IZON SHŌ

Chapter XLIV

Forty fourth session

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The mood in the place was turning more pleasant with every minute. The trio seated at one of the tables of the izakaya were laughing before the stories Jinenji was sharing about his own teenager days and InuYasha's. Kagome was also paying special attention to the details being narrated, absorbing the information with keen interest.

"Oh, c'mon! Those magazines were yours!" InuYasha shouted, smiling, as he leaned back on the chair.

"They were, but that didn't stop you from keeping them for more than three months, and to return them suspiciously stained." Jinenji pointed out, his index finger extended in InuYasha's direction, using his right hand as if to further stress his veiled accusation.

"Really, InuYasha?" Kagome feigned to be scandalized.

He looked at her, his smile unceasing.

"I told you I had spilled some juice." InuYasha said, knowing Jinenji would exploit the topic further.

"Sure, sure. Where did the juice come from, though?" He asked, then looked at Kagome. "Alright, better to leave it at that. I may scare your Thursday's night girl away."

Kagome felt particularly at ease with that man who at a first glance seemed rude, or even prone to having a foul-mood, yet came as a fun and sweet individual. Her smile widened before the comment, and she couldn't help stealing a glimpse of InuYasha, finding him doing the same; She had started as her Thursday's girl, after all.

"That's for the best. We don't want that." InuYasha kidded.

"Don't stop for me, I love these kinds of stories." She encouraged, tapping her beerless glass.

"I'm going for another round." InuYasha stood up.

"No, please, don't let it be said I didn't invite you while in my own place." Jinenji tried to stop him.

"Precisely because it's your place, I want to order myself." He placed a hand on his shoulder.

Kagome didn't miss that act of mutual care she saw between the two friends, nor did she found it strange, for everything she'd seen until then about InuYasha, pointed to him being an honest man. Maybe that was why her gaze followed him to the bar, more enthralled than she would have wanted to show.

"Are you liking Nakano, Kagome?" Jinenji's question was simple, and meant to fill the empty space of the moment.

"I am. It's quiet here." It was the first adjective she found to define all she'd seen until then. A place with movement, with picturesque and familiar views.

"Of course; coming from a city like Tokio, this should seem quiet." The man put two and two together.

Kagome shrugged, and nodded.

"Has InuYasha told you this place was almost ours?"

"No. Can you tell me?" She seemed cheerful; She was just discovering she liked to know details about InuYasha's life.

In that moment she looked towards the bar, towards him, and found that a woman had placed a hand on his shoulder to get his attention. InuYasha turned around, happy, only to then take half-a-step back and nod as a greeting. He seemed to know her.

"Well, around high school we had started planning to open up bar. Back then we both were thinking we needed a more joyful place than what we could find around here." Jinenji started to narrate.

Kagome would look at him only occasionally, her attention focused on the scene of InuYasha with that woman.

They were talking, and she would often touch her hair to make sure it was perfectly straight on her back. She had the feeling the woman was restless, and in fact she seemed to be the only one talking. InuYasha then made a gesture, as if waving the importance away of something, probably a part of what she was saying.

"... finally one day he decided to try his luck in Tokyo." Jinenji stopped then, and followed Kagome's gaze. "... oh, it's Kikyo."

"Kikyo?" The question came without wait, as a strong foreboding feeling settled in her stomach and chest.

"Yeah, an ex." He interrupted himself then, looked at her, and seemed to understand he was saying more than he should." … I think I've drank one too many beers. I shouldn't be the one to tell you this." He smiled.

"Don't worry. We are all adults here." She said, albeit that didn't get rid of the sudden pressure on her chest.

Kagome observed the scene a bit longer, and soon found InuYasha's gaze on her, a gaze that seemed to want to know if she was watching.

"In any case, it was a long time ago. About the time we were about to finish high school." Jinenji added.

Kagome smiled at him again, this time looking directly into his eyes.

"I'm going to get some fresh air. Could you tell InuYasha?" She tried to sound casual and calm.

"Of course."

It was true that she needed some fresh air, yet it was also true that her insecurities suddenly overpowered her. The woman with InuYasha was elegant, beautiful from what she could discern in the distance, and probably the kind of woman that was good and cultured, something she wasn't. Even her mother was sure to want her as a daughter.

When the cold air struck her cheeks, she realized she was being absurd, yet her emotions didn't, still feeding off everything negative, arousing her fears. The street was deserted, and because of it she felt in the need to walk a few meters away from the door, recalling the direction they had come from, yet too disoriented to know where InuYasha's home was. She sighed, and knowing she needed to calm down, she brought her phone out as a way of distraction... yet as soon as she opened an app, she heard a voice.

"So pretty, and so alone."

She lifted her gaze, and found a man who should be about her age, accompanied by other two men who were now on their way to surround her. She knew the pattern.

Crap.

Her fears emerged once again, together with a memory still so vivid it crawled beneath her skin, her body to the point of trembling due to the emotive charge of it. She had a hard time finding her voice to retort to that, but she did.

"I'm not alone." It was a poor argument, but it was the first thing that crossed her head and that she managed to say out loud.

The man that spoke to her smiled, and she recognized that smile as the rest of them mirrored it. Feeling intimidated, her first reaction was to take a step back, turn around and flee to someplace where these men, nor her memories could follow her; but she couldn't, paralyzed as she was.

"It's true, she isn't alone." She heard InuYasha, who made his way towards her in a steady manner, and embraced her over her shoulders. "But thank you for worrying." He smiled at them.

Kagome felt surprised and relieved in equal parts.

The men looked at them for a few instants, probably deliberating if it was worth the effort to further pursue the matter, only to turn around, spitting some words about leaving, together with some other less agreeable to one's ears.

"Everything alright?" InuYasha inquired once they were out of sight, seeking her chestnut brown gaze she was now hiding.

"Yes, everything alright." She assured, then looked at him, briefly, too much.

"Should we leave?" This time, she did look at him directly. He seemed so close and kind she didn't know how to fit the lingering emotions from what had just happened, with what InuYasha was, and was offering her as a person.

"I'd like that. We should say goodbye to Jinenji first though." She started towards the place, planning to do what she considered to be the right course.

"Don't worry. He'll undertand." He stopped her. "We can come back tomorrow, and spend some time."

Kagome thought about it for a bit, then nodded; she didn't want to go back inside either.

They began to walk slowly, and in silence, one beside the other but without physical contact.

What was happening?

Kagome couldn't help trying to find of a reason why they were acting so distant. First, she thought it could be because of being found with those men, albeit she couldn't really avoid such people from getting close to her, or to be involved in such situations. Could he be of those who think she could?

That was a tough topic for her; in fact, every time anything remotely related to it appeared, she would usually dismiss it to the point of forgetting about it, and that way keep moving forward.

There was also the possibility of his conversation with that woman leaving something in him he wasn't telling her about; they had been a couple after all, right?

She tried to reason that. She tried to stop repeating the name Jinenji had mentioned, which belonged to that woman; she failed miserably at both.

"Who is Kikyo?" She found herself asking before her mind could register it.

InuYasha turned his head around just about enough to look at her. It was clear he was surprised by her question.

"How do you know her...? Oh, right. Jinenji." His smile didn't seem to reach his eyes as he drew that conclusion.

Kagome didn't say anything else, and he remained silent for an instant, taking a lungful of air, thinking about how much of what he spoke with Kikyo he should, or could tell her. After all, it had been a deeply, intimate and painful experience, of the kind one lives; and more than anything, it belonged to him.

Finally, he talked.

"She was my girlfriend for a short while during high school." He began to explain, his gaze fixed on what was ahead, in the distance, as they kept walking. "We hadn't talked since we graduated. A few times, I've seen her in the distance, and today she came to tell me something."

He thought about stopping there, believing it unnecessary to tell Kagome how his ex-girlfriend came to apologize for being a jerk back then, and much less how she also assured him that the moment they had shared in her room, had meant something. However, the unusual silence Kagome seemed to be in made him partially change his decision.

"She wanted to apologize." He voiced, hoping it was enough.

Kagome remained silent, walking by his side with her gaze on the ground a few steps ahead of them. She seemed as if her energy had been drained, yet... what else could he tell her?

He was still surprised to come across Kikyo so suddenly, and his first thought was that time had treated her well. Then, he also thought about how impossible it seemed to be receiving an apology from her; however, and what mattered, was that he realized he didn't need it.

"I guess that's part of your past now." Kagome concluded, at the end of that thick and long silence.

"That's right." He declared, confident. "It was a long time ago."

"Time is irrelevant for these things." She added, confident. "Was it important?"

InuYasha didn't know how he came to be in the middle of such a conversation, yet that wasn't an excuse to avoid the answer.

"It was." He accepted.

There were some things he probably wouldn't tell Kagome, like the deep depression he had been in back then. However, he did want to be as honest as he needed to be, and the very same words Kikyo used just a few moments ago, confirmed him how insidious to lie can be.

"I'm sorry. I didn't know when I became unable to be honest."Was part of her speech.

The cold of a winter's night was starting to sink in, yet the alcohol they drank with Jinenji was helping them keep warm; the silence, however, was wrapping them once again, and ever more now that they had left behind the central part of the district. InuYasha wondered about what was going through Kagome's head, for she seemed too serious, and he feared she may be busy erecting once again all the barriers it had taken her so much to lower. He needed to say or do something, and so acted on the first thing that came to mind, leaning towards her to kiss her in a spur of docile playfulness. He noted how she became surprised, and for a moment it seemed she'd avoid the kiss, but she didn't, softening as she took one of his arms as if to have something to hold on to, amidst so many emotions. He had never reasoned it like that, yet to hold on tight to someone else during those moments of crucial feelings has much to do with survival, to an inner need of not getting lost.

He kissed her with as much passion he could show in the middle of the street, wanting to let her know he was with her now; Kagome seemed much more willing, and much more vulnerable than he could ever recall, and when their lips parted, he touched her cheek and smiled, only to see her returning his smile without the joy ever illuminating her gaze.

Both sighed, knowing themselves still harboring the remnants of a lingering insecurity.

They continued on their way, and a few steps later, right before the next turn, it was Kagome this time who took his hand and asked him to stop with that gesture. InuYasha looked at her, and didn't need much else than her figure, standing on the tip of her feet, to know she was seeking another kiss.

In that manner they made their way, stealing kisses from each other as soon as the urge aroused. Kagome, having lost the count of how many times they had stopped in the last hundred meters, recalled similar kisses, in the darkness and on the way to her apartment... the first time she took InuYasha there.

"We'll never get to your home at this rate." She laughed, abandoning the kiss but not without some uncertainty.

On the surface, she felt better, more cheerful than when she left Jinenji's izakaya, and she knew it was thanks to InuYasha; he, somehow, always helped her to center her own emotions, to make them more bearable. He looked at her in that particular way Kagome had learnt to recognize, as his hands tightened their hold on her waist.

"We are only one street away." He defended, leaning back for the kiss.

Kagome received him in a sigh, released before the satisfaction of his warmth, then bent backwards, away from the deepening caress. As she was giving in to his request, she couldn't help thinking how he seemed to be still who he was, despite the conversation he had with that woman who was so important in his past. She should be at ease, she knew so in her mind, yet she was having a hard time getting there, and was completely aware of how much she needed to be fitting for InuYasha, to be the kind of woman he'd choose.

In that moment, a light turning on at one side of the street distracted her.

"They've turned on a light." She pointed at a house.

She felt particularly coy, prisoner of all that was expected of a proper woman.

"What of it?" InuYasha said, a question drowned in his need of the next kiss that Kagome received, and like the previous one, stopped before it could lead to something more.

"I don't want to." She said, not recognizing her own voice.

It was then when InuYasha looked at her as if understanding there was something else, something he needed to comprehend behind that denial. It was strange, for she herself didn't know of a way to explain it; until know it had been easy to be the carefree girl who didn't get attached to anyone, only ever having casual relationships, however, in that moment she was entertaining elements that she used to think foreign, or impossible to measure. And all of it, came hand in hand with InuYasha.

"Very well." He accepted, not without a certain tension in his voice Kagome could note, and albeit she didn't say anything immediately, she did find an ungrateful feeling inside.

She felt InuYasha's fingers intertwine with hers, as they resumed their pace through a silent and empty street. They walked like that for a few meters, and when turning to the street Kagome recognized as the one where his mother's house was, she noted that nothing of what was happening inside and outside of her felt known, or safe. For a moment, she felt the need of seeking stability, somewhere, and so looked at her companion who felt so foreign to her then. She didn't want him to think this was because of their previous conversation.

She felt as if she was breaking apart from the inside, and knew. She knew that all of which she had always made sure to hide, beneath layers and layers of fortitude, would be uncovered.

No. Her mind rebelled.

Her steps stopped in their wake, and that made InuYasha pull at her to keep walking, only to halt and look back at her, the question evident in his slightly darkened eyes. She hoped it was because of the night.

"What's wrong?" He asked, his voice contained, albeit he tried to veil that.

Can I blame him? She asked herself. Kagome knew her behavior was at the very least paradoxical, but she ignored the thought, and instead went back to seeking confidence, knowing but one way of getting that: control.

She took half-a-step closer and used her free hand, the one not intertwined with his, to place it on InuYasha's waist and so start a caress with the intention of seducing him. She lifted herself on the tip of her feet and went for a kiss that sought immediately something more, feeling the hardness of InuYasha's chest against hers. He didn't answer that kiss with the promptness she expected, which made her doubt, yet soon his free hand surrounded her with the confidence only desire knows.

She heard him mutter a phrase she couldn't understand well, yet she knew almost by instinct that he was cursing and worshipping her at the same time. Then, she heard him huff, an echo of the emotion that gave birth to it.

"Let's go." InuYasha's darkened voice extended the invitation, and she nodded.

In that way, they covered the distance left to the door giving access to the house, and InuYasha opened it slowly, mindful of not making too much noise. That caution gave the moment a furtive hint that made Kagome restless in a strange way, barely natural. Once at the entrance, which was illuminated by a lamp giving off a warm and dim light, they heard the silence flooding the place and guessed Izayoi had to be asleep.

They looked at each other, their gazes met and held as if in a tacit decision about how the rest of the night would play out.

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To be continued.

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A/N

Hi to those who are reading,

Here I bring you another chapter of a story whose length I won't bother to comment on anymore. The more I try to think about how much is left for its ending, the more I fail in my calculations. So nothing, I desist.

I hope you've enjoyed the chapter, and that you tell me.

Anyara.

This text is possible thanks to the translation of: Dezart