Chapter 10: Things Fall Apart:

"Whether times are good or bad

Happy or Sad

Let's stay together."

Al Green, Let's Stay Together

Kagome flung open the door to her house and stormed inside. The argument she and Inuyasha had about her returning home was still ringing in her ears and all she wanted to do was go upstairs and sleep.

"Is that you Kagome?"

Stifling a groan, she walked toward the living room. I'll just say hello and make my escape, she promised herself as she automatically smiled in her mother's direction. "Hi Mama!"

Not stopping her strong walk to her haven upstairs, Kagome almost made it when her mother called out, "Come here please." Her normally sweet voice was oddly tense and instinctually Kagome knew something was wrong.

Wary now for reasons she couldn't have explained, the time traveler dragged her feet as she walked over.

Yasu watched her daughter plod over, sullen and angry as she usually was nowadays and restrained a sigh. The conversation to come wasn't going to be easy…

Kagome examined her mother's face in wary surprise. Yasu's mouth was in a tight frown and there were lines that hadn't been there the last time Kagome had seen her mother. A graceful hand gestured for the girl to sit and Kagome did so, growing more and more uneasy.

"Why is it so quiet?" she asked finally as the silence between mother and daughter stretched uncomfortably.

"I sent Grandpa and Souta away," Mrs. Higurashi said stiffly.

"What? Why?"

Meeting her daughter's eyes, she said softly, "We need to talk."

Oh shit… moaned Kagome mentally. Just when I thought the day couldn't get any worse, it does. "Okay," she sighed in obvious annoyance. "I don't really have a choice. What's this about?"

Mrs. Higurashi pulled something from her lap and held it up accusingly. Kagome's eyes went wide as she recognized the sheets she and Inuyasha had ruined a few days ago. The sheet was clean if one ignored the tell-tale faint brown stains of washed out blood.

Kagome took a deep breath. "Momma, I know what this looks like," she said urgently, "but I can explain!"

"Try," her mother challenged quietly. "I know it wasn't blood from the loss of your virginity. First off, it's too much blood and second, you haven't been a virgin for a while now. A mother can sense these things and you lost your innocence to that boy a long while ago."

Kagome stayed quiet and her mother glared at her for her silence. "I still haven't heard your explanation. Explain to me why my daughter is sleeping with someone who makes her bleed."

"It's not like that," Kagome sputtered in shock. "We were…uh…"

"Having sex?" Yasu filled in bitterly. "This may surprise you dear but these walls aren't sound proof and you and that boy are both rather loud."

Her face flushed so quickly that it was painful and Kagome tried to not slump lower into her seat. "…Sorry," she said lamely.

"You should be," the formerly gentle woman spat out. Standing up, she flung the sheet at her daughter. "I thought you were smarter then this, failing out of school or not."

"What is it with everyone harping on me about school today?" muttered Kagome.

"That's not the point!" her mother shouted, fists clenched. "Stop talking and listen to me for once!"

Kagome jumped at the sound of her mother's raised voice. She couldn't remember the last time her mild-mannered mother had yelled and now her mother's face was red and she paced in anxiety.

Yasu bit her lip and try to focus beyond her emotional turmoil. "Kagome-chan, I love you. Everything I say or do is for your benefit. You believe me when I say that, don't you?" Kneeling in front of her oldest child, she took Kagome's hands in her own.

"Yes," Kagome replied softly, uncomfortable and soothed by her mother's closeness at once.

Rubbing her thumb over her daughter's knuckles, the tears rose in Yasu's brown eyes. "I remember every day with you as if it was yesterday. You were the happiest child, always brave and kind. I was…I am so proud to be your mother," she whispered. "I'd die to save you. I'd kill to protect you and Souta. But," she raised her eyes and gazed in horrified grief, "I don't understand why you're with him!"

Kagome swallowed hard. "Momma, I'm in love with him."

"You're a teenager! People your age fall in and out of love all the time," Yasu said wearily.

"Not me," Kagome responded with a sad smile. "Not us. This is it."

"No it's not. This is not 'it'," her mother said with a shake of her head. "It just feels that way."

"I've felt this way since I was 15. I know who I'm spending the rest of my life with. My place is with Inuyasha."

"Do you hear yourself?" her mother asked incredulously. "You were 15 when you met him! Do you really think a 15 year old Kagome should make this sort of decision? Haven't you grown and matured since then? Haven't you altered your standings on certain issues or changed your tastes in music and clothes?"
"Of course!" Kagome said with an uncomfortable laugh.

"Well then why are you saying you decided on a life partner when you were 15?" she asked softly. For a moment no one said anything as Kagome digested her mother's words. "You were a child Kagome," Yasu added. "A lot of emotional and physical things have happened between the two of you when you were both very, very young. It made such an impression that you can't see clearly what's going on…"

Kagome stayed quiet, dread and fear combining in her stomach and causing her gorge to rise. I don't want to hear this, I don't want to hear this…!

"There's blood on that sheet. Too much for my comfort but any blood at all would be. He's abusive," her mother concluded sadly. "He's abusing you and you just don't see it."

Kagome shot off the couch. "He is not!" she gasped. The idea was almost laughable. Inuyasha wasn't anything like that and Kagome simply couldn't understand what her mother was thinking to say such a thing. "He's…not!" she denied loudly. Running her fingers through her hair, she shook her head and looked away from her mother. "Momma you have it all wrong. He's not abusive. He loves me."

"Maybe he does," Mrs. Higurashi admitted. "He acts like it sometimes but he doesn't know how to control himself. He made you bleed," she hissed, her anger sudden and visible as she thought of her precious daughter being maimed. "He hurt you."

"Yeah he hurt me and it's fine!"

"I don't think you understand-" her mother began.

"You're the one who doesn't understand!" Kagome burst out. "It…it was a sex thing, okay?" she explained angrily. "Is that what you wanted to know? It was during sex and he got a little careless with his claws! That's all!"

"That's all?" Yasu repeated in shock. "Kagome, when someone hurts you, you don't protect him or give him excuses! You leave the relationship!"

"I enjoy protecting him!" Kagome yelled. "He needs me!"
"He doesn't need your protection anymore! He's a grown man!" her mother shouted back. "Furthermore, you need you more! He may not mean it but he can really hurt you and the fact that he's already so careless terrifies me!"

"It doesn't concern you!" the younger Higurashi woman shouted into her mother's face. "Don't you get it? I can make my own decisions!"

"Not if these are the types of decisions you make," Yasu whispered. "He could kill you," she said fearfully as a tear slid down her cheek.

"Don't be so melodramatic," sneered Kagome with all the skepticism of a child who thought she was grown. "You never minded him before."

"I know," Mrs. Higurashi admitted. "Maybe if I hadn't wanted you to like me so much, I would have had more control over what you did. Perhaps this is my fault. I was so afraid of you hating me like I hated my mother that I became the opposite of everything she stood for. I regret it now," she said softly. "My mother was so strict but I never had a problem with my self worth."

"I do not have image problems," scoffed Kagome.

"It's the only reason I can see that my brave, smart daughter would stay with someone of that sort."

"Don't talk about him like that!" Kagome spun away but Yasu wrenched her around with her fingers clenched tightly around her daughter's upper arm. Their gazes clashed and it was a silent, bitter battle that Yasu lost.

Kagome glared at her mother relentlessly as she was released. "I am fine with my relationship and I wish you would leave it alone."

"I know you're not fine with it," Mrs. Higurashi said softly. She held up a small package and Kagome gasped in horror as the label on the box penetrated.

"How…how did you get that?" she asked numbly as her hand reached for the all important parcel.

"It was on the front porch when I came home. I saw it was for you and once I realized where it was from, I became suspicious and opened it," her mother said calmly.

"It was my package!"

"I'm your mother. I don't care if I invade your privacy if it protects you."

Kagome shook her head in disgust. "You invaded my privacy when it wasn't necessary."

"Apparently you aren't as sure of that as you pretend to be if you felt a need to go to a doctor outside of Tokyo for birth control."

Kagome sighed and looked away. "I just don't want kids yet…"

"While I'm happy that you use protection, if you were so positive that he was your life partner you would have come to me and we would have found a doctor together," her mother said quietly. "I would have supported you for making a responsible decision. You didn't come to me and that's because you see something in your involvement that you knew I'd disapprove of."

"You can support me now Momma," Kagome said optimistically. "I still need support."

"No, what you need is counseling," her mother replied sharply. "I won't let this relationship continue. He's abusive."

"He is not!" shouted Kagome, hurt and infuriated by her mother's seemingly cavalier dismissal of her long bond with the hanyou.

"He is!" Yasu said forcefully.

"He isn't!"

"Kagome, I'm telling you-!"

"For god's sake, just fuck off!"

Slap!

Kagome felt her eyes fill with tears as she held her hand against her aching cheek. "You hit me…," she whispered in disbelieve.

Yasu looked just as shocked as she gazed momentarily at her palm. "I…I didn't mean to," she said shakily. "I…"

Overcome, the two settled onto opposite sides of the couch, staring at each other as though they were strangers.

"What happened?" Kagome asked as the silence stretched too tautly.

"I'm your mother," Yasu said softly. "When I heard you use that word at me, I couldn't help it. You never used to talk that way…I'm only trying to help," she explained in a low voice, "and you cursed at me so vilely. I did nothing to deserve that."

"I know," Kagome agreed just as quietly. "I'm sorry for cursing at you but you're wrong. He's not…you know….to me."

Yasu said nothing and merely stared at Kagome in resignation. "Did he apologize?" she asked suddenly.

"For what?"

Kagome had never seen such a withering stare before as her mother glared at her daughter's obstinate blindness. "For cutting you. For being so rough that he ripped you open."

Kagome stood up suddenly. "I'm done with this conversation," she spat out and stormed up the stairs to her room. Slamming the door, she collapsed onto her bed.

She wasn't crying and it surprised her. Perhaps, Kagome thought absently, it's because shock is setting in.

Had he apologized for cutting her?

She wasn't sure was frightened her more, the fact that Inuyasha hadn't apologized for cutting her or the fact that she hadn't realized before now.

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Inuyasha leaned against the thick trunk of the Goshinboku and tried to settle his thoughts.

She's so different. I don't know when it happened. How could I not see it? he wondered as his eyes narrowed against the sun. Thinking of the vicious argument that had exploded between the two of them before Kagome had ran to her era, Inuyasha sighed and thumped his head against the ancient tree. We just both blew up for no reason. I can't even remember the reason for the fight but now she's mad at me again. I didn't do anything!

"What the fuck is her issue?" he muttered angrily.

"Master!"

Inuyasha blinked and peered at the small flea demon floating down from passing bird. "Miyouga-jiji. What the hell are you doing here?"

"I'm here to assist you," the old and maligned youkai said as he fastened onto his favorite snack bar, Inuyasha's nose. "Mmmm…"

Inuyasha flicked the flea away in annoyance. "I'm not dinner, you tiny pain in my ass. Go find a nice animal to suck on."

"I am surely the least appreciated being in the universe," groused Miyouga as he unflattened himself and climbed onto Inuyasha's raised knee.

"What assistance do I need?" the hanyou asked his father's old retainer. "I'm doing fine. No real demons to fight, no Sesshomaru to kill…"

Miyouga folded his legs and nodded sagaciously. "True and indeed a fine thing it is too, not worrying over your safety constantly-"

"From a distance," Inuyasah interjected dryly.

"That's not the point," Miyouga sniffed. "I am here to offer support in any way possible." The flea stared at Inuyasha's wan skin and the dark bags underneath his eyes. He noticed the hanyou's slumped shoulders and the sigh the boy heaved without realizing. "Are you all right?" Miyouga asked in sincere concern.

Inuyasha stared at the cowardly flea for a few minutes without blinking. "It has nothing to do with you," he answered finally.

"But it does with the lovely Lady Kagome?" the tiny demon shrewdly guessed.

Inuyasha glared at the older youkai malevolently. "It doesn't concern you so drop it!!... How'd you know anyways?"

Miyouga shook his head at the persistent hubris of the young. "I'm old, Inuyasha. I've been around and seen that expression to often to not know that it relates to woman problems."

"Don't all problems come down to women?" Inuyasha rhetorically asked darkly.

"Some would say that," Miyouga replied with a chuckle. He turned serious, leaning forward toward his master. "What is bothering you about Kagome?"

Inuyasha sighed. He did not want to discuss this private issue with the nosy youkai but there was no one else to talk to. "We aren't the same anymore," he mumbled. "I just don't get what happened and why things changed."

Miyouga nodded his head slowly and whistled out a breath for courage. What he knew had to be said was not going to comfortable for his sensitive master to hear. "Why wouldn't things change?"

Inuyasha blinked in astonishment. "Why would they change? We've been doing pretty well for ourselves. Why should anything change?"

"Because that is what thinking beings do," the old demon said with a small, hidden smile. "Master, the fact is that you are not the person you were. Change is natural but how it will affect your relationship with Kagome-sama is entirely up to the two of you."

Inuyasha looked down at his retainer. "Meaning what?"

"Maturity is painful, Master. An adult evolves and sometimes leaves things behind. It is an unfortunate but a true, common circumstance."

"I don't want to leave something behind," Inuyasha protested angrily, knowing precisely the 'something' that his retainer was talking about.

Miyouga shook his head. "You speak like you have a choice."

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Kagome glared at the closed door of her house and whirled away in fury, her pursed clenched hard in her hands. "I cannot believe she's making me do this," she muttered as she marched down the steps of the shrine. Her mother's words echoed in her head, "I made you an appointment by your doctor. I need to be sure you are okay."

"You mean not pregnant," Kagome said angrily.

Her mother was ominously silent for a moment before she turned and said, "Go to the doctor or don't come back."

Kagome walked automatically toward the train station. Sure Momma but what if I don't want to go? "I'm fine…," she mumbled to herself, kicking at a stone. "I don't need the damn doctor." A part of her mind told her she was overreacting but Kagome ignored it in favor of the comforting and distracting anger at her mother. She didn't want to think about any of the disturbing things her mother had forced her consider.

"She doesn't understand," Kagome whispered. "She doesn't understand us at all."

Waiting for a corner light to change, she wanted to stomp on the foot of the man who jostled her rudely but held herself back. I should have rescheduled the appointment. It's too hectic at the end of the day, she grumbled to herself. At the end of the workday, office drones were filling the streets as they all headed for somewhere comforting after a stressful day. Like so many others, Kagome headed for the subways.

A little voice in her head was pleading with her to think on her mother's words but she ruthlessly shunted it aside. I don't want to, she told herself crossly. Leave me alone.

The crowd surged forward as the walking sign turned on and even if she had wanted to go in the other direction, it would have been almost impossible to fight the tide of people. Moving toward her destination, the concrete passed quickly under Kagome's feet as she marched, anger giving her speed and agility to maneuver through the crowded Tokyo streets. Stomping down the stairs, she looked around to find her train that would lead to Ikebukuro and her gynecologist.

Knowing the subway schedule, she was prepared for a wait as her train had just run through. The platform emptied somewhat as most of the commuters boarded their trains. Kagome shifted impatiently for the Y to show up but knew it would be a long time in coming. At the very edge of the platform, she looked down at the tracks into darkness of the tunnel.

When did it get so difficult? She reflected unhappily, her thoughts turning naturally back to her emotional predicament. We used to be best friends. We were really…happy with each other. But now everyone is yelling at me, telling me that I don't know what I'm doing. People I love are so disappointed in me and I don't understand why.

I can't deal with this.

I just need a little time.

She shakily exhaled as tears pricked at her eyes again. Rubbing them away, she looked down the tunnel but no train was coming.

He isn't abusing me. We were just excited.

That little voice piped up again and Kagome hated it with a passion. He's done it before, it said forcefully. He always cums so hard afterward, as soon as he sees you helpless and bleeding underneath him. How is this relationship healthy?

Her fists clenched. "I don't care. I'm not going to give this up!"

In the past he was so careful with me. He never used to want me to get injured but ever since we've become lovers, he's been reckless. It's like I shared my body with him and he thinks that now I can take the same rough treatment his body can.

All the things people had been saying to her flashed through her mind, their faces disappointed, frightened and scornful.

"You're pathetic. You let some guy run your life. Where has your pride gone?"

"I thought you were smarter then this, failing out of school or not."

"What will you do when your future is decided for you, all because you couldn't be bothered?"

"A lot of emotional and physical things have happened between the two of you when you were both very, very young. It made such an impression that you can't see clearly what's going on…"

For what felt like the thousandth time since it had happened, Kagome could feel the impact of her mother's palm against her face, recalling with perfect clarity the sting of it and the sound of flesh hitting flesh. Her shoulders slumped as she saw her mother's tear filled eyes questioning her, asking her to see what was happening.

"Stupid train," Kagome mumbled as a tear fell. "Always late."

She pictured Inuyasha as he was when she first saw him, hair swaying in the breeze as he rested in the spell-induced limbo between life and death. After she had woken him, the Jewel had shattered and the two were thrown into an epic battle against evil that had controlled everyone's lives, stole their happiness and youth for over two years.

He was at peace then, comatose and unreachable.

A smoker lit a cigarette near her and casually blew the resulting haze her way but Kagome didn't move or notice.

I think right before I woke him was the last peace either of us really had.

A train pulled into station but it wasn't the Y and so she suffered through the pushing and shoving that result when many people try to get on and off the same train.

Has everything I've done been useless or worse, harmful?

The subway engine pulled away and the platform shook.

Kagome's eyes gravitated toward the tracks. They're not so far away, she thought a tad hysterically. If I jump, will that solve everything?

Time seemed to slow as she realized what she had thought. Light, sound and scent faded into inconsequence as the dangerous railways sparked with electricity, calling her into a final comfort.

I've run away from a lot of things, Kagome mused absently, why not this?

If I jump, would my problems end?

If I jumped, would everyone be relieved that I had died with my potential still alive and everything I could have been forever a possibility? Who really wants or needs someone who always ends up a disappointment?

The yellow warning line at the end of the platform had never seen more like a shackle. So many people in Japan do it. Why not me? she thought radically. Why not me?

Her feet seemed to move separately from her consciousness as she shuffled to the edge of the dais. The purse she had held in her hands so tightly before dropped from her grasp but the overwhelmed teenager didn't notice.

It would be over so quickly. Just a burst of electricity and then nothing…or I'll do it before a train, get hit and die from the impact. It would be over so soon.

"This whole situation would finally be finished...," she whispered, greedy, selfish and blinded by the effortless genius of her plan. Simplicity itself…!

Poised on the rim of the subway stage, Kagome took a breath and released it silently. A single move forward would throw her over the side and into peace. Slowly she eased her foot forward with a smile on her face.

A wooden cane hit her in the stomach gently and pushed her backward from the edge. Shocked at the interference, she turned to deliver a blistering sermon about minding the privacy of others.

An old Japanese man in a faded, brown tweed coat and ridiculous looking black bowler hat nodded at her and nudged her from the edge one more time with his cane. Kagome stared down at the hunched over old man who barely reached her shoulders and blinked in confusion.

"Excuse me but who are you?" she asked irritably. "Why did you hit me in the stomach?"

Despite the sunglasses on his face, she could see his bushy white eyebrows rise. "When one is wishing to make a suicide wish, perhaps speaking it out loud is not the best way to preserve secrecy, hmm?" he asked rhetorically.

Mouth agape she blushed miserably. I can't do anything right. "I was talking out loud?" she winced.

"Indeed. Perchance your unconsciousness is trying to tell you something child."

"I don't think so," Kagome disagreed rudely, turning her head away from the meddlesome elder.

"It's your head. It's a safe bet that you know it best." The man spoke in breathy modulations, catching his wind at the end of every sentence and so ending always with a sigh.

Kagome looked at the old man and frowned at herself. "I'm sorry," she apologized in embarrassment. "I'm just not happy today. I shouldn't have taken it out on you. My apologies," she finished with a small bow.

A small smile lifted the corner of the wrinkled man's face and he waved away her request for forgiveness with a gracious air. "It's of no consequence in the long run of life," he wheezed, "like so many other things." He tapped her foot with his cane. "You've only got one life to live my dear. So make sure that before you throw it away, you evaluate if whatever is causing you all this pain is truly worth it."

Kagome swallowed hard and looked around. She had the strangest desire to just dump all her troubles on this stranger, see what an objective listener's perspective would be but she said nothing. He waited but as the moments ticked by and she remained silent, he nodded and turned away.

"It's a guy," Kagome burst out before the stranger had even taken a step.

The old man faced her with a curious expression on his wrinkled face. "A man, you say? A man?"

"He's really a boy," she explained in embarrassment. "But I love him and there are all these things that have happened, things you wouldn't believe, and I just don't know what went wrong between us and I want to fix it but I don't know if it's possible and-"

With a small laugh, the old man held up his hands as if surrendering. "Good heavens! What a litany of pain!" he chuckled again and mumbled something about impetuous youth and finally looked at Kagome. "There is only one question to ask here," he said quietly. "Are you being fulfilled by this relationship?"

"Wh, what do you mean?"

"In my long life, I've been through more then my share of hurts. Who hasn't, after all? But there are two things I have learned a long, long time ago and they may help you now. First off, never make a decision in the heat of the moment, especially if it's important. Go somewhere quiet and think the matter over for a while. Things become more easily heard when it's silent." With an obvious look, he glanced at the subway platform's end and raised his eyebrows. Kagome nodded in embarrassment. "Good," the old man said softly before continuing. "Secondly, all of life's choices can be evaluated by asking yourself very simply, 'Does this make me a better person?' In this case, if the relationship does, then it should be given another chance. If not, you should think of why you're together in the first place."

"Because we love each other!" Kagome said emphatically.

"But is it enough?"

Kagome could feel her heart pounding. With a screeching of the breaks, a new train pulled into sight.

"A train's coming," she commented softly.

"Indeed it is. Is it your train?"

"I don't know. I guess I'll have to find out when it gets here…"

"Yes. You will."

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A/N: Hey. Hope you liked the chapter. For those who are like 'why is kagome suddenly committing suicide? That's a bit ooc'.

To that I say two things: firstly, she's a teenager- as a breed (and they are a breed apart), they're more melodramatic than most anyone else. Every issue has overwhelming importance and significance. Every issue is huge and seems insurmountable. Add to this attitude an actual, real problem and some less than wise decisions are the results. Hence Kagome's thoughts on suicide. Besides, she's an emotional person who has no support left for the most important thing in her life, her relationship with inuyasha. All these doubts after achieving everything she thought she wanted is very upsetting.

secondly, by virtue of the fact she's having sex at all, this whole story is a bit OOC. go with the flow people.

hope you enjoyed the chapter. Also, btb, kagome's mother's name Yasu is not canon and means 'calm' in japanese.

review and let me know what you thought!