Chapter 4:

Kagome frowned, staring down at her "lunch" tray.

She believed it was a tray… but whether the stuff on it constituted edible food, much less a lunch, was still up for debate.

To be honest she was just a little scared of it…

She gave it little pokes with her fork as she followed Sango from the cafeteria to a table outside under a big tree. The dried bird crap was a little off-putting, but the shade felt good. The day was warm, despite the month, and the red and orange leaves falling around it were beautiful.

She had to admit, when not running around lost, the campus was great.

Overly huge, yes, but great.

After all, if you're going to charge people a small fortune for their kid's education, you can at least provide it on grade A land.

"Are you positively sure this is edible?" she asked as sat down, poking it again.

Sango just laughed.

"Nope. Not a bit." She held up a paper bag.

Kagome glared at her.

She laughed again.

Grudgingly, Kagome shoved her food aside, unwilling to risk it. She'd grab a snack at…

At the Taisho's house.

No matter how much Izayoi hugged her and called her , "sweetheart," and , "dear," it wouldn't change the fact that that enormous house by the lake wasn't her home. It was nothing like her home. Her home was two towns over, a small house near an apartment complex. She'd lived in that complex from the ages of 3 to 7, in an apartment on the third floor. She could still remember her mom out on the balcony, precariously perched on the edge, swinging her legs carelessly as if they weren't dangling three stories above the ground.

She could remember being afraid that her mother would fall someday, splatter across the pavement below, and leave her forever.

At the time nothing had seemed worse.

After all, what on earth could possibly be worse than that?

Funny… she hadn't really wanted an answer.

Whenever her mother would sit on the edge, she'd always end up going outside too. She'd stand on the little stool her mom had made for her so that she could see over the edge and she'd stare out to whatever her mom liked to look at so much, and she'd hold onto the hem of her mom's shirt, or her skirt, or her belt loop or something. She'd always hold on, so that she could pull her mom back if she started to fall. Even though, as she got older, she knew that she'd be unable to. She just didn't want to do nothing, didn't want to just stand there and watch her mother fall. She wanted to be able to do something. That was very important to her, even back then.

One specific memory she had from that balcony, was her mom staring at that little house. There was a chain-link fence that went around the apartment complex's property, encircling everything except the parking lot. The side of the little house was practically right up against the fence, and as long as she could remember the For Sale sign had been in the yard. No one had ever wanted to live in a small little house, squeezed into a lot, in between an apartment complex and a 7/11. No one even knew why there was one little house there, although the rumor was it had belonged to the owner of the 7/11 an extremely long time ago.

Turns out even he didn't want to live there.

But her mom did.

She'd never known why.

She'd asked her once when she was about 6. Asked her why she wanted to live in an ugly little gray house that no one wanted. Her mom had just kind of smiled in that all knowing way that parents reserve for small children and patted her head. Swinging her legs back over the ledge and hopping down, she leaned her upper body over the wall, and stared at the little house upside down. She was quiet for a while, and when she spoke her voice was kind of far away.

"I want to own something, that house. I want a place to truly call my home."

Kagome had just looked confused pointing back towards the door, "But we live here! This is our home!"

Her mom was quiet again before smiling. Patting her daughter's head again, she ruffled the six-year-old's messy hair before shoving her hands in her pockets and heading back inside.

Kagome hadn't understood what she'd meant for many years, and even when she understood the concept, she didn't think she ever truly understood the emotion.

Not until now.

Now Kagome would give anything to return to that dingy little house, even before her mom had fixed it up with new carpet and happy, yellow, paint.

Because it was really, truly, her home.

Except it wouldn't be.

Not without her mom.

Sango frowned as she watched her new friend's expression go from disgusted to lonely. Sad.

Was the lunch really anything to be that upset about?

No, the food was inedible, but had never caused a student to become emotionally distraught.

She sensed further problems. But there was really nothing she could do. She'd know the girl for all of about four hours. I mean, sure, she liked the girl and was pretty sure she liked her back, but she didn't expect her to confide all her deepest darkest secrets in her. Especially not secrets dark enough to put that look in her eyes.

Somewhat helplessly, Sango scooped her sandwich from her bag and set it in front of her. She also retrieved a pudding cup which she pushed across the table under Kagome's nose. It took the girl a second to emerge from her thoughts, but when she did she jerked back a little in surprise, blinking, before focusing on the offering.

"What's this?" She asked as if she'd never seen pudding before.

"Pudding," Sango replied, raising an eyebrow. "Haven't you ever eaten pudding before?"

"Yes." Kagome stated, "I have. Many times I fact. But this pudding wasn't there when I…"

"Zoned out?"

"Exactly," she nodded, relieved at Sango's easy explanation.

Sango nodded knowingly. "I do that sometimes. Anyways…" She hesitated, treading softly on delicate ground, "You seemed kind of…upset…so…" she gestured towards the pudding. Kagome didn't say anything, her blue eyes just a little cloudy. She made another motion towards the abandoned pudding cup. "It's impossible to be upset while eating pudding."

Kagome continued to stare at the pudding cup to the point where Sango began to wonder if her new friend was autistic or something, when suddenly she started to laugh.

Sango did some staring of her own now, confused.

Kagome grinned, "Interesting logic."

Sango felt a smile crawl up her face, felt laughter bubble up in her throat. Her laughter joined Kagome's blending and swirling in the air above them, until the were both out of breath, having no clue what they were laughing about. Each laughing at the other, because they were laughing at them. Simply laughing because things had gotten kind of heavy.

Sango wiped at her eyes, opening her mouth to speak, when her voice was drowned out by another's.

"Alright, I've got to know. What's so funny?"

Inuyasha made a rude noise in his throat, attracting Miroku's attention.

"What's wrong with you?"

Inuyasha was sitting outside, straddling the bench, as to scowl at the scene before him.

Well…actually it was across the quad…but still… He could see it.

"What does that idiot think he's doing?"

Disgusted, Inuyasha swung his leg over the bench, turning his back on the scene, viciously attacking his cup of noodles with a spork.

Miroku frowned.

"Just what may I ask, has changed this previously normal lunch period into feeding time at the zoo?"

Inuyasha sent him a glare, angrily slurping at a noodle that was dangling from his lips, before jerking a thumb over his shoulder. "That," he spat.

Miroku leaned over the table, trying to identify the dreadful wrongdoing, but came up with nothing…

"What are you talking about?"

Inuyasha made that noise in his throat again, and turned his upper body around to look too, as if it was the scene of a train wreck; Horribly gruesome, but he couldn't look away. "That," he pointed."Koga."

He spat the name like something dirty. Not that this surprised Miroku. He was constantly trying to figure out if the two boys liked or despised each other.

It was really very exhausting.

Peering around Inuyasha he quickly scanned the quad for his friend, to find him standing by a table, talking to two girls. Miroku's lips turned down to match his friend's.

"So," he frowned, his voice flat, "Sango talks to him no problem…"

"What? No…this isn't about Sango," Inuyasha replied, sounding exasperated, "It's about…" His lip curled up, "her."

"Who?" Miroku, wondered, examining the girl at the table. At first she didn't ring any bells, but he gradually began to recognize her as…

"Hey! That's the girl from the bathroom this morning!"

"The wha-" Inuyasha slapped a hand against his forehead, "No…just…I don't want to know…"

"Hm? Ok, but… wait! She's -"

"Yeah," Inuyasha scowled, "That's her."

"Hmmm…" Miroku tilted his head, studying the girl. He couldn't see her well, but she didn't seem to have any hideous deformities. In fact, if his memory served, she was rather pretty if not somewhat tired. "Odd. She doesn't look like an inky stain on the face of the earth…"

"Feh." Inuyasha rolled his eyes. "You don't know her."

"And I suppose you do?" he replied, wryly.

"Better than you," he muttered under his breath.

"Ah, once again your wit is astounding," came a deep voice from behind. Turning, Inuyasha's scowl deepened. "Don't you have a fan club to entertain?"

Sesshomaru raised an eyebrow. "A few girls who like me do not qualify as a fan club." he smirked, "Though I can understand your confusion, seeing as you have no experience in the matter."

Inuyasha continued to glare and Miroku his a snicker behind his soda can.

"I do so have girls!"

"Once again, little brother, one stalker doesn't count."

"She's not my stalker," Inuyasha growled, "And if I could pry her away I would."

He turned angrily back to his noodles.

Because his brother's voice was getting ragged, his breathing uneasy, Sesshomaru pushed the subject no more. Brotherly teasing should really only go so far and to go further would be intentionally cruel.

He'd tease his brother unmercifully, but there were lines than even he would not cross. Turning, his long silver hair glinting in the sun, he took his leave, soon followed by several not so discreet admirers.

"Pudding."

"Excuse me?"

While Inuyasha and had been scowling and calling people idiots, Kagome, completely unaware, had turned to see who'd spoken to her. She had to admit, she'd been surprised to see Koga standing there in a black T-shirt with his leather jacket and soft looking brown pants. He was smiling, a warm and engaging smile, with lots of shiny white teeth.

He looked like the epitome of friendliness, somewhat contradicting the air of moody rebellion she'd sensed earlier.

He'd seemed like the kind of guy to smoke in the boys room just because it's cause a scene.

Now he seemed like the boy next door.

It was a little disorienting.

He seemed honestly interested. So she'd answered him honestly. They really had been laughing about pudding, more or less.

"Really," she replied, holding up the pudding cup, waving it slightly.

He cocked his head to the side, "I don't get it."

"Neither do we," Sango shrugged. "Join the club."

"We've got jackets." Kagome added with a smirk, wondering if anyone else would get the movie reference. Sango at least did, laughing a little while she opened her pudding cup. After all, once you've laughed at pudding you are positively obligated to eat it. To do otherwise would hurt it's poor little pudding feelings, and that's just wrong.

Koga cocked one eyebrow, shooting her a million-dollar grin that ,for reason's she wasn't completely sure about, caused her stomach to do a little flip. Not certain she liked this, she made a mental note to revisit this later and waited to see what'd happen next.

Shoving his hands in his pockets, he stared at her for a moment, still grinning.

"Heh. You're not what I expected Kagome."

Um….ok?

"You were expecting something?"

He didn't say anything, just chuckled a little and, still grinning, walked away suavely, hands in his pockets. Shooting a confused look across the table at Sango, she was met with an equally confused shrug.

"Is it really that bad?"

Kagome actually stared at the phone in baffled amazement. Was she serious?

She had, for the past half-hour, been on her cell phone ranting to Ayame about the horrors of Takahashi Private School. The many, many, horrors.

She had yet to bring herself to use the Hayashi's phone. She wasn't sure why, but she suspected it was a matter of belonging. If she used the house phone, then it would become her home phone number. If she never used it then…

Well, honestly people would probably still refer to it as such but still… It just felt better. It helped her on the inside.

Somehow, however, in this chatter filled half-hour of horror, Ayame had failed to grasp the severity of her situation.

"Did you hear a word I said?" She exclaimed when she found her voice. "Remember those four foreign exchange student from England freshman year? The ones who dressed all formally and made shoving their nose in the air an Olympic sport?"

"Of course," she replied, and Kagome could all but see her friend wrinkling her nose over the phone. "They always smelled like coffee and went on forever about their queen, and how their parents had been knighted. Which was the biggest load of bull I've ever heard."

"But still," Kagome was waving her hand impatiently at the phone as if her friend could actually see this, " Knighted or not their parents were freaking loaded."

"Indubitably."

Kagome smirked before morphing her face into a very believable, if not completely pointless, mask of horror.

"Imagine an entire school of snooty foreign exchange students, sans the sexy accents."

"Gasp!"

"Seriously."

"There's no one normal there? At all?"

"Well there is this one girl…and maybe a guy, though I wouldn't really call either of them normal exactly…"

"A guy? Who? That one you live with?"

"What? No!" She made more pointless dramatic anti-Inuyasha hand movements. "Definitely not! And for the record that doesn't really narrow it down much, I live with two, well, four if you want to be technical."

"Okay, so it's not what's-his-name.."

"Inuyasha" She filled in, her mouth twisting as the word tasted bitter in her mouth.

"Right, Inuyasha. And the other ones are…"

"Sesshomaru, and well…Shippo and Taisho if we're being technical again."

"We can be. What are they like?"

"Well Inuyasha is a moron," she replied quickly, as if dying to express this to someone, "He's rude and obnoxious and…ugh, he's in three of my classes…"

Ayame made a sympathetic noise over the phone.

"What about Sesshomaru? He's older one right? Or the younger one, you had said he was cute."

Kagome grimaced again.

"I said potentially cute. I wouldn't know, I've never actually seen the kid smile."

She sighed rubbing her hand over her face. "Seriously, he hates me."

"Really? I mean, you were never like Mother Goose or anything, but normally children get to know you before they develop an extreme sense of dislike. And even then I don't think it's ever reached hate."

"Well…this one does."

"Well…what about that Sesshomaru guy? What's he like? Come on, one of them has to like you."

"I don't know. We don't talk. Which actually, sadly enough, give us the best relationship…" She flopped backwards so that she was laying horizontally across her bed, her knees bent and swinging off the side. Since nobody could see her, she allowed her eyes to be sad, her shoulders to sink into the mattress looking defeated. Maybe she was. For the time being anyways.

"You should come back," Ayame told her, her voice soft and maybe even slightly pleading. "You don't belong there."

"I know I don't. Seriously, this has to be the one place that I belong the least…but it's where I'm stuck."

"Stupid legal system."

Kagome's lips twitched in what could possibly be interpreted as a smile, her spirits lifting momentarily.

"Thanks." Her lips and spirits turned back down, "I want to go back too."

Ayame had to bite her lip to keep from sniffling. She loved Kagome, wanted her back with her. Hell, it didn't even have to be with her, though she'd prefer it, it could be somewhere else. Anywhere else. Anywhere but that gigantic house filled with people who didn't like her, and that equally huge school filled with people who couldn't possibly appreciate her. Taking a deep, composing breath, she forced a fake smile on her face, purely for her own benefit.

"What about Taisho?" she asked, her last attempt at finding something somewhat positive, "Or Izayoi?"

Kagome sighed, rolling over onto her stomach, casting a look at the door as if she could see the people they were speaking of through the plaster.

"They're alright" She replied quietly, "they at least try I guess… but I don't see why. No matter how much they smile and call me "sweetheart" and "dear," and tell their sons to look after me" - Ayame could be heard snorting at the idea of Kagome needing looking after - "it doesn't change anything. I don't belong here with all these rich people. I'm not rich… not anywhere close. I don't belong."

Her last words were a whisper, barely audible.

She closed her eyes, pressing her face into her bed, imagining her little house next to the apartments. Visualizing her mom sitting on the cold, cement steps out back in patched up overalls splotched in yellow paint, planting happy looking tulips against the house. She could almost smell the oil and grease from the fast food joint she'd worked at, feel the perspiration beading against the back of her neck. See the crowded hallways of her old school, loud and smelling of candy and sweat.

"I- I have to go," she mumbled into the phone, closing it quickly and tossing it to her pillows before pressing her face into the mattress more firmly. Squeezing her eyes shut tight against the tears that threatened to overflow.

And when they finally conquered her, she went silently, with dignity.

Izayoi sighed, leaning against the wall. She knew that eavesdropping was a nasty habit, she'd always tried to giver her children the privacy they wanted, but she couldn't help it.

She'd originally come up to ask Kagome about her classes, if there was anything she needed. To ask how her first day went, though she was sure Taisho had done just that on the ride home. She'd been about to knock when she heard the girl's voice through the door. Assuming she was on the phone, and not psychotic, she waited a few moments. After all, to interrupt a phone conversation was just rude. She could wait.

She'd meant to wait against the wall. To stand outside in silence, yet somehow she found her ear pressed to the door curiously listening in.

She'd always told her children not to eavesdrop, currently working on Shippo since it would be too late for the other two has her lessons not already stuck. Like she'd told all three of them, "Eavesdroppers often hear things they'd rather not."

It only figured that that lesson would come around to bite her.

Imagine an entire school of snooty foreign exchange students, sans the sexy accents.

Well Inuyasha is a moron, He's rude and obnoxious and…ugh, he's in three of my classes.

I've never actually seen the kid smile, seriously, he hates me.

I don't know. We don't talk. Which actually, sadly enough, give us the best relationship…

They're alright, they at least try I guess… but I don't see why. No matter how much they smile and call me " sweetheart" and "dear," and tell their sons to look after me it doesn't change anything. I don't belong here with all these rich people. I'm not rich… not anywhere close. I don't belong.

Izayoi sighed, slouching a little. The mother in her was appalled at her posture, but overpowered by the unhappiness of the child on the other side of the wall. Her motherly instinct was going crazy, wanting everyone to be happy.

From what she could tell, not many were.

"Mom?"

Snapping her head up, she turned sharply, finding herself face to face with her oldest son.

"Um…yes?"

"If you want to go in, I don't think she'll decapitate you. Inuyasha maybe "- she detected glee at the prospect - "But not you. Probably."

She huffed out a breath, smoothing her hair back and trying to appear competent and confident in front of her son. He pretended not to notice.

"I know that."

"Alright," he shrugged, continuing on down the hall. She almost let him before…

"Wait!"

"Hm?"

"Not here," she whispered, having the sense to pull him away from Kagome's door before discussing her. She stopped a little ways down the hall near the staircase.

"How was it?"

"Excuse me?"

"Kagome, her first day. How was it?"

"Why not ask her?"

"Because…" She looked back at the door… "just because… Because I asked you!"

Exasperated he ran a hand through his hair. "She survived and as far as I know didn't run out of class crying at anytime throughout the day. I really can't tell you more."

"Oh alright," she sighed, looking tired.

"She really won't decapitate you."

"I know that," she snapped, taking on an all-knowing motherly tone. "She's entirely too small to."

As if this was a suitable farewell, she marched off down the hall leaving her slightly confused son in her wake. Shrugging, he turned and ignoring his previous task returned to his room. Venturing outside just wasn't worth this.

"What's going on?"

Turning, Taisho found Izayoi standing in the doorway of his study.

"What do you mean?"

"With Kagome. What's going on with her?"

Taisho sighed, gesturing for her to come closer, seeing the weariness in her eyes, opened his arms and let her slide onto his lap. She curled up there, laying her head against his shoulder and sighed.

"What's going on?" she asked again.

"I can't tell you," he murmured into her hair. "It has to do with work."

"I know that but -"

"But?"

"But… She's unhappy Taisho!" She exclaimed, pulling back to look at him. "She doesn't like it here! Doesn't want to be here!" Worn out she lay her head back on his shoulder. "And your sons aren't helping. You're going to talk to them."

She felt him smile against her hair. "Alright dear." Looking down at her he stroked her hair, running his fingers through it gently, wishing more than anything that he could tell her the truth.

"It's work related honey," she whispered. "I can't tell you."

"I know," she muttered, pouting adorably.

"I know you want her to be happy," he murmured. "You want everyone to be happy. I love that about you." He absently kissed her head. "You can make her happy, I know it. She'll be okay. She's just adjusting. Just give her time, you'll see."

Izayoi sighed again, her arms linked around his neck. "I hope you're right."

"I am," he smiled, his voice holding just the slightest hint of smug.

"Sure," she replied, her lips turning up, pressing her lips against his cheek. "You'd better be."

He closed his eyes, smiling as he held her tighter. Gods how he loved her. Not many women could handle all of this. Handle having a husband whose work couldn't be discussed, taking in children she'd never met for reason he couldn't tell her. Much less throwing herself into it as fully as she had. Welcoming the girl into their home as easily as a stray puppy or kitten and giving it her all.

Holding her close, he rocked the chair back, wondering just how much more this woman would have to blindly accept.

Yea! I've finally managed to dip back into the mystery just a little bit. I've never really written a mystery before so if this ends up being really predictable I'm sorry.

That's all for now!

Remember, reviews make Redfairy happy!

Later!

_Redfairy