Curiosity

Disclaimers:

First, I don't own Inuyasha. Just so you'll know.

Second, I do not approve or encourage smoking or drinking, especially underage. it's bad for you. don't do it.

Warning: in this fic, Kagome will be portrayed a little differently then the sweet goody-two-shoes she appears to be in the anime/manga. if you have a problem with that, you can stop reading right here. don't say you weren't warned!

And if you're still here - well, hope you enjoy!

Inuyasha took one sniff at her and growled. "What the hell is this smell?"

Now, normally she would have 'osuwari'ed him all the way to America for suggesting she smelled (like he could talk! He never showered unless they made him!), but this time she knew exactly what he had meant.

Before she had fallen down the well at the age of fifteen, Kagome had a habit of hanging out with her friends, drinking and smoking. Sure, she was underage, but she had friends who weren't, and besides, there were always places that didn't bother asking for IDs.

Once she had gotten to the Feudal Era, these outings had stopped, for the simple reason that she had nearly no time at home, and when she did have time, she was too busy keeping up with her school work to go out with her friends in the middle of the night.

The past week, thought, she had spent at home for her birthday, and her friends had insisted that she go out with them, just like old times.

She soon found that during her time in the Feudal Era her ability to hold down liquor had shrunk to half of what it was, not that it was much to begin with, turning her into a laughingstock in front of her friends. She also found that she had rather missed the taste of cigarettes, and the high feeling they induced. It was that that had caused her to buy a pack as a small birthday present from herself.

In fact, she had smoked one just before coming to Sengoku Jidai, which was the cause of Inuyasha's rather rude remark.

It was later on that evening that she found herself in – more excused herself to go to, really – a small clearing not too far away from their camp, yet not too close so Inuyasha won't faint.

That had been after a rather nasty fight with one of Naraku's baboon-clad puppets, and she figured she earned that cigarette fair and square.

It was not two moments after she had lit her cig that she heard a voice calling to her.

"Miko, what is that offending smell?"

Now, that voice she could recognize anywhere. She was pretty surprised he had decided against punishing her – which is to say, killing her – for causing such a stench in his nearby vicinity. And he was more polite then Inuyasha about it, too.

And then she realized his voice was once again laced with curiosity, the only emotion she could ever identify in the normally stoic Taiyoukai.

For a while now, ever since he had learnt of her true origins, Sesshoumaru would come to her whenever she was alone to ask her all sorts of questions about the future.

His curiosity was perhaps the only thing stopping him form killing her on the spot, and she thanked the gods for that. Curiosity might have killed the cat, but it was the dog's curiosity that had allowed it to live in the first place.

"It's a cigarette," she explained. "True, the smell leaves much to be desired, but I find the taste and the effect cover for that."

"Effect?" he demanded, and she readily explained.

"Well, a cigarette is made out of tobacco and nicotine and… umm... who knows? Anyway, when you light it up and smoke it – that is, inhale it through the filter in the end straight to the lungs, the stuff inside goes to your head and causes an effect not much different than drinking a lot of sake, only much nice, if you ask me."

Soon he was standing in front of her, wrinkling his nose. "Show me," he commanded.

"Well, the part that is lit is where all the tobacco and stuff is, and the other end is called the filter. I just inhale it, like this," she demonstrated. "Then breathe it out, along with the smoke." Said smoke was coming out of her mouth as she talked, and she supposed it looked pretty weird for someone not used to the sight, but she rather liked it.

His head was cocked just a bit to the side, and his eyes were full of curiosity as he stared at the cig between her fingers.

"Do it again," he ordered, and she was only happy to comply. This time, she puckered her lips just a bit, as she exhaled choppy bits of air, along with the breaking of her jaw, causing the smoke to come out in small, gray rings.

"Hn," he responded.

She didn't know what imp had caused her to do what she did next.

"Wanna try?" she asked, not really expecting him to reply, and definitely not to agree. But to her surprise, he nodded, and she handed him her half finished cig.

He took a pull out of the cigarette, exhaling the smoke before nodding at her and turning to leave.

With her cigarette still in his hand.

"You should kill it before it reaches the silver line that marks the beginning of the filter!" she shouted after him, before bursting into silent laughter. Sesshoumaru smoking. Now that was something worth seeing, she thought to herself as she lit another cigarette, to replace the one that he had taken.

so, tell me what you thought!

Lyla