Chapter one

Looking down at my hands I start picking at the already chipped pink paint. I'm trying really hard not to look up at the girl in front of me and her puppy dog act. It's a damn death trap that works every time.

Ever since Rin woke up happy this morning and offered to take me out for pancakes I've been waiting for her to spill the bad news. We've been best friends for the last fourteen years and she has never been a morning person or a fellow pancake lover.

"Kagome." She says tilting her head to the side with a pout. "You know I love you and you're my best friend in the entire world right?"

I instantly glanced up " Oh my god, what did you do now?"

The first time she started a conversation like that was in high school. It was to tell me that her pet gerbil named Gilbert had 'accidentally' gnawed my hamster Jerry's face off.

Because Sesshomaru had decided they would make good cage buddies.

The second time she had started a conversation with the phrase 'Kagome you know I love your, right?'

Was in our senior year when she has accidentally dyed my hair purple instead of the intended brown, because she had read the labels at the beauty supply store wrong.

Because Sesshomaru was distracting her with questions on which shampoo bottle would be honorable enough to use on his hair.

The third time she started the conversation with that was last summer. When she accidentally missed my birthday for the first time in fourteen years.

Because Sesshomaru had decided to take her to a surprise vacation to Hawaii and had planned the returning flight on the wrong day.

Seeing the pattern here yet?

Well yea back to the conversation at hand.

" I didn't do anything really..it's just..well..uh.." She bit her lip, trying awkwardly to explain the situation.

A folded my arms to my chest and sighed. "Enough with the dilly-dally, spit it out already Rin." I needed to know if I should dial 911 now or if I had time to go and save the situation.

"Since Sesshomaru's moving in I think it's best for us all if you moved out." She blurted.

Ouch.

"Since I know you guys don't really like each other. You actually kind of loath each other."

Okay for the record I do not loathe Sesshomaru, I just wouldn't mind seeing the prick in utter agony for the rest of his life. There's quite a difference.

" I so do not loathe him."

"Yea Kagome, you really do."

"Oh and how would you know?"

"Because you call him She Man every chance you get."

"It's an endearing nickname." I said shrugging.

"He hates it, and you know it!"

I thought about this for a few moments. " Well yeah, okay maybe a I hate him. Just a little."

I leaned back against the couch—our couch, the one we'd bought from Urban Outfitters after six months of saving—and looked at Rin with narrowed eyes.

She looked back at me, and I softened when I saw that her eyes were starting to fill with tears. I stifled a sigh; she wasn't being manipulative, Rin was just really, really sensitive, something I'd never understood about her.

I think it had something to do with the fact that she'd never, ever been hurt emotionally in her life, not once.

Pathetic, I know.

"Kagome.." She said getting down on her knees, skootching toward me. The gesture was too much for my stomach to handle.

"Oh, fine," I snapped. Rin stared up at me with her damn big hazel eyes and I sighed deeply. "Don't worry about it," I said in my most reassuring voice, which isn't, I'll admit, very reassuring.

I have a problem with sincerity. So sue me.

"Really?" she yelped, and before I could answer she flung herself at my neck and had me in a vise-like hug. "Thankyouthankyouthankyou for being so understanding!"

She started doing a little jumpy dance thing and squealing for joy…holding on to my head all the while.

"Uh, Rin?" I managed to choke out. "I love you and all, and I'm really glad you're happy and stuff, but do you think you could let go of my neck?"

"Oh, sorry," she gasped, taking a step back. "Do you want some ice?"

"No, I do not want some ice. I want…" I bit my lip and looked around the apartment.

It was mostly her style, but my tastes showed up occasionally...the huge CD rack, the couch, the art posters, huge white board in the kitchen where I made scatterbrained Rin write down her work and school schedule every week.

What did I want? I wanted to make Rin happy, naturally—she was my best friend after all.

But it saddened me that her happiness meant me leaving and Sesshomaru moving in. I wanted things to be like they were when we younger, when Rin hadn't quite discovered how to put her curves and ebony hair and big hazel eyes to use.

I wanted to go back to being 'Rin and Kagome' instead of 'Rin and Sesshomaru…oh, and Rin's friend Whatshername.'

Jealous? Moi? Nahh.

"Kagome?" Rin asked, looking at me tentatively. I snapped out of my trance and smiled at her. I wondered vaguely if she could tell I was faking it.

"When is he moving in?"

"Next Wednesday," she replied, biting her lip.

Wednesday? I wanted to scream. That gave me six days—six!—to find a new place to live. A year and a half of living together over in six days. Our friendship as we knew it gone with the passing of a week. Stick a knife threw my heart why don't you?

Yeah, I have a flair for melodrama.

"Well," I said, looking around with a distinct sense of foreboding. "I guess I'd better pack, huh?"

"So she just asked you to leave, just like that?" Jakotsu stared at me incredulously over his soy half-caff latte with no whipped cream.

I nodded, taking a sip of my Caramel Frap.

"But, I mean, it does make sense," I said in her defense.

Jakotsu raised a carefully manicured eyebrow at me. "And how is that?" he asked, pursing his lips in an almost comically gay gesture.

I repressed the urge to laugh. "Well, Sesshomaru and I do hate each other, and who am I to hold her back from falling in love—"

"And getting her heart broken."

"—and getting her heart broken, but that's beside the point. Plus, I think I'll look at this as a chance to get out on my own and learn to live without having to tell someone to pick up after herself and to not stop having sex altogether, but maybe just be a little more quiet about it, and…what?"

Jakotsu had burst into a fit of hysterical laughter and was fanning his warm brown eyes dramatically with one hand.

"Stop it, you'll hemorrhage," I snapped, not at all amused. "I'm glad you find this so funny."

"Quiet sex," he managed to choke out between hysterical gasps for air. "Really, you are a virgin!"

"Shut up!" I exclaimed, turning pink. "This has nothing to do with my virginity, which, incidentally, is none of your business."

"Sure it is. At nineteen you'd think you would have at least had the decency to jump in bed with one guy and ease my worried mind." This earned him a patented Kagome glare. "Okay, okay, sorry." He took a sip of his drink. "Continue."

"So," I finished grandly, "I think this will be a growth opportunity."

"Booo-ring," Jaks replied, rolling his eyes theatrically. "There's got to be more to it than that."

"…and she said I could have the couch."

"The couch?" His eyes widened and he stared at me in happy disbelief. "The one from Urban?"

"The very same," I said with a nod. "We're treating the whole thing like a very amicable divorce. I take what's mine, she keeps what's hers, and we split what we bought together. Since she gets the apartment, I get everything we've ever bought from Urban."

Which is a pretty sweet deal, if you ask me.

"Okay. So let me get this straight. She gets that lovely little apartment near campus, but you get the couch, rug, shower curtain, the coffee table, the dish chair, both floor cushions, the bowls, the plates, the bartending set, and the Position of the Day Playbook?"

"I told her she could have the book, but yes, I get the rest of it."

"Dammit! Why'd you give her the book?" Jaks looked genuinely angry, but I knew better. Jakotsu was too…gay to be angry. He felt that anger ruined his complexion and would eventually give him wrinkles.

"Because she'll actually use it."

Jaks considered this for a moment.

"Good point. It would be a complete waste in your clutches."

"Thanks." I said dryly.

"Well, it's true!" he replied with a smirk. "Honestly. You'd think you didn't date in high school or something."

I was about to snap a witty reply when "It's Raining Men" blared out of his cell phone. A few businesswomen at the table next to us shot a glare in his direction. He blew them a kiss.

"Sorry, darlings."

"Could that ringer be any more cliché?" I asked as he flipped it open.

"Probably not. Hello?" he said into the phone. "Having coffee with Kagome; you remember her, right? Yeah…Bankotsu says hi."

"Hi, Bank," I said automatically. Bankotsu was Jankotus's boyfriend of almost three years; they were a year older than me—juniors, more than halfway done, the jerks—and would have been married had the Texas legislature allowed it.

They absolutely defined the saying 'opposites attract'—Jakotsu was so flamboyant, you wouldn't even think he wasn't gay, while Bankotsu was much more subdued.

I'd actually thought he was straight the first time I met him, even with my built in gaydar (which I think comes with the territory of being female).

Jaks was a dark haired, brown eyed beauty queen, built like a track star, with an aristocratic face featuring high cheekbones, a wide, clear forehead, and a nose that could be described as nothing except a ski slope.

Bankotsu, on the other hand, was tall and muscular, with dark hair that he kept in a braid and deep set blue eyes. He was also a chronic hypochondriac, but Tyler was able to overlook this in favor of Marc's other excellent qualities—patience, a sense of humor, cleanliness, a mean grilled cheese sandwich, and (as Jankotsu put it) "the man's hung like a moose".

Like I really needed to know that.

"She says hi. So what's up?" Jaks crooned into the phone. "Oh, it was good. Yours?...He did not….He did not….Ugh, that whore!"

I laughed and took our empty drinks to the trash. Jabkotsu held up a five dollar bill upon my return and gestured wildly at the cookie display.

Rolling my eyes, I went up to the counter and got us a chocolate chip cookie to share.

As I set the plate back down on the table, I noticed that the flirty tone was out of Jaks's voice entirely. I frowned at him and he waved a hand dismissively, grabbing for the cookie.

"You're sure? Like, for positive?…Uh huh…yeah, we could definitely do that. How much a month?" He grinned at me, his eyes shining with excitement.

I grabbed a napkin, pulled a pen out of my purse, and wrote 'Apartment shopping?' Jakotsu read it and nodded. "Four thousand? No, babe, sorry. There's no way."

He shook his head sadly while I stared at him in shock. Four thousand? I thought. This is a freaking college town. Who would charge that much for rent?

"I just don't think—what?" Jaks's eyes lit up again. He leaned forward and spoke into the phone more intently. "How many? Wow….Yeah. Yeah, that could for sure work. Who?...I need names here, babe. Okay…okay…okay…okay…ooh, okay for sure!...Shut up, you know you're the only one for me."

Jakotsu jerked his head toward the door. I nodded and we headed outside, walking down the sidewalk past American Eagle, Abercrombie and Fitch, and Victoria's Secret. I stopped and stared inside the latter, noticing a 'sale' sign in the window.

Jakotsu turned and looked at me, rolled his eyes, and opened the door for me, chattering away into his phone all the while.

"How many bedrooms?...Seven? Shit, that's a lot. Bathrooms?...Shit, that's a lot. We could actually have one more. That would at least make the rent an even five hundred per person, per month." He frowned thoughtfully at the thong I held aloft for his approval and nodded.

"All these guys have jobs, right?...Good. Now…one more person we can all stand…who has a job."

I made my way over to the bras and inspected a lacey lavender one I'd had my eye on for a while. It was marked down to fifteen dollars from forty. I grabbed it without hesitation. One can never have too many bras, right?

"Ugh, no, I despise him. He's too…you know, him…Nope. He made a homophobic joke the other day in my English class…Not him, either. Miroku's enough of a partier; we don't need two." Jaks looked up at the thong I was dangling in his face and snatched it out of my hand impatiently.

Throwing it back into one bin, he rummaged around in another until he came up with two more he apparently liked better.

"You have no taste," he sighed at me. "No, not you, Banky. Kagome."

Suddenly his eyes lit up. He looked at me appraisingly, almost as if I were some sort of dress he was thinking of wearing on his next excursion to his favorite gay club, All American Beef.

"Bankotsu baby. I've just had an epiphany." He dashed off and hid over in the teddy section, an area he knew I'd never venture.

I stared after him for a moment before shrugging and continuing on my search for the final two thongs that would make up the five in my 'five for twenty-five' deal.

After paying, I looked around the shop for a moment for Jankotsu before spotting him outside. He was smoking a cigarette and still talking on his phone.

"No," he was saying as I walked outside and perched on the sidewalk next to him. "Of course it's a good idea. I thought of it…Yeah, I'll arrange it all...Okay. Love you, bye."

He snapped the phone shut and looked at me with a distinctly evil gleam in his eyes.

"What?" I asked warily. Jakotsu only looked at me like that when he wanted to try a new hairstyle on me.

"Kagome, how would you like to play Snow White?"

A/N: Review, reviews, I love reviewwwss. )