Fruits Basket Episode 1 Summary
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The first
episode of Fruits Basket opens with the title song.
A shot of Honda Tohru next to a tent (presumably her house)
is shown along with her admiring the blue sky.
While walking to school from her new home, she discovers a
house. She meets the house's owner, black-haired man
dressed in a gray robe. He
shows her the 12 Chinese zodiac clay? figures that he has just made. She
comments on
how cute they look and how the cat is not there.
She mentions that her mother told her this tale that the cat was
unable to go to a party because the mouse tricked him. Since
the cat did not go to the party, he was banished and
therefore not present in the 12 zodiac signs. She explains
that she was a dog but decided to become a cat because
she felt so sorry for the cat that did not get to go to the
party. Sohma Yuki, her classmate, comes out of the building
and she is surprised at the luck of seeing the most popular,
(deemed "Prince") of her school here at this house.
Yuki's cousin introduces himself as Sohma Shigure, his
cousin. Tohru explains her house is near (looking very
embarrassed and not mentioning the tent). She tries to run
off to school but Yuki offers to accompany her.
3 girls from the Prince Yuki fan club angrily approach her in
the school and ask her why she was with "10th grade
Kaibara High school Class D's Sohma Yuki." Her two
friends Uo and Hanajima save her by threatening to attack the
three girls with a physical fight (Uochan) and a mental
electrical zap (Hanachan). In cooking class, the three of them
discuss how odd Yuki is and explain that once an 11th grader
confessed her love to him and tried to hug him
but was thrown back. Uochan suspiciously ask her why she is
working so hard lately. After Tohru's father passed
away her mother supported her. However, after her mother died
after a car accident, she was sent to live in her
grandfather. However, he was not working so she felt that she
was a burden to him. He moved in with his daughter
and her family but since the house needed renovations, she
was to live with her friends. However, Hanachan
had five other people in her family and Uo lived by herself
in a one-room apartment. Tohru did not want to burden
her friends so she pitched a tent in the middle of the forest
and decided to live there for a while. She hesitantly tells
Uochan that she has been living with her grandfather and that
they are feeding her well and none of them are
taking the money she earned from working. Somewhat satisfied,
her friends stop questioning her. Yuki walks her
home and they chat happily. She explains that Yuki's cousin,
Shigure showed her the 12 zodiacs. Yuki comments
that he heard she wanted to be a cat. He explains that cats
are bad and there was no room for the cat in the 12
zodiacs. She wonders at his comment and asks if he dislikes
cats. He replies by telling her to take care of her health.
She is not discouraged by his words and instead works harder
at work. She works in a corporate building where she
cleans and takes care of the trash.
On
the way home from eating, Shigure complains to Yuki about having to eat out
all the time. Yuki explains that having a female maid is
impossible. They see Tohru slowly trudging into her tent. She
says hi to her mom and crawls out to wash her face. Shigure,
standing next to Yuki, are right in front of the tent
opening. Shigure laughs hysterically at her. Back at
the house, (Shigure still laughing) Shigure explains it is impossible
for her to live outside in the forest. She says she can
survive and will pay rent for her stay. Unfortunately, she falls
over and Yuki says she has a fever. Shigure tries to get ice
but the kitchen is blocked by the huge load of trash. A
wolf howls and Shigure explains that there has been a
landslide near the tent. Tohru runs out to see that her tent has
been completely squashed and her mom's picture is somewhere
under the rubble. Yuki stops her from trying to dig
in the rubble.
Shigure puts her in bed while Yuki
looks for some ice. Tohru explains that she is sad because she
couldn't greet her mom that morning of the car accident. She
had stayed up all night to study for a test and did
not greet her mom. She expresses her guilt at being unable to
say anything to her mom that morning. She wanted to
quit school after junior high but her mom wanted her to
finish high school since she wasn't able to. Tohru says
she's wants to go through high school so that she can enjoy
something her mom was never able to. She falls asleep
and Yuki says that he think she is impressive to live in a
tent. He was never able to break from his family. Yuki says
he's going out to dig in the tent. Shigure asks if he is
going by himself and Yuki only smiles mysteriously at him. A
flash of black mice with red eyes chirp.
Tohru wakes up in the morning with
the picture of her mother beside her
bed. Yuki comes in and tells her that he has picked out all
her stuff. She thanks him and asks him if he did it by
himself. He says he did not do it alone but it is a secret.
Shigure comes out and asks if she can cook and clean. Yuki
smiles and says that Tohru can live at the house with them
since there is an extra room upstairs with a bolt. Tohru
says she won't live with them since they have done so much
for her. Yuki tells her to be herself and take things
slowly. Shigure asks Yuki if it is okay that Tohru lives with
them.
Just as Yuki is showing her the the
room, A guy with orange hair drops through the roof and challenges Yuki
to a fight. Yuki just laughs at him as Kyo (the guy with
orange hair) launches himself at Yuki. Tohru grabs Kyo
around the waist and he turns into a yellow cat, startled she
screams that she turned him into a cat. A part of the
roof falls on her head and she falls into Yuki and Shigeru's
arms and Yuki turns into a mouse while Shigeru turns into
a dog. She looks around and thinks that she has somehow
turned them into something completely different. She
faints in the middle of the air.