Chapter Two: Time to Forget (edited!)

University is, strictly speaking, just okay. That is what Kagome decided in her first month as a university student. Everyone was loud and the professors were strict and the library was anxiety inducing, honestly. A month and a half later, she felt completely neutral towards the place, but was still grateful for the space and the "new start" aspects of the gig. Being away from Inuyasha, she decided, was exactly what she needed. At least, that was the mantra she repeated every time she checked her phone, eyes avoiding the messages that just kept coming. Kagome, please just talk to me. I don't know what I did.

The relationship between Kagome and Inuyasha is everything to Kagome, always has been, always will be. They met when Kagome was only fifteen, an energetic, optimistic girl who feared nothing and everything at once. She would go rock climbing, skinny dipping, would wink sweetly at boys whose eyes lingered on her for too long. She was absolutely fearless, if you asked her friends and family. Propriety be damned, Kagome lived for her self, even at a young age. At the same time, she feared rejection, could never speak her true feelings, and allowed her temper to control her actions.

In fact, the only reason Kagome even met Inuyasha was because she had been too curious, and then too angry, and then too persistent. Afterwards, she could not be without him, and he could not be without her. And because of that, because of their intensity, their unlabeled, unidentified, intensity, they never knew what to call one another, and settled unanimously on 'best friends'.

The night they met had been different, though. Something about the meeting was different from everything that followed. Maybe it was because it was the only time they'd never felt insecure around one another, the only time they hadn't denied themselves the pleasure of being open. Then again, that might've been the sake.

(flashback)

While she was a hard working student and while she had a small group of close friends, Kagome had been anything but a social butterfly. Although she was plenty brave and headstrong, Kagome was a dreamer, and preferred to keep to her own world most of the time. Parties were too big, too loud, too much for her, to be quite honest. She much preferred a good book to a loud crowd of people. But parties happened, occasionally, and when they did, her friends were bound to find ways to push Kagome into attending. At the time the reason had been Hojo, Kagome's all-too-innocent suitor who wanted so badly just to be around Kagome. They had dated briefly and the result was a series of uncomfortable dates neither one of them looked fondly on later - well, Hojo might've enjoyed the early ones.

The party itself was made up of high schoolers, but Ayumi had an older brother as well as Hojo, and well, the opportunity presented itself, and before you could said "Higurashi" Kagome found herself attending said party. She felt her mistake upon arrival; there was lots of cheap beer and sake, and because she had showed up late with Hojo, she had missed the initial sampling, and felt too out of place to request her own illegal beverage (she was fifteen, after all!). The music was quiet, neutral, and the chatter meaningless, frustrating.

"OOOOOHH, Kagome!" squealed Yuka, grasping Kagome's arm a little too tightly. "Isn't this exciting?" Eri and Ayumi gigged behind her. There were streamers on the walls and couples on the furniture, but it felt more like a party a parent would put together than a bunch of students. "Hi Hojo!" Yuka gasped. Kagome wiggled her arm free and immediately felt regretful about showing up in the first place. She would not be drinking any of that sake, that was for certain. As it turned out, almost everyone at the party was in high school - and almost done with high school - and Kagome knew that if she wanted her friends to get home safe and sound, someone would have to be responsible. Kagome eyed the can of Strongbow in Ayumi's hand wearily.

"Looks like uhh, quite the party," Kagome shifted her eyes to Hojo, but he was already gone. His brother, a much older boy with a much louder voice, was in the process of dragging Hojo over to a table where a game of cards was being played. A lot of cheering erupted from the table when the tipsy onlookers spotted their friend's little brother. Hojo was looking back at Kagome, begging for help, but she only waved at him cheerfully before turning away.

"Nightmare," Kagome mumbled. She turned to her friends. "How much sake have you girls had?"

"Three cups each!" Eri announced proudly, showcasing three tally marks on the back of her hand. "And Ayumi found herself some beer!" Kagome nodded severely. The girls looked at Kagome expectantly, as if waiting for her to request her own drink. She felt the pressure even without the words of encouragement.

"I'm going to… get some water," Kagome decided. "Don't move." Kagome turned away from her flock of giggling friends, silently angry at them for pressuring her to come. Didn't they know how weird it was to be hanging out with all these older high schoolers? Not to mention the fact that only a few of those high schoolers were girls…

Kagome found the kitchen, which was fortunately significantly quieter and only held a smaller group of girls. She recognized none of them and avoided their circle, feeling uncomfortable around people who were just out of her age range. She couldn't blame the high schoolers for partying, but hated that she had found herself there, on a date with a boy she'd been waiting to let down for months. She grabbed a plastic cup from a stack, moving to the sink silently to fill her cup -

"Inuyasha and Kikyou broke up? Wow, I could've sworn those two were in it for the long haul!" Kagome attempted to ignore the tidbits of gossip that she kept catching, but every girl in the kitchen seemed to be trained to one conversation, and she flushed when she realized a few of them were whispering together, their eyes on her. "Yeah, apparently Kikyou cheated! And when Inuyasha confronted her, they had a huge fight, a very public one, too!"

Kagome sipped her cup of water thoughtfully, peering over the edge at the girls. Thankfully only one girl seemed all that bothered by Kagome's presence. The rest were either too tipsy to notice or just didn't care.

"But isn't Inuyasha here tonight?"

"He is! But I haven't seen him in a while, maybe he left?"

"No, I think he just got too drunk to stand up! He's a total bad boy!"

They giggled conspiratorially, more of them noticing the middle school girl with the water, and looking over with interest. Flushing, Kagome fled from the kitchen, heading down the hall in the opposite direction she'd come from.

What a disaster…

Rounding the corner, Kagome realized the party itself, while being quite loud in some parts, was actually only made up of a handful of high schoolers. She had found a small sitting room that, while lit, was completely free of party guests and very enticing. The room was cozy and made her sigh out with relief. She wouldn't have to attend the uncomfortable party after all. Kagome sank onto the sofa gratefully, sipping her water, wondering how much time she would have to spend in the sitting room.

And that was the first time she saw Inuyasha. Looking around the room with vague interest, Kagome realized she was not alone. There was, in fact, a boy slouched in one corner, seemingly napping in an uncomfortable position. He wore only a red tee shirt and loose-fitted jeans, and his dirty feet were bare. His head was slumped forward, an entire bottle of sake grasped in one hand. A couple of empty cans were on their sides, a ways away from his unconscious body. Atop his head, a set of perfectly cute dog ears.

"Oh!" Kagome gasped. While she was aware that hanyous did in fact attend her school, she had never really met one, or even spoken to one. A lot of the time they kept their, ah, non-human "parts" hidden, so as not to draw too much attention to their blood status. Of course, full-fledged demons did not attend public school, but Kagome knew there were hanyous that preferred to live among humans.

She just never figured she would run into one.

"H-hello?" Kagome approached the boy with sudden interest, eyes on his dog ears. He was indeed asleep. His mouth hung upon just slightly, and he was snoring quietly, almost cutely, his chin hanging close to his chest. He was not much older than Kagome, she guessed, though he could definitely be older technically, she figured in hanyou years he probably only had a year on her.

"I think I wanna… touch them…" Kagome thought she must have been in a trance. What else could explain how she freely allowed herself to smooth her fingers across the poor boy's ears, reveling in their softness, as if he were a common house pet! A strange drunken noise came out of the boy, and Kagome suddenly felt heated, awkward, and immediately attempted to fix her mistake - too late.

"AHH!" The boy was awake then, and she had never been more humiliated. The bottle was flung up, and the liquid hit Kagome full in the face, right into her mouth, which had been hanging open in shock. The boy attempted to right himself, but only succeeded in keeping the bottle upright.

"AGH!" Kagome jumped back, startled, coughing and spitting. The boy was blinking rapidly, obviously in some sort of drunken stupor.

"What're you doin, Kikyou? Here to rub salt in the wound?" He rose to his feet, glaring at Kagome with so much hate that she was completely baffled. He shook the bottle at her as if brandishing a sword, and she only gaped at the boy stupidly.

"What did you call me?" she demanded, using her sleeve to wipe the remaining sake from her face. "Kikyou who? I'm Kagome!"

"Oh…" A slow smile appeared on the boy's face, stretching into a lazy grin. "Thought you.. thought you were somethin' else…"

"Someone?" Kagome prompted, wondering if the boy needed help far beyond what she could offer.

"Y-yeah…" the boy stretched, pulling himself off the floor. "What, what were you doin' to my ears? They're… sensitive." Kagome had the decency to blush.

"Uhh, sorry about that! And I'm sorry about this, Kikyou person."

"S'fine, was just too sleepy to figure it out. You smell totally different." Kagome squinted, realizing the boy had very bright, very beautiful golden eyes. She was hardly disturbed by the question, more so by her own actions - was he part dog demon, then?

"My, smell?" she finally asked, her cheeks darkening even more when she watched him realize she was staring.

"Yeah," the boy shrugged. "You smell, you smell kinda nice. Hey… you can have some of my sake if you want, I kinda stole the bottle. Parents always keep the good stuff hidden."

(end of flashback)

Looking back on it, Kagome should have known it was a disaster to begin with. Falling for a guy in the midst of his breakup with his girlfriend was just not a great situation to be in. Never mind that he had mistaken her for his ex. Never mind that he had stolen an entire bottle of sake for himself.

Never mind that his ex was no longer an ex.

Kagome shook her head gently as if to ease her self out of those memories. She was in the library, it was a Tuesday afternoon, and she had several hundred pages of reading due for the week. Already.

"God damn it…" Kagome stared down at the book in front of her. The Lake by Banana Yoshimoto. She could hardly get through a page without being reminded of Inuyasha. She was a literature student, she always figured she would be, but she never realized how hard it would be to enter college with so much emotional baggage that she was forced to connect to her every day studies for good marks. Everywhere she looked, tragic love stories were blossoming both inside and outside of reality. Students were hooking up while she recited Shakespearean passages about love and deceit and jealousy. She would need to learn to be a stronger person, to have nerves of steel, to be less God damn sentimental if she was ever going to get through her studies.

That was part of why she came to university, anyway.

Kagome's roommate was someone both more sweet and more inquisitive than Kagome anticipated. Little Rin, a girl hardly pushing five feet, a girl who liked to wear colorful kimonos and sang to herself every day, seemed much more girl than woman to Kagome. Yet she seemed to know everything about Kagome's predicament, and had only known her for a very short time. Most of what she had learned about Kagome she had guessed. Some information Kagome had willingly shared. Kagome would be lying if she said she disliked the girl, though; something about her was comforting, and she was definitely useful for advice.

"So you met Inuyasha at a party?" Rin was cross-stitching on her bed, legs folded under her as she skillfully maneuvered the small needle. Everything about the girl was graceful. Kagome, meanwhile, was lying face down on a bed that was covered in books she needed to have finished read already, sighing loudly and often. Pages stuck to her face and pencils poked her uncomfortably. She had yet to find a hobby that would keep her grounded, and now she knew she would never get the chance to read for fun while she was a literature student.

"Yep, and I was only in middle school," Kagome turned over, side-eyeing Rin as she crushed books in her attempt to be comfortable. "I actually haven't been to a party since, believe it or not."

"Maybe that's a solution!" Rin dropped her needle to clap her hands together. "Kagome, what happened last time you went to a party?"

"I had a miserable time?"

"No, the other part."

"I found a passed out hanyou and fondled his ears?"

"And?"

"And I went on to fall in love with him and have my heart ripped to shreds?"

"Yes! I mean uh, yes to the first part of that. Maybe if you start going to parties you'll find someone else. Think about it, one party, five years of being in love? Think of what another party could bring you!"

"Well when you put it like that," Kagome huffed, sitting up in her bed to collect all the books she'd left. She groaned at the sight of them. She'd never have time to read them all!

"How come you never went to parties in high school?" Rin resumed her cross-stitching. "It sounds like you were popular and had lots of friends! I was home schooled, I would've loved to have had that experience!"

"I guess I spent most of my time with Inuyasha," Kagome confessed, finally finished with stacking her books. She carried them over to her desk, promptly slapping them down next to a secondary stack of books. She rubbed her eyes, hoping the menacing rectangles would disappear.

"He must be really kind," Rin offered, her eyes growing shiny. "Is he really handsome?"

"Kind? Only in my dreams. Handsome? Well…" Kagome blushed, then decided the question could not answered in her current state. "Maybe we should consider venturing to some parties. We are at university, after all." Rin winked at Kagome, noticing her slip.

"I've never been to a bar, either," Rin sighed dreamily. "We could make a weekend of it! Try some new things, meet some people. I've only really talked to you since we got here, Kagome. And I like you a lot! I just, I've never had friends, you know? I want to… meet people." Rin's voice grew soft, and she turned away, gazing out the window wistfully. The window sill was adorned with a collection of potted plants, which contrasted nicely with Rin's sunshine-yellow quilt. Kagome smiled at Rin's back. She was the sweetest person Kagome had ever met. No wonder she'd been home schooled.

"I haven't really met anyone either. Only problem is, we need to hear about a party to go to one." Kagome sighed. "Well, we can still go to a bar! That could be fun. There's at least one on campus…" Kagome bent over, stretching her legs. They felt cramped from her many hours spent in the library. "But it's only Tuesday! I think I'm going to try out the gym, this stress is getting to me and that might be the healthiest way to deal with it." Kagome turned to her closet, eyes sliding over her cell phone, which was crammed between stacks of books. The screen had lit up briefly.

I need to talk to you.

Kagome flipped her phone over so she couldn't see the screen, moving to grab her gym clothes from the shelf and her iPod.

"Let me know if you come up with any party schemes!" Kagome practically ran from the room, heart clenching. She hadn't spoken to Inuyasha in weeks…

"Will do!" Rin chimed, eyes still lingering out the window in innocent bliss.