Disclaimer:: I don't own Inuyasha. Duh.
____________________________
Inuki
Chapter Thirteen :: While You Were Away
The rain had slowed to soft pitter patters outside the hut, and inside, by the warmth of the fire, a little old miko tended to four sopping wet young people. Inuki was cursing the length of his hair as he wrung out the long strands, while Sango and Miroku eyed him discreetly, still surprised by his familiar appearance. Kagome was changing her clothes behind a folding screen.
"Here," Kaede offered, and Inuki blinked, taking the blanket and wrapping it around his shirtless form. "Oh. Thanks, babaa."
"My name is Kaede."
"Oh yeah, I forgot, Higurashi told me. Kaede-babaa." The old woman did not seem fazed by the name, and sat down at the floor-hearth, stirring the soup. The group of them had changed from their muddy wet clothes into the top picks from Kaede's batch of spare hakama and yukata while their clothes were left to dry.
Kagome appeared from behind the screen, wearing the typical red and white, and running her fingers through her dark hair. Inuki grinned at her. "Look at you. Little Miss Miko-sama. They look better on you than they do me."
She smiled slightly and went to sit between Sango and Miroku, both of whom had put in a good attempt not to gawp, but failed miserably. It sounded so strange hearing a compliment coming out of such a familiar face, especially when said familiar face had once had the habit of spouting only insults.
Kagome smiled bittersweetly. "He's something else, isn't it?" Inuki raised one eyebrow at her comment, curling up underneath the blanket as he began to braid his hair. "I'm not something ya gotta admire, Higurashi." She bit her lip, embarrassed. "Sorry."
As Kaede handed Miroku a bowl of soup, she glanced at the temporarily white-haired boy, eyeing him curiously. "What is your name again?" she asked and Inuki, just finishing the loose braid, didn't even look up. "Inuki."
"That is… uhm, a unique name." Miroku pressed and Inuki nodded. "It's means dog-demon.. or dog-ogre. Something like that. Makes me wonder if my mother had a sense of humor…"
"Please do not take this in offense, but… are you youkai?" Miroku asked and Inuki flashed amber-gold eyes on him, as if sizing him up. After a long moment he tossed his braid over his shoulder and nodded.
"Hanyou really. Half youkai and half human."
"An inuhanyou?" Sango blurted, and when Inuki looked at her in surprise she shrugged. "I guessed inuyoukai by your hair… am I wrong?"
Inuki shook his head, pulling the blanket down at his waist. "No. Good guess. You're Sango, right…? Higurashi told me about you guys before we came… figures you'd get it, being a taijiya and all."
She nodded at his words, as though digesting them, and then looked down uncomfortably. The conversation had reached a dead end. It was so hard not to just press him for answers, but then, what could they possibly ask him?
'Do you remember any of us? Do you remember anything about being Inuyasha?' All this when they weren't even sure if he truly was their friend's reincarnation.
Miroku turned to Kagome. "Kagome-sama, when did you meet Inuki?" The miko was drinking her soup; as she set the bowl back down she answered him.
"A month ago. He goes to school with me."
Sango held back a soft giggle and when they all looked at her, she put a hand to her mouth. "I'm sorry," she attempted, "But that's just incredibly ironic. Inuyasha hated the fact that you had to leave all the time to go school. That he would be reborn and endure it is funny."
Kagome smiled. "Yeah I guess it is, I never thought about it…"
Kaede looked at Kagome seriously. "Have you been doing well, child?" Kagome shrugged. "As well as I can, I guess… It was hard for awhile, I had alot of work to catch up on from being out of school so long. And…" she looked down at her half-empty bowl, rubbing her finger over the rim. "I.. kept hoping one day Inuyasha would come to get me."
Miroku and Sango exchanged glances, and abruptly Kagome looked up, ignoring the pools of tears in her eyes. She sniffled, brushing them away quickly. "I came to catch up with you guys. How were things here??"
Sango opened her mouth to speak and then shut it, looking sorrowful. Kagome looked at her friend with concern. "Sango-chan?"
"Kagome-chan, it was hard for us too, while you were gone. We didn't know if you were coming back… and if you were, when; we just didn't know. We had wanted to wait, we really did, but--"
Kagome recognized the reason behind the other young woman's hesitation. As much as she told herself she had wanted them to, she had still feared that her friends had gone on with their lives without her. And it hurt, no matter how happy she was for them.
But she wouldn't show that, not on her life. "You and Miroku-sama got married?"
Sango blushed, turning her face down. Miroku grinned widely at her embarrassment, giving his bride's hand a squeeze. "A month after you left."
Kagome looked at the houshi in surprise, then laughed and threw her arms around Sango's shoulders, then Miroku's. She smiled as she pulled away, holding both friends' hands. "I'm so glad!!! And I'm so sorry I missed it!"
"Well that's not all," Sango persisted, looking a little sheepish, and Kagome turned to her. "There's something else?"
Sango's sheepish grin widened. "I'm going to have a baby."
Kagome gawped. She looked at Miroku, who was looking away with a badly suppressed grin, and Kaede nodded. "As the village doctor I have examined Sango-dono. She's three months pregnant."
"A honeymoon baby, huh?" the young miko commented with a wicked smile, before giving another high-pitched squeal and latching onto her friend. Abruptly she pulled away, wincing. "Ah, gomen!" Gently she patted Sango's flat stomach. "Did I hug too hard??"
"Kagome-chan~~" Sango turned beet red at the miko's actions, while her husband simply laughed.
Miroku wiped tears of laughter from one eye, smiling. "Kagome-sama, you seem better. I am glad that sending you home did you some good. Inuyasha would not have been pleased had you not regained your cheerfulness."
Kagome stopped, turning to him in surprise. Regained her cheerfulness?? She sank back on her knees slowly, suddenly pensive by Miroku's remark. Had she? The five months after Inuyasha's death had been devastating.
They all had lost a guardian, a comrade, a cherished friend; and Kagome had lost her best friend and the love of her life. She had refused to go on without him, as though one day someone had simply denied her oxygen.
After the hanyou's burial, Kagome did not eat, nor sleep, nor speak. She stayed outside by Inuyasha's grave for days on end, refusing to leave his side for even a moment. She had eventually become sick, which Kaede diagnosed as exhaustion, if not plain heartsickness.
It had taken an entire month for Kagome to regain strength enough, both physically and spiritually, to return home. But even at home things did not change. She walked through life blind, detached from everything and everyone, with no drive or passion at all.
And suddenly Inuki appeared in her life. He crept into her school, worked himself into her home. Over the course of a week she had realized his presence made the hurt fade, and that if he left her side, she would miss him.
She had smiled more in the past month with him than she had in the previous five months alone. She smiled softly, glancing over at the boy in question. He had pulled back the bamboo-roll door, watching the rain with eyes that sliced through the dark and the muck like a hot knife through butter.
Kagome nodded. "I guess I did…"
~*~
He felt like a fifth wheel as Kagome chattered with her friends about Sango's pregnancy, or the other miscellaneous events taking place in the village. This is what they had come for, this is why he had suggested it. She needed this, to be at her friends' sides and catch up. To refamiliarize herself with the life she had left behind so that if she needed to cry about him again, it wouldn't be so awkward.
But he felt like he shouldn't have come. It wasn't right that he be here and see the proud look on Miroku's face when Sango talked about their baby, or hear the embarrassed giggles Sango had when she discussed their marriage and the little quirks Miroku had now that he wasn't the world's most lecherous bachelor anymore.
Inuyasha was supposed to see it, not him. He wasn't Inuyasha, and he wasn't a part of their little group. He was experiencing that out of place feeling again, the feeling that he was a foreigner and didn't belong.
But he kept his mouth shut and examined the hut in which they sat instead. The old but sturdy wood, obviously standing the test of time. It smelled of the earthen floor, the herbs Kaede dealt with daily. He could smell the fresh pine firewood stacked by the hearth, its spicy aroma flooding his augmented senses.
The crackling embers popped and sputtered, a soft symphony against the sound of the rain outside, pattering a soft rhythm against the earth. From his corner it was easy to reach out and hold the bamboo-roll door open and watch the rain. He didn't have anything else to do, that was all for Miroku and Sango and Kaede and….
"Hey where's the fox-kid? Shippou?" he demanded, abruptly realizing the short fluffball from the picture wasn't present.
"Oh," began Sango, "Shippou left awhile back. He said he was going back home to bury his father's fur and then he would return."
"By himself?!" Kagome looked up, rightly horrified. Kaede nodded. "Houshi-dono and Sango-dono asked if he would prefer that they follow and he politely denied."
"He told us he wanted to handle it on it own," Miroku reiterated, then glanced at her. "He's grown up quite a bit since you saw him last. Once he said no, Sango and I really had no more to say."
Kagome blinked at the houshi in surprise. "Shippou-chan did?" At the subsequent affirmation, she sighed. *He grew up... and I didn't even notice.* Her smile was bittersweet as she smoothed out the wrinkles in her hakama. "Shippou-chan would've loved to meet Yashagawa-kun…"
"You say that as if you're not coming back again." Sango accused, then worriedly she leaned forward to look her friend in the eye. "After you leave, you're still coming back, aren't you?"
"Yeah, she is." The group looked up at Inuki. He looked at them pointedly and Miroku and Sango felt chills run through them at the well-known intensity of his yellow eyes. "She's coming back until I say it's okay."
Kagome turned an annoyed pout his way. "Hey you, you're not the boss of me," Kagome chastised, "And you're not my psychiatrist!"
"It's not like you've been in the best of moods while NOT coming," he said sharply, "If I see you mope out of your bedroom one more day on the way to school--"
"I do not MOPE! Where in the world did you get that?!"
"Inuki, you intend to return with her as well though, correct?" Miroku asked, cutting the would-be argument short, and Inuki looked stupefied for a moment. "Me?"
"You mean you weren't going to?" Sango sounded disappointed. Inuki looked away. "Why do you guys want me to come back, you hardly know me…"
"We were like to get to know you," Miroku said, "You may look like Inuyasha but you're not him. Just as Kagome-sama resembled Kikyou-sama, they are not the same. I doubt you and Inuyasha are alike when it comes down to it."
Inuki just stared at them. Miroku looked inquisitive as he waited for the boy's reply, and Sango smiled. "It would be nice to have you back."
Inuki nodded. "O-okay. I'll come back."
Miroku grinned. "Wonderful. Well then, it is getting rather late. We should all go to bed." Kagome raised an eyebrow and Miroku smiled, raising his hands. "No, no. I'm a married man now Kagome-sama, and I'm no longer a delinquent or a lecher-- ow ow~"
Sango gave a slight tug on his ear, nodded sarcastically. "Yeah right. Kagome-chan, I'll see you tomorrow morning."
"Where are you going??" Kagome wondered numbly and Sango gestured south of Kaede's hut. "Our house is on the southern end of the village," Her smile grew very proud as she said, "Miroku-sama built it for me after we got married."
Miroku looked down, closing his eyes, and Kagome could sense the embarrassment in his voice. "Sango, I did not 'build' it, I commissioned several of the men in the village to build it for me and the only work I actually did was trying to get them to take only half price for their efforts… I don't know how to build a house and I'll ask you again to stop telling everyone that!"
"But you did build it, Miroku-sama," she said, "I saw you doing heavy lifting and hammering and stuff like that~" The houshi cleared his throat and took their clothes off the rack where they were drying. "We will see you tomorrow, Kagome-sama, Inuki."
Sango smiled amusedly at Kagome. "See you tomorrow." Kagome nodded with a pleased laugh, waving goodbye as she curled up on a pallet next to Kaede-baachan.
While she straightened the blanket around her, Kagome looked up at Inuki. He had settled against the corner, arms folded over his bare chest. The thin blanket was draped over his shoulders. "Yashagawa-kun?"
Two glittery gold eyes opened and trained on her. "What?"
She smiled at him. "Thank you for coming with me."
Inuki turned away, glancing out towards the door. "Keh. It's not like I did anything. Go to sleep, we'll probably end up missing school because of this, but we still don't need to be sleeping in until noon."
Kagome nodded and lay down, folding one arm underneath her head as a pillow, fidgeting and squirming until she was comfortable.
Keh. It's not like I did anything.
*You're wrong. Because of you, I was able to make it this far. If you hadn't been by my side, I would turned away at the wellhouse door… I would never have been able to smile again.*
"Thank you…"
~*~ To be continued ~*~
a/n :: It's getting harder to get chapters out. My inspiration is getting to where it takes a good swift kick in the rear to get it to come. But I'm still alive, and still working hard to bring more Inuki to you at the same quality you expect from me. Please stick with me, reality's throwing me through the wringer and I appreciate you guys' support TONS v^^-
Anyway, notes on the chapter, lol-- Yes, I KNOW Shippou's father's body disappeared when he used kitsune-bi to protect Kagome and Shippou from Hiten's attack in volume 4. I needed a reason for Shippou to be gone (he's coming back, don't worry) so if you don't like it, tough. ;p
Please review!
~*~ V^-^V ~*~
~Tessen
____________________________
Inuki
Chapter Thirteen :: While You Were Away
The rain had slowed to soft pitter patters outside the hut, and inside, by the warmth of the fire, a little old miko tended to four sopping wet young people. Inuki was cursing the length of his hair as he wrung out the long strands, while Sango and Miroku eyed him discreetly, still surprised by his familiar appearance. Kagome was changing her clothes behind a folding screen.
"Here," Kaede offered, and Inuki blinked, taking the blanket and wrapping it around his shirtless form. "Oh. Thanks, babaa."
"My name is Kaede."
"Oh yeah, I forgot, Higurashi told me. Kaede-babaa." The old woman did not seem fazed by the name, and sat down at the floor-hearth, stirring the soup. The group of them had changed from their muddy wet clothes into the top picks from Kaede's batch of spare hakama and yukata while their clothes were left to dry.
Kagome appeared from behind the screen, wearing the typical red and white, and running her fingers through her dark hair. Inuki grinned at her. "Look at you. Little Miss Miko-sama. They look better on you than they do me."
She smiled slightly and went to sit between Sango and Miroku, both of whom had put in a good attempt not to gawp, but failed miserably. It sounded so strange hearing a compliment coming out of such a familiar face, especially when said familiar face had once had the habit of spouting only insults.
Kagome smiled bittersweetly. "He's something else, isn't it?" Inuki raised one eyebrow at her comment, curling up underneath the blanket as he began to braid his hair. "I'm not something ya gotta admire, Higurashi." She bit her lip, embarrassed. "Sorry."
As Kaede handed Miroku a bowl of soup, she glanced at the temporarily white-haired boy, eyeing him curiously. "What is your name again?" she asked and Inuki, just finishing the loose braid, didn't even look up. "Inuki."
"That is… uhm, a unique name." Miroku pressed and Inuki nodded. "It's means dog-demon.. or dog-ogre. Something like that. Makes me wonder if my mother had a sense of humor…"
"Please do not take this in offense, but… are you youkai?" Miroku asked and Inuki flashed amber-gold eyes on him, as if sizing him up. After a long moment he tossed his braid over his shoulder and nodded.
"Hanyou really. Half youkai and half human."
"An inuhanyou?" Sango blurted, and when Inuki looked at her in surprise she shrugged. "I guessed inuyoukai by your hair… am I wrong?"
Inuki shook his head, pulling the blanket down at his waist. "No. Good guess. You're Sango, right…? Higurashi told me about you guys before we came… figures you'd get it, being a taijiya and all."
She nodded at his words, as though digesting them, and then looked down uncomfortably. The conversation had reached a dead end. It was so hard not to just press him for answers, but then, what could they possibly ask him?
'Do you remember any of us? Do you remember anything about being Inuyasha?' All this when they weren't even sure if he truly was their friend's reincarnation.
Miroku turned to Kagome. "Kagome-sama, when did you meet Inuki?" The miko was drinking her soup; as she set the bowl back down she answered him.
"A month ago. He goes to school with me."
Sango held back a soft giggle and when they all looked at her, she put a hand to her mouth. "I'm sorry," she attempted, "But that's just incredibly ironic. Inuyasha hated the fact that you had to leave all the time to go school. That he would be reborn and endure it is funny."
Kagome smiled. "Yeah I guess it is, I never thought about it…"
Kaede looked at Kagome seriously. "Have you been doing well, child?" Kagome shrugged. "As well as I can, I guess… It was hard for awhile, I had alot of work to catch up on from being out of school so long. And…" she looked down at her half-empty bowl, rubbing her finger over the rim. "I.. kept hoping one day Inuyasha would come to get me."
Miroku and Sango exchanged glances, and abruptly Kagome looked up, ignoring the pools of tears in her eyes. She sniffled, brushing them away quickly. "I came to catch up with you guys. How were things here??"
Sango opened her mouth to speak and then shut it, looking sorrowful. Kagome looked at her friend with concern. "Sango-chan?"
"Kagome-chan, it was hard for us too, while you were gone. We didn't know if you were coming back… and if you were, when; we just didn't know. We had wanted to wait, we really did, but--"
Kagome recognized the reason behind the other young woman's hesitation. As much as she told herself she had wanted them to, she had still feared that her friends had gone on with their lives without her. And it hurt, no matter how happy she was for them.
But she wouldn't show that, not on her life. "You and Miroku-sama got married?"
Sango blushed, turning her face down. Miroku grinned widely at her embarrassment, giving his bride's hand a squeeze. "A month after you left."
Kagome looked at the houshi in surprise, then laughed and threw her arms around Sango's shoulders, then Miroku's. She smiled as she pulled away, holding both friends' hands. "I'm so glad!!! And I'm so sorry I missed it!"
"Well that's not all," Sango persisted, looking a little sheepish, and Kagome turned to her. "There's something else?"
Sango's sheepish grin widened. "I'm going to have a baby."
Kagome gawped. She looked at Miroku, who was looking away with a badly suppressed grin, and Kaede nodded. "As the village doctor I have examined Sango-dono. She's three months pregnant."
"A honeymoon baby, huh?" the young miko commented with a wicked smile, before giving another high-pitched squeal and latching onto her friend. Abruptly she pulled away, wincing. "Ah, gomen!" Gently she patted Sango's flat stomach. "Did I hug too hard??"
"Kagome-chan~~" Sango turned beet red at the miko's actions, while her husband simply laughed.
Miroku wiped tears of laughter from one eye, smiling. "Kagome-sama, you seem better. I am glad that sending you home did you some good. Inuyasha would not have been pleased had you not regained your cheerfulness."
Kagome stopped, turning to him in surprise. Regained her cheerfulness?? She sank back on her knees slowly, suddenly pensive by Miroku's remark. Had she? The five months after Inuyasha's death had been devastating.
They all had lost a guardian, a comrade, a cherished friend; and Kagome had lost her best friend and the love of her life. She had refused to go on without him, as though one day someone had simply denied her oxygen.
After the hanyou's burial, Kagome did not eat, nor sleep, nor speak. She stayed outside by Inuyasha's grave for days on end, refusing to leave his side for even a moment. She had eventually become sick, which Kaede diagnosed as exhaustion, if not plain heartsickness.
It had taken an entire month for Kagome to regain strength enough, both physically and spiritually, to return home. But even at home things did not change. She walked through life blind, detached from everything and everyone, with no drive or passion at all.
And suddenly Inuki appeared in her life. He crept into her school, worked himself into her home. Over the course of a week she had realized his presence made the hurt fade, and that if he left her side, she would miss him.
She had smiled more in the past month with him than she had in the previous five months alone. She smiled softly, glancing over at the boy in question. He had pulled back the bamboo-roll door, watching the rain with eyes that sliced through the dark and the muck like a hot knife through butter.
Kagome nodded. "I guess I did…"
~*~
He felt like a fifth wheel as Kagome chattered with her friends about Sango's pregnancy, or the other miscellaneous events taking place in the village. This is what they had come for, this is why he had suggested it. She needed this, to be at her friends' sides and catch up. To refamiliarize herself with the life she had left behind so that if she needed to cry about him again, it wouldn't be so awkward.
But he felt like he shouldn't have come. It wasn't right that he be here and see the proud look on Miroku's face when Sango talked about their baby, or hear the embarrassed giggles Sango had when she discussed their marriage and the little quirks Miroku had now that he wasn't the world's most lecherous bachelor anymore.
Inuyasha was supposed to see it, not him. He wasn't Inuyasha, and he wasn't a part of their little group. He was experiencing that out of place feeling again, the feeling that he was a foreigner and didn't belong.
But he kept his mouth shut and examined the hut in which they sat instead. The old but sturdy wood, obviously standing the test of time. It smelled of the earthen floor, the herbs Kaede dealt with daily. He could smell the fresh pine firewood stacked by the hearth, its spicy aroma flooding his augmented senses.
The crackling embers popped and sputtered, a soft symphony against the sound of the rain outside, pattering a soft rhythm against the earth. From his corner it was easy to reach out and hold the bamboo-roll door open and watch the rain. He didn't have anything else to do, that was all for Miroku and Sango and Kaede and….
"Hey where's the fox-kid? Shippou?" he demanded, abruptly realizing the short fluffball from the picture wasn't present.
"Oh," began Sango, "Shippou left awhile back. He said he was going back home to bury his father's fur and then he would return."
"By himself?!" Kagome looked up, rightly horrified. Kaede nodded. "Houshi-dono and Sango-dono asked if he would prefer that they follow and he politely denied."
"He told us he wanted to handle it on it own," Miroku reiterated, then glanced at her. "He's grown up quite a bit since you saw him last. Once he said no, Sango and I really had no more to say."
Kagome blinked at the houshi in surprise. "Shippou-chan did?" At the subsequent affirmation, she sighed. *He grew up... and I didn't even notice.* Her smile was bittersweet as she smoothed out the wrinkles in her hakama. "Shippou-chan would've loved to meet Yashagawa-kun…"
"You say that as if you're not coming back again." Sango accused, then worriedly she leaned forward to look her friend in the eye. "After you leave, you're still coming back, aren't you?"
"Yeah, she is." The group looked up at Inuki. He looked at them pointedly and Miroku and Sango felt chills run through them at the well-known intensity of his yellow eyes. "She's coming back until I say it's okay."
Kagome turned an annoyed pout his way. "Hey you, you're not the boss of me," Kagome chastised, "And you're not my psychiatrist!"
"It's not like you've been in the best of moods while NOT coming," he said sharply, "If I see you mope out of your bedroom one more day on the way to school--"
"I do not MOPE! Where in the world did you get that?!"
"Inuki, you intend to return with her as well though, correct?" Miroku asked, cutting the would-be argument short, and Inuki looked stupefied for a moment. "Me?"
"You mean you weren't going to?" Sango sounded disappointed. Inuki looked away. "Why do you guys want me to come back, you hardly know me…"
"We were like to get to know you," Miroku said, "You may look like Inuyasha but you're not him. Just as Kagome-sama resembled Kikyou-sama, they are not the same. I doubt you and Inuyasha are alike when it comes down to it."
Inuki just stared at them. Miroku looked inquisitive as he waited for the boy's reply, and Sango smiled. "It would be nice to have you back."
Inuki nodded. "O-okay. I'll come back."
Miroku grinned. "Wonderful. Well then, it is getting rather late. We should all go to bed." Kagome raised an eyebrow and Miroku smiled, raising his hands. "No, no. I'm a married man now Kagome-sama, and I'm no longer a delinquent or a lecher-- ow ow~"
Sango gave a slight tug on his ear, nodded sarcastically. "Yeah right. Kagome-chan, I'll see you tomorrow morning."
"Where are you going??" Kagome wondered numbly and Sango gestured south of Kaede's hut. "Our house is on the southern end of the village," Her smile grew very proud as she said, "Miroku-sama built it for me after we got married."
Miroku looked down, closing his eyes, and Kagome could sense the embarrassment in his voice. "Sango, I did not 'build' it, I commissioned several of the men in the village to build it for me and the only work I actually did was trying to get them to take only half price for their efforts… I don't know how to build a house and I'll ask you again to stop telling everyone that!"
"But you did build it, Miroku-sama," she said, "I saw you doing heavy lifting and hammering and stuff like that~" The houshi cleared his throat and took their clothes off the rack where they were drying. "We will see you tomorrow, Kagome-sama, Inuki."
Sango smiled amusedly at Kagome. "See you tomorrow." Kagome nodded with a pleased laugh, waving goodbye as she curled up on a pallet next to Kaede-baachan.
While she straightened the blanket around her, Kagome looked up at Inuki. He had settled against the corner, arms folded over his bare chest. The thin blanket was draped over his shoulders. "Yashagawa-kun?"
Two glittery gold eyes opened and trained on her. "What?"
She smiled at him. "Thank you for coming with me."
Inuki turned away, glancing out towards the door. "Keh. It's not like I did anything. Go to sleep, we'll probably end up missing school because of this, but we still don't need to be sleeping in until noon."
Kagome nodded and lay down, folding one arm underneath her head as a pillow, fidgeting and squirming until she was comfortable.
Keh. It's not like I did anything.
*You're wrong. Because of you, I was able to make it this far. If you hadn't been by my side, I would turned away at the wellhouse door… I would never have been able to smile again.*
"Thank you…"
~*~ To be continued ~*~
a/n :: It's getting harder to get chapters out. My inspiration is getting to where it takes a good swift kick in the rear to get it to come. But I'm still alive, and still working hard to bring more Inuki to you at the same quality you expect from me. Please stick with me, reality's throwing me through the wringer and I appreciate you guys' support TONS v^^-
Anyway, notes on the chapter, lol-- Yes, I KNOW Shippou's father's body disappeared when he used kitsune-bi to protect Kagome and Shippou from Hiten's attack in volume 4. I needed a reason for Shippou to be gone (he's coming back, don't worry) so if you don't like it, tough. ;p
Please review!
~*~ V^-^V ~*~
~Tessen