Disclaimer: Please note that I claim no rights to Inuyasha. This is purely for fun. I am making no profits from this story.
Kagome walked home, like she did every day. One foot in front of the other, just as she'd reminded herself to do since the beginning. Unlike usual, Kagome was walking this path about fifteen minutes later than she would have had she not needed bagels, butter, rice, and nori. The blue-tainted-white plastic bag slung from her wrist as she kept her hands in her coat pockets served as explanation for her lateness to any neighbours noticing the difference.
She lived alone in a third-floor apartment in Japan. She had been careful to choose where she lived - to make it close to where she would emerge from the well each time she used it in feudal Japan. That reasoning escaped her usually, because she didn't like to think about it. She wanted it to be easy for him to find her, should he be alive and come looking. She'd carved the year that came and went two cycles past deep into a tumbled stone with a file and given it to him five years ago. Five years it had been since his voice had last touched her ears. Five years since he had kissed her in the well for that last time.
He'd promised to come. He promised he would start searching exactly five hundred years into the future, like the stone said. He'd promised it with such a low, pained tone.
She knew why. She knew that, if he were to be alive, he would be seven hundred years old - if he managed to merge into modern day society and escape dangers for that long. The next five hundred years would be wrenching for him, if he decided to wait for her, and not mate to someone else. The next five hundred years for him would be… probably as odd as the last five had been for her. She knew that time was next to nothing for the immortal - Sesshomaru had been five hundred around the time she'd spent in the feudal era.
She sighed and unlocked her door, pushing him out of her mind. Stepping into the warmth of her apartment, she pulled off her coat, hanging it on the hooks that hung on the wall beside the door. She carefully put her things away in the kitchen, ate a snack of peanuts and chocolate-chips, and spent the next few hours before the usual winter dusk at 6:30 on her computer, talking to Yuka and Eri over email and researching ferrets, which someone had said something about while walking past her desk today at work. After the sun set, she said good night and called Mama to chat while eating a chicken salad dinner. When the phone call ended, she showered, blew-dry her hair, and went to sleep.
Tuesday was almost exactly the same as Monday. Her alarm sounded at 6:45 AM, and she spent five minutes toasting and buttering two blueberry bagels for breakfast while packing sushi rolls for lunch. At 6:50, she ate breakfast quickly, and at 7, she softly padded barefoot to the bathroom and applied a little bit of eyeliner to the corners of her bottom eyelids, a little bit of concealer to even out her skin tone, and some black mascara to lengthen her eyelashes. Satisfied with her appearance, she dressed in the usual black jeans, white company blouse (tucked in, of course) and black flats with a small buckle on the front of each. She spritzed perfume over her blouse once (and only once) before shutting all the lights in the house off and donning her coat, purse, and lunch, and walking briskly out the front door of her apartment a minute early, at 7:09.
Kagome knew she was giving prime examples of obsessive-compulsive behavior, but this was a comfortable way of living for her. The obsession she had with doing things on schedule had come just a few months after she'd returned home from the feudal era for the last time. It had upset Yuka, Eri, and Ayumi that she'd become so nervous about time escaping her grasp, so Kagome left out two hours after school in her schedule to be filled by chattering, eating fast food, and laughing.
The time with her friends had been a sort of therapy that she could find nowhere else. It was comfort to talk to Yuka, Eri, and Ayumi. They all knew that Kagome had taken a jump start in her career, and had chosen to stay close to home and not go to college, but continue working as a secretary. She worked in an office for an electronics company, and had for the last three years. Only when she'd left the Shrine had she picked up the job full-time. It served as good income and pleasant way to affect others. She could talk to someone that was having a bad day on the phone cheerily for a few minutes and know that she'd lifted their mood, which made her feel excellent.
It was therefore a completely normal trip to work, a completely normal work day, and a completely normal afternoon as she walked home. It began snowing lightly when she turned onto her street and she looked up at the trees around her, admiring the beauty they held for once. It seemed to her as though she never really appreciated the beauty of things anymore.
It was four forty when she got home, like it was every day. She repeated Monday afternoon until she realized she wanted a cheeseburger more than she wanted to stay in, and more than she wanted anything that she currently had in stock.
She slipped warmer boots on and donned her coat to walk to the nearest fast food restaurant. She got the bigger dinner this time instead of scrimping and walked home with a surprisingly little amount of anxiety. She'd managed to block 98% of the memories of being around Tokyo with him, and this particular trip, like most to and from work, was devoid of thoughts of him.
Wednesday.
Thursday.
… Friday.
Kagome had been forced to bring her backpack to work in order to bring a change of clothes appropriate for the weather. She tried not to let it bother her too much, but by the time she came home and slipped her feet out of her weatherproof boots, she was in a stressful mood. It made her even more stressed that she was in a stressful mood, because this was when she started letting memories come through.
She waited until 8:30 PM to pour herself a glass of bright pink alcohol called "Kinky." She didn't admire the name, but it tasted like mango and passion fruit, and she needed it like she needed it every Friday evening, to wash away the stresses of the week and pretend she never had to leave the sanctuary that was her apartment again.
Just like she needed to watch this soap opera and forget about how empty her life was. How empty her heart was.
Around eleven, Kagome went to take a shower, and although the alcohol had lulled her into a half-asleep state, the task went without incident. Just as she changed into her pajamas and hung up her jewelry, there was a soft knock at the door.
She froze. It was far too late for this to be anything normal, like apartment complex management or family. Grabbing her mace off her dresser, she stalked to the door as quietly as she could. When she looked out the peephole, her stomach seemed to catch and she thought she might have left her insides behind her in time. A dark haired man stood at the door, either looking down or with closed eyes. He wore a black pull-over hoodie with no distinguishing insignia.
It couldn't be Inuyasha. Inuyasha had hanyou ears, Inuyasha was shorter than this man. But that face looked so familiar and so much like his. Perhaps he was a salesman, and he was looking down at pamphlets to hand out. Yes, that would be it, Kagome decided. Though she smacked herself mentally for letting herself think his name, her organs seemed to return the where she was. She opened the door with a composed expression and set the mace on the table by the door.
As soon as she got her first real look at him, she knew. It knocked the wind out of her to see him standing there. He raised his eyes to hers and the sweet, amber-gold went right through her. She swore her legs would give out, and she was so heavy from the alcohol. Upon meeting her eyes, the man raised his right hand and seemed to grab something around his forehead. He pushed his hand back, and the black hair came with it. The wig fell onto the ground, leaving two white dog ears exposed. His silvery hanyou hair had been chopped short, likely to help hide it. The black jeans and black shoes he wore almost looked out of place, but he seemed to fit into them as well as he'd fit into his red - his red -
Kagome's eyes tore at his neckline. They found the purple beads in an instant.
"Finally," he said softly. He cracked a smile. "I'm two years late, but I found you." Inuyasha held out the carven-stone she had given him five hundred - or five? - years ago. The smile faded from his face as he watched her.
Kagome stared at him for a moment before she had to support herself with the doorframe. The alcohol's effect seemed to be getting heavier and she closed her eyes for one exhausted moment.
"You've been drinking," he said. He reached a hand out - a hand with trimmed claws - to grab her before she fell. "Please - can I touch you - ?"
"Inuyasha," she gasped. She started to collapse, but the hanyou dropped whatever it was he was holding - Kagome hadn't seen, only heard - and caught her. Immediately looking around to the balcony to make sure no one had just seen what happened, he picked her up bridal-style, as he had so many times before, and carried her to the couch. Laying her down, he moved swiftly and gathered the things he'd left out on the doorstep before locking the door and returning to her side.
"I don't have to stay if you don't want me here, Kagome. Don't let me make you uncomfortable. I've been tracing your scent since this afternoon, when I finally found it on the train, but it was two days old and it got too faint in some places - I thought -"
Kagome opened exhausted eyes and her expression silenced him. "I thought you had gone away," she said before she closed her eyes and fell into an unwilling sleep before him. After about a minute, he decided that her bed would be where he wanted her to wake up. He scooped her up again and revelled for the first time in five hundred long, agonized years in her soft, slightly cold skin. He set her down on the right side of the bed and pulled her blankets over her before he realized that this bed, a different one than he remembered, was big enough for both of them. Kagome had a lot of blankets, as though she had a hard time keeping warm by herself.
His heart panged. He automatically wished that he'd showed up when he was supposed to, so that she wouldn't have spent these last two years almost completely alone.
Because this apartment had not seen another soul in quite a long time, that he knew by scent.
He walked back to the living room and unzipped the pet carrier he had with him. Nothing emerged, but a soft mewl ensued. He reached into a backpack and pulled out his old clothing, like he'd planned. He unwrapped Tessaiga, setting it on her kitchen counter as he changed. He wasn't self-conscious in the slightest; he knew she wouldn't be waking any time soon.
He tied his obi before walking silently - barefoot - through the tiny living room and into her bedroom. Pulling back her blankets, he climbed into bed with her and wrapped a warm arm around her waist. He thought he would explode from the overwhelming swelling in his chest, the happiness that he was finally here, with her, once more, breathing her scent that he'd been so afraid he wouldn't be able to remember.
Kagome didn't move in the slightest.