May 15, Magnolia City Park, 4:15 PM
Kagome pulled the brim of her wide straw hat down farther. She knew it was ridiculous, cliché even. But she couldn't help it. Sango was reduced to bodily propelling her across the lawn as Kagome tried to keep watch everywhere at once and hide under her hat at the same time.
Sango would have laughed if her friend wasn't so obviously distraught. She sighed, pausing amidst the crush of humanity.
"Kagome."
The woman in question didn't even turn, busily scanning the crowd for a certain individual and shifting from foot to foot.
"Kagome." Louder this time, pitched to carry over the buzz of conversations and good-natured pandemonium.
Kagome turned around, expression taut.
Sango grimaced. Perhaps this particular operation to cheer Kagome up with loud music and booze was ill-advised.
"If you want to leave, we can," Sango offered.
Kagome shook her head. "We're already here. Let's just find a spot that's out of the way."
"Over there, then." Sango motioned to a large sweetgum tree, which no one had yet claimed with a blanket or camp chair.
They found out why it was still vacant when Kagome yelped and leapt up, having sat down hard on several spiny gum balls. Hat slightly askew and grumbling obscenities under her breath, Kagome helped Sango clear the obnoxious seed pods from a patch of ground. When they were comfortably seated on their pale pink and magenta blanket, Sango extracted two beers from a small cooler, popped their tops and handed one to Kagome.
Kagome sipped absently, barely noticing the fresh taste of hefeweizen as it passed her lips. An acoustic strum of a guitar lilted out of the speakers and across the crowded lawn— a cheer went up and—
There he was.
Sango turned at Kagome's sharp intake of breath.
"Kagome, give the band a break, they only just started playing— "
Kagome shook her head and pointed. Perhaps sixty feet ahead and slightly left, two nearly identical cascades of white hair brushed the ground, their owners seated in camp chairs and separated by a black-haired woman and a fizzy little girl bouncing in her seat. The furred, pointed ears atop one head of white hair twitched as though flicking away a bothersome bug.
"Oh," Sango breathed. The weekend before, Kagome had shown up at the Monk's Vice with no warning, looking haggard, and spilled the details of the last few weeks. Sango had been simultaneously irate and relieved. By now the relief that Kagome was not in fact dead had worn off, and Sango's annoyance with the whole situation was beginning to creep in.
"Just ignore him, Kagome."
Kagome's attention snapped to Sango. "As if I can," she said. "He's right in front of us."
Sango exhaled a long-suffering sigh and began to stand up, resigned to spending the next half hour scavenging for a new place to sit.
"Where are you going?" Kagome asked in confusion.
"We're going to find somewhere else to sit," Sango explained irritably.
"But— "
"Do you really want to stay here and stare at his back like some kind of creeper?" Her hands were on her hips as she glared down at Kagome. Kagome, who wouldn't meet Sango's accusing gaze. "You do, don't you."
"Do not," Kagome huffed finally, unfolding her legs to stand.
As they walked off, Kagome cast one last glance over her shoulder and met surprised golden eyes, a liquid expression of longing— and Kagome would have gone to him in that moment, but his gaze slammed shut and he turned his face away as if he hadn't seen her.
Breathlessly, Kagome stumbled after Sango, the picnic blanket clutched tightly to her chest.