A/N: This was inspired by the song "Letter to Me" by Brad Paisley. I wasn't looking to write a oneshot, but this song kept coming up on my playlist and the ideas kept creeping in until I finally caved.
'I don't know if I can do this.'
The textbook lay open on her desk, its companion practice book draped across it with creased and smudged pages from repeated corrections. Loose leaf paper with hastily scribbled notes and reminders covered the remainder of her desktop and lay littered on the floor. Some were balled up in frustration and tossed as far as the doorway.
It wasn't like she hadn't been studying her ass off for months. She knew this material. Her friends had helped her study. Helped her memorize the formulas, the dates, and everything in between. They'd worked hard to help her get to this point.
It wasn't the exams that she was afraid of anymore.
It was the unknown after the exams that terrified her.
She was going to graduate high school, and then what? She'd never thought that far ahead! Not even before…
The very moment her thoughts shifted towards the well house and what lay beyond it, Kagome's throat constricted. Her heart would beat sharply, reminding her of the heartache like it hadn't been three years since she was closed off from the feudal era and everyone in it.
On autopilot, she began tucking papers into the practice book, stacking it on top of the textbook and creating a neat pile that she gathered into her arms. With her materials, she left her room, went down the stairs, and out the back door.
'Across the shrine grounds. Don't run. It won't disappear. Almost there.'
The well house door slid open without so much as a creak. Grandpa must have come through and tended to the tracks earlier. When she had come here the day before it had made an awful squeak.
"I'm here," she called out softly, not expecting to hear a voice, but desperately wishing she did. Kagome let out a sigh as she set her things on the floor next to the well. When she sat on the dirt and pressed her back against the old wood, she spoke again. "I know you'd call me stupid for even talking out loud to myself, but…it helps.
It helps me feel closer to you. You probably can't even hear me – in fact, I know that you can't hear me. I just… I miss all of you. So much.
School is going well. Not like I didn't say this every other time I came in here to talk to you. I've been working hard, and my grades are the best they've ever been in math. Can you believe it? I used to have nightmares about failing math, and here I am…"
Kagome sucked in a breath and hated how staggered it felt. It wasn't the dust in there that was making it hard to breathe. It was her heart breaking. Every time she came in this space, she was reliving seeing the well taking Inuyasha away from her. She could still feel how she broke her fingernails trying to dig like she'd done once before. How her little brother had to build a rig to help get her out when she sprained her ankle a week later. How on new moon nights she'd take a sleeping bag down to the bottom of the well and pray that he wasn't alone.
Yet she kept coming back because it also gave her comfort.
Deep down in her heart, Kagome had to believe that there was a shred of hope that they still thought about her as well. She'd spent the last three years hoping that maybe, just maybe, the well might reopen. Let her pick back up where she left off in her adventures…but it hadn't…and her heart was beginning to accept that it would never let her through again.
Her calling was done. It had deemed that she didn't have any reason to travel back five hundred years anymore.
She disagreed. She had a purpose still.
A sniffle echoed in the room and Kagome hastily wiped the fresh tears from her cheeks. She needed to get a grip. If her family heard her crying in there again, her grandfather would seal the doors for good. He'd already sealed them after she'd hurt herself and threatened to fill the well in if she continued to put herself at risk. It was an empty threat, and they both knew it. Her family was concerned and hurt because she was hurting. They didn't know how to make it better.
To her, there was only one way to make it better.
"Kagome, dear? Are you in here?"
Her mother's voice cut through the increasing sadness that clouded her thoughts. Kagome looked up to see the older woman standing in the doorway. "Mama?"
"You doing okay?" Michiru gave her a quick once-over. There were her daughter's study materials sitting next to her by the well, in addition to a few tears that still rolled down her cheeks. Asking if she was 'okay' was about as pointless as saying that water was wet. She knew her daughter wasn't okay at the heart of it, but she had to ask regardless. "Are you worried about your exams?"
Kagome stood and brushed herself off. "No…no it's not that. I just…felt overwhelmed, I guess? Graduation won't be long after the exams. After that…I…"
"I understand." And she did. Her daughter had had more life experiences in one year than most adults ever did in their lifetime, many of which would be beyond comprehension. To finish high school had been something that Kagome had worried she wouldn't get to do during her travels, and now that she was…what was next? Her firstborn was lost without direction, and she feared that she was losing hope on finding it. "Souta brought in the mail," she shifted gears, holding out a large envelope. "This was addressed to you."
"Me?"
Michiru could read her expression as she took the envelope. "There's no return address listed. Could it be from one of the universities?"
Kagome shrugged. "I don't think I sent off any applications."
They both knew she hadn't. The first few weeks it had been a struggle to get her to go to school, because it put too much distance between her and the well. University just wasn't going to happen. Michiru feared that if things didn't change, there would be a time when she'd leave this world knowing that her daughter would spend her own waning years by the well. Loyal to the end, just like her hanyou.
She shook her head. She didn't need to start crying. Kagome had already been. It wouldn't do. "Well, whatever it might be, I wanted to give it to you now. And to say that dinner will be done soon, so you might want to put your things back in your room and wash up. I'm making your favorite tonight!" If her smile was a little more forced, Kagome didn't mention it.
Kagome tossed herself onto her bed and studied the envelope. She hadn't opened it before dinner, simply sat it on her desk with her study materials, telling herself that she'd get to it later. But now it was later, and it was filling her with as much curiosity as it was apprehension.
Who the hell even sent mail without a return address?
It couldn't have been junk mail. There was no way some company would take their marketing team so far as to send a bubble mailer. One of those thicker cardboard mailers, maybe. Even then it would have to be a company that wouldn't lose out on wasted resources.
Her address wasn't written on the envelope with a marker. It had been a printed label done from a computer, so either the person that sent this was doing well for themselves or they'd had this prepared at the post office. Regardless, they had to be doing well for themselves; the cost of the label was far more than she expected it should have been. Kagome chewed her lip, turning the mail over and slowly breaking the adhesive seal. There was only one way to find out what was inside, and she wouldn't get anywhere by just looking at it.
She dipped her hand inside the opening, removing folded paper. The texture…it didn't feel like notebook paper, or even copy paper. What was this…parchment? Who used parchment paper anymore? Kagome couldn't think of anyone but maybe her grandfather that would, but that was for a whole different purpose. And this felt like it was far older than what he'd use. With the lightest touch, she unfolded the papers and was taken aback by the sight of the familiar handwriting.
It was too familiar.
Kagome, the letter started, I've known you long enough to know that you won't believe who I say I am without some kind of proof. Even then you probably won't believe that I'm you.
"No way," she breathed. Her suspicions flared, like it was the old days when she searched for the jewel shards and Naraku. She tapped into her abilities, trying to sense if there was any malicious intent contained in the letter, only to find…nothing. Nothing but the faintest trace of her own energy.
Look in your desk, top drawer. All the way in the back. There's a Wonder Woman notebook you've tucked under an old planner where you've written your most personal thoughts late at night. On the twelfth page you've written that you'd like to see Inuyasha without the fire rat, and you went into quite the fantasy of what you thought he'd look like without –
Kagome squeaked, dropping the letter, and making a dive for the desk drawer. She flung it open and tossed everything out of the drawer and across the room as she looked for the notebook. Sure enough, she found the worn spiral bound notebook in the back underneath the planner – which, she really should toss one of these days because it was at least six years old. Kagome silently counted as she flipped the pages until she found the twelfth one, and….oh god….
She'd drawn pictures.
It was a good thing that her brother had never come across this, cause like all little brothers he had that period of being nosey, but in that moment she was more thankful that Inuyasha hadn't discovered it. After she actually had seen him naked she'd had a hard enough time looking him in the eye – but that was besides the point! This – this person in this letter knew she had done this, which could only mean –
"Oh my god."
She'd written a letter to herself. But…how?
Taking the notebook back to the bed with her, Kagome reached for the letter as she reclined against her pillows. Of all the things that had happened to her and around her since Mistress Centipede, she shouldn't have been surprised by this, but here she was, reading a letter that she'd penned…when? Was this from when she was younger? She couldn't recall writing a letter to her future self. But if it wasn't her younger self…was it…
I'm sure at this point you're thinking back on if you wrote this before you ever went down the Bone Eater's well. You're not going crazy, Kagome, I promise you.
As I write this, I'm looking out the window of my home, thinking back on everything that I – or rather we – went through to get here. How when the well closed I'd tore my hands up trying to dig. How I'd go to sit at the well, wondering if it was all a dream. And then I look at my scars, and I am reminded that it wasn't a dream. That I earned each scar and stretchmark.
"Stretchmark?"
You are so young, Kagome. I know that what you're feeling right now hurts. That you feel like your heart will never mend, but I promise you that it won't feel like this forever. You're going to be okay –
"Okay? How am I supposed to be okay without Inuyasha?" she muttered, feeling bitter towards this apparently older version of herself. From the sounds of it she'd moved on, started a family, forgotten about –
Everything is going to pay off for you, you'll see. I know that when this reaches you, you'll be approaching your final exams before graduation. You're going to do so well; you'll wonder why you ever stressed during your travels about making it to high school at all. Keep studying but take breaks. Keep going to the well to talk when you feel like you need it. It helps more than you know because you're not the only one that's there.
"…what..?"
He may not be able to hear you yet, but he's there. He's always coming to the well.
"Inuyasha..?"his name came out as a whisper, and she felt her throat constrict as her nose started to burn. Was he really going to the well like she was?
He will be furious that I wrote that in, but he just doesn't want you to worry, is all. Our friends have been there for him. I can't wait for you to see everyone –
Her breathing hitched. What did that mean? Was it possible –? Could she return..?
You should see how he is with the kids. He's become a favored uncle as well as an amazing father, Kagome. But…you will get to see that. Once the time is right, so…don't be afraid.
Don't listen to your classmates when they say that these are the best years of your life. Don't let them make you feel bad because you haven't applied to university. You have so much ahead of you that it would make them jealous. Do take pictures. Do take breaks and spend a Friday night or two with the girls before school ends.
The next time I'll see you will be in the mirror when you're as old as me. I should end this before I ruin all of the surprises for you, because take it from me, you're going to want to discover them on your own. Check the mailer – there's a good luck charm from everyone to wish you all the success on your tests. Don't be so hard on yourself, Kagome. You're doing the best you can.
I know.
And there, at the bottom of the letter, was her name.
Kagome blinked away the tears that had started to run down her cheeks. Her mind was whirling with emotions, but all she could think about was reaching for the mailer and tipping the open end over her palm. Something slightly weighty fell into it, and her heart clenched as she took in the handmade bracelet. Each bead was wooden, shaped, and smoothed with care, as well as inscribed with symbols. At the center of the bracelet hung a tooth – a fang.
She knew whose it was, and the tears fell harder.
The fact that he'd gone through that pain again, after hearing about how horrible it was to have one removed to repair his sword, it touched her deeply. It was like this version of her wanted to soothe her fears about everything. Not being able to see her friends, the isolation that she felt for the last three years, the nightmares of Inuyasha never finding her…
She wiped her cheeks with her free hand, sniffling loudly in the silent room. 'Get ahold of yourself already,' she thought. 'Inuyasha wouldn't want you crying like a baby, would he?' Kagome took a shaky breath, trying to will herself not to cry anymore. Of course he wouldn't want her to cry. He hated when she cried. Hell, he panicked when Sango cried. Inuyasha was never sure how to handle a crying woman, because his go to for problems was to use his fists or his sword.
The image of him yelling at their television that one time when she'd cried over a romantic comedy – how was she supposed to know the girl died at the end – made her laugh. He'd panicked and started to threaten the box with his sword, demanding that it fix it so she wouldn't be sad, like he thought it could go back and redo the story.
But then, that was life after all. There weren't really a lot of opportunities to redo things that had the big impacts in one's life. Sure, you could remarry for instance, but you can't get those years back. And maybe….that was part of why this older version of herself sent this letter? To remind her that just because it's not where she wants to be in life, that she shouldn't write off the things that she does want because they haven't happened yet?
Kagome ran her thumb across the bracelet, studying it closer. The little wooden beads weren't any bigger than a 1-yen piece, threaded through a leather cord. The craftsmanship was impressive; not one bead had a jagged cut, save for the engravings on the beads. Looking closer…she saw that the marks…they were names.
Special names.
Names that brought tears to her eyes again.
A few stretched across a couple beads, but the intent was all the same. Her friends wanted to be with her in spirit when she completed her studies. They still cared and missed her.
Kagome didn't care if she woke up with the bracelet digging into her the next morning. She slipped it on her wrist and felt a peace settle over her that she hadn't felt in a long time.
It had also been the most restful sleep she had gotten in three years.
"How long are you going to wear that, Kagome?"
She wasn't going to be irritated with her brother. It wasn't his fault that her friends had asked her that every day since the last exams were completed. She'd never explained to them that it was from friends she hadn't seen in a long time, but she also hadn't really told Souta either.
"It's from Inuyasha and the others. I...I don't want to take it off," she replied. "It's all I have of them."
Her brother rolled his eyes, and that she did get irritated by. He was getting pretty huffy for a preteen already. "Duh, I know that much. I can read, after all." He leaned back in his seat at her desk, watching her piddle around in her room. Graduation was the day before, and now that she didn't have a focus, she had all this…nervous energy? It kind of reminded him of how Buyo would get before a thunderstorm. "How do you know that's all you've got? What was it that letter you told mom about said?"
Kagome paused, chewing her lip. "It said…to not worry. That things…that things would work out." It was paraphrasing, but she didn't know if she could say out loud that her older self said that she would have a family with the only man she ever loved. Even if the last time she had seen him, he'd been a boy. She'd been trying not to let her thoughts be consumed with the possibilities, because she didn't want to have her heart broken again. But now that school was done, she didn't have much to occupy her time. Her friends were wrapped up in plans for university, and as far as they knew she was going to work at the shrine.
And with her chaotic energy lately, there wasn't a lot of things to do after a few days of manic cleaning.
Souta stood and stretched, walking over to his older sister. He knew that she wasn't telling the whole truth, but he wasn't going to bug her about it for once. She'd gotten that faraway look in her eyes again, and the last time he'd pecked she'd broken down. "Then if that's what the letter said, then that's what'll happen. We all miss him too, Kagome."
"I know. I'm just…"
"You don't have to feel guilty, you know."
"What?"
"Feel guilty about wanting to be with Inuyasha. We've been with you all your life, Sis. Inuyasha hasn't. So, if there's a way you can be together, then you should be."
Kagome was touched. As annoying as her brother could be, he still had his moments. "Thanks Souta," she whispered, pulling him in to a hug. "I know one day I'm gonna miss this, no matter what happens."
Michiru gave her oldest child one final squeeze before she released her from the hug. She'd seen the well house doors open again, and came to check on Kagome, thinking she was feeling down again. Instead she found her standing at the well, looking down inside.
When she joined her, she could see sky where there should've been a dirt floor.
Her heart had seized briefly, knowing what this would mean.
She was losing her child.
"I'm gonna miss all of you," Kagome whispered again, wiping away a tear.
"We'll miss you too, dear. But you need to do what makes you happy now." She pulled her back quickly for one final – she swore it was the final time – hug, murmuring that she loved Kagome and would always be proud of the woman she became.
It was tough watching your firstborn grow up and move on without you, but to watch them disappear into a portal that took them five hundred years into the past? That was so much worse. Kagome had perched on the edge of the well, swinging her legs over. Only once did she look back before she pushed off the edge, giving her a brilliant smile.
Then the light within the well had faded, and she knew it would never open again.
'Be strong,' she told herself, climbing the steps and exiting the well house. The doors slid closed behind her, and she tried to focus on what was next. She'd have to tell her father-in-law and Souta. They'd always suspected, but she was scared of delivering the actual news. 'In through the nose,' she silently chanted, breathing in. 'and out the mouth.'
It was her focus. Her way of grounding herself. It was how she'd kept control of herself when the police officer had told her that her husband had died at the scene of the accident. It was how she'd handled the first few months of Kagome traveling with Inuyasha. And now it was how she was calming herself after watching her daughter leave for the feudal era for the last time.
She decided not to go directly back to the house. Not yet. It was a nice day. The sun was out, and the weather was warm on her skin. The soft sounds of the birds in the distance and the wind chimes across the shrine would do her some good. Her feet led her to the bench that sat before Goshinboku, and it was there that she made herself comfortable, closing her eyes to take in the sounds around her.
"Excuse me, is it alright to visit the shrine today?"
Michiru opened her eyes to see a pair of brown eyes that looked very reminiscent staring back at her. "It is," she replied with a smile.
"Oh awesome! Hey Mom! Mom! It's okay!"
While the young woman was shouting, she bit down on her lip to stifle her laughter. This girl couldn't have been any taller than Kagome was, with her black hair pulled back in a red ribbon. There was an abrasiveness to her voice that felt familiar as well, but she couldn't immediately place it.
"Moroha!" another woman all but hissed, struggling to make it up the steps. "You know better!"
The girl, Moroha it appeared, knew but also didn't seem to care at the moment. "Yeah, I know, but Mom–"
Another voice joined the commotion and Michiru felt like she'd been punched. A long mane of silver hair and a familiar red suikan billowed around the man as he closed the distance between him and Moroha's mother. He was instigating an argument with the woman because she wouldn't wait for him and she was obviously in no condition to try to sprint up the stairs after their daughter.
"I said I was fine!"
"You don't look it! You're out of breath!"
"Then tell your daughter not to yell in the middle of a shrine!"
"She gets it honest!"
"Don't make me say it –"
Michiru couldn't contain the gasp as the scene settled before her. They looked so familiar. Even having aged a bit, she still knew who they were. The sound was enough to catch their attention. "K…Kagome…"
"Mama…"
She couldn't help it. She was crying again as her daughter shuffled to her the best she could with the swollen belly. Michiru threw her arms around her shoulders and held tight, crying, and laughing at the same time. "How far are you? Do you know..?"
Kagome smiled wide as she stepped back. "Five months, and the doctor says it's going to be a boy. Inuyasha seems to think otherwise."
"You gonna trust some quack or my nose?" The hanyou seemed to sulk as he walked past his wife to greet her mother. "It's been a while."
"It has," she smiled. "Is this..?"
"I'm Moroha," the young woman grinned. "So I guess that makes you my grandma, right?" She didn't hesitate to accept the hug that her grandmother offered. "Mom's told me all about you and Great Grandpa and Uncle Souta."
Michiru wanted to be a little selfish and hold Moroha against her a bit longer. The girl didn't seem to mind. It had been a long time waiting. She laid her cheek against Moroha's temple, observing her daughter and son-in-law. They had aged a fair amount and appeared to be in their mid-twenties to early thirties if she had to guess. But given the span of time, she knew that they were in fact far older. "You both look like you're doing well. I don't know what anti-aging regime you have but I'd love your secret," she teased.
Kagome laughed, but Inuyasha turned away with a hint of a blush, so she suspected that whatever it was that had been done had been a rather intimate affair. Which, to be fair, was better that she didn't know. There were some things that a mother didn't need to know.
In the end, it had brought her back to the shrine, so she wasn't going to question it.
"It's been an ordeal," Kagome explained. "Once I told Inuyasha that I'd sent the letter, he's been pushing to come here, and Moroha too. Trying to explain that we needed to wait until the right time was not easy. Like father like daughter, so they say."
"Who's they?" Moroha mumbled.
"An expression," Michiru said. "Why don't you all come inside, and I'll fix some tea? There's so many things we need to catch up on!"
"Yes, that would be great, Mama."
Moroha was all but glued to her left side, and Kagome walked on her right. Michiru reached down and squeezed her hand, listening as her daughter talked, starting from the moment that Inuyasha pulled her up from the well. It wasn't the same, knowing that her daughter had a lifetime of experiences in over five hundred years that she had missed. It wasn't the same knowing that the Kagome she'd just said goodbye to was not the same woman she was speaking to now.
She'd missed a marriage. Gaining a son-in-law. The birth of her first grandchild. Seeing her grandchild grow up.
But now she had a chance. They were here, walking next to her. Talking with her. She'd get to learn about what she missed and be able to be there for all the things to come.