A/N: This one is Megumi-centric and it:s equal parts sad, and equal parts just plain angsty. I don't think Megumi would have just easily accepted the fact that Kenshin chose Kaoru. More than her past, more than the opium horror, the simple fact that the red haired samurai chose the sweet sweaty tomboy will forever be her burden.

I would appreciate more reviews from people! I have to admit that I was a bit disappointed with the turnout of reviews from the first chapter, but im keeping my fingers crossed on this one.

Summary: A collection of short romantic and dramatic oneshots capturing lives and emotions in a fleeting moment. Character introspective including KenKao, SanoMeg plus other non canon pairings.

Disclaimer: I have been writing Rurouni Kenshin fanfictions for almost a decade now, and I still don't own the series or the characters.

Trice

These are the split moments that define life

.

KNK

2. tenuity- lack of substance or strength

Tae and Tsubame stand by the sides, decked in their usual Akabeko uniform, both holding identical smiles. Yahiko, now a young man of fourteen, is standing beside Tsubame and is grinning mischievously at the lens; a closer look at the picture and one will realize that one his hands, partially hidden behind him, is holding Tsubame`s.

But the pair that always really draws her attention is the man and the woman seated at the center of the photograph. With a gentle smile and a hand on the shoulder of his very pregnant wife, the tender strength of the red haired man is as equally hard to miss as is the cross shaped scar that mars his handsome face. His wife, seated beside him, is just as equally stunning. Her blue eyes, round and bright, radiates with joy and the bulge in her kimono only confirms the fact: pregnancy has done her wonders.

She looks at the photograph every morning, before her daily rounds begin and every night, before the doctor`s coat is exchanged for a softer, cooler sleeping yukata.

Sometimes she finds herself smiling as fond memories filter through her senses. She can almost hear them now: Yahiko complaining about Kaoru—busu-`s cooking, Kaoru`s impending retaliation followed by a resounding thwack on the young so-called Tokyo Samurai`s head, Kenshin`s soft fussing over his little beloved Kaoru-dono.

And then sometimes the photo alone brings selfish tears to her eyes. The smiles are a painful reminder that ｓhe is neither a sister, a wife, nor a mother. At the end of the day, she is just the doctor of the town and she knows that the thought is as unfair as her tears are selfish.

She knows she has a lot to feel grateful for in life. Before the whole Takani clan had been reduced to ashes in Aizu, she had been hidden safely away under a stack of old medicine bottles by the village chief. When life at Kanryuu`s had become too much to bear, the heavens had sent her flying to a gambling house and stumbling upon a betting baka tori atama and a sheepish red head. She had been saved and redeemed far more than she had ever deserved.

At night, her sleep is plagued by the one of the most vivid memories of her last days in the dojo: Kaoru is ambling clumsily along the dojo corridors, belly protruding and heavy with child. Yahiko emerges from the training hall, sweaty, all hot and bothered and he starts to peskily badger Kaoru; something which the doctor absent mindedly notes that is something only a younger brother would do to a heavily pregnant shihandai master; and in return, the adjutant whacks him sharply on the head, something only an oneesan can do to a young Tokyo samurai.

The ensuing argument attracts the attention of a certain redhead and as he rounds out from a corner, he is then instantly beside his pregnant wife, fussing over her, smiling at her constant protests, rubbing her back, all Kaoru dono this, Kaoru dono that.

And Kaoru just sighs and leans against him and murmurs how she is so impatient for the baby to come already. She lightly fans her hands in an attempt to cool herself as her husband leads her to sit by the engawa and even Megumi is hard pressed to admit that pregnancy and motherhood have indeed given the woman a definite glow.

It should be a joyous occasion. She knows this. Their little make shift family is to be blessed with something they had all come too closing to losing: life. And indeed, she is happy, until that traitorous small voice that sometimes lives to haunt her dreams come up to taunt her:

It could have been you.

You could have been the one to become a shining beacon in a child`s dark life. You could have been the one to marry him; you could have been the one to bear his child.

It is not long before she sends herself to Aizu.

At the end of the day, she is neither a sister, nor a wife, nor a mother. She knows this. She knows that when morning touches her eyes, she does not bequeath her first smile to a loving husband, nor does she banter playfully with a child whom she has taken as her own; nor does she place her hand at her belly and marvel as to how life could be perfectly created between two bound individuals.

No. At the start of the day, she writes lists of medicines that needs replenishing. She runs from one house to another, one clinic to the next. People with both familiar and random faces all flock to her, if only, and simply because she is the town doctor. Though smiles, words and pleasantries are often exchanged, at the end of the day, there is nil a soul in Aizu whom she can expect understanding and acceptance from.

Sometimes, she weeps; for all the what ifs that would have had the chance to see the light of fruition had she had the courage to act upon it. Sometimes, the sting becomes a barb too painful and she feels anger and resentment bubbling at her chest, occasionally resulting to uncharacteristically dirty broken stitches on a poor unsuspecting farmer`s arm.

And then, there are times when she just stares at the distance and she just feels listless… drained. The proverbial hollowness of the soul is a familiar companion of hers. It simpers by her side as she listens to the shadows of the night and weighs the humanity in her soul and she is left to wonder if this was what she had fought so hard to survive for.

TBC…

Sometimes, I think, the real tragedy of the series is Megumi.