Forgotten Snow
Chapter seven


Kagome could feel the tension in the air whenever she and Inu-yasha were in the same room together. They were silent and barely spoke to each other for days and Inu-yasha often just shut himself up in his office. He was ashamed of himself, she could tell.

Even though he'd intruded on her day off, had caused minor damage to her mother's wall, and had screamed his head off...Kagome could tell why he'd done it. She could see the pain had stayed with him. It was weird...ten years to forget and yet...it had stayed with him. The pain, the rejection, everything.

But why?

Why had he allowed himself to carry this pain, when the simplest thing would have been to let her go?

And why was it after all these years to forget, to move on...Kagome found herself still in love with the hotheaded bastard?


Kirara tapped the controls and made her character jump nimbly into the air, only to be shot down by Rin and fall to her doom in a pit of fire.

"Damn it, Rin!" Kirara snarled.

"Kirara," groaned Inu-yasha from his desk, where he was playing a round of bastard fish (As Miroku energetically called it) with said employee, "No swearing in front of your sister. Sesshoumaru would kill me." He turned to Miroku. "Go fish you bastard!"

Miroku took a card, "You know, your nieces will make me loose my job. They're better video game testers than I am!"

"Yes, well since they games are made for kids...." Inu-yasha trailed off. "Got any threes, bastard?"

Miroku tossed two threes at him and sighed loudly. "Kagome seemed tense today. Hey, now you're all tense! Is there some kind of cold going around?"

"Don't say here name," Inu-yasha kicked Miroku. "I really don't want to deal with her right now."

"And why not?" Miroku asked as he shuffled the cards. Inu-yasha kicked him again for collecting the cards when they weren't done with the game. He had been winning too.

"Because I just don't want to talk about it," Inu-yasha muttered darkly.

Miroku sighed deeply. "Well anyways," he decided to change the subject, "the holidays are coming. What are you getting us, your fellow employees?"

"I don't celebrate Christmas," Inu-yasha muttered.

Miroku eyed him, "Are you a Jewish?"

"No...I support Buddhist beliefs and hold it in my everyday life without completely motivating myself to turn to Buddha completely," Inu-yasha said.

Miroku gave him a blank look.

"It means he holds some Buddhist beliefs, but he isn't a die hard Buddhist!" Kirara called without taking her eyes off the TV screen.

"Thank you Kirara," Inu-yasha said.

"Daddy says that Uncle Inu used to celebrate Christmas, but he stopped ten years ago!" Rin said happily.

"Rin," Inu-yasha cursed his niece under his breath.

"Oh ho ho, so the plot thickens," Miroku said and grinned, "So tell me, what happened ten years ago that sucked the happiness of the holidays out of you?"

"It's none of your business!" Inu-yasha said crossly.

"Oh come on, you can tell me!" When Inu-yasha didn't answer Miroku flung himself onto Inu-yasha, "Please! Please! Please! Please!"

"No, now get off me!" Inu-yasha snarled.

Miroku pouted and released his boss. "You aren't any fun," Miroku muttered.

"And you aren't in any way mature," Inu-yasha said as he leaned back in his chair, "You're a bad influence to my nieces, move your ass out of here."

"Yeah, move your ass!" Rin chirped happily.

Miroku rolled his eyes heavenward, "Yeah, I'M the bad influence."

"Out," Inu-yasha said crossly. Miroku grinned and left after giving him a clumsy bow and patting Rin's head delicately.

Rin giggled as Miroku left and Kirara snorted indifferently.

Inu-yasha sighed and leaned back in his seat staring at the ceiling with a wistful look on his face. That day...so long ago...it constantly replayed in his memory. How could he have allowed himself to be hurt like that? It was that day that he learned to never give himself to anyone else every again. It was a foolish thing to do, which would probably cause him to only have the pleasure of being laid once...but...every time he looked at a girl he found himself comparing her to her and that time so long ago. And he hated it....

He was jerked from his thoughts when he heard something outside that sounded suspiciously like a fight...


As Kagome replayed the fight through her head over and over again, she began to lose the pity she held for Inu-yasha and instead found herself growing angrier and angrier. How dare he pull the guilt trip on her? How dare he come to her house and scream at her? How dare he cause damage to her ancient home? How dare he put her mother through a near-heart attack? The many 'how dare he' excuses buzzed through her head and she found her blood boiling deep within her.

To vent out some anger she pounded furiously onto the keyboard and typed in Inu-yasha's appointments and that entire 'god damned good for nothing shit' that he had her file.

'Monday: Have a meeting with some whiny assholes. Tuesday: Have an appointment with your adorable neice and your bitchy little hell spawn. Wednesday: meeting with some more whiny bastards. Thursdays: Wow, nothing. You can pout in your office and find more ways to be an asshole. Friday: You'll probably be late for your meeting, so be sure to park in a handicapped space…Saturday: day off. Good for you. Sunday: Wow, another day off. You're so fucking lucky…' she typed furiously.

"Excuse me?" came a soft voice that caused Kagome to look up. Half expecting Inu-yasha or Miroku she was surprised to see a man with long black hair and piercing blue eyes instead.

"May I help you?" Kagome asked with fake cheerfulness, wishing fully that the man would leave her be.

The man didn't seem to notice as he grabbed her hand and lightly kissed it, his blue eyes flashed. "My, what a beautiful young lady I've stumbled upon. May I ask your name?"

"Yes you can," Kagome snapped, hoping she could scare the guy away.

No such luck, apparently this boy was as dense as mud. "Ok, what is your name, then?"

Kagome rolled her eyes heavenward, "Higurashi Kagome."

"Ah and what a gorgeous name it is," he kissed her hand again, causing Kagome to silently gag. "I am Kouga," he didn't offer a last name, and Kagome didn't really care, either.

"Well, Kouga," Kagome said in a false sweetness. She tried to smile and act as angelic as she could, after all this Kouga guy could be a higher rank than her....and if that was so, then he had the power to fire her, which she neither wanted nor needed. "If you could please state your business I'll be happy to connect you to either one of the Takahashi's."

Kouga snorted, "Like I need to talk to the dogs."

Kagome fought in urge to slap the idiot in front of her. Instead she widened her smile and leaned forward. She bent a finger to beckon the man towards her. He eagerly moved in. her lips were inches away from his own and his eyes were drifting shut. Kagome took a deep breath, and then yelled in his face, "Then why the fuck are you here?"

Kouga, obviously not expecting such a reaction, toppled over backward and stared at the ceiling in surprise. "I-I-I...um..."

Kagome exhaled sharply and turned back to her computer. Ignoring the moron on her floor, she continued with what she was doing. She whipped her hair behind her and crossed her legs in annoyance as she eagerly awaited the man to leave.

Instead, Kouga stood and leaned against the desk with the outlook of someone who was about to score a winning goal in a basketball game. Kagome stopped typing and turned towards him with her smile gone. "May. I. Help. You. Sir?" she hissed angrily.

"Why yes, yes you can," Kouga drawled out and examined his fingernails as if there was anything wrong with them. She noticed that he had claws. Terrific, a youkai, just what she wanted at the moment.

"And WHAT, pray tell, could you possibly need?" Kagome sighed loudly.

"A hot date with a hot chick," Kouga smirked.

Kagome tensed; did he just use one of Miroku's lines?

As if hearing the sentence, the said pervert came strolling out of Inu- yasha's office and spotted Kagome. "Ah Kagome, dear, you'll go out with that guy but not me?"

"I'm not going out with ANYONE," Kagome snapped at Miroku, who reeled back in surprise. It had been a long time since Kagome had been in a bad mood. Miroku simply shrugged it off, it took a lot to annoy him and he simply assumed that Kagome was going through PMS or something that girls always had issues with. (He really didn't want to think about it)

"Of course she isn't going to," Inu-yasha said as he leaned against his doorframe. He smirked wickedly, "Even Kagome has enough taste to know when to say no to stupid wolfs."

"Shut your mouth, dog turd!" Kouga snapped back automatically.

Kagome, however, already boiled to the brink not to mention all the stress over Inu-yasha and then being annoyed by the annoying wolf youkai, stood up in her seat and marched to Kouga. He blinked in surprise while Miroku and Inu-yasha peered curiously behind her. Kirara and Rin were also watching in amazement.

"You know what, Kouga?" Kagome said loudly. "I'd LOVE to go on a date with you," Kagome said and smiled maliciously at Inu-yasha, who growled softly and pretended to not care.

"Really?" Kouga brightened up and grinned, "Great!"

"Yeah let's go," Kagome said with a huff.

"Right now?" Kouga asked in confusion and eyed Inu-yasha, "Aren't you kind of...working right now?"

Inu-yasha appeared indifferent over everything but Miroku could see that his fists were clenched horribly tight and his face had gone deadly white. He also appeared to be biting his tongue. His ears were flat and his eyes were burning with hatred and hurt.

"Oh I'm sure his majesty won't care," Kagome said sweetly, "After all, what's one day out of ten years?"

Kagome hadn't meant to sound so harsh but the moment it left her lips she knew that she'd hit a tender point.

She glanced over her shoulder to see that Inu-yasha's hands had gone slack and that small drops of blood were falling from his open palms. His ears drooped sadly and his mouth opened in surprise. His eyes flashed sadly before they were hidden under his bangs. Taking hold of Kirara and Rin he silently shut his office door.

Miroku was unaware of what had gone on between Kagome and Inu-yasha, but he could tell that that was not the thing to say. "Ouch," he said to Kagome and shook his head sadly. He turned and entered the office to comfort his friend.

Kouga, instead of being sympathetic, merely smirked happily, "Well then, Kagome, let us go on that date!"

"Um...yes," Kagome said and silently begged forgiveness from Inu-yasha.