Sango polished Hiraikotsu with a buff-colored cloth, while Miroku watched with interest. Her long-fingered hands moved in a slow, meticulous pattern, and he could see from the way her forearms were tensed that she was putting muscle into the task. "Houshi-sama," she warned, not even bothering to look at him. "I'll knock you unconscious if you so much as twitch in my direction."
Miroku made a large gesture that encompassed his muddy self. "What, and get your boomerang dirty again? After you've put so much effort into cleaning it?"
Sango now glanced up at him from her task. Her brows arched pointedly as she reached one hand for a nearby rock, roughly half the size of Shippou. She hefted it experimentally, decided it was too heavy, and selected a second. This one apparently met with satisfaction, because she set it down within easy reach of her right hand. "You are right. It would be a shame to put so much time to waste."
Miroku laughed to himself. "I'm going to take a bath," he announced to the group at large. Then he looked at Sango and Kagome. "In case either of you are interested in watching."
From his customary perch in a tree, Inuyasha growled at Miroku. "They're not perverted. Go away and stop bugging Sango."
Miroku frowned up at him. "Tch, I was merely being courteous," he said, heading down to the river.
Shippou crawled onto Kagome's lap. The girl wrapped her arms around his cute little self, before pulling away, holding her nose. "Shippou, you smell," she announced. Shippou curled his tail around himself, yawning.
"Sorry," he said. "I'm tired. Tomorrow I'll bathe."
Inuyasha huffed loudly, glancing up at the sky. The deep blue was shot with pink and orange. "Look, we stopped far too soon as it is. We're making crappy time. Either you bathe now, or else not at all."
" 'Kay," said Shippou agreeably. His little hands grabbed Kagome's blouse and tugged her closer. "You're warm."
Kagome leaned back, out of his reach. "Let me rephrase that for you, Shippou. Either you bathe now, or else you bathe now."
Shippou looked at her quizzically. "What? Kagome! That's not a choice at all!"
"Exactly." Kagome stood, holding him out at arm's length. "Inuyasha!"
"What do you want now?"
"You're going to take him down to the river. I'd do it, but Miroku would get the wrong idea."
"Feh, are you afraid he'll get lost?" scoffed Inuyasha. "He's not that dumb. Just send him down there."
"No, I think he'll just splash himself with water and come back, pretending he's cleaned up." Kagome waved the kitsune at him. "C'mon Inuyasha."
"No."
"Fine," huffed Kagome. "I'll do it then." She bravely tucked the smelly boy to her chest and dug some shampoo out of her pack. "Be right back." Inuyasha watched her stride off for the river until he was sure she wasn't bluffing.
"Kagome!" he yelled, jumping from tree to tree until he was to the front of her. Then he dropped down and snatched Shippou from her. "Fine, I'll do it. Damn, do you want to see that monk naked or something?"
Kagome smirked. "No, of course not." She handed him the shampoo, then leaned in and sniffed him delicately. "You better wash up too," she informed him, making a shooing motion with her hands.
"Feh," said Inuyasha, feeling like he'd just been tricked. He tucked the kitsune under his arm. Shippou started squeaking frantically in protest. Once they reached the river, Inuyasha flung him into the water, glaring at Miroku. "This is your fault."
Shippou's head surfaced, sputtering out Inuyasha's favorite curses. "I'm still dressed!" He swam to the shore and shed the soggy garments.
"What's my fault?" asked Miroku curiously. "And what did I hear about someone wanting to see me naked?"
"This is your fault," Inuyasha elaborated, kicking Shippou back into the water. He held the bottle of shampoo up and twisted the cap off. "All right, what now?" he asked himself. That one time he'd spied on Kagome, she'd squeezed some of the blue contents onto her hand, right? Inuyasha dumped the shampoo onto his waiting palm until it spilled down his arm. "So far, so good. Now, let's see, what did she do then?"
He looked down at the monk, who had seen this particular bathing ritual executed many more times than he had. "What do I do now?"
"It goes in your hair," Miroku explained.
"Not in my hair, it doesn't. Shippou!" Inuyasha shrugged his kimono off, careful not to upset the handful of blue goop. He waded in. "Damn it, come here!"
"You're not gonna put that stuff in my hair!" cried Shippou, diving under the water and resurfacing a distance away.
"You let Kagome," pointed out Miroku.
"What was Kagome doing bathing you?" demanded Inuyasha of Shippou.
"Man, you're jealous of a little kid, aren't you?" Shippou giggled until he swallowed water and started coughing. Inuyasha fished him out by his tail. Once Shippou could breathe, he said, "The question you should've asked was, 'what was Miroku doin' watching?' Cuz Kagome was naked and she was only knee deep in the water too."
Inuyasha dunked Shippou, accidentally submerging the shampoo-laden hand too. "Damn," he said. "Pervert, if you pass me that bottle to your right, I won't kill you."
Miroku rolled his eyes. "You're just sorry you chose that day to be a prude. You always chose the worst days to pretend like the sight of two gloriously naked women would kill you," Miroku reached for the shampoo, capped it, and threw it to Inuyasha. "But since you missed out, let me assure you, Kagome-sama has a lovely—"
Inuyasha brained him with the shampoo; it bounced off Miroku's head and sunk. Miroku picked it up using his feet. "I suppose you want this back?" he asked with a sigh.
"Unless you want to wash the brat," Inuyasha said. Miroku tossed him the bottle again. Inuyasha fumbled at the cap with his one available hand.
"Ha!" said Shippou. "You're gonna have to let go of me—oh." Inuyasha had bitten the cap off and now his face twisted with the horrible taste of it. He dumped the container's remaining contents over Shippou, and then dunked the kitsune again. Then he threw him onto shore.
"Good enough," the hanyou said, spitting out shampoo.
"I'm still soapy!" complained Shippou.
Inuyasha gestured at the water. "Feel free to rinse it out," he said, slogging out of the water.
~*~
When the three males made it back to camp, both of the girls were busy. Kagome watched their kettle heat up; while Sango chopped up the puny vegetables Miroku had scavenged earlier. And both offered frigid glares to the two older boys.
"Um, Miroku? Do you remember what we did to piss them off?" Inuyasha whispered, elbowing the monk lightly.
Miroku considered this. "No, actually we've both been behaving extremely well. I've kept my hands to myself and you've managed not to insult Kagome." He shook his head mournfully. "See, this is why there's no point in being good, because they'll always find something to blame you for anyway."
Inuyasha grunted in agreement.
"We've already eaten," Kagome told the boys, handing them each a ramen cup. "Now, it's our turn for a bath."
"Oh really?" said Miroku, lifting an eyebrow with interest.
"Don't," was all Sango said, but her narrowed eyes spoke volumes more. Still, Miroku, skilled reader of female body language, could not figure out what was bothering her. He shrugged and tore the top off his ramen.
"Damned girls," scoffed Inuyasha. "You just took a bath yesterday. Why do females have such a weak, delicate aversion to dirt?"
"A wise man doesn't question life's little blessings," cautioned Miroku.
Sango set off for the river, while Kagome held her hand out to Inuyasha. He looked at it in confusion. "My shampoo," she bit out.
Inuyasha reached inside his damp kimono and pulled out the bottle. Kagome sighed, holding the empty container up to eye level. "Well, at least Shippou is really clean."
She got out a small bottle of body soap, deciding she'd have to improvise, and started out after Sango. At the river, she did a belly flop in, splashing Sango. "Well, that was fun."
Sango smacked the surface of the water with the flat of her hand, her cheeks bright red. "I can't believe we did that!"
"We were just taking Miroku up on his offer," said Kagome with a shrug, but her cheeks were slightly pink. They looked at each other, slightly ashamed, and then they both burst into laughter.
"That was certainly…interesting, wasn't it?" whispered Kagome, pulling Sango closer in case either of the boys had indeed snuck down after them. She watched the other girl's reaction closely in the dim light.
"I can't believe Inuyasha spies too! He doesn't seem the type."
Kagome frowned. "What? I didn't hear anything about that—"
"Houshi-sama said 'chose to be a prude that day.' That means there have been days he's chosen otherwise," pointed out Sango.
Kagome stomped her foot underwater. "And he acts so aloof, like he isn't interested at all."
"I know," said Sango. "And here we thought houshi-sama was the only pervert of the group."
Kagome's cheeks flushed from pink to a crimson even deeper than Sango's. "Well…now…we…kinda…are—"
Sango's eyes went wide as saucers. "Perverts as well," she completed Kagome's sentence.
"Unsuccessful perverts," Kagome said plaintively. "He kept his under-things on. And I told him to wash up! All I saw was him splashing around after Shippou. And I can't even call him on it, because then he'd know. He's probably still smelly."
"And I can't hurt houshi-sama for watching us the time we gave Shippou a bath!" scowled Sango, her thoughts just now returning to that particular comment. "I remember I had to chase Shippou, so for awhile everything was showing."
"An eavesdropper's dilemma," Kagome said with a sigh.
~*~
"What are they saying?" Miroku whispered impatiently to the keener-eared Inuyasha.
Inuyasha caught himself smiling and schooled his face into a determined frown. "I'm surrounded by perverts!" he whisper-snarled at the monk. Unlike the girls, it failed to occur to him that, judging by his current position in a prickly bush near the river, that word described him as well. Ha! Wench, you're right, I didn't use any of your girly-smelling hair care products! And there isn't a damn thing you can do about it, unless you want to confess!
"You're smirking!" Miroku pointed out, nudging Inuyasha. "What are they saying?"
"Feh, I'm doing no such thing." Inuyasha decided this bit of information was too amusing to share with Miroku. "I'm tired of this; I can't see what you find so attractive about either of them. I mean, I suppose Kagome is all right, her face and such, but—"
"You're looking at her face? You're hopeless. You can see her face any time! Yes, it's more than all right, but the face is one of those parts that feminine modesty doesn't require to keep covered. Don't waste—" Miroku noticed his lecture had been pointless, as Inuyasha had already made good his escape. His eyes, of course, had been occupied elsewhere, and you bet your life 'elsewhere' didn't mean on Sango's face. But now her suspicious expression did drag his eyes up from the more intriguing parts of her. Miroku swore to himself, as Sango gestured at his hiding place.
Kagome's blush came back and she whispered something to Sango. They both ducked low in the water until only the upper halves of their heads were visible.
Uh-oh, thought the monk. This was the position most commonly assumed before he was brained by a large rock, one that had been smoothed into a streamlined, aerodynamic shape by the river. As if the river were a living mother figure who objected to Miroku's bit of perverted fun, and thus aimed to provide blushing maidens with the best weaponry she knew how to make.
He edged away, leaves crackling underfoot. And then—
THUD
Rock connects with head. Blackness encroaches on vision. And then, the pervert falls.
"Pervert," said Sango, reaching for her clothing.
Kagome peered into the thick foliage, trying to visually find the pervert in question. "Who do you think, Miroku or Inuyasha?" she asked.
"The houshi," Sango stated without a moment's hesitation. "Inuyasha is lighter on his feet, and it would take more than one rock to knock a hanyou out."
Kagome hissed to herself, perversely wishing it had been Inuyasha. She pulled on her own clothes and stormed into the woods. In revenge on Miroku for daring to spy on them without dragging along Inuyasha, she towed him back to camp by his ponytail. Inuyasha sat innocently in a tree, gulping his ramen.
"Have you ever spied on me?" she demanded of him. If Sango's wrong, oh dear, that would be awful, being more of a pervert than my sort of/kind of boyfriend.
"Huh? What the hell are you talking about now, bitch?" Since his hands were securely wrapped around a cup of ramen, and he had another dozen stolen cups hidden in the folds of his kimono, Inuyasha judged it safe to insult Kagome.
"I gave you that ramen too soon! SIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!"
Inuyasha was sat headfirst into a hollowed out stump with an opening at the top. Ramen cups rained down on the girls, Shippou, and the unconscious monk. Shippou stared up at the sky in awe, because in all of his years, he had never seen clouds weep ramen instead of rain.
Kagome's nostrils flared with her anger. The two girls gathered the ramen back up and returned it to Kagome's pack.
The hanyou emerged from the stump, swearing up a blue streak. Shippou once again remembered his poor innocent ears. To preserve their unsullied state, the little kitsune coughed and poked Kagome, summoning up his sweet-little-kid look.
"SIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII-iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii-IIIIIIIIIIT!" Kagome shouted, loosing one of the most powerful combinations she'd discovered. Inuyasha did not merely slam into the ground, but instead flew briefly into the air, before nose-diving into a sit some five hundred yards away.
The hanyou returned, nursing his bruised muzzle. "Freaking dumb-butt piece of shoot," he snarled at Shippou, who only laughed at him.
"Inuyasha's Kagome-whipped!" he cried. "Kagome-whipped, Kagome-whipped—"
Shippou, this is a tree. Tree, this is a Shippou. I hope you get along, because the Shippou will be stuck in this convenient kitsune-shaped hole in the tree for awhile.
With that introduction made, Inuyasha turned his wrath on Kagome. "Damn you b—wench—what kind of sit was that? Damn you for being clever and damn you for taking my ramen!"
"Stolen ramen," Kagome pointed out.
"My stolen ramen," Inuyasha countered.
The hanyou and the girl just stood there for a long time, locked in an angry stare down. Kagome's hands were planted on her hips.
Finally, Kagome yielded, knowing she could not possibly out-stubborn Inuyasha, and wanting to continue her interrogation. "Have you ever watched me when I was bathing?" she said, breaking the stare down off.
"W-w-w-what?!" Inuyasha manfully tried to keep a blush from his cheeks. Then he remembered what he'd heard—
"Ha! You have no right to ask me that, when you're a sneaky little peeping pervert yourself!" Inuyasha grinned, pleased he'd found a way out of his predicament and a way to turn the tables on Kagome. Let's see her stutter and blush!
Kagome went red, but with anger, not embarrassment. "I knew it!" she crowed. "You were watching today!"
Sango bashed Inuyasha with her boomerang; then she toed Miroku over onto his stomach. She picked up a long stick and edged his hands underneath him as if they were separate entities from his body that might venture their way over her body even though the monk himself was unconscious.
And then she upended her water jug over him and backpedaled hurriedly. Miroku eased into a sitting position, and then blinked rapidly, trying to slow down the nauseating way the world kept jerking back and forth in front of his eyes. Two Kagomes? Two Sangos? Hhhhhmmm, actually what was he doing? Twin Sangos was really quite an interesting prospect—
Two Inuyashas?
Miroku groaned.
Kagome and Inuyasha broke off their argument over who was the greater pervert to glance at Miroku. Inuyasha extended his youkai senses in an attempt to try and figure out what had so frightened the monk; there was nothing. He shrugged his shoulders, decided the monk was going mad. "I looked at you only after you looked at me!" he lied. "You were perverted first and caused my perverted-ness."
Miroku squeezed his eyes shut so he wouldn't have to think about the possibility of two Inuyashas in the world, and concentrated on their conversation. When he heard that, he laughed.
To keep the monk from opening his mouth and condemning the hanyou to a series of agonizing sits, Inuyasha tackled him. Miroku was forced to open his eyes, and the girls were treated to the sight of Miroku fighting off both Inuyasha and an invisible opponent.
~*~
Later that evening, Inuyasha found Kagome to apologize, because his stomach was rumbling out a demand for ramen. And because other parts of him were demanding a repeat of the 'tongue-thing.' "Wench," he began.
"Wench went that way," Kagome said, with her back to him and her knees tucked to her chest.
Inuyasha grunted in irritation. Well, maybe it was time to try attaching '–sama;' it did work for Miroku after all. "Wench-sama," he tried again.
Kagome's shoulders shook with silent laughter. "Sorry, no Wench-sama here."
"Fine!" Inuyasha took a deep breath. "Kagome! There, are you satisfied?"
Not yet, Kagome's mind gave the same answer she'd given him yesterday to the same question. But her mouth said, "Try adding, 'I'm sorry.'" If yesterday's kiss were to happen again, well, Inuyasha would have to initiate it. She didn't have the nerve right now.
"Sorry for what?" he asked, even though that was why he'd come to her. "For spying on you? You should apologize too!"
"You weren't naked!" Kagome pointed out. "I was. That puts them on different levels."
Hhhhmmm, did I hear some disappointment in that 'you weren't naked?' Inuyasha wondered. "Feh, I didn't even look at you—the only reason I was there was to stop the dumb monk from spying, and then I heard you giggling with Sango. So I listened."
"Yeah right!" Kagome said, and went back to ignoring him.
Feh. Damn woman. He'd show her; no stupid human was going to deprive Inuyasha of ramen. He reached out and cupped her jaw in one hand, studying her features. Miroku was right; her face was more than all right. "Fine! I looked! Now will you stop being so stubborn, and give me a kiss—ramen! I meant ramen!"
Kagome laughed. "Right."
Inuyasha growled. "Why would I want another evil, sneaky, underhanded kiss like that thing last night? Stupid wench, sticking your tongue in like that! That wasn't fair—"
The memory of the power she'd felt yesterday gave Kagome the nerve she'd been lacking. "Sneaky, am I?" she purred, tugging Inuyasha to her again.
"Damn wench, oh no you don't!" Inuyasha turned his head aside so her lips pressed against his cheek instead. Then before she could recover from his swift, skillful dodge, Inuyasha pulled away, adjusted his angle, and moved back in. He moved his mouth against hers. If she was allowed to mess around with her tongue, so was he!
If Kagome's kiss had been a sneak attack, Inuyasha's was an aggressive barrage. It was as unsubtle as, well, Inuyasha.
"Wow," said Kagome after he was done. It was a long moment before she could say anything else, and then it was an appreciative, "Not bad. Now where were we? Oh yeah, you just admitted you looked," she glared at him sternly.
"And that," she said, "means you owe me…" The girl reached out for that inconvenient kimono…
"KAAAGOOOMEEE!" went up the cry from the hanyou, loud enough to spook Kirara, who yowled and gave away Sango, Shippou, and Miroku's position.
"It's just as well," said Sango later on, with Kagome and Inuyasha both heatedly denying Kagome had been about to take his clothes off, from opposite sides of the fire no less. "Much longer and we would have had to move away anyway, and I'm sure Inuyasha would have heard that."
"It was fun to watch though," said Miroku. "You innocents are so…innocent…it's entertaining."
"I am not innocent!" snapped Inuyasha because innocence didn't really fit in with the 'tough guy' thing he had going on.
"Hhhhhmmm, you're right," agreed Miroku slyly. "I mean, with the number of times you watched Kagome bathe, there's no way you could be…"
~*~
A/N: OOC, too many sits and boomerang-meets-head moments, clichés... ^^;; *scratches head* Well, I wrote it a long time ago. I hope you enjoyed it anyway. I've recently made some revisions, but there's not too much that can be changed without changing the entire plot, in which case I might as well take it down. Alas, I find the idea of parting with those 40 reviews rather unappealing, so it'll stay up. :P