at the members of this makeshift family I realized that for once I am not leaving a mess out of the responsibilities which I could not handle. Besides I have Kenshin who’d look after my mess. If I quit that is.

--

I thought that maybe if our family would become even bigger and even louder Kenshin would slowly open up. But perhaps I was wrong as I continued watching him doing the laundry, cleaning the dishes, cooking food while he continued talking in cryptic, abstract words. That was probably one tactic of shielding others from knowing you.

I usually don’t get him. Sometimes I want to smack that smile off his face because it felt so distant. I told him once to drop the honorific. He could call me simply by my first name because I read somewhere that to further relationships, things such as honorifics should be replaced by nicknames, or if there aren’t any, simply by names. Sano had started calling me Jou-chan, a nickname I hadn’t gotten used to since just last month, and Yahiko had been calling me Busu ever since which earned him a hit on the head every time.

But at least I could say Sano and Yahiko and I were closer.

“Kenshin,” I called him.

“Hn?” he asked, smiling. He looked so carefree.

“Stop calling me Kaoru-dono.”

“Why?”

“Just call me Kaoru. Or think of a nickname for me,” I said, looking ahead.

He simply smiled and did not answer. Later that night he called me Kaoru-dono again.

--

One time when we went to the market a group of armed policemen made such a fuss about Kenshin’s carrying a sword. Being forced to fight to protect the swarm of people who now gathered to cheer for him, the sword-wielding police force wasn’t at all that popular with the people since they were abusive, he attracted the carriage of a high ranking official.

The fight was called to a stop as the official, who I learned was one of the people Kenshin worked with in the past, stepped down from the carriage. The warmth in his tone when he addressed Kenshin surprised me.

“Our comrades have been waiting for you. You deserve something because without you the restoration of the Meiji Government wouldn’t have been possible.”

Kenshin shook his head and said, “Thank you for the offer but I decline. I have killed many people in the past. The only way I can atone for my sins is to continue protecting them with my sword.”

“But with the Government you could protect more. You could not do much with just your sword.”

I watched as Kenshin simply shook his head again, slowly lifted his hand to rest them on my shoulder and said, “Yes, I agree with you. Even though my sword is not enough to change the future I will still use it to protect those whom I care for.”

And he looked at me and said, “I have people who are very important to me whom I want to protect.”

And my heart raced. And I fell in love.

--

A/n: So how was that for chap1? This fic is all about Kaoru's perception on how things are happening, her first exploration on what love is and on what certain feelings are...kind of mushy and fluffy but well...so please do read and review okay?