Death Be Not Proud
Chapter Two
By: Lunar Kitty
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A/N: Alright, it's official, I have a problem sleeping. It's four FREAKING THIRTY in the morning, and I've been trying to go to sleep for three FREAKING hours! That whole 'interesting fact' that the average person falls asleep in seven minutes is a crock of bull. Seriously........Anyways, here's the next chapter of DbnP. Hopefully the reviewing will pick up as it goes along. This seriously is NOT a long story, so if you're looking for something short and good, here it is.
==============
Kagome groaned as she walked up the steps to her shrine. She was so hungry! Her eyes were practically glazing over as she walked up the steps. School had been.......strange today. There was no homework given, in any class except Biology, but with Satan as a teacher, it wouldn't matter if the world was coming to an end and you weren't going to be able to turn in the homework the next day.......you'd have to spend your final hours before the apocalypse sweating your brains out over a freaking drosophilus experiment or something.......It almost made her want to develop a twitch. Of course, she wasn't totally sure about the homework thing in Calculus, since she had slept through the entire class.
She pulled out her key as she reached her door, the long climb to the shrine barely fazing her. She'd only walked the same path after school for thirteen odd years. The door slid back as her cry of "Mom, Souta, Ji-chan! I'm hoooommmee!" echoed throughout the ancient building. Normally her brother would come pounding down the stairs to greet her, a big baggy t- shirt and pajama pants already on despite the fact that it was four in the afternoon. He would be begging her to come play SSX Tricky with him, or some other game on the PS2, or bribing her for answers to his homework. Her mom didn't seem to be home either, and despite her thorough search of the kitchen, she found no note explaining her family's whereabouts. With a sigh of annoyance, she began her truck up the fourteen stairs that led to her room, her large book bag making her back ache.
When she reached the top, she dropped her book bag with a thud onto her floor, wincing as she felt the house shake, and heard something break in the dining room downstairs. "Whoops......" she said sheepishly, running a hand through her hair. She crossed her fingers and prayed that it wasn't one of Ji's antiques.......she'd never hear the end of it if one of his mummies had disintegrated because of her ample school work. Rubbing her temples with her hands to try and ward off an oncoming head ache, she turned her attention towards her bathroom, in which waited a sauna tub. Grabbing a towel from the linen closet in the hall, she trotted her way towards the sauna singing her favorite song, "Every Heart". She opened the door to the bathroom, surprised to find it cleaner than a whistle, none of her many clothes were scattered about the floor, and her make-up was gone. "That's strange..." she murmured tired eyes surveying the spotless floors. "It looks like a teenage girl doesn't even live here anymore....." she giggled. Her mom had really done a good job cleaning up. She'd have to write her a thank you note or something.
She walked into the room, carelessly dropping her school uniform on the floor as she reached over to turn hot water on. As she wrapped her robe about her body, she almost mooshed into a pile of jelly when the first few wisps of steam began their sensuous way up from the hot water, making her skin thirst for hydration. With a smile of unbridled happiness she turned around to get her favorite bubble bath from the top drawer of her cabinets.
She quickly leafed through the drawer; her hands flying through the large collection of bathtub squirt toys that belonged to her little brother. Her hands gently closed over her Cucumber Melon Melody, a new fragrance from her favorite bath products store. As she lifted it out in her excitement, she painfully slammed her elbow into the edge of the drawer. Hissing in pain, she lifted her arm out gently and tried to turn it so she could see the bruise that was bound to have formed in the short time it had taken her to extricate her arm from its precarious position. However, it was one of those places that you just can't see with your own eyes, you know, those bruises on the back side of your arm that never quite come into full view?
Sighing in utmost aggravation she turned to her large ornate mirror that hung over her green marble counter tops to try and get a better view, and what she saw.........what she saw.......was nothing. Where she should have been standing, there was a clear reflection of the bathtub filling behind her. In shock, she waved her injured arm, still holding the bubble bath, around wildly, and was stunned to see the bubble bath whirling around the room........but her arm.......it wasn't there.
Terrified, she dropped the bubble bath and stumbled out of the room, knocking her mother's antique lamp from its perch in the hallway, its crash onto the rug covered hardwood floors echoing sharply throughout the house. Her haphazard panting breath sounded like the bellows of a wounded animal as her vocal chords tried to make any kind of noise. She headed towards the only place she could think to go, her mother's room, almost falling down the stairs as she tried to reach her sanctuary, her happy place to retreat to when something went wrong.
The room she had cried in when her father died in that plane crash, the room she had gone running to when she fell and hurt herself when she was younger. The place that personified the very essence of security in her life, the four sided structure that had become her mother in every shape form and fashion. It was the first room in the house her mother would enter when she came home, and at the moment, Kagome needed her mother more than anything else.
She slammed through the doors into its serene darkness, the beautiful china blue wallpaper based on an Ancient Chinese print her mother had had replicated from the museum she was curator of giving it an ethereal quality. The beautiful silk bed sheets that echoed taste and dignity, and the gorgeous deep royal navy down comforter, its soft contours ready to absorb all the tears of fear that Kagome had pent up inside of her at the moment. She walked slowly across the room and collapsed onto the bed, her long black hair spilling about her pale, ivory white skin in a fountain of ebony. Her arms wrapped around a long squishy pillow, dragging it towards her body, and smashing it against her small frame so she could have something to comfort her in her time of need.
She inhaled her mother's sweet perfume, something by Este Lauder she presumed, due to her mother's abnormal fondness of the company. She snuggled deep into the covers desperately trying to block out the vision of the bottle of bubble bath floating in mid air. Where had she been? Was it some trick of her brother's, to make her freak out? He did things like that sometimes. It must've been Souta, or Ji-Chan, he could have brought another one of those "cursed" objects home again. She would never forget the time he brought home a "cursed" bag of marbles.....he had refused to allow she and Souta to play with them, telling them that the shooters would swallow their souls. However, she and her brother had blatantly ignored him, and had been covered in sutras with scribbled black lines on them as soon as he had discovered them in the act, his meaningless chants to bring their souls back from Hades doing no more than giving them swirly eyes and head aches.....
She smiled at the memory. The mirror just had to be one of Ji-chan's crazy stunts. The old coot was always babbling about some legend or another from a thousand years ago. She almost laughed out loud as she remembered the "legend of the pickles" story. Oh my......that one had been a gut buster.......tears of mirth streamed down her cheeks as she remembered Souta's mini-shrine to the dill pickles he had created underneath his bed in fear of enraging the "Pickle God".....if mom had known what was making that "awful" smell in Souta's room, she would have thrown a fit!
Her laughter at her memories was quickly interrupted by the slamming of the front door, most likely courtesy of her little brother Souta. She heard the sound of shoes being taken off, and the dropping of a house key on the kitchen counter. Her suspicions on the identity of the unknown human in the kitchen were quickly confirmed as she heard a large book bag drop on the floor, and two house shoe clad feet thunder up the hard wood stairs. She heard him open and shut the door to his room, along with his small voice saying "Why's the water running?"
His footsteps walked across the hallway into the bathroom and his elementary school kid voice gasped. Her eyes opened warily. What had she done? Had she left her underwear on the floor or something? Nope, she was wearing those.....a tampon perhaps? That was always a possibility........she sweat dropped uneasily.....what was wrong? Her little brother's disembodied voice came softly from upstairs, hardly hearable as he spoke, "All her stuff is supposed to be put away now.....what's it doing out?"
Her confusion was plain on her face as she listened intently. What was Souta talking about? Why would her stuff be put away? Had she done something wrong? What was up with everyone today? Anybody she talked to had seemingly shunned her. Her books were gone, her makeup was gone off her own counter. Her bathroom was clean.....something strange was going on, and Kagome didn't like it one bit.
She was debating confronting Souta when she heard the back door open, her Ji-chan's shuffly footsteps creeping along through the living room, his rheumatic back creaking with every step he took. She listened hard as Souta trotted down the steps, a half hearted "Konbanwa" echoing down the stair well.
"Ji-chan" Souta called. "Did you leave the water running in the tub earlier today?"
"No." his wrinkledy voice crackled "Why do you ask?"
"Well I came home from school, and the bath water was running upstairs, and some of....Kag's clothes were on the floor."
"Like she never ran away from us......." her grandfather grumped.
"I wish.......I wish she'd never gone out on that date with Inu-niichan!" Souta said, his voice barely audible to her ears, despite the fact that she was only a few feet away from them in her mother's room.
"I know Souta....I think we all wish she hadn't left......"
"It's been over a week......Ji-chan.......I can't stand it......" her brother began to sob uncontrollably, "What I am going to do....I know she's never going to come home again.....and I.....I can't stand it Ji-chan!" his boyish voice, unaccustomed to crying, cracked painfully, making Kagome wince. What had she done? She was right here! Didn't they see her shoes at the doorway, her purse on the counter?
"When is your mother getting home Souta?" Ji-chan questioned.
"I don't know Ji-chan.....she said something about stopping by........" his voice dropped too low for Kagome to hear, her eyes wide in shock. Had she run away and not noticed it or something? Or were they talking about someone else? Her confusion mounted as she blocked their voices out. What was she missing? What essential piece of information was she lacking? What would make her mystery complete?
Their conversation suddenly came back into focus as she heard her Ji-chan say "How about I take you to McDonald's Souta? Would that make you feel better?"
"Hai, Ji-chan, I think a good old McFlurry would cheer me up a little."
"Okay then, we can get your mother a salad and put it in the fridge for her when she gets home."
"It looks like it's going to rain Ji-chan, should we take the car?" Their voices died away as a loud clap of thunder shook the house. It had been dreary on her way home, and the weather man had said something about a chance of rain today, but thunder storms?
Kagome shook her head wearily.......it was all too much, just too much. She lay her head back down on the pillow, sighing. Why was it that everything unexplainable always happened to her? She vaguely registered hearing the car start as she moped about on her mother's bed. Maybe she should watch some TV or something........
Just as she was reaching for the clicker she heard the front door open again, and a different set of foot steps began their melodious way into the house. It was her mother....she could tell, from here. The way she walked, the way her heels clicked as she took her shoes off to exchange them for the house slippers she normally wore. The swooshing of her raincoat as she hung it on a peg over the mat to dry.....
Kagome smiled, her mother would know just what to think about the "mysterious" mirror. Souta would get it now! It was another one of his childish practical jokes, it....it had to be. Why else would she not have a reflection?
Her mother entered the room slowly, holding a wet newspaper in her hand, the headline slightly smudged. She seemed not to notice Kagome at all as she put the paper down, hands reaching up to pull down her soaked hair from its messy bun. "Oh Kagome" she said quietly.
"What is it mom?" Kagome replied, hair falling into her face as she sat up on the bed to face her mother, who looked straight ahead of herself into the mirror.
"I went to see you today." She said, her voice almost too quiet to hear in the darkness of the room. Kagome could hardly make out her face as she took her earrings off, her hands gently removing all jewelry off her person.
"Really?" Kagome replied, "I didn't see you around school."
"The flowers are absolutely gorgeous, this year. I guess that's why there are so many there........"
"At my school? Yeah, the flowers are beautiful this year. Just think about the Cherry Blossoms we'll see next year!" her fear was being cast away as she listened to her mom's soft voice.
"Remember that tree you used to love in the cemetery, when we went to visit Grammy's grave?"
"Yes.......Goshinbuku isn't it? The thousand year old God tree?"
"It's leaves are falling, and they mixed in with the flowers today. I wish you could have been there to see it. I missed you so much today."
"Did you see Grammy while you were there momma?"
"The article in the paper today is about you."
"Really momma? What kind of story is it? Does it have anything to do with the band competition?"
"It tells everything.......I wish........I wish I had grounded you last week when you broke that plate.........but Inuyasha had already made his reservations for Sullivan's.........I wish I could have stopped you Kagome............"
"Why momma? I heard Souta and Ji-chan talking about this earlier. I thought you all liked Inuyasha!"
"I liked him so much........until he took you away from me."
"Momma, I don't understand, what are you talking about?"
"I love you Kagome, forever and ever. You......you'll always be my little girl, okay? Even if I can't see you all the time like I used to..."
"I know that momma, I love you too."
Her mother smiled demurely.......but sadness still echoed in her brown eyes. She turned towards her bathroom door, grabbing her bathrobe off its hook as she made her way in. Kagome lay back down on the bed as her mother started the shower......the soothing sound of water trickling down the shower curtain gradually lulling her into a stupor....
Just as she was drifting off to sleep, a loud crash of lightning and the roar of thunder shook the house violently. She sat up quickly, her mother shrieking in surprise. The pictures rattled on the wall, and she swore she heard something fall in another part of the house. Quivering, she stood up and went to try the lights. She walked to the switch over by the window, shivering because she was chilly.
Reaching for the switch, she flipped it up. No lights came on. She flipped it once more to be sure. Yup, the power was out.
Sighing in aggravation, she turned around to retreat back to her mother's bed and her solace, but tripped over something on the floor. She looked down, squinting in the pale light and saw the newspaper her mother had brought in earlier. So this must have been the something she heard drop a few seconds earlier. Rolling her eyes, she reached down to pick it up, walking over to the windows to use what light she had to read the story her mother had told her she was featured in. Closing her eyes momentarily, she leaned her head against the cold window pane. When she opened them, she turned the newspaper over, the headline was hard to make out in the waning light. With a mumbled curse she leaned closer, her eyes hardly perceiving any writing on the paper.
Just as she leaned closer, a huge streak of lightning crashed down, illuminating the illusive headline.
Kagome read the words slowly, hardly comprehending what the large black font was telling her eyes, her mind barely processing the information now flooding through her system. In shock, she heard herself whispering the headline out loud, her ears screaming for her to stop.
"Two Teenage Lovers Die in Tragic Train/Car Collision"
A tear dripped out of her eye as she looked down at her own face, her own prom picture, Inuyasha holding her hand as they stood in front of one of his dad's limos.
"I'm.........dead?"
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A/N: What a horrible place to stop, ne? I'm glad I finally finished this chapter, I had already finished the third and final one before I even finished this one! AAAAAAHHHH!! Chemistry is driving me nuts! NOT! Chemistry is fun, even if it is a little brain boggling at times.....I'm already ready to get my test back from Ms. _____ that I took today. It was pretty easy *knocks on wood* I hope I did okay. A ninety-five would be nice.......*Lizbet aka Meggums, Bec, and LK's sister all nod enthusiastically* I need to make a high A in that class ya know? *Liz, Bec, and Keru all put on Miaka "pass your exams" head bands* LOL! Anyways! Read and review please! I'm so excited I'm getting ready to finish my very first story! And YES Beast is coming Beast is coming! I'll have a new chappy out as soon as possible, and as soon as my muse kicks herself in the rear and wakes up.........Okay! Gotta go, Keru hasn't been fed, and mom's shopping, so it's time for me to cook......*cough::not::cough* supper! R/R pretty please! - Lunar Kitty
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A/N: Alright, it's official, I have a problem sleeping. It's four FREAKING THIRTY in the morning, and I've been trying to go to sleep for three FREAKING hours! That whole 'interesting fact' that the average person falls asleep in seven minutes is a crock of bull. Seriously........Anyways, here's the next chapter of DbnP. Hopefully the reviewing will pick up as it goes along. This seriously is NOT a long story, so if you're looking for something short and good, here it is.
==============
Kagome groaned as she walked up the steps to her shrine. She was so hungry! Her eyes were practically glazing over as she walked up the steps. School had been.......strange today. There was no homework given, in any class except Biology, but with Satan as a teacher, it wouldn't matter if the world was coming to an end and you weren't going to be able to turn in the homework the next day.......you'd have to spend your final hours before the apocalypse sweating your brains out over a freaking drosophilus experiment or something.......It almost made her want to develop a twitch. Of course, she wasn't totally sure about the homework thing in Calculus, since she had slept through the entire class.
She pulled out her key as she reached her door, the long climb to the shrine barely fazing her. She'd only walked the same path after school for thirteen odd years. The door slid back as her cry of "Mom, Souta, Ji-chan! I'm hoooommmee!" echoed throughout the ancient building. Normally her brother would come pounding down the stairs to greet her, a big baggy t- shirt and pajama pants already on despite the fact that it was four in the afternoon. He would be begging her to come play SSX Tricky with him, or some other game on the PS2, or bribing her for answers to his homework. Her mom didn't seem to be home either, and despite her thorough search of the kitchen, she found no note explaining her family's whereabouts. With a sigh of annoyance, she began her truck up the fourteen stairs that led to her room, her large book bag making her back ache.
When she reached the top, she dropped her book bag with a thud onto her floor, wincing as she felt the house shake, and heard something break in the dining room downstairs. "Whoops......" she said sheepishly, running a hand through her hair. She crossed her fingers and prayed that it wasn't one of Ji's antiques.......she'd never hear the end of it if one of his mummies had disintegrated because of her ample school work. Rubbing her temples with her hands to try and ward off an oncoming head ache, she turned her attention towards her bathroom, in which waited a sauna tub. Grabbing a towel from the linen closet in the hall, she trotted her way towards the sauna singing her favorite song, "Every Heart". She opened the door to the bathroom, surprised to find it cleaner than a whistle, none of her many clothes were scattered about the floor, and her make-up was gone. "That's strange..." she murmured tired eyes surveying the spotless floors. "It looks like a teenage girl doesn't even live here anymore....." she giggled. Her mom had really done a good job cleaning up. She'd have to write her a thank you note or something.
She walked into the room, carelessly dropping her school uniform on the floor as she reached over to turn hot water on. As she wrapped her robe about her body, she almost mooshed into a pile of jelly when the first few wisps of steam began their sensuous way up from the hot water, making her skin thirst for hydration. With a smile of unbridled happiness she turned around to get her favorite bubble bath from the top drawer of her cabinets.
She quickly leafed through the drawer; her hands flying through the large collection of bathtub squirt toys that belonged to her little brother. Her hands gently closed over her Cucumber Melon Melody, a new fragrance from her favorite bath products store. As she lifted it out in her excitement, she painfully slammed her elbow into the edge of the drawer. Hissing in pain, she lifted her arm out gently and tried to turn it so she could see the bruise that was bound to have formed in the short time it had taken her to extricate her arm from its precarious position. However, it was one of those places that you just can't see with your own eyes, you know, those bruises on the back side of your arm that never quite come into full view?
Sighing in utmost aggravation she turned to her large ornate mirror that hung over her green marble counter tops to try and get a better view, and what she saw.........what she saw.......was nothing. Where she should have been standing, there was a clear reflection of the bathtub filling behind her. In shock, she waved her injured arm, still holding the bubble bath, around wildly, and was stunned to see the bubble bath whirling around the room........but her arm.......it wasn't there.
Terrified, she dropped the bubble bath and stumbled out of the room, knocking her mother's antique lamp from its perch in the hallway, its crash onto the rug covered hardwood floors echoing sharply throughout the house. Her haphazard panting breath sounded like the bellows of a wounded animal as her vocal chords tried to make any kind of noise. She headed towards the only place she could think to go, her mother's room, almost falling down the stairs as she tried to reach her sanctuary, her happy place to retreat to when something went wrong.
The room she had cried in when her father died in that plane crash, the room she had gone running to when she fell and hurt herself when she was younger. The place that personified the very essence of security in her life, the four sided structure that had become her mother in every shape form and fashion. It was the first room in the house her mother would enter when she came home, and at the moment, Kagome needed her mother more than anything else.
She slammed through the doors into its serene darkness, the beautiful china blue wallpaper based on an Ancient Chinese print her mother had had replicated from the museum she was curator of giving it an ethereal quality. The beautiful silk bed sheets that echoed taste and dignity, and the gorgeous deep royal navy down comforter, its soft contours ready to absorb all the tears of fear that Kagome had pent up inside of her at the moment. She walked slowly across the room and collapsed onto the bed, her long black hair spilling about her pale, ivory white skin in a fountain of ebony. Her arms wrapped around a long squishy pillow, dragging it towards her body, and smashing it against her small frame so she could have something to comfort her in her time of need.
She inhaled her mother's sweet perfume, something by Este Lauder she presumed, due to her mother's abnormal fondness of the company. She snuggled deep into the covers desperately trying to block out the vision of the bottle of bubble bath floating in mid air. Where had she been? Was it some trick of her brother's, to make her freak out? He did things like that sometimes. It must've been Souta, or Ji-Chan, he could have brought another one of those "cursed" objects home again. She would never forget the time he brought home a "cursed" bag of marbles.....he had refused to allow she and Souta to play with them, telling them that the shooters would swallow their souls. However, she and her brother had blatantly ignored him, and had been covered in sutras with scribbled black lines on them as soon as he had discovered them in the act, his meaningless chants to bring their souls back from Hades doing no more than giving them swirly eyes and head aches.....
She smiled at the memory. The mirror just had to be one of Ji-chan's crazy stunts. The old coot was always babbling about some legend or another from a thousand years ago. She almost laughed out loud as she remembered the "legend of the pickles" story. Oh my......that one had been a gut buster.......tears of mirth streamed down her cheeks as she remembered Souta's mini-shrine to the dill pickles he had created underneath his bed in fear of enraging the "Pickle God".....if mom had known what was making that "awful" smell in Souta's room, she would have thrown a fit!
Her laughter at her memories was quickly interrupted by the slamming of the front door, most likely courtesy of her little brother Souta. She heard the sound of shoes being taken off, and the dropping of a house key on the kitchen counter. Her suspicions on the identity of the unknown human in the kitchen were quickly confirmed as she heard a large book bag drop on the floor, and two house shoe clad feet thunder up the hard wood stairs. She heard him open and shut the door to his room, along with his small voice saying "Why's the water running?"
His footsteps walked across the hallway into the bathroom and his elementary school kid voice gasped. Her eyes opened warily. What had she done? Had she left her underwear on the floor or something? Nope, she was wearing those.....a tampon perhaps? That was always a possibility........she sweat dropped uneasily.....what was wrong? Her little brother's disembodied voice came softly from upstairs, hardly hearable as he spoke, "All her stuff is supposed to be put away now.....what's it doing out?"
Her confusion was plain on her face as she listened intently. What was Souta talking about? Why would her stuff be put away? Had she done something wrong? What was up with everyone today? Anybody she talked to had seemingly shunned her. Her books were gone, her makeup was gone off her own counter. Her bathroom was clean.....something strange was going on, and Kagome didn't like it one bit.
She was debating confronting Souta when she heard the back door open, her Ji-chan's shuffly footsteps creeping along through the living room, his rheumatic back creaking with every step he took. She listened hard as Souta trotted down the steps, a half hearted "Konbanwa" echoing down the stair well.
"Ji-chan" Souta called. "Did you leave the water running in the tub earlier today?"
"No." his wrinkledy voice crackled "Why do you ask?"
"Well I came home from school, and the bath water was running upstairs, and some of....Kag's clothes were on the floor."
"Like she never ran away from us......." her grandfather grumped.
"I wish.......I wish she'd never gone out on that date with Inu-niichan!" Souta said, his voice barely audible to her ears, despite the fact that she was only a few feet away from them in her mother's room.
"I know Souta....I think we all wish she hadn't left......"
"It's been over a week......Ji-chan.......I can't stand it......" her brother began to sob uncontrollably, "What I am going to do....I know she's never going to come home again.....and I.....I can't stand it Ji-chan!" his boyish voice, unaccustomed to crying, cracked painfully, making Kagome wince. What had she done? She was right here! Didn't they see her shoes at the doorway, her purse on the counter?
"When is your mother getting home Souta?" Ji-chan questioned.
"I don't know Ji-chan.....she said something about stopping by........" his voice dropped too low for Kagome to hear, her eyes wide in shock. Had she run away and not noticed it or something? Or were they talking about someone else? Her confusion mounted as she blocked their voices out. What was she missing? What essential piece of information was she lacking? What would make her mystery complete?
Their conversation suddenly came back into focus as she heard her Ji-chan say "How about I take you to McDonald's Souta? Would that make you feel better?"
"Hai, Ji-chan, I think a good old McFlurry would cheer me up a little."
"Okay then, we can get your mother a salad and put it in the fridge for her when she gets home."
"It looks like it's going to rain Ji-chan, should we take the car?" Their voices died away as a loud clap of thunder shook the house. It had been dreary on her way home, and the weather man had said something about a chance of rain today, but thunder storms?
Kagome shook her head wearily.......it was all too much, just too much. She lay her head back down on the pillow, sighing. Why was it that everything unexplainable always happened to her? She vaguely registered hearing the car start as she moped about on her mother's bed. Maybe she should watch some TV or something........
Just as she was reaching for the clicker she heard the front door open again, and a different set of foot steps began their melodious way into the house. It was her mother....she could tell, from here. The way she walked, the way her heels clicked as she took her shoes off to exchange them for the house slippers she normally wore. The swooshing of her raincoat as she hung it on a peg over the mat to dry.....
Kagome smiled, her mother would know just what to think about the "mysterious" mirror. Souta would get it now! It was another one of his childish practical jokes, it....it had to be. Why else would she not have a reflection?
Her mother entered the room slowly, holding a wet newspaper in her hand, the headline slightly smudged. She seemed not to notice Kagome at all as she put the paper down, hands reaching up to pull down her soaked hair from its messy bun. "Oh Kagome" she said quietly.
"What is it mom?" Kagome replied, hair falling into her face as she sat up on the bed to face her mother, who looked straight ahead of herself into the mirror.
"I went to see you today." She said, her voice almost too quiet to hear in the darkness of the room. Kagome could hardly make out her face as she took her earrings off, her hands gently removing all jewelry off her person.
"Really?" Kagome replied, "I didn't see you around school."
"The flowers are absolutely gorgeous, this year. I guess that's why there are so many there........"
"At my school? Yeah, the flowers are beautiful this year. Just think about the Cherry Blossoms we'll see next year!" her fear was being cast away as she listened to her mom's soft voice.
"Remember that tree you used to love in the cemetery, when we went to visit Grammy's grave?"
"Yes.......Goshinbuku isn't it? The thousand year old God tree?"
"It's leaves are falling, and they mixed in with the flowers today. I wish you could have been there to see it. I missed you so much today."
"Did you see Grammy while you were there momma?"
"The article in the paper today is about you."
"Really momma? What kind of story is it? Does it have anything to do with the band competition?"
"It tells everything.......I wish........I wish I had grounded you last week when you broke that plate.........but Inuyasha had already made his reservations for Sullivan's.........I wish I could have stopped you Kagome............"
"Why momma? I heard Souta and Ji-chan talking about this earlier. I thought you all liked Inuyasha!"
"I liked him so much........until he took you away from me."
"Momma, I don't understand, what are you talking about?"
"I love you Kagome, forever and ever. You......you'll always be my little girl, okay? Even if I can't see you all the time like I used to..."
"I know that momma, I love you too."
Her mother smiled demurely.......but sadness still echoed in her brown eyes. She turned towards her bathroom door, grabbing her bathrobe off its hook as she made her way in. Kagome lay back down on the bed as her mother started the shower......the soothing sound of water trickling down the shower curtain gradually lulling her into a stupor....
Just as she was drifting off to sleep, a loud crash of lightning and the roar of thunder shook the house violently. She sat up quickly, her mother shrieking in surprise. The pictures rattled on the wall, and she swore she heard something fall in another part of the house. Quivering, she stood up and went to try the lights. She walked to the switch over by the window, shivering because she was chilly.
Reaching for the switch, she flipped it up. No lights came on. She flipped it once more to be sure. Yup, the power was out.
Sighing in aggravation, she turned around to retreat back to her mother's bed and her solace, but tripped over something on the floor. She looked down, squinting in the pale light and saw the newspaper her mother had brought in earlier. So this must have been the something she heard drop a few seconds earlier. Rolling her eyes, she reached down to pick it up, walking over to the windows to use what light she had to read the story her mother had told her she was featured in. Closing her eyes momentarily, she leaned her head against the cold window pane. When she opened them, she turned the newspaper over, the headline was hard to make out in the waning light. With a mumbled curse she leaned closer, her eyes hardly perceiving any writing on the paper.
Just as she leaned closer, a huge streak of lightning crashed down, illuminating the illusive headline.
Kagome read the words slowly, hardly comprehending what the large black font was telling her eyes, her mind barely processing the information now flooding through her system. In shock, she heard herself whispering the headline out loud, her ears screaming for her to stop.
"Two Teenage Lovers Die in Tragic Train/Car Collision"
A tear dripped out of her eye as she looked down at her own face, her own prom picture, Inuyasha holding her hand as they stood in front of one of his dad's limos.
"I'm.........dead?"
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A/N: What a horrible place to stop, ne? I'm glad I finally finished this chapter, I had already finished the third and final one before I even finished this one! AAAAAAHHHH!! Chemistry is driving me nuts! NOT! Chemistry is fun, even if it is a little brain boggling at times.....I'm already ready to get my test back from Ms. _____ that I took today. It was pretty easy *knocks on wood* I hope I did okay. A ninety-five would be nice.......*Lizbet aka Meggums, Bec, and LK's sister all nod enthusiastically* I need to make a high A in that class ya know? *Liz, Bec, and Keru all put on Miaka "pass your exams" head bands* LOL! Anyways! Read and review please! I'm so excited I'm getting ready to finish my very first story! And YES Beast is coming Beast is coming! I'll have a new chappy out as soon as possible, and as soon as my muse kicks herself in the rear and wakes up.........Okay! Gotta go, Keru hasn't been fed, and mom's shopping, so it's time for me to cook......*cough::not::cough* supper! R/R pretty please! - Lunar Kitty