Solitaire by Kibou7587

Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha or any of the characters or the story line. So yeah.

This is my first fan fiction and first public piece of writing ever. Please be kind…then brutally honest.

It's gonna start off kind of slow…and I actually have no idea how long it's going to be but bear with me, please.

Introduction

"Osuwari!!" screamed a distraught young miko in her usual unusual green and white attire. Having just concluded another battle of lung capacity with a hanyou as stubborn as herself, the young girl was indignant, frustrated, and rather at a loss as to what to do with herself. The hanyou who caused her such strife had already leapt away to sulk in the high boughs of one of the many trees surrounding the clearing that they and their companions inhabited for the evening.

The remaining bystanders of the fray simply looked on, somehow undeniably riveted to the scene before them despite the fact that they had seen it before. It was like a really good tv show with a completely typical story line—they had seen it a million times before and like a million times before Kagome attempts to start a conversation, which Inuyasha always magically manages to turn into a confrontation. So the story goes…

1) Kagome asks Inuyasha to go home or tells Inuyasha she is only back for a short time (depending upon the day)

2) Inuyasha insults her

3) Kagome becomes upset, indignant, frustrated, angry, sad…etc. etc. All of the above on some days.

4) They fight.

5) Inuyasha gets "sat"

Now about here is where it gets interesting. The monk, taijiya, kitsune, and neko are, from step five, familiar with two courses of action called 6A and 6B.

6A) Inuyasha caves and goes off to sulk

7A) Kagome is exceedingly grateful and cheery until her departure

This is the usual course of events. 6B happens so rarely that the fascinated onlookers had all but forgotten it existed. But on this particular night they were pleasantly, or unpleasantly, surprised because the turn of events had taken the miko and hanyou down the path of 6B which follows:

6B) Inuyasha refuses and stalks off before the miko can respond

7B) Repeat step 3

8B) Kagome tries to vent her frustrations—typically via more sitting Inuyasha or taking a bath.

And such is the show the monk, taijiya, kitsune, and neko are accustomed to. But this particular night was not meant to turn out like all the others because Kagome neither excessively sat the inuhanyou nor did she demand Sango's companionship for a bath—whether it was because she tired of both or was simply angry enough to not think of either no one was sure.

But the group watched on in clear fascination as their young friend stood staring after Inuyasha. With Kagome's loud cry of "OSUWARI!!" the group relaxed, back in familiar territory. And from there things continued business and usual, as far as everyone present was concerned. Kagome prepared their meals and they ate in comfortable silence, with the occasional mutter from Kagome about how stupid and stubborn dogs were and Miroku nodding in sympathy and Shippo throwing in his own insults.

While cleaning up and putting the supplies back into her bag Kagome spots something that has no business or purpose for the feudal era. It was a small rectangular box with red and white diagonal stripes across the surface, creating a diamond pattern over the box. "Oh," she muses aloud, "I wonder how this got in here."

"How what got where, Kagome?" The miko turned to the little kitsune who had come to explore what she had found. She placed it back within the confines of her bag—it would do no good to keep Shippo up tonight with a new game for him to want to play.

"It's nothing important, I'll show you tomorrow," she quickly reassured her adoptive son. "You should be going to bed soon. We'll be doing a lot of traveling tomorrow, if we hope to beat Naraku to the last shards."

Night descended and everyone began settling in for the night. Inuyasha was still nowhere to be seen, but that was to be expected, he was undoubtedly still close by keeping watch over them. Slowly each member of the group drifted off. Starting with Shippo, then Kirara, then Sango, and Miroku—and then there were two.

And the night progressed with two very unhappy people awake and fizzling, their annoyance a far cry from the intense anger it was earlier that evening. "Go to sleep, wench," the trees commented down to Kagome, "you'll need the energy tomorrow if you have any hope of finding the shards."

Still annoyed beyond belief but not willing to wake her companions with another verbal sparring session, Kagome opted for the high road, of sorts, and lay down in her sleeping bag, closing her eyes and evening out her breathing. "Good night, Inuyasha."

A slight huff which sounded suspiciously like a "g'night" was heard from the trees. Followed by a soft thud and shuffling. Kagome turned over in her sleeping bag and looked toward the noise to see Inuyasha settled against the tree directly across from hers, eyebrows furrowed. She watched him for some time and after a few minutes she saw his brows relax and knew he was asleep—and then there was one.

Kagome lay awake in her sleeping bag alternating between quick glances at her companions, to staring at the star-dotted sky with its crescent moon, to checking to see if the fire was dying. She let out an inaudible sigh and let her mind wander.

It had been two years since she had fallen down the well. Two years since she met Inuyasha, and two years since her life was changed forever. Almost two years spent in the Feudal Era hunting demons, seeking jewel shards, forging friendships, and fighting the good fight. Two year since she met Inuyasha. And thingshad changed a great deal. She no longer believed that demons did not exist, no longer squirmed at the sight of blood or broken bones, no longer ran in the face of danger, no longer feared for her life alone, and no longer disliked Inuyasha as she had in the beginning--quite the opposite actually.

She was almost certain she loved him. She knew she cared for him. She knew she would do almost anything for him. And she knew she did not want to ever see him hurt. She knew she wanted to keep him happy and healthy, and she knew she would die for him. But she was only almost certain she loved him. He was brash and angry and emotionally stunted, but Kagome did not care about those things. They were the things that made him distinctly "Inuyasha."

Kagome giggled lightly at herself and the turn her thoughts had taken. Thinking was tiring, worrying was tiring, sleep was inviting. But try as she might, Kagome could not go to sleep. So staring again at the stars peeking through the trees the young girl rolled over and quickly made her way to her yellow backpack. Feeling a little bit childish (in the good way) she crept slowly toward her backpack on her tip-toes, shoulders scrunched forward, and eyes wide for any sudden movements from her slumbering friends, all the while humming the tune to the "Pink Panther" in her head as she moved.

Finally reaching her backpack she silently rummaged through her pack. With a silent exclamation Kagome did a little victory dance, to a tune only she could hear, and made her way back to her bedding. Instead of sliding back into it, she positioned herself cross legged on top of it and got comfy. Kagome cast a cursory glance to make sure everyone was still asleep and then gave a purposeful yawn to see if she was sleepy yet. Deciding she was not, she set about her task and pulled out a small box with red and white diamonds on the surface. She opened the box and pulled out…a standard deck of cards.

52 count. 4 suits—two red, two black. Each suit counting from Ace to King. Just a standard deck of cards. Kagome hadn't had time to play since she started her time traveling, or maybe she simply never made the time for it. Whatever the case was, it didn't keep her from renewing one of her favorite pastimes. And with a slight smile on her face, she dealt out the cards.

Seven rows. Each row with one more card in it than the other, the last card of each section flipped so that the face showed. Four empty spaces left above the seven rows. It was Kagome's favorite one-person game—Solitaire.

Okay, so I had no idea how hard writing a fanfiction actually is.

This is only the Intro and I'm getting worn out. I know its really slow and there's a lot of prose, but this is my first public piece of writing and I just could not resist jam-packing it with a bunch of useless-ness heh.

It will get better!! I hope. I do have a point to this fic. Hopefully I'll get there sooner rather than later.

please review?

( I just realized I kind of punned w/ how many times I said hope and my name being kibou...if anyone caught that…if not…ignore me.)