Digimon Fan Fiction ❯ Taste of life ❯ Prologue ( Prologue )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

Disclaimer: I don't own these characters. They're not mine. Only the fic belongs to me, but not the characters. End of story!

Taste of life
prologue
by: Nekocin
Email: animecrush@sr.net
Type: AU
Warnings: It's overly HET, I supposed... ^_^' and uh... if you don't like Sora, please don't read. You'll torture yourself just to read a fanfic with her in it.
Pairings: HET ones what else? -_-

Author's notes: the title seems disturbing and strange... I think I'll change it next time. ::Crosses fingers:: I hope I'll be able to finish this soon. This story came up to me after I've left a library and it just hit me that I SHOULD write it down just like the other fanfics -_-' I hope it doesn't suck. I'm actually known to like both shounen-ai/yaoi and shoujo-ai/yuri in this anime or any other anime, but this just hit me. It's going to be HET. And uh... I'm not turning them into Mary Sue.

Anyways, just read it and I hope you'll enjoy ^_~.

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"Mr. Takenouchi! Your time is up!! Just give me the damn money!" a tall man clad in some middle classed robes was demanding in front of the man whom he called Mr. Takenouchi.

"But-but-but... I don't have it right now... I promise I'll get your money tomorrow morning! Please give me another chance... please... I beg you... I really don't have it right now..." The other man struggled with his own words while he pleaded in front of the furious-looking man.

"No, Mr. Takenouchi, you've already promised me last week that you'll pay me today. Now where's the money?" The other man demanded.
Mr. Takenouchi tried his hardest not to sound weak as his wife was watching them through a chink. She looked worried at her husband and leaned forward to take a better look at the two.

Where can they find enough money to repay their debts? Where can they get the money? They lived in a poor neighborhood and like any neighbor they had their own debts to pay. Mr. Takenouchi had lent the money from Mr. Kanzaki last month just to be able to buy some food to feed his family. Life is so hard nowadays that they were afraid that their only daughter would suffer under this kind of condition.

Being poor... making most noble men strip them from their honorable Takenouchi name which they'd been trying to hold high in all those years and making their only hope for a better future or life, their daughter... a prostitute. But like any good parent they don't want bad luck in their daughter's path, especially when she's their only child and only hope that their life weren't that rotten at all.
Their problems are now other than paying for their debts... they'd to marry her off as soon as possible before she becomes an overgrown maiden. Someone who is going to stay a virgin for all her life and not giving them any signs of having their grandchildren.

At last Mr. Takenouchi was able to persuade Mr. Kanzaki for coming back next time to take their debts.
"Well... you better think of something right now, Mr. Takenouchi..." Mr. Kanzaki said while poking his finger at Mr. Takenouchi's chest, who winced silently.

"Good day, Mr. Takenouchi..." Mr. Kanzaki grumbled and walked out of the door.

"G-g-good day, Mr. Kanzaki..." Mr. Takenouchi said and closed the door.

He slumped down on one of the wooden chairs in the house and sighed heavily.
"What to do now?" he mumbled under his breath. His wife rose from her hiding place and slowly walked up towards her husband.

"W-w-what should we do?" she asked worriedly while glancing back at one of the closed doors. Mr. Takenouchi looked up at his wife and sighed.

"I don't know... there's too much coming up... Sora is already going to reach a marriageable age... and still I've to find one good man for her..."

"You know that she won't let you do that... you know she wants to find that someone on her own now... you know how stubborn she is when it comes to these kind of subjects..." Mrs. Takenouchi sat near her husband and laid a reassuring hand on her husband's.

"I know... I wonder from which side of the family did she get that stubborn attitude?" He wondered and glanced up at his wife.

She understood his gaze and her glance hardened. "Don't look at me like that. It came from your side. You were the one who told her about those fairy tales. She believed you. You're the one told her about the great knights and princes or whatever they're called who were trying to find their one true love and whatever there's more..." she contradicted his gaze.

"Oh... I really didn't think she would take them so seriously... besides I heard those stories from my mother when I was young. So I'll have to pass it down to her, right?" a sly grin appeared on his face.

"Stop joking around... get to work, you know we have to pay him back..." her gaze was still hardened and her husband pouted.

"You're right..." he sighed.

There was a firm knock on their door.
Both of them looked at each other, confused. Who will be knocking on their at this kind of early morning?
"He's already back?" Mrs. Takenouchi said in a trembling tone.

"Can't be..." Mr. Takenouchi whispered.
A few knocking sounds can be heard.
"Mr. Takenouchi!" was the voice.
Mr. Takenouchi squinted his eyes and walked slowly over to the front door.

"Doesn't sound like Mr. Kanzaki..." he said under his breath.

"Mr. Takenouchi, I know you're in there!" the voice called while knocking on the door again. Mrs. Takenouchi looked at the front door as her husband slowly opened it.

"Yes..." His eyes widened the minute he saw who was at his doorstep.

"You-you-you're..." he managed to say.

*.*.*.*.*

A big bush of red roses was on a table. It had a tag on it, which was addressed to Takenouchi Sora and was wrapped neatly by a light blue ribbon, keeping it together. A young girl with light brown hair and red with highlighted orange eyes, slumped on her chair as she was staring blankly at the roses.

"Again?" one of her friends who was sitting in front of her asked, while glancing at the big bush of red roses on her friend's desk.

"Yeah...I suppose..." she answered while staring at the tag.

"Who is it from? The same guy from yesterday?" her friend asked while leaning on Sora's desk, staring at the bush of roses.

"I guess so..."

"Ha! You've a secret admirer!" her friend teased and her friend's cheeks flushed.

"No way... this-this may be some kind of joke..."

"No it's not..."

The other students just stared at the big bush of red roses.
"I wonder how he knows your name... I mean, come on. If this is from a secret admirer, than maybe it's from one of you guys..." Sora's friend glanced at the boys from their class.

"Nu-uh... not me"

"Me neither"

"Don't look at me"

"I'm already taken"

"No way"

Sora's friend rolled her eyes and glared at the boys from their class.
"Fine! Then he's one total stranger!" she was exasperate and rubbed her temples.

"Still no clues who's it from, huh Sora?"

Sora chuckled and ripped the tag away from its place.
"Nope... just the same nameless tag and this poem... "

"A poem, huh? The same one like that hilarious little scribbles 'violets are blue' etcetera?"

"No... a different one..."

"Like the wind when it glare through my skin, your smile stabs into my heart,
like the wind when it takes along its knives and hundred teeth, the coldness is tearing me apart,
please accept this gift from me as a token for my loyalty to love you..."

Sora shuddered a little and her friend watched her with amusement in her eyes.
"Good. It's a different one...It sounds a lot better than that violet poem" her friend teased and Sora shot her a glare.

"What? You've always wanted to be in love or something..." her friend rolled her eyes as she crossed her arms over her chest.
Sora quickly clamped her hand in front of her friend's mouth and hissed a quiet "shut up or else..." to her.

*.*.*.*.*

"How are we going to tell her?" Mrs. Takenouchi said while she was worried and happy at the same time. Her husband was walking up and down in the room while looking hard on the wooden floor.

"I don't know. I don't know... I don't know..."

"But you could have asked her first before accepting the offer..." his wife glared at him, who seemed to not notice the hard look.

"I know... but I just can't refuse his offer. You know he's a good friend. A friend whom I've never met again after our wedding... I'm sure Sora will understand this. I know she will, she'll never misunderstand my judgments..." Mr. Takenouchi said while Mrs. Takenouchi noticed how his words were trembling when it came out of his mouth.

"I'm home!" came a clear and cheerful voice, which broke the tension a little bit.

"She's home..." Mrs. Takenouchi said under her breath and looked up at her nervous husband. He straightened himself and cleared his throat.

"Sora! Come here. We've something to tell you..." He said firmly, trying not to tremble again.

"What is it?" the girl asked as she threw the roses near the other bushes of red roses, which were hidden in a box.
"Sora...we... you..." her father tried to blurt out the words which he'd been practicing in his head for the last few minutes.

Sora looked confused at her parents and sat on the wooden chair. Like any teenage girl, she had to sit down and listen to her parents if it was something very important. Usually Mr. Takenouchi wasn't afraid of telling his daughter his big plans which were always on top of the list, but now... something seems to be very wrong... very wrong.

She noticed how uncomfortable her parents were shifting on the chairs. Mrs. Takenouchi watched as her husband tried to explain something and sighed. Even if he's much more braver than you thought, usually a mother should take matters in her hands whenever it has something to do with her daughter, besides... Mr. Takenouchi doesn't really know how to talk about these kind of stuff when it comes to his daughter.

"Sora..." Mrs. Takenouchi caught her daughter's attention and she noticed the confused look in her crimson eyes.
"What's going on? Did I do something wrong? Did the neighbor blame me for the cat being lost again?" Sora asked. "Tell me..."

"Well... Sora, this morning... a friend of your father... came to visit us..." Mrs. Takenouchi started.

"A friend?" Sora looked questionably at her father.

"Yes, a very good friend. More likely a brother... we used to visit the same schools..." Mr. Takenouchi added.

"And?" Sora wondered why this has anything to do with that something they wanted to tell her.

"You know we've to repay Mr. Kanzaki and you know we really can't afford it so soon... Our visitor happens to be a very generous man and so he gave us the money to release ourselves from Mr. Kanzaki's debts..." Mrs. Takenouchi hesitated and Mr. Takenouchi noticed it, the tension was rising again. Sora frowned and glanced blankly at her parents.

"What has that got to do with me?" She kicked herself mentally when she knew something very bad would come out as an answer to her question.

"... In return we've to marry you off to..." Mr. Takenouchi gathered up his courage and finally blurts it out.

"MARRY ME OFF TO HIM?" her parents winced when their daughter's angry voice was rising each time. "HOW COULD YOU?"

"No not him..." Mrs. Takenouchi assured. "I know that it's a bad idea... but we've to pay our debts as soon as possible and my friend has already given me the money to pay for our debts..."

"THEN GIVE IT BACK! THERE'S NO WAY I'M GOING TO MARRY AT THIS KIND OF AGE... ESPECIALLY TO A TOTAL STRANGER!!" she shouted angrily.

"I can't... Mr. Kanzaki had already snatched it away as soon as he saw me with my friend... I couldn't even utter a word when he just snatched the money away from my hand before I could give the money back to my friend. I know you'll be upset... but... that now I've to give my friend something in return..." her father cut in quickly, trying to calm his daughter down.

"Sora, I know you're really upset, my friend didn't protest when Mr. Kanzaki snatched the money away. He just asked for your hand for..." Mr. Takenouchi said slowly as he grabbed his daughter's shoulders. "You understand that I'm right this time. You understand that I'm doing this for your own sake and for our Takenouchi name even though we can't have another child who can bear our family name down to his children... You understand that, right? You know that I can't turn the clock around to give the money as fast as I could back to my friend... you know that. And you know that we're broke and..."

Sora's shoulders slumped down and she looked down.
"Enough..." she muttered softly, knowing that she'd been defeated and that her father was right. The last few weeks they were running out of money and out of food supply. There's almost no other way to repay their debts... if they were going to lend some money again, their debts would just increase even more.

"May I go to my room now?" she asked softly.

"Sure... I'll call you when it's dinner time..." Mrs. Takenouchi said as her husband let go of Sora's shoulders.

She walked towards her room with her head down and tried her hardest not to let the stinging in her eyes take over. Her parents watched her enter her room and sighed as the door was slammed closed. Sora broke down and hid herself under her blankets.
"Life is not fair!" She screamed in her pillow and almost choked in her burning tears. If she's going to be married off she'll have to leave her parents, her friends, school... all those other normal things any girl at her kind of age will do. As soon as she takes on her husband's family name, she's no longer a girl now... she'll become a woman. That's the hardest thing she'll ever do... maybe not the worst, but the hardest.

"Do you think she'll be fine?" Mr. Takenouchi asked.

"I don't know... I can only tell that she's going to be miserable for the rest of her life..." Mrs. Takenouchi answered while leaning her forehead against her husband's back.

"Do you think he's suitable for her? I've heard they'd a hard way of convincing him for a lot of times... What if he's going to break her or something if he doesn't approve her being his soon-to-be wife? What if...?" her voice was trembling.

"I'm not sure, but I trust my friend's assurances... I'm sure Sora is strong enough to become a great wife..." Mr. Takenouchi said slowly.

"There's no other way to take the whole thing back?" his wife asked him in a soft voice.

"I guess not..." he sighed and dropped his eyes.

"Life is getting more miserable each time someone knocks on our front door..."

"Just like I'd pointed out, sometimes life just isn't fair which will never be..." Mrs. Takenouchi said and embraced her husband from his back.

>.>.>.>.

End prologue

Author's notes:

::takes deep breath:: Aaa... finally done with prologue. @_@ It's such a hard way to express the whole scene and write it in a more understandable way -_-'. Aaa... my fingers hurt.
Anyways, this fic was actually inspired by some known facts from my History class ^-^, and uh... it has to make sense somehow, so I choose to write like that -_-'. Now I've to worry about who is going to be the groom -_-'. Any ideas? Nah... >:P I've already a couple in mind. Well, on to chapter 1.

=^-^=cin