I stare at your grave, covered with the flowers I myself brought to lay there, and for the billionth time I feel like screaming my heart out. The sun burns down on the back of my neck and on my head as I drop to the ground, unable to hold myself up any more. I'm past crying, you know. I've already cried so much, I just can't bring myself to do it again. I've cried, I've yelled, I've gone through pretty much every stage and form of mourning ever thought of. This pain is terrible. I'd rather battle a million demons—and lose—than feel this feeling another second.

It feels like my heart's being ripped from my chest. My head hurts all the time. I haven't been sleeping. Your face haunts my thoughts every time I rest, every time I even close my eyes. I can't eat anything either. The others are worried. I know that. If you were here, you'd probably scold me for being stupid, for being arrogant and worrying your friends without thinking. But you're not here, are you?

What difference does it make to you that I feel so numb all the time? I'll bet you're really happy up there in your pretty heaven, with your nice fluffy angel wings and your halo and your clouds. Do you play with the other angels, Kagome? Do you even spare all your poor mortal friends downstairs a backwards glance once in a while? Do you interrupt your happiness, even for a second, just to think of us, of the life you left behind?

You were so stupid. It was all your stupid fault that you died. If you hadn't wandered off into the forest in a huff, all haughty and angry, then you wouldn't have been alone. If you hadn't sat me right before you left, threatening that if I didn't leave you alone, you'd leave and never come back, I would've followed you, and I could've saved you from that stupid demon. It didn't even have a Shikon Shard with it! Why didn't you think to bring you're a weapon with you, at least? Would it have made that much difference to you to spare just a moment to get your bow and the quiver of arrows? It would've made all the difference in the world to the rest of us.

But you were too angry...with me. You wanted to leave right away.

What did I do to you? I barely even remember. It was some stupid argument, as always. Did I call you a shard detector again, like I used to? Did I tell you that you were useless, that you were brainless, that you would never be anything more than an idiot? Did I tell you that you were more trouble than you're worth, that I was tired of always having to come to your rescue? Whatever it was that I said...I didn't mean it, dammit. You're supposed to know that. You're supposed to be patient with me, dismiss it as you always do and argue back. Then you're supposed to sit me and go home, and come back later and apologize, and make me feel like the lowly mutt that I am.

You weren't supposed to die. That never should have happened.

I've thought about all this over and over and over since that night. I've gone through times of being alternately furious with you and furious with myself, disbelieving that this even happened at all, and so sad that it aches to breathe. I've felt unimaginable guilt, and the most terrible sense of reliving a nightmare. Now, it's sort of settled into one big numb feeling: I can't help but feel like it's my fault, but at the same time, I'm furious with you. For leaving. For breaking your promise. I know it's selfish. But you told me you'd always stay with me, as long as I wanted, no matter what happened. Even though every day I insulted you, forced you to play second to some corpse woman with no heart. Even though I dragged you away from your happy normal life with your family, and your friends. Even though I dragged you through villages where you witnessed things no other teenager from your time has ever seen. I made you watch suffering, pain, death, and sorrow. And you were all the stronger, all the kinder for it. You were an extraordinary person, Higarashi Kagome.

Did your friends back in the future know how special you were? Did any of them—even Hojo—see that courageous fire that you hid behind such a sweet, innocent face? I think your mother knew, maybe. She knew you were special, if nothing else. She believed in you from the very beginning. And Souta? You were his hero a long time before I ever was. You were his hero when you were just a normal schoolgirl. He loved you so much, and he's going to be crushed when I tell him. I say 'when' because, despite how you always said I was so brave, so fearless...these last few days, I've been closer than I ever have been before in my life to being a coward. Yes, a coward.

I'm afraid to tell your family, Kagome. I'm not sure I'll be able to bear their sadness. And they might even blame me. I know I couldn't survive through that. They were almost my family, too, you know. They accepted me as readily as if I'd just followed you home from school like one of those babbling airhead girls. I don't think I could stand to have them think that I killed you, or that it was my carelessness that let it happen...

I get enough of that from myself.

Shippo's mad at me. Normally, I can pretend like I don't care, but this time he has a reason. He blames me for what happened to you. Can I blame him for thinking that? No. I can't convince myself that it was all your fault, no matter what I tell myself or anyone else. If I hadn't been being an ass as usual, you wouldn't have left camp. If I hadn't been provoking you, telling you a bunch of cruel crap that isn't true in the first place, you'd still be with us. I've tried to explain to Shippo, but he won't hear of it. He won't even look at me.

Sango and Miroku know I didn't mean for this to happen. Shippo knows it too, but he's so young...he needs someone to be at fault. He'd rather be angry than be considered weak and sad, even if he is. Miroku's been trying to talk to me a lot more often, but it doesn't seem normal without his annoying teasing. He's just been trying to keep me company, the way Sango used to keep you company. I appreciate the effort (sort of), but it's not helping. Nothing any of them could do could take away all this pain.

Do you want to know what the worst part of this is? You died, still smarting from something I'd said. You died thinking I was an insensitive jerk, that I thought nothing of you, that I still thought you were just some annoying brat that got stuck in my hair every so often the way Shippo did. You died thinking I mind rescuing you, that I don't want you around. That's not true. I said all that because I was trying to cover up the fact that I was in love with you, and I wasn't sure how to react. There, I said it. Can you even hear me right now, Kagome? I love you, dammit. I love you so much that I would've given my life for you in an instant. I love you so much that I threw myself in front of attacks meant for you, and protected you from anything and everything I possibly could. I even spared you from the heartache of feeling loss—or tried to, anyway. I figured, that if I was a jerk to you, and I didn't let you get too close, then it wouldn't be so bad for you when I finally went to hell with Kikyou.

I know I was wrong now. If you felt even a fraction of what I'm feeling now, even hell wouldn't have been bad enough punishment for me, for letting you feel such misery.

I promised that I would protect you, and I took that vow very seriously. Though you didn't ever hold me to it, like Kikyou did, or remind me of what I owed you, like Kikyou did, I would never, ever have gone back on that promise. Nothing in the world could've stopped me if you needed my help. And yet, here we are. You needed my help that night, possibly more than you've ever needed it in all the time I've known you. It was the one time I didn't protect you, the one time I wasn't there in time. And that was all it took. One small, stupid argument is the reason that I feel this horrible torture, the reason that Sango lost a friend, that Shippo lost a mother. Just another argument changed my entire future.

You can't come back now, Kagome. I'm having such a hard time gripping that. It's been weeks, and I still expect you to come bounding in at breakfast twenty minutes late, yawning and smiling and brandishing your socks at me for making a comment about lazy wenches. I still keep thinking that you'll climb out of the old well, and we'll all go off on another adventure for another jewel shard. Sometimes, at night when everyone's sleeping, I could swear I hear your voice, praying with Shippo like you used to, or singing him a lullaby. Now, the kit cries himself to sleep every night, and there is no singing. He won't let Sango sing to him.

I don't think I'll ever forget that night. I see flashes of it all the time, no matter what I'm doing or how hard I try to forget. I remember being irritated with you, and jumping up into the Goshinbaku's branches, watching as you stomped off into the forest. I was peeved, not paying attention. Dammit, if only it hadn't rained the night before...I might've caught the demon's scent. But the rain washes away all aromas but its own. I couldn't even catch YOUR scent.

Then I heard you scream. One shrill, frantic yelp, and then everything went silent. Even the crickets didn't dare to make a sound. My heart was pounding mercilessly. I couldn't breathe. My body had figured out what was happening before my brain could process it, and as I jumped into the tree, suddenly I knew what had happened. I could feel you writhing in pain as the demon drove its claws even further into your body, pinned you to the tree. I felt each and every painful gasp that you had to fight for, and every cut that happened because you were struggling.

By the time I got to the clearing, it was already too late. Too late to save you. Too late to pull you from the jaws of death, and scold you for almost dying. Too late to be the hero you always looked up to me as. And that made me furious. Without expelling any effort, I ripped the stupid beast away from you and threw it backwards, impaling it with one fell sweep of Tetsusaiga. It died quietly, without even an agonized splutter. But I didn't notice.

You were lying at the base of the tree, panting, done struggling with the monster. Your face was so pale...there was so much blood. The scent of it was dizzying. It would attract every demon within a hundred miles. But I dared them to come close. I dared them to try to hurt you again.

I'd never seen your face so blank. You fought so doggedly to breathe...there was still a claw remaining, protruding from the wound. I blinked grimly, and gave you a look, explaining. You understood—or maybe you were just too out of it to realize that a big spiny thing was sticking out of your stomach. It would have to come out. I grasped the thing and pulled, as hard as I could. You didn't even scream. You should have.

There was so much blood. I pulled off my haori and tried to stanch it, but nothing helped. A still more vibrant red seeped through and stained my jacket. I remember vaguely muttering to you—and partly to myself—that it would be all right. I told you to keep your eyes open, to stay awake, while I tried so hard to stay calm, to formulate a plan. You needed healing, but I couldn't move you back to Kaede's. I wasn't about to leave you out in the wilderness, either, as an easy meal for anything that wandered by. I'd made that mistake once.

"In—u—yash—a—" your words were accompanied by a gurgling bubble of red liquid that ran down your chin to join the rest of it, adding to a still more vibrant crimson hue. I'd never seen such a bright red color. No blood had ever been so red. I tried to calm you down, to keep you quiet. You were only making things worse. But you weren't going to have it. "Inu—I'm s-sorr—y—" It was hard to understand you, you were gasping so hard.

"It's okay," I soothed, working as fast as I could, trying to bind the slash I hadn't protected you from. I couldn't stop the bleeding. My hands were becoming a bright crimson, the same color that was staining the ground around us. Why did you keep bleeding? The demon must've had venom in its fangs. I was panicking. Your time was running out, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

I could tell you were getting tired. Your eyes were glazed over with a strange film I'd never seen before, sparkling with a serene dying glitter. You weren't even watching me anymore, as you had been—you stared straight through me, past the trees and the pain of the clearing, deep into something I wouldn't have been able to see even if I had looked up from my work. Each time you blinked, your eyes stayed closed too long, as if you had to force them open again. Your breathing was slowing.

"Don't give up," I'd snapped, squeezing your hand tight enough to send a little pain through your arm, to jolt you awake. You didn't react. My heart pounded fast enough for the both of us, and I shook you by your shoulders, desperately trying to wake you up. Open your eyes, I pleaded. Kagome, open your eyes. You opened them, and stared at me blankly, the tiniest of calm smiles gracing your features. I stopped shaking you around like a rag doll, and felt my entire world come crashing down around my ears. You were holding on, just for a moment, to let me say my goodbyes.

A million and one phrases jumped to my mouth. Suddenly, time had grown very short. I wanted to tell you I loved you, how stupid I was for not saying so sooner. I wanted to apologize for anything I'd ever said or done to hurt you—all the times I'd ran to Kikyou and left you, vulnerable; all the times I'd called you terrible things, said things that weren't true in the least; and, most recently, for not protecting you. I wanted to tell you everything all at once, but there didn't seem to be enough time. I struggled with myself, and your eyes sparkled with tiny silver tears, which moved down your face, making little clean streaks in the blood.

Your hazy eyes told me you understood, as you always understood. You were accepting my silence as proof. Proof that I'd meant it when I told you that you were my shard detector, and I'd never feel anything else for you. Proof that I'd been serious when I'd said that Kikyou was my first love, my only love. Proof that I was really mad enough to let you die out here, at the hands of an unknown, unintentional foe. I wanted to blurt out that none of that was true. I wanted to scream at you for dying, for thinking such a thing, for being so understanding when I had just let you die being stupidly careless—

But I couldn't. Something in your face, in your eyes stopped me. You let out one shuddery breath, closed your eyes, and lifted yourself so incredibly slowly from the ground. I could only sit there in shock as you forced your tired, limp body to move towards me, until you were sitting—leaning—stiffly against me. You reached over, meekly, and pushed your cold lips onto mine. My eyes widened, but I didn't push you away. I let your stay there until you pulled away, breathless, and whispered quietly in my ear.

I love you, Inuyasha.

Those were your last words to me. Your body suddenly wasn't willing to sit up any longer. You slumped forward, into my arms, the very last breath your life had to offer whistling against the side of my face. I sat there, trembling in shock and indescribable grief, before throwing my arms around you and burying my face in your hair, babbling insanely all the things that I had wanted to say in your final moments. I tasted your blood as I cried, and silently cursed all the gods and demons in heaven and hell for taking you, allowing this to happen.

But it was my fault. Not yours, not theirs. Even then, completely engulfed in grief of you, I knew that. I couldn't accept it, but I knew it, somewhere in the back of my mind.

Your funeral was held a few days later. I remember wondering if this had been what it was like when Kikyou died. The whole village showed up to mourn you with us. There was not one child, one jiji, one single person missing from the crowd. Even the ones that could barely walk, either too decrepit or too sick came, and had someone hold them up. Not one villager's face was dry. The little children were wailing, holding onto their mother's skirts and grieving for their playmate, their role model, the happy-go-lucky smiling girl that brought them flowers when they were ill and read stories to them in the sick house.

Shippo was desolate. He wouldn't let Sango hold him, like she wanted to, and wouldn't let Miroku get close, to hand him a handkerchief or pat him comfortingly on the shoulder. His mourning was a quiet sort of sadness, but somehow it was more painful than any of the villagers'. Every few seconds two or three tears rolled down his cheeks, and he did nothing to stop them. He just stared at your coffin, lost in his own misery. I gave him space. He didn't want to talk to me. He hated me just then.

Miroku said the service, and closed with a prayer that the gods would be kind to you in the afterlife. The villagers murmured along with him, but Sango and I just stood there, and watched, numbly, as one or two of the carpenters lowered your coffin into the ground. Miroku threw a handful of dirt over it, and I wanted to scream at him that he was making it so final, that it was wrong. He was throwing dirt over your body. I might've said something then, and caused an incident in my grief, except that Sango leaned over and buried her face in my shoulder, shaking with the tears she was too proud to allow to be loud. I was held quite still beneath her trembling hands, and didn't dare push her away.

When the service was finally over, all the villagers went home. It was just us—me, Sango, Miroku, and Shippo. Kaede-baa-baa went back to her home to begin preparing our dinner, but she told us to call if we needed something. The thought struck me as odd. Unnatural, somehow. How could she expect us to eat, to do something so NORMAL when you were dead? Everything had changed, and yet Kaede wanted us to go on, eat, keep living. I didn't realize it then, but she had the right idea.

Maybe when you get older, and all your measly little mortal friends die, you get to know a thing or two about loss. I'm not entirely sure, but I do know this: Kaede was right. She knew that I wanted to curl up into a little ball and stop living, and she knew that I couldn't. That's probably why she was looking directly at me when she said that dinner would be ready shortly.

I'm not sure how long we all stood there. No one spoke, no one moved. I was scarcely aware of breathing, just that suddenly, a little Sakura blossom fluttered down from the heavens and landed on the dirt covering your coffin, pale pink against the dark brown of recently disturbed soil. Even then, in the middle of my most chaotic rounds of yelling at myself over and over, I realized what an odd occurrence it was. Sakura blossoms shouldn't still be around in wintertime. They're spring flowers, one of your favorites. I blinked and stared at it as Sango went forward and knelt down, looking at it. She saw it too. I wasn't imagining things.

That small, insignificant flower held all our attention. We all watched it, unblinking, as though it were the most extraordinary thing in the world. Sango eventually seemed to work up to nerve to touch it. She reached out a hand, hesitantly as if it might reject her with a cackling force of energy like one of Kikyou's arrows. It didn't. She picked it up and held it to herself in both hands, as if it were a precious gift. Maybe she took it as a sign from you. She glanced up at the sky, which was streaked with stripes of orange and purple, and smiled the tiniest of wry smiles, whispering something that only Shippo and I could hear, it was so soft.

"Arigatou, Kagome-chan."

Some people might've found that exchange with a deceased friend odd, but I didn't. Miroku looked puzzled, probably because he hadn't heard what she said. Shippo just glanced up at the sky with Sango, searchingly. Maybe he hoped to see you there, or some sign from you of his own. I think that's all he really wanted at that moment. Sango suggested a few minutes later that they go back and accept dinner from Kaede. After all, it would be rude to keep her waiting. Miroku and Shippo went along meekly, but I just ignored them and stayed behind. They didn't try to force me. They left, quietly, sensing I wanted some time to myself.

I stared at the dirt where your coffin had disappeared beneath. We hadn't allowed you to be cremated, even though that was the traditional fate for priestesses around the village. I justified it by telling myself that you didn't care either way, and that, besides, you weren't a miko really. You were just some stupid little idiot girl that stumbled backwards through time and fell face first into more chaos than you could handle. I think the only way I could ease the pain at all at that moment was to be mad at you. That's why I tried to remember every thing you'd done since we'd met that was annoying, that had gotten on my nerves at any point in time—anything that proved that we were better off without your blunders.

But I came to realize...I couldn't think of anything. All those sits that I had so resented in the past...they were provoked, and when I looked back on them, seemed almost comical. All those mistakes—breaking the Shikon, for one, had not been so bad. You'd brought us together. You gave Shippo a family, Miroku a reason to keep cheerful, and Sango a friend. And me? I think you gave me most of all. You gave me a person to trust, a person who took every chance she got to defend me and my imperfect half-blood, a person who told me every time I even thought of doubting it that I was worthy, and fine the way I was.

I reached into the folds of my sleeves and pulled out the little chunk of Jewel fragments we'd collected ever since we began this stupid quest. I fingered it, and it blinked a dull purple. It wouldn't ever be bright again, I knew. You were its holder. You were its master. It would never glow the same for anyone else—unless you were reincarnated, the way Kikyou was. The thought sickened me. The gods wouldn't dare. They wouldn't dare force your soul into the world again, after all the suffering it had been forced through in both lives. You didn't belong anywhere but Nirvana. You're too good for earth.

I stared blankly at the small jewel, and suddenly I wanted to toss it far, far away. THIS was what you had died for? THIS stupid thing? It wasn't worth your life, or Kikyou's, for that matter. It wasn't fair. The Shikon no Tama corrupted everything that came in contact with it one way or another, even those too pure to be corrupted. It couldn't corrupt you or Kikyou, so it killed you instead. With its unquestioned vengeance on the world, it had taken away the two most wonderful people I had ever known, or ever would know.

No, I thought suddenly. The jewel didn't kill you, Kagome. And it didn't kill Kikyou.

I did.

Kikyou died because, no matter how she wanted to, she couldn't trust me fully. She had died in a way similar to the way you had—in betrayal. In an unfair swoop of fate. You had died because I wasn't watching you. And, what's more, if I hadn't forced you to keep coming back, if you'd never come to the Feudal Era at all...then you'd still be a normal teenager. You wouldn't have had to be burdened by death and carnage. You wouldn't have had to suffer through my indecision, through my ridicule, through me always making you stay by my side and play second best. Why? I was so selfish.

Even now I am selfish. I was thinking about it, then. What if you never had come back to the Feudal Era? I would never have been awakened. I would've stayed, bitter and alone and angry, in that world of dark nothingness. I would've thought for all eternity that Kikyou had betrayed me, and I never would've had a chance to change. But worst of all, I never would have met you. I never would have known you, someone so pure, so faithful, so patient with me and my tainted half-blood that I probably don't deserve to have known you in the first place. I guess all my karma finally caught up with me. Miroku'd been saying it would for years, but I never really listened.

Even I didn't deserve a fate like this one. I am cursed to wander forever, lost without you. Death would've been better—my death. Or, if we had died together. That would've solved everything. At least, for me.

I'm still staring at the grave. The dirt isn't quite as dark as it was the day of the funeral. Everything seems so final, you know. Like you're never coming back. And you aren't, I have to remind myself. You aren't coming back. I'll never see your smile again in this life. I won't feel your fingertips, butterfly-like, flit across my face when you're putting one of those little band-aid things on a stupid scratch that doesn't matter anyway. I'll never see your eyes light up when Shippo brings you his hundred-and-fiftieth daisy chain, or when Sango confides that Miroku's really not SO bad, all the time. I'll never see the tears that set you apart from Kikyou, and I'll never feel that feeling that I'm complete, and somehow, against all odds, everything will be okay.

Everything will not be okay.

Now I understand, Father. Now I understand why you died in the battle to protect everyone. Mother was on your mind the whole time, wasn't she? And the fact that you did your best to keep her safe probably made your passing so much more peaceful. You and she were always so close...you probably didn't have any doubt in the world that you would see her again in heaven, as corny as that sounds. And you were right, you know. I bet you're really happy now, together. That's all you wanted—that, and a son to carry on in your legacy.

I couldn't even give you that much, Father. I'm a disgrace. I couldn't even protect one human woman—the woman that I loved. Yes, loved. I still love you, Kagome. And I realize something. That does matter. I've been telling myself these past few days that nothing I feel really has any value to it. I mean, what difference could it possibly make that I feel horrible about letting this happen? What difference could it make even if I'm finally ready to admit to the fact that I was wrong, and I was at fault—that I'm finally ready to tell you, to scream to the whole damn forest that your death had nothing to do with you, and everything to do with me.

It does matter how I feel because I can change all this. I can end all the pain, all of Shippo's fury, all of the villagers' unease that I'm ill-fated, and maybe I'll cause something to happen to them too, or even attack them again, the way I did fifty years ago.

I unsheathe Tetsusaiga and stare at the battered blade, which is reflecting the setting-sun purpley sky. It won't transform unless I'm protecting a human. Which is okay. I won't be needing it anymore anyway—not in a moment. I hold the sword up—the one my father gave me—and say a prayer to you. Kagome, please don't be angry with what I'm about to do. I know you would normally discourage a choice like this—hey, normally I would too. It's the coward's way out. But let's face it. I'm a coward without you. Yes, a coward—but not too much of a coward to end all this suffering. I raise the sword above my head, close my eyes, and bring it forward with all my strength. So awful was all the pain in my heart these last few days, the sword piercing my flesh hardly hurts at all. I pull it out again, with a small moan, and set it down beside me, along with the blood-splattered sheath. My vision is spinning, but for the first time since that day, everything is warm, and nothing hurts. I'm already at peace, even if my life isn't completely run out yet.

I quickly mutter the sealing words over Tetsusaiga. I want Shippo to keep it, father, if you can arrange that somehow. Make it all right for Shippo—and maybe someday, his child—to wield it. It's the least I can do, since Kagome's not here, and I can't leave it to her.

The Tetsusaiga blinks, so he must have heard me. I reach over, just to check, and the barrier shoots out, shocking my fingers. I am no longer its master.

Thank you, father, for helping me give one last gift to that little kitsune. Let him grow up happier than I did, and please, don't let him mourn over Kagome and me. Let him know we'll be happy together where we're going.

Everything's so warm now. So bright. Everything has been so dark, but now it's nice again. I feel peaceful as I see a beautiful shining figure step forward from the center of the light, and the sound of angel song fills the air, reverberating in my dying ears. Above the song, though, is that wonderful calming voice I've missed so much these past days. I feel myself smile, one last time, as Kagome reaches her shining fingers towards my gray ones.

"Welcome home, Inuyasha."

((---------0---------00------------------------00------------0----------))

It was a dark summer's eve. Humid promises of rain clung to the fragrant air, which smelled of roses and daises. The moon rose steadily over the earth, casting happy rays down upon the shadowy forest ground. A few speckly stars splattered across the navy blanket of nighttime, calling softly to the small lone cottage below.

Not too far from the cottage, sitting high upon a heathery tree branch was a dark figure. In his lap he held an old beaten scabbard, which was never far, and on his finger he idly twirled a pretty little daisy chain that his youngest daughter had woven for him. He'd shown all his children how, from the very beginning, and it became almost a ritual. Daisy crown season lasted from the very first spring budding ones to the very last winter frostbitten ones. The youngest was becoming quite good at it, he noted proudly, touching the soft blossoms with sensitive fingertips.

She had taught him how, all those years ago. It had been years and years and years since her death. Their friends—Miroku and Sango—had grandchildren, and even one great-grandchild, a bouncy baby girl with light black curls and mischievous dark eyes like her mother's. Their grandchild had named the little girl Kagome, after the woman she had heard all the stories about from Grandma Sango and Grandpa Miroku.

He still missed her. He had long sense ceased to cry himself to sleep, but his wife still asked him, quite frequently, lately, what was the matter. A heavy sorrow echoed in his deeper-than-life emerald eyes, which Sango sometimes compared, albeit quietly, to those of a hanyou they had known so long ago. The Anniversary of His death was approaching steadily—Hers had already come and gone.

Every year, on those two days, only a little while apart, he took two daisy chains over and laid them on the graves, which were side-by-side. That was where he, Miroku, and Sango had found their friend, finally free of the pain of loss. They had mourned, but also, in a small way, rejoiced—for they were together and happy, away from the threats of Naraku and Kikyou and the rest of the world. They were together, finally together. They had deserved it all along. He had known—from the very day he had met the two of them, the audacious girl that was Kagome and the arrogant hanyou jerk known only as Inuyasha—that they were in love, however hard they tried to hide it. And they had known too. Just before the end they had discovered their feelings.

In the days between her death and his own, Inuyasha had been so desolate. He refused to eat, refused to sleep, refused to do anything but brood and grow thinner, missing her. He had spent most of the last of his days in the clearing with her grave, lost in his very own world of torture. Pain, red-hot and burning, had blazed in his eyes, along with memories of her, and even though he was furious with everyone, he had found it hard to be angry with Inuyasha then. The hanyou's hurt was so obvious—it was so obvious how much it hurt him to know that he had never told her.

Miroku and Sango pitied Inuyasha and his quiet relinquish of hope. It was so unlike Inuyasha to do something so cowardly—to commit suicide, to run from his problems. But when Kagome had died, everything had changed. His spirit had been broken. He had no will to argue or even take up for himself when shot those angry, blaming glares. Perhaps it was best that he had taken his own life, the person mused, for if he hadn't, the first foe they would've come up against would've. He had no will to lift that sword again, and it probably wouldn't have transformed anyway.

That same sword now lay in his lap, cradled softly in his rumpled forest-green tunic. From a chain around his neck hung the locket she had given to Inuyasha those years ago, which had inside two rather comical pictures Kagome's brother had taken without their knowledge (at the time, anyway.) He also had several other keepsakes, back in his cottage: packed away were the purple rosary beads, several candid shots of them, and a picture book of a story Kagome had read to him many a night. The story was called Beauty and the Beast, and it had always reminded him of Inuyasha and Kagome. Even now, as he flipped through the worn pages and read them to his daughters and his newborn son, the pictures were familiar, like an old friend.

He ran his fingers over Tetsusaiga's cool steel surface. The sword would allow no one else close now but him—not even Miroku and Sango. He suspected that Inuyasha had sealed it specially somehow just before his death. Even now, years later, he wondered why it had been given to him. Especially sense he'd been so terrible to Inuyasha after Kagome'd died.... He'd known it wasn't the hanyou's fault, but he had been angry just the same. That knowledge plagued him now, many years later.

For years afterwards, the macabre scene he had stumbled upon had haunted his dreams, and every now and then he still awoke in a cold sweat, panting. Usually the two images—the two separate images—were overlain: the cold, blank stare of Kagome, peeking out at him from beneath the funeral sheet; and the bloody form of Inuyasha, sprawled on the disturbed earth, with the bloody Tetsusaiga lying beside him, his handprints still upon its hilt and his blood upon its blade. Those images would probably never fade, he thought, staring up at the sky.

'Kagome? Inuyasha? Are you listening now?'

It was silly—he knew it was—but he often prayed to them, rather than to Buddha or to whoever else. If there were such things as angels, then he stubbornly believed that Kagome would be the best to talk to, and to relay his prayers forward.

Now, staring at the stars (the very same he had watched with them all those years ago), he smiled tiredly, and closed his eyes in quiet prayer.

'Today's the day you died, Inuyasha. We miss you. I miss you. I wish you'd gotten a chance to meet my family, and Sango and Miroku's. I wish Kagome would've been here, to hold our children the way she wanted to be, to give Sango advice and to kiss me on the cheek at my wedding, and say how I'd grown. I wish you'd never left, guys, but since you had to, I'm glad you went together, and I'm glad that you're finally happy. And together. We're all happy for you.' He put his hand to his lips and slowly blew a kiss towards the heavens, just as the cottage door opened below.

"Shippo?" The questioning voice called. "Dearest, are you up there?"

"Yes, M'love," he answered. "I'll be down in a moment." He grasped Tetsusaiga and the daisy chain and slid down the tree trunk as easily as he had as a small kit. "Are the children finally sleeping?" he inquired softly as he stood beside her, watching her lovingly.

"Yes," she answered with relief. "At last, they're all asleep at once! Thank Kami." She blinked at him, always the perceptive stare-into-your-soul wife, and asked carefully, "Is anything wrong?" She knew of the anniversary, and its effect on him. Normally he left for a few days around this time of year and came back looking sad and tired. This time he looked a little more cheerful, and something like hope sparkled in his bright green eyes.

"No, no, darling. Nothing's wrong." He slipped an arm around her shoulders and led her back to the house. "Now, what was it you wanted earlier?"

"The baby," his wife said with a smile. "It's time to christen him. He's almost two weeks old now. Have you thought of a name yet?"

"Name him...Inuyasha," Shippo said with a smile at the inquisitive look his wife gave him. Perhaps it was an unusual name for a kitsune kit, but it would be an honorable one, to say the least. It was the most honorable one Shippo could think of. He smiled still wider and laughed, walking back into his home with his wife and children.

A small, rosy-pink Sakura petal floated down from the heavens and landed on the doorstep, catching the cool light of the moon with its pastel surface.

((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((------------ ))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Sakura blossoms shouldn't still be around in summertime. They're spring flowers, one of Kagome's favorites. I blinked and smiled at it as my Kagome stepped forward, shimmering like the moonlight itself, and lifted the petal into her hands. She blew a cool breath over it and it disappeared, only to reappear upon Shippo's pillow, where Tetsusaiga rested. She was so clever and subtle, leaving him a sign like that. I smiled at the old sword, and eagerly slipped my arms back around Kagome as she returned to my side. We glanced together at Shippo and his wife and children. They had named their firstborn son after me! Who would've thought. Our memories were definitely kept alive in our friends. Sango and Miroku even had a great-grandchild named Kagome! The thought had always made me laugh.

"Clever," I murmured to Kagome approvingly as we walked. "You trickster. How mischievous." She giggled and gave me a quick kiss on the cheek.

"C'mon, Inuyasha. We can't linger. They'll get angry." She glanced pointedly upwards, and I knew she meant past the moon and the stars and the summer night sky. I allowed her to take my hand as we began to ascend again.

"Rules, rules," I mocked. "Still the same old goody-two-shoes, aren't you, wench?"

Kagome laughed, and we left the earth together, ready to spend the next year enjoying ourselves in the afterlife. We would be back again later, for her anniversary and then for mine, but not before then. The gods were very strict about our visiting mortals, you know. I sent one final farewell to Shippo and the others, and I'd bet Kagome did as well.

Have a good year, minna. Ja matta.