It still seems odd not to be engaged to Ranma. Not bad, not 
really, just odd.

   Ranma-san, Kasumi would correct me. Possibly Ranma-kun. 
Calling him just plain "Ranma" implies familiarity with him, 
which would not be proper. 

   Kasumi is very insistant on that kind of thing, although not in a 
pushy way. She really has been a mother to us all, yet she 
somehow manages to avoid the tags you can pin on a parent. She 
does not nag. She is not overprotective. She does her duty to her 
family, willingly throwing away her childhood to do the job 
mother left for her. She deserves our respect and love.

   Why, if it weren't for her, I might have married Ranma.

   Father had insisted on it, poor man. My sisters supported 
him...Kasumi more than Nabiki. Funny how things turn out.

   I thought I loved him, but...I don't know. Love is something that 
develops over time. True love? It's not real. Just a fable, 
something to put in books, like evil magicians and wise dragons 
and enchanted princesses.

   He was just...so...he was so utterly unbelievable. Like a 
hurricane, full of force and noise and fury and confusion. He had 
this expression, sort of a grin, sort of a laugh, almost both, not 
quite either.

   And sometimes he would do something, or say something, and 
I'd think that I loved him. When he wasn't being such a baka...

   Again, Kasumi's voice tells me not to call Ranma-san a baka. 
It's cruel. Impolite. Not proper.

   And I think she knows that baka, when used with his name, 
doesn't really mean baka.

   He had saved me, yet again, and hadn't known it. I seemed dead, 
you see. He had howled like a wounded animal, just held me and 
cried to the heavens, screamed that he had never had a 
chance to tell me that he...

   But I wasn't dead, of course. 

   And so they began to arrange the wedding.

   Kasumi had done the routine check of background, more out of 
form than anything else, she tells me. Certainly she never 
expected the investigator to find what he did. 

   Of course, when it came to light...well, the wedding was out of 
the question.

   Father was very embarrassed, and had to confer with Kasumi on 
a way to save face. Finally he informed Saotome Genma-san that 
the dojo was too crowded for the Saotome family to be 
confortable. He had rented a hotel room for them, where they 
would be much better off.

   That was the day Nabiki left, too. There was a fight, the first 
real family fight we've ever had.

   How can you do this, she screamed at me. You love him. He loves 
you. Nothing has changed.

   But, I had replied, it's...wrong. It's unnatural.

   That was the right answer, Kasumi tells me. Nabiki spit in my 
face, and left. 

   Nabiki trying to tell me what's right or wrong. With her deals, 
and her blackmailings, and her photos! How dare she?

   Ranma...Ranma-san...saw me just once after that, as they were 
leaving.

   I care for you, he said. With him...I knew what it meant.

   And part of me, the tomboy, I suppose, wanted to say I love you, 
to hell with what's right, I love you and I want to be with you.

   But I told him that I was gratified by his concern.

   And again he screamed, and howled, and cursed the world, but 
this time he did it with just an expression. And then he left.

   I think how close I almost came to marrying him. Not him. One 
of _them_. Bad enough, Kasumi says, that they actually lived in 
the same house for a year, used the same bathroom and sink as we 
did. They can't help it, she says, and it would be cruel to blame 
them, but they just aren't sanitary.

   Ukyou left town, saying she needed to think about things. 
Shampoo doesn't understand, is overjoyed that the engagement to 
me is off. She'll probably marry him, since I can't believe Ukyou 
would.

   Ryouga comes by every now and then to talk, and I think he has a 
crush on me. Father has been making hints, saying that he's the 
finest martial artist in Nerima. But he seems so terribly guilty. 
He doesn't talk about getting revenge on Ranma anymore. He 
flinches if you mention the name, and just looks at the ground. 
And doesn't say anything.

   I know why. But it's wrong to feel that way.

   Father should have seen it. Look at how Saotome Genma-san 
acts. It's obvious that he's one of them, obvious. Ranma will turn 
out the same way.

   There are times I wish I had never found out, but really...it 
would have been wrong. Unnatural. Unclean.

  That's just the way burakumin are.

------------------------------------------------------

Notes:
   Burakumin are the descendants of Japanese who did 
"unclean"jobs during the Tokugawa period (1603-1868), such as 
animal slaughter and disposal of the dead. The most common job 
for a Japanese PI is to check for evidence of Burakumin ancestry. 
Companies often refuse to hire them, saying it would give the 
corporation a "dirty" image, and teachers and students often 
refuse to eat or associate with them.
   There are roughly 4 million Burakumin in Japan today.