"Speaking"

'Thinking'

Kagome sat at the dinner table fidgeting her hands underneath. 'Why did I have to go and make things awkward?! I could've just said sorry without hugging him…. But he just looked so sad and I couldn't help it!'

Barry sat in front of her with Iris next to him. They haven't said anything since that whole ordeal by the door. Until someone decided to speak up.

"So, um-" Barry started, and Kagome looked up at him but just then Joe came in with dinner. "Y'all ready to eat?" He asked as he put two boxes of pizza down on the table. As he started putting slices on everyone's plate he said, "So Kagome, I registered you in the same school as Barry and Iris so you can start Monday." Kagome froze. 'Oh no, I have to do school all over again! That means more stupid math classes," she groaned. "Ok, what's the uniform like?" 'Please no more short skirts.'

"We don't have a uniform code," Iris answered. "Oh." Was all Kagome could say. "But I'm sure Iris won't mind letting you borrow some of her clothes, right Iris?" "Of course Dad!"

The rest of dinner went on smoothly with Kagome putting in a few words.

Finally, it was time for bed. Kagome, Iris, and Barry were all in the bathroom brushing their teeth. While looking in the mirror, Kagome noticed that Iris was taller than both her and Barry but Barry was still taller than her. 'Why do I always have to be the short one?' Kagome thought.

Kagome followed Iris to her room. She paused outside the door as she watched Barry walk to another room down the hall. 'He looks kinda relieved to finally have some alone time. 'I can't blame him.' She walked into the room before Iris noticed anything.

"You can sleep on the bed with me," Iris said. "No, I couldn't, I'll be fine on the floor." "You sure?" Kagome nodded her head. 'Besides, I'm not used to sleeping on beds anymore after spending all that time in the Feudal Era.' "Well, ok then." Iris passed her a cover and a pillow and laid down.

Kagome set up a makeshift pallet on the floor. 'Much better.' Kagome tried closing her eyes but each time she did all she saw was her family. She sighed, 'I can do this.' Right when she closed her eyes, she heard something. 'Is someone...crying?' She sat up. "Iris?" She whispered, but there was no response. 'Guess, I'll have to go by myself…' Kagome stood up and walked slowly towards the door and opened it as slowly as she could. 'Stupid doors.' She walked down the hall and stopped in front of Barry's door. 'What am I even going to say? What if I just embarrass him?' Kagome's eyes cast down as she heard him sobbing. 'He needs me.' Her decision final, she pushed open the door.

Kagome walked in and shut the door behind her. Barry hadn't even noticed she came in. She walked over to him and sat on his bed. He jumped and she flinched.

'Probably not the best way to approach someone who's crying, you're doing great Kagome,' she internally groaned.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you… I just wanted to talk, is that ok?" Barry nodded while wiping away his tears.

Kagome looked down to her hands on her lap. "I… I know how you feel. And I know that everyone says that, but I mean it. We have a lot in common, ya know?" Kagome looked up to see Barry's face.

"Everyone thinks we're crazy, no one is gonna believe a couple of kids. Even though Joe hasn't asked me about it yet, I know he won't believe me when I tell him about the lights…" Kagome mumbled the last part mainly to herself, but Barry heard anyway.

"Wait, what lights?" Barry had an idea of what she might be talking about, but he wanted confirmation before he went into this deep of a conversation with her.

"Oh, well, this might sound crazy, but I know what I saw. The Police think that a couple of robbers may have come in to try and steal things from the shrine but got caught and killed everyone, but they didn't see what I saw. There were two of them, one red and one yellow. They were moving so fast that I wasn't able to see anything but blurs. They ran inside the shrine, ran out, circled around me, and then left. When I walked into the shrine, my family was…gone." Kagome hastily rubbed her eyes to stop the tears that were forming from falling. Kagome didn't mention how the red one stopped to look at her.

Barry stared at her for a good minute as if trying to form a response.

"I saw them too." Kagome looked at him, but he was looking down at his blanket. "The lights, I mean. They were circling my mom and I didn't see anything else because I was taken outside by the red one before it left and...and no one believed me. They blamed my dad even though I said it wasn't him, but they took him away anyway." Barry now had tears falling down his face but he tried to hide them from Kagome.

"Hey, it's ok to cry," Kagome moved closer to hug him, but the force of it had them both falling backwards. Kagome quickly rolled off him and apologized. "I'm so sorry!" She was now lying next to him thanking the Gods that it was mostly dark so he couldn't see her blush.

Unknown to Kagome, Barry was doing the same thing.

"It's ok," Barry said after a while of short silence.

Barry turned to face her. They kind of just laid there for a while not saying anything, but it was comfortable. But Kagome didn't really like silence all that much.

"What was your mom like?" Kagome asked but then instantly regretted it when Barry closed his eyes. 'Too soon Kagome, too soon.' "Sorry, you don't have to answer if you don't want to."

Barry opened his eyes and looked at her. "No, it's fine," and he went on to talk about how amazing his mom was and how he misses her. In turn, he asked Kagome about her mom and the rest of her family. So she told him how her mom was the best cook, and how her grandpa was a little crazy, and how even though Souta was a little annoying at times, he was the sweetest little brother.

The rest of the night went on with them both telling little stories of how great things were before it all fell apart. That is, until Barry started dozing off in the middle of his sentences.

"Are you sleepy?" Kagome asked.

"No!" Barry said a little too quickly. Kagome gave him a pointed look. "Maybe a little," he confessed. Kagome smiled and sat up.

"It's getting late, I should probably go back to Iris' room now." She stood up but a small hand wrapped around her wrist and pulled her back down. Kagome looked at Barry a tad bit confused.

"S-Sorry I-I didn't mean to pull you down that hard, or at all, it's just... Could you stay? I don't wanna be alone right now…' he trailed off. He didn't want to tell her that he has nightmares, not yet at least.

"Of course I'll stay Barry, but will Joe mind?"

"You don't have to stay the whole night, just until I fall asleep?" He asked pleadingly.

Kagome internally sighed. 'How could I say no to that? I'll just wait for him to fall asleep, and then leave, and Joe will never find out! Easy peasy heh…

"Ok, I'll stay." She laid back down and faced him.

Kagome didn't want to bring up the topic of family again even though he said it was ok. She doesn't want to risk him getting upset at her and deciding he didn't want to be her friend anymore.

"What's school like?" Kagome was curious since she's never been to an American school, and she wanted to get Barry talking since that seemed to tire him out…

"It's fine when you look past the bullying and P.E., but Science is the best class ever!" He went on to talk about the things he learned and what he thought about certain theories.

Kagome listened attentively but her mind couldn't help but wonder if Barry meant that he was getting bullied. 'He's such a sweet boy, he should have tons of friends! If anyone even thinks about bullying him they'll have to go through me!'

"What about you?" Barry asked.

Kagome smiled sheepishly although he probably didn't see it. "I'm sorry, what was the question?"

"I asked if you had a favorite subject in school."

"Oh yeah, my favorite subject is History, but I doubt it'll be the same here. We mostly learned about the different Eras of Japan and rarely mentioned America. I've also taken a liking to Science though." Kagome smiled. 'Yeah ever since I fell through a well and time-travelled.' But she left that part out.

Barry's face glowed when she mentioned she liked Science. "Really?! Iris doesn't really like Science, she's more of a Language Arts type of girl."

"Yeah, my favorite topic is Space. But math will be the death of me I swear," she groaned. Then she glanced at him hopefully, "Unless you're any good at math?"

"Totally," he yawned out. "I'll help you anytime you need it. That's what friends do right?" His eyes, heavy with exhaustion, started to droop close.

Kagome let out her own yawn, "Yeah, it is," she let her own eyes close and they both fell asleep for the night.

~~Couple Of Hours Later~~

"No!"

Kagome sat up and looked over to Barry who was sweating and wiping tears from his face. She wrapped her arms around him. "Shh, everything's okay now, kay? Did you have a nightmare? It's over now, everything is alright." Kagome was reminded of the times she comforted Shippo and her eyes started to sting.

Barry slowly pulled away from Kagome, "T-Thanks for, ya know."

Kagome smiled at him, "Do you wanna go downstairs? I know it's a bit early, but everyone should be getting up in another hour or so. We could watch TV or something?" Barry nodded.

So they made their way down the stairs as quietly as possible and sat on the couch. Barry grabbed the remote and put it on a Nature Discovery Channel, which is just what Kagome wanted to watch anyway. She looked over at him.

"O-Oh sorry, is this ok? We can watch something else if you want-" he started but Kagome cut him off.

"No no this is great! It's just what I wanted to watch," she smiled at him. She seemed to be doing that a lot.

They were debating over which was the best bird in the world and that was how Joe and Iris found them this morning.

They went to sit at the table while Joe prepared breakfast. Barry next to Iris and Kagome in front of Barry.

"So Kagome," Iris started. "I woke up in the middle of the night and I didn't see you on the floor, where were you?"

"You had her sleep on the floor Iris?" Joe said disapprovingly.

"No, she wanted to Dad!"

"Yeah, sorry about that, I got up and came out here on the couch instead. Then Barry came out a few hours later. Guess I wasn't as used to the floor as I thought," Kagome said sheepishly.

"Do whatever makes you comfortable, Kagome, this is your home now too," Joe stated as he placed plates of food down in front of them.

"Thank you, Joe, I appreciate it a lot."

Everyone dug into their food. Kagome glanced up and caught Barry's eyes. They lingered for a moment in agreement to keep their little secret.

Joe was oblivious but the look didn't go unnoticed by Iris.

AN: I know I'm a terrible writer, don't mention it.

Read and Review, or don't, it's ok, I know I suck... And I'm weird. Sorry.

I was originally gonna update every 5 days but I kinda wanna see more interaction with the story.

I have chapters ready but I won't post them till I know more than a few people are reading.

So REVIEW!...or don't...