A/N: Shippou, after Kagome is pushed back into her own time by Inuyasha, and has returned.
III.
The day she found me, right away, I wanted to like her. Love her, even. When I said so, once, she laughed and said, "But didn't you steal them from me - my shards?" I couldn't deny that, but it was still true, and she knows the reason why I took them, anyway. Knows it wouldn't have done any good - anyway.
Shards...I wanted them then, but now - I hate them. If it weren't for shards, what would we be doing? It's spring now, sakura spring, so maybe we would go to the cherry-blossom festival, and there would be good things to eat and she would be smiling, a real, happy smile. I know when she pretends, when he runs off to be with the other one, when he is wounded, when he is fighting, when he is stupid. A real smile. A festival - yes. Or maybe - maybe, since only she is human, we would not go to the festival. Maybe we would stay home in the village, and eat something simple, tell a story, laugh together, go to sleep together. There would be no more fighting, no more looking for fighting...well. Except maybe him. But that would be okay. That would be fine, if there were no shards.
But...if there had been no shards, no shikon for them to break off of, she would not be here. I would never have met her. I hate them - shards. And I love them, but...I don't understand. She says, "when you're older"... about some things.
This, too?