Chapter Three: Realizations

She felt safe, engulfed in a warm embrace, and she snapped her eyes open crying out in panic. "It wasn't a dream!" Kagome felt warm hands pushed her down onto a soft surface and she allowed her eyes to settle on deep brown ones filled with concern. It was her mother.

Blinking and frowning, she struggled against the gentle grip and cast a glance around her. She was in the hospital.

"What happened?" She asked.

"Some kids found you in the street, dear. You were unconscious."

Shaking her head, she sat up giving her mother a glare. "Where is he?" She shouted.

"Who?"

"Inuyasha?" Kagome snapped. "You better get your hanyou ass in here now!"

Her mother sighed. "Kagome, relax. I don't know whom you're talking about, but I've had about enough of this nonsense.

"Right!" Kagome pushed the covers from around her legs and stood up fuming mad. "Inuyasha!" She yelled. She knew he was here; it wasn't a dream after all. Those golden eyes bore into hers before she lost consciousness, and those ears were unmistakable. "Inuyasha!" Kagome shouted again, knowing if he was around he would be able to hear her just fine.

Blowing hot air through her nose, trying to maintain some form of collective control, she shouted. "Inuyasha! Sit boy!" There was the distinct sound of a muffled curse and a loud slam just outside the hospital window. Turning her head, and glaring at her mother whose head also turned to the window, Kagome stalked towards it and pushed open the window, staring down two floors to the ground. It was dark out but Kagome's eyes picked out the form of red on the ground, sprawled out.

Turning away from the window, Kagome bolted out the door and down the stairs with her mother shouting for her to stop. Shoving open the exit doors, Kagome stalked over to where she had seen the blob of red and snarled angrily at the now empty spot.

"Inuyasha! SIT!" If he was going to try and dodge her, she would make it extremely painful for him, and hard for him to outrun her rage. Again she heard a thump, and she raced over to where the sound was. Around the corner she saw him. Grabbing his collar, she jerked him up as much as the rosary allowed, and she yelled right into his face. "You coward!" She cried.

His eyes were clenched shut, and he winced. His collar was released, and the spell finally allowed him to gather his feet and he backed away quickly. Twisting around he tried to run.

"Sit! Sit! Sit! Sit! Sit!" Kagome snarled. The hanyou flattened against the solid cement, and grunted with each sit, finally cracking the cement with the last few sits.

Kagome stalked up to him again. "How dare you! Sit!" Another grunt. "How could you be so heartless?" She cried out. Her mother came around the corner and stopped suddenly, seeing a guy sprawled on the ground. "How could you do this to me? Sit!" She raged. A whimper.

"St…stop." He whimpered.

"No! SIT!" She cried out in her fury. "I can't believe you ruined my life for your own personal gain! How dare you try and make me forget! How dare you take away my friends! Sit!" Kagome raged again, each sit getting louder and louder with each passing second.

Kagome felt hands on her shoulders and she shrugged them off. "Mom, stay back!"

Oh Inuyasha was going to pay. "Tell me one thing, Inuyasha! How did you manage to seal the well, and you are able to be here while I can't go back?"

A soft whimper reached her ears. "I was only trying to protect you."

"Protect me?" She snarled. "Protect me?"

Inuyasha sat up with difficulty and attempted to cross his legs. Kagome's mother sat back on her knees and stared at him, as if for the first time. "What?" Inuyasha frowned. "It's not like you've never seen me before."

"She doesn't remember anything, Inuyasha!" Kagome shoved his shoulder, punching him hard at his name. "You successfully managed to outcast me from my friends and family, making me sound like a raving lunatic, and you say you were only trying to protect me?"

Inuyasha blinked, peering closer at Kagome's mother. Her eyes held no recognition. "Well how is it you remember? I wished for no one to remember."

"A promise is stronger then a wish, you idiot!" Her face was red from her exertion.

"What promise?" Inuyasha blinked.

"I promised not to forget anyone! Remember you baka? You were there, or were you just not listening, like usual?"

Inuyasha sighed. "So you are the only one who remembers?"

"Oh it took some time, after months of therapy, and I would have thought myself crazy if you hadn't shown your face." She yanked on the beads, pulling his face closer to hers. "Now answer my question!"

"Keh! Come on Kagome, what ties me to you?" Inuyasha scoffed, looking pointedly at the beads around his neck.

She glared down in her hand. "So you kept the beads? Why not send those back with me? So you wouldn't have this headache anymore? And why did you put them back on?"

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes. "Trust me, I would rather have not put them back around my neck. I tried to enter the well without them first and I only slammed into the bottom. Then I held them in my haori but still I flattened myself. So the only other thing I could think of was to put them on. It worked and here I am. If I had left them with you, my wish would have been over run once you had seen them."

"What an idiot!" Kagome raged. "You ruined my life!" She stood up and shouted over her shoulder for good measure. "SIT!"

Inuyasha made a strangled sound and met the cement once more.

"Why'd you come back?" Kagome snorted.

"I only wanted to make sure you were okay." Came his pained response.

"Oh so you come, hoping to find me well and fine and then leave again?"

Inuyasha pushed himself up slightly. "Yes. That was my intention. I couldn't let you see me; it would have erased my wish. That guy was hurting you and I couldn't stand by and just watch it happen. I should have just left it well enough alone." He sat up fully now, glaring at her back. His eyes met the wide ones of her mothers and he smirked.

"I guess you should have!" Kagome snarled, stalking back to him and she almost laughed when he cringed away from her in fear. "Oh yes, Inuyasha, be afraid, very afraid for what I have in store for you is going to make my sits look like a rainbow after a spring rain."

Inuyasha flinched at the threat. He released a whimper that he had unsuccessfully tried to bite back.

Kagome smiled sweetly at him. "Now let's go back to the shrine shall we? I really need to have a talk with my little elusive friend here." She stressed the word friend with sarcasm, it dripping from her lips like poison.

Inuyasha got up quickly, and bolted down the street.

"SIT!"

Again he flattened meeting his good old friend, the ground. His yelp still echoing on the night air.

Kagome glanced at her mother and crossed her arms. "Told you I wasn't crazy!"

Her mother stood and nodded, still in shock.

They began walking, and every time the spell wore off Inuyasha and him trying to race away into the night, Kagome's sits were heard echoing in the night. Followed by a grunt of pain, and a whimper, and then his running feet again.

Kagome's mother sighed. "You're hurting the poor dear."

"Ha! I'll be doing much more then this once we get back home mother." Kagome snapped.

Inuyasha blanched at her tone and his ears flattened on the top of his head and he whimpered softly. Had he been so wrong as to want to make sure she was safe? How had things turned out so wrong? Now he was going to have to explain himself fully. Looking at his feet, he shuffled behind the two women and groaned softly. He did fear Kagome when she was enraged, but somehow this was different.

He had deeply hurt her and it was something he had never wanted to do in the first place. Inuyasha had only wanted her to be happy, but he had made a grave mistake somewhere down the line, and now he was going to pay for it. Taking a deep breath, he wordlessly followed Kagome and her mother all the way to the shrine where he was sure to have ringing ears for the next few hours.

Smiling slightly, he glanced at the back of Kagome's head. This was the Kagome he knew and loved. Nodding, he quickened his pace and followed behind her closely, almost stepping on her heels as they walked.

Kagome whirled around to shout out something to him, but yelped when she noticed him right there, and she stumbled over her feet, tipping over.

Inuyasha grinned and snaked his arm around her waist and drew her to him quickly, steadying her before she fell. Her hands landed on his chest with a gasp, and he felt a blush rise to his cheeks. There had been other times like this, where they had been close, and Inuyasha flashed a smile at her, before wrapping his arms around her tightly.

"Hells I missed you, wench!" Inuyasha whispered in her ear.

Kagome gaped and then slowly relaxed in his embrace. "Don't think you're getting out of a good chastising just because you are hugging me, Inuyasha." She whispered.

"Keh! If you weren't so clumsy, I wouldn't have had to have caught you." Inuyasha released her and allowed the grin to spread over her lips again. He crossed the grounds quickly and hopped up the side of the house without a word, and slipped into her bedroom before either Kagome or her mother had made it half way across their yard.

Kagome's mother shook her head. "He is fast. I suppose I should make something to eat?"

Kagome nodded and broke into a run and slipped into the house darting up the stairs where she knew Inuyasha would be waiting. She knew she hadn't been crazy, and now seeing him after all this time, made a real smile cross her lips for the first time in a long time. It was so good to see him again that she couldn't contain her excitement as she bounded up the stairs. Yes she would get mad at him, but as always they would make up and be friends again.

Besides, what were friends without a little argument from time to time? It would certainly be a dull friendship, however, Inuyasha was never dull.