She couldn't hear his thoughts.
Miroku yawned, sitting up in
the crouded hut, between a warm woman and a tiny cub. Kaede was putting
wood onto the fire, while several other people were waking from the heavy
sleep. They'd stayed fairly warm that night.
He stretched, standing and walking
outside. "Oi, Oba-sama, I'm going to see if Inuyasha survived the
night without going to get Kagome."
She nodded, personally wondering
if the dog demon had even survived through the night with such a thin blanket.
He walked through the clean
whiteness towards the forest, yawning yet again. "OI! Inuyasha?!
Hey! Where are you, dog-boy?! Ya didn't go to bring Kagome
back, did ya?!"
"He isn't here."
A voice not too dissimilar from
Kagome's sounded behind him and he spun around, facing Kikyou. "YOU!"
"He isn't here..." She
didn't seem to notice him, her bare feet walking through the snow and not
seeming to notice the cold.
"Do you know where he is?
He isn't at the village."
"Where is the girl?"
"She went home for the week."
"Where is her home?"
"I dunno." He looked at
her suspiciously. "I'm getting back to the village. You may
want to do so yourself."
"Inuyasha died last night."
She said, her voice seemingly emotionless. "His aura vanished.
His spirit is gone. He is not here."
"..." Miroku silently
turned away, walking back to the village. *Probably did go to get
Kagome, then.* He thought, his hands cradling the back of his head.
The blizzard they'd had the previous night making it difficult to move
quickly. *I wonder when Kagome-sama will return...*
Kagome put the kettle on the
gas heated stove, lighting the flame quickly. She sighed, wondering
if she should go wake Inuyasha. With a quick shake of her head, she
pulled down two cups, sticking tea bags in them. It was one of her
favorite herbal teas, green. She sighed, as the kettle began two
whistle and poured the water in both cups.
Inuyasha stumbled into the kitchen.
"What is that noise?" He asked irritably.
"Oh, the tea kettle. I
was heating water for tea." She gestured to the cups and walked to
the window. "It needs to sit awhile before you drink it, or it wont
taste like tea." She bit her lip, looking outside. The snow
was up to the window sill and showed no signs of stopping. "Looks
like we've been snowed in." She laughed at the irony.
"Something funny?" He
asked sniffing the cups.
"Not really. I'd just
been thinking that you've been snowed in with the one person you really
just can't stomache." She said, her voice sounding sad.
"..." He looked at her
curiously.
Buyo padded in, stretching leasurely
and padding over to Kagome. It rubbed around her legs forcefully.
"Mreaor..."
"Hi, Buyo..." She made
babying noises at the cat and picked it up. "You've gained weight!"
She chuckled, stroaking the cat's fur.
"Why did you say that?"
"Because he has-"
"Not that. About me not
being able to stomache you."
She turned towards him, her
face a bit sad. "Because, you always pick on me...treat me like ya
hate me..." She blushed, looking away. "Said ya couldn't stomache
the way I smelled..."
He didn't respond. *Kagome
no baka...* A soft sigh escaped him before he could contain it.
"Whatever."
She looked at him curiously.
"What?"
"If you say so, Kagome.
Fine, I hate ya. Happy?" He looked up at her, irritably.
"Don't try to read me, girl, I'm more complicated than most humans think."
Her face was genuinely startled
and she set down the cat. "I don't understand..."
"Do you think I'd protect you
if I hated you?"
She was silent for a moment,
drawing things on the fogged window. "I don't really know."
She said finally. "I try to understand you, but...I can't.
You say I smell bad, then that I smell good...then you insult me constantly.
You try to kill me, then try to protect me, then...you say you're my friend."
She looked back to the window, still drawing.
"What are you doing?"
"Thinking..." She looked
over towards him, her face unreadable. "About you...and me...and
Kikyou..." She paused. "I seem to be doing that a lot."
"Why?" He frowned at the
mention of Kagome's previous incarnate.
"Mainly because I can't help
but wonder what would have happened if she hadn't been resurected..."
She gulped. "If it had just...ya know...been us..."
He stared at her, shocked.
*Please, Kagome, don't love me, we can never be together and I don't want
to hurt you...*
"If maybe we would have fallen
in love instead of you and Kikyou..." She smiled and shrugged.
"I guess I'll never know."
He looked down into the cups
again while she moved over, claiming one and sitting at the table, her
feet tucked under her, gesturing to the other cup. "Go ahead, have
some."
He hesitantely claimed a cup
and sat across from her. "I don't understand why what could have
been concerns you." He tried to keep his voice hard, but failed to
keep the slight waver out of it.
Fortunately, she didn't notice.
"I like daydreaming. I like to relax and think of what might happen,
what might have happened...what could have happened..." She smiled,
sipping the tea. "The one I have the most is daydreaming about my
father. I miss him..."
He watched her normally cheery
face sadden.
"He died when I was really young.
I know I have his eyes...and mom says I'm smart like he was...but I have
my mother's temper and good sense. And compassion." She sighed,
closing her eyes and willing away the threatening tears. "But I guess
you understand better than me how it feels to lose a parent."
He took a sip of the tea.
It was a very light herby flavor, not at all unpleasant. "Yeah.
I guess I do. But I didn't get anything from my mother."
"Sure you did." She looked
at him, and a faint smile crossed her lips. "But you probably don't
know about it." She smiled larger at his baffled expression.
"You look like your father twenty seven days out of the month, but one
day, you look like your mother."
His eyes widened. "You
mean-"
She nodded. "When your
human blood ebbs away, your hair becomes black, and your eyes become violet."
"Oh...I never knew. I
always used to hide when it was the new moon, I never wanted to see..."
She smiled, absently patting
his hand. She saw the shocked look on his face and jerked her hand
back. "G-g-gomen."
He watched her stagger to her
feet and rush from the room.
Kagome walked from the house
to the wood shed, hoping to find some dry wood. Her coat was already
soaked through, chilling her body further. "C-c-c-cold..."
She murmered, grabbing some small pieces of wood before walking back towards
the house. She used the rear entrance, the one that WASN'T piled
up to the window's with snow. There was still so much snow it was
hard to travel through. "M-m-m-maybe I sh-sh-should have just let
I-i-i-inuyasha d-d-d-do this..." She whispered, walking back in.
"I told you to let me get it,
damn fool girl." He muttered, barely glancing at her as she stumbled
in. "Now you're soaked through."
"I-i-i-i'll l-l-l-live..."
She growled, setting a fire in the fire place. "N-n-now sh-shut up!"
When it was lit and a good roar was starting, she spread his kimono out
in front of it, then left the room to get out of her soaked clothes.
"Damn fool girl." He muttered
softly. When she came back, her clothes were hanging loosely in her
hands and she was shivering, a faint blue tinting her lips. He watched
her, his eyes betraying his concern as she stretched the clothes out and
sat just behind them, directly in front of the fire. "Kagome?"
"I-i-i'm j-j-j-just a bit...c-c-c-cold..."
She said softly through chattering teeth.
Silently he moved beside her
and put the blanket around her too. She looked up at him in surprise,
her face coloring slightly in a blush. "Wha-"
"Don't argue with me."
He said simply, his voice tired. "I'm going to sleep." He said,
dozing in his seated position.
She smiled, shaking her head.
"If you'll stay awake a little longer I'll go get some futons."
He looked at her, one eye popping
open. "Why do we need more than one?"
"Well...it wouldn't be proper
for both of us to sleep on one...and I'm tired too..." She flushed.
He opened his other eye, looking
at her curiously. "We're friends, right?"
She nodded. "Of course."
"Is there another blanket?"
"No."
"Then get one futon, or I'm
going without-"
"You'll get hypothermia!"
"Were you planning on going
without one?"
Her eyes widened in realization.
She sighed heavily. "I-okay! I'll get a larger one..."
She stood, disappearing for a moment. When she returned she had a
decent sized futon under her arm, but it still was barely large enough
for two people.
He flushed a bit, realizing
how close they would be sleeping. *Maybe if we'd gotten two and pushed
em together...*
Kagome flopped down on it, her
face tired. "Gods I'm sleepy." She whispered, rolling onto
her side before the fireplace.
Inuyasha lay beside her hesitantely,
gulping hard. When both were covered by the blanket and the warmth
began seeping in, Inuyasha finally fell into a very deep sleep.
Kagome rolled, facing him, looking
up at his face. It was peaceful, reminding her greatly of when he
was pinned to the Go Shimboku tree. His eyebrows were smoothed from
their normal scowl, his mouth slack. *I...I want to kiss him...*
She blushed, her hand going to touch his face gently.
*I'm going to torture myself
to death doing this...* She thought, rolling a few more times before
she settled, facing him again. She smiled fainly, gently brushing
his ears with her fingers. "What am I going to do with you...?"
She wondered, before she finally fell into a light sleep.
Two Times The Trouble
By: DemonSaya