Disclaimer: I don't own him…at all.

A/N: This chapter was a little longer, I was going to keep going but I thought it would be a good place to stop where I did. Once again thank you to all my lovely reviewers, without them I'd probably be in some corner sobbing about my failures. (Especially inashosetai 3) I went to the movies with my cousin who also happens to be one of my best friends. We took these retarded pictures in one of those booths that can only really fit one person. They give you like 5 seconds to get ready for a pose; me and him were scrabbling to get ready so our photos looked like we were on crack.

Oh by the way, Inuyasha isn't a half demon in this fanfic...maybe I should have put that one in the beginning but I'm an idiot. They're a bit out of character too…but…I like them this way, it helps my story. I just wanted to make it seem more realistic, you know. I hope you all forgive me. Ok now you probably want to read, so I'll leave you to that.

Cigarettes and Lavender

Chapter 4-Alcohol and Old Books

Bi Polar

Inuyasha awoke to the scent of lavender. 'I've always wondered what heaven smelt like.' His sight was blurred but one thing was clear. Instead of seeing the expected pure white walls, everything was a brilliant pink. The thought startled him and he bolted upright. A pain seared from his side up his spine and came out of his mouth in the form of a yelp. He put a hand over his mouth like that would take back the sudden noise he had just emitted. 'I need to get out of here.' His mind moved rapidly.

He dragged himself out of bed, quickening his pace when he heard hushed noises from the other side of the white door he was now moving towards. He held his side, which was now bandaged. Now that he was standing he saw that he wasn't wearing the jeans he had left his house in, as a replacement he wore red sweat pants. He also noticed that he wasn't wearing a T-shirt, instead he fashioned white bandages with faint red stains. His head also clad bandages, his hair poking out all over.

He was searching for his backpack. His head was swirling. 'Damnit what happened?' He couldn't remember only bits and pieces. 'I remember…I remember…him…the one who took me to the alley. That's all…no! I remember those eyes…those blue eyes.' Inuyasha's mind ached as he tried to place his memories back in place. And then he stopped, everything stopped. His breathing hitched and his body stopped sifting through the room. The door was opening.

He stood before a middle aged woman. She looked startled, her eyes wide with surprise her tiny mouth forming a small "O." Inuyasha backed away from the woman. 'It's actually quite pathetic I'm afraid of a woman in a flower apron.' He thought ironically. His back came in contact with the pink colored wall.

Then the flower aproned lady spoke. "My! What a surprise to see you up!" Her eyes went from surprised to cheerful and she smiled at the boy standing across from her. "We weren't suspecting you up for quite sometime, especially with that wound in your side." She slowly started walking towards Inuyasha. His eyes searched for a way out and his breathing quickened. The apron clad woman must have noticed this. "What's the matter?"

'Something's not right. Why is she so nice?' Still he searched for a way to leave. "I've…I've got to…leave." The words stumbled from his mouth. The lady kept moving forward towards him.

She reached out her hand and Inuyasha instinctively recoiled as if expecting a blow of some sort. The woman frowned at this and in a flash Inuyasha was in her embrace. She held him close to her and he mechanically tensed. His hands were held close to his sides and his back went straight as a pole. She didn't seem to mind the uncomfortable tension though. She squeezed him softly in a motherly way.

"It's ok…we're not going to do anything to you." He relaxed as she whispered the kind words into his ear. She back away still holding Inuyasha's shoulders. She gave him a kind smile "Would you like something to eat?" Inuyasha nodded feeling like he had finally found an adult he could trust. She smiled and instructed Inuyasha to follow her.

He sat at the kitchen table as the apron clad woman fixed him something to eat. He felt slightly uncomfortable still not knowing his caretakers name. As if sensing his uneasiness she turned to him and gave him one of her light smiles and said in a soft voice. "You can call me Mrs. Higurashi." Inuyasha nodded and gave her a shy smile.

"My daughter found you on her way home from a friend's house. She thinks you were mugged. Its crazy how society has gotten hasn't it? She thought it better to bring you here than to a hospital. She never told me why, maybe you could shed some light on that, hmm?" she turned to the silver haired boy. He sat with his eyes turned towards to table. The pieces and images of the night he left home placed themselves in the appropriate place as if a puzzle. He shook his head, answering Mrs. Higurashi's question. He was afraid she'd turn him in and he'd have to go back to that horrid place where he had spent most of his days.

"Oh I see." She took it lightly turning her back on him. Inuyasha's heart dropped, he felt as if he had betrayed her for some unknown reason. She came back a minute later with a large bowl of soup and a big glass of iced tea. Was this how mothers were supposed to act? "I always thought soup was nice when I was sick or hurt." She sat across from him with her own bowl of soup. "So where do you come from?"

"Kofu."

"Oh that's a lovely town. I went there last spring to visit a friend."

"Yes…" The conversation was dull and uncomfortable and he was relieved to see Mrs. Higurashi get up and put away her bowl. She went into the other room, and came back a short while later with Inuyasha's backpack in her hand.

"Kagome brought this home when she found you; she said it belonged to you. Don't worry we didn't look in it." She handed Inuyasha the bag and then grabbed her purse and car keys from the hook besides the back door. "I have to go to the grocery store for a little while. I hope you don't mind. You took up most of our bandages. Is there anything that you would like me to pick up?" Inuyasha shook his head and she smiled and left the room, and then peeked her head back in to add, "Oh, and if you steal anything, please take the things with little sentimental value; like the television or the phone."

Inuyasha was surprised to see that she trusted him at all, but even more so surprised that she would allow him to take their household items. She walked out of the room with a wave of her hand and he sat there for a moment; his bag in his lap and spoon dangling from his hand.

He lost his appetite after that; not because of Mrs. Higurashi, but because his side hurt so damn bad that he was afraid nothing would stay down. He brought his bowl up to the sink and out the window he spotted an enormous tree on the grounds. The sun hit it just right and it almost looked holy. The humongous trunk shot out of the ground; it branches supporting the lovely spring leaves. It's those sorts of sights that you just feel like you need to sit down and look at it. So out the back door he went, bag in hand.

The day was absolutely gorgeous. The sun was out, and only a few clouds lined the sky. (A/N Quite different from where I'm sitting; its raining like crazy…sigh Seattle.) He stared up at the bottom of the branches and saw peaks of blue showing through the thick mass of green leaves. He smiled, fully, for the first time in what seemed liked years. It took awhile to get to the branch he wanted to sit on but after he got to it he was glad he had put his effort into it.

His bag dangled off another branch nearby and he grabbed it to see what the mugger had taken. 'All my money, go figure. Damnit; my CD player…and all my CDs…what a jackass, hmm...some clothes…wow…that's kind of sick; he took a pair of underwear. Guess he wasn't a smoker." At this thought he grabbed his cigarettes and his lighter he bought at the gas station back home. He lit it, took a long drag. 'Full, complete relaxation.'

"Hey Kagome! Are you ok?" Eri waved her hand in front of her friend's face.

"Oh! Yea, I'm fine, sorry about that." The girl said. Her black hair fell well past her shoulders and framed her face wonderfully. Her bright blue eyes twinkled as she smiled at Eri. She held her books close to her chest and walked along with her friends to their last class.

"You seem really out of it today, is something on your mind?" One of them said, Kagome hadn't really kept track of who was talking, she was too busy thinking. After all, who wouldn't think when there's a strange boy sleeping in your bedroom? Her thoughts flowed back to the amber eyed stranger that she had found 5 days ago. "Kagome?"

"Oh, sorry…again. Um…no nothing's really on my mind; its just one of those days, you know?" She smiled again, but her thoughts still remained on the young teenager.

Once she had got him home, he immediately passed out. Her mom came out and was surprisingly calm about the whole situation. Kagome made it clear that 911 (A/N or whatever their emergency response number is) couldn't be called. Her mom didn't question much further, they took the boy into the living room and cleaned him off. He was really quite handsome after all the blood and dried dirt was cleaned off. He had high cheekbones, which brought out his outrageous eye color. She suspected them to be colored contacts. His silver hair, which she highly doubted was his original color, was just above his chin. His figure, she had to admit, was even better than her own. They replaced his clothing with old sweatpants that had belonged to her father; of course she left the room when her mother did this this.

They brought him up to her room after they cleaned him up, and she sat by his bedside for quite some time. She really didn't have a clue why she did that, but it just seemed like the right thing to do. His breathing was shallow but as normal as one in his condition is to be. She watched his lean chest go up and down with the breaths he took and expelled. They left him with no shirt and she was rather surprised to find scars marking his entire being. They traced from up and down his arms, to his chest, to his shoulders. She wondered what could've happened to him, but let it drop as it grew late.

"Are you sure?" Ayumi said, twirling a bit of her curly hair around her forefinger. She was a quiet respectful girl, a romantic really; and Kagome loved her for it.

"Yea, I'll be fine, thanks though."

"Is it a boy!" Yuka was a different story. After she had had her first contact with a boy she had loved them ever since. She was deeply obsessed with other's lives and loved to whisper around gossip and rumors. Eri tended to follow Yuka's trend.

"No!"

"It is!" Eri and Yuka all but screamed in unison.

"If it was a boy Kagome would have told us. Isn't that right Kagome?" Ayumi whispered.

"Oh bag that! Jeez, Ayumi, you really are innocent. The first rule about boys is that you never tell anyone until they beg you to." Yuka said holding her pointer finger in front of Ayumi's face.

'I've never heard of that rule…then again, I've never heard of any of these rules, they just make them up so they have rumors to spread.' Kagome was use to their questioning. "So which guy is it? I've heard Hojo has his eye on you." Yuka winked.

Kagome sighed turning to the girls who all stopped in the middle of the hallway to hear the important news. "Yes I'm sure…Hojo hasn't talked to me at all. I'm not having any sort of relationship with him or anyone else for that matter."

"…Fine…" Eri and Yuka sighed in defeat and Ayumi giggled at their antics.

Kagome walked home fast that day, wanting to see if the stranger had woken up. When she arrived home and discovered no one was there. 'Mom's probably refilling our first aid kit, which is almost creepy huge. Souta is at school until 4 and Gramps is staying at that one guy's house…what's his name, oh yea Shoshio, 'the priest from the east' as Souta would say.' She thought.

She put her bag down and walked up stairs, quietly opening her bedroom door. The expected scene, the sliver haired amber eyed boy lying peacefully in bed, was not seen. Instead her covers were on the floor and there was no one lying in it. She panicked. Her first instinct was to see if anyone was here, but seriously injured. She checked all the rooms. No one was here, and nothing was stolen oddly enough. She expected their china to be gone, their TV, there jewelry, or anything else of value. She was still worried though.

She ran to the kitchen searching all over the counter tops for the phone under piles of bills, pictures Souta had drown, phone numbers, and school work. Nothing was there and she went to the next area. That is, until she saw a figure in red perched atop the sacred tree. Her hands stopped moving and her heart stopped pounding. He looked at peace up there, on the Goshiboku(I'm sorry if this is wrong, please correct me.) 'I should go introduce myself. I don't think there's anything dangerous about him. If he was going to do anything he would have done it by now.'

"Excuse me?" Inuyasha looked down from his high resting place to see those blue eyes staring right back at him. "Uhh…my name is Kagome; I'm the one who found you in the alleyway." She fidgeted with a strand of her raven black hair. Her eyes looked hopeful and kind.

"I'm Inuyasha…and…thank you, for saving me…" He was barely loud enough, but she heard him. She smiled widely and let her strand of hair go.

"Why don't you come on down, I'll make us some tea." She motioned with her hands. Inuyasha didn't really know why he went with her, he wasn't that hungry or that thirsty and it was difficult to get out of the tree with his wounds. He went though, maybe it was her eyes, but whatever it was he knew he could trust her. Her whole being was comforting.

Kagome beamed as the boy slowly climbed from his perch. When he got down she gave him a grin and held out her small hand. He shook it and smiled shyly. She led him indoors again and put on a teapot and then came back to sit down across from him.

"So have you met my mother? Was she here when you woke up?" She asked, her hands kept together on her lap.

"Yes, she's a very nice woman."

"Yea, she's great. So where do you come from? And why, may I ask, where you out at that time of night?"

"I'm from Kofu. I…hadn't realized the time…when I was out."

"Oh…ok." She didn't believe him, they both knew that, but for the time being it was just enough to get her off that subject. "How are you feeling?"

"Good, a lot better."

"Hehe, well I would hope so! You were a total wreck when I found you."

"Yea."

"So…uhhh…what happened before I found you. If you don't want to talk about it its ok, I understand." She was fidgety again and he wondered if she only got this way when she wanted to ask something.

"…uhhh…I got off the bus…was mugged… and that's about it." He finished his lovely narrative off by gulping down the rest of his tea.

"Oh…did you happen to see what he looked like?"

"Not really. His face was covered by his hair and it was dark. He smelt funny…" Inuyasha's eyes glazed over, and he seemed to be reliving some event in a distant time.

"…He smelt funny?"

"Yes; like a combination of alcohol and the smell of old books that have never been open." He came back from wonderland with a timid smile on his face.

"Hmm…" She smiled thoughtfully taking his empty cup and bringing it to the kitchen sink.

A/N: My charming reviewers, I just thought I'd put them down here…because…well just because.

Auxana: Thank you for putting me on your favorite list, I'll try and get enough time to check out your stories.

Inashosetai: :D I love you're long reviews! They make me feel so damn loved! 3 Yea, I like checking out random stories, regardless of the summaries and titles. But I don't get a chance to very much. I go to a college prep school so I've been loaded down with work. D: I friggin' love you for all of your kind comments. I hoped that this one would be different, I was just afraid to put it on the internet…because I'm a wuss like that. But I'm glad I have because now I get uber cool reviews like yours! I'll try and look at your stories when I get time and leave you a couple reviews. :D

Inu's-Mate: Yea…but as I said at the beginning of this chapter, he's probably not going to be a half demon. But, muggings can be brutal, so stay off the streets at night! …er…sorry. As for Kagome, you're probably right that she wouldn't swear, but when you find a bloody boy in an alley you're first reaction is going to be a little frantic. But thanks for the input. :D

Laura-chan, Trallgorda, Nanirain, Inuyashabooklover5188, Rabbitstew, desertwater, Roses: THANK YOU SOOOO MUCH! YOU GET 48234207429 GOLD STARS. 3

If I missed any one I apologize, I love you anyways! Haha I'm so sorry that my Author's notes are turning out to be longer than my story.