Disclaimer:I do not own Inuyasha or any other characters mentioned in this story. They all belong to the talented Rumiko Takahashi. I'm just borrowing them for my own amusement.

Merry Belated Christmas, guys. You can even call it a gift for the new year, if you want.

Decorations

Winter Fresh.

That was the first thought that came to Kagome's mind as she gazed across the shrine's empty courtyard, the pristine blanket of pure white snow sparkling brilliantly from the rays of sunshine that filtered in through the clouds that hung in the gray skies.

All was quiet at the Higurashi Shrine and Kagome closed her eyes, a gentle, content smile curling her lips upward as she enjoyed the absolute peace that surrounded her and the serenity seemed to seep into her very bones, making her feel slightly lethargic and utterly relaxed. Inhaling the clean winter air, the young woman let it out in a content sigh, opening her russet orbs to watch her breath materialize before her in a puff of steam. A cool breeze stirred her raven locks and she tucked her scarf more securely around her neck, her cheeks and nose rosy from the frigid atmosphere.

She loved winter. It was Kagome's favorite season because it always made her feel as if the beautiful snow that fell from the heavens was sent to wash away all of the bad karma that happened in Tokyo, wrapping the world in a white shawl of cleanliness only to melt away and leave everything pure and ready for a new year to begin.

Kagome smiled again and tilted her face to the heavens, closing her eyes and spreading her arms out as she twirled around slowly, delighting in the way the snowflakes fell upon her flesh and melted upon contact. She shivered once but continued to merrily twirl around. True, she loved winter, but she could do without the cold that accompanied it.

Half-way through her seventh twirl, a gruff voice jolted her out of her fun and she faltered for a minute but quickly regained her footing on the icy concrete.

"Oi, wench. What're you doing?" A pause. "Stupid, you're gonna slip and fall if you keep doing that."

Rolling her eyes, Kagome released a soft huff and placed her hands on her hips in a typical female stance, facing him. "For your information, Inuyasha, I only slipped because you startled me. And Iwas enjoying the quiet atmosphere until somebody decided to interrupt it." She shot him a pointed stare.

Said half-demon snorted and crunched his way through the snow over to her, hands in his sleeves and ears twitching atop his head of silver hair. "You shouldn't be outside in the cold anyhow. You hardly have anything on," he said, gesturing to her thin, ripped jeans.

She blinked. "I have a coat on..."

Inuyasha snorted again. "Lot a good that'll do you when you slip and fall on your ass."

Kagome narrowed her gaze at him then just shook her head, giving a sigh of defeat. "Whatever, dog-boy. At least I'm not the one that's barefoot in the snow. Let's just go inside them and I'll make us some hot cocoa, okay?" Without waiting for a response, she whirled around and trudged through the snow toward her house, confident that her hanyou companion would follow her. She was not surprised when he appeared beside her in the next moment, infamous scowl on his face and golden eyes staring straight ahead.

She sent a smile his way and opened the door when they reached the house, stepping inside them kicking off her winter boots as Inuyasha closed the door behind them. Kagome made a beeline for the kitchen and immediately took out two coffee mugs and set a kettle of water on the stove to boil. Inuyasha sauntered in after her and made himself comfortable in one of the chairs, placing his hands behind his head as he leaned back and crossing his ankles beneath the table.

While the water was boiling, Kagome hummed a jolly Christmas tune to herself and took out two packets of instant cocoa then a small package of marshmallows. She paused and took a peek at the hanyou at the table, giggling silently to herself when she saw that his ears had perked right up and he only had eyes for the bag of tiny marshmallows. She added them every time to his cocoa now ever since she had his discovered last winter that he harbored a secret love for the tiny cubes of fluff.

Not without a smile, the raven-haired young woman ripped open the cocoa packets then poured them into the mugs, dropping a few 'mallows in her mug and a bit more in Inuyasha's. The tea kettle started to whistle and she turned off the burner before the whistle had an attempt at hurting the half-demon's sensitive ears.

Silence continued to reign over them as she commenced with the pouring of water into the mugs before setting one down in front of Inuyasha with a spoon and sitting down with her one steaming mug of the chocolate concoction. He immediately speared one of the marshmallows with a claw and popped it in his mouth.

Kagome laughed softly and took a delicate sip of her cocoa. She smiled and sighed. "Yummy."

"I guess so."

"You only wanted the marshmallows."

"...Keh."

She laughed again and wrapped her hands around the hot mug, warmth singing through her veins and throughout her body. "Hmm... Say, Inuyasha, how is it you're able to drink hot chocolate when dog's usually get sick from chocolate?" Kagome questioned, cocking her head curiously.

Inuyasha blinked then shrugged, poking another cube of fluff and popping it in his mouth. "Dunno. Guess it's probably 'cause I'm half human." Another marshmallow.

"That's logical, I guess," she conceded and took another sip of her drink. "Wanna decorate the tree?"

He blinked. "Huh?"

"The tree. Wanna help me decorate it? Mama and Souta are at a Christmas party and Gramps is with some friends at a local pub. The tinsel and lights are already on it, so all we have to do is put the ornaments on. So whaddaya say?"

Inuyasha stared at her. "You mean to tell me your mother let that senile old bat to go a pub? With alcohol?"

She frowned. "Yes..." Then her eyes widened in realization and her mouth formed an O. "Oh dear..."

"Yup."

"Well, there's nothing we can really do, so I guess we'll just have to...wait and see what happens." For some reason that thought did not bode well with her.

"Right. How long will it take?"

"What?"

"The decorating thing. How long is it gonna take?"

Kagome shrugged. "Depends on how many decoration Mama got out this year, I suppose." She looked down into her mug thoughtfully before taking a longer sip, the liquid having cooled off a bit during their conversation.

Inuyasha sighed and ate the remainder of the marshmallows in his cocoa before downing the drink two large gulps. "Sure."

Kagome awed at how fast he downed the beverage before shaking her head and beaming at him. "Great! Just lemme put the dishes in the sink and we can get started." She stood and collected both of their mugs, dumping the rest of the contents from hers down the sink before rinsing them and setting them in the sink. She'd wash and put them away later.

When she turned, she was slightly surprised to see an empty seat where her inu-youkai companion had been just a minute ago and she walked into the living room to find him rummaging through the boxes of Christmas decorations and miscellaneous ornaments. She smiled and joined him in poking around.

For the next hour and a half or so, girl and hanyou put a little Christmas cheer around the house and decorated the tree with ornaments of various colors, shapes, and sizes. Kagome had somehow managed to get herself quite literally wrapped up in some extra tinsel and after Inuyasha laughed at her for a good ten minutes from her stumbling around, he finally decided to help the poor girl out and slice the tinsel off of her with his claws. Kagome promptly rammed a Santa hat on his head and mussed his hair around under the hat before hauling ass, an indignant hanyou hot on her heels.

He ended up chasing her through the house, upstairs, around her room, twice up and down the hall way, then back downstairs round the living room and finally plopping down on the couch, out of breath.

Inuyasha left the hat on the whole time.

Kagome wished she had her camera as she glanced at the half-demon beside her with the Santa hat slanted at an angle on his head and one fuzzy ear could be seen poking out from his mass of hoary tresses. He was just too cute sometimes.

She giggled and Inuyasha shot her a suspicious look.

Kagome grinned and shook her head. "Only one thing left, Inuyasha, and then we're done," she announced then leaned over to drag a box over to her then bent over it and searched around.

Inuyasha raised a brow and stared at her as she took out and rearranged things to find a particular object. "And what would that be?"

"The star, of course," she answered, still bent over the box of left over decorations.

"Star?" he echoed.

Kagome hummed in the affirmative, muttering something about importance before releasing a soft cry of triumph. She straighted herself and in her hands was a large plastic replica of the North Star and Inuyasha could see that it sparkled somewhat.

Like her eyes, he thought absently then fought the urge to blush. Keh.

"Whaddaya do with it?" he asked to derail his current thoughts but Kagome's answering smile didn't help much.

"You put it on the very tiptop of the tree," she replied shortly, firmly and Inuyasha just stared at her.

"...That's it?" Somehow that didn't seem very important to him.

Kagome beamed. "Yup!" She stood up and skipped over to the tree, holding the precious star carefully in her hands then craned her neck up. She blanched. "Uh...oh..."

Inuyasha frowned and joined her by the tree. "What's wrong?"

"...I'm too short."

He blinked once then looked up to the top of the tree, tilting his head as he glanced from the young woman beside him to the tall tree before them. He snorted. "You don't say."

She shot him a look then huffed in annoyance. "Drats. If only I had a ladder maybe I could..." She trailed off, mumbling herself and bringing a finger to her chin thoughtfully.

Inuyasha just continued to stare at her as she wasted a considerable amount of mental energy on how she would get the star up there before he finally gave her pity and promptly grabbed her waist, stepping to stand behind her.

Kagome gasped and an instant flush stole across her cheeks as she looked over at her should at him quizzically. "Inuyasha...what...?"

The hanyou was determined to fight back his own blush as he stared at her and flexed his hands on her slim waist. "I can just lift you up so you can put your damn star on the tree," he said lowly inched his hands farther around her stomach.

Kagome swallowed the sudden lump in her chest that was making it hard to breath and nodded, turning toward the tree again and bracing herself for when he lifted her up. A few seconds later his grip on her tightened and he stepped forward, forcing her to walk with him and then her feet left the ground as he used his hanyou strength to lift her from the floor. Kagome wasted no time in extending her arms and thrusting the star onto the top branch before grabbing his own arms and hanging on as he lowered her to the ground.

Her feet touched the ground and she sighed in relief, waiting for him to let her go so this slightly awkward moment could be over. But he never did. In fact he drew her closer to him instead the young woman from the future gasped as her back collided with a hard and warm chest. Her heart skipped a beat when his arm snacked around her waist and stayed there.

"Inuyasha," she said breathlessly and turned her head to look at him and nearly jumped out of her skin when he leant down and put his face close to hers, so close she could feel his warm breath on her lips. Her heart thundered in her chest and she idly wondered if he could hear it.

The slight smug curl of his lips gave her her answer and she was just about to say something – anything – when his free arm suddenly lifted above their heads and Kagome had an awful idea of what was dangling from his fingers.

"Merry Christmas, Kagome," he breathed and Kagome nearly melted.

"M-Merry Christmas, Inuyasha," she replied breathlessly, a lovely shade of pink tinting her face. She didn't dare glance up and instead meekly asked, "How did you...?"

"Souta."

That brat! I'm gonna hide his Christmas present and—!

Inuyasha's lips were suddenly on hers and she lost all train of thought. She readily returned the kiss and closed her eyes, sliding a hand up and around his neck, her fingers sinking into his hair and toying with the fluffy ball at tip of the Santa hat.

She grinned against his mouth, tugged it off, then threw it across the room. Kagome liked it better when both of her playthings were visible.

And with that, she attacked his ears with one hand and yanked the sash of his hakama open with the other.

This was originally a drabble for one Helluva Christmas party hosted byInuGrrrl, but I had to cut it down to 600 words so, needless to say, I did a lot of editing and cutting. Oi. I didn't have the heart to delete the whole thing though, so I saved it, hoping that I could maybe post it after Christmas. I'm rather proud with the way it turned out so I hope you guys enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Also, I wanted to tell you guys who are reading Wanted, LoL, or Switch that I will not be discontinuing those stories. I may have to put them on hiatus for a while, but I promise you that I will finish them. I hate it when authors start a story and never update it for like five years, and I don't wanna be...that word where I do something that I said I'm not gonna do. Too lazy to look it up and waaay too tired. To those of you who have remained loyal thus far, thank you so much for your patience and support. I really am trying my damnedest to find the time to work on them and I've managed to get at least a page of Wanted, and about three for Switch. I'm at a writers block for LoL (Lessons of Love) so please, if any of you have any suggestions, feel free to tell me in a review or tell me via email. I'd very much appreciate it. Thank you muchly, guys. I love you all.

Again, Merry Belated Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Keiz