Dedicated to all those who had to wait for love, whether it be for five hundred years, or five days. And to Jason, just for being the one I would wait forever for.


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I Would Wait Forever
By AbsentAngel
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It's ironic.

After going through your whole life afraid of the pain that death will bring, that no pain comes. Just the mind numbing cold that comes when you find yourself looking down at your body . . . at the people surrounding it. Crying, begging you to come back . . . you feel a different kind of pain. The kind that rips at your chest while the girl you love claws at your clothes, yelling the sacred words that you had never had the chance to tell her.

"I love you! You can't leave, please don't leave me! I need you! Inuyasha!"

The tears that slide down her face fall in streams onto your face, burning into your heart. The way she holds your head to her breasts, hoping that the sound of her heart will magically enable your own to start beating . . . to see her wait with you for hours . . . just incase of a miracle. Before your silence eats away at her mind . . .

"Inuyasha, you need to wake up. The others are going to worry if we don't meet them back at the camp soon. Oh, come on you lazy bum, it's not like you to sleep so long. Inuyasha?"

But you can't answer her.

Can only sit, watch, and pray. Not for yourself, but for her. For the the girl who, on her knees, refused to leave your side. It had always been like that in life, but you never would have thought that it would still ring true in your death . . . You find yourself wishing that it wouldn't. That she would leave with out shedding a tear, without feeling any pain or sadness . . . So that you could find it in your heart to let go of all those precious moments you spent with her . . . So that you could stop loving her.

So that you can stop the aching in your heart, and move on to the next gateway of death. Instead of being trapped in the in between, where you are neither in the living world, or the dead. Glued helplessly to the thick glass window that you watch from, unable to tear your eyes away from the living world . . . Even when they tear that desperate, beautiful woman from your body, and you want to look away. To save yourself from the pain of her screams.

"NO! Why are you taking me from him! Stop! INUYASHA! . . . Please . . ."

But you can't look away . . . and you watch her as she collapses in sobs. Accepting the truth . . . that you are no longer with her. You watch as your friends try desperately to comfort her, even through their own tears. Feh, and the defeat of Naraku was suppose to be a joyous occasion . . .

Her pain is something you'll never forgive yourself for. Even when she is no longer there to watch . . . having gone back to her time . . . Five hundred years into the future. You wait, your mind turning over memories, both good and bad. Thinking of things you should have done, or should have said. Even though you know it's far to late. Just something that keeps you occupied when your friends are sleeping . . . when you aren't watching the lives of the married monk and slayer, and the ever growing kit who eventually turned into a fine demon . . . But all things have to end, and one by one they died. Coming up and visiting you by your window. Talking to you for what seems to be such a brief moment in time . . . before they departed for the gateway of death.

To go to their heaven.

While you sit, and wait . . . and wait . . . and wait. For five hundred years, you watch the world change through tired eyes. Until slowly, very slowly . . . you see the place called Tokyo rise into the sky. . . along with your hopes.

You search for her, trying to find your way in the massive city. Until your hopes, once so high, begin to fade. It's then you see her . . . more beautiful, and more alive then you remember. Younger than you remember. There, sitting on the shrine steps, sits Kagome Higarashi . . . The Kagome you knew for only a short time. The one who knew nothing of her power, or of the demons of the past . . . or of you.

That's when you feel it. The great and uncontrollable guilt that stabs at you every time she smiles. You can't help but notice how happy she was . . . . and wonder if she would have stayed so happy had she never come into the feudal era . . .

You never get the opportunity to find out.

The next year, she fell into the well and out of your sight. Until coming back angrily . . . followed by a inu hanyou dressed in red . . .

You.

The rest unfolds before your eyes, you see what you hadn't seen when you were living. You see the tears she shed and hear the prayers she prayed for you . . . even defending you against her own friends. Everyday you watch her, and every day you learn something new . . . her favorite candy, favorite song, favorite memories . . . it went on and on. Until the day she came back from the well . . . never to leave her time again.

For months after, you watch her cry herself to sleep every night . . . after saying a prayer for you.

"Inuyasha . . . I don't know if you can hear me . . . but I hope you can. Your the only thing keeping me going . . . I don't want to live with out you . . . but I want to live for you . . . because even though you never said it,I know in my heart that you loved me . . . and that I loved you . . . God, who am I kidding? I still love you Inuyasha . . . I still love you . . . and I always will . . . Goodnight Inuyasha . . . I'll talk to you tomorrow . . ."

With that, she would flip off her light, and let the tears run down her face with out so much as a sound . . . And you thanked her, every night, for still loving you . . . and then you would pray to whatever god there was behind those heavenly gates of death, that she would find happiness . . .

Your prayers are answered the very next year . . . in the form of Kenji Yanakii. A shy, but caring boy who simply fell head over heels in love with Kagome . . . and much to you pained relief, she fell for him too . . . but still she prayed for you every night . . .

Even years later, when she was married to the kind hearted Kenji and had two wonderful children . . . when she was no longer Kagome Higarashi, but Kagome Yanakii . . . she prayed. Then one night, when her husband confronted her about it, she simply gave a sad smile.

" I pray for someone who is very dear to me. Someone who, after all these years of losing him, I still love as much as I did all those years ago . . ."

Those words are something that engraves itself into your mind forever. Leaving you with such a sense of warmth . . . it's like your alive again . . .

After that, the days went quicker. The children grew up to be adults, having their own children . . . leaving Kagome and her husband as old grandparents . . . and then it happened.

Kagome was diagnosed with cancer.

The doctors were forced to explain to Kenji as well as Souta that the cancer had been present for a long time . . . longer than they ever believed was physically possible in a human.

But out of all the people in the room . . . it was Souta who knew how it was possible for Kagome to carry cancer for over fifty years with out any signs . . . and he made the choice to stay quiet about his elder sisters miko powers . . . that was part of her past now, and this was present.

Inside you feel excitement, for Kagome, the end was near. And in her death, you could finally hold her, tell her everything. How you loved her so much, and how your sorry about everything you did wrong . . . but then . . . you realize something.

Was Kagome ready to go?

To leave her family and friends behind? Maybe she didn't want to die just yet . . . it was a painful thought. One that you simply couldn't push out of your mind . . .

But you could, couldn't you? Because in reality, this isn't your story . . .

It's mine.

As I look down past my window, and into the real world. I watch her . . . on her hospital bed with tubes coming out of her arms, her white hair disarrayed . . . and I know that she's coming back to me . . . Even Kenji knows . . . and as he holds our lover's hand, he whispers into her ear.

"I hope you find him up there . . . and I hope that he brings you the happiness that I could never give you . . . I hope you get the happily ever after that you never had. I love you . . . and though I know you love me too . . . I know that I am not the one who truly holds your heart . . . Goodbye Kagome."

She looked at him, reaching up a shaky hand to caress his cheek, wiping away a tear, giving him him a soft, thankful smile before retracting her hand and closing her eyes. With in the next five seconds, she was gone . . .

Soon, I will see her. After waiting over five hundred years . . . The anticipation weighs at my chest as I wait . . . and then . . . I see her. Just as I remember her most, the young school girl who won my heart.

I've planned for this so long . . . and yet, I can't move. My feet are cemented into place. All I can do is stare at her, as she stares at me . . . and then . . . the most amazing thing happens . . .

She smiles.

The most beautiful smile I would ever see, and with her tears rolling down her cheeks she talks to me, in that angelic voice that's distinctly hers. "I knew you'd wait for me . . . Inuyasha."

At that point, I found myself moving with out even thinking it. I ran toward her as fast as I could, scooped her up in my arms and kissed her. Kissed her lips, her cheek, her nose, her eyelids. Everywhere I could reach. "I would wait forever for you, my love, my Kagome."

Still her tears kept falling, and I kissed them away gently. Taking her by the hand and leading her to the gate that has stood open to me for half a millennia. "I'm sure the others are waiting for us . . ."

She nodded, tears still pooling at the corners of her eyes, but smiling lovingly at me. I smiled back, giving her hand a gentle squeeze.

"It's time for us to have our happily ever after."

She gave a choked laugh, another happy tear rolling down her cheek. My heart felt as if it would burst with the excitement of having her next to me again. By my side again . . .

As, hand in hand, we watched the door open . . . before walking into the light.

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You know, my english teacher told my class to never EVER use the word 'you' in a story. So this started out as simply experiment, however I must say I totally disagree with my teacher. I think the usage of 'you' in the beginning seems to pull the reader in more. But then again I'm the author . . . my opinions of my own work doesn't really count U..

Oh, and about the cancer thing . . . I'll be the first to admit that I'm no docter . . . so . . . frankly . . . I don't know what I'm talking about. Please correct me if a fact is wrong. I'll probably come back and polish it up a little more later.

Disclaimer: I do not, nor will not, own Inuyasha and co. But it'd be pretty damn cool if I did . . .(thinks about it for a moment) . . . on second thought . . . maybe I should just leave it to the real writers . . . . '