The low down: Only one chapter left? Oh how will I make it end? Hehehe, you'll just have to wait. This one's going to be a little shorter… In case you're wondering what the freaking crap takes me so long to update now… here's a little list.
1) Studying… I do this occasionally…
2) Volunteering… at the local rehabilitation center.
3) Date/Going out… It happens people! But the random going out to clubs happens more. ^_~
4) Socially inebriated… naturally… I don't really write when I'm in this state. But wouldn't it be funny if I did? Remember kids… alcohol is baaaaaaaaad…. Yeah…
I know you don't care… I wouldn't either… but it sounded funny in my head and you see the little pen name up top? ^_^ That means I can be as dumb and corny in these little author's notes as I want.
Love and Marriage
Chapter 7
No Such Thing as Happy Endings
"Kikyo…" his voice was weary and strained. Was she actually trying to hurt him? "I think I've made it clear by now. I won't walk out on you." He watched her face for any display of emotion. When had Kikyo become so efficient at masking what she felt? Had he just missed her retreat into herself or had it all happened at once? He had no clue and that was just as frustrating. "Don't push me away, Kikyo. I won't break my promise to you."
He grabbed the handle of the door and soundly pushed it shut.
***
10:00 AM
Airports can be so frightening. All around, there are people rushing to get where they need to be and so desperate that friendliness is long forgotten in the stampede. Guards are everywhere looking ferocious and just waiting for someone suspicious. Metal detectors, random searches, long lines, and annoyed faces everywhere she looked. Airports made Kagome nervous.
She checked the screens for her flight status. On time to depart at noon, should everything go smoothly. And so far it had. With one little phone call the night before, she had put her entire family in a happy frenzy. Sota and Grandpa were apparently already moving boxes upon boxes of spiritual scrolls and charms from her room. While the two men of the house did the cleaning, her mother filled herself in to some details using that mother mind meld trick that seemed to be a universal maternal trait. Kagome had braced herself for screaming, lecturing, disownment, all the usual things a girl would expect for telling her mother that she had single handedly come between a man and his wife.
Another constant maternal trait is that no matter what the circumstance, they will shock their daughters senseless.
She had actually asked if she actually thought that leaving was the best solution. She said the same thing as Sango! 'Don't let a man make you run away from life.' She wasn't angry…
She didn't hate her…
She didn't think she was a terrible daughter…
She was just Mom about it…
Kagome cracked a smile at the receptionist behind the baggage checking station in the memory. Not that smiles will get you anywhere in an airport, but sometimes, a girl just can't hold it in.
"Two more hours…" Sango said sadly. "Are you sure you don't want me to wait with you?"
Kagome patted her arm affectionately and smiled. "I told you that's not necessary. I am a big girl, Sango, and you've all ready done enough by just driving me here and saving me the headache of a cab."
She pulled her into a warm hug for probably the last time. Sure friends parted will write letters, make phone calls, rely on emails, but such things only stay true for a while. After all, time makes the heart grow forgetful. Kagome thought off the fun she and Sango had had, and how dear this woman was to her heart, and she hated the thought that with distance, they would grow apart. But that's life isn't it? People will come into your life and you'll care for them with all your heart, but they can't stay there forever, right? That was just the way the world worked… she thought…
"Besides," she pulled away and grinned up at Sango's face. "You have a date this afternoon. I wouldn't want you being late…" She gave a wink.
Sango slapped her forehead and burst out "Oh!" But as Kagome started laughing, she soon found herself joining in. "I forgot all about that lech!" She giggled.
"Now, now…" Kagome said, "That's no way to talk about the man you love." She laughed lightly and spontaneously grabbed Sango's hand. "How are you ever going to handle keeping a boyfriend without me to keep track of your dates?" She said.
Sango squeezed her hand gently and wiped some hair from her face. Kagome began to notice she was making a lot of little gestures at her face. Wiping at invisible strands of hair in her eyes, smoothing an eyebrow that had no need of it… oh no! She saw a glisten!
"I really don't know…" Sango's voice broke as moisture built up and shook against the brown of her eyes.
"Oh Sango please don't!" Kagome said. "Please don't cry! You know if do, then I'm just going to start and then we'll both just be a couple of wailing idiots in the middle of an airport attracting stares."
Sango couldn't help laughing at that image and leaned on Kagome in a slightly tearful embrace. "I'll miss you. And I'll personally go and kick Inuyasha in the groin."
Kagome laughed and hugged her back. "Have fun. But there's no need for it. Inuyasha is a thing of the past. He's out of my life, and I plan on keeping it that way."
She pulled away and gave Sango's hand one last squeeze. "I'll miss you too, Sango. But believe me, I won't be missing Inuyasha."
Sango gave a smile to keep from a defense she knew was false. She watched as Kagome entered the terminal where she could not go and slowly disappeared from her life.
"That's no way to talk about the man you love…" Sango whispered to Kagome's back as she walked away. She shook her head once and dug in her purse for her car keys.
11:30 AM
"So there's this old woman who wants to turn her community's church into a historic memorial to preserve it." Miroku said while leafing through letters and legal documents. "It's a simple case, but it may be a bit messy on my end… but when does that really sway you?"
Inuyasha absently flicked the swinging balls on his desk toy so it clacked into the other ball and sent it flying higher than usual. He tapped it as it came back around and the ball flew in an arc and tangled in the strings of the other. He sighed and rolled around in his chair to the window without really caring. It was a dumb toy any way.
Miroku glared at the back of Inuyasha's head and gave a tight frown. He hated when his partner wasn't paying attention to him when he was talking about a new project. "Ms. Kaede is very concerned for the welfare of her community and is quite compliant with any measures that will ensure the preservation of the church. And truthfully, we could use the good public relations. You don't exactly hold well with the press…"
Miroku gripped his pen when he still got no answer. He'd have to play a little dirty…
"And I could always contact Kouga to hype it up. The basic outcry to the public to stop the evils of production from destroying patriarchal society. As long as we don't include you too much in it, he should be all too happy to take up the story. There's so much potential…"
"We're not going to that bastard for anything!" Inuyasha flung around in his chair and gave a glare that promised pain… and a lot of it.
Miroku looked at him blankly and wondered why he even bothered coming to work some days. If the only way to get his partner's attention was to blatantly stoke his anger, he'd do better sitting at home hanging out with Count Chocula and Bob Barker.
"Look!" Miroku stood and slapped down hard on the desk. No way he could stand putting up with this childish crap when it came in the way of business. "If you don't…"
His rant was cut short as a sharp knock pounded on the door. They called the person in and a man wearing too nice a suit for a delivery boy walked to the desk, depositing a manila folder in front of Inuyasha.
"You're Inuyasha?" he asked stiffly while the referred nodded dumbly. "Sign here please." And he held out a clipboard saying the delivery was made.
"What is this?" Miroku asked while his friend signed for the confusing folder.
"Bill of divorcement." He said stiffly. "Deepest condolences." Miroku looked at him incredulously. Sure didn't sound like any condolence he'd ever heard… definitely a lawyer.
Inuyasha was much less analytical about the man making the delivery.
Throughout the building, secretaries, janitors, and copy boys stopped in shock of the word that echoed down the halls and offended the ears.
12:00 PM
She walked slowly up the long and narrow tube, glancing back over her shoulder into the airport terminal. Last chance, Kagome, this was her last chance to turn around.
She pulled her carry on further up on her shoulder and walked into the plane.
'So this is it...' she thought as she walked the isle. 'This is the end of one era in my life.'
She sat by the window and watched the men bring the baggage cars under the plane. She absently played with the jewel at her neck. Her thoughts wandered with their own will, to the man she was leaving behind, curiously wondering what he would do now without her as a problem. What would his life hold now?
Whatever it was, she hoped he was happy.
12:00 PM… elsewhere
Inuyasha was pissed. Not just pissed, red-eyed, soul snapping, raging animal out for blood, pissed. "Kikyo!" he screamed and threw the heavy door open with a nerve rattling jolt. "Kikyo! Where are you?!"
"You're earlier than I thought." An unfittingly calm voice spoke from his side. He found Kikyo, sitting straight at the dining room table, a legal folder opened in front of her, and a disturbingly resolute gleam in her eye. He would have been nervous at her unnatural amount of tranquility given their current situation… that is if he wasn't so blindingly angry.
"Kikyo," he gritted out. "What is the meaning of this?" He flung the papers he had been delivered on the table right on top of her own copy.
"This is me waking up." She said. "I don't want to pretend any more."
If she was hoping to appeal to his emotions, it didn't work out too well. He was huffing with un-vented anger. After everything he had suffered beating himself up emotionally, she just thought she could do something like this without even giving him the satisfaction of telling him to his face? "What do you mean pretend?" He growled.
"I once envisioned this perfect life for us." She said, looking down at the table now. "I guess none of it turned out how I planned. I don't want to go on pretending that there's any chance it ever will."
"Why now?!" he screamed. "Why fucking now, Kikyo? And why not to my face? You had to just drop this on me out of the blue. I've been going insane not knowing how to help you, but you can't even tell me this to my face."
"I realized something." She looked up again with an expression he wasn't sure how to classify, but she sure wasn't responding how he thought she would.: no screaming, no crying, just calm. He wanted to start yelling again just to try to make it seem normal again. He wanted to scream about why she wasn't answering his questions. "The baby did it all." She said.
He shut up.
"You were so happy, Inuyasha." She continued with a soft smile. "For a while, I thought my own heart would burst from the joy. We were finally happy. Finally something to look forward to together. But I realized something… you were happy because you needed someone to love."
Some invisible force in the universe just punched him in the stomach.
"I realized, you couldn't love me, so if you loved a child that belonged to us, you could be satisfied. It would have bound us together so much more powerfully that a ring."
He saw her fidgeting with something on the table's edge. He caught a faint sliver of gold between her fingers as she twirled it in her palm. Kikyo had removed her wedding ring. He cast an involuntary glance down to his own left hand.
"I guess it was a sign." She said so low he strained to catch the words. "A child should be a symbol of love between two people who want to bring life into the world." She caught his eyes meaningfully. "Not a means of entrapment."
A single tear finally gave away her emotions as she looked into his eyes. "Maybe it's a sign, I was never meant to be a mother, because I can never love another man, and you can't be forced to love me."
If Inuyasha had ever been angry, he didn't remember it with the sudden rush of shame that flooded his mind. He was at her side in a second, pulling her into his arms and allowing her to release long pent up tears into his shoulder. There was nothing for him to do in all the world but hold this crying woman, wronged in so many ways in her life, and stroke her hair, whispering comforts to her, any thing that might soothe her broken heart.
She cried quietly as he held her. Her shoulders moved sharply, as she tried still to hold in the emotions and he marveled at her. Even now, she was guarded. She should be sobbing like an idiot: complete with loud wails, pathetic shaking, and snot on his shirt.
Kikyo rarely cried. And even that was controlled.
"I wouldn't have left, Kikyo." He whispered. "We could always have tried again. I would have been faithful. I swear, the entire time, I never once meant to hurt you. All I ever remember is wanting to protect you."
He pulled her face away from his shoulder to look in her eyes. "I guess that's love in its own way, right? I cared about you, Kikyo, deeply, but I don't know what's wrong. I would have just believed that love didn't exist and what we had was the closest thing anyone could ever get."
She brought her hand up to hold his cheek. "Until Kagome…" she stopped his speech. The shocked expression she got was enough to give her a small smile. "I know, Inuyasha. I've known longer than I've wanted to admit it. From the beginning." Kikyo sighed and shook her head sadly. "I always pretended that she wasn't real. That you didn't really love her and she didn't have any hold over your heart. I told myself, if I loved you enough, that would be all that mattered. It might be obligation at first, but I was so sure over time, you would come to feel the same. It might have happened that way, had she not come along. If she had never been there, there wouldn't be anyone else you would have placed in your heart."
"I'm sorry, Kikyo." He said.
She shook her head again. "I guess I just wanted it too badly."
They stayed silent for uncounted moments, just collecting their thoughts. Each letting memories flow across their minds and wondering just what the future might hold now. They shared so much common history. Was it the wisest thing to throw that away? They had to wonder.
"Kikyo," he said. "Are you sure this is what you want."
So this was what a last chance felt like. Kikyo looked into his eyes searching for any reason to say no and hold on to him. It was so hard, letting go. It would just be so easy to keep him by her side. She'd have him, and that was what she wanted. But it would be for an oath… he would not want to be with her. He would do what ever she wanted of him… but in reality, that's not how she wanted her life to be.
"You aren't able to do what I truly want of you, Inuyasha." She said weakly. "Please just sign the papers."
She couldn't watch as he took the pen in his hand, so she turned her back to the table.
"So what happens now?" a gentle voice spoke behind her.
He watched her turn with an expression he had not seen on her face in far too long. She was smiling gently, a sad smile, but true. Her eyes, although tearing, had a look of relief to them that calmed his spirit more than any other force in the universe would be capable of doing. She stepped close to him and took his hand in her own.
She leaned up and caught his lips in a gentle kiss. "Goodbye." She whispered and looked down at his hand, at the pale gold band around his finger. She caught the ring and slipped it slowly away. "You're free now…" she said as the tears started to flow.
He caught and held her in reflex as she cried.
"I was good to you, wasn't I?" She asked and looked up into his eyes like she wasn't quite sure of that statement any more.
"Yes." He gently wiped a tear away from her cheek. "Yes, you always were."
12:00 AM
"Please! Can we stop for the night?" a whiney voice called from behind a massive cardboard box.
Sango looked around the room, calculating how many more cubes of cardboard she could cram in the living area before she'd have to learn to fly. Miroku dropped the heavy package on the ground and plopped on the pile he had assembled to look like a sofa. Ahh… he knew all those childhood hours playing with legos would eventually pay off.
"I guess that's enough for today." Sango said hesitantly. So much of her personal belongings still littered her kitchen cabinets all through the restaurant. The cooks didn't particularly appreciate that little fact.
"How can you have so much stuff." Miroku moaned. "Didn't I carry enough to fill this whole building a week ago?"
"Stop whining. You volunteered for this." She smirked down at him.
"Where do you find room to put all this?" he said and wiped his brow dramatically.
"I have my ways." She grinned.
Miroku was busy having a conversation with himself along the lines of 'That should not be a turn on…' so he didn't immediately notice Sango's mood take a much more somber tone as she looked around the apartment. Things would soon look so different from how they had when Kagome lived there. Sango wondered if perhaps that was the reason she was in so little hurry to unpack everything. Just in case…
"It's going to be so different…" she mused aloud, catching Miroku's attention. He gave a similar look around the room before nodding in understanding.
"Have you heard from her?" He asked.
She nodded and nudged him over on the cardboard couch. "I've talked to her since she got home. She sounded fine, just looking for work again."
He nodded distractedly, thinking instead of his partner's relationship with the absent Kagome. She probably didn't even know Inuyasha had divorced, having finalized it legally only a few days prior. It had been finished from the beginning in every other way except legal. It figured, just as he was free to come to terms with his feelings for the woman, she runs away and Inuyasha didn't have a clue.
"Bah…" he muttered under his breath. "Inuyasha's an idiot."
When he heard his exact words echoed at his side, Miroku whipped his head around in surprise. Sango's brows were lowered as if she was frustrated, and she had just mirrored his sentiments on his friend's intelligence.
"Wait…" he said. "Why do you think he's an idiot?"
Sango flushed at being caught in her mutter and wondered if it was alright to tell Miroku the truth behind Kagome and Inuyasha's past.
"What do you know?" Sango asked just to test the situation.
"That depends." Miroku said just as cautiously. "What do you know?"
They studied each other intensely as if trying to see the information shoot out through the other's eyes. The only information they recieved, however, was that neither was telepathic and the whole ordeal was stupid. Well, Kagome couldn't really run away again. Sango decided she might as well tell her side of the story in order to get the information she wanted.
"She ran away to get away from him." Sango said bitterly. "She felt guilty because he kept coming to her and she was afraid she'd cause his marriage to break and ruin everyone's life."
Miroku slapped his hand over his eyes and groaned.
"What?" Sango said, blinking at him confused.
"They divorced…" Miroku muttered.
Sango gapped at him before she likewise slapped a hand over her face and slumped back against the box furniture. "They're both idiots." She said without malice.
"Agreed." Miroku said in a similar tone.
They sat in mirrored postures for several silent moments. Miroku couldn't help smiling as he thought just how comfortable he was becoming on scrunched cardboard boxes next to Sango. If only his friends would be able to someday have some comfort of their own, that was all he hoped for them. And who knew? Maybe, just maybe, things might just….
"Sango…" Miroku said quietly, "What was that noise."
"Nothing." She said quickly, blushing a little.
A huge, laughing grin took up his entire face. "You did, didn't you?" he said.
"Did what?!" she raised her voice, feigning anger in hopes of getting him to back off the subject. Of course it didn't work.
"You did!" he cried laughing and moved to hug her.
Sango pushed his arms away with a cry and jumped off the boxes. He followed her move and continued to chase her, even as she started screaming at him to get away and ran through the apartment.
Apparently Sango was more comfortable around him than even he had thought.
"Aww!" He laughed at her. "Honey, it's your first fart!"
She's been good to me when things weren't going' right.
She made my days long before you made my nights.
***
Next Chapter: Leaving On a Jet Plane
(OH! It's the last one! Gee... I wonder what I'm gonna do... NOT! ^_^)