...OOO...
The next day they woke up and fell into the same routine as all other mornings with little decipherable change.
For a moment, Sesshomaru had to wonder whether he had just dreamed the whole scenario last night. In any case, he was starting to have second thoughts. What was it about a new morning that always seemed to tear the iron resolve of night?
Down in the kitchen, they sat down once more to breakfast, neither speaking to the other, but that was the norm in their relationship.
Looking at his wife quietly nibbling on a dice of cantaloupe, Sesshomaru debated whether or not to bring up the topic of divorce again, perhaps clear up the air. But as she didn't seem any different, he thought that it would probably be best just to leave it alone. Maybe if neither one acknowledged it, then they could just pretend it had never happened in the first place.
Still, it wasn't natural to brush off something so significant as talk of a divorce, and something about the morning and his wife kept nagging at Sesshomaru.
After breakfast, she met him at the door as usual, holding out his light spring jacket. The day was off to a chilly start.
"I might be late for dinner," he told her, speaking first.
Smiling wanly, she merely replied, "That's alright. Have a good day at work."
He nodded and walked out the door, and it wasn't until he was halfway to his car that she added something she never said in their morning partings.
"Good-bye."
Sesshomaru paused for an indecipherable second before continuing to his car and slid behind the wheel.
It didn't mean anything, he told himself. It was a perfectly normal thing to say when two people parted- whether for just the day or the rest of eternity. She didn't mean anything...
Shifting the car into reverse, he started backing out of the driveway but stopped just short of the road.
Kikyo was still standing by the open door, watching him leave the way she did every morning.
His hand itched to throw the car back into park, get out, and walk back inside with her. But it was an absurd idea. He had to get to work. There were things people depended on him to accomplish that day.
Slowly he eased his foot off the brakes, turned the wheel, and drove away.
When he was out of sight, Kikyo closed the door and went upstairs to their bedroom. Reaching to the clasp behind her neck she removed her pearls and placed them back in their velvet-lined case, but before closing it, she fingered them softly and hesitated.
She didn't have to do it, she told herself. He hadn't asked her to leave. In fact, he hadn't brought up the topic at all. The way he acted this morning, it was like last night had never happened. She didn't have to go. She could just stay and wait to see what happened next...
Maybe he didn't even mean what he said about the divorce. Maybe she was wrong and they still had a while yet to go before the inevitable happened.
But then again, why tempt herself with such hopeless possibilities? The inevitable was the inevitable.
In reality she was scared that if she waited a little longer, waited for him to come home, she wouldn't be able to handle it. And what if he really did want her gone? The idea was too excruciating to think about.
In the end though, she did wait a while before calling a taxi. She stuck around long enough to make their bed, tidy up the house a little, prepare a broccoli and cheese casserole in a glass pan complete with heating instructions.
She supposed it was a futile gesture considering the circumstance, but she couldn't bear the thought of him coming home hungry that night without dinner ready at the table.
When the taxi arrived, Kikyo took the one suitcase she had packed of her few personal belongings and left her set of keys on the nightstand beside the bed. She'd have no use for them anymore.
Sliding into the back of the yellow car, she gave the driver directions to the bank, and as they drove away, she forced herself not to look back for fear she might change her mind and return.
All the while she told herself it was for the best.
She loved him, but he didn't even care enough to notice her.
The worst part was that she couldn't even resent him for it. Everyone had warned her beforehand, and she knew the kind of man he was before she married him. She had no delusions about changing him, but she said 'yes' anyway. The only person she could really blame was herself.
...ooo...
It was late by the time Sesshomaru got home to a darkened house. Right away he knew something wasn't right, even though he could plainly see Kikyo's car in the driveway.
Walking in through the front door, he flipped the lights on and set his briefcase down. It was really quiet, but that wasn't anything new.
"I'm home," he announced, wondering why he bothered even as the words left his mouth. There was no answer and he hadn't expected one- Kikyo was probably all ready asleep.
Except that she wasn't in her usual spot on the couch.
Shrugging off his coat, Sesshomaru went into the kitchen to see if she had perhaps waited up for him. But all that greeted him was the casserole dish wrapped in tin foil, a note on top written in her neat script:
Heat oven to 250. Bake for twenty minutes covered, remove the foil and return to the oven for ten more minutes. Be careful not to burn yourself- there are oven mitts on the second drawer beside the stove. And there's a bottle of wine chilling in the fridge. –Kikyo.
Sesshomaru frowned a little and flipped the card over, half-expecting to find some sort of explanation in its blank face, but there was nothing there but the obvious.
Kikyo was gone and her only farewell was a written set of instructions on how to heat a casserole.
Following the instructions, Sesshomaru set the food in the oven, got out the bottle of red wine, and poured himself a glass.
He didn't know why her absence surprised him so much. Hadn't she just been waiting breathless for the chance to leave him? To leave this house that made her so miserable?
Calmly he sipped his wine and when it was done baking, took the casserole- the last dinner she would ever make for him- out of the oven and served himself a plate. It was his favorite dish, but it didn't taste as good as it usually did, which was odd since he was sure all the ingredients were the same. Kikyo wasn't petty enough to leave him with anything less. The only difference was that he was the one who had heated it.
When he was done, he left the dishes unwashed in the sink.
Despite his wife's wishes, it had been a hard day at the office, and now a slight headache was forming right in the middle of his forehead.
He massaged a hand over it to dissipate the pain but was interrupted by the ruckus right outside the kitchen door.
That damn cat again, he frowned, watching it dart off one of the lidded garbage bins.
Sighing wearily, he opened one of the cabinets and was astonished to find a whole stack of canned tuna even though it was not a staple in either of their diets.
How long had she been feeding that thing?
From another drawer he found the can opener and ran it around one of them, then set the can outside.
He supposed there was no harm if it kept the animal from making a mess pawing through the garbage.
Upstairs he found her set of keys on the nightstand along with the designer purse he had bought for her. Her wallet was still inside complete with cash and credit cards. All that was missing was her driver's license.
It irritated him.
Did she think he was so cruel as to deny his own wife- even if she would no longer be in a short while- financial support? Then again, she always was stubborn when it came to accepting help, no matter who it came from or how badly she needed it. Wasn't that the reason why he had married her?
Briefly he wondered where she could possibly have gone, but he wasn't all too concerned. He knew she had some small savings put away from before she married him- only a few grand, but enough to last her for a week or two until her lawyer got in touch with his to work out a divorce settlement. Right now she was probably at some hotel getting the sleep she never got sharing his bed.
It was fine by him. At least tonight he knew he wouldn't be awakened by anything except the sun and his alarm clock in the morning. At least that would have been the case had he actually slept. Sesshomaru spent the better part of the night frowning at the indecipherable words in his book. They must have been in league with her- they weren't making sense anymore either.
...ooo...
He didn't see or hear from her until a week and a half later when they and their attorneys got together at a conference room to arrange the divorce.
He stayed standing beside the window against one wall, gazing out past the blinds into city traffic. On one side of the long rectangular table was his lawyer- an old man who had represented generations of his family. Across from him, she sat with her lawyer, a prim woman sharply dressed in a crisp black suit with a gleam in her eyes that was akin to shark's when it just spotted its latest entree.
Despite the growing heat of the afternoon, Kikyo wore a sweater, too big now for her small frame, with a loose neckline that slipped off one shoulder and exposed her prominent collarbones bereft of their customary pearls. He had never remembered her looking so small before.
"Since there was no prenuptial agreement signed," her lawyer was saying, "my client is entitled to-"
She was cut off by Sesshomaru's representative, "Yes, but all major items- including the two pieces of real estate, the cars, jewelry, etc., were all purchased under my client's name, hence-"
Sesshomaru interrupted him.
"Give her whatever she wants," he declared, pushing away from the window but without looking over. "The car, the house, it doesn't matter. Whatever amount she wants for alimony, let her have it."
"But-" His lawyer was flabbergasted.
Sesshomaru didn't stick around for any arguments. Quickly he turned toward the door to leave, but not quickly enough that he didn't hear her response.
"I don't want anything," she said quietly, more to her attorney than to him. "The car, the house... they're all his. Let him keep them." Then she too rose from her seat to exit through a different set of doors, leaving behind two stunned divorce lawyers. It was the first time either had ever encountered a case in which both parties insisted the other get everything and refused them at the same time.
Since they had no children and had no bitter arguments about the settlement, the proceedings went smoothly and the divorce was finalized within a month.
True to her word, Kikyo left him with everything- including all the dresses and jewelry he bought her. In fact, Sesshomaru noticed that the only things she had taken with her when she left was what she had brought with her the first time she moved in as his new wife- a few pieces of clothing, an old quilt some matriarch or other in her family had sewn together, and a collection of old mournful jazz records she longed to dance to but never did. Everything that was solely hers, things he never had claim to.
Once again it irked him.
Was that how she saw their marriage? Did she see them as that separable that everything was labeled as either hers or his?
The house, the car, the clothes, the jewelry- he had bought them for her. They were hers as much as they were his. Why couldn't she stop being stubborn and take it as that?
He knew Kikyo would never take handouts, but did she honestly see his gifts that way? Did she not think he merely wanted everything good for her?
Why couldn't she be like normal women and entitle herself to a piece of their life together? Did she feel she would be indebted to him if she did? Did she really think he was that petty?
Or maybe she was simply being Kikyo, making a clean break that left him to dispose of all their memories.
Memories.
How he hated that word. It was so sentimental. The past was the past- there was no use revisiting something that was already lost.
For a while though, Sesshomaru stayed in the house, continued to sleep in their bed, now too large for his single person. At first he didn't think her absence would make much of a difference- she had always been so quiet, so easily missed even when she was around. So he found it quite surprising how much emptier the large house was without her. The quiet he never minded before was now deafening when it greeted him at the end of each day.
He started keeping an apartment in the city, and eventually he stopped going back to the house altogether. It was more convenient anyway, closer to his office. He had only moved to the suburbs because he had thought the open space would benefit her. Kikyo had never been much of a city person despite living in it most of her adult life.
Now she was back there too, he found out, living in some row house district in the east side. Small, but reasonably affordable.
He didn't know if she had started teaching again, or if she had found another job, but the thought of her struggling to make ends meet didn't sit well with him. And despite the fact she had said she didn't want alimony, he sent her a personal check monthly to cover whatever expenses she might incur.
They were never cashed but she never demanded he stop either, so he continued sending them every month like clockwork. It was their only link to one another after the finalization of the divorce.
Once or twice Sesshomaru thought to include a note with the check, but what was there to say?
Hello. How are you?
Hope you're doing well?
Inside he was afraid of what he might tell her if he gave himself the chance.
I was wrong.
I miss you.
I need you.
Come back home.
I love you.
All the things he neglected to say when they were together.
In the end the checks went unaccompanied.
What good would such words do him now? He couldn't even begin to imagine how she would receive them. She would most likely think he was crazy. Pitiful.
She didn't miss him and she certainly didn't need him- the way she didn't need him before she met him. He had done nothing but ruin her and make her miserable, turned her into a woman who had to cry every night and then lock herself in a cold shell every morning. It was better this way. At least now she could start picking up the pieces of her life and move on. And he could do the same.
Still, he could never bring himself to accept the dinner invitations one of his attractive female colleagues was always dropping his way.
...ooo...
Before her illness Kikyo had taught an art appreciation course at a local college. It didn't pay much, but it had been enough to support her before marriage, and afterwards she had kept the job. Before she met Sesshomaru, it had really been the only thing in her life she thoroughly enjoyed, the only thing that had given her any sense of fulfillment.
During the first two and a half years of her marriage, when she was still working and enjoying being a new bride, she had truly been happy. And then...
And then she didn't know. Everything became grey again.
It must have been a slow process because she couldn't pinpoint an exact time when little by little, all the color was drained from her world.
At first she tried to ignore it, tried to keep going as if everything were still the same. In the end she couldn't.
About six months prior to the divorce, everything unraveled, too fast for her to stop. That was when she started to feel tired all the time and couldn't sleep. With every passing day it became more and more of a struggle just to get up, and even worse knowing what sort of day awaited her- full of smiling, laughing people. Happy people. Normal people. Her strength failed her and she couldn't bring herself to face them. The smiles she painted on her own face became too difficult to maintain.
She took a sabbatical halfway through the fall semester. They hired a replacement for the rest of the year before phasing out the program completely from lack of funding.
Now to support herself, Kikyo took a job directing a small art gallery uptown. She knew the only reason she got it was because the owner was infatuated with her, but it paid well and her savings was nearly depleted after putting down the first three months rent for her apartment and buying the needed furniture to make it livable. It was still pretty bare, but she didn't care. Kikyo had never needed much in the way of material items.
Every month Sesshomaru sent her a check, but she never cashed them. She wanted to tell him he didn't have to feel guilty or worried or whatever it was he was still feeling in regards to her. She was capable of taking care of herself- had done so long before she ever met him. There was nothing for him to concern himself over.
Still, every time they came- always on the fifteenth- she opened the envelope. It was a stupid and senseless thing to do because she knew exactly what was inside, the check and nothing else, but she always caved in to the tiny part of her that still clung to the hope that maybe he had included a note. Just to say hello. Ask how she was. Something that told her he still thought of her just beyond finances. There was never anything.
Every day at work, the owner of the gallery came to see her, a man named Naraku- tall, dark, good looking, and wealthy. The kind of man women tripped over themselves for.
It was almost ironic, like some bad punishment fate insisted she take.
If it weren't for Naraku, she and Sesshomaru would never have met.
Kikyo remembered that night- was it nearly five years ago? It might have been just last week.
For weeks Naraku had been stalking her. She couldn't remember how they came to know one another, probably through some mutual acquaintance, but from the very beginning she had made it clear she was neither interested in him nor anyone else. But Naraku wasn't one to take 'no' for an answer. He remained persistent, found out everything she liked to do, all of her interests. If she had thought to do so, she could have had a restraining order set against him, but he wasn't threatening. Annoying perhaps, but harmless.
And then one night he presented her with an offer he knew she couldn't refuse- tickets to an exclusive gallery opening and auction. It wasn't even a date. Naraku was going with someone else, but he told her he had an extra ticket and seeing as how she was so keen... Kikyo had decided it wouldn't hurt to attend.
That was where she first met Sesshomaru. They had just happened to be studying the same painting, and Kikyo had made a dry remark which he must have found amusing because she could have sworn he almost laughed.
Later on they coincidentally enough were also seated at the same table along with Naraku and his date for cocktails during the auction.
Naraku had leaned over and asked her which piece she preferred and she told him- an abstract painting of a doll-like girl with black eyes, her figure intersected by sharp angular flowers and bladed leaves all done in shades of blue and gray.
He made a bid for it. Sesshomaru beat him and presented it to her afterwards.
Looking back, Kikyo wished she had refused it. It wasn't as if he had really bought it for her anyway. He had only done what he did for the satisfaction of beating Naraku- it was obvious they were acquainted and that neither cared much for the other.
She wondered what Sesshomaru would think now if he knew she working for Naraku.
If they were still married, he probably would have marched into the place, threw her over his shoulder while threatening to blind Naraku if he so much as looked at her again.
Then again, she knew it wasn't really for her benefit either. Sesshomaru was possessive of everything he considered 'his'. She could have been a piece of property for all it mattered.
Since she came to work for him, Naraku had been unusually attentive. He probably noticed the absence of a wedding band on her ring finger. He was constantly offering to take her to lunch, to dinner, had fresh flowers delivered to her office daily, stopped by to chat, see how she was doing- all the things Sesshomaru never bothered with.
Kikyo declined him politely.
She wished she could just tell him outright to save his energy and attention. There was no way she would allow herself to fall into that trap again. No matter how tempting the proposition. She couldn't even remember how she came to fall into it the first time around.
No one could understand how a woman like her could fall for such a man as Sesshomaru. For a long time Kikyo herself couldn't understand.
He was so cold, they told her. Nothing at all of what she needed, and certainly nothing of what she could want. She should be with someone who could appreciate her, Naraku had said. Someone who knew what she needed, what she wanted, and exactly how to give her both. Not someone like Sesshomaru.
But when she was with him, none of that even mattered. When she was with him, for the first time Kikyo felt that perhaps there might be something more to life than simply waiting for it to end. That perhaps there was something more to her than just an empty shell.
She was such a fool. No wonder Sesshomaru could never love her.
She wished they had never met. Her life might have been empty before him, but at least it was bearable compared to the void she felt now.
After work every day, she went straight back to her apartment, stopping only at the supermarket to purchase ingredients for a dinner she often times forgot to make and more often forgot to eat.
The nights were always the hardest.
During the day she could force herself to get up, get dressed, go through the motions of living, but at night... At night there was nothing to occupy her mind, nothing to distract her from the voices constantly whispering insecurities. Nothing to keep her from being possessed by that woman who loved to cry.
How Kikyo hated her.
Stop crying! she demanded. It was weakness to cry, but the woman never listened. She cried and cried and cried, and in the morning Kikyo hated herself even more because of it.
She was only glad Sesshomaru never found out, otherwise he would have hated her too. He would have been disgusted to know just exactly what kind of woman she was, had allowed herself to be reduced to.
Months went by, and the numbness spread, but it was never the same as before she got married. Life was a black and white photograph. The picture was the same, but before it had been out of focus, the edges blurred, the gray images soft. Something not altogether real. Now everything was sharpened to fine points, so clear she could almost reach in and touch them. But she bled every time she tried to.
...ooo...
As the days turned into weeks and the weeks into months, Sesshomaru fell into a routine with the semblance of normalcy.
Every morning he woke up, took a short shower, changed into his suit. He took breakfast at the corner café with a really strong brew of coffee- bitter, but satisfying- while browsing the morning paper for anything interesting. There usually wasn't. For lunch he ate in his office whatever his secretary bought him from the deli across the street, and for dinner it was either restaurants or take out. It tasted nothing like Kikyo's cooking, but he tried not to think about it.
His whole life came to revolve around his work, but really, that wasn't so different from before. It was just that now he pushed himself even harder to meet the needs of his clients and the firm the way he could never meet his wife's. It paid off too- in the first few months after their divorce, he was promoted to a bigger office, a bigger paycheck, bigger responsibilities. Not that it made much of a difference. It only meant that now he had even more money he didn't know what to do with. But at least his work kept his mind from thinking about her.
He was through with thinking about her, concerning himself over how she might be doing when she didn't even care to tell him. In the end that was what had really bothered him, even before the divorce. It wasn't that she felt the need to cry, it was just that she refused to let him see, to let him know she wasn't well. The way she always stepped out of the bedroom to do it, used the bathroom down the hall when she got sick, brushed her teeth afterwards so he'd never find out. She didn't even trust him enough to take care of her.
That was the real issue.
If someone as weak as that woman who cried constantly in the hallway didn't see it fit enough to seek out his help, didn't see him as capable of helping her, then how much weaker did that make him?
He realized he had never really been angry with her for crying, he was angry with her for not telling him, for hurting his pride as a husband. He was supposed to take care of her, she was supposed to be able to depend on him. But Kikyo refused to depend on anyone.
Wasn't that why he had married her in the first place?
God, he was such a fool.
One day he learned Kikyo was working at an art gallery owned by Naraku- a man Sesshomaru knew briefly by reputation as they were acquainted with the same circles socially. He had had quite an infatuation on her, and it baffled Sesshomaru to no end how she could agree to work for such a man.
Sesshomaru never did like him.
Naraku was a notorious playboy, and he had gone after Kikyo simply because she wasn't interested and wouldn't give in to him. He was in it for the conquest, nothing else.
Sesshomaru remembered the night of their meeting.
A client of his had insisted on his attending some art show he had absolutely no interest in, but the man who invited him was quite an important figure and his wife had some pieces on display- trite paintings of arranged silk flowers. Sesshomaru had a sneaking suspicion they had been included simply because the man was backing the gallery.
He had been observing one of the paintings when a woman had appeared beside him, her eyes roaming the canvas distastefully.
"It looks like something an art I student regurgitated for a mandatory still life project- mediocre technique and even less creativity," she had stated dryly. It wasn't necessarily aimed at him, but he was the only one nearby to hear it.
In any case, he had found it amusing. Didn't she know whose work she was criticizing? Or did she simply not care?
Later that evening he had found himself sitting beside her with Naraku on her left. The man was with another woman, but the passes he kept making at Kikyo were quite obvious enough. When the auction began, he had asked her which piece she favored, and naively she encouraged him by pointing one out. Naraku made a bid for it.
Sesshomaru didn't really know what came over him, but on impulse, he raised his card as well, upping the price. For several minutes it had gone back and forth between him and Naraku until with a small shrug, Naraku gave in.
"Well, my dear," he had told Kikyo, "I tried, but it seems our friend here is quite eager to obtain the piece you had set your eyes on. Heartless of him, really, but what can one do?"
Sesshomaru hadn't bothered to respond. He had just blown several thousand dollars on a painting he didn't even know the artist to, but it was well worth it just to put that arrogant bastard in his place.
When the whole thing was over, he had stood out under the large awning of the gallery lobby. It had been pouring down rain and he was waiting for the valet to bring the car around. He noticed her not too far off. She glanced back and caught his eye, a quick smile.
"Congratulations on acquiring the painting," she had congratulated when he walked over. "The composition is marvelous."
"If you say so," he replied blandly. "I have no interest in such things."
"Then why did you buy it?" she had questioned.
And he answered matter-of-factly, "Because I could."
Her lips twisted into a wry smile, "As good a reason as any other, I suppose." Turning away, she glanced up at the darkened sky flashing lightening and the big heavy drops of rain pelting the ground.
She sighed a little.
"I hope this rain lets up soon," she murmured more to herself than to him. Taking out an umbrella, she opened it up and prepared to leave.
"You plan on walking in this downpour?" he asked.
"Unless I can catch a cab," she answered. "It's either that or wait for Naraku to insist on taking me home, and I'd rather not take him up on that offer."
Just then his car rolled in front of them.
On another impulse he told her, "Get in."
"What?" She had to look at him twice to understand what he had just spoken.
"I'll give you a ride," he repeated already behind the wheel. "If you want it."
From a distance Kikyo had spotted Naraku making his way to her and jumped inside. He drove her home that night, memorized the address, and had the painting delivered the next day. That was how it had all began...
And this was how it all ended, with neither one much better off than when they started.
The idea of her working now for Naraku- a man he knew would still be deeply interested in her simply because he could never have her- really bothered Sesshomaru. The possibility that they might be involved crossed his mind, and he nearly recoiled at the thought. His Kikyo with that bastard?
No, she couldn't... How could she be so naive as to fall for someone like Naraku? Surely she must realize what he was after, and that once he had it, he wouldn't think of her again.
Sesshomaru didn't know who to be more angry at- Kikyo for attaching herself to Naraku, or Naraku for playing Kikyo. If anything happened to her, he swore he'd kill him.
And then Sesshomaru caught himself, frowned, ran a hand through his hair.
Was it really any more of his business what she did now? He had to keep reminding himself Kikyo wasn't his wife anymore. She was free to do as she damned well pleased, and he had no say in the matter.
Damn woman...
But how could she be so blind as to get involved with Naraku? Or had things simply become too difficult and she was working for him because she had no choice?
This idea bothered him even more than the thought of them together, and the next check he sent her, Sesshomaru doubled the amount with the hope that it might be enough to convince her to quit. But of course, she never redeemed it.
...OOO...
Ok, I'm in dire need of sleep and food, but I couldn't stop typing, though people kept interrupting. Sigh, when did it get to be so hard to achieve a little solitude? Move to Appalachia and become a hermit who farms beets? Oh to lead such a life...
Lol, ok. Enough of that.
Anyway, I've decided not to respond individually to reviews at the moment, just because this will be a pretty short story. I thought it would be better just to finish it and let you guys draw your own conclusions, and at the end if anyone has any comments or questions, then I'll answer. But please don't hold back on the reviews now, because I do still take them into consideration when writing- they help me figure out not only what you guys think but also of ideas and feelings I might be falling short in conveying. So please, leave a note:pout: lol.