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Mae to Ima
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Disclaimer: I don't own Inu-Yasha. Watashi no InuYasha dewa arimasen.
AN: Wasabi fanfic pplz? I am sad to say that with the shift of ratings, I have lost many a reviewer... but thank you, deeply, to those who have kept track of my story and have given me feedback.
To the (one time) reviewer who goes by "no screen name": I'm very sorry that I left you hanging for so long but as I said with the start of school, my updates will be quite slow. My daily schedule is always packed... I hadn't even checked my e-mail for weeks. I am, however, very flattered that even though you are indeed an avid fanfiction reader who has never reviewed before that you have taken the time to pull up that little box in order to request more of my humble, little creation.
Right now, I'm dealing with frustrating school personnel who refuse to believe that I've advanced a year's worth of required English Literature classes in two months. My physic's class won't go through (they also refuse to believe I have all the required science credits I need and that I want to take an extra) and I have music juries that I really have to start practicing/memorizing for. I even gave up on trying to take the music electives I requested last term (who needs more piano?) I also have no time for taking my Japanese classes at Japan society this year (this hurts.) I guess I'll just take Japanese at LaG (they want us to call it "La!" now, keh) next year... though they'll probably just teach me stuff I already know... so maybe not.
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Chapter Four
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Looking out the window in her office, Kagome sighed.
It was already dark outside and she still had not completed her outline of important parts of the documents on her desk. There were just so many papers to read!
Placing her reading glasses on her desk, she rubbed her eyes and yawned loudly pulling her feet off her desk and tipping her chair back slightly as she stretched.
The room in which she worked was dark except for the work lamp she was using as a source of light to read with.
The door to the office was pushed open abruptly and Kagome fell back, chair and all.
"Uh... Kagome?" said the dark haired man at the door.
"Miroku! Uh, hi... didn't you leave, like, hours ago?" she asked as she righted herself and attempted to smooth her tossed hair.
"Yeah but I forgot to give you this..." he held out a letter.
"For me? I thought you were married!" she raised a brow with a giggle.
"I am. It's from Sango. She said she found it recently while she was cleaning out the attic and thought you might be interested in reading it," he laughed and tried to ignore the fact that her skirt was very high on her thighs.
"Hmm, thank you. Tell Sango I'll be coming to visit very soon," she smiled.
"I'll be sure to relay the message to her. See ya," he smiled and closed the cherry-wood door.
Still smiling, the raven-haired girl looked over the envelope in her hand. Yellowed with age, it was still sealed. Flipping it over, the young woman found her name written delicately.
Astonished that Sango had found a seemingly old letter that belonged to her and was still unread, Kagome reached for a letter opener that was at the right hand corner of her mahogany desktop.
She slid her hand over the large surface, her eyes still looking on wonderingly at the paper she held, and knocked the knife like tool off her desk. With a mumbled curse, the girl stood up, abandoning the letter, and walked over to where the object lay fallen, glaring. Bending over to pick it up, her skirt hiked up yet again right as the door opened for the second time that evening.
An eerie moment of silence passed.
"You won't get a raise for this, Kagome," a silky and serious voice commented.
With a shriek, Kagome stood up, her hands frantically pulling the hem of her skirt back into place.
"Sesshomaru!" she shouted.
"The one and only," he said dully.
It was always like that. Sometimes he would have his moments where he was slightly pleasant, but then he always returned to the way he was over five centuries ago when she knew him in the Warring States Era as The Great Taiyoukai, Lord Sesshomaru-sama...except less homicidal. Not even time itself could change this man.
"Don't you knock or something?" she asked still pink in the cheeks.
"I own this building. Remember?" he replied, raising an eyebrow; a habit she was starting to pick up from him.
"So!" she said, refusing to give in.
'Fool,' the taiyoukai thought.
Ignoring the fuming girl in front of him, the tall male looked at her desk; walking around her, he approached the table like structure.
He picked up a packet of paper, looking at the notes she had written and what she hi-lighted. He spotted another pile of papers at the foot of her desk and took a different set of sheets that had no markings on it other than the neat type.
"You are not finished."
"State the obvious, why don't you?" she huffed and walked towards him.
"Someone's a bit grumpy," he stated still reading the notes on the other documents.
"That's because you were looking up my skirt!" she yelled.
"Correction, you flashed me. Just be happy no one else is present on this floor, this would have proved quite a situation to explain," he smiled slightly, with a lazy feel.
"I'm sorry," Kagome lowered her gaze.
"It's okay. You are stressed and tired. I understand, after all, you do have to deal with my little brother on a daily basis," he nodded in uncharacteristic sympathy.
Blinking at him, the young woman frowned, "do I look that bad?"
"I don't mean to insult your current appearance but your hair could certainly use a brushing and well... you look like you're about to fall asleep as I speak. Your workday officially ended about six hours ago... I believe what I'm trying to say is 'go home'," he said.
"Oh. Okay. Um, Sesshomaru, do you know the number to a car service?"
"Come on, I'll drive you," the amber-eyed man spoke with a slightly annoyed huff.
Without another word, the two were on their way to the elevator.
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It was around 12:37am and Kagome was still not home.
So, naturally, he had determined that the car pulling in front of the house was that of Kagome's friend who offered to drive her home. For a moment InuYasha pondered over the information he received on her friend, over the phone, from Kagome. 'Keiko, hm. Wonder if she's cute,' he thoughtas he pulled a curtain backto see what this girl who was with Kagome looked like.
He saw, what he was certain was, the back of Kagome's head and then her face as she laughed and opened the red BMW's door. When she stood up, he observed her companion. A man. A very familiar man with hair and eyes similar to his own. This... person was very handsome, he had to admit, and very demon from the youki he sensed.
InuYasha killed the growl rising in his throat as Kagome leaned back in the car to hug this man before shutting her door and blowing him a kiss. The guy's face remained the same except for a lifted brow that made the girl in front of him giggle slightly, like a foolish schoolgirl.
Finally, as Kagome walked towards the house and her friend drove off, InuYasha made his way to the door.
He opened it just as the blinking girl in front of him had put her key in the lock.
"Inu...Yasha?" she looked slightly confused.
"Have fun?" he asked looking down at her with eyes as cold as dry ice.
"Huh? What are you--"
"Keiko looks a lot more... masculine than I thought she would," he said still watching her with those breathlessly hard and dangerous eyes.
"InuYasha, I--"
"How long have you been seeing him?" he questioned with a sneer, pulling her in the house by her rather small wrist.
"He's just a--"
"...friend with privileges?" he asked in a near growl, her wrist still in his grasp.
"No! You don't understand. He and I were just--"
"Is he the reason you were out so late?" he asked as she struggled to pull her herself out of his bruising grip.
"Yes, but not because of what you're thinking," she glared at him.
"What am I thinking? That you slept with him like the little bitch you are-?" as soon as he made the statement Kagome's other hand reached out and slapped him full across the face.
"How dare you!" she shouted, her voice quivering with anger.
InuYasha's lips were in a thoughtful frown as he dragged the upset raven-haired girl to her room and threw her on the bed. The girl's eyes widened in realization as the man with fierce golden eyes moved on top of her and pushed her wrists onto the mattress.
"You'll sleep with anyone else but me?" he stated more than asked, annoyed with the female beneath him. He leaned down to kiss her but she had pushed her face to the side in order to evade his actions.
"Leave me alone!" she screamed, kicking as best she could. A tear slid down her cheek and InuYasha took in her appearance for the first time since they entered her room.
Her face was flushed and her hair was had fallen out of the loose bun it was in. She was an utter mess but the thing that struck the silver-haired hanyou the most were found in her eyes. Within them, he established such fear. Somewhere in his past, he'd seen that emotion in the eyes of others... many a time, in fact, and always directed at him.
Observing the drop of salty water coming from her expressive eyes, InuYasha abruptly started laughing. Standing up, he let go of the girl he wanted to smack at the moment through torn emotions.
"This is just freaking rich!" he said quietly. Still laughing, he left her room and sat heavily on a sofa in the living room.
For a moment, InuYasha breathed in the air surrounding him and found her scent still unmarred. He'd wrongly accused her.
Kagome, still a rumpled mess, sobbed softly.
She cried for the sweet, annoying and stubborn InuYasha she used to know. She cried for all the moments she spent with him, all the times he smiled, blushed and sulked.
He was lost to her now. This new man was not InuYasha. He just couldn't be.
From the other room, she heard his voice once again.
"Would you stop crying already, it's pathetic, really," he said dully, rather like the way his older brother used to be. His voice betrayed the thoughts going on in his head and the frustration he felt. Why did he always react so strongly towards her?
Kagome was thrown back into convincing herself that he was not the hanyou she had known for so long. Even the small act of not expressing his anger aloud was another reminder that this InuYasha was not the same one she'd known for so long.
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He was becoming very irritated with everything in this world.
On top of Kagome's attempt at quiet sobs and sniffling for the past hour, InuYasha had been hearing fresh clips from his past in his head along with what a voice, which he presumed was his conscience. He was gaining an intense headache and even seeing flashes of light.
'But of course, if you are in love with her...' a man's voice, a wise friend: so familiar. He was positive he'd heard the voice in another memory.
'Why did you betray me?' a woman he loved, he was sure.
'Filthy half-breed' his family, his only sibling, his brother.
'You are weak,' said his conscience over all the things flashing through his mind. In addition, his head pounded and his anger rose.
'You'll never be good enough for her, dog-turd,' a rival in love.
'Let me go; he must be stopped!' a woman, a close friend: someone he relied on.
'Why do you always make her mad!' a child, a boy, a friend.
'Letting a woman defeat you!' the voice spoke again and for some reason his heart weakened as though remembering something of it's own accord.
'InuYasha-sama,' an old spirit of wisdom, a friend of his father's.
'InuYasha' the strong voice of a man: his father; the only time he'd ever heard him speak.
'Inu-chan' a melodic voice: his mother.
'You cannot defeat me,' an enemy, the reason for... something.
'That makes two losses to the same soul!' the voice again. Again his anger rose to yet another level of rage.
"Just SHUT UP!" InuYasha roared at himself.
Kagome immediately stiffened, not sure if he was aiming his aggression at her. She closed her eyes and tried to will herself asleep despite her distress. She was tired and the wash of emotions was only making her sleepier. The last thing she saw was the door that InuYasha had left open in his quick and slightly disturbing departure from her room. In her opinion, he was acting rather psychotic.
'I'm going home! I-I just have to get away from here for a little while,' he thought as he put his coat on without putting on a t-shirt.
With a glance into Ayumi's room, where the girl was sleeping, and then a longer observation of Kagome in her pretend sleep, he made his way to the door.
'I'll come back tomorrow... this place always gives me intense memories,' he continued to think.
What he didn't realize was that it wasn't the house that gave him frequent flashbacks, it was Kagome. The presence of her soul was causing his own to react and it was trying to make him remember things that his conscience wanted him to forget.
Back in her room, Kagome "woke" at the sound of the front door closing. Sitting up she discovered her door closed and blankets draped over her.
Eyes still cloudy with emotion, she whispered one thing as she pulled her knees up to her chest.
"InuYasha..."
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AN: I'm really sorry this chapter is so short. It was so uncomfortable to write for some reason.
I really hope you all know what I'm gonna ask right now...
So, PLEASE review? For me? Please? For InuYasha?
InuYasha: Oh no no no! Uh-uh. Don't bring me into this!
Zavtra: Shut up and grovel!
Inu: Why should I? They all think I'm a perv!
Zav: That's cuz you are! We all know what you're thinkin' about when you carry Kagome on your back; don't lie! It's always the... not-so-quiet ones.
Inu: K-keh... -shifts nervously-