Time for Sesshoumaru to take stock of himself. Time has passed, his life has changed and continues to change. He is learning about his mate but having a bit of difficulty incorporating what he's learned in his dealings with her. He hasn't even realized that some of their discussions about her life could apply to his in some big ways. But he has an inkling. It needs to percolate a little and he needs to do some very private thinking. Good thing he has the time in this chapter.

I do not own: 1) Inuyasha, the characters or world therefrom. Those belong to Rumiko Takahashi. 2) the original idea that spawn this specific plot. That was borrowed from the first chapter of Shellbabe's Lost Mate found on FFN.

Quiet Respite

Since Sesshoumaru had never previously bothered to learn anything about most of the women he'd encountered beyond how best to get them out of their clothes, this completely platonic approach to his own mate was proving to be a true eye opener.

As foolish as it seemed, thinking back on it now, he could admit that he had believed the age old hype pertaining to females and their universal desires. He had tailored his plans to fit into that older maxim that all women desired to be swept off their feet by the spectacularly handsome and wealthy male of their dreams. This was generally followed by a huge ceremonial announcement of their newly attached state and the creation of unnumbered pups that proved their continued state of "Happily ever after".

Sesshoumaru had never imagined that a female could have other priorities to accomplish prior to seeking that state of domestic bliss. Most Japanese women, statistically speaking, sought higher education and the ghost of a career in order to meet men of higher socioeconomic class before settling on one and dropping out of the work force to eternally gloat over her wedded accomplishment by periodically baring young. Youkai females depended on their breeding to introduce them to the worthwhile males of their species to produce similar results. Generally, they all dreamed that their goal would be obtained under romantic conditions, "love at first sight" being a general favorite.

Apparently, the stereotype wasn't universal, or even marginally accurate. According to his mate, every female desired something different from her life in the same way that every male had unique goals of his own based on personality, family motivations, and past experience. Her roommate was a pointed example she enjoyed rubbing in his face. Her gay roommie certainly wasn't on the look out for any Miss Right, wasn't eager to have progeny, and wanted to work for non-profit medical organizations that traveled through third world countries. By contrast, his sister, whom his mate had met on more than one occasion, intended to go into politics, studied law, and refused to have more than one night stands.

Their mother had single-handedly supported their family respectably well, pursuing a career in a predominately male run industry and excelling at it. Their father was a stay at home writer who attended PTA meetings and campaigned for whichever charities struck his fancy.

His mate's Mother worked as a nurse despite her two kids and senile father-in-law who worked at the home shrine and met with other Buddhist priests to complain about everything younger than themselves. Her father, when he had been alive worked as a government consultant and often stayed far from home. His income would have provided enough for his wife to stay at home, but she'd worked even then all the same. Her little brother wanted to be a professional athlete on the National soccer team and his latest girlfriend planned to be a computer programmer because she could work from home if she had to.

Truly, taking a mate had provided him with a broader education than he'd ever imagined possible or ever received from his long history of attending the finest educational institutions. Sesshoumaru had never been so intimately exposed to the many varied dreams and goals of people. As an inu in a fairly small but prominent pack, there had been little opportunity to converse candidly with anyone as a young pup. He had been the one to allow it to remain a habit as an adult. Partly because he hadn't realize there was so much to enrich his relationships outside his pack, but mostly because he didn't know how to change it.

But he was learning.

Sesshoumaru lay sprawled across his crimson, satin sheets waiting for the phone to ring as the hours of the day crept by. He had absolutely no intention of moving or doing much of anything else today, for today was the day for lovers. Despite how other nations viewed the holiday, Sesshoumaru was a product of his culture, and in his culture Christmas was a holiday spent with a lover. As such Sesshoumaru had worked hard to talk his mate into calling him as soon as she made it home from her roommate's family gathering. It wouldn't be Christmas for him by then, but it was better than no contact at all.

She'd gone to the big old, small town, house with her roommate and his lover last night to participate in all the festivities apparently celebrated in a western country in relation to this holiday. The infamous Brett-san had quite forcefully insisted on her attendance since she wasn't allowed to go home. Her plans were to return sometime after lunch on Christmas day, her time, at her professors' behest.

She'd complained about her impending boredom as without her Brett-san to work with her she wasn't being scheduled at her part time job and with classes let out for the break and her chronic insomnia she was looking at a long stretch of empty hours to fill. With the holiday being what it was, she wouldn't even have much access to the local library to pick up new reading material.

So he'd tried to badger her into a promise to call. Unsuccessfully.

Or actually, she had almost promised to call until he'd tried to turn her promise into agreement of preplanned phone sex. Sesshoumaru was all but desperate.

He was inu for kami's sakes. Inu were never meant to go as long as he had without sexual release. Especially this inu, as he had, prior to his mating, generally fed his sexual appetite as often as the urge occurred to him. Being a normal, healthy inu that had naturally required several marathon sexual escapades in any given week. As a newly mated male his sexual appetite increased. Unfortunately, the one he wanted wasn't available to help him with his need.

Sesshoumaru could no longer remember what it was like to wake up feeling well rested. His nights were filled with arousing visions of all the things he'd done to his little mate in their one night or all the things he'd like to do to her delectable little body when he tracked her down someday. So when he woke in the morning, or often in the middle of the night, he was rock hard with no relief in sight. Most males would be able to see to the problem presented to him upon waking without necessarily involving any outside assistance. Not this mated inu, it appeared.

Without the scent of his female significantly thick in the air, Sesshoumaru could not find the pinnacle of physical pleasure and release. His only recourse was to pray that a cold shower offered him some painful relief.

And like every time he'd brought it up with her, his mate flippantly told him to take a lover. It was most frustrating. He hadn't told her then, like he probably wouldn't tell her now, he couldn't. Sesshoumaru really did need her scent in the air to achieve orgasm which was why he'd made the request of her he did.

He had finagled a gift from her. It had taken some fancy persuasion, reiterating the importance of scent to an inu which he was certain had been supported by her previous readings, but eventually he'd been successful. He wanted a garment from her that would be steeped in her personal scent. This limited what she could send him and he'd trusted her medical knowledge and common sense to realize that without Sesshoumaru spelling it out. She'd sent him a bra, which arrived yesterday still soaked in her scent, though it wasn't exactly what he'd wanted when he'd coaxed her underwear off her. Truly it was the scent that mattered most to him, although he'd been aiming for her panties. They would have been more thoroughly soaked in her scent and thus would've given him greater comfort for a longer period of time. Plus there was also the invigorating thought of laying hands on a garment that rode her body so close to where he most wished to be.

But it was better than the complete lack of anything with her scent Sesshoumaru had lived with before. The minute he'd opened the package yesterday and released her scent to stain the air of his penthouse apartment, Sesshoumaru's body had reacted.

It had taken iron control to not immediately seek self gratification. It was more important to do what he could to preserve her scent in the soft fabric. Sesshoumaru had no idea when he would next be able to coax such an important concession from his mate so he definitely had to see to it this treasure's comfort would last as long as possible.

The minute his task was completed, his sire called upon him to attend an evening conference with some business associates. Sesshoumaru barely had time to take a freezing shower before leaving to attend the mind-numbing event.

As usual, he spent the duration avoiding the other young heirs forced into company with him. Sesshoumaru had cultivated a rather detached manner that held all comers at the frigid outer borders of his concern. This night, he was a bit more taciturn than normal, given that most the others arrived with dates tittering gayly over Christmas plans and irritating his sensitive hearing.

His grumpier mood had even won him an icy glare sent his way from his sire. Thankfully, the event being what it was, prevented an exchange of words with the male that had dragged him away from the first bit of promised peace Sesshoumaru had been able to grasp in months.

He'd returned home so late, there was nothing for it but to strip off the restricting costume he was required to wear for these things and drop into his bed. Sesshoumaru was so tired he almost forgot to open the protective covering on her gift to flood his bedroom with the soft cloud of her scent before he slipped into unconsciousness.

Surprisingly, his sleep was deep and peaceful. For the first time since waking up to the abandonment of his mate, Sesshoumaru slept though the night. His dreams had been filled with the soothing and companionable sensation of a warm body lying trustingly beside him. It was a warm and elusive sensation he couldn't remember ever knowing previously, even as a pup. There was a sense of security - illusory, obviously, but the feeling was nice.

Sesshoumaru woke up slowly to the sun streaming through his panoramic window and immediately decided not to get out of bed if he didn't have to. He'd never before had a lazy day and had only heard of them recently from his mate. Even then, he hadn't quite understood the appeal of indolently lounging about doing nothing. But then, he'd never felt quite as comfortably mellow as he did today. Neither had he ever slept in quite so late without strenuous exertion in the bedroom the night before. More so than his regular marathon sessions, closer to the effort and time spent the night of his somewhat disastrous mating.

Sesshoumaru languidly shifted position and watched the gray clouds roil and pool outside the wide glass window. Sometime in the late afternoon, snow began to fall in the slow drifting way that most imagined when picturing Christmas snowfall. An hour later, it started to come down a little harder as the day waxed into the early darkness of winter.

After the city lights started to stain the canopy of snow filled clouds, Sesshoumaru got hungry and was obliged to leave the warm comfort of his bed to search out his kitchen. He didn't bother with the lights or covering his nudity. He was alone, it was Christmas and he seldom allowed himself to indulge. Mostly because, every interlude spent in his personal apartment had a finite and definite end either due to expecting a summons from his sire and alpha, or an appointment already set to call him away.

The heir of such a large business franchise seldom had time without demands on it. But he knew today there could be no last minute calls from his alpha, for even in Tokyo, very few CEOs would put up with the business intrigues Taishou Hiroyuki played, not on Christmas. Too many of them knew better than that.

The males may run most of the businesses that his alpha competed and negotiated with, but all were affiliated with some female or other and thus all were required to spend this day with their respective females. It occurred to Sesshoumaru to wonder which female the esteemed Taishou was spending his evening with this night. It was no secret that Izayoi and Sesshoumaru's own mother were both still attached to the inu multi-billionaire. It was a favorite topic in a number of the so-called gossip rags.

As a boy, Sesshoumaru hadn't realized how unusual his family circumstances were until Izayoi managed to birth the whelp, Inuyasha. Before then, all three of his parents had doted on him equally. In naive childish fashion, he believed his mother and his father loved him and Izayoi loved him because she couldn't have any other children of her own. Those were happy days, or as happy as Sesshoumaru could ever remember his days being. Even then, those days always held a hint of sadness, a sort of longing in Izayoi's eyes and a cold distance in his father's at all times.

It wasn't until Izayoi's pregnancy made the rounds of the tabloids that Sesshoumaru learned the truth behind his conception. He was born for a purpose other than just to show the love of his parents with each other. More than that, he learned his own mother had birthed him only for what she could gain. Why she remained with his father after that, Sesshoumaru had never bothered to ask, though he was certain it was due to some level of attachment to his sire. Females were strange that way.

Sesshoumaru was certain that if there were a way for an inu to take two mates, his father would have marked both females, for as surely as he drew breath, Taishou Hiroyuki had no intention of letting either female free of him. It did not surprise him, for inu were possessive to a fault. Males especially so. What so disgusted him, if disgust were the right term, is that both females allowed their male to hold on to both. They cheapened themselves, as his mate would say, by doing so.

As a boy, he hadn't understood the complexities of a romantic relationship between adults. As an adult, he couldn't understand how the three of them had allowed their lives to become a three ring circus for the most creative writer to paint in increasing depravity and lurid hues of lust and, if the respective author were feeling kind, love. Sesshoumaru sneered at the thought. But he was no better.

Sesshoumaru had crafted an image in the public eye of reckless drunkenness. The difference, he generally told himself in times past, was that he was not actually mated to any of the women he'd allowed to be pictured beside himself. He had been single and living the life of the young, famous, and wealthy. He'd never dreamed his behavior would be turned on him so blatantly when he achieved his purpose for building such a reputation.

Sesshoumaru drew his thoughts away from the tangled mess of his family bonds and public behavior amazed that the darkness had drawn his thoughts down such long avoided corridors. But he supposed, that was the point of a truly lazy day, to think about all the things you hadn't time to think of before.

His mate had a cathartic way of drawing his thoughts from the buzzing life of a pseudo-celebrity poised to unwillingly take over the business world to the slower quieter hum of more personal paths. She, Sesshoumaru had learned over time, made a point to think seriously on a number of more emotional topics that he'd never had the stomach to do himself. The result, he'd found, was a truer tranquility than he'd ever attempted to portray. She was solid in her skin, comfortable and accepting of all her flaws. Not that he was ever willing to believe she had any beyond her unwillingness to return to him.

But after her anecdotal reason for the distance between them, he could no longer argue that point. He had a hanyou half brother himself. And while Sesshoumaru had long blamed the shattering of what had been the illusion of a happy family on Inuyasha, he never wished him dead. Truthfully, he sort of felt it would be an insult to the power of his father's blood if Inuyasha ever succumbed to the same type of thing as her childhood friend. As such, he was proud of her for making the effort to prevent it from happening.

Knowledge, as they say, is power.

Around midnight, Sesshoumaru left off his gazing out the window and his thoughts of the mysterious nuances of his Alpha's romances and decided to take a shower. It was the first time since the morning after marking his mate that the water running down his body was warm enough to create the steam necessary to fog the mirror. He stood there as the water ran down his shoulders reveling in the sweet warmth that pounded over his back and swept through his lengthening silver hair heedless of the time that passed.

Showers were magical places, his mate had told him. Something in the mix of steam and water and relaxation became quiet reflection and soft revelation. He hadn't understood what she meant when she said it. All Sesshoumaru's recent experiences with showers were unpleasant freezing episodes in attempt to bring down his swelling need. He'd only stood under the spray long enough to achieve his purpose before gratefully turning off the cold water. After half a year of going without it, there was no way for him to take the hot water for granted. And his mate's words slowly made sense as his skin became gradually acclimated to the heat.

With the stream of steady water and the release of what little tension was left in his shoulders drained away, it occurred to him that the shower itself contained no magic beyond the reality that there was little to distract him from his thoughts. The motions of bathing required little conscious attention, leaving much of the mind to wander over other things. Such as his mate's suggestion that he take a class that had little to do with his rather concrete future.

Sesshoumaru had never been able to keep his lack of ambition in regards to his future from his mate. Whether he just tried to keep it out of conversation beyond letting her know about his plans for the evening beyond their precious phone calls or his attempt to avoid talking about his classes, she picked up on the lack of enthusiasm. He supposed it wasn't terribly difficult to pick up on such a thing for her, who went about everything in her day eager to tackle any obstacle she encountered. The lack of such in himself was just one more thing to point at and show how much of a mismatch he was for her.

How was Sesshoumaru to woo her back to his side when he kept proving himself insufficient. After her great disclosure concerning the very emotional decision to pursue her current medical career, he had even been so foolish as to inform her of the great discrepancies between them as individuals.

Instead of spurning him as he was certain she would do the minute he'd realized what he'd told her, she'd offered to help him grow as a person. She told him that passion can take many forms be they quiet or bold, private or public. Sometimes people, like his mate, are allowed to make their dream into a career, but most could only pursue the things they truly enjoyed as a hobby.

Sesshoumaru didn't have a hobby and had never attempted to pursue anything beyond what was required of him. She'd seemed worried when he told her that. His mate told him that hobbies and passions were the best way to release stress. They helped to maintain sanity in a world all too full of random insanity. Seeing an opportunity to try and persuade her to reveal her present location, he'd tried to convince her that most inu found their comfort in the presence of their mate.

His mate had actually scoffed at that. She had argued that sex was not always the answer to everything, least of all his forecast of problems. And while he could possibly ease some of his stress through the company of a lover (the term drew a growl of frustration from him), the results would be a temporary band-aid for his bigger issues. The truest comfort to be had in a real relationship was of course, being able to relate one person to another. And there was no such thing as an interesting relate-able person without a passion or interest that could be discussed or shared with another. His mate believed that part of the reason divorce was so prevalent in today's world was because of a distinct lack of maintaining connection with all the things that had made them individuals prior to wedding.

It was hard to keep the same interest in a housewife that had been found in an ambitious artist or lawyer or teacher or idealist. Just as it was difficult to find the same intrigue in the beleaguered white collar man that had been out to change the world, or play his music or fix up his cars. Passion for something was the spark that drew people to each other and while necessity often required a body to cut back on the amount of time spent pursuing those individual passions, they shouldn't be dropped entirely.

She'd made up her mind that he needed something beyond his eminent position as a CEO. He expressed a want in his person of something he could be passionate about and so she'd taken to brainstorming possible suggestions for his down time. Her latest suggestion had been that he take up art, and like all her other suggestions, Sesshoumaru had neglected to give it real consideration. Until the shower drove him to really ponder her choice and the reasons she gave for it.

His mate had decided that whatever he did had best be creative in nature. His business endeavors were mostly given to tearing down the hard work of others therefore his off time should be spent building up something to help balance that out. Sports and Athleticism were out because, while she believed he would be good at them and possibly even enjoy the exercise, he was unlikely to grow passionate about something that had limited potential to grow with him. She'd also, by the same token, eliminated starting a collection of pretty much anything since youkai lived a long time and Sesshoumaru wasn't the type to hold on to or collect anything he couldn't use. Sentimental, he wasn't.

His mate had laughingly ruled out the pursuit of music due to his inu hearing and the inevitable discordant sounds of every beginner on an instrument. Thinking back on his younger days in his private schools, the halls echoing with the efforts of some classmate or other attempting to master a violin or piano, Sesshoumaru had equally agreed.

So she had suggested art.

Sesshoumaru had never considered art as something he would enjoy, and nobody else had ever thought to suggest it to him either, but he couldn't argue with her reasoning. Sesshoumaru was already long used to the smell of graphite and ink from their long usage in his school work. Chalk was hardly more irritating. Water colours, if he progressed that far presented little issue. And that was only the logical extension from the beginner drawing and sketching that typically marked a new interest in art.

Perhaps his mate had chosen well for him. Even if she did tease him that once he got beyond stick figures he could draw nude models. At this point the only nude model he was interested in was a female that lived half a world away and wore his mark under her clothing.

Sesshoumaru turned off the water in the shower when it started to chill and reached for the fluffy towel on the rack. Diligently he removed the excess water from his skin and long hair before once again sprawling naked over the crimson sheets of his bed. The impact of his body with the bed sent up a cloud of scent infused with that of his mate causing his body once more to react. He fought off the urge to attempt to do something about it before his mate called. With his luck, she would call before he finished and would easily pick up on what he was doing. The smirk that curled his lips was slightly rueful as he remembered that long ago call he made following one of the first of his almost wet dreams. There was no doubt in his mind that she wouldn't appreciate it.

As if in answer to his thoughts, the magical sound of his phone ringing cut through the settled silence of his apartment and Sesshoumaru answered its summons swiftly, pleased at this call like he never was when the caller was his sire.

"Hello, my mate," Sesshoumaru growled that low instinctive rumble designed to entice his mate into carnality.

"Merry Christmas, Taishou-san," her warm voice answered from the other side of the world.