I'm so used to writing InuYasha and Kagome romances; now I'm trying something new by exploring the relationship between our favourite Sesshomaru and Rin! Relationships won't always be perfect; Kodak moments don't last forever (pun totally intended.) This story came to me when I was reading a really sad excerpt a friend sent me last night.

I wanted to do a tribute to the online story and in a way I wanted to write my own interpretation to it. The first chapter is very similar to the original story (in fact, I used it as a reference and decided to keep key lines from the original story because they were just so... poignant) but having that been said I'm not intending to infringe on copyrights and I'm certainly not taking credit for it. I would love to cite it but the authorship of this story is unknown.

I don't think I need to disclaim anything here. It's just so obvious I don't have the ownership over any of the characters from our favourite anime series either!

Well, I think I'm going to change my style up a bit with this story... you know? Change is good.

She was adroit at the chopping board. Each pepper was sliced perfectly into the same thickness. With the flicker of the gas, the stove lit with blue fire and she gingerly placed the pan on the fire to preheat. It had been a long day - she had spent the entire morning cleaning the tatami flooring of the bedrooms and washed all of the delicate laundry by hand. It was just a typical day in the life of Rin Takahashi. As a faithful wife, she had fulfilled her uxorial duties from cleaning and caring for her husband. She attended to his every need. When she married him, she gave up her budding career to start a family. Instead of trading stocks at the Tokyo Stock Exchange and watching the Nikkei index, she was now bartering at the produce markets and browsing through supermarket promotional advertisements on a weekly basis.

Rin glanced at the clock once again: 6:45 pm. She was expecting her husband to be back from work any moment now. For some odd reason today, he was late. Rin lifted the simmering pot of miso soup from the stove and poured the soup into each bowl. She laid down two pairs of chopsticks and set the small dishes of daikon radish and tsukudani salted fish on the dinner table. Those were Sesshomaru's two favorite side dishes; Rin never forgot to prepare them for him.

"Rin."

Rin turned to see her husband stepping into the house; she flashed a bright smile across her face as she always had. She was always so glad to see him. Her face bloomed. Rin took off her apron, set it aside, and approached her husband and tried to give him a gentle kiss on the cheek.

He crouched down to untie his shoelaces, dodging the kiss.

Rin cringed but she recollected herself. Nevertheless she was hurt.

"Welcome home, honey. How was your day?" Rin tried to engage her husband in a conversation while helping him take off his light autumn jacket and accepting his briefcase from his hands. She never brought her eyes to his. Instead, she kept her head low and helped him get settled before dinner.

He said nothing to her. His face was cold and stoic. Rin's heart sank - she knew what was to come.

"I made unagi for you today," Rin tried to ease the atmosphere between them but her effort failed miserably.

Sesshomaru's Point of View.

When I finally came home after a long day at work, Rin was there to greet me. She had already made dinner as usual and she made my favorite dishes, as usual. Our days were nothing but mundane routines.

We ate in silence for we had long before run out of things to talk about. We no longer had anything in common. It was like we were strangers living under the same roof engaged in the same daily routines and nothing else. Nothing. The fire was gone; the romance was dead, and love? What love?

I need to tell her; I met with the lawyer today.

I put down my chopsticks and slowly grabbed her hands into mine. It was so unnatural. Her hands were clammy and frozen cold. She was shaking.

I could see the pain in her eyes; her usual warm and exuberant chocolate eyes were now filled with anguish. At that moment, I didn't know how to begin. I had been planning this for a while now; why couldn't I say the words? The cat got my tongue; I was lost for words. I've been obsessing this for weeks now; I should tell her. I really, really shouldn't drag this out for too long.

After some time, I finally mustered enough strength to begin. I stared steadily into her eyes.

"I want a divorce."

My voice was tranquil. I've finally said it. She probably had braced herself because when those four words came out of my mouth, she only stared at me blankly like she had already expected it. She must have, it wasn't the first day our marriage was falling apart.

There was an eerie silence between us. She winnowed her tiny hands out of mine and brought the bowl of miso soup to her lips. I waited for her to finish the bowl of soup before she began again.

"Why?" she asked softly.

Her calm disposition scared me. I was expecting her to have a fit. Her reaction only made me feel guilty.

I didn't want to answer her question. It was a rhetorical question. She knew why I wanted a divorce and so did I. I didn't think it was necessary for me to explain myself any further. Then, she did something I had never expected her to do. Rin stood up and stared sternly at me. I've never heard so much conviction in her words.

"You're not the man who I thought I loved," she raised her voice at me, slamming the bowl onto the table. Rin had never done anything like this. She left the table. For the first time in our marriage, she left the dishes on the table after dinner.

I sat in the dining room for some time until the sun set and there was no more sunlight pouring into the windows. It was dusk. I got up and grabbed my briefcase that was beside the door and stepped into our bedroom. She was sitting by the window, curled up into a ball and whimpering in tears. I should give her a definite answer but I couldn't. How would I even begin? I no longer loved her. In fact, there was nothing I felt towards her other than pity. I pitied her. I'm now in love with some else. I love Sara Asano. Sara was a flutist for the Nippon National Philharmonic. I met her at the company's annual gala a year ago. When I first laid my eyes on her, I knew I had to have her.

I am only doing this to please my father. Believe me, I would much rather be somewhere else right now. Anywhere but here. This was pathetic. My wife, Rin was back at her mother's place to take care of my ill in-laws. I'm just here for the food so I didn't have to cook. Catering at the company gala was always spectacular.

I sipped my champagne and felt the fizzy alcohol tease my tongue. I was drinking to my misery and boredom. I was wasting my life here; I surveyed the premises to amuse myself with something interesting, then suddenly there she was. Young and beautiful in a low cut black floor-length gown. She was stunning. I felt a sudden peak of interest arousing me. It was pure lust and I knew it.

I took a few steps towards her and grabbed her hand firmly into mine. My gaze never left her stunning gray eyes. I slowly brought her hand to my lips.

"I believe I have just met an angel who has just fallen from the heavens," my voice was reassuring and confident as I began. I was going to seduce her with my charm.

"I'm sorry, I'm not interested," she stared back at me with a sexy smirk across those plump lips.

A woman with a little feisty edge? I liked it. I knew I had to have her in my bed that night. I, the great Sesshomaru Takahashi always had it my way.

Her body was below mine. My fingers were intertwined in her long brown tresses.

"Sess... h...o... maru..." she cried my name. I felt my insatiable hunger fulfilled for the very first time. Her body was trembling; her pants were heavy and rapid.

My wife could no longer fulfill my appetite, only Sara could. That was the first night of my yearlong affair with Sara Asano.

Rin had lost my heart to Sara.

"Here," I handed the thick Manila envelope to my wife without looking down at her. I just held it before her with my right hand as I tucked my left hand in the pocket of my suit pants.

"What's this?" she looked up to me curiously and grabbed it from me with hands.

"Open it," I began. "It's the divorce papers. You can have the car, our savings account with the 60 million yen, the house, and 25% share of Takahashi Corporation."

It was the least I could do for Rin since I am telling her that I wanted to end our five-year marriage. I didn't need any of the money; I'm giving all of it to her as compensation. I pitied her. I pitied her for all the unnecessary energy she had put into our marriage. I pitied her effort to patch up our torn relationship. I pitied her for all those time she had wasted being my wife. I really wanted to make it up to her but there was nothing I could do other than to give her money. I can't reciprocate everything emotionally she had sacrificed because I love Sara and not her.

"Who do you think I am, Sesshomaru?" she began yelling. Rin never yelled. I had never heard her yell out once at me for the fourteen years we had known each other. "I don't need any of this! You think I'm in it for the money? Take it… take it all away. I don't want the money!"

She surprised me once again as she tore open the envelope and began ripping the divorce papers out page by page. She bit her lips as she used all of her energy to tear the fifty pages of document into tiny pieces that were now accumulated on the floor. Tears poured down her face like a waterfall.

I did nothing but to stand there and watch.

It was catharsis for the both of us. I had faked my emotions in front of her for so long, I've cheated and lied to her for so long... Now, it was all coming together and making sense. I admitted to adultery - I now had nothing to hide from her anymore.

Since when did I fall out of love with her? I once promised her that only death would do us apart and now I wanted nothing more than a way out of our marriage.

I woke up in the morning and found her side of the bed untouched and empty. Where was this woman?

I rolled out of bed and threw on a cardigan sweater. I roamed down the halls to find her in the study scribing away. She looked up at me; her gaze was begging me to approach her and so I did.

"Here are my divorce conditions, Sesshomaru," she held the page out for me to see. I glanced at her pristine writing. "I want two months. Just two more months before we finalize the divorce. During these two months, I want us to live as normally as we can, together."

"Rin..." I turned my attention away from the paper with the two conditions to look at her. Why didn't she want anything else? She could have gotten so much more out of this marriage. If it were any other woman, she would have driven me to the ground with her excessive financial demands. But Rin wasn't any other woman.

"I'm not finished yet," she continued as she recollected her conditions before I interrupted her. "Remembered how you used to rock me in your arms as you watched me sleep? I want you to do that; I want you to hold me in your arms every single night for the next two months."

I perked my eyebrow and gawked at her with a perplexed and bewildered expression. I have never heard of anything more bizarre in my life. Yes, I was used to Rin's odd requests... but this? What the hell would that do for us?

"Rin... I..."

"I only have two conditions. They are the only two things I ask of you from our marriage. Do you agree to the conditions?"

That was true. I pitied her. The vulnerability on her face made me weak; I didn't have the heart to turn down her two simple requests.

"I do."

Remember Sara Asano? The princess from episode 133? How appropriate.