A Modern Cinderella Story
By: DemonSaya
Prologue
Once upon a time, in a far away land...
Yeah, right. You all opened this probably expecting a carbon copy of every other Cinderella Story that has careened down the pike. In which our Prince falls in love with our darling little miss perfect, Cinderella. Well, this is NOT your average Cinderella Story, and I am NOT your average Narrator. So if that's what you're expecting, I suggest you put this book down and walk away.
Fast.
If, however, like me, you find yourself wondering what would happen if the time was changed, the gender roles were changed, and our Cinder Fella wasn't quite so 'perfect', read on. I'll spin this story.
It actually starts not too long ago at all. In fact, it was really only about ten years. See, most of you can remember back ten years. If not...maybe you're too young to be reading this.
Anyways, moving on. In the city of Washington D.C., a ten year old boy sits on the couch of his mother's large apartment, playing video games with his best friend. This boy isn't exactly like other boys. His hair is silver-white, and his eyes are bright gold. Rather than ears on the side of his head, like his friends, his are on top, covered in silver fur, much like those of a dog.
His name is Inuyasha.
To truly put our young friends future into perspective, you have to appreciate how he lived before his world was turned upside down and inside out.
Inuyasha's mother was the widow of a wealthy demon. Her name was Izayoi. She was a hard worker, and loved her only son dearly, buying almost whatever his little heart desired. Unfortunately for poor Inuyasha, she was also a business woman and spent the majority of her time away at work, running her multi-million dollar corporation.
Despite their nearly constant separation, they were close. His father had died shortly after he was born, so the only adults he knew were his mother and his baby-sitter, eighteen year old Kikyou. Periodically he saw his old brother, a full demon by the name of Sesshoumaru, but they weren't close, and never spoke.
Inuyasha was a sharp student, but he had a habit of isolating himself away from other students. His only real friend was a girl named Sango. Sango was short-tempered, but she had a good heart, and while the other students muttered about the weird Hanyou, Sango was the one that offered him half her peanut butter sandwich when Kikyou packed him sushi.
He had a healthy sized trust left to him by his father, but unfortunately, he could not touch it until he was eighteen years old. It was intended for him to go to college so that he could eventually become a productive member of society.
Our ten year old boy, however, never thought that far ahead. While he was bright, he didn't yet have the foresight in order to plan into the distant future. Eight years seemed like a long time, heck, sometimes, eight minutes did.
Like now.
"God, why isn't she HOME yet?!" Inuyasha huffed in frustration, pummeling Sango's character with a fervor that belied hours of practice and months of play. When the character finally went down with a ritualistic K.O., he threw his controller down and did a victory dance. "YES! I OWN YOU!"
Sango rolled her eyes and grabbed another potato chip. "Yeah, yeah. I don't have this game at home." She grumbled, munching the chip and peering down into her half-empty cola. "Just chill. It's just a date and your mom's a smart lady. Nothing to stress."
He crossed his arms, scowling. "It's not like I care if she remarries. She seems to think I need some male influence." His lower lip stuck out in an insolent pout. "I feel like I never see her, anymore."
Just then, the door clicked open and he launched himself from the couch, flying towards the door as fast as possible. "Mama!" He cried, then screeched to a halt, seeing a stranger with her. He looked at the stranger frowning, not liking the way the way he smelled, not liking the way this man was standing too close to be proper to her mother. Every instinct grated harshly against his nerves and he glared at the man. "Who's that?" He asked, pointing rudely.
Izayoi blushed, stepping inside, dropping to her knees. "You don't need to worry about him, darling. That's the man who took mommy to dinner. Now, where's Kikyou?" She straightened, looking towards the kitchen, desperately. "You're supposed to be in bed by now..." She saw Sango sitting on the couch with a bag of chips and six pack of coke on the coffee table. A sigh escaped her. "Tell me that's not all you ate?"
"We ordered pizza." He said, wrinkling his nose. "Kikyou made that sushi crap again. It doesn't agree with my palate." He looked back at the man, who was looking down at him with disdain. "I don't like him." He said, looking back at his mother. "Make him go away."
Her cheeks darkened, and there was a flash in her eyes. "Sweety, mommy was inviting Mr. Kuroshii in for a drink. She wont take long, and I'll be up in a few minutes to tuck you in. Sango, you should go home."
"I have permission to sleep over." She offered, not really trusting the strange man that hadn't spoken since he'd entered the apartment. "Come on, Yash, let's go upstairs." She finally said, seeing that his mother was getting stressed and embarrassed. Sango had always had an uncanny ability to read adults. Even Izayoi Akimoto. "I got a new manga I wanna show you." She grabbed his t-shirt sleeve and headed upstairs.
He pulled his sleeve out of her hand and glared at her when they hit the stairs. "What the heck are you doing, Sango?!" He pointed back down towards the kitchen. "That guy is gonna do something!"
"We can eavesdrop from the stairs." She hissed, frowning. "Whoever he is, he feels funny. Like snail tracks. Kinda slimy." Her brow furrowed. "Why is your mom with him?"
"I don't really know. I think she's been spending too much time talking to our neighbor, crazy old woman..." He scowled. "She keeps talking about how I need a 'male influence', whatever that means. I have mama, and that's enough for me."
"You tell her this?"
"Of course I did. It's like she's desperate. She could do better than that...slime ball." He reached into his unusually creative vocabulary and scowled down the stairs. "He better not try anything on my mama..."
His mother's voice filtered upstairs. "I'm sorry about him. He's a little wary of strangers."
A laugh. There was something wrong with it. "You're his mother. He has a right to be." The voice sounded like it was trying to be soothing. It grated against Inuyasha's nerves.
"Why, Naraku, you almost sound like you have a boy of your own."
"I have."
"Really?" There was a twinge of excitement in her voice. Almost like she thought she'd found someone who could understand the stress of single child-rearing. "How old?"
"Ten. Like your boy." There was something about him that didn't make him comfortable. "Three quarter demon, but who's counting." A chuckle. His mother echoed the sound. "I had a nice time, Izayoi."
"Me, too." Inuyasha's heart crashed into his stomach. "We should do this again."
There was a long silence and Inuyasha was about to go downstairs and break up the party. Sango stopped him and started dragging him to his room when the sound of footsteps headed towards the stairs. They dove into their sleeping bags and pretended to have been flipping through the manga when the door opened and Izayoi peeked her head in.
"You're still up?" Her voice was a bit high pitched, and she seemed a little flushed and hurried.
Inuyasha didn't answer her. He just looked at her with a dead pan expression. "I don't like him." He repeated.
A splash of color splashed across her cheeks. "I do." She said pointedly. "I'm seeing him again tomorrow."
He jumped up. "Fine! But don't expect me to call him daddy! He's your boyfriend, not my father!" He turned his back to her, expecting her to bend to his will. The wind was knocked out of him when his mother spoke.
"I'm sorry you feel that way. But since you just as good as gave me permission, maybe I will marry him after all."
He froze and turned back towards her. There was a hard edge in his mother's voice and his heart fell. "Mama, he's not good for you! I..." Tears welled in his eyes. "He feels wrong and smells funny!"
"This isn't about me, Inuyasha! It's about you! Why don't you see that?!" She dropped to her knees, grabbing his arms. "You need a father!"
He looked at her, his face sad. A tear ran down his cheek and he wiped it away. "Fine. Whatever." He broke her grasp on him and lay back into his sleeping his bag, turning his back to her. "Goodnight." He said pointedly.
He heard her soft sigh and felt her lips gently press against his temple. "Goodnight, baby." She gently caressed his ears and left the room.
"You shouldn't be angry with her, Yash..." Sango said softly, facing towards him, seeing his pupils reflecting the scant light. "She's trying to do what's best for you."
He sighed. "Yeah, maybe she should worry more about herself." He muttered, looking away. "'Night Sango." He said, closing his eyes and pretending to go to sleep.
o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o
It was a whirlwind courtship.
That was the only way Inuyasha could describe it. Over the next two months, Naraku wined and dined Izayoi every night. Izayoi, who was already thirty two, flowered under the treatment she received. Finally, in an extravagant ceremony, the two were married, and Inuyasha watched his mother take the final step away from him.
Naraku and his son, Onigumo moved in that day. Kikyou quit the next week, refusing to look after the other boy, or be anywhere near Naraku. The weeks that followed quickly made Inuyasha desperately wish that he could run away from home.
He was kicked from his sizable bedroom to the living room couch. His mother seemed unperturbed by the changes in her new spouse, saying that it was just Naraku getting used to the place. Inuyasha couldn't help but begin to resent his mother as much as her husband. Not his father.
The man insisted that Inuyasha call him dad, but he circumvented it completely by refusing to speak to the man directly. The pair had been married for nearly a year when Inuyasha noticed the bruises on his mother's delicate face.
The now eleven year old boy did not know what to do. He could see his mother was broken, no longer her same, cheerful self. She began drinking, and as a result, Inuyasha began catching the brunt of her frustrations. Naraku, also noticed that Inuyasha was an easy target. Inuyasha was given the lion's share of the chores, and when he failed to complete them to Naraku's standards, he found himself at the end of many fists and lashings.
Several beatings were so brutal, he didn't show his face for days, hiding in the broom closet.
By the time he was sixteen, his mother was taking about three different drugs for depression, and had developed full-blown alcoholism. Inuyasha was desperately looking for any way to escape his hell. But he couldn't leave his mother. So, he did what his mother's husband was evidentially too good for.
He fished his mother's head out of the toilet when she drank so much her body rejected it. He stroked her hair, and kissed her brow, tucking her lethargic body back into her bed. Then, one morning, he found her in bed, an open bottle beside her, beside that a bottle of booze. Both her wrists were slit, and her beautiful face, once so full of life, was gray with death.
And the sixteen year old boy grieved what had happened to the person who was his only family. Someone he loved more than life. A woman who had once been vibrant with the joy of life, had killed herself.
Naraku entered the room while Inuyasha knelt by the bed crying. The man didn't even mourn the woman. He just left, called police and an ambulance and poured himself a martini, staring across the buildings at the rising sun.
The bastard never shed a tear, never showed a drop of emotion.
Inuyasha stayed long enough for the funeral. Sango and the neighbors were there to support him, but his step-father was strangely absent. Inuyasha didn't really care why.
That man was the poison that had killed his mother.
o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o
AN: So, there's the Prologue. Always the hardest little bit to eke out. Ten-year old Inuyasha has a bit of an adult's mouth. I'm trying to keep this straddling somewhere between Inuyasha and Cinderella, which is actually harder than you may think. Next chapter is the 'present' time. Tell me what you think 3 Oh, P.S. There are several chapters of stories in the works. They aren't posted yet because I'm having trouble motivating myself to do them. This one's mostly happening because my husband bought me a laptop for my birthday, so I can chase kids and write at the same time. . ;