Chapter XXII
Twenty second session
What are the chances of coming out unscathed from a story of love?
"You've got a cat?" InuYasha asked as he hurriedly put on his shirt, running late already for his night shift at the restaurant he worked at.
It was a Saturday afternoon, and it had been a few weeks now since they began seeing each other, through short meetings in which they kissed a few times, and took their clothes off; albeit the last didn't always happen.
"No." The answer was concise. InuYasha looked again at the plate on the floor, right beside the window.
"But you have cat food." He clarified. Kagome looked at him from the kitchen, as she drank the only cup of coffee she had prepared and they were now sharing.
"Yes."
"And you don't have a cat." InuYasha lifted his eyebrow in a clear gesture of curiosity.
Her eyes remained on him, then she smiled in a way that almost didn't perturb her features, and which he found so sensual and enigmatic.
"There is a cat that comes and goes, I don't own it, it's not mine, it is its own."
InuYasha came on the verge of breathing in deeply and sighing from emotion. The answer came as subtle, and beautifully elaborated; very philosophical.
"You haven't been skimming through my philosophy books, have you?" He joked. It was always better to do that, rather than confessing he felt delighted with Kagome and her perception of things.
"When? I don't have one minute for myself when I'm in your apartment." She joked back, smiling with her lips resting on the edges of her cup of coffee.
"Whenever you want, I can give you the keys for you to come by." He offered.
In that moment, a light silence found place between them, speaking about how compromised that offer actually was. Kagome was the first to react, yet that didn't mean she improved the situation.
"Better not. I could find one of your girls in there."
InuYasha just smiled at this, he wasn't about to admit that possibility had become unlikely since they started seeing each other.
"It's an excellent reason."
Kagome disguised her discomfort by drinking some more coffee.
"Weren't you running late?" She sought to put order in the ideas that had begun to levitate between them.
Work tonight was fussy, and the public, abundant, with the place filled with people seeking to dine or placing order for takeaway. InuYasha, not even once, had been able to rest in the four hours he'd been in the kitchen, and now that they were closing, he sat in front of one of the tables, for an instant, to drink something and get some energy back.
"It's been a good night." Mentioned Iku, his usual cook assistant.
"Yeah, like never before. Must be the festivities coming up." InuYasha accepted.
"Are you leaving? I'm on my way out." More than once they had walked some streets together, then the man would turn towards his home while InuYasha would keep going straight.
"Let me get my jacket."
A moment later they were outside, their steps starting with a calm pace. The nights were getting colder, and winter, closer.
"Since when are you wearing that kotodama no nenju?" Asked Iku then, with clear curiosity.
"A few days, it's a gift." InuYasha caressed one of the pearls with his thumb and index.
"A gift, uh?" He smiled. "From your friend of the other day?"
InuYasha smiled back as an answer, and slipped the rosary beneath his shirt. For some reason he felt like that was his and only his, with no desire of sharing it with anyone else. Maybe it was superstition, but he felt like when you tell too many people something about your life, that thing seems to become muddy, perturbed.
"Were you able to fix the issue you had with the Kitchen's plumbing?" He changed topic. His coworker smiled a bit more, understanding his intention.
"Yes, although it was some patchy work. Narumi will make me pay if the leak reappears." He accepted. "Well, I think here is where we part ways."
They had just arrived to the street Iku usually turned at.
"I hope it doesn't reappear until you find someone able to fix it." InuYasha attempted to joke about and cheer him up. "See you tomorrow."
"See you tomorrow."
The streets were practically empty, and the cold was beginning to be felt as time passed. InuYasha looked at his phone in case he had a message but found nothing; It was past eleven at night. It was also Saturday, not late yet, and Kagome may still be up and about if he were to call, however he felt it was important that he made an effort to placate some of his need of her. He let out a breath almost in a sigh, and thought about how were his Saturdays at night a few weeks ago, when he had yet to meet her. The truth was that he used to go to a zone of nightly entertainment where he'd usually look around, trying to discern someone who may catch his eye enough for them to be his casual date of the night. If luck wasn't on his side, he'd send a message to Kaguya then, solving his problems. In that moment he recalled she hadn't left a message since his last denial two weeks ago.
Maybe It would do him well to go have a drink to clear his mind a bit.
With that idea his steps carried him forward, ignoring the detour that would take him to his apartment. The streets, little by little, became filled, giving way to the festive atmosphere of the weekends. He could discern couples and groups of friends laughing as they glimpsed inside the different areas of entertainment, full of light. He chose a place less conspicuous, a few meters away, in which he had seen Kaguya for the first time. He had to admit that, from all the persons he'd been with in a casual manner, she was the one who he felt more comfortable with, despite her irascible character; maybe it was precisely that indomitable air what made him feel like that, and finally, since their relationship was but sex, it simplified everything.
He neared the bar and asked something to drink, his plan wasn't to get drunk so he chose a beer. Seeing as he was alone, he did the usual and remained at the bar once they served him. He observed the place, discerning couples already formed, groups of friends who were there just to have a good time, and those who were surrounded by friends only until something better came up. He knew the proceedings, many times he had been that something. However, today he just wanted to get his hours of work off his shoulders.
He drank from his glass and began to look at his phone, checking if there was something that might interest him. He practically laughed at himself, ironically, when realizing he couldn't get Kagome out of his head, but she seemed not to miss him even a bit. If he had to quote something from his philosophy books, Ovidio would say he was acting like the thirsty man who is offered bread; or like Myoga would say: leave it.
"What are you drinking?" He heard a voice by his side. When turning to look, he found a girl, young. If he had to guess he'd say she wasn't more than twenty.
"Beer." He answered, and even smiled at her with a certain tenderness before her attempt at seduction, which came as worrying given the two ribbons she wore, high behind her head. "And you?"
"I think I'll ask for the same." Despite being young, and the slight shiver in her voice, the girl seemed to be pulling it off.
InuYasha turned side-ways towards her, and decided he'd distract himself a bit with the attempts of that girl who right there was seeking his gaze with a pair of warm violet eyes.
"I'm Shiori." She found the courage to say, when she realized his attention was on her.
"And, are you alone, Shiori?" He was shamelessly flirting with her in that sort of experiment, and could appreciate the result in the girl's suddenly rosy cheeks.
"Not exactly. I'm with some girl-friends, there." She pointed at a table, a few meters from them. Her friends were trying to dissimulate, as if distracted in their own conversation, yet InuYasha knew that conversation was all about Shiori and her attempt at seducing him.
"I see. They seem cheerful." The group laughed, stealing glances at them with failed subterfuge.
"Yes, they are always happy." The girl seemed to be feeling a bit calmer. "Do you come around here often?"
InuYasha dropped his gaze, placating a smile before the question she had just asked him, as if out of a manual. He could understand such a thing, and the girl caused him to feel sympathetic, so he decided to play along.
"Every once in a while." He answered, meeting her gaze, counting the seconds she'd be able to do the same. To his surprise, Shiori endured without running away, and that somehow made him change his impression of her: young, yes, but also brave.
"I haven't seen you..." She halted her words, and dodged his eyes. "... I still don't know your name."
InuYasha found curious that sudden change of tone, so distant from being flirtatious. It seems the girl had realized there had been a step in the manual she hadn't taken.
"Do you want to know it?" He asked, pouring intent in his seduction. Shiori nodded a few times, and he drank from his glass, calm, waiting for her restlessness to grow a bit more.
"Yes." She insisted. Then he looked at her, intense, so that she felt particular and unique.
"I'm InuYasha."
The girl seemed to breathe a bit more deeply after listening.
"InuYasha. I haven't heard that name before." The girl continued with the conversation. He thought she was doing rather well.
"And you? Do you come around her often?" InuYasha followed the script.
"This is the second time." Shiori's answer came as cheerful, as if she had managed to achieve something important.
"Then is natural you haven't seen me her before." He clarified, and a smile with a hint of enjoyment appeared in his features after unveiling the girl's advances. She became tense for a moment, but then finally relaxed her shoulders.
"Of course. I'm sorry. I just wanted to check something." She confessed, honest.
"What did you want to check?"
She looked at him, as if evaluating him. To InuYasha, that reaction caused him curiosity, and made Shiori look wiser than he could suspect.
"If I could be of interest to an attractive man." Her voice trembled slightly.
InuYasha pondered her words, deciding there was a story behind them, besides the clear necessity that girl had of gaining confidence. The latter was something he could help with.
Kagome was on her way back from running the few kilometers she had managed to do that morning. That kind of exercise had been part of the ways she sought to free some energy, something she had stopped doing a few years ago. It happened during that time when going out of her home was something she avoided at all costs, even more if she had to do it alone, the day being sunny notwithstanding. She took her shirt off on her way to the shower, and as she untied her hair, she couldn't help thinking that her body was precisely what she resorted to when trying to communicate —she had turned it into a tool because she didn't know how to do it any other way. She felt how a knot formed in her throat before her own conclusions, and the analysis she was doing of herself. She shook her head, preferring to stop thinking about it.
Sometimes it was better to abandon what one is incapable of handling.
She got in the water stream, and her mind began to wander between her previous conclusion and InuYasha's abdomen. She wondered if he played any sports, for his body gave signs of being well treated, and its muscles were developed enough to be considered attractive. She reaffirmed herself in the idea of focusing only on what's physically captivating of him, that way she'd avoid giving room to complex emotions she was sure to be unable to handle. She didn't need to think further from last night, were after watching a movie and talking with her friend Sango, she went to sleep, waiting for InuYasha to call, or leave a message, and that was something that couldn't happen to her, because then the anxiety would consume her, aside from the fear and the total lack of confidence in herself and her own steps.
She let the almost cold water fall on her head, knowing it wasn't the most prudent thing to do, however the physical pain was helpful to toughen herself up.
Once she came out of the shower and returned to the main room, she caught sight of the cat waiting for her, on the other side of the window of her seventh-floor apartment. At first, she would panic at the picture of the cat standing on the window's stool, and she believed it climbed the external stairs up to the seventh floor, then it'd start strolling through the other apartment's windows to reach hers. As time passed, she got used to seeing it outside her window, even if just to sunbathe, and understood the cat's life only belonged to the cat itself, so she could only leave food and water in case it decided to stop by, assuming the risks. In some way, that situation had served Kagome to frame her own casual relationships: each and every one knew the risks, and were responsible of taking them.
Her phone rang while she was on the couch, and when she looked at it. she knew it was a call from her mother. She pondered if to answer it or not, yet she was aware it was fruitless to keep avoiding her. It had been three weeks already, which was more than usual.
"Hi, mom." She answered, using that neutral tone of voice with which she always started the conversations with her mother.
"I thought I wouldn't find you again." The woman replied as greetings. Kagome took a deep breath and kept trying to maintain a neutral tone.
"Well, today I'm available. How are you?" She turned the questions towards her, she knew that way she'd manage a few minutes of conversation where she'd only need to listen.
Among the many things her mother began to tell her, there was her stomachaches and knee pains, aside from her grandfather's ventures, who couldn't stay put despite his age.
"Souta brought a girl home, she seems nice, but she laughs a lot for no reason." She continued her stories, this time about Kagome's brother.
"Is it the first time you meet?" Maybe that would explain the girl's behavior.
"Yes, it's the first time she comes. And you? When are you going to bring a boy home? It's about time you get a boyfriend." Kagome knew the topic was unavoidable every time they talked.
"When I meet someone, I'll tell you." It was her mother; she didn't want to dramatize from the start.
"Living along doesn't really help your reputation either, that way you'll never be taken seriously, I've been telling you since you entered university, and went to live to that match box you called apartment." Kagome felt her own bile all the way up her throat, and she had yet to eat anything.
"Mom, I have to leave you. I'm supposed to meet with a friend." She lied. Her mother sighed on the other side of the call.
"Will you come this weekend? Remember your grandfather is going to lead the purification ceremony at the temple." Those things were important for her grandfather, and she wouldn't stop attending them.
"Yes. You know I'll be there." Her voice had ceased to be neutral, and little by little it had taken a turn as bitter as the taste in her mouth.
An instant later the call ended, right after her mother, with all the will one has, told her she just wanted the best for her.
Kagome rested her weight against the frame of the window, as the cat bit into the food she had placed for it. She remembered the last time she had attempted to talk with her mother about something important to her, and the abysmal abandon she felt. It had been a few days after that happened, in that back alley near the apartment her mother had just talked about. Back then, she wanted to tell her something had happened to her.
Mom, the other day a group of men stopped me. She started.
Don't tell me you were wearing those tight short-pants you've taken a liking to wearing. I've told you many times you are treated as you are seen. I'm sure they followed you because they thought you looking experienced. Experienced, she repeated inside her mind.
After that she became unable to utter a word. She assured her the men had only told her two things and that'd been all.
To be continued.
A/N
Here I share with you a bit more of this story that, personally, I'm liking quite a lot. I've got the feeling of taking the life of two common persons, somewhere in the middle of the world, and opening a curtain to look into what composes them.
Thank you for reading and keeping me company. I also thank those who have felt up to leaving comments!
Kisses,
Anyara.
This text is possible thanks to the translation of: Dezart