One Artist to Another

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Inuyasha, kk?

"Sai!" The artist looked up at his female teammate's voice. She was running toward him, waving some piece of paper in her hand and smiling as she always did.

He put on a fake smile. "Hello, Hag. What can I do for you today?" He was… surprised, yes that was the peculiar feeling that he had when, for some reason, she didn't respond to his insult with a punch that would no doubt hurt him more than her.

Sakura just smiled and held the piece of paper she had been waving out to him. "It looks like you have some competition." Curious, Sai took the paper from her and looked it over. His eyes widened at what was on it.

It was a picture, hand drawn and painted with amazing detail. It was of a small, red-haired boy and someone who Sai assumed was his mother, though she had black hair. The boy was jumping into her arms with a wide grin while she was kneeling on green grass, also smiling with her arms open to catch him. What amazed him were the girl's eyes. They were a deep, powerful blue that nearly glowed with love for the boy.

In fact, the only problem that Sai could find with the scene was that the boy had a bushy tail and his feet and hands resembled paws.

Sai narrowed his eyes in confusion. With his pictures, they were like him, dead of nearly all emotion, but… this one… this one felt alive. Even he could feel the emotion radiating from the paper. Not only could he feel it, he could recognize the love in it. "Where did you get this?"

Sakura blinked before answering. "A girl about our age in selling them… Actually, I think that she's the girl in the picture." She pointed back the way she came and blinked when Sai vanished… with her picture. "Sai!"

The art jutsu-user ignored her call and searched for the girl whose eyes had captivated him. He found her surrounded by people crowding to look at her art. Sai calmly pushed his way through them but stopped in… shock, was it? when he looked at the table.

Spread across the table were various pictures, most of them were of the boy in Sakura's picture and a regal, cold-looking man with long silver hair. The boy was always grinning or laughing, sometimes being chased by a man in red with silver dog ears, while there were very few pictures where the man was smiling. In most of them, the man was with a smiling little girl in a checkered kimono. All of them radiatedsome emotion or another.

"You're an artist, too, aren't you?" Sai turned his head to the side to see the girl from the picture, if only a little older, smiling kindly at him. "I can tell by you're hands," she told held out her hand, palm up, for him to see. "Because they're like mine."

Sai looked down at her hand then to his own, but he couldn't see anything that could have connected the two of them. He shook it off then turned back to the paintings. "You did all of these?" He saw her nod from the corner of his eyes and traced his finger over the tiny smile caressing the silver-haired man's face in one of the few pictures. "How were you able to do this? Express so much… emotion into all of them?"

The girl paused and seemed to be thinking over what he had said before she smiled. "I think I know what you're asking, but there isn't really an answer…" She picked up a picture of the boy sitting on a tree stump, happily going through a box of pocky. (AN: KAWII! XD) "The best thing I can say is that it's because… everyone in these pictures… they were, (maybe are, I'm still not sure,) very close to me, so I pour my love for them into these."

She set the paper down and turned back to him with a bright smile. "I know it's not a good answer, but it's the best that I have." She turned around as someone tapped her shoulder wanting to pay for a picture.

Sai watched her for a moment before turning back to the table. Pour the emotion… into the picture… He frowned in thought. I don't understand. He turned and walked away, intent on figuring out what she had meant.

Kagome watched him leave with a small smile. He would understand what she meant eventually, and he would probably discover his emotion in the process. After all… She looked down at the picture of the smiling Sesshomaru with a fond smirk.

Sai looked down at the picture in front of him and smiled a little. It wasn't much, but it was there, a sense of contentment and peace radiating from the drawing of a waterfall and a garden. It had taken him a whole week or so, but he had finally put an emotion, other than the annoyance and frustration he had discovered while trying, into his picture.

Sai nodded in approval and stood to go find Kagome, who he had gone to more than once for advice. She was easy enough to find, but the circumstances were not what he had expected or was used to. She was leaning against the rail of the bridge that Team 7 usually met at, just staring out at the water.

She looked up as he approached and smiled. "Hey, Sai. Did you draw anything new?" He held out the waterfall picture and watched her analyze it. "Sugoi… You did a really good job!" She smiled brightly, tilting her head to the side. "I'm glad I was able to see it before I leave."

"You're leaving?" Sai felt a new emotion well up inside of him. It felt… like he had lost something important, or that he was trying to hold on to whatever the something was, but was failing. He wasn't sure what it was, but he quickly decided that he didn't like it.

Kagome smiled sadly and looked out to the water again. "Aa, there's no reason for me to stay, and I still have to find my family." He could tell that she was sad, but he didn't know how to help, or how to give her a reason to stay, so he, for once, didn't think through his actions.

She felt him come up behind her, but she didn't expect him to wrap his arms around her. "S-Sai? Wha?" From what she knew of him, he was still learning how to feel, so he wasn't one to have much physical contact with anyone outside of battle.

The art jutsu-user placed his head on her shoulder and looked out at the water. He didn't know what had told him to embrace her, but he was guessing that it was an instinct, not that he was complaining; he found that he liked having her in his arms. "I don't know what I can do to make you stay, so I won't try, but…" He pushed his head into her hair, trying to memorize everything he could about the girl who helped him change. "I just want to say thank you… and please come back soon."

Kagome smiled and turned around in his arms. "I'll come back, I just can't promise how soon." She pressed her lips against his for a quick kiss, but when she went to leave, he pulled her back and deepened the kiss.

After a moment, she pulled back to breath and smiled at him. "I'll come visit, I promise." She tried to give back the picture, but he shook his head and folded her hands around it, clearly saying, 'keep it.'

The miko smiled at him one last time then turned to walk away. I'm sorry, Sai, but I have to make sure that I'm really the only one left before there could be anything between us. But… She smiled softly as the sunlight fell over her face. We'll always be friends, one artist to another, no matter what.

AN: This is my first fic with Sai in it, so if I get his character wrong, please forgive me. Thank you all for reading and please leave me with a review of your thoughts or something for me to write for this fic!