A/N: Sorry for the long delay... But on the plus side, I have been editing my earlier chapters (gah! The typos!). 1-4 are done. So yay for that! Don't worry, nothing drastic was changed, mostly just some smoothing over. Anyhow, here is a new chapter, just to show that I am still around; I think it is even a little longer than usual. My, I'm feeling so productive today.

Disclaimer: Still don't own anything.

11. First Night Jitters

As they drove through the dark streets, utter silence fell over the car. Inuyasha was yawning in the back seat. Luckily for his stomach, Kaede was a much smoother driver than Kagome. As he began to drift off, Kagome turned to the old woman beside her.

"So, umm, hi," she said, feeling somewhat lame. She hated this part of meeting someone new—especially someone to whom you were indebted.

Kaede glanced at her with amusement.

"Umm, thank you...for letting us stay with you."

"You're welcome, child. It is no problem."

Kagome smiled. The older woman seemed quite approachable. "How do you know Miroku?" She asked, unable to contain her curiosity any longer.

In the dark car, Kaede's face was inscrutable. Without taking her eyes off the road, she replied, "When he was young he needed a place to live. I took him in."

"'Oh," said Kagome, unable to think of any other answer. Her cheeks burned a little. She felt as if she had just inadvertently stumbled onto forbidden territory. Maybe Miroku would tell her later, she thought.

Kaede's face softened a little as she looked at the still very young girl who was hanging her head next to her. She smiled at Kagome, "He was quite a handful in those days," she said.

Looking up, Kagome saw the smile briefly illuminated as they passed under a streetlight. Relieved, she felt her own features stretch in an answering smile. "I can imagine," she said.

The rest of the ride passed in silence. It was not very far to their destination. Kagome gasped as the car pulled up in front of a rather large house, although one side of her mind was preoccupied with noticing how deftly Kaede parallel parked the car.

"It's, it's so big," she said softly.

Kaede, unbuckling her seatbelt with a no-nonsense 'snap,' said "It's been in the family for years. I suppose you could say the city grew up around us."

Kagome nodded and slowly opened her door. In the backseat, Inuyasha finally stirred. "What's going on?" he mumbled, "Why are we stopping?"

"Get up, Inuyasha," Kagome ordered, "We're here."

"Don't order me around, wench," Inuyasha grumbled. Nonetheless he unhooked his seatbelt and opened his door. Stepping out of the car, he noticed the house for the first time. "Holy shit," he said, "Not too bad is it?"

Kaede swept ahead of them and into the big building they were standing in front of. "Come on, you two. I'm sure you must both be tired. It is time for me to show you to your room."

"Room?" Kagome repeated, "As in, just the one?" She resolutely shut out the small corner of her mind that insisted it certainly did not mind sharing a room with the dog-boy.

"Wait a minute," Inuyasha growled, ignoring the butterflies that leapt into his stomach at the idea of sharing a room with Kagome.

"Sorry," replied Kaede, "I'm afraid that is the only room I have available.

"But this house is BIG," said Inuyasha loudly. Kagome's elbow swept into his ribs (she'd picked up an act or two from Sango).

"Don't be rude," she hissed at his chin. She was aiming for his ear, but both of them were way out of her reach. "Kaede's doing us a last-minute favor, so we should be accommodating."

Kaede smiled innocently at the two of them as she stood in the doorway, holding open the door. "Come along now," she said, "I'm not going to stand here all day."

"Of course," said Kagome, "Thank you again for letting us stay with you." She turned towards the dog-boy behind her. "Inuyasha, come on, we're keeping Kaede up."

With a grumble the boy fell into step behind her. Together they followed Kaede up the stairs and into the darkened house. Their room was on the third floor.

"Here you are," Kaede said, sweeping open a door. "This is the only room on this floor, so it's fairly large. There should be plenty of room for the two of you."

"It's perfect," said Kagome, her eyes sweeping around a large rectangular room. On one side, the ceiling came down towards the floor. There was a sofa placed in the area there. Across from the sofa was a dresser; next to the dresser was a pretty large bed and an end table. A half-filled bookcase was the only other piece of furniture in the room.

"The bathroom opens off the room over there, next to the closet," Kaede pointed at two doors down the other end of the room that Kagome had missed from her earlier cursory glance. "Alright, well, goodnight you two. Sleep well."

"You too," Kagome replied automatically, her mind already going to the problem that was facing her at that moment. The bed.

Kaede left, shutting the door softly behind her. As she headed down the stairs, she allowed a small chuckle to escape her lips. She wished there was some way to watch the two of them figure out the sleeping situation. She shook her head. Sometimes she worried that a little bit too much of Miroku had rubbed off on her during those long years when he was growing up.

OOOOOOOOOOOOO

Inside the room, Kagome stared at the bed, a faint blush on her face. Okay, so maybe she was mildly attracted to Inuyasha. After all, that body, those eyes, mmm...

"Umm, Kagome?" Inuyasha waved a claw in front of the schoolgirl's face. She had closed her eyes and her cheeks had turned a little bit pink.

"Yes! What? Nothing!" Kagome said. Shit, she had gotten a little carried away there. Okay, back to the sleeping situation. Just then Inuyasha spoke up.

"I figured we could take turns with the bed. The other person can sleep on the couch."

His unusually diplomatic stance startled the schoolgirl. She also felt a quick tinge of disappointment, which she tried to ignore. After all, their relationship was strictly platonic.

Then why does your stomach flip over every time you see him? A traitorous little voice from deep within asked her. Gah! She told it. Scram! So I think he's cute, no big deal. I am not interested in anything more with Inuyasha! The smile on her face gave the lie to that statement, but luckily she couldn't see herself.

Inuyasha could though. He wondered what it was that she was grinning about it. A quick glance around the room showed him nothing exciting. Not that it was bad, far from it. The sofa looked comfy, so did the bed. And inviting, especially the bed... Really, he shook his head, his subconscious was so not subtle.

The two of them climbed into their respective beds, both preoccupied with their own thoughts.

"Goodnight," Kagome said as she shut off the light.

"Goodnight," Inuyasha answered out of the darkness

OOOOOOOOOOOOOO

The next day had dawned long ago by the time the two teenagers woke up. After all, technically, they had gone to bed after the dawn. Kagome woke first and accidentally awakened Inuyasha.

"What're you thrashing around for?" he grumbled, sitting up and looking over. Kagome appeared to be losing some sort of battle with her sheets.

"Where am I?" she cried, "Why is it so dark?"

With a sigh Inuyasha got off his sofa. He took three long strides until he was standing next to the bed, and then he reached out and plucked the blanket off of Kagome.

"Oh," she said, looking up at him. Her hair was sprawled over the pillow behind her except for one long strand that was tucked into the corner of her mouth.

Inuyasha sighed, then reached out a claw and brushed the hair out of her face.

Kagome gulped, a blush spreading across her face. She had just made an ass of herself, and then Inuyasha had made that incredibly sweet gesture. She wasn't quite sure where to look.

Inuyasha looked panicked. Shit. Did I just do that, he asked himself frantically. Oh god. Must do something to reassert manliness!

"We're at Kaede's, dumbass," he growled. "We got here early this morning, remember?"

Kagome's blush was instantly replaced by a frown. "Thanks," she replied, her voice tart. Then her eyes shifted, and she grinned just a little.

"What? What're you thinking?" Inuyasha backed up nervously.

"Nothing," said Kagome, swinging her feet out of bed. Then she rushed for the bathroom. "Race you to the bathroom!" she called over her shoulder.

"Wench," said Inuyasha. He went back to the sofa to sit down.

He had lost track of the time when the outside door was slowly pushed open. Instantly, Inuyasha was on his feet. "Don't come out, Kagome," he called.

A small, redheaded child poked its head around the corner of the door. "Who're you?" it asked.

"Who'm I?" said Inuyasha, "This is my room. Who are you?"

The small child darted into the room, leaped on all of the furniture, and then ran over to Inuyasha. "I asked first! I asked first! I asked first!" he shouted.

"Why you little brat..."Inuyasha lunged for the kid, but he was too quick. In an instant he had swarmed up the muscular teenager's back and was pulling his hair. "Gah! Get the fuck off me," Inuyasha shouted.

"What's going on out here?" Kagome demanded as she emerged from the bathroom wrapped in a towel. "Inuyasha? What are you doing to that kid?"

"What'm I doing to it? You mean, what is it doing to me!" Inuyasha retorted, angrily trying to grab hold of the little kid who was now gnawing at his head.

"Oh how sweet," Kagome cooed, coming closer. "Hello. My name is Kagome. Who are you?" She held out a hand to the redhead, who had stopped his chewing on Inuyasha to regard her with large green eyes.

"My name is Shippo," he chirped then leaped into her arms. With a laugh, she caught him, very nearly losing hold of her towel as she did so.

"That's Inuyasha," Kagome said, gesturing towards the fuming boy standing in front of them.

Shippo stood up in Kagome's arms to lean against her shoulder. "He's mean," he whispered into her ear.

Kagome laughed while an irritated dog-boy turned bright red.

"Keh," he snorted. "I'm going to take a shower." With that, he stalked out of the room. Kagome looked down at the small boy in her arms and giggled.

"Is he always like that?" Shippo asked.

"Pretty much," Kagome answered with a smile.

OOOOOOOOOOOO

Half an hour later, Inuyasha emerged from the bathroom to find Kagome and Shippo sitting companionably on the bed and chattering away. He rolled his eyes before approaching.

"Oi!" he called.

"Yes?" said Kagome.

"So what're we doing today anyways?"

"Right. Okay, Shippo, why don't you head out for the moment? We'll be downstairs in just a few minutes."

The small boy nodded and walked out the door. Kagome turned back to Inuyasha.

"Well, do you have any ideas?" she asked. "There's some stuff I need to do—call my mom, meet up with Eri. We should start thinking about what you are going to do. Perhaps work? I guess maybe the first thing we should do is get you accustomed to being out of the lab." After all, she didn't want the poor boy to get hit by a car right off the bat or something. They'd better make sure he could function in the real world without drawing too much attention to himself.

"Actually," Kagome surveyed his appearance, "I think we need to find a disguise for you first. Luckily I brought some things!"

Inuyasha smacked his head. "Great," he said sarcastically. Then he paused. Kagome was still wearing her towel and it was beginning to slip a little. "Erm..." he said as his face began to get a little pink.

"What?"

"Umm..."

"What is it?" Kagome asked again. "Oh," she looked down at herself. "I left all my clothes in the bathroom," she explained. "But now that you're out..." She quickly got off the bed and went into the other room.

"I got some clothes for you in that other duffle," she called through the door. "Feel free to go through it."

Inuyasha stood in the middle of the empty room for a minute. The doors were unlocked, he realized. For the first time in his life, he was free. With a huge grin on his face, he went over and unzipped the duffle bag.