Hey my peeps and creeps, your fifth-favourite author is back from the dead! (audience cheers, claps, screams, frothing at the mouth, etc.). I know, I know you probably sent a hitman after me for telling you guys I would write more and then disappearing for like four months…. And I really don't have any excuses for my complete and utter lack of motivation. :0

SO, I will be trying to get back into a writing schedule that works with my school hours and endless amounts of homework, also I'm trying to make the chapters a bit longer than an average of 1500 words so that might take me a little longer to produce. Make sure to stay safe during this pandemic and to take care of yourselves! Yes, I'm looking at you… go drink some water and have a snack.

Alrighty, You guys are probably tired of this little note so let's get back into MPHB! *I Carly cheering noise*

As always, I do not own any of the characters used in this fic, that bragging right belongs to our one and only Queen, Rumiko Takahashi.

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Chapter 4: Coffee is the essence of life

Alright Kagome just play it cool; It's not like you're going to get coffee with a complete stranger. A bitter thought taunted in her head. Jeeze she could be such an idiot sometimes, maybe this could be the start of a great friendship? The small, optimistic voice sounded more like a question than a statement. Sure, Kagome would admit that she was a little out of her comfort zone, considering she had only met a handful of demons in her small hometown. But that was something she needed to overcome in a city with a rather large demon populous. She felt strangely drawn to this Inuyasha guy- He seems nice enough, I guess I will give him a chance…It was almost as if there was this Magnetic pull between them, even though she had no idea who he was her body longed to be near him and that was a scary thought considering Kagome was a nineteen-year-old with the emotional intelligence of a tater-tot. Sango always teased her, saying "You have straight A's and B's yet you still can't decipher if someone is flirting with you or just being a total creep...". Pshh I know the difference… totally.

During her long string of thoughts, Kagome had completely missed the barista from the campus café calling her name. Only snapping out of her daze when Inuyasha waved his hand in front of her head. "Hello? Is anybody home?" He asked playfully. A light pink blush graced Kagome's cheek due to her newfound embarrassment. Damn, why do I always have to overthink things… All Kagome wished to do in that moment was crawl into bed and groan out of the utter horror she felt for zoning out in public with a stranger.

After taking a breath, Kagome walked up to the counter to retrieve her coffee, muttering a small "sorry" to the exasperated teen with dark circles. The two waited for Inuyasha's plain black coffee. "Are you ok?" Inuyasha asked suddenly "I mean, you looked pretty dishevelled this morning… I thought you were going to barf all over my shoes or something." He bit out a lame cover up for his genuine concern. Why do I even care about this wench…? It's like I'm being pulled to her. Maybe she put a curse on me? Nah, she looks too… innocent.

Kagome was taken aback by his statement. Her cheeks flushing in a fit of anger opposed to her earlier embarrassment. "Hey! I wasn't that scared, I just got lost and I haven't been in that part of campus before!" She bit out, after all, Kagome wasn't the most comfortable with sharing her diagnosis with people she just so happened to run into along the way to class. "Large black coffee for Inuyasha!" The brown eyed teenager hollered from their counter, still looking as tired as before. At the mention of his name, one of Inuyasha's ears tilted in the direction of the overworked employee. He then walked briskly to go pick up his piping hot coffee, practically oozing confidence with every step. Wow, that's really… intimidating. Kagome noted quietly.

The pair made their way over to the customization station in a comfortable silence. As soon as they got there, however, Kagome began loading her previously plain, black, coffee with sugar and creamer, mixing her ungodly concoction of almost 87% sugar together with a stir stick. "Jesus, cool it on the sugar! Are ya trying to give yourself type two diabetes?" Inuyasha's rough voice cut in on Kagome's moment of sweet, sweet bliss. "I have no idea how you can drink coffee without it, doesn't it make you want to saw your poor tongue off with a dull butter knife?" She side-eyed him playfully. With a mock-offended look on his face, Inuyasha shot back "Coffee is the essence of life, its bitterness just reminds me of the real world. You can't always sugar-coat it." With a melodramatic sigh.

With a roll of her eyes, Kagome started to walk towards the shop's exit. They would drink their coffee on the way back to their dorms and then separate in the hallway.

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"I still refuse to believe you hate sports! They're by far the best way to stay in shape." Inuyasha all but yelled, a baffled look plastered all over his handsome face. "I can't help that all my sporty classmates screaming at me from the sidelines deterred me from finding any enjoyment in my forced participation. To be completely honest, you definitely look like you would be the type to berate someone for missing a goal in soccer." Kagome rolled her eyes (yet again) at the man-child's enthusiasm towards one of the things she detested the most in life. Inuyasha stood at the bottom of the dorm stairwell, guffawing at her statement. His hearty laughter filled the echoey room, making Kagome's heart thump awkwardly. A small blush starting to form on both of their cheeks; one from the lack of oxygen from laughing like a madman, the other from slight embarrassment.

After all the blushy laughter died down the two found themselves making their way up to the top floor in a comfortable silence. After what seemed like a few seconds (which was actually five minutes) the pair made it to their hallway.

Turning to Inuyasha, Kagome locked eyes with his. Her heart started to thump again, why does it keep doing that? Inuyasha's face was so serene, with locks of subtle silver swaying gently in the breeze of the crappy 1970s air conditioner the school had yet to replace. His amber irises flickering over her face with the speed of a cheetah, like he was trying to burn this one memory into his hippocampus.

What Kagome did next was something that would be seared into both of their skulls like the brand of hot metal. Not knowing which one of the kami had possessed her to do such a thing, Kagome grabbed Inuyasha's poor, angular, and shocked face, pulled it down to her level (which was probably around a foot considering I've made Kagome tiny in this rendition of Inukag) with such gentle fingers, then proceeded to move her face closer, their breaths intermingling with the intoxicating smell of coffee fresh on their tongues.

Inuyasha could not believe what was happening, his face still morphed into a shocked look, his jaw on the floor. Without warning, Kagome closed her eyes and moved closer. He could hear her heart pounding against her ribs with such force he thought they might break, internally whimpering at the thought of her hurt. That's odd, I shouldn't be feeling this way about someone I've just met. That's only ever happened with mates- Inuyasha's thoughts were interrupted by the feeling of Kagome just inches from his face. Their lips only millimeters apart. He took a deep breath, fully prepared to kiss the life out of this poor human girl he had grown to like over about 3 days (maybe a bit fast there buddy?) but at the very last second, Kagome swerved and planted the gentle kiss on his cheek. You sly wench a smirk formed on Inuyasha's roguish face as he watched Kagome hurry into her apartment with a formidable blush that reached past the neckline of her turtleneck. I wonder how far that blush goes. With one last up and down glance from Inuyasha's hooded eyes, he retreated into his own home across the hall.

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I cannot believe I just did that! Slumped against the door, Kagome was a hot mess- literally; she was burning up in her turtleneck, red-faced and sweaty. Inuyasha and her stood silently for what felt like hours (really only about two minutes) so what better way to end their outing than with a kiss on the cheek? Well- almost everything is better than that when the person you're about to slobber all over is in fact an INCREDIBLY attractive hanyou. Kagome had panicked and paused for a moment, but of course that's when Inuyasha had decided to stop zoning out and instead looked right into her soul with those damned amber irises.

Finally deciding to go wash off the day's perspiration, Kagome got up and walked slowly to the bathroom. Sango was nowhere to be seen, maybe she also found someone to hang out with. Taking off her jewelry, Kagome thought about her past days, it was so crazy that she'd ran into Inuyasha three days in a row, maybe this was fate? They seemed to get along pretty well and (as Kagome's mother always said) everything happens for a reason.

Kagome shed her clothes when the shower got warm enough and stepped in, letting the hot water melt all of her worries and thoughts away. She scrubbed at her heat-flushed skin with the loofah drenched in lily scented soap. Drying off after she got out, Kagome waltzed into her bedroom; Putting on a clan pair of underwear and throwing on one of her father's old shirts, it still kind of smelled like him. With a sad smile, Kagome lied in bed with only one thought plaguing her mind as she drifted off into some deep REM level sleep,

Everything happens for a reason.