Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction ❯ Spirit Cords ❯ Skin ( Chapter 2 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Thank you to everyone who reviewed my story. I really appreciate it!

Higher Being
Margarita
CooKooClok

And a special thanks to LustfulCrimsonSin13 (dA) for supporting my story, letting me bounce ideas off her, and for drawing fanart of Hakumei. I will post a link if I get her permission to do so.

Hakumei stripped off her tights, leaving them in a black wad on the locker room floor. It smelled like body spray and city water and she changed into red bloomers and a white t-shirt to whispered gossip. The one thing Hakumei hated most about gym was the uniforms. She could hear her classmates pointing at her back as clearly as if they had announced it.

There were still a few minutes before the girls had to meet outside for roll, more time for her to be the center of attention. She pulled on her socks, white with red stripes encircling her calves. White sneakers. She tied the laces slowly, and when she was done with that she resigned herself to staring at her bare legs, praying that the movement for unisex uniforms would pass before she had to go through her entire school career exercising in shorts that barely stretched over her underwear.

It wasn't that she was unfit; she got plenty of exercise in gym—an hour a day six days a week. It was that her legs were marbled with long, jagged scars. Hakumei traced the marred tissue along the surface of her thighs as if the word ugly had been branded there.

For the most part the other girls left her alone, but occasionally someone was curious enough to gather the courage to ask, "Oh my god, Hakumei. What happened?" Hakumei would answer simply and smile when the truth wasn't as dramatic as her classmates had hoped.

Though she typically wasn't insulted for her appearance, every now and then Hakumei would have to deal with some girl having a bad day who couldn't keep her remarks to herself. She tried not to let it bother her, but sometimes she found herself wishing that she had gym with the boys instead of the girls. They would probably think her scars were cool.

A shadow fell over her knees and Hakumei looked up to see Keiko standing over her.

"Hi?"

Keiko's eyes were defiant, daring Hakumei to refuse whatever she was about to propose. Hakumei's gaze shifted. Was Keiko mad at her? Why? Natsuko and Karin were standing behind her, looking guilty and afraid at the same time. Maybe it was them?

"Uh—"

"Play volleyball on my team today," Keiko demanded.

Oh.

Hakumei smiled, a little confused by Keiko's expression, but happy. Keiko really was the class sweetheart. Maybe she could pretend the ball was Mr. Fujiwara and let out some frustration.

"Sure, okay."

"Good."

The lockers were suddenly very interesting to Keiko, and Hakumei could tell that she was trying really hard not to look at her legs, which was almost worse than the blatant staring she usually got. "As long as you relax," she said with a pointed look.

Keiko blushed.

Yusuke this and Yusuke that. Hakumei knew that the two were friendly toward each other, but she had no idea they knew each other well enough for Yusuke to be the subject of an entire conversation.

She and Keiko were talking about a homework assignment a few months ago when Yusuke waltzed up to Keiko and chatted away like Hakumei wasn't even there. Something about Keiko making him ramen quickly turned into a complaint about him lowering the class attendance average and making Keiko look bad as class rep. Keiko eventually got around to chastising him for ignoring Hakumei and properly introduced them, and Yusuke sometimes remembered who Hakumei was.

Now Keiko talked about Yusuke and how none of the rumors about him were anything close to reality. Apparently he's more like a lamb than a dangerous thug, though Hakumei doubted Yusuke hadn't earned at least part of his incredible reputation, which brought Keiko to the reason she invited Hakumei to play on her team. Her friends repeated some wild rumor about Hakumei being kicked out of a gang, which may or may not have been Yusuke's gang, and it really got under Keiko's skin. She was tired of hearing outrageous lies about people she knew.

"Keiko, people don't bully me. I really doubt that anyone actually believes I was in a gang. Sometimes it's just more fun for them to imagine that I was."

"Well it's still rude," Keiko huffed. She jumped and spiked the ball, scoring a point. The ball bounced from hand to hand. Natsuko hit the net, and the ball rolled into another court. They all broke for water at the whistle.

"So," Keiko said, sitting on a bench with a plastic water bottle sweating in her palm. "What did happen?"

Hakumei wondered when Keiko would be comfortable enough to ask the question. She took a sip of her own water and looked up at the sky. "I got attacked by a dog," she shrugged.

"Seriously? How?"

Hakumei, four years old, waved goodbye to her mother and adjusted her backpack. There was something in the air that day, something in the sound of the leaves falling in the wind, an unusual hush over the normal racket of bikes, children, and cars that rang through the streets. She had wanted to stay home because she was afraid to go outside, but her mother had put her daughter's worries to nonsense and pushed her out the door with her lunch box, a peck on the cheek, and an "I love you, baby doll. Have fun at school."

She had whispered. Why was everything a whisper?

"When I was little our neighbors at the time had just adopted a tosa. It was a rescue from a fighting ring and they volunteered to help rehabilitate abused animals. Really nice people."

Hakumei walked hunched over, flinching at the lack of sound, straining to hear that comforting loudness of a busy morning. The cars were still there, the kids were still zooming past on their bikes, still ringing the bells on the handles. Why did everything seem so muted?

She saw something move out of the corner of her eye. The front door of her neighbors' house opened with a soft click, and the sound came rushing back like a flood. It hit her with tidal force, almost knocking her backward in its wake. Her neighbor screamed as the leash was wrenched from his fingers with a violence that pulled him down through the door and into the front steps. He didn't get back up.

Hakumei took another drink. "Anyway, he got out while I was passing their house on my way to school and started chasing me down the block. I tried to climb a tree, but he grabbed me before I could get myself onto the first branch."

Hakumei froze with the crystal clarity of the noise. Sharp claws raking across the concrete. Saliva dripping from its gums in thick globs. The guttural growl rising from its belly and erupting from its throat, rumbling between its teeth. The dog was speaking to her with an energy that permeated off the subtle swish of every strand of fur. Kill, it said, over and over again until she couldn't hear anything else. Kill.

She ran.

"My legs got the worst of it, but I have some smaller scars on my back, and there's one above my eyebrow."

Hakumei lifted up her shirt and leaned forward to reveal some small marks, hardly noticeable around her shoulder blades and lower back. Her hands had some thin lines trailing down the knuckles. She pointed to a scar as small as an eyelash above her left eye. Keiko leaned in and squinted, tilting her head to the side.

"Wow, I can barely see that at all."

The dog ripped into her legs. Her skin tore like thick, visceral paper with a snap of its jaws. Blood seeped down into the grass, wet and fluid, as she tried to curl into a ball. Screams echoed in the background and she covered her ears with her fists, pleading for the quiet to come back.

"Eight stiches. It healed up really well," Hakumei said, "Could've lost my eye though."

"Doesn't it get hot wearing tights every day?" Keiko asked on their way back to the locker room.

"Not really." Hakumei shrugged. "It's not so bad with the summer uniforms. I'd rather be hot than stared at anyway."

"Most girls would like to be both," Keiko said with a small laugh. "So what are you doing for the talent show?"

"I'm singing and Kuwabara's handling stage work. You?"

Keiko rolled her eyes as she pulled her skirt up. "Goro wants to recite poetry, and I have to help him write something 'heart-wrenching and relevant to the plight of the people.' What song do you want to do?"

Hakumei snorted. Goro always did take himself a little too seriously. She pulled on her sailor shirt and fixed her hair, which had fallen out of its bun during their volley ball game. "Not sure yet, Kuwabara and I are going to pick one out after school today."

"Well I can't wait to hear it. You've always had a really pretty voice."

"Thanks, I wish I could say the same thing about Goro's poetry."

There was a pause of quivering lips and escaping snickers before the two burst out laughing.

Hakumei and Keiko walked together on their way back to class, agreeing to go shopping after school some time, maybe Keiko could even get Yusuke to go. While it was a nice sentiment, Hakumei figured that they would probably never hang out outside of school, let alone get Yusuke to go shopping with two girls.

The Fine Arts Club was cancelled that day so students could work on their acts for the talent show. Hakumei traded her school slippers for a pair of brown boots that stopped at her ankles. If there was one girly vice Hakumei allowed herself, it was boots. In fact, she didn't have any other type of shoe—save for regulation footwear provided by the school. She happily tied the laces and went out to the front gates to meet Kuwabara.

He was lying outside the school gates with a vast array of bumps and bruises on his face. His nose was pointing, bent, to the left. Yusuke was standing over him, cackling.

"Oh, come on Kuwabara! Is that all you've got?"

"I'll get you, Urameshi," Kuwabara wheezed through his mangled jaw.

Hakumei bit her lip and stepped forward, leaning down to get a better look at her project partner. "Are you, you know, okay?"

Kuwabara sprang to life, spry as a gazelle. "Oh, hey baby, I didn't see you there."

"Issei, what are you doing hanging around someone like Kuwabara?"

"Step off Urameshi, we're going on a date."

"A date! Ha! Who the hell would want to go on a date with your ugly mug?"

"It's not a date," Hakumei said.

"You watch your mouth Urameshi, I've got lines and lines of chicks just waiting to go out with yours truly," Kuwabara said, pointing at himself with his thumb.

"Lines and lines?" Hakumei asked blankly.

Yusuke fell over, clutching his sides. Kuwabara jumped over Yusuke rolling on the ground to kneel beside Hakumei.

"Hakumei, baby, that's not what I meant!"

She shook her hand out of Kuwabara's grip and stepped away. "It doesn't matter Kuwabara. We're not going out." She turned to Yusuke, who was picking himself off the sidewalk. "We're going to the karaoke box to pick out a song for the theater project."

"I didn't know you sang Kuwabara," Yusuke wiped a tear from his eye and held his hands out in the girliest of fashions, prancing around Kuwabara in circles as if he were wearing a dress. "Do you write poetry too or is karaoke enough to express your widdle feelings?"

Hakumei cut Kuwabara's retort off before things could get out of hand. "Actually I'm singing, and Kuwabara is going to be my stage hand."

Yusuke blinked, looking at her. "You sing?"

"I do…" Hakumei said, unsure of where this whole thing was going.

"Cool, can you sing something right now?"

"I've never heard you sing either, and I actually go to class," Kuwabara said.

"You never go to club meetings after school, though." She glanced at Yusuke, "If you want you can come with us to the karaoke box."

"What? No! He'll ruin our date."

"It's not a date."

"Yeah, all right," Yusuke said, considering the idea with a stroke of his chin. "I've got nothing better to do." He wrapped his arm around Hakumei to get under Kuwabara's skin. "I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

"Beautiful my ass," Kuwabara muttered from behind them.