Chapter 15
"Mama!" Called the young miko as she rested her bike against the side of her white shingled house.
Inuyasha stood nearby, his arms still tucked into his kimono sleeves and a grumpy looking expression on his normally handsome and youthful face.
He followed close behind Kagome as she led him inside the house. Kagome stopped abruptly at the entrance room and slipped out of her shoes.
"Wipe your feet. Mama will have a fit if you track anything into the house." She stated, pointing to Inuyasha's dirty feet.
"Keh! Yeah, right!" The hanyou protested, walking forward a little, though not stepping into the kitchen.
"Just wipe your feet, Inuyasha! Try not to be such a nuisance!" Kagome cried, shaking her head and walking into the kitchen, her bare feet padding over the plastic tiles. Inuyasha stayed back to wipe his feet for two seconds, maybe less.
He caught up with Kagome in her room. She set her bag on her bed and began to shift through her dresser for some clothes to relax in.
"So. Whatcha got to do around here?" Inuyasha asked, his hands dropping to his sides as he entered the overwhelmingly feminine room.
"I dunno. We have a TV…if you wanna watch that…" Kagome replied, throwing a white t-shirt and a pair of green shorts onto her pink, silken, bedspread.
"And what's a TV again?" The half-demon retorted.
Kagome shook her head as a small smile played over her lips. She couldn't help but smile. He was so oblivious that it was actually cute.
"Kagome? Is that you?" Came a soft voice from out in the hallway.
"Mama!" Kagome cried as Ms. Higurashi popped her head in the door.
Strangely, the young mother's face looked older. Deep wrinkles creased her forehead as she look at Inuyasha. She had purple bags under her eyes and her smile lacked the warmth it usually had.
"Oh. Hello, Inuyasha." She said friendly as she stepped further into the room and pulled a pair of latex gloves off her bony hands.
'Uh oh…' Kagome thought. 'She always cleans when she's upset'
Inuyasha nodded at Kagome's mother with a straight face. If there was one person he was truly respectful to, it was Mrs. Higurashi.
"Hey, mama? What day is it?" Kagome asked politely. From all the switching back and forth between eras, she had lost track of what day it was.
"Sunday." Her mother replied softly. She always knew what day it was and what time it was, on the dot. She was so organized. Kagome envied her of that.
"Oh no! I have a test tomorrow! I have to study! Oh no, no, no!" She cried, raising her hands and placing them on each side of her face as she struggled to remember what her test was even about.
She darted to her desk and shifted through the piles of book that sat there. "Where is it! Where is it!" She cried, tossing aside literature and science books, along with some history book and biographies.
Inuyasha stood, an eyebrow arched at Kagome as she panicked over her test. Mrs. Higurashi chuckled softly and slipped from the room, a small smile on her face. She was proud of her daughter for still trying to take responsibility for her school duties.
The inu hanyou moved to the side and sat on Kagome's bed, moving his eyes over the clothes she had placed there.
"AH! Found it!" Kagome announced, holding up a thick, green math book.
Inuyasha sighed and shook his head.
"I'll alert the media…" The hanyou retorted.
'Kagome and her spells…' He thought, referring to the symbols and strange words inside the textbook that she held and was now frantically flipping through.
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"Hey, Kagome? What's that symbol mean?" Inuyasha asked, his voice high and almost slightly mocking.
"AGH! INUYASHA! WHAT ARE YOU DOING! I'M TRYING TO STUDY!" Kagome cried, nearly falling out of her chair as Inuyasha leaned over her shoulder and placed one long, sharp nail on a plus symbol.
"It means add, now leave me alone!" She replied, pushing his hand away and gluing her eyes back to the text of the book.
"What about that squiggly line?" The persistent half demon asked, pointing to a dollar sign.
"SIT!" Kagome cried, fed up with his constant questions. Did he do that just to annoy her? Probably. That seemed like something Inuyasha would do.
Kagome turned her full attention back to her math book as she heard Inuyasha's yelp as his face plummeted to the carpet below them.
"Grrr!" He growled, jumping up and raising a fist to Kagome's head. He stayed in that position, fist raised, as if he really meant to hit her.
"….Sit…" Kagome said, a hand propped up under her chin. She knew what he was doing. He had done this so many times before. She even found it somewhat cute…though she wouldn't let her thoughts wander that much.
Inuyasha plunged to the ground once again. He moaned an exasperated cry and lay still. He would rather be with that annoying little brother of Kagome's than with her when she was studying.
He pushed himself up and grumbled as he made his way towards the door. He was bored and off to find Souta, his last chance of escaping boredom.
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Soft breaths escaped into the air as Kagome's chest rose and fell at a gentle pace. Her charcoal hair fell over her pale features as her cheek pressed against pages 236 and 237 of her math book. She had worked herself to sleep. The way she looked, sleeping there, people would think she had been bored to death.
"Kagome? What time is it?" Asked the voice that belonged to the hand that curved around the edge of the door.
He stepped inside, his steps soft against the carpet. His brows raised as his amber eyes fell on the sleeping girl.
'She studied herself to sleep...' He thought as he made his way over to her and looked down between the locks of hair that covered the miko's face
Slowly and gingerly, he swept away the dark locks of thick black hair and pushed them behind her ear. His long, elongated claws trailed across the skin on her cheek. Just like he had done the night when he had caught Naraku's scent.
One pale arm slipped around her back and the other lifted her head from the book. Her head gently fell back against the hanyou's shoulder. He felt a strange heat rise from his belly to his throat. He tried to swallow the lump that had formed in his throat down but it remained, freezing him to the spot with Kagome leaning against him with such a blank expression...just like the one she had had when she was injured, knocked unconscious. When Inuyasha had mistook her for dead.
He grasped her underneath the knees and lifted her from the chair and fully into his embrace. He held her there for a moment, felt her warmth against him. The lump grew and heated up his body, made his heart race.
A soft moan left Kagome's soft, full, pink lips. It startled Inuyasha somewhat. He was so sensitive right now, so jumpy, so unaware except for Kagome's soft breathes and the racing of his own heart.
Carefully, he lay the miko onto her silken pink bed and his arms slipped away. He watched her as she quietly stirred and her long lashes parted and her eyes, the color of melted milk chocolate, were revealed.
"Inu...Inuyasha?" Kagome's soft voice spoke out to Inuyasha.
Her words tickled the inside of his ears.
"What...are you doing?" She asked, slowly rising to a sitting position. A portion her raven black hair fell over her soft and pale features.
The hanyou was speechless though he took in each word as if it were orphaned.
"I was...what time is it?" He managed to choke out in a voice that he didn't recognize.
"I don't know...late..." She replied, dropping the question before.
'I don't remember getting up and going to bed...did he...' Again, she stopped her thoughts before she thought of something stupid, something that Inuyasha could have done that was actually romantic.
"I'm...tired..." Inuyasha whispered, lying completely. He looked around and then back to Kagome. For some reason, he wanted this awkward moment to end though Kagome wanted it to last.
Quickly, Inuyasha hopped onto the bed, beside Kagome. He laid down casually, a mocking smile on his face as he crossed his arms behind his head.
"Hey! No way! You're not sleeping up here, dog boy!" Kagome yelled, rolling over Inuyasha and shoving him from the other side.
"Hey! Ah- Kagome!" He cried as he was shoved off the bed. It was so easy to slip off of the silken fabric. "Who are you callin' 'dog boy'?"
"You!" Kagome retorted. "You...Sleep here.."
She pulled one of the laced pillows and threw it on the floor.
"What? No way! I'm not sleeping on the ground like some kind of rodent!" The irritated hanyou replied.
"No. Not like some kind of rodent. Like a dog!" She replied, her voice high. She was fully awake now.
"I am not sleeping down here!" Inuyasha refused, being as stubborn as ever. He shook his head furiously, his silver-white hair flying from side to side.
"Yes you are! Cause you sure aren't sleeping up here! You are sleeping down there!"
"No...I'm not! I am not sleeping down here!"
"Yes! You are!"
"NO!"
"YES!"
"SIT!"
"AGH!" The purple beads around Inuyasha's neck grew brilliantly and forced his face forward, roughly to the carpet. It was lucky that the pillow was lying just under him or his face may have gotten some serious carpet burn.
"DAMN IT! KAGOME! WHY DO YOU DO THIS TO ME!" The angry inu demon yelled as he rose from the carpet and clenched a fist beside his red face.
"Humph!" Was Kagome's only reply as she sunk under the covers and turned over, away from Inuyasha.
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Inuyasha moved to the side of the bed, his expression cautious. He set two pale, clawed, hands on the side of the silky material that covered the bed and Kagome.
Quietly, cautiously, he lifted himself onto the bed and moved over Kagome, his billowing kimono lightly grazing her body as she slept soundly. He settled himself just beside of the sleeping miko. He didn't move under the covers...he just lay there, taking in the soft feeling of the mattress and the warmth of Kagome's fragile body near his.
Eventually, his eyes closed, only to awake a few hours before Kagome so he wouldn't be caught sleeping by her side.
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Yeah. Cute, right? This one wasn't too terribly bad.
Aw, well. It's getting better, no?