A/N: Yay! I've got new story ideas! Woo! So excited! Must finish a couple first though. Right. Read on.

Chapter 7

I finally regained the ability to talk. "You're not…upset?"

My mother finally paused from her excitement. "Upset?" she repeated, as if the word were foreign to her. "Why on earth would I be upset?"

"Well, we're so young, and…" Now that I thought about it, all my nervousness seemed ridiculous.

"Your father and I were practically the same ages as you two when we got married." Nobody seemed to notice how I flinched at the mentioning of my father, or if they did, they said nothing. Then Inuyasha squeezed my hand again and I gripped his more tightly.

"I told you," he said to me. I made a face at him.

"So, when's the big day?" my mother asked. I stared at her in horror.

"What?" I finally said.

"When is the wedding?"

"I don't know; we haven't had much time to plan it…" I trailed off. Although, I realized I'd had a whole year and all I'd accomplished was overreacting about telling my mother.

"Well, we'd better get to it," she said. "If you want to get married this summer." The look of horror was on my face again.

"This summer?" I repeated.

"Yes, summer weddings are so beautiful," she said. "And you can have it outdoors."

I finally looked at Inuyasha. He seemed to be in a bit of shock all of a sudden. Maybe all this talk of actually getting married was making him nervous, though he'd been perfectly at ease the whole engagement. "What do you think?" I asked him. "Inuyasha?"

He blinked. "I, ah…yes."

I looked at him funny. "What? That doesn't make any sense."

"We don't need to concern him with all the planning," my mother cut in. "He just needs to show up in a tux." She smiled.

I smiled back. "Sota, why don't you go show Inuyasha your new baseball cards?"

He perked up. "Sure! C'mon, Inuyasha!"

He dragged Inuyasha to standing position and out of the rooms. Before the kitchen door closed, Inuyasha glanced at me and I was confused by the look of disorientation in his eyes. It was like he couldn't concentrate on anything that was happening, not even the little boy dragging him by the arm.

My mother launched into talk about flowers and gowns and invitations. Before I knew it, she was asking me the most important people to include on the guest list. I mumbled out a few people.

I was stuck on trying to figure out what was going on in Inuyasha's mind right now. He wasn't—he couldn't be…is he changing his mind? Would he…? I interrupted my mother in the middle of the discussion about types of flowers and theme colors to excuse myself.

I wandered up the stairs and knocked on Sota's door. It wasn't shut all the way so it creaked open farther and the two were sitting on the floor, cards spread around them with little room to step. I noticed that Inuyasha had returned to his usual self, and the two glanced up when the door creaked slightly. He half-smiled at me.

"Inuyasha, can I talk to you for a minute?" I asked. He raised an eyebrow and glanced at Sota. Sota nodded, as if to give Inuyasha permission to leave. Inuyasha stood and walked towards me, careful not to step on any cards.

I led him to my room and shut the door, making him sit on the bed. "What's up?" he asked.

"I could ask you the same question," I replied.

He tilted his head at me. It was as if he didn't remember a thing about the last hour. "What?"

"You were completely out of it after my mom asked when we were getting married," I told him.

"Was I?" he asked. Now I was annoyed.

"Yes!" I exclaimed, making him jump slightly in astonishment. "You looked like you could barely remember how to breathe!"

He blinked. Then he sighed. "I'm sorry," he said. I could feel my face go blank in surprise.

"You're…sorry?"

"I know how I was like," he said. "I was just hoping you didn't notice…"

"How could I not notice?" I asked him. "You seemed like you were…" I didn't finish my sentence. He grabbed my hands and pulled me down next to him.

"What? What did I seem like?" he asked, his voice full of concern.

"Like…" I choked out. "Like you didn't want to marry me anymore." My eyes were suddenly burning with tears, threatening to spill over at any moment.

He hugged me to his chest. "Don't be stupid," he said. "Of course I still want to marry you. I was just…surprised when your mother said this summer."

I looked up at him, brows furrowed. "Isn't that what we've been planning for?"

"Yeah," he said. "I never said I understood why I was surprised, I just was."

I smiled at him, glad that he was over his little episode. He leaned down and kissed me, light and sweet. He stood, pulling me with him, and went back to Sota's room, turning to me before he went in.

"Go talk with your mother—you need to have a say in something about what gets planned." We grinned at each other, knowing full well that my mother would plan the entire thing on her own if she had to.

I went back downstairs and was able to actually concentrate and make decisions with my mother. So far we had written out the beginnings of the guest list—there was already over fifty people, and it was only on my side—and decided what flowers would be used. Red roses and lilies.

Though it was one small decision, I suddenly felt so great about it. Whenever I saw roses or lilies, I would have a reminder of my wedding. And, to my surprise, I was incredibly—overwhelmingly—excited about getting married. Or maybe it was about getting married to Inuyasha. Definitely about getting married to Inuyasha.

--

When we told Mika about the wedding the next day, she was so excited. Especially since I wanted her to be a bride's maid.

She had made us go out to dinner—she couldn't drive, so she had to jump up and point whenever she wanted to turn—and then she made Inuyasha pay for it. Luckily, he didn't mind too much. But he did mind.

After we were finished we went to tell Sango and Miroku that it was extremely official now—they'd already known that we were engaged. Sango was to be my maid-of-honor. Miroku was the best man. It all worked out perfectly.

And then Inuyasha had to tell Sesshomaru. He wouldn't mind us getting married, but I'd made Inuyasha promise to invite him to the wedding and have him be part of the ceremony. Now that might be a bit of a problem. I felt sure that he wouldn't refuse though. He couldn't. And if he refused to Inuyasha, he'd have to try and do it again to me. This was one thing I would not be afraid of yelling at Sesshomaru about.

We walked into his house after having a fight about the whole thing, and Mika was lounging on the couch watching TV. She had her legs thrown lazily over the back of the couch, a position that didn't look comfortable but it apparently was to her.

"Hey, Mika," I greeted her.

She didn't look away from the screen. She lifted a hand in a half-wave. "Hey," she said in a monotone voice. She was clearly into the show she was watching.

I gave Inuyasha a hard look and then looked at the top of the stairs, in the spot where I knew Sesshomaru would be—his office. Inuyasha scowled but he didn't argue anymore, which was good, because he wouldn't have won.

I watched him walk tensely towards the stairs, and then I went and plopped down on the couch next to Mika.

I was listening for any signs of Inuyasha yelling. Sesshomaru wouldn't yell. He only yelled at Mika. I couldn't concentrate on the flashing screen, so I went and paced at the bottom of the stairs. Eventually, Mika clicked off the television and mimicked my actions, watching me curiously.

After a couple minutes of waiting for me to explain, she got impatient. "What's wrong?" she asked.

"Inuyasha's telling Sesshomaru about the wedding."

She looked at me funny. "And you're nervous about that?"

"I'm making him ask Sesshomaru to be part of the ceremony." I turned to walk the length of the room again.

"Ah. I get it," said Mika, still following. "And you think Fluffy won't do it?"

"I think he will, but Inuyasha doesn't. I'm listening for…for something. I dunno what."

Mika stopped and grabbed me by the shoulders. "Stop pacing! It's getting on my nerves."

I bit my lip and glanced up the stairs for the hundreth time. Mika huffed. "It'll be fine."

"I know. I don't know why I'm making such a big deal about it."

"Because of Inuyasha. He's rubbing off on you," Mika stated.

"What do you mean?" I asked, baffled.

"He always makes a big deal of things. And now you are too. I gotta say," she added, as an afterthought, "that's gonna get real annoying."

I smiled sheepishly down at her. She smirked and I suddenly knew everything would be fine. I could feel it in my gut. Or maybe that was just the nerves again…

Suddenly, Inuyasha was shuffling down the stairs, his scowl still hinged into place.

I raised my eyebrows expectantly, but he said nothing. Mika got to it before me. "Well?" she said.

"He'll do it." Relief flooded over me, but the tone of his voice caught my attention.

"Then why are you acting so…" I searched for the right word.

"Like somebody died," Mika finished for me.

"Because," said Inuyasha, annoyance suddenly coloring his voice. Painfully so. "I had to talk to him, and he always talks down to people—especially me—like he's all high-and-mighty. It's pretty goddamn annoying."

"Right," said Mika. "I always forget how you two don't like each other very much."

"No," said Inuyasha. "I don't like when we're out of Ramen very much. I hate Sesshomaru."

"Alright, sheesh," said Mika. "You're always so melodramatic."

I let out a giggle and Inuyasha glared at Mika. Then he looked accusingly at me. I tried to stifle my laughs. "Can we go now?" he asked me.

"Go where?"

"I dunno…anywhere. I just don't want to be in the same house as him anymore."

"Fine, ya big baby, we can go somewhere. Wanna come?" I asked Mika, ignoring Inuyasha's protests over calling him a baby.

"Sure. Let's go to the park," she said. "No, the movies!"

"Okay."

Inuyasha moaned. "You guys are just gonna talk through the whole damn thing again," he accused.

"So?" said Mika. "Deal with it. Or you can just stay here…"

"Fine. Let's go." He walked out of the room while Mika and I followed just slowly enough to annoy him a bit more. He stopped a few feet before the garage door and grabbed my hand, dragging me—and Mika, whose arm was linked with mine—at his own pace.

When we got to the movie theater, most of the movies sounded bad, so Mika and I picked one that we could make fun of. Inuyasha was right; we talked through the entire two-and-a-half hours of the foreign film. We pointed out every little thing that was totally fake looking and laughed whenever the characters said something that sounded strange in their language. Inuyasha sat with his arms crossed, glaring at the screen.

Finally, when he'd calmed down a bit, he reached out and grabbed my hand—he was to my left, so it was the hand that I wore my ring on—and began playing with my fingers. I let him, knowing he just liked the way the ring—his ring to me—sparkled in the dim lighting.