(Hey people, this is my first submitted fic, so go easy on me, ok? And by the way, Inuyasha and all respected characters don't belong to me, and neither does anyone from Sailor Moon...and with that, please enjoy!)
Ch 1
Inuyasha paced the shrine grounds. "Where is that wench?"
Kagome was two days late. TWO DAYS! She promised to come back to the Feudal Era in a week, and here it was, nine days later, and she still wasn't back!
He began to pace faster as his anger grew. 'She always does this! She always stays for too long and then I have to come back to this stinkhole and get her! Why I put up with her I don't know!' He was snapped out of his rant by a broom getting pushed into his face.
"Inuyasha! You could at least be doing something productive like sweeping instead of pacing!" Kagome's mother pushed the broom a little further to the half inu-youkai and waited for him to take it. "Just wait until she comes back from school; she'll only be out another ten minutes or so."
"Keh," muttered the half-demon as he snatched the broom from her outstretched hand. He pulled his haori sleeves up and began sweeping.
"Oh, by the way," said Kagome's mother. "Here, so no one sees your ears." She tied a purple bandana over the white appendages.
'I hate this,' thought Inuyasha as he tried to move his ears. 'It's not as bad as the cap though.' He shrugged his shoulders and went back to sweeping.
True to her mother's words, Kagome did come home around ten minutes later, but she was not alone.
Two girls began the long trek up the shrine stairs. "So, we'll meet at my house for the project today and tomorrow, right?" The raven-haired girl looked at the new student. She had silver hair and bright blue eyes that were shining with happiness.
"Yeah, and then we'll meet at my house on Thursday and Friday."
"Well, we're almost there," Kagome huffed as the girls mounted the last set of stairs. "One good thing about living at a shrine: you become an expert at climbing stairs," said Kagome as she jumped the remaining two steps.
Serena nodded and followed suit. "Whew, if I were you Kagome, I would get an elevator installed or something," she said jokingly as her heart rate tried to even itself out and her breathing returned to normal.
"Fantastic idea, but I don't think Grandpa would like having an elevator on the shrine grounds." Kagome swiped her hair out of her eyes as she laughed and looked over to Serena who now had her breath back. "Come on, I'll introduce you to my…" Kagome trailed off as she spotted a certain half demon running around like a chicken with its head cut off, dragging a broom. Before he began running, she could swear he could have been sweeping. The first thought that came to her mind was 'That's weird,' and the second was, 'Holy cow, not good, I need to get him outta there before she-'
"So Kagome, who's that?" Serena was looking at the silver-haired boy. 'His hair is the same color as mine…I wonder if he colors it?' She began walking over to him, shaking her head of her stupid question.
Inuyasha looked up from his sweeping. He smelled not only Kagome's scent but someone else's as well. 'I hope it's not her crazy friends she's always telling me about…they sound weird.' He lifted his nose in the air and took a deep breath. 'The new girl smells like roses…and something else,' he deduced after a minute of thinking. 'Anyone who smells that good has to be nice.' He flushed at his thoughts and then heard them talking. 'Introduce the family huh? That just might scare the new girl away. Especially if I'm…if I'M here! Need to hide, need to hide…' His eyes darted for a good hiding place. 'Behind the tree?' He began heading to the tree, but he stopped. 'No, she'll spot me running to it; it's too far away.' Turning to the house, he shook his head. 'The house? No, she's probably heading to the house. How about-'
Too late.
He heard the girl ask Kagome who he was. He then heard Kagome clear her throat.
"Well, he's my cousin from…Australia, yeah." She nodded her head trying to convince the other girl of his origins.
Serena looked at Kagome. 'She sounds like she's lying, but I'll let it slip for now.' Her feet took her over to the young man who had resumed his sweeping. She tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention. When he turned, her breath was taken away.
Gold eyes stared back at her blue ones and silver hair fell over his face, contrasting with the amber-like color of his eyes. 'Are those real?' she wondered.
Inuyasha felt a tap on his shoulder and he turned to come face to face with an ice angel. 'Or at least she looks like one.' Her silver hair, pale skin, and blue eyes matched perfectly to make her look like a fairy. He shook his head and extended a hand. "My name's Inuyasha. What's yours?" The half youkai had managed to learn some manners from Kagome. 'Amazingly. I guess traveling with her for two years has helped me with that.'
The girl blinked. His voice, 'Wow.' "Uh." She stammered a bit before remembering her name. "My name's Serena Tsukino, nice to meet you, Inuyasha." A soft hand met his in a firm hand shake.
"Serena, huh," whispered Inuyasha. 'What a perfect name, so beautiful.'
Kagome watched as the two seemed to disappear in their own little world. 'How cute!' Her head shook as Inuyasha seemed to change into an entirely different person. 'Ugh, sure, be nice to a stranger but not your best friend,' thought the girl. She had only friendly feelings to the dog demon, and besides, if they did get together, Kagome would always wonder if it was her or Kikyo he saw. Which brought her to another thought: 'He'd better not hurt her.' But then again, who's to say the two would ever meet again?
Kagome was pulled from her musings as Serena poked her on her arm. "So, are we gonna work on the project or what, Kagome? Remember the project, right?" Serena waved her hand in front of the grey-blue-eyed girl.
"Oh yeah, so, let's go," she pulled Serena's arm and the two disappeared into the house.
"So Kagome…" Serena had been lead up another flight of stairs and was now in her new friend's room. She trailed off and looked at her. "Inuyasha, what's he like? He seems nice and gentle, and since you're his cousin, I figure you know a lot about him." She was seated on Kagome's bed while Kagome was sitting at her desk with a sheet of paper with scribbles on it for their class project.
"Inuyasha, well, uhm…" Kagome let her voice fall. 'What do I tell her? "Yeah, he lives in Feudal Japan and is a half-dog demon." Yup, sounds disastrous to me.' A nervous throat cleared itself and she began tapping the pencil on the desk. "Well, he has an older half brother…they don't get along too well. His mother and father are dead, and he had a very rough childhood, so don't be shocked when his people skills aren't too good."
"Wow," whispered Serena. "An orphan like me." The mattress made a slight pop noise as Serena fell back onto it. "I lost them in a fire when I was five," she said as the memories came flooding back.
Kagome looked at her new friend in shock. The chair she had been sitting in almost tumped over as Kagome stood to give her a hug. "I'm sorry if I brought up bad memories," she whispered after she had helped her friend into a sitting position.
Serena shook her head which sent her silver locks flying and flashing in the sunlight streaming through the open window. "It's not your fault, you didn't know." A tissue was snapped out of its box as Serena wiped her tears away.
Meanwhile, outside, Inuyasha had almost stormed into the room when he heard Kagome begin to tell the stranger about his messed up past. If she were to find out, he wanted to be the one to tell her, but his eyes softened as he heard about her parent's deaths. 'At least she didn't try to say she knew how I felt without really knowing,' he thought quietly. He then suddenly decided he wanted to get to know here better. He'd tell Kagome after Serena left.
'Wait, why do I want to get to know her?'
'Because you like her, dolt!'
'Oh great; my inner voice.'
'And don't you forget, buddy. Like I said, I think you like her!'
'But I haven't even known her for two hours yet! Besides, what about Kikyo?'
'What about the clay pot? She's dead fool, and she's nothing like the woman you fell in love with fifty years earlier either.'
'True, but- no! I love Kikyo…don't I?'
'If it's possible to love someone who's almost killed you, Kagome, Shippo, Sango, Miroku, and has given jewel shards to Naraku, sure, I guess you can love her,' said the voice with a sarcastic bite.
'Ok, I get the point, I should get over her.'
'What with this new girl and all, I think you already have.'
His inner voice quieted as he heard a door close.
"Ok Kagome, I'm coming over after school tomorrow to start right?" Serena stepped out of Kagome's house and into the fading sunlight. Her silver hair almost looked gold now as the sun's final moments stained it a brilliant yellow. A large bag was slung over her right shoulder and she stumbled a little as she put her left shoe on.
Kagome grabbed her shoulder to balance her. "Yeah, right after school, so you'll walk home again with me, ok?" Kagome gave the girl a hug before waving as she left. "I'll see you tomorrow at school, Serena!"
"Ok, bye Kagome!" Serena got onto her tiptoes and waved back as she descended the steps.
Once her head disappeared, Inuyasha leapt out of the tree by Kagome's window and into her room. He opened her door and walked downstairs to find Kagome talking to her mother about dinner.
"You could have let her stay, Kagome," said Miss Higurashi as she chopped some veggies for dinner.
"No, she said she had to get home, something about a curfew that her landlord gave her or something. She's too young to be living on her own, so the landlord gave her a curfew and her next door neighbor checks on her to see if she's ok." Kagome snatched a piece of the carrot her mother had been chopping.
"Ah, I see," replied her mother. 'If I had known that, I would have asked her if she wished to live with us. It has to be better than coming home to a cold apartment everyday.'
Inuyasha cleared his throat and both women started as they found him at the bottom of the stairs.
"Goodness Inuyasha, you scared us," said Miss Higurashi as she clutched her racing heart. "I thought you'd left when Serena arrived." She paused after a moment and asked him if she had seen him.
"Yeah, she saw me, so what?" He was getting a little impatient; he wanted to talk to Kagome. Maybe if he found out where Serena lived he could keep an eye on her.
'You just want to see her again.'
He shut his voice up and waited for someone to say something. When no answer was forth-coming, he began to lightly tap his foot on the floor. "Well?"
"Oh nothing," she replied rather flippantly. "Are you staying for dinner, Inuyasha?"
He knew they were having curry, and he remembered how it burnt his tongue, but he wanted to talk to Kagome about Serena. Inuyasha felt his ears droop; he wouldn't be able to talk to Kagome about the silver-haired girl after all.
His train of thought crashed, however, when Kagome's mother told him he could have ramen instead of curry. He quickly agreed and leapt over to the counter with the ramen in it.
If Serena had heard the thoughts of Kagome's mother, she would have agreed with her. It was lonely coming back to an empty apartment.
She unlocked the door and stepped inside. She was so tired, she forgot to remove her high-heeled shoes from her feet before stepping onto the carpet, and she made her way over to the kitchen to get dinner ready.
Serena peered into the fridge and then the freezer. 'I guess I need to go grocery shopping before this week's up. I'll only have pickles and mustard after tomorrow night.' She pulled out a TV dinner and popped it into an almost too small microwave. Numbers were pushed and the microwave began whirring as it cooked dinner.
A phone rang from the other end of the apartment. It was so small though, she made it to the phone in three strides. "Hello?"
"Miss Tsukino? So you're home?"
"Yes, Mr. Takashi, I'm home."
"Good to hear. Well, have a good night, Tsukino."
She saluted on her end of the phone. "Yes sir!"
Chuckling came from the other end of the phone. "I'm no longer a man of the army, Serena; you don't have to call me sir."
"Oh, but I saluted you and everything!" She laughed at the retired Colonel Lieutenant.
"I'll see you tomorrow Serena, ok?"
"Ok, see you later." She hung the phone up just in time to hear her dinner beep in the microwave. Her feet walked back over to the kitchen and opened the microwave door. Serena carefully took the dinner out and sat down on the couch to eat. A small prayer was said and she began eating.
'Wow, it's really lonely in here,' she thought as she ate a bite of her macaroni dinner. 'I might not have noticed if I hadn't made friends with Kagome today.' She sighed as she finished her dinner a few minutes later and dropped it into the trashcan next to the couch. Her blue gaze then swept over to the only thing that had survived the fire. The grand white piano.
It took up the most space in the one bedroom with a living/dining/kitchen area. With the couch squished against the wall, she could barely squeeze by. She stood and opened the lid and sat down on the slightly black bench. She ran her fingers across the black and white keys as she tried to remember a song that she had been taught by her mother. She pressed a key and frowned when it was the wrong one. 'Come on, where is it?' After two more tries, she finally found it.
Inuyasha heard a sad melody floating from Serena's apartment. He had asked Kagome where she lived and told her he wanted to check up on the girl that had come over earlier that day. The hanyou remembered the conversation quite clearly.
"So, Kagome…" Inuyasha trailed off as he looked at Kagome after they had finished dinner.
"Yeah, what is it Inuyasha?" She tucked her hair behind her ears as she turned to regard the half inu-youkai. 'I wonder what he wants to talk about. He never talks to me like that.' She sat in her desk chair and waited for him to begin speaking.
"Well, I was just wondering where Serena lives." He nervously began to fidget as Kagome just stared at him. "Keh, what are you looking at wench?" Crossing his arms in impatience, he waited for Kagome to speak..
"Ah-ha!" Kagome tackled Inuyasha. "There's the Inuyasha I know so well!"
"Oi wench! Get off! What do you mean the 'Inuyasha you know so well'?" He struggled to get out from the choke hold the girl now held him in.
"You were so…what's the word? Nice, that's it!" She looked into his eyes and saw them soften a bit.
"Well, I figure I could talk to her and get to know her better, you know?" His ears twitched a little as he heard Kagome giggling. "Hey, why are you laughing at me!" Amber eyes widened as the giggles burst into full-fledged laughter.
"Oh you're so cute when you like someone!"
"Huh?" 'Wow, intelligent response, genius.' Standing, he turned his back to her. "So what if I like her?"…oops. White ears drooped as he realized what he just said and he dropped onto the bed, utterly defeated.
Kagome began whooping and jumping around her room. "Hah! I knew it!" After she calmed down, she plopped onto the bed next to Inuyasha. "So," she said, "what do you want to know about her?"
"Uh, well…" He scooted back as she placed herself inches from his face.
"Well?"
He jumped from the bed and perched on the desk. "Give me some space, would ya?" His head shook as if he was clearing it and looked at Kagome who was now a safe distance away. "I just wanted to know some stuff, like…I dunno, stuff!" He jumped from the desk and slumped down onto the floor in his regular pose and scowled at the floor.
Kagome thoughtfully scratched her chin and began speaking. "Well, she lost her parents in a fire when she was really little, and the only thing that survived the fire was a grand piano, so she has that somewhere in her apartment. She doesn't like curry; she says it's too spicy; just like you…" She looked at her ceiling. 'That's weird.' She shook her head and continued. "She's really nice and energetic, but at the same time very mature. Then again, I guess she would have to be; she lived on her own for a very long time." Kagome now began pacing and ticking things off on her fingers. "Her hair's naturally silver…she said her grandmother had the same shade. She's an only child, like her parents were, and she can play the piano, guitar, violin, and flute really well." Kagome then sat back on her bed. "That's about all I know about her so far."
Inuyasha nodded his head and stood. "So, where does she live?" That had been the one thing Kagome had not told him.
"Huh? Why would you want to know that?" She had a feeling that he would want to see her, but then something struck her. "And how are you going to get inside her apartment? Through the window? Then you'll have to tell her about the warring states era and what you are. She'll think you're crazy or something."
The hanyou shook his head. "No, she smelled different, Kagome. She smells like a hanyou as well." He had smelled it the first time he had seen her. She was like him, a half dog demon, half human.
So, here he was, standing outside her window, listening as the last chord floated through the air from the piano. He felt a cold drop on his head and realized that it had started raining. Well, it was now or never. Raising an uncertain clawed fingertip, he began tapping on the window.
