Saki Hanajima

Beneath an intimidating aura, Saki is regularly called a beauty by those around her. She stands at a middling height and build, her fair face set with a pair of drowsy purple eyes. Wavy black hair spills all the way to her hips and usually hangs in a single long braid draped over one shoulder, though she wears it loose away from campus. On school days she keeps to the traditional navy-and-white sailor uniform with a pleated skirt; everywhere else she favors black, from elegant dresses and veils to a cape that matches her brother Megumi's and dark nail polish, all of it originally worn to mark her guilt, even if she now admits she genuinely likes the color.

Saki is a natural loner who once shut herself off entirely, so consumed by self-blame that she believed she deserved every cruelty aimed at her. The steady acceptance of Tohru and Arisa Uotani gradually lets her forgive herself. She speaks sparingly and stays polite, but she turns blunt with strangers and is unafraid of confrontation, delivering dry humor behind a straight face and reserving her smile for those she trusts. Rumors do not trouble her, since she knows the people who cherish her see her clearly. She is strikingly mature and level-headed, reading feelings no one else notices. At the same time she is content to be lazy, flunking tests on purpose because the make-up exams come easier and dodging gym class with dramatics. Food and Tohru occupy most of her thoughts.

Saki is the first in her family born able to hear the inner voices of others through electric signals, yet her parents, grandmother, and younger brother Megumi support her without hesitation. Trouble begins at school when bullies force live newts into her mouth; in her fury she wishes for the ringleader's death, and when the boy abruptly collapses she discovers her power and is branded a witch, with every later misfortune pinned on her. She takes to dressing only in black to signal her remorse, and classmates keep their distance out of fear. After a group of girls hold down her arm and burn it to test her waves, the family moves so she can start fresh. At the new school Tohru shares her lunch and Arisa waves her over to sit with them, refusing to let her eat alone; when Saki's secret surfaces again and her waves lash out, she tries to push both away, but they hold on, and the three have been inseparable ever since. That support, along with her family's, finally teaches her control. Saki can sense the good and evil in a person, read thoughts that arrive like words straight to the mind, and even loose poison waves capable of harm, though she reserves them for spooking the Prince Yuki Fan Club when they pester Tohru. In Fruits Basket Another she is married to a man from overseas and mother to Rio Mosca.