Author's Note: Hehehe! I have officially passed the one hundred reviews mark! Yaaaa! Pretty good for my first fanfiction, don't you think? So now let's make it two hundred! (lol) I'll do all the hard work of writing the story, and all I ask in return is that everybody please review and tell me what you think of it so far! Thanks! :D

Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha, sadly, or any of the characters that the wonderful Rumiko Takahashi has concocted, but the character Rhiodoru is my own personal creation ;-)


( " " talking, italics thinking )

Games

Inuyasha was angry. First of all, he was angry with Kagome for using all those sit commands on him yesterday. He was still aching. The angrier Kagome was when she used the command, the more it hurt - and the girl had been furious. His head, which had still been aching at the time, had felt like it had been smashed into a million pieces with a sledgehammer. He hadn't been able to even sit up for a whole ten minutes afterwards. He scowled deeply at her back as she walked a couple feet ahead of him.

He'd only been playing with her. She obviously didn't have much of a sense of humour. Sango and Miroku, and even Shippo, had told her that he was only playing and that it really had been funny, but the girl refused to apologize to him.

Last time I ever play around with her, he thought grumpily.

After he had recovered from the commands, he had spent the rest of the evening pouting silently, before going to bed early on a nice tree branch. Kagome had studiously ignored him the entire night. To be completely honest with himself, Inuyasha had to admit that she had hurt his feelings. He desperately hoped that no one else had figured that out. He was still trying to keep them under the impression that he didn't have any feelings to be hurt, but it didn't seem that he had been all that successful. The others all thought he was a total softie underneath the demon exterior. He scowled, his thoughts returning to Kagome. All he had done was try to play with her, something he'd never done before, and she'd gotten mad at him. He knew she hadn't been hurt or anything, so she couldn't be angry about that. He had even let her win, so she couldn't be cross about losing. So what was her problem?

Inuyasha tried to calm down a little, but failed. The second reason he was so mad was because he was furious at himself for acting so idiotic. He had behaved like a little child. Disgusted with himself, he was already trying to forget that it had even happened, but that was very difficult to do when Shippo kept pestering him to play games. Inuyasha was not playing any more games, ever. His anger wilted as he thought that. As much as he hated to admit it, he had had fun. Lots of fun. And he wanted to play some more too. It had been almost a decade since Inuyasha had played any kind of game at all, and he had really enjoyed himself yesterday afternoon. Well, except for the sit commands part.

No, he thought to himself, no more games. I have to concentrate on finding the jewel shards and destroying Naraku. I don't have time to be playing around.

He found that thought very depressing. He wanted to play around. And Shippo wasn't helping either.

"Inuyasha! Inuyasha! Come play tag with me!" The kitsune started yanking on Inuyasha's sensitive ears, trying to entice him to play. "You played with us yesterday! Why not today?"

Losing his temper, the half-demon grabbed the kitsune and threw him to the ground.

"Yesterday was a one time thing!" He yelled furiously, causing Shippo to cower down on the ground. "I'm not going to play anything with you ever again, so get off my case and leave me alone!"

The others turned and stared at him. Shooting a nasty look at a surprised Kagome, he stalked past them, muttering curses under his breath. Maybe if Kagome hadn't taken it so poorly, he might have actually considered opening up his inner barriers like that more often and having some fun every once in a while. But no, she had to freak out at him, making him feel like he could never open up again. He scowled more deeply. He was in a very bad mood.


Kagome watched Inuyasha storm past them. She felt a wave of guilt wash over her, and cursed herself for her stubbornness. Inuyasha was mad and upset because Kagome had used the sit command on him excessively for no good reason. And now it looked like, because of her, Inuyasha would never be in a playful mood again.

She really had enjoyed herself when Inuyasha had been such a brat and stolen her candy. She had had so much fun. But she had over reacted completely when Inuyasha had said he had done it simply for fun. She had felt that she had acted like an idiot just for his entertainment. She had been humiliated that he had tricked her. For a moment she had forgotten that he had just wanted to play. And in that moment of anger and embarrassment, she had made a huge mistake; she had used the command.

Almost immediately afterwards she had realized her mistake. But the damage was done. Inuyasha had been furious. She had been so ashamed of her shortsighted and insensitive actions that she had tried to pretend that it hadn't happened, and had been too embarrassed to apologize. That had just made things worse. Inuyasha was not taking it well at all, and she couldn't blame him.

"Kagome," Miroku said sternly from behind her, "go apologize to Inuyasha."

She turned to face him, blushing guiltily. She knew she should, but she desperately didn't want to.

"Do it Kagome." Sango added. "You're being as stubborn as Inuyasha usually is."

She blushed even more at that, knowing it was true.

"Kagome, you've hurt Inuyasha's feelings badly. He showed you a side of himself we've never seen before and you pretty much threw it back in his face. If you don't apologize right this minute, I doubt we'll ever see that side of him again." The monk ruined his stern lecture by cracking a smile. "And I must admit, I prefer this new Inuyasha. He might still be aggravatingly annoying, but in a much more pleasant way." Sango nodded in agreement, giving Kagome an encouraging smile.

"Fine," Kagome muttered, "but you guys all stay here."

She trudged off after Inuyasha, trying to decide what to say. To apologize, she would have to admit that she had been wrong and had made a mistake, and that would be hard. Not to mention the fact that Inuyasha never admitted it when he was wrong. Why should she?

She found him sitting under a huge tree, munching on some kind of fruit that grew in abundance on the tree's branches. He glowered as she approached, but didn't move from where he sat. Kagome sat down beside him and stared at her hands. She considered what she should say.

"Inuyasha," she blurted in a rush, "I'm sorry about what I did. I shouldn't have used the command on you like that. You were just playing around. I'm so sorry, I totally over-reacted."

Inuyasha stared at her for a moment before grunting and taking another bite of his fruit. Kagome wondered if that meant he had forgiven her.

"Ummmm..." She said, feeling strangely shy all of the sudden. "I actually had lots of fun yesterday. Maybe you... or, uh, we could, uh, do that again sometime. I promise not to get mad or anything again."

Inuyasha looked up at her in surprise. Then he looked down at his lap. "I don't think so." He sounded almost disappointed.

Peering at Inuyasha's partially hidden face, she noticed that he was blushing slightly.

He's embarrassed! She realized in surprise. The hanyou was always so touchy about being treated like a child, he probably thought that it was too unmanly to act a little silly once in a while.

Kagome narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. He's too embarrassed to want to play again. Well, I can fix that!

"Are you sure?" She asked teasingly, getting to her feet. Inuyasha looked at her in confusion. Reaching down, she snatched the half-eaten fruit out of his hand. Scowling, he tried to grab it back, but she dangled it just out of his reach. Jumping to his feet, he tried to snatch at it again, but Kagome was already running away. Then the chase was on.

Around and around the tree they ran. Kagome was laughing wildly by the time Inuyasha caught her from behind. Dizzy from running around in circles, she sagged in his arms as she laughed. Chuckling himself, the half-demon shifted her into one arm and took his now mutilated fruit from her. Looking at it in disgust, he chucked it away and flopped back down on the ground.

Her support suddenly gone, Kagome toppled down on top of Inuyasha, giggling madly. Inuyasha laughed too. As she sat dizzily in his lap, she realized that he had a wonderful laugh. She twisted around to look at him and realized that he looked wonderful when he was laughing too. Smiling broadly, she reached up and tweaked one of his ears. He tried to scowl, but failed, starting to laugh all over again.

"So Inuyasha," she teased, "is playing around once in a while all that bad?"

He stopped laughing and gave her a deeply disdainful look, which didn't really have the desired effect because she was sitting in his lap and he couldn't look down his nose at her. "I wasn't playing around at all. I was merely trying to retrieve my stolen food, which, by the way, you ruined."

"Oh, is that what you call it? 'Retrieving your food'? Let me guess, demons don't play." She tweaked his ear again.

"Of course we don't." He sniffed. "A playful demon is a dead demon. It's always a bad idea to let your guard down."

She gave him a serious look, and pretended to peer at him closely. "But Inuyasha, you don't look dead to me! Maybe playful demons really aren't dead ones after all."

He stuck his tongue out at her. "I'm just not playful, and that's why I'm still alive."

"Not playful?" She began, but abruptly stopped when Inuyasha jumped to his feet, dumping her on the ground.

"Inuyasha! What -" She suddenly noticed that Miroku, Sango, Shippo, and Kilala were all walking towards them.

"Well, well, well," Miroku called to them, "I see you managed to make up all right. Maybe you'd like a little more private time with each other to – owww!" Sango bashed him on the head with her giant boomerang.

Kagome started to blush. They must have seen her sitting in Inuyasha's lap. She glanced at the half-demon and glowered. He wasn't blushing at all. In fact, he was looking quite amused. She opened her mouth to tell him off, when he abruptly stooped down and picked up the half-eaten piece of fruit off the ground. With a smirk, the half-demon whipped the fruit at Miroku's head. It splattered all over the side of the monk's face with a wet smack.

Kagome stifled a laugh as Miroku swore, wiping the chunks of fruit off his face. Sango bashed him on the head again for swearing around Shippo.

Inuyasha began walking down the path, continuing where they had left off. Kagome fell into step beside him, the others following behind. Miroku was still grumbling about the fruit. She glanced back at Sango. The demon slayer winked at her. Kagome blushed again. She was definitely going to have to explain things to the others. She hadn't meant to sit in Inuyasha's lap. It had been an accident.

She found herself thinking that she should accidentally fall in his lap again, only next time, she should do it somewhere a little more private where they wouldn't be interrupted.

Blushing at her own thoughts, Kagome looked at Inuyasha. She had known for a long time that she loved him, but she had never been sure about his feelings for her. She knew that he cared about her, but Kikyo had always gotten in the way. Now that the priestess was gone though, Inuyasha no longer had romantic ties to anyone, and, in essence, he was free for the taking. But did he want her the way that she wanted him? Kagome wondered if she would ever have the courage to approach Inuyasha and tell him how she felt. She had almost told him when he had held her and comforted her yesterday morning. But she had chickened out and merely given him another hug. Now, with this new, playful, open Inuyasha, she didn't know what to think. She didn't want to risk her friendship with him by revealing her feelings for him if he didn't feel the same way about her. If only he would give her some kind of sign.

Kagome grimaced to herself. It would have to be one hell of an obvious sign, because she wasn't one for noticing that kind of thing.