"Who hurts you?"
"Nobody hurts me." She smiled at the silly question.
"But you've been hurt before."
She chuckled. "Well of course, everybody's been hurt before."
He hated her like this. She always demeaned her pain like it was nothing to worry about. She never wanted him to worry about her. But it was the only thing he knew how to do. The past weeks they had spent every single day together, every minute, from morning until night. He didn't want it to change.
They were sitting on a little hill of sand. It was their favorite place to be. By the beach, near the water, listening to the waves rising and falling along the shore. Today you couldn't tell the sky from the water, they were the same colour of grey-blue that seemed to reflect off one another. He sighed. On days like this he knew she was thinking.
No matter how happy he was, there was always that horrible feeling in his heart. He knew it was dread. He dreaded the day that she would leave him. And he knew that one day she would; he would wake up and any trace of her from his home would be gone. There would be no singing, no laughing, no constant chatter, no patter of feet on his concrete floor. No one would bother to open the windows. Nobody would be there to suggest going out for dinner, not to that place they went to last time, let's try something new.
He loved her. He already knew that and so did she. He hoped that she loved him also, but a girl like her you could never be sure.
A gust of wind blew from the water. Inuyasha watched her hair sweep past her shoulders and she closed her eyes, breathing in the salty air. She rubbed her arms in the cold. Taking off his sweater he draped it over her little form, eyes wandering over her bruised arms.
The bruises. He wanted to kill somebody every time he saw them. He didn't know where or how the hell she got them. He was with her 24/7, and he didn't ever see her fall or hurt herself. Yet, new bruises would appear every week, on her legs, all over her body. He never asked her about them, for fear she would leave him. Things would have to be weighed before he said them because he knew that one wrong move would push her away and cause her to disappear. He could see it on her face and the faraway look in her eyes. She yearned for something and he knew it was his fault that she couldn't have it. She stayed for him. He knew he should feel happy knowing that she cared for him, but really the only thing he felt was guilt. The way a ball and chain would feel, dragging her down into the water and watching her drown.
He watched the blades of grass quiver in the wind. He felt so small. It was discomforting, all this dread and guilt. But then one look at Kagome and he forgot it all. He'd never felt comfortable around anybody except during the brief moments he'd spent with his mother before she died. With Kagome, he was home. Anywhere she was he would feel like he was home.
She was amazing, this girl. Her laughing, smiling. Not like those bubbly ditzes on television who cackled at everything and fought for the limelight. With Kagome, the sunshine followed her no matter what because she was a beautiful woman. An enigma forever. He didn't know anything about her past, but he knew everything about her. She never told him where she was from, where she lived, where her family was, just nothing.
Inuyasha guessed it was alright that way, but he couldn't stop himself from being curious on grey-blue days like this.