Title: Bridge of Sighs
Summary: Something to learn when you're in love... Things do change..
Rating: T
Pairing: Miroku & Sango
Disclaimer: I don't own InuYasha's cast.
Warning? If you don't care what you read, then continue on. If you're a bratty little whiner like my younger brother, then leave my story alone. This is not for the feeble-minded. And I'm in a crappy mood..

She watches him, silently as he walks ahead of her.

It was so strange to feel this way, after what she had gone through. There was never a chance though, was there? To spend time away from reality.

Often it was like looking through a glass window. Those crafty little windows that you can only see through one side of- yes those for criminals.

And she feels like a criminal.

Yes, she does. But why? She asks herself silently. There's no need. Her family, her whole village, was devoted to helping others.

Maybe it was he who should feel like a criminal.

But she couldn't think that way. Why? She asks herself silently. Because it was just guilt. It was always that slight guilt resting scornfully on her feminine shoulders.

And we all know guilt likes to bite hard. She knows especially well. Mostly when she comes upon her younger brother while they travel. Naraku knows how to play on that guilt. He knows so well. It rests in the minds of their group.

In every single one.

And Naraku loves it, because it is his one advantage.

She scowls before ignoring the nagging feeling. Walking over to her female friend, she asks quietly, "Kagome-chan? Do you know what we'll be having for lunch?"

She silently waits.

"Ah, um... I have some specially packed supplies to make sushi, if you want to help me make that?" The seventeen-year-old girl replies.

She's grown so beautifully, Sango thinks. I don't know if I'm beautiful. And so in that thought, she hopes a certain someone has noticed her beauty.

She looks toward the monk who still trails behind the half-demon, talking amiably.

Then she remembers her friend. She'd never been good at cooking, but she says yes anyway. She wants to spend time with her best friend and confidante. She nods slowly as she answers and nods more because it automatically becomes a habit.

"Okay. InuYasha... let's stop for lunch now!"

She watches with a small smile as InuYasha scowls and is 'sat' while Miroku automatically spins and whips the silver-haired young man with the purple robes. Miroku is obviously hungry too, she realizes.

Kagome laughs by her side and she turns away, afraid that laughing would ruin the scene. They rarely see her laugh, so why break it?

She watches Miroku as he watches the stars. He is beautiful cast in moonlight and the glow of the campfire. She envies him slightly because she doesn't know if she's beautiful, but she knows he is. He has stopped groping her, she belatedly realizes. He doesn't do that to any other girl any more. She barely ponders the subject because she knows he has a lot on her mind.

She can tell when he stares at his covered hand.

His cursed hand.

And she feels sympathy surface, while her best friend calls out to her. "Sango? Are you all right? It's getting late, and-"

"I'm fine," she replies slowly, telling Kagome that all's right with the world.

"Sango.. You need to go to sleep..."

"I have a lot on my mind. I'm going for a short walk." And Sango walks slowly away into the dark, her hiraikotsu slung onto her back. Kilala whimpers and casts a worried glance into the brown eyes of the young priestess from the future.

"I don't know; I just don't know."

"I'm going to go with her. I bet it has to do with me." The monk speaks up and hears a distinct 'keh' come from the half-demon, and they both know.

Miroku follows silently, watching from a distance, unwilling and afraid for the first time in eight years- of what might come. She stops at the creek from earlier and he hears her sigh, wishing he could comfort her, but still afraid. "Miroku, come out.."

-:-

Miroku sighed in thought when he heard her speak, so calmly and so smoothly. She was a demon slayer- what could he expect? She sensed auras just as well as he or Kagome. Slowly he approached, unhappy with a frown marring his young features. "Fine. Now tell me what's wrong Sango."

"Ever to the point, monk. Why can't you-"

"Can you stop calling me 'monk'? I have a name," he whispered.

She stopped staring at the surface of the cool water to look at the side of his face. "I know; I know, you do.. Miroku." She inwardly smiled when she saw his eyes ignite with something akin to gratitude. "Our destinies- our group's destinies- changed the moment we became that group. We are targeted, we are hated, we are wanted dead for nothing-," she broke off in a sob. "And I go on, watching life pass me by as I stand waiting for my whole village to come alive again, and for my baby brother to come back to me."

"Sango..."

She turned back to the water when he moved closer to her. "My life is scarred. I don't care if I'm over-exaggerating, but it hurts. And I see InuYasha and Kagome getting closer even with Kikyo and Naraku and Koga in the way... and I just wish for something more. Something to take me away from everything that's happened to me.

"So that I can hold my memories of the ones I love, but that I can still move on to something bigger..."

"I- I..." Miroku paused when he looked back at her face- the beautiful face of the one he loved. He couldn't outright tell her his feelings. It just didn't seem like the right time, and she was confessing her fears to him; it was a side of her that he never had the chance to see before. "We all have at least one goal in common," he said, and at her confused look he explained. "Naraku."

Naraku... the one who revels in our pain, because he knows our weaknesses. And mine is Kohaku... Sango nodded in spite of what was running through her head. She felt the priest lay his cursed hand on her forearm and she felt her arm's muscles tense; he had moved much more closely.

"I don't think I can say anything that would help you, but just know that I do care for you deeply and I will be here for you whenever you want. I will stop whatever I'm doing and talk when you want..." Sango took in a shuddering breath as her only reaction.

After a few minutes had passed with out his hands roving, she realized he was very serious. She took her eyes off of where his hand was and looked into his eyes. She didn't see pity or concern, or a condescending look, but a love of sorts. She was so utterly confused right now, that she decided to take an insane chance.

"Am I beautiful, Miroku?" She whispered hoarsely.

He removed his hand from her right forearm, and reached out to grab her right hand in a firm grasp. He squeezed gently as he looked directly into her eyes. "Yeah, yes... yes, you are." And he didn't smile to placate possible doubts; he just stared at her, never taking his eyes off hers.

Sango turned her head away, breaking the eye contact. She vaguely felt the sting in the back of her eyes and knew as soon as she felt it, that she was crying, feeling helpless in front of the man she loved.

Before she realized what had happened, she was pressed to a warm body and two comforting arms were holding onto her waist. My waist... Not my hips; not lower... She sighed. Things were changing and she didn't know how to cope. Life was still passing her by as she stood still on the side of the road.

"You are beautiful, Sango, and I won't ever leave your side. Believe me when I say, I loved you the moment we met," he breathed into her ear, his warm breath tickling her neck.

They pulled back and she nodded, not saying a thing as she began to walk back to the campsite, their hands still clasped. In her soul, she knew things could only get better from here, whether or not she got her family back. She had learned something that night.

As the moonlight shone down through the foliage to cast glowing ripples on the stream's surface, the pair of lovers walked slowly away, knowing they had learned something about love-

Something while being in love.

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