A/N: So my cousins came over for a party during the weekend. Too bad I was stuck with 200 glorious pages of Moby Dick. Not to mention I also had homework. It's just too bad I literally spent my entire spring break in New England; otherwise, we would've really partied. : (

(And you know I'm totally procrastinating.)

Disclaimer: Bah. Need one of those universal ones.


Chapter 15: Second Base

Nghi


"Oh, it's really nearby," Miroku had said, his voice barely audible over the loud music. "It's only ten minutes from where you live, at the most. You freakin' live in his neighborhood, man. I've been over here so many times before, trust me."

He should have known better.

He really, really should have known better and went with his instinct. He should have opened his mouth and requested—no, demanded, "Pick me up, then." It would have made life so much easier and oh so much less painful, because it had taken Inuyasha more than a grand two hours to trek through four neighborhoods, two parks, countless intersections, and two steep hills. Presently, he was working on his third one.

"Where the fuck does he live?" Inuyasha growled, ignoring the way his soles ached for a bench, or the way his thighs throbbed funnily, or even the way his left kneecap was making weird, popping noises. It didn't matter; at this point, he just wanted to find the goddamn house, find an empty bedroom, and curl up to sleep. Maybe he could wake up later and rummage through the refrigerator, but right now, his body was too sore to comprehend hunger.

After much grumbling and whatnot, Inuyasha reached the peak of the hilly road. "Thank God." And he meant it, too. Running had never been a problem with him—he just hated moving anywhere.

Finally pulling himself away from his irritation, Inuyasha looked around and realized that, surprise surprise, he was nowhere near a white house isolated among trees and hills. Scratch that—there was a shitload of hills. But sarcasm aside, there really was no white house; if anything, he was in the middle of a big city. A really big city.

"Fuck," he swore, glancing around one more time. "What kind of directions are these?" Of course, there was always a possibility that he took a wrong turn or two a few streets back, but two things were flagrantly wrong with that postulation, one being it way too hard to keep track of anything without a pen or paper. The other blatant mistake was that Inuyasha never made mistakes when it came to destinations. Fuck, if there were two things he couldn't screw up in life, it was baseball and driving. And by driving, he meant location-wise, not safety-wise. He was more than confident in his superb ability to read any map, so logic pretty much dictated that Miroku had fucked him over.

"That no good, son of a—" Inuyasha muttered underneath his breath, reaching into his pocket for the cell phone. It was almost ten-thirty, and most of the stores had closed by now. That meant if Miroku couldn't help him get to Yamaguchi's, then three things would happen: he wouldn't be able to go back home; he would be sleeping beside a homeless man for the night; and of course, Miroku will have brain hemorrhage come Monday.

Which meant the captain had better pick up the ringing phone now.

Luckily, the man did so a few rings later, and he was greeted with a prompt "Fuck you". "Whoa, buddy, simmer down there." Miroku frowned at the other end. "What's gotten into you?"

"What's gotten into me?" Inuyasha barked incredulously. "More like what's gotten into you!"

"Oh, just a few shots and six-packs…." A merry cheer followed.

"That's not what I meant!" He nearly kicked a public trash can onto the street, but stopped himself just in time. Instead, he took three deep breaths before speaking into the mouthpiece. "What I want to know is where the hell you got those directions to Yamaguchi's house."

There was a long pause at the end of the line.

"Miroku, it is at Yamaguchi's, right?" Somehow, he couldn't seem to control that twitch below his eye….

"Well, theoretically… yeah."

"You-!"

"But but but! Before you go ripping a new one in me," he interrupted, "I know how you must feel, all stupid and let down for having missed a great party. But rest assured, the party is still live and swinging. It just… moved."

There was litter all over the black pavement as Inuyasha stalked away. "Listen," he hissed venomously, and Miroku involuntarily winced. Thank God for technology. "You fuckin' dragged me two hours from my home to go to a fuckin' party from some random guy. Then when it turns out your directions were all a bunch of twists and turns that led to nowhere, you finally tell me the party's fuckin' moved somewhere else?"

"You make it sound like I did that on purpose or something."

"Aughhh—" There was a soft click, and then silence permeated through the air. Or through the line, rather.

"Hello?" Miroku covered his ears, straining to hear any noise. "Hello? Inuyasha? Oh great, battery's dead."

-

We're sorry, the phone number you have tried to dial is temporarily unavailable. Please hang up and try—

Angrily, he pressed the end button and dialed the number again. "You did not just hang up on me, asshole," he muttered darkly, and for all it was worth, he glared burning holes into the screen. It was all the fucktard's fault—if he would just pull his goddamn face away from some girl's chest, then maybe he wouldn't have misled an innocent boy into the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night!

We're sorry, the phone number—

He couldn't stop himself; Inuyasha let loose a long string of profanity as he shoved the phone back into his pocket. I swear to God, when Monday comes around….

But the murderous thought would have to wait, because right now, he had a bigger problem: where the hell was he going to stay for the night?

A few taxis rolled past him, but Inuyasha hadn't brought any money. That also ruled out renting a hotel of any kind. He could try backtracking to his house again, but he wasn't too sure how he could do that when Miroku had been stringing him along with phony directions. Plus, it would just put the icing on the cake if his parents were still fighting; two hours was not enough when those two were duking it out under one rooftop.

The only option he had was to sleep somewhere public.

"I am so going to make you bleed for this, asshole."

-