Disclaimer: Only gonna say it once: me no own Inuyasha.

Ok, sry I'm not updating my other story, I ran outa fire. But I'm trying to finish the Chappie! I swear! Anyway, just got a random idea while practicing piano one day I decided to give it a shot, I hope u like it

Almost Tangible

By Kitty

Life and Death are no phenomena; Life will Die and cultivate new Life again. This cycle has no mystery, no allure. But if in Death you find reason to Live, then I pray for you the miracle, Love, to surpass the Laws that bind the Earth and resurrect your Inner Strength.

XXX

Either up there, or down there, decisions, decisions, oh, what's a poor little girl to do? Should I make a try to Heaven? Or should I visit Hell? Quite frankly, I like it here thank you very much. Some call it Limbo. I like to call it plain old earth. Only, I'm not TECHNICALLY on earth… and for those knuckle heads who couldn't figure it out, I'm dead.

Chappie 1: Houseguests
The heavy door creaked open to show a small group of children fearfully peeking into the old house. It was a large house, one whose worth should well have been over millions of dollars. It was seven thousand. Some muffled arguing and soft shoving brought the first tiny foot to touch the gleaming wooden floor of the foyer. Silence. Tentatively, more feet pattered into the room, though, even with the shuffling, eerie silence still permeated from the walls, the ceiling, and the dark shadows within. The house felt like a vacuum that threatened to pull the air out from their small, rasping lungs as they tip-toed non too quietly through the house. A pair of eyes (had she a body) opened and she fluttered down to meet her guests. One, two, three, four, five; five little kids, one girl and four boys huddled together, trembling, in her living room. She shook her head, air bending the faint light so slightly that it wasn't noticeable, even to the sharpest of eyes. 'So,' she asked herself, 'what should I do about my uninvited guests?'

A sudden unnatural breeze stirred the inside of the room. Shadows flickered in candlelight that wasn't there. Pale faces glanced at each other and heartbeats drummed through thin rib cages. The children tittered excitedly for a single startled moment then held their breaths, heads whipping to and fro, all hoping to, yet dreading to, catch sight of the apparition said to be there. This is it! It must be it!

"Rooow." A sound burst from the far corner. The children screamed and fled, little heads bobbing in the soft glow of the flashlight. Thundering footsteps careened out the door, closing it shut with a mighty slam.

Kagome looked at her living friend, 'Buyo! Was that necessary?' The large cat didn't respond, seemingly unaware his roommate had said anything at all, and stretched his back before lazily leaving the room in his slow, wagging gate. Kagome sighed, 'that fat cat!' she thought. Leaving the room, she heard a strange noise. A coughing, wet sound; one she barely remembered as the sound of crying. Quickly locating the whereabouts of the resonance, she lightly flew to the side of a little boy, perhaps eight years old, sobbing and clutching his knee. Kagome's eyes softened upon the entering the scene, the poor kid. Kagome gently hovered next to the child for a moment, watching blood slowly ooze from his skin and drip onto her carefully looked after carpet. This will not do. Pooling together some not-so-often-used power, she knelt down next to the boy and reached out to touch the scraped knee. He froze in shock for a moment, eyes growing wide when he saw the faint pink glow beside him and the chilly feeling on his injured limb. Scared witless, he watched as, slowly, a scab formed, at ten times the rate a normal one would. Startled, he stared again at the small glow, this time, looking into another surprised face.

Kagome hovered transfixed; those eyes, that warm brown hue, the perfect almond shape, those were her mother's eyes; they were her grandmother's eyes. A giggling baby who liked to tug at her hair. An annoying brat who'd always tattle on his older sister for the smallest things. A child who had to watch a sister he barely knew, yet loved so dearly, be lowered into the cold dark ground. Recollections and memories flowed through her mind, and then slowly, a name surfaced.

"S-Souta?" the boy heard a soft whispery voice that sounded like a faint summer breeze. But the tone, the warm, cheerful tenor struck a familiar chord in his spry little body. And… how does she know my name? Then, quick as a blink, the faint figure disappeared, leading the boy to wonder whether or not she was there in the first place. But the scab on his knee was proof enough. The boy got up and began feeling for a way out, suddenly desperate to get out of the cold haunted mansion. A faint light led him to the open door leading to the driveway. But, hadn't his friends closed it? Just inside the gate, Souta looked up one last time at the mysterious house before hightailing it back home, to the shrine just a few blocks away.

Her eyes followed the child's flight down the street. Her heart murmured a silent prayer and blessing to whomever's cold heart controlled Fate's cruel path to watch over the boy she called brother in a life from which she was absent and taken from far too early.

XXX

A slick Mercedes hastened to a halt outside the iron gates of a large mansion. Well, actually, it's a bit small for a mansion, but too big to be called a house. Inside the gates, a colorful yard full of trees greeted the new owners, a lawn, pruned to perfection, ran up to the U-shaped driveway. The car full of white heads peeked up at the house they soon would call home. The only dark haired person in the car excitedly walked up to the front door, closely tailed by her three white haired companions.

"It's magnificent!" she exclaimed.

"Of course," the eldest of the silver haired, amber eyed males said, "I picked it."

"…" shorter and younger, the other two fanged tooth critters said nothing, both looking bored and unenthusiastic. The two young brothers stood stiffly next to the happy couple, both raising their hackles, ready to dash into the house to lay claim on rooms.

"Well then, let's go inside and figure out where to put things," Izayoi exclaimed, unintentionally commencing the latest bout of sibling rivalry. Today's event was to capture the best room in the house. Racers ready? Get set, GO!

XXX

Kagome was startled by the sudden noise. The oaken door slammed open and two charging boys came hurtling into her house. Unable to move from shock and barely registering the sudden entrance, she froze as the one of the two boys ran through her body and watched as the pair of lightning fast demons thunder upstairs and began opening and closing doors to the bedrooms. From the front door, a low warning growl hollered after them, saying that the master bedroom was reserved. Mentally, Kagome made sure the door to her favorite room was locked.

"Damn it Sesshomaru! I called this room!" Inuyasha exclaimed, trying to shove his older brother out of the way.

"Humph, this Sesshomaru has already secured this chamber as a sleeping quarters and you, my filthy half brother, will NOT challenge my claim," the low voice said in reply, sending shivers up Kagome's ghostly spine and making her rub her ears.

"Damn you!" the younger voice growled. There was some stomping before rattling and agitated and rude remarks began to burst from the doorway of Kagome's favorite room. "Damn it! Why wont this beep door open!" Kagome floated next to the hot headed hanyou, worry lines creasing her forehead as she watched her new, unwelcome houseguests seemingly tear through her carefully looked after home.

XXX

Meanwhile, still at the doorway, Izayoi and her husband peered into the house in confusion. The two brothers apparently missed the strange occupants of the house. Tables, coaches, stands, display cases and a variety of other furniture filled the building. And, considering how long the house had supposedly been empty, there was, amazingly, not even the thinnest layer of dust on the floor. Inutaishu, Izayoi's male companion, frowned, "What the fu-"

Izayoi whipped her finger up to her lover's lips, nearly skewering his nostril by accident, "Honey," she said warningly, "you've already caused enough damage to Inuyasha's vocabulary."

The white-haired demon harrumphed and gently pulled Izayoi's finger off his face, twitching his nearly damaged nose, "Well, it's not like it can get any worse," he grumbled.

"Which is exactly why you should stop and be a good example for our children," Izayoi said promptly, turning her nose up to stare into Inutaishu's disgruntled face.

"Which is why you forced, oh excuse me, asked, me to volunteer in the school's Romeo and Juliet Spring Play right? He-," Izayoi's finger was up there in an instant. Inu-papa growled btw, the term Inu-papa is something I got from yeah… just didn't wanna get accused for stealing or anything… but refrained from remarking on that.

Izayoi smiled slyly, "Well, that was for my own enjoyment. The tights really suited you."

Inu-papa was about to retort when a tap on his shoulder turned his attention to the poor moving men standing just outside the stairs, shaking as they tried to hold up a very large, heavy wooden frame of the king sized bed. "I hate to interrupt your lover's spat, but we can't hold this any longer! Where do you want it?"

Izayoi's expression softened into one of pity when she glimpsed Inu-papa's eyes give a sudden evil glitter. "Well, I was planning on having it carried upstairs…" uniformed workers groaned, trembling under the weight of the heavy framework, "But, seeing as how the house is apparently already furnished, I guess you'll just have to bring it to the storage shed in the back of the house."

Jaws dropped. The storage shed was at the very end of the backyard, nearly a football field away. Izayoi tried to keep her face straight, or at least manage to look sympathetic as she watched the poor sweating workers look at her husband as though they were ready to skin his hide (which, by the way, is sure to make a beautiful rug in the living room if he makes Izayoi angry enough).

XXX

Kagome, after getting bored of Inuyasha's moronic raving, decided to wander around to see what other damage her new freeloaders were wreaking. It certainly seems at least one of her guests would be very interesting to bother in the days to come. The loud mouthed boy stubbornly refused to stop banging on the door of the locked room, hollering curses to every god in heaven, from Roman mythology to Egyptian deities, of which kept Kagome amused for about a half an hour. But, as entertaining as that was, Kagome left to make sure not all of her prized possessions were being wrecked. The older brother seemed to be setting up his newly claimed room, the one above the dining room. A wicked smile spread across Kagome's face as she thought of the fun tricks she'd like to do with that long silver hair. And the happy couple on the first floor seemed to be admiring the ghost's choice of décor, or at least the female one. The demon seemed more interested in the Miko weapons display. Kagome giggled at the horrified expression on his face as he read some of the detailed cards next to them. Finally, Kagome glanced outside to see a pathetic little troop of workers lugging furniture to the shed. A frown emerged on her forehead as she watched the poor guys. That dog demon was working them like dogs! That'll have to be fixed.

XXX

Ken set his end down to rest for a little bit, wiping off the pouring sweat. Damn this hot July weather! Damn this heat! Damn those good for nothing dogs! He bent down to once again pick up the heavy bed frame. SMACK! The five laborers fell backwards, howling in pain and shock, as the frame levitated itself and flew across the field to the shed. Wide eyes and strained nerves panicked and were out of there in a blink of an eye. 'hmph' grumbled Kagome, 'ungrateful dogs!' she thought jokingly. Kagome glanced at the pile of things that yet needed to be transported and smiled, 'let's get to work then.'

XXX

"Honey?" Izayoi asked, the family had gathered around the traditional low Japanese table and were digging into the meal, "where do you think all the movers went?"

"I don't know," Inu-papa said carelessly. The entire group didn't notice the little flicker in the back of the room of a little ghost watching the feast and salivating hungrily.

'Stupid ghost body!' Kagome grumbled, 'can smell, touch (well, not really) and hear things, but can't TASTE them!' Kagome's poor translucent tummy flopped around inside her ghostly form as she watch the happy (well, almost happy) family eat; the lucky numbskulls! Tired of watching, Kagome floated up to sulk in her room, the locked one. She looked around it, at everything, perfectly situated the way they were before the incident. Gloomily, Kagome picked through her things, her paintings, her pictures, her books, her memories. Happy days, sad days, they all revolve around this room. The familiar weight seeped into Kagome's body, her tidal-waving emotions causing her to materialize. The lively family downstairs burst into laughter, a sound that hollowly hacked at Kagome's ears. Tears, real tears, started to fall from her eyes, her mind far away, in a time when she had a family, a family that laughed together the same way they did downstairs. But that time had passed, preserved only by the pictures in front of her, fragments of a time where she had been whole, content and happy.

XXX

Sniff, sniff. Inuyasha's nose twitched when he picked up a new scent. Suspicious golden eyes locked onto the door in front of him. The one that wouldn't open, not matter how much he cursed and yell at it, not that he expected it to. What was weird, was the fact that there was a scent coming from the room, a strange one, and definitely female. And there were… tears? Question marks floating around his head, he gave the door another try. Still locked. Oh well, the hanyou thought, surprisingly not bothered by the uncooperative door, let's get settled into my new room.

Kagome had been startled back into transparency when the door gave a little rattle; the only evidence of her being there was a few drops of quickly drying tears. Staring at them, she couldn't help but wonder again why she was allowed to have a solid body, only when her emotions were too crazy to enjoy it. Sadness was usually the reason. But, happiness too. Kagome looked thoughtfully at her precious pictures before deciding to go play tricks on her room mates.

Inuyasha would be her first victim. He was sitting on his bed, looking around, obviously wondering who the hell owned this room before him. Kagome giggled, remembering the cute little boy who used to live there. Poke-mon decorated an entire wall, and across from them, transformers armada fought the forces of evil. The teenage mutant ninja turtles looked even more mutant that usual on another wall, and the Power rangers gave the onlooker thumbs up on another heroic victory. Kagome started to develop an idea.

Inuyasha glared at the disgusting décor around his room, it all just has to go! The Pikachu, the freaky turtles, the runaway trucks, all of it! Sickened straight to his gut, Inuyasha failed to notice the red power ranger sneak up behind him. Kagome grinned widely as she tackled the unsuspecting demon with the paper power ranger. Inuyasha leaped sky high, an oink-like squeal escaping his lips. WHAT THE beep! Inuyasha crashed down, wailing his arms and legs out in all directions, growling and grunting as he fought the posters gone bad. Two worried head poked into his room. Izayoi's pretty face furrowed a little in concern, not sure what to make of her spazzing son. Inu-papa just stared, mouth open, eyes blank. The ghost in the corner watch in delight as her victim squirmed under the red power ranger's karate chopping assault. Izayoi and her husband backed away from the door and closed it, horrified expressions on their face. Our son has finally lost his marbles… they simultaneously thought. Meanwhile, Kagome, biting her lip to keep from laughing too hard, sent more killer posters his direction. This time, Sesshomaru stuck his head in to see what all the ruckus was about, and left shortly after, his face not changing at all. All that brain-damage I gave must have finally gotten to him, Fluffy thought as he walked away from the scene, Izayoi and Inu-papa still standing near the door in shock.

While busy frantically tearing off the evil posters, swearing to random gods and slipping on the torn shreds, one of Inuyasha's sensitive ears picked up the faint, but distinct sound of uncontrolled laughing. What the hell…? Still slipping, Inuyasha reached out toward the sound, more surprised than Kagome was when he touched something solid. And down they crashed. Wha-? Inuyasha thought, feeling something, a body, fall on top of him as he slipped on a shred of paper. The dog demon looked at his hand, dazed. He was obviously gripping something, but, nothing at the same time. Lowering his nose, he proceeded to sniff whatever it was that he held, the paper attackers finally returning to they're original lifeless forms.

Kagome quickly recovered from her initial surprise, shock and amusement flooding into her ghostly body, and stared wonderingly into the bewitching golden eyes. Why it was that he was able to touch her, she had no idea, but after five months of getting used to being dead, Kagome had gotten accustomed to this type of unexpected occurrences. Inuyasha however, couldn't believe his eyes. This girl, pretty girl (o.O), had slowly appeared out of no where! She had this mischievous look in her eyes, mixed with a dash of hot sunshine. Inuyasha, frozen, stared into the deep blue eyes, now absolutely certain that he'd just gone crazy.

"First of all, it's rude to start sniffing someone you don't even know." Inuyasha jumped at the sound of her voice. Eeps! He thought, it talked!

"Secondly, staring is very rude too," Kagome narrowed her eyes when he didn't respond, "Hello? You alive over there?" Kagome waved her hand in front of his face. The boy blinked a few times, and finally refocused his eyes on her. Suddenly, everything happened at once.

"Who the HELL are YOU!" Kagome lurched backwards to avoid getting knocked on the head with Inuyasha's dense little skull. Inuyasha had leaped up at her, and would have knocked her over if she hadn't had her ghostly powers. Tilted at a 20 degree angle from the floor, Inuyasha, out of shock, didn't even realize the compromising position he'd just forced the two of them into.

"No, wait, WHAT the hell are you!" Inu-papa once again poked his head into his lunatic son's room. Even more freaked out than before, Inu-papa's eyes just about shot out of his head when he saw his son talking to air, well, yelling rather, although, in this house, it'll come to mean the same thing. Quickly closing the door, he once again, stood out there, his mouth hanging open, in a weirded out daze. Izayoi was standing beside him, the same expression written neatly across her face.

"Is he still acting-" she started.

"Crazy…" Inu-papa finished for her.

Back it his room, Inuyasha and his "imaginary friend" were getting better acquainted.

"HEY! ANSWER ME!" Inuyasha growled at the ghost, who seemed to be giving him the silent treatment. Kagome was humming a little bit, hanging the blood-thirsty posters back up, fixing the giant tearing gashes the best she could.

"Hum deed um deed um dum dum dooooooo-"

"ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME!" Inuyasha screamed, tearing down the ginormous puzzle Kagome was working oh so hard to fix up.

"I'm not going to answer you until you either clean up that obnoxious mouth of yours, and start talking politely," Kagome said, levitating herself up to his height level, making Inuyasha jump back a bit, "or at least stop yelling, I may be dead but I'm not deaf!"

"You're… WHAT!" Inuyasha nearly shrieked. Kagome winced; it really isn't as though her hearing had gone bad after death you know. Inuyasha, eyes fired up and muscles tensed, unconsciously tightened his grip on the girl's wrist. Poor Kagome winced again, feeling the pain as though she were in her solid body, but quickly looked up at the spazzing dog demon, pain fading fast from her face.

"Well, bye, bye!" was the last thing Inuyasha heard as the ghost disappeared. The posters around his room fell fluttering to the ground, and deafening silence settled in her wake.

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT!" Inuyasha screamed; frustration radiated off his tense, freaked out body. Outside his room, Inu-papa and his wife jumped at the sudden explosive outburst. That's exactly what I wanted to know, they thought.

XXX

Yawning, Inuyasha stomped down the stairs, lazily finishing pulling on his shirt. He opened his mouth to ask his mother what was for dinner when he caught sight of the last thing he wanted to see. A semi transparent dark haired girl stood next to his mom. Frozen stiff, Inuyasha watched helplessly as his mother placed an egg on the counter and turn to assemble other ingredients. The lone egg promptly disappeared, and another egg was added to the egg carton. Izayoi look confused at the counter before shrugging and retrieving another egg from the carton. Fuzzy white ears trembled in an effort not to laugh; Inuyasha felt his stomach shake in repressed laughter as he watched his mother scratch her head as she turned on the stove a second time. From the corner of his eye, he could see that the culprit was also finding amusement in her actions. Seeing the ghost, however, sobered him up quite a bit. This was the same girl that caused him so much grief in his room last night.

"What are you doing, move it," a cold baritone voice said from behind him. Inuyasha jumped, then growled, trying to recollect himself and slumped down into place at the table. Sending a side long glance at the "invisible" member of the household, Inuyasha raised an eye brow when he saw her face light up with that sneaky smirk she'd given him the other night. Sesshomaru, oblivious to the danger, walked around the kitchen to get his breakfast. Inuyasha picked up a glass of milk and was about to drink when…

Kagome delightedly ran her fingers down Sesshomaru's long smooth locks. What soft strands! Oh how she bristled in jealousy for a moment, wishing that she had hair like that while she was alive. The dog demon stiffened a bit, sensing a presence behind him, though his senses told him no. Shaking off the feeling, he continued to move about the kitchen, interrupted only when his half breed brother suddenly guffawed.

Inuyasha watched, wriggling with mirth, as the strange girl walked behind his brother, successfully exaggerating the obsessively self-important style of moving characteristic only to Fluffy. Kagome stuck her chin into the air, her lips puckering out and her eyes staring down at her nose. She buffed out her chest and flexed her not too flattering biceps with one hand, and patted an imaginary stray lock of hair with the other. Inuyasha distinctly heard monologue to accompany the show as well.

"Look at me one and all; it is I the mighty king of fluff and all natural hair products. I am the emperor plastic surgery and synthetic sex change! Oh yeah, I'm just way too sexy for all of you. I bet you wish you were as sexy as me. Humph, I too good for all of you, even with my oddly girly face and freaky tattoo's and my over-grown arm-pit hair draped over my shoulder. Yes, my sense of style is unrivaled. I tell you, guys in dresses are all the rage now in my world…"

To the sound of Inuyasha's laughter, Kagome turned to look at him, surprised. Her faced quickly warmed with a goofy smile and she gave him a small victory sign. Inuyasha, hardly registering her actions, continued to laugh like there was no tomorrow. Meanwhile, Izayoi and Inutaishu were busy looking up numbers to the nearest psychologists in the area.

When the family finally settled down for breakfast, Inuyasha was surprised to find that the ghost had disappeared. Shrugging, he dove into his pancakes and bacon, unprepared to round 2 of torture-the-family-you're-haunting super sweep stakes.

"Izayoi, would you please pass the syr- oh, thank you," Inu-papa said, barely taking any of his attention off his wife's delicious home cooking.

"What dear? I didn't do anything," Izayoi said, her attention on her breakfast as well. Inu-papa, a little bewildered, glanced at the bottle of syrup he'd just put down. He clearly remembered it falling into his outstretched hand. Whatever, he got his syrup, that's all he wanted. A loud clang resounded throughout the room. Startled heads shot up to see what happened. Sesshomaru's face muscles flinch only in the slightest as he got up to pick up some lost silverware that seemed to have fallen off the kitchen counter. Inuyasha, starting to vaguely put together what was going on, glanced around the room suspiciously before turning back to his meal. Upon returning his gaze to his food, he promptly proceeded to leap backwards with startled yelp.

"Hehe, good morning!" Kagome said; her neck was directly in the center of Inuyasha's plate. The other occupants of the table stared at their youngest member with surprised concern. Inuyasha, blushing up to his ears in embarrassment, shuffled back to his seat, stabbing a fork into the annoying girl's head.

Kagome winced as the solid object passed straight through her. Jeez, she knew she was causing some discomfort among her guests, but did he have to stab her through like that? Inuyasha, meanwhile, smirked at her obvious wincing reaction and haughtily continued to eat through her head. Miffed to no end, Kagome did the next thing that popped into her head, she kicked under the table. The white head jumped in surprise, quickly turning shock into anger. 'How dare he…' the demon thought dangerously. Sesshomaru watched lividly as Inuyasha innocently ate his meal. 'So you want to play it that way do you?'

Inuyasha jumped into the air, a cry of pain slipping from his lips. And thus, the scene at breakfast quickly transformed into a brawl.

XXX

"YOU!" Inuyasha growled. He had the girl stiffly by the shoulders and was pushing her back into the wall when he realized something, making him double back and sharply jerked her a step closer to him. Kagome winced at his tight hold, scared to her wits end, and unable to concentrate enough to transport herself out of her captor's hold.

"What?" she asked irritably, annoyed by the sudden unwelcome sensation of pain running through her body.

"Explain everything, damn it!" Inuyasha demanded, "from what the beep are you doing here to how the hell you exist!"

"I don't need a reason to stay here!" Kagome cried back, losing her temper for the first time in 5 months, "and how on earth am I supposed to know why I am what I am! It's not like I went to ghost school or anything to learn about it!" Inuyasha tightened his hold on the poor girl, the shooting pain, surprisingly, bringing semitransparent bruises to her exposed skin.

"Then just tell me everything you know!" Inuyasha screamed. He'd cornered Kagome in the attic, and locked the door so that no one else can come in and haul him off to an asylum. In response to a bone chilling glare from Kagome, he gripped her arm with renewed vigor, determined to squeeze every last drop of information out of her. Hissing a little in pain, Kagome finally relented.

"Fine!" Kagome yelled as loud as she could at his dog ears, Inuyasha winced visibly but refused to let her go, "I died 5 months ago, ok?"

"Yeah," Inuyasha said, obviously waiting for her to go on. When she didn't, the half demon flexed his grip as a warning, making the ghost yelp and continue, venom dripping from every word that came out.

"I died 5 months ago and woke up here. Apparently, the law of gravity doesn't affect me and I'm not supposed to be visible to humans and demons, only some animals and people with spiritual powers-"

"Then why the hell can I see you!" Inuyasha cut in, driving Kagome further past her boiling point. Her frown deepened as she ground out the rest of her story.

"I can't touch solid objects but I can manipulate them with my mind. You're not supposed to be able to see me and I can't touch people."

"Then how'd you kick Sesshomaru in the shin today?" Inuyasha asked, slowly starting to cool his temper. She was finally cooperating.

"I gathered some power and just thrust it at him," Kagome replied promptly.

"Then why couldn't we feel it?"

"Because my powers don't have a presence, I'm technically not there, only in spirit, and the spirit realm operates on a parallel, yet non intersecting, dimension or something like that… oh, how should I know!" Kagome cried, giving up on this hopeless hanyou.

"And how come I smelled you're scent yesterday, just after dinner?" Inuyasha questioned.

Kagome looked up at him shocked, "You smelled me?"

Inuyasha snorted, "Well yeah, it's not hard to miss a stench like that." 'Smelled like something green, like springtime, or something.'

"Well I'm so sorry," Kagome yelled at him in disgusted awe at his audacity, "but we ghosts don't exactly have readily accessible showers where we can bathe everyday like you solid beings can."

'Don't shower,' Inuyasha thought, 'it'd be nice to smell that every-' He quickly cut his train of thought right there, and said instead, "Well, why did you suddenly have a scent?"

Kagome looked down, "I don't know, I just happen to materialize sometimes when I get a strong emotion, like sadness or joy. I guess it's because a spirit is simply there, it's not supposed to have emotions; it just exists. But for a ghost, you still have conscious thought, and thus you have emotions as well, however, things like that can only exist in this plane, and not the spirit realm… or something…" Changing her tune quickly, she glared up at him, "Are you happy now?"

"Almost," Inuyasha said, the steam quickly leaving his initial assault, "why didn't you move on?"

Kagome blinked a few times to the blunt question. Why didn't she? She didn't quite know herself. She was a top student, always did well at anything she tried. She had a loving family, and friends that had looked out for her, or at least looked up to her. 'Why haven't I moved on?' she asked herself, 'Even I don't know the answer to that.'

Inuyasha felt the strained silence more than his ears did. About to open his mouth to say something to lighten, or at least liven, the mood, Kagome suddenly murmured something that caught all his attention.

She spoke in a hushed whisper, as if afraid to speak. It was as if she was afraid that if she voiced this, something terrible would happen. Her voice was serious and sad, her naturally cheery tone dampened by suffering she never deserved. Inuyasha's human heart lurched in unfamiliar ways as the dead girl whispered.

"I guess, there's something here that I need to do. Something that's so important, that even dying isn't allowed to be an excuse not to do it."

"Here is a test to find out whether your mission in life is complete. If you're alive, it isn't" Richard Bach