Life comes at you one hundred miles an hour. It never stops, never slows down, never waits. He'd found himself at a mere twenty years old suddenly at the top of the UFC food chain before he could even register what happened. His career had skyrocketed to the top at rocket speed. There was no manual that prepared him for the pressure, the fame, the newfound wealth and endorsements from brands he used to dream would even breathe in his direction. How did I get here?

"Inuyasha?"

He was called back to earth by the journalist that sat in front of him, notepad in hand, a worried look in his eyes. How long have I zoned out for?

"Oh…yeah." His voice trailed off; a nervous smile plastered on his face. "What was the question again?" He asked, his eyes darting over to Miroku who stood behind the journalist, outside of the little pocket of fluorescent lights and cables connecting audio and cameras. This interview had been on his schedule for a few months now, and it came only a few days after accepting Koga's rematch. To Miroku it was golden timing, to Inuyasha it was absolute hell.

His body was still feeling shitty after coming down from a multiple day high and he had spent most of the previous day cuddled up in bed with a bottle of vodka trying to drink the dread of this interview away (as well as nurse a cocaine crash). He'd woken up that morning reluctant to sit in a chair face to face with someone he didn't even really want to talk to for multiple hours, but Miroku forced him out of bed and dragged him into his shower. He forced him to eat and get ready.

So, he found himself here. In this interview. Irritated to high heaven but here.

Sometimes he just had to show up, and hope that was good enough.

"What motivated you to become the fighter you are now?" The question hung suspended in the air for a moment, he sucked in a breath and held it in his chest for a few seconds before exhaling. Why'd he have to be so bad with words? Why couldn't he just...talk.

"I come from a very poor area in Osaka. The Nishinari ward, specifically the area surrounding Kamagasaki, the poorest neighborhood in Osaka. I struggled a lot growing up." It was the most that this journalist was getting out of him regarding his upbringing. "If you wanna talk about motivation, that was mine." He added, shrugging his shoulders.

"I see...you just wanted to get out of where you're from? That was your motivation?"

"In summary." Inuyasha replied, shrugging his shoulders again. There's a lot more to it.

"Did your parents influence you at all—"

"I don't talk about my parents." Inuyasha cut him off, waving his hand dismissively. "Too much to unpack." My dad was a fucking drunk, and a drug addict and my mother split when I was like 5. Do you really need a sob story?

"Oh." The journalist replied, his mouth shaping an 'o', realizing he seemed to have struck a nerve with the hanyou, noticing the slight twinge of irritation in his voice; it was hard to miss. "Tough upbringing?"

"Whaddya think?" Inuyasha responded, rather hostile. He was beginning to lose patience and as a result ripped off the little microphone that was clipped to his shirt, standing up from his seat as he took off the little microphone pack that was clipped to the back of his pants. "I'm taking a break." He muttered, walking out of frame and over to Miroku, who was busy on the phone. He tapped him on the shoulder, and then crossed his arms.

"You're supposed to be interviewing, go." Miroku ordered, attempting to shoo his friend away. "I'm in the middle of something."

"I don't want to do this interview with this person." Inuyasha whispered, tilting his head in the direction of the journalist, who waited patiently in their seat for the athlete to return to the interview. He understood that nerves were a factor in how journalists did their job, but he wasn't going to sit there and be asked redundant questions and waste his time. "Reschedule." he ordered, "now."

"Can't you sit through it? You do this all the time." Miroku pleaded, holding a hand over his phone. Inuyasha rolled his eyes, causing Miroku to tug at his earlobe, messing with the small hoop earring he wore. "Please?"

"Miroku." Inuyasha warned, but Miroku was all but accustomed to his empty threats.

"Inuyasha, I'm currently on the phone with a brand that wants a deal with you and if I don't get back to this conversation, I will personally purify you to all fucks."

There wasn't much that Inuyasha could say in response."Fine." he groaned in response, earning a thankful smile from his friend.

"You can do it, only a few more hours left." Miroku said, going back to his conversation.

Begrudgingly, Inuyasha exhaled in frustration, and dragged his feet back to where he was sitting. An audio technician came forward quickly, setting up his microphone once more. He sat back down, and gave the journalist a fake smile. "Where were we?"

"So how did it go this morning?" Kagome asked, glancing from the artwork on the wall to Inuyasha, who started intently at the piece, as if trying to figure out what it might represent. "With the interview."

"Fine." Inuyasha replied, still staring at the artwork. Sure, he might have been a little more than just mean to the journalist. And the interview would have to be heavily edited for expletives before ESPN could even consider airing it, but it had gone notably better than any other interview he'd had in his career. His eyes trailed over the painting of a skull, missing its jaw and some teeth, but perched atop a book with some papers. A toppled glass on the table leaned against the skull, an old orange oil lamp standing behind the skull and book, slightly to the left, if he squinted he could barely see the embers of a wick that seemed to be just put out. A feather and vial of ink. It was all so random to him, and yet…

"This is art?" He questioned slowly, as he leaned slightly toward Kagome. He glanced over to the silver plaque under the artwork, it was painted in 1628.

"Yes." Kagome muttered back. The museum was quiet, calm. Every once in a while you could hear the shuffling of feet from one exhibit to the next, but not much else beyond that. Kagome had suggested to Miroku a while back that they take a trip to the museum as a "date", but he strongly objected to the fact that museums typically did not allow high quality cameras, and the whole point of their relationship was to be public and photographable. He changed his tune, though, when he figured out that people could easily take pictures of them with their phones and upload them on social media. After all, phones weren't considered high quality cameras. She'd noticed some people taking pictures of them with their phones held low to their hips, or held a strange angle so as to be discreet but also capture an image of them. "What, you don't think it's art?" Kagome asked, raising an eyebrow.

Inuyasha scoffed, "It's not that I don't think it's art...it's just weird."

"This is supposed to represent the fleetingness of life, how nothing stays the same and how everything is temporary...except death." Kagome said, taking a moment to look at the painting again and point at the glass with her pinky finger, circling the area. "The glass is reflecting the room the artist is in, you see that? It's kind of distorted and shifted...like you're walking past it and happen to see the reflecting in the glass."

"And that's supposed to signify... what? Life?"

They hadn't talked much since she came to see him after his accident, wagging fingers and scolding him for not contacting anyone since getting out of the hospital after his accident. She'd thrown out a phrase that made him break out in hives every time it was uttered in his direction.

"I care about you"

She hurled it at him like a weapon, hoping it would weaken his wall, and get him to just stop being so insufferably defensive. But it hadn't done anything. She didn't get a change of expression, a glint in his eyes...nothing. He was stoic, as if she hadn't said anything at all. Because every other person that had uttered that phrase in his direction had fucking lied to him. And he was tired of being lied to.

There was one person in his life that he believed whole-heartedly cared about him, and that was Miroku.

So when Kagome stared at him with anger burning in her big, brown eyes, her hands balled up in fists at her sides as she screamed those words at him...announcing that she cared about him, it took everything he had in himself not to laugh cruelly at her. But he wanted to. Inuyasha tried, and failed miserably to push her words away—but they echoed in his mind all night, repeating like some broken record, and he couldn't get it to stop.

He felt like there was awkwardness between them because of it, because he didn't give her a typical reaction. But in reality it's just...being cared for, or caring for other people just...it scared him. He didn't like it.

"Yes." Kagome responded, glancing around the room before her eyes settled back on the painting. "What do you think?"

"It looks...real, for being so old." He muttered, taking in a sharp breath, "did they teach you this stuff at...what's that place again?"

"Harvard?" Kagome asked, raising an eyebrow. "I took a class in this one semester, it was fun. I remember a lot."

"I can tell."

It was quiet between them for a moment, before Kagome started to move toward another art piece without saying a word, and Inuyasha found himself quietly following her, his golden eyes following her line of site to another realistic painting. Half rotten fruit (oranges, apples, grapes) were drawn strewn over a table. It's white cloth bunched up to one side, the fruit bowl in which the fruit was most likely originally in, was fallen on its side. He glanced quickly in her direction, watching as she tilted her head to the side slightly, brown eyes squinting as she stared at the artwork. Her wavy black hair held back in a loose ponytail, showing off the piercing she had on the helix of her ear, and the small butterfly tattoo behind it. "Is this by the same person?"

"No." Kagome answered, glancing down at the plaque. "But it is from the same era."

"Why are there so many dark colors?"

"It was part of the art style of that period. People really focused on the vanity of humans, so they hung up these really dark art pieces to show that 'hey we really shouldn't be caring about these things because we're all going to die soon'. They were kind of emo like that, in that time period." Kagome replied, shrugging her shoulders.

"That's fucked." Inuyasha scoffed, shaking his head slightly. "What's so bad about enjoyin' the finer things in life while you're here and able to? You've worked hard for it."

"I think modern day society can take a page out of their book," Kagome said, inhaling sharply. "The only thing certain in life is death, everything else is fleeting. We spend so much time obsessing over things like money, our social media presence, the possessions we have."

Everything else is fleeting.

Inuyasha wrinkled up his nose in disagreement, rolling his eyes at Kagome. "You act like you don't think about that." And in a whisper he added, "You wouldn't have taken this gig if it wasn't for a million."

"I know I do." Kagome replied, turning her head to look at him, one of her hands resting on the top of her chain bag, the gold of the chain glinting under the soft gold light of the museum. "Because society has placed such a big emphasis on money. It's not all that matters in life."

"I dunno, when you grow up going hungry because your family is broke, you realize how important money is." Inuyasha retorted, a slight bitter note in his voice as he crossed his arms defensively. Her eyes trailed over to the muscle in his arms, before darting back up to his face where she was met with smoldering golden eyes. He had a sort of predatory gaze, making her breath hitch in her throat for a second. His eyes were beautiful. No matter how much she hated him, disagreed with him, argued with him, whatever...his eyes were the one thing about him that would always admit were absolutely breathtaking to her, and nothing could change that.

She may not have found his personality particularly likable, but she would be lying to herself if she said he wasn't beautiful. His hair was always so shiny it might as well glow under direct light, it reminded her of spun silver. The beautiful eyes that she was entranced with the second her own eyes met them, like pools of molten gold, or honey in sunlight. The predatory gaze was constant, it never left, never changed, adding an aspect of forbiddenness to him, like he was too beautiful to touch. The muscular bodice, and the veins in his arms. Her mind flashed back to the night they had sex, she remembered the feel of the muscles in his forearm as she guided his hand up to her neck. The feeling of his hand gently tightening around it. The moan of her name as she rode him. God, that moan…

She could admit he was a living breathing, work of art, if only for a moment.

"Kagome."

His voice snapped her out of her trance, and she smiled at him, trying to flight down the blush on her cheeks as she looked at him. She may or may not have lied to him when she told him that day that she didn't remember much. She remembered many moments of that night. "Yeah?" She replied, raising her eyebrows.

"You spaced out." Inuyasha said, eyeing her for a moment before turning his attention back to the art work they were looking at. "Why exactly are we here?" He asked, sighing as he shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans. "I'm bored."

Of course he would find a mentally stimulating activity boring, Kagome thought to herself. "I suggested we come here as a date idea to Miroku."

"And he agreed because…?" He made a motion with his hands, causing Kagome to giggle to herself.

"I pressured him into it. I was getting tired of constantly going to events and dinners and...mentally and physically exhausting events. I work all day before most of them, so it's like double exhaustion. I wanted to take it easy for once...have a slow day."

"So you suggested spending the day walking around the museum?" Inuyasha questioned, a black eyebrow raised before he rolled his eyes, huffing. "Okay then, if it makes sense to you who am I to tell you it doesn't."

"It's better than spending the night at some loud club, or social event after a day at work." Kagome argued, and Inuyasha could accept that it was a valid point.

It was again quiet for a few moments between them, before Kagome grabbed hold of his hand. "What the hell is that for?" Inuyasha asked, attempting to tug his hand out of her grasp. Kagome shot him a glare, and growled lowly in response, but closed his hand around hers reluctantly.

They'd settled into a sort of...better dynamic. They still argued a lot, but much of it had lost it's nasty, straight-for-the-throat edge. They could converse without it turning into an argument which had both alleviated Miroku's headaches and anxieties about the arrangement and Kagome's stress. Inuyasha always seemed to be in higher spirits, and Kagome mostly attributed it to summer starting. While he hadn't lost his argumentative streak, he was happier these days, sometimes a little too upbeat, which made her suspicious but she never questioned it. Whatever was putting him in good moods was good for her, and she didn't want it to stop anytime soon.

She had, however, noticed that he had gotten quieter since the last time she was at his apartment. Which was odd, considering he was never quiet, and always had something to say, whether it was good or bad. So for him to suddenly clam up and constantly avoid looking her in the eyes was...strange. "Are you okay?" She asked quietly, no longer able to contain her curiosity. With a gentle tug on his hand, she led them out of the exhibition they were in, and out into the hallway.

"Yeah?" Inuyasha answered, although it was phrased more as a question than an answer as he trailed behind her toward the other exhibition, his hand loosely holding onto hers. "Why?"

"Nothing," Kagome replied quickly, starting down the large limestone steps, the sound of her short heel echoing throughout the quiet building as they descended the steps. "I've just noticed that you've been kind of...quieter...lately." She tucked a loose strand of her hair behind her ear as she paused for a moment on the steps, and turned her body in his direction. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine." Inuyasha replied, huffing. "Why wouldn't I be? Maybe I haven't been feeling very talkative lately."

"No it's just…" Kagome paused for a moment before shaking her head, and starting down the stairs again. "Lets just go look at some more art."

"No, Kagome." Inuyasha said, pulling back on her hand slightly. "What is it?"

"I told you I cared about you and you just...didn't respond. Like...that's a pretty big thing to say someone and you just...didn't respond. Your expression didn't change, the look in your eyes didn't change...you were stoic. I felt like I was looking at your brother for a second." She looked up at him and noticed that he looked confused by her words."What I'm trying to say is that you've been quiet ever since I've said that."

He knew she was going to bring it up, it was only a matter of time. And when she did he could feel the exhaustion of the squabble they were about to have enter his body almost as if he had invited it in. "It's...don't think about it too much, alright?"

"Hm." Kagome vocalized, turning to start once more, down the stairs. It took a few seconds for Inuyasha to follow after her, no longer holding her hand. In a few moments, he found himself standing in a room, basked in natural sunlight. All around him were sets of armor encased in glass cases. Some of them sat atop statues of horses, also covered in armor.

He found Kagome on the other side of the room, again seemingly deep in thought as she looked at something that was inside of the large glass encasement, and he felt a rush of anger overtake him for a short moment, before he took a deep breath. He didn't know much about museums, but he knew that having an argument in the middle of one wasn't a good look. It took him a few moments to gather his composure before he started toward her.

Okay...so what he didn't respond in a way people usually respond when someone tells them they're cared for? What exactly did she expect him to do? Change? Tell her he cared about her too?

To be honest, he was confused on exactly why she was angry with him. It's not like he'd done anything particularly deserving of her disappointment since then, or at least, nothing that she was aware of.

"I don't get it." Inuyasha whispered when he came closer to her, glancing up at the shield that was in the encasement for a brief moment, before looking back at her. "Why exactly are you mad at me?"

"I'm not mad at you, Yash."

"Don't call me that." He corrected her for what seemed like the dozenth time, shooting her a glare. Kagome rolled her eyes in response.

"Can we not talk about this now? Please? I kind of just want to enjoy the art."

"Fucking armor is art now, too?"

"If it wasn't, why would it be in an art museum?" Kagome snapped back at him, now annoyed. Inuyasha put up his hands defensively. "I figured you'd like this room."

"I do." Inuyasha replied quickly, but his eyes were still glued onto Kagome. He noticed how she wriggled under his gaze, scratching at her neck and attempting to avoid looking at him. "You still haven't answered my question, woman."

"I did." Kagome said, pretending to be interested in another piece of armor that was displayed next to the shield. "Oh look, it's a full set of medieval armor, isn't that neat?"

Inuyasha rolled his eyes at her. He'd come to realize that she was very bad at hiding her emotions. "You know, I just don't understand how the fuck you can say you care about someone without really knowing them. I can't say I care about you. You know why? Because I don't fucking know you, Kagome!" His voice echoed in the large hall, bouncing off the walls. He cleared his throat before talking again. "I don't know shit about you, but you know all about my fucking life." The more he thought about what he'd just said, the more it was true. In the last few months, she's been able to collect practically every little detail that was public in his life, without him getting even the tiniest of detail. What he did know for sure, was her name, where she lived, and where she was from. Kagome, twenty-three years old, lives in the Bronx, and she's originally from Seattle. But, birthday? What she likes? What is her favorite song? He didn't know any of that. He couldn't even guess it—he did once, on that YouTube video they did a while back, but hadn't bothered to ask her if he got anything right. She was still angry at him.

Why is this fucking mattering anyway?

"So, is this you saying you want to get to know me?" Kagome questioned slowly, turning to look at him, taking a step closer to him. "Is it, Inuyasha?" She tried to ignore what he'd said about not caring about her, attributing it to his sudden burst of anger (annoyance? Frustration? Those three emotions looked the same to her when it came to Inuyasha). But it hurt, because why, after all these months couldn't he have even the tiniest of soft spots for her, like she had for him? Sure he argued with her alot, and a lot of times she hated his guts, and he did hers but...she'd spent so much time with him, it was inevitable she would grow to care for him, even if it was in a casual way. She shook her head slightly. No. she wasn't going to take their dynamic in that direction, she didn't even want to. He just looked nice today, that was it. She could admit that to herself, that he looked nice.

She needed to put up a wall between them, forget about his damn reaction. Forget about everything that happened that night at his apartment when she'd told him she cared. He was much easier to hate than love, and Miroku had already told her—told both of them—to not catch feelings.

Shut up and do your fucking job.

He had to pause and think about her question. Is that what he actually wanted? Is that what this whole thing was about? "I…" He started to speak but couldn't really figure out what he wanted to say once he did. He'd said it wrong. It's not that he didn't care for her...he was just…

I don't not care, but I'm not indifferent toward you.

It was weird hearing those words in his head, for the first time when it came to Kagome. Usually, he was silently calling her names and wishing she would crawl into some ditch somewhere and leave him alone. It actually scared him because why the fuck did he need to let his guard down with her? And why the hell did she care if he did? Why did he care if she let down hers?

He was confused.

"If you want to know about me why didn't you ask?" Kagome pressured, folding her arms over her chest. He looked away from her for a few seconds, causing her to scoff at him. "You're pathetic, you know that?"

"Pa-PATHETIC?!" He sputtered. His voice filled the room once more, prompting Kagome to bring her index finger to her lips and shush him. He immediately looked around for a few seconds, before speaking again in a hushed tone. "Bullshit, I'm pathetic!"

"Just say you'd like to get to know me before I go saying stuff like that." Kagome said to him, looking over her shoulder, teasing him, he could just tell. "See, the reason why I've never said anything about myself to you is because you never bothered to ask in the first place."

"Don't go doing that to me…" Inuyasha whispered to himself, his voice dragging slightly as he watched her walk away toward another artifact. He followed quietly after her. "You tellin' me I gotta ask you?"

Now that he thought about it, Kagome did ask Inuyasha about himself on the very first outing Miroku had planned for them, but he hadn't asked her.

He hadn't bothered to.

"I asked you." Kagome said, glancing up at the twin pistols that hung on the wall, each encased in what looked like ivory, small golden details around the barrel and trigger. She looked down at the plaque. "Now you ask me."

"You asked me months ago, Kagome. Is this really necessary right now?'

"It's not." Kagome said softly, still reading the plaque. "You know what? Let's drop this subject, it's not important." She said it abruptly, Inuyasha was slightly taken aback. He blinked, hard. Once, then twice before huffing.

As confused as he was, he wasn't going to pressure the matter further. He sure as hell didn't want to argue, much less in a museum.

"Okay."

What the fuck was that?

"So, Kagome. How did the museum go?" Sango asked her almost as soon as Kagome stumbled into their tiny, yet quaint apartment. She was slipping off her flats at the entrance, holding herself up by pushing her free hand into the wall. Her hair, that was blow dried and curled to perfection in the morning, had lost its curls.

"Just fine." Kagome responded, notably irritated. Sango's smile was wiped from her face, the faintest of frowns making an appearance on her face in its place. Of course she would be irritated, she always was when she was around him.

But Sango always reminded her about the money...so she kept it going.

"Not good? Again?" Sango asked, raising an eyebrow as her eyes followed Kagome until she threw herself down on the couch next to her, putting her feet up on the coffee table.

"No it's not that, it was fine." Kagome said, squinting her eyes as she tried to think about what to say. "We got into an argument but...it wasn't really an argument." She added slowly, tilting her head up slightly as she spoke.

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

"It went from me asking him why the hell he didn't react to me telling him I care about him to him telling me he doesn't care about me because he doesn't know me. What the fuck does he mean he doesn't know me? We've been hanging out almost every day for fucking months. We fucked! It...it was a weird...awkward, conversation. I thought we were getting better, but the awkwardness is just as bad." She understood that much of this was attributed to getting off on the wrong foot, and that this whole situation between them was just as much her fault as it was his. But this time she was confused.

"Hm." Sango vocalized, pressing her lips together as she flipped through the TV channels. "I mean, I'm not defending him, but I am going to play devil's advocate. Put yourself in his shoes Kagome. He's paying you one million dollars to be around him for a year, basically. After a few months of being around, you throw out that phrase. You may not have meant much by it, but I'm sure he sees it as you trying to get more than just a million out of him." Kagome rolled her eyes at Sango. "I'm just saying! You don't have to tell me I'm right or anything, I'm just saying..it can be interpreted very differently than what you intended at the moment, giving the circumstances."

"He acts like no one around him cares about him so I just...blurted out that I do! He was so surprised to see me show up to his apartment after literally ignoring everyone and everything after getting out of the hospital. Remember how he ignored everyone's calls after the hospital?" Sango nodded, slowly. "Well!"

"I understand it's frustrating. Inuyasha is hard to read, especially if you haven't known him for a very long time." Sango offered, rubbing her hand across Kagome's back. "You're really taking it to heart, huh? Not being able to crack his code…"

"It's frustrating. Just when I think I've made some leeway, he clams back up. I told him i cared about him, which i admit was probably too much too soon, especially when we both went into it not expecting more..but."

"But?" Sango asked, confused. "Are you developing feelings?"

"I don't know, maybe?" Kagome said, pouting as she dragged her hands down her face. "I don't not care for him...but I also….like I'm not indifferent? But we're so fucking different I don't see how I could ever even fall for him, I mean...he's such an ass."

"He's attractive." Sango said with a shrug. "You find him attractive."

"He's one beautiful man, yeah." Kagome replied, jokingly, earning a laugh from her friend. "I'm just gonna ignore it, maybe my period is coming soon and I'm just horny."

"Okay so what I'm hearing is that you need to start using your psychology degree on him, and get him to like you back."

"I- Sango I'm not going to psychoanalyze Inuyasha. Did you not listen to what I just said?"

"You should, you might get some answers out of him."

"Like what? Getting him to finally admit he's an alcoholic?" Kagome joked, although she knew it was nothing for her to joke about. But before she could add the classic 'oh, just kidding!' comment to the end of her phrase, Sango had already audibly gasped.

"Shut up...really?" She asked in a hushed tone, as if he could hear them somehow, which was impossible considering he wasn't anywhere near their apartment.

"No!"

"Oh, thank god. I thought Miroku was going to have more on his plate." Sango said, breathing a sigh of relief as she pretended to wipe sweat from her brow. "He never stops working, he's on call 24/7 for Inuyasha...it's nuts."

"Hm." Kagome responded, cracking her knuckles. "Is he really?" She turned her head lazily in the direction of her friend. Sango nodded in response. "That's unhealthy. Kind of. I mean…" She sighed, "I know being a publicist, manager is...hard especially for a troublesome celebrity who just...won't listen to the shit you have to say."

"It's the fact that they're friends on top of it. Like…" It was difficult for Sango to articulate exactly what she meant. Miroku and Inuyasha were friends, best friends. Brothers. She wasn't going to tell Miroku to drop Inuyasha because she was starting to feel like less of a priority to him. It wasn't her place to do so. They grew up together, struggled together, it was only right for him to be so attached. It's just….

"He works...so much. Around the clock. Constantly. If it's not negotiating deals, making Inuyasha's schedules, getting him interviews, or helping to promote his next fight, it's Inuyasha himself." Sango said, almost tripping over her words she was so...frustrated.

"Is Inuyasha a clingy friend?" Kagome asked, asking more so for her own curiosity than anything else.

"Not that he's clingy. He has bad timing." Sango sighed, rolling her eyes. "I can't tell you the amount of times he's called in the middle of Miroku and I having sex, and Miroku just has to answer. He's like a parent." Kagome grimaced at her comment, but continued to listen to Sango vent. "We'll go out to dinner and sure enough he 'has to take this call' or 'has to shoot this email' or 'has to send this text'. It's impossible to go on a date without work rearing it's nasty little head." Kagome giggled.

"Talk to him?" She suggested, raking her hands through her hair.

"I have." Sango replied, defeatedly. "It works for a few days but then he just can't help it, it's like he's addicted to work. He's a workaholic."

"Hm. Yeah that can be difficult. Especially with these two. They're attached at the hip." Kagome offered in response, giving her friend a lopsided grin. "I'm sorry Sango."

"You're telling me?" Sango scoffed. "And Sesshomaru has been gone for god knows how long, so Miroku's working overtime answering to Inuyasha's every whim."

"Yeah, where the fuck has he been anyways?" Kagome asked, raising an eyebrow. "I mean, I've talked to Rin...she doesn't say much. But I can tell she's worried, and pissed." She added. "Think he went back to Japan?"

"Miroku told me Inuyasha fired him."

"I wasn't aware of this...so he went back to Japan with his tail between his legs?"

"Said it was only going to be for about a week."

"It's been more."

"I know."

"Jesus." Kagome breathed, sinking back into their couch. "How bad do you think that argument might have been?" After a few moments she added, "I feel bad for Rin..all alone in that huge house. How could he just leave like that?"

"Miroku told me their relationship is weird. They each do whatever they want—they understand each other like that, I'm sure Rin understands." Sango said, shrugging. "She's busy all the time anyways, and so was he. Not like either of them saw each other much."

"Yeah but," Kagome bit her bottom lip for a second, "That's still her fiance. You don't just...up and leave when you want to...I guess I'm just looking at all this through my perspective, but I would've totally called off the engagement if he left and just didn't come back…" It looks like Inuyasha puts a strain on everyone's relationship, not just Sango's. "We should call her and invite her over, have some drinks and stuff. What do you think? Are you up for it?"

"Of course!" Sango replied, "I can run to the liquor store really quick and get us some more wine, and some of that tequila you like."

"Awesome." Kagome replied. "I'll text Rin." With that she got up from her couch, and padded over to where she set down her bag. She fished around inside her bag for a few moments before locating her phone.