Fruits Basket Manga Volume 21 <– Buy from Amazon.com!

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis: Kyo finishes telling Tohru his tale of being there when Tohru’s mother died, believing her final words to be that she wouldn’t forgive him. As such, he doesn’t want Tohru to forgive him. Tohru is upset, says she loves Kyo but he leaves, which annoys Yuki. Tohru goes for a walk and encounters Akito, who’s upset that all of the zodiac are leaving her. Despite Akito’s angry confrontation with a knife, Tohru understands the head of the Sohma family. Akito is afraid of a world without the forced linkage of the curse so Tohru encourages her to start over and does so be reintroducing herself. As she does this, the ground underneath Tohru gives way and she falls into the ravine below.

Akito races away and runs into Yuki and Shigure, reporting that Tohru has fallen. Yuki heads to the scene of the accident while Shigure takes Akito to his house and makes a call. Kyo comes up to where Tohru is laying injured and is horrified, especially in light of what he’d just said to her. Tohru recognizes that Kyo is there and tries to assure him and he kisses her.

Tohru is taken to the hospital while many of the Sohma zodiac members gather at Shigure’s home, worried about Tohru and also believing that Kureno is in the hospital as well (which he is). Yuki is still very angry with Kyo because of how he hurt her with his words before her accident. So when Kyo comes home, Yuki demands to know why Kyo didn’t go to the hospital. Kyo’s excuse of not being able to protect Tohru leads to Yuki punching him. Yuki confesses that he wanted to be more like Kyo as they grew up and that Kyo had been protecting Tohru, citing how Tohru lit up whenever Kyo was around. Yuki’s words reach Kyo and he immediately leaves for the hospital, only to discover visiting hours are over.

It is another day and Akito is at Kureno’s hospital door. Elsewhere in the hospita, several of the Sohma’s are there to visit Tohru including Kyo. Uo-chan and Hana-chan are guarding the door and have some sarcastic things to say about Kyo before Uo-chan goes off verbally on Kyo. They know of Kyo’s hurtful words to Tohru thanks to Yuki and they forbid Kyo to visit Tohru. Hana-chan informs Kyo that his simply apologizing won’t cut it since Tohru doesn’t blame him and an apology without thought is meaningless. Kyo agrees.

Outside, Momiji sees Akito and they talk, Akito wondering why Kureno is so kind to her. Momijji tells Akito his “The Most Foolish Traveler” story. After that, Akito then pays Tohru a visit.

At school, the student council members talk about Tohru’s being in the hospital. Afterward, Yuki gives Machi a call to meet her as he has something to give her. They meet and Machi has a gift for Yuki to give Tohru and a gift for Yuki — fertilizer for his garden. Yuki has a Mogeta stuffed animal for Machi, which she loves. Machi is glad that Tohru had been protecting Yuki and in the end, the two make their feelings known without saying “I love you.” The two then walk away, hand-in-hand.

Thoughts/Review: I swear, why do the bloody adapters feel the need to mix “he” and “she” when dealing with Akito? I understand that not all the family knows her secret, but either work on making an adaptation that doesn’t use a pronoun, or use the “she” pronoun when people who know the secret are talking. Personally, I prefer the former and I do know that not using male/female pronouns is very, very difficult. However, Del Rey did it in Tsubasa for a gender-neutral character and frankly this should have been done in Fruits Basket.

I still hate the character designs as they are now. If you aren’t paying attention, characters really start looking alike and that’s not good. But I’ve already ranted about that before, so I’m not going to do so again.

While the manga has gotten too angst-filled for my tastes (to say nothing of being difficult to follow who’s speaking at times), I did love the tribute to the fun of old with Hana-chan and Uo-chan’s scene at the hospital. I liked that Tohru has confessed to Kyo and that he kissed her (though she may have been unconscious for the event). I really liked how Yuki and Machi are now a couple, so that’s cool.

So, things are rapidly wrapping up with only the remaining zodiac to be freed of the curse and the birth of the new Sohma family to happen. Also, there’s the get-together of Kyo and Tohru. I do look forward to reading the remaining volumes, assuming TP doesn’t decide to delay their publication further.