AN: This is my first fic, so appreciate it! (Please?) And I'm still kind of working on it so it might change a little.
Disclaimer: I do not own Inu Yasha or any of the characters, no matter how much I wish I could. (Kouga, you and I will one day be together.)
"Lord Sesshoumaru?" Sesshoumaru looked down at the little girl tugging on the hem of his robe.
"Yes, Rin?" Sesshoumaru looked up from his examination of the random sword he had just taken from a soldier, who was no longer with the living, unfortunately.
"Lord Sesshoumaru, why are you always gwumpy?" The little girl was gazing up at him with wide, worried eyes.
"I'm always – grumpy? " Sesshoumaru faltered, wondering what this girl was talking about. Why does she always look at me like this? She's like a puppy, with those big, huge eyes.
"Yeah, you never smile." Rin beamed up at him, as if demonstrating the expression that supposedly never appeared on Sesshoumaru's face.
"I never smile." Sesshoumaru repeated Rin's words, still unable to understand what she was talking about.
"But don't worry, Lord Sesshoumaru, I can teach you."
"What?"
"You don't need to be sad because you can't smile anymore because I'm gonna teach you how to smile."
"You're going to teach me…how to smile?" By now Sesshoumaru was totally nonplussed. He wondered, how is this important?
"I just said that, didn't I?"
Tugging on his robe even more, Rin tried to pull Sesshoumaru over to a rock. Looking down, Sesshoumaru realized what Rin was trying to do and allowed the girl to lead him to his seat.
"So, how do I… smile?" Sesshoumaru asked, somewhat disconcerted that he would even be curious about how one goes about smiling.
"First, think of something happy, that makes you go all warm and fuzzy inside."
Sesshoumaru looked at Rin blankly, "Like what?"
"Flowers!" Rin replied immediately, "Butterflies, birdies, bunnies—oh, and chocolate! I like chocolate. Don't you, Lord Sesshy?"
"I've never—what did you just call me?"
"Lord Sesshy." The girl repeated Sesshoumaru's new nickname.
"Never call me that again." Sesshoumaru said through slightly gritted teeth. That's the third name already. First Fluffy, then Spot and now this. Where does she come up with these?
"But I like it, it fits you." Rin said that as thought it was the most obvious thing in the world, which it wasn't, and like it was a perfectly good reason for her to keep calling Sesshoumaru "Lord Sesshy."
"I don't like it, so don't call me it." Sesshoumaru looked down and found that he had crossed his arms defensively. He uncrossed them, he did not get defensive.
"Please? Plleeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaasssssssssseeeeeeeeeeee? Plleeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaasssssssssseeeeeeeeeeee?" Rin's begging continued on for some time, but Sesshoumaru successfully zoned out pretty quickly—he had had lots of practice recently.
It wasn't until Rin voiced a particularly interesting plead that Sesshoumaru paid attention again.
" 'Pretty please with a cherry on top'?" Sesshoumary repeated the words the girl had just said.
"Yeah, a cherry, I really want to call you Lord Sesshy!." Rin brightened, "It might help you smile."
With that, Sesshoumaru gave in. "Okay, now, what was I supposed to do just now?"
"Think of happy things."
"Ok, I'm thinking… now what?" Sesshoumaru asked, his brow wrinkled in concentration.
"Just let your face go!" Sesshoumaru did so, and Rin doubled over with laughter. "Lord Sesshoumaru! Your mouth is hanging open, you're not smiling."
"But I was thinking of all the things you told me to think of." Sesshoumaru mad a face, trying to find where he went wrong.
"Well," Rin bit her lip as she thought, "Maybe you need to find your own happy things, not the stuff I tell you to think about."
"Okay, so I just think of stuff that makes me happy, like before?"
"Yep, and try again."
Sesshoumaru racked his mind for happy things and then tried to smile again.
"Lord Sesshoumaru," Rin said through giggles, "you're frowning."
"Rin, this isn't working, can we just stop?" Sesshoumaru rubbed his temple and then set his head in his hands.
"No! You can't give up! You need to know how to smile."
"Ok," Sesshoumaru, "what else can I do?"
"Just try letting the corners of your mouth go up, oh, and open your mouth a little."
"Like this?" Sesshoumaru tried and ended up with something more of a grimace than a smile.
It was at that moment that the relative silence that had accompanied Sesshoumaru's smiling lesson was interrupted by Jaken's entrance.
"Lord Sesshoumaru," Jaken swaggered up to Sesshoumaru, making it clear that he thought he was much more important than Rin. "What are you doing? We must continue on our way or—"
The rest of what Jaken was going to say was never heard because Seshoumaru cut him off.
"Jaken, smile for me," he ordered.
It took Jaken a moment to register what Sesshoumaru had told him to do, but when the absurdity of his task dawned on him, Jaken had a lot to say about it. "Lord Sesshoumaru, smiling isn't important, it's completely ridiculous, and it isn't nearly as important as our mission—" But once again he was cut off.
"Jaken, smile." And so great was the unspoken threat in Sesshoumaru's voice that Jaken froze for a moment before attempting to smile while his mind was in a panic.
Sesshoumaru's eyebrows rose when he saw the expression Jaken had fixed onto his face. Rin was on the ground, holding her sides, laughter overcoming her.
Fighting a curious feeling in his stomach, Sesshoumaru choked out the words. "Jaken, you need lessons even more that I do." And then succumbed to his own laughter.
Rin glanced up and, realizing that her master was actually laughing. All smiles, she exclaimed, "Lord Sesshoumaru, laughing is even better than smiling!"
Jaken looked at the two and walked away. "Who would have guessed that Lord Sesshoumaru had a sense of humor?"