What surprised Miroku most about the days he spent recovering from being poisoned was how little Inuyasha complained about it. For once in his life the hanyou seemed content to give Miroku all the time he needed. Whatever had happened to bring about this strange development, Miroku was glad not to be rushed in his recovery.

It had been a stupid risk, he knew, to use the kazaana with all those wasps and youkai around. It could have been torn open again. He could have accidentally harmed one of his friends. Or the poison could have killed him. It was only through sheer luck that none of those things had happened.

He and his friends had emerged relatively unscathed, and so had Kohaku. It was a victory of a sort, even if it was not what any of them had hoped for. They had not succeeded in even locating Naraku as they had originally set out to do, but they had at least managed to thwart his latest plan.

Too bad Miroku was not at all certain that they could repeat such a feat.

Alone in the room with no one to distract him or keep him company, he decided it was better not to dwell on past failures, and directed his thoughts elsewhere. He preferred to focus on the positives, anyway. Like the fact that his friends were still alive. He was still alive.

And, also, Sango had regained something of her usual self. He had even caught her smiling once or twice when she came to keep him company. Seeing everyone rally to help her, to try to save her brother, it had changed something in her—that much was plain to see. It seemed to him almost as if she had been a flower bud waiting to bloom, that had now burst forth into a riot of lovely petals and sweet scent.

In those fleeting moments, he realized just how sad and subdued she had been all this time. The woman he knew was a mere shadow of who Sango really was. Deep down he had always known this must be so, but now he had seen it for himself. And he wanted to see more.

That surprised him, a little. What surprised him even more was that her smile almost made the pain and the poison and this tedious recovery worth it.

To see her smile, to have some hope that she might one day claw her way out from under all the grief and despair that had been dropped onto her shoulders… Miroku might not admit it out loud, but he would do it all again. Shared experience and pain had drawn them together, however uncomfortably, but his trauma was years behind him. However terrible his scars, he'd had time to heal. Sango had not.

He had kept it to himself, but he had worried about her all this time. Just a little bit, not intrusively, but he knew all too well what it felt like to lose everything and try to keep living. It cheered him immensely to know that Sango might be moving past the worst of it.

He was still pondering the implications of her smile when Sango quietly announced herself and entered the hut. Kirara was with her, and Shippou came last, carefully carrying a bowl of Kagome's delicious-smelling noodle soup.

"You look extra cheerful today," the kitsune observed as he delivered the soup. "Does that mean you're feeling better?"

Miroku graciously accepted the bowl while Sango and Shippou seated themselves near his makeshift bed. "I am," he told them. "It seems I'm not going to die from the poison after all."

Shippou shot him a warning look, but Sango just looked relieved. "I'm glad," she admitted. Was that the hint of a blush he saw on her cheeks as she went on, or only his imagination? It had not escaped his notice that she was here despite his misbehavior during her first visit, or that she had been careful to sit nearby but safely out of reach this time. "I couldn't stand it if you died because of me."

Miroku did not like the direction this was going. "Then there's no reason to be sad."

Her eyes narrowed. "You're not going to tell me to smile again, are you?"

He chuckled. "Me? No. I'm going to enjoy this soup, and the company, and the fact that Inuyasha isn't insisting we get moving again—"

"Not yet, anyway," Shippou cut in. "You know he's getting impatient."

"Is he?" Miroku asked dryly, though he really had no doubt. Left to his own devices, Inuyasha usually wasn't this patient; Kagome and Sango had probably been working hard to convince their hanyou friend to let Miroku rest and recover. If so, he owed them a great deal of gratitude.

"You know how he is," Sango agreed. She paused a beat, and added, "If you need more time…"

"I have no intention of finding out just how far I can push Inuyasha's patience," he told her. At least, not this time. Seeing the dubious look that Sango and Shippou shared, he protested, "I really am feeling better."

"Is that really saying much when he was nearly dead a few days ago?" Shippou asked Sango, as if Miroku were not sitting right there listening to them.

"No, I don't think it is," Sango agreed.

At that point, Miroku just shook his head, which only made him a little dizzy, and let their conversation go on without him. Still, it was nice to know they cared. He wasn't used to that… at least, not like this. Mushin was always much more gruff—and a lot less gentle.

And Mushin certainly never brought him noodle soup from another world. The poison had left him with little appetite, but he knew he would need to keep up his strength, especially if Inuyasha wanted to be back on the move soon. At least the soup had a strong, salty flavor that could penetrate even his poison-dulled senses.

As he ate, and listened to Sango and Shippou talk of the road ahead, he finally began to feel heartened. Having spent most of his life alone or in fleeting, frivolous relationships with people who were essentially strangers—he was living on borrowed time anyway, so why form attachments?—he had never really understood how much it could help just to have friends around.

When he had finished eating, Sango gathered up the dishes and helped Shippou balance them to carry them back outside. Before she left, she turned back and said softly, "Rest well, Houshi-sama."

And then she was gone, and Miroku was left with an incongruous realization: while the others had quickly taken to calling him by his name, Sango never had. Now that was something to think about while he had nothing else to do but lie here and recover…