Forever With You

Fourteen

"Let me see your hand," Hitoka said, after putting Aiko down in her cradle. She held her hand out expectantly.
"I'm fine," he replied gently. "It's really nothing to worry about." Eita held up his hand and showed her, trying not to show how much pain he was actually in.

Except, it didn't work. She saw the way his eyes squeezed shut for a brief moment, and heard him stifle a gasp. All she did was lift a single eyebrow, and his hand was in hers. With great care, she started to inspect his hand.

"Nothing seems broken, or out of place. Can you make another fist?"
He tried, and inhaled sharply. "Damn! Sorry. Hurts like hell," he grumbled. "It'll be fine in a few days."
"I know. Please, let me help you."
"Alright."

Breathing a sigh of relief, she asked him to sit down at the table and wait while she gathered up a few things to patch him up. While she put what she needed on a tray, and started the kettle for tea, she calmed herself as much as she could.

"Thank you," she said softly, once she made it back to him. "You didn't have to do that."
"Yes, I did," he replied as she took his hand in hers once more. "What he did to you was wrong. He hurt you..."
"It was my choice, my mistake..."
She cleaned his hand and rubbed the tiny splits in his knuckles with an antiseptic. He winced again, and she apologized softly.
"He took advantage of you, Yacchan. I wouldn't be surprised if he targeted you."
"That may be true, but still..."
"No buts, Hitoka. Terushima is a slimy bastard who went after a girl desperate for any sort of love and affection, preyed on those needs, used you, and then left you without a single care when you needed him most." He paused for a moment. "It's not your fault."

She knew that. She did! There hadn't been a single day that went by during her pregnancy that she remembered his rejection. After Aiko was born, she buried the memories as much as she could. What's done is done, right? All in the past? They should fade with time and happier memories to replace them, right?

She startled when she felt his hands gently cup her face, as if she were something precious to him. He slowly swiped a thumb along her cheek, and that's when she felt the wetness of her own tears. And they kept falling, no matter what she tried to do to stop them.

Shaking free of his hands, she stood up and walked away, but she stopped about halfway to her room. She couldn't stop crying. It wasn't just what happened at dinner; it was more than that. It was everything that had happened in her life since her mother put her on the ship to Japan.

With one little phrase, everything came rushing in to swallow her whole. She only ever had time to keep acting like everything was normal, to keep landing on her feet every time the rug was ripped out from under her. To keep moving forward when she wanted to curl up in a corner and disappear. Remembering that she couldn't do that when she was now the mother of a beautiful baby girl.

She doubled over with heart wrenching sobs. She would have fallen to her knees, if it weren't for a warm pair of arms surrounding her, holding her tight. Swaying gently, as if he was rocking her like a child. Humming the lullaby from their homeland and gently rubbing her back to calm her. Even going so far as to sift his fingers through her hair, massaging her head with each soft pass.

Duke Semi... no, Eita... had been there when she needed someone, at least recently. For reasons she couldn't yet understand, she knew in the instant they met that she could trust him. She could trust him with her daughter, and perhaps most of all, she knew she could trust him with her heart.

Her sobs quieted, but she still cried, soaking his shirt with her tears. Her hands gripped that shirt tight, refusing to let go. And Eita held onto her through it all.

~*~

A few hours later, Eita walked into his suite and found both his advisors waiting for him, along with one of the palace physicians to look at his hand. While the doctor examined his hand, applied a cooling ointment to the reddish, bruised areas, and then wrapped his hand, Eita took Taichi's report and read it.