My December (Remix), Sad Inuyasha playlist, California King Bed.

This story, it is so long. I'm currently working around the 32 mark but I know it's just gonna keep growing. Probably my fault since I keep adding content and funny little chapters, but omg xD

Sorry for updating so late, I slept in until like 2 in the afternoon and then waffled around doing other stuff before firing up the laptop.

Taking Care

The Work-Place

"Excellent practice, ladies! I couldn't have done better myself!"

Kagura's week days from ten till three were spent at the Tetseiga, excluding Mondays that she had off and Fridays where she came in by eight for an evening of dancing and performance. Most clubs stayed open all week and changed their hours on the weekend, but Tetseiga was in that upper-class of clubs and party venues that only had to be open select hours during the week- mostly private functions and the upstairs restaurant, and then made most of its money only on the weekend. Dancers were only needed for those three big parties a week.

But that was why the dancers had a new routine every week, although after six months here at the Tetseiga Kagura had learned to recognize the patterns and rotations in the routines. Each one was different, and came with a unique set of props and colours that were never paired together more than once, but there were still foundational moves and transitions that made it possible to change things up.

It was Thursday and Kagura was towelling off her face and neck as Jakotsu, who still managed all the choreography while his brother played with the music from his booth, clapped and tittered happily. She was able to hop down off the stage after Yura, her usual partner in most routines, and file neatly into the dressing room to fix herself up and go home.

It had been just over a week since she'd last spoken to Sesshoumaru. She'd tried calling him, but it hadn't worked: it was also 'tried' as in she'd stared at her phone and physically tried to work up the nerve to call. He rarely called her first, they'd gone out for a month or two and she could only think of two, no more than three conversations he'd initiated- counting the original call to ask her out. But there had been a lot of phone calls in those few weeks.

Kagura'd rationalized it down to the fact that she'd come on too strong, she'd liked having that one person to talk to way too much and that had been the end of it. Seeing the infant had just been the final strike, and he'd walked. She'd gone through the agonizing process of this self-reflection this past Monday, when she hadn't been sure what would happen at seven, so she'd gone down into the lobby- just in case, at six-thirty.

And waited.

He hadn't called her in a week, there'd been no contact at all. Seven o'clock rolled around and the parking lot had remained empty. Some people who lived in the building had passed by, but Kagura hadn't gotten dressed up or anything so she wasn't a someone to stare at as she loitered in the foyer. At seven-thirty there was still nothing, eight o'clock, nothing, at eight-thirty Hakudoshi came down and just sat on the steps without saying anything. At nine Kanna came down and the three of them went back upstairs so the baby wouldn't be left alone.

So, yeah, her week had pretty much sucked. She'd get through it, lesser people had suffered worse fates.

"Hear ye, hear ye!" Hear what? Kagura was seated in front of one of the big vanity mirrors in the dressing room, drinking some of her water as she turned to stare at Jakotsu. He was probably the only man who could walk through the dressing room with absolutely no teasing or cat-calling. Inuyasha came in during working hours of course, but unless he was really focused on something the girls could usually get a rise out of him. Kagura participated too sometimes, because why the hell not? "Ladies I call this meeting to order!"

"Meeting?"

"Finally!" Abi was the first one to speak up, and Kagura blinked as she heard cheers and clapping around the small room. Looking around, her co-workers were all looking... at her? Uh oh...

"Yes!" Jakotsu announced, lifting his arms, then pointed at Kagura. "This is the fourth meeting of the 'Kagura De-glooming' Committee!"

"Fourth?" Because if she tried attacking the committee's name that would, with Jakotsu, get her nowhere. Instead she just had to jump as Yura sauntered up behind Kagura's chair and draped her slender arms over the seated woman's shoulders. Great. The brunet's tee-shirt had been shed but not replaced yet and she leaned down and nuzzled the side of Kagura's head like a cat. It was creepy, but that was Yura.

"Honey, we need to get you laid..."

"Uh, no?"

"Of course we do!" Abi spoke up loudly, the auburn-headed girl standing up with her copper locks falling out of the tight bun she'd pinned behind her head for practice. Abi was already zipping up the black mini-skirt she'd come into work wearing, hiking up her thick leather boots that hugged her ankles and zipped up her calves. "We need a girls' night out, that'll getcha back on your feet!"

"Ladies, I'm fine." Kagura went back to drinking her water and then pulled the tie out of her hair, picking up a brush and running the bristles through the ever-tangled black strands. "Really."

"Psh, we'll find you some nice, cute boy so you can finally-"

"Yura, just I came out of a relationship." Handing the brush over as Yura tried no less than three times to snatch it out of her grasp, Kagura folded her arms and hooked one leg over the other in her chair, leaning back with her eyes shut as she heard the outraged gasps behind and beside her. Yura actually went so far as to drop the brush on the floor, Abi hobbling her way over with her other big black boot hanging in her hand.

"You were dating! ? When? Who?" Yes, last month, and some guy. "Why didn't you tell anyone! ?"

"Ooh, poor Kagura-chan!" Oh no, and now Jakotsu was right up in the action too. The man came over and physically turned Kagura's chair around so he could kneel on the floor and take up her hands like he was proposing. "Your dear heart must be in pieces, and we, your friends, didn't even know!"

"Stop being creepy."

"That's it! We're going out!" Again, no. Kagura worked her hands free of Jakotsu's possibly-well-meaning grasp and folded her arms again, letting Yura slap her shoulder as she made the announcement. "We dance tonight, sleep tomorrow, then perform tomorrow night! It's perfect!" Yeah, except for one thing.

"Sounds great, but I need to go home."

"No! Bad, Kagura! We're having fun tonight!" Abi was still standing next to her, shaking her head and lowering herself down to Kagura's eye level. "And I know just where we're gonna go too."

"Abi."

"Kagu." Ugh, that was such a stupid nick-name. "What do you have that's so important at home anyways?"

"None of your business."

"Ooh! I bet it's whatever the boss keeps bugging her about! Isn't it, Kagu?" Kagu sounded like something the infant would say, and she snatched the comb out of Yura's hands and started fixing her hair on her own. The catty woman was far too interested in the gossip. "C'mon! You never go out with us! It'll be fun! Where're we gonna go, Abi?"

"Remember that new place that opened up on the east side?"

"That Toki place?" Toki?

"Tokijin, yes!" Kagura went back through previous gossip sessions and plucked the name out of the ether. Right, it was supposed to be some skanky little place not too far from where her apartment was. Why on earth would Abi wanna dance out there? "Because that's where all the bad boys are, obviously!" Obviously...

"Whatever." Kagura turned back to her mirror, hair finished and tie at the ready as she spun the black length up and twisted it around properly. Yura pounced.

"Whatever-yes?"

"No!" Standing up suddenly, now they were getting annoying. Kagura picked her bag up off the floor and tossed her brush inside, then the towel that was still around her shoulders. She ripped her jacket off the back of her chair and started for the door, but Jakotsu was there dogging her ever step.

"Kagura you never-"

"I never drink, I don't date, and I don't party. I know what I don't do, Jak." He could tell she was getting mad just by the way she was walking, never-mind the sound of her voice, and Kagura knew he was backing off when he moved away enough that he wasn't directly in her face. He also wasn't grinning like a fool, which is a good sign that Jakotsu might be taking the situation seriously.

"You dated that other guy-"

"That was different." She stopped, she didn't want to but she stopped walking and turned on him properly.

There was an audience. Yura and Abi and a few other girls who hadn't been nagging her as openly, but they were all still watching and had been nodding and yeah-ing along with the plans to go out. There was a big audience of Kagura's co-workers, but she wanted this to be the only time this happened. She'd had a scene with her co-workers when she worked in the mall, and she was prepared for another scene here and now, but it's not going to happen again after this.

"I made a mistake and I went on a date with some ass-hole who knew a couple clever lines and had a pretty smile. And I had a good time, so I went on another date, and another, and then another, and then I-" She pursed her lips, she curled them in and bit hard enough that she could feel the blood squeeze out of them. Kagura couldn't look around behind her at the other girls, who were all silent listening to her explain. And she couldn't even look at Jakotsu straight because he seemed openly concerned, watching as she felt her jaw shake and bit a little harder on her lips to keep the reaction from growing.

He knew she had issues at home, Kagura'd never told him what exactly, but she'd come in for private lessons with him for over two months before finally getting the call in to try out for the Tetseiga. Kagura could only hope that he hadn't gone to Inuyasha or their boss's girlfriend, Kagome, and found out about the infant. If he had then bless him for never asking her about it, and if he chose now to do so Kagura'd have to do something drastic to get him off the scent.

She was not a single mother. Kagura was not some stupid girl who'd gotten herself knocked up in high school. And she wasn't some smart woman who'd been caught off-guard by a surprise moment of intimacy at the wrong time of month. And she wasn't moral enough to get trapped in an ethical box even if she had gotten pregnant at some point. Kagura hadn't made a mistake, she'd taken responsibility, and people were either going to stop fucking pitying her over it, or they were gonna follow Sesshoumaru's example and just get out of her life.

"Look, Jak-" and- "-and you guys too!" She didn't turn around, just flung her arm to the side and back, because she knew the other girls were still watching and listening. "Look, I don't..."

For once Jakotsu wasn't giving her the puppy eyes, his expression was sombre and his hands were tucked into the pockets of his jeans. He was dressed pretty tame too, but that was what rehearsals were for; just a yellow tee with a peace-sign in green, then a blue pin-stripe shirt tossed on over that and left un-tucked and unbuttoned over his jeans.

"I don't go home to shouting, and drinking, and fighting and shit like that. I used to- I don't anymore." Almost a year, it had almost been a full year. "I don't go home to something big and bad that I need to be saved from or anything; Inuyasha's just a bleeding heart who won't get over himself." And one who was never going to get the full story from her. Maybe if she quit someday, for some reason, or maybe when the infant was old enough to go to school in another five years. One day maybe she'd just walk in with the kid and Kanna in tow and freak Inuyasha out. "I don't need help, I'm fine, I'm just on my own."

Because it wasn't fair for her to rely too much on Hakudoshi. He didn't deserve to be tethered to the apartment just because she felt like going out and having some fun. She'd done that dating Sesshoumaru, she'd done it the night her boyfriend dumped her. Every now and again? Fine, she'd leave him with the responsibility of looking after their siblings for the night, but she'd just come out of a break-up she should have seen coming from a mile off, so tonight was way too soon for her to toss aside the responsibility again. She'd had her fun for the next little while.

"You know you don't have to do whatever it is alone, right?" Jakotsu's voice was mild, a very odd sound, but Kagura just shrugged. She could feel herself coming back under control and let her eyes roll up and examine the ceiling for a moment, coming back down on her former dance instructor.

"My boyfriend wanted nothing to do with it, s'not something I can just force on my friends." He'd wanted out so bad after he saw the baby he hadn't even pretended things were okay. "Most of the people I've known didn't have what it took to be any help. So just drop it, okay?" He didn't like this, but he took the words with salt and then offered his own, slow, shrug.

Kagura glanced back over her shoulder at her other co-workers, the other dancers. Yura had a shirt on at last and was zipping up her layered black-and-red winter jacket. Abi had been almost ready to run out when the conversation got serious anyways. They were still watching her, and Kagura had a feeling, judging by the expressions both women wore, that they were coming to their own conclusions in their heads. They'd be the wrong conclusions, about things friends can't help with and that scare boyfriends away, but Kagura wasn't going to go into details.

"You guys have fun at that club tonight." The Doki-whatever. Jakotsu finally let her out of the change-room, Kagura shouldering open the door as she heard a couple sober 'bye's and unhappy farewells from the other women she was leaving behind.

There was light coming in through the windows on the second floor. Bankotsu was still sitting up in his booth despite the speakers being off- lost in his mixes and twists. She didn't mind that he didn't return her wave, or even see it for that matter, and just started for the exit when she heard the door to Inuyasha's office open and saw her boss and another man step out. They were speaking in low voices, and Kagura couldn't see who the second guy was, so she just gave them a wider berth as she focused back on the-

"Hey, Kagura." Great, what now? She stopped and looked at her boss, he had his grim 'this means business' face on. "There's someone here who-"

"Kagura-"

Oh.

What?

He shouldn't be...

Kagura felt the feeling drain out of her limbs slowly, until it felt like she was just a head hanging in the air. It wasn't fear that made her freeze or some overwhelming sense of dread, but the dread was there. It was in her blood along with a myriad of other feelings that Kagura couldn't name and didn't want to think about. The man who'd been speaking to her boss stepped out and spoke to her, and she felt the sudden, crushing need to run away.

It wasn't Sesshoumaru, was that a good thing? This man was only a little bit taller than she was. His hair was black with familiar violet undertones, his eyes holding the same lavender colour as her half-brothers Hakudoshi and the infant. He was slender though, almost feminine: he looked more like their father than she did, and Kagura in turn looked more like their mother. Their mother, because they shared one.

"Byakuya." He shouldn't be here. Byakuya wasn't allowed to be here. This was her space, this was where she worked: this was something that belonged to her that he didn't get to have, him in his sharp looking suit and manicured nails. He didn't get to look so comfortable coming out of her boss's office with his violet-stained hair tied back behind the top of his head, the locks only long enough to hover over the collar of his starched white shirt.

"You've changed..." Changed? Of course she'd changed she- it had been- no, count back. Stay calm and just count back slowly, she was twenty-two now, she'd been six then... Kagura was good with numbers, it shouldn't have taken her so long to-

"Sixteen." Years. He took a step closer to her and Kagura instinctively took one back, spitting out the number instead. She had one hand frozen in her pocket and the other one clutching the strap of her back-pack. How dare he show up here, how dare he show up at all. "Why are you here?"

"Looking for you, I-"

"Get out." Kagura was leaving, her response was stupid. She should have been telling him to stay here, not leave, but this was her place, her job, her world, not his. She watched him, her brother? Her full brother? She watched him stop and stare, watched him have the gall to look almost disappointed. But her boss was still there, and Kagura heard his rough, grating voice speak up from behind the other man.

"Hey, I don't like the way this's going. Why don't you-" One hand touched her brother's arm and Byakuya suddenly turned around.

"She's my sister."

"Bullshit!" That word came out loud. Her voice was loud enough to jar Bankotsu where he was reclining in his booth- she heard the wheels of his chair slam the stage floor and almost toss him. The door to the change room was propped open too, no one coming out but she could feel curious eyes watching her. Inuyasha's was one set, but at least Byakuya didn't have the audacity to be confused. He looked grim though, almost disturbed, maybe almost hurt, but she really couldn't say she cared.

"Kagura-" No! She wasn't going to talk to him, least of all here where she didn't want to be.

"Look, pal, you'd better just leave for now."

"Unhand me- Kagura!" Kagura turned and was heading straight for the door, she didn't want to say anything, she wasn't going to do anything; just go home. And she'd take a different route in case he followed her- and he'd better not follow her! She'd had her scene, that was good enough: one scene and only one in front of co-workers and her boss, just one break in conduct in the place where she came to make money and do what she loved.

He had no right to be here.

"Kagura- mother's dead!" She hated herself for stopping, her hand on the door and was just about to push and let herself out into the sunlight. Kagura hated that she felt like she had to stop and hear him out, hated that she didn't know what to say- too much and nothing came to mind. She could laugh, cry, yell or just brush it off. They all felt like valid reactions to her. But she couldn't stall, she wasn't gonna give him that inch.

"Yeah, I know." So Kagura turned around with something else. She looked her full brother in the eye where he was still standing in front of her grumbling, clearly pissed off boss, the two of them still across the floor standing by the bar. So Kagura finished with: "He put her in the ground last year."

She opened the door with her back and vanished outside, hands in her jacket pockets. Fuck him, she used her name but Kaguya Kaze was no longer Kagura Kaze's mother.

"So... it didn't go very well."There was silence on the other end of the line, but Byakuya wasn't going to let himself be discouraged by this. He kept his cell up to his ear and sighed. "I don't suppose you would have-"

"Her address?"

"It's stupid, I know..." And why would his boss's son know where his sister lived anyways? Byakuya considered this bizarre little conundrum from where he was sitting at a local WacDonalds. Checkered black-and-white floors, yellow, red and white plastic seating, very bright florescent lighting and a lot of heavy rush-hour traffic streaming by the window to his left. Sitting in front of him wasn't the most nutritious dinner, but the suit-and-tie'd man just munched on his fries and waited for the brush-off from the man on the line.

His attempt to speak to Kagura had actually, at best, come off as disastrous. For one, she had a terribly nosey boss and he had been required to quote the law at the man to make him back off. Kagura's personal life and his relationship to that life was absolutely none of her employer's business, and if it was then Mister Charleston-Taishou and Kagura were perfectly within their rights to discuss matters privately. But Byakuya was not going to go there with a stranger. He'd discussed, just once, only a little bit, with the man he was on the phone with now, but that was because Bya had to start somewhere, so it might as well be through connections at work.

Another greasy stick of salt was guiltlessly consumed before he got a response from Sesshoumaru.

"...Go on a Monday. She's at-" Byakuya almost fell out of his seat, searching for a pen in his briefcase, pinning a napkin under his elbow so he could write on it. It would be too much to expect Mr. Inu-Taishou to go repeating himself! "Keep me informed." Huh?

"What? Why would I-?" There was a beep on the other end before Bya choked the question (and a bit of fry) out into his phone: he'd just been hung-up on.

The young lawyer reclaimed his plastic bench seat and stared at the traitorous numbers flashing at him: the length of the call and the combination for Sesshoumaru's cell. Something deeply personal came to light and Byakuya found himself hesitant to approve, in fact he felt down-right cautious now. But alright: the connection had been terminated, and the man he'd been speaking to was his boss's son, so maybe the fact that he'd hung up was okay. He wasn't too sure, but at least the dropped call gave Byakuya the freedom to exclaim:

"How do you even know her apartment number?" -without getting fired.

No joke, I feel like I'm writing a soap-opera.