Disclaimer: I enjoy writing this too much. Ha.
A/N: So super sorry this took so long… I just haven't been um… I guess "inspired" to write for a while… I wrote this in three sittings instead of my usual one or two… but anyway… shout outs!
Ixchen- sorry about that wait… heh heh…
Pillarchick- hey, cuz! I'll try to get another chapter of either this or Karma out before we come to visit, alright?
Erica6060- (bows) thank you!
Kody Leigh- thank you! Heh, you'll get your wish soon enough!
Lady hawk 89- sorry I took so long… and I have to ask… is your name reference to the movie? I love that movie… Matthew Brodierick was so adorable! (fangirl squeal) … O.O … sorry… heh heh…
DramaQueenABZ- (blush) Wow. Thank you very much! I will do my best!
Enough of that… seeing as how that's all of you… (sigh) … at least you all are loyal… but still, one always would like more reviews… tell you guys what:
02-23-06 A/N: Wheee!
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…
As Kagome was vacuuming the last of the woodchips from the broken door, she was still pre-occupied with her thoughts of the frustrating hanyou and didn't notice the figure that had appeared where the door used to be.
"Kagome-chan…?" Sango carefully asked. "What happened here?"
"Oh! Sango-chan. Hey. Oh, this?" She looked around the disheveled office with drooping shoulders. "Inu Yasha came early today. Sorry you missed him. He'll be back tomorrow, though."
"What happened? It looks like a tornado went through here!"
So Kagome related the story to her friend.
Sango, was not pleased. "What a jerk! For him to put you through all that and then run off—making an even bigger mess in the process—and leaving you to clean everything up! The nerve!"
"Now, Sango-chan, he's not that bad…"
"Why are you defending him? Kagome, this guy sounds like trouble—and I mean it! Why did he have to leave so suddenly?"
"He didn't tell me… but it could have been for anything! Just because he wanted to keep an appointment he just made with someone else over the one he had with me… doesn't make him… a …bad…"
Kagome's weak defense of the hanyou quickly dissolved under Sango's glare.
"I don't like it. I think I'll have a chat with this guy before you start dating," and she gave a small nod of her head and crossed her arms over her chest.
"I suppose—wait! Before we what! I am not—"
"Oh don't even deny it. You're dying for this guy and it's painfully obvious. But I don't know if you should be getting mixed up with this guy. There's just something about him that doesn't sit right with me…"
"Look, I don't want to talk about it right now, okay?"
"Fine. But don't think you've gotten out of this!"
"Hai, Okaa-san." Kagome replied with a submissive tone.
"Yes, Mother."
Sango realized how she'd been sounding and both girls began laughing.
"Come on, lets get some lunch—my treat!"
Kagome had already dropped the handle of the vacuum and was getting her coat and purse. Laughing arm in arm, the girls went off to enjoy a nice dollar menu meal from Wac Donald's.
The day passed quietly, as though the universe could feel Kagome was about to go postal on the first thing she saw if something else went wrong before she went to sleep.
Lying snug in her bed, Kagome quickly began to drift off, exhausted both physically and emotionally.
Stupid Inu Yasha. Boys ruin everything. If only he'd just stand there and look pretty instead of opening his big fat mouth and ruining everything he touches… oh well… tomorrow is the last time I'm gonna see him… unless he flunks the test… hmm… now there's an idea. If he fails, he'll have to come back again…
She smiled at the idea of seeing him everyday and hugged her pillow a little tighter.
Time for sleep now……
…
DREAM SEQUENCE…
…
Kagome was back in Japan… she was standing around these old ruins… she was in her high school uniform and in the distance she saw her friends waving for her to join them. Seeing them brought a tinge of nostalgia over her. It had been so long since they'd been together…
She ran to them, noticing that there were mostly families just milling about instead of students waiting to go to school. She soon shrugged it off and had to stop again to find where her friends had run off to.
Then a man came up and began speaking to her. She didn't really hear what he said, but she knew he was hitting on her. He wasn't so bad, but she wasn't really interested… so she flirted for a bit. He deserved something for his efforts, after all. Then, she had somehow caught up with her friends to find that Eri was holding a child! The baby was only a few months old and was not Japanese… it looked Chinese, actually. She thought to herself for a moment about how some people were so ignorant that they couldn't tell the difference. Then she asked how it was that Eri had a baby. Eri explained that it wasn't hers, but a girl in one of her classes didn't feel like carrying it around all day, so she had asked Eri to hold it for a while.
Kagome looked at the chubby baby and felt almost mesmerized. She asked if she could hold it for a while and her friends all laughed and commented about how Kagome was always meant to be a mother.
She resented that a little, but it didn't matter. She loved babies! Eri handed the baby to her outstretched hands.
Kagome promptly fell to her knees—the baby must have weighed 75 lbs! It was amazing! It looked like a normal baby, but it was so heavy she could barely stand up. Then her friends began to run off calling behind them that it was time for class to start and that Kagome had better hurry it up.
Holding the baby in her arms close to her chest for support, she began to jog as best she could. As she ran, she saw her family. She wanted to tell them it wasn't her child, but Eri's classmate. But they just smiled and waved and gave her a thumbs up of approval.
Frustrated, she continued running and glanced down to check on the baby. She was greatly concerned when she noted the child had latched firmly onto her breast.
She thought wryly to herself how awkward this was—and painful! The little booger was doing something down there but every time she looked down, it was smiling sweetly back at her, all innocence.
That was really annoying.
Then she saw her friends up ahead. She felt a ray of hope and called out plaintively that the child was biting her boobie!
Her friends just laughed knowingly, saying she had everything that the child wanted.
That really upset her.
She looked down at the child she'd been left with.
It looked back thoughtfully and spoke in a high-pitched voice:
CHI…CKE…N!
Startled, she watched as the child again spoke forcefully, demanding something of her.
CHI… CKE… N!
This was starting to really freak her out. She began to grow afraid of the baby in her arms, wanting desperately to get rid of it somehow… she looked up to where here friends were before, but they were gone.
She turned, searching for any familiar face. She needed help… but no one was there.
She was alone. With the freaky Chinese chicken baby that wouldn't leave her alone!
She began to cry. She wasn't really sad or afraid, but she just didn't want to be left alone. She wanted someone to rescue her…
In the distance, she thought she heard a noise and looked up sharply to see who had come for her…
Flowing silver-white hair… that was all she could make of the shadowy figure walking towards her… now the baby was demanding roast beef.
She begged for the figure to hurry.
The shadow continued inching towards her. All she could see was still the hair… but, wait! What was that? On the top of the figure's head… two lumps… like doggy ears?
Her heart soared. It was Inu Yasha! He had come to save her from the demon delicatessen child. Why it wanted lunch meat, she hadn't the foggiest… but it wanted bologna now… she called for him to run. The baby was getting heavier. She felt like she was sinking into the darkness, though all she could see was white.
The figure started to pick up the pace. Kagome's smile was blinding as she waited for her sexy savior. But it quickly faded again when she noticed he was limping. Was he injured? Her mind began to conjure excuses for why he was so late—again—and why he was hurt… a battle perhaps.
She became lost in her thoughts for a while as the shadowy outline grew steadily firmer in her sight.
He was really there!
She threw open her arms, calling out to him and forgetting about the baby until she saw it flying towards him.
Panic struck her very core—she'd thrown the baby at Inu Yasha! Who knows what it would do to him! It may go so far as to ask for some sort of aged cheese to go with his bizarre meat needs. She wouldn't let that happen!
Time slowed like in the movies as she launched herself between the flying demon infant and the silver haired hunk.
His eyes widened in horror as the baby entered Kagome's back like a bullet.
Suddenly it was raining. and she was lying in his lap, his damp hair dangling against her pale cheeks. She coughed weakly as he proclaimed that she couldn't leave him like this. But she knew it was too late. She was dying.
She asked her beloved for a single kiss… goodbye…
A tear rolled down her cheek as she saw his beautiful face contort in grief.
She noticed that he looked like an old man when he cried, his face scrunched up tightly.
He leaned closer… closer… she closed her eyes and pushed her lips weakly to meet his in her last and most fulfilling moments.
When she opened her eyes again, to look into his visage one last time, she screamed in pure horror.
She was no longer in the arms of her hanyou, but one of the old ladies from work!
She cackled at her in a thick brogue something about being a real "bonnie" lass but Kagome couldn't take any more.
She woke with a start from the nightmare, trying to calm herself.
Drenched in her own sweat and breathing like she'd just run a marathon, Kagome sat in her dark bedroom, trying to go over what had just happened in her dream.
Blindly she reached out to her bedside table and grabbed a small flashlight. Glancing at the clock she saw that it was 4:36.
Well, that's one more minute than yesterday… ugh, I can't live like this!
She opened the small drawer in her table open and pulled out a worn journal which she tucked into her robe as her slippered feet padded into the kitchen. This was a ritual she'd been through for since she learned how to write, it seemed. If a dream woke her up, she would immediately set it down in writing in her journal.
This particular journal had lasted her through almost five years. She flipped through the faintly musty pages looking at some of her old favorites.
There was the one she had when she was seven about the time that her cat Buyo went insane and was beating up Souta and Grandpa while Kagome kept trying to calm him down…
She smiled at the memory, thinking back on how frightened of the corpulent kitty she'd been after that dream… she wouldn't go near him for a week!
Once she found a clean page towards the back of the large journal, she set down what she could remember of her odd dream.
By the time she'd done that and gotten the coffee started, it was time to shower and get ready for the day.
She was already exhausted.
Stupid Inu Yasha… I don't know how this is his fault, but I'm sure there's a reason…
Sighing, she felt a headache coming on, already.
I don't know how I am gonna make it through class today… I think he's graded the tests by now… ugh… today is not going to be pretty…
And sure enough, by the time she got on the bus to go to work, she had a pounding headache not only from lack of sleep, but from being yelled at and thoroughly humiliated in front of the entire class for falling asleep during the lecture…
"Te' me, lassie: is that fine looken boy-o cumin' again tedah? Eh em tellin' ye, e' meh be ruff on te ears, but e' sure ain't too hard on te eyes!"
Kagome had her eyes closed and fingers massaging at the temples to relive her physical pain while trying to ignore the cackling of the desiccated bag of bones that was so loudly mocking her.
Just shoot me. Strike me down, oh heavenly being… I don't know what I did to anger thee, but if you will end my misery now, I will be eternally grateful…
She almost winced when she heard the bell on the frame of the door tinkle loudly, announcing company and rather than see who it was, the child inside won and she opted to just put her head down in hopes that whoever it was would either not see her, or just leave her alone.
Opening her eyes only enough to see what time it was on her wrist watch, she let out a loud screech upon seeing not the face of her sleek watch, but two unblinking, golden eyes not more than two inches from her own.
"DAMMIT!" Inu Yasha's hands flew to his sensitive ears protectively as he jumped a foot away from the source of the noise. "What the HELL is your problem!"
After catching her breath, Kagome promptly emptied her lungs again explaining to him exactly what her "problem" was.
His face paled at her sheer volume, if not her words. Finally, she resumed the position he'd found her in, head on the desk, this time, and firmly clasped by her arms as she sobbed to no one in particular how much she hated everything.
After a moment, Inu Yasha quietly asked, "Even me?"
Her head shot up. Surely he didn't just ask something like that! That was the kind of thing that the hunky bishonen would ask before he got together with the heroine of the story!
Her curiosity was met by a flash of blinding light followed immediately by uproarious laughter.
"Oh! You should have seen your face! (choke) (gasp) Do you have any idea how lame that line was? Man, that was too good! (snort) I just bought this little baby and I couldn't resist! Wait, here… I'll show you!"
Through the haze of her remaining tears, Kagome saw he was holding a sleek little digital camera and was fidgeting with the buttons…
"Here… (chortle)" he handed the silver camera to her.
Staring back at her was a horrific sight.
Her eyes were swollen to the size of Tibet and grossly red as certifiable waterfalls were pouring from each socket. There was a look of terrifying hope though that just made it unbearable. She looked pathetic.
And somehow, it was really, really funny.
"God, I look terrible… (sniff)" Kagome began to shyly giggle as she handed it back to the hanyou.
"I know! …but you feel better now, don't ya?"
Kagome looked up again. But there was no flash this time. Only a simple smile.
Even though she was sitting down, Kagome felt her knees go weak. He wasn't pulling any stupid stunts or making fun of her. He was trying to make her feel better.
I am an ice queen… I am an ice queen … I … think my polar caps just melted…
"So!" Kagome actually had to shake her head in order to bring her back to reality at the sound of his voice. "Let's get this damn thing over with." He plopped down in the chair in front of her desk and propped his feet up, looking quite pleased with himself, all traces of his sincerity and thoughtfulness gone like last months cheese.
"Well, for starters, let's check your documents. I trust you have them all?" She gracefully swiped his feet off her desk and began to straighten it up with an occasional self-conscious touch to her hair or wipe at her eyes.
"Keh. 'Course I do. Just ask and ye shall receive."
Kagome had to fight back a snort at hearing that. Don't tempt me.
"Let's see… permit?"
"Check."
"Good." She ignored his growl to her patronizing tone and continued, trying only barely to conceal her smirk. "And… your insurance and registration?"
"Check, check, wench."
"Kagome."
"You know what I mean."
"Kagome."
"…Kagome…"
She smiled, proud of how she was handling his disappointing but predictable return to the indulgence of his inner child.
"All right, then! It looks like we're finally going to get this over with! Just let me get the rest of the papers…" She got up to look in the filing cabinet the crones had behind their desks.
The tinkling of the bell shot a spark of sudden panic through her.
A walk in? We didn't have any appointments until after noon, did we? What time is it?
She wheeled around to look at the clock.
The irony was beyond sickening.
12:32.
The stranger tried to speak with the two old ladies, but found it difficult to understand anything other than their shriveled fingers aimed at Kagome.
"Hi… I'm here for my appointment for 12:30… sorry I'm …late…?"
Kagome was laughing, holding onto the shoulder of the bewildered stranger for stability.
"Oi! What's so funny! Let's get this over with, dammit!" Straightening, Kagome walked back over to where the hunk had replaced his feet on her desk.
"Oh, I'm afraid that isn't going to be possible now. At least not today, it isn't. Do you see the time? Better yet, do you have an excuse for it? Because I would love to hear why you came in so late."
The look on his face was too perfect. The camera was within her grasp, as he'd left it on her desk earlier.
There was a flash and almost before it was finished capturing the moment, he was on his feet, chasing a squealing Kagome around her desk.
"GIVE ME THAT!"
"Hahahaha! NO! EEK! GET AWAY FROM ME!"
The forgotten newcomer cleared his throat awkwardly. He was not used to being in this kind of situation, that was for sure.
He stood almost as tall as Inu Yasha, but that was where most of the similarities ended.
He had long hair, too, but his was jet black and in a high ponytail atop his head. His skin was a lush, olive tan and he had surprisingly blue eyes. They weren't a normal, boring blue, but almost an aqua or teal color.
He wore a brown tee shirt and plain jeans and a worn in pair of running shoes. He was well built and stood confidently. Well, usually… right now he was a bit confused to say the least.
He was just going to take his driving test and immediately go and hit the road on the cross country trip he'd been promising himself since he graduated high school.
But when he walked in the door, he felt his legs freeze.
She was perfect.
Absolutely perfect in every single way possible.
And she was now being chased by some guy with claws, long silver hair and a foul mouth.
He did not like that.
"HEY! What is going on here!" the stranger shouted, trying to get the other man's attention.
He was ignored, though, and the other guy in the red shirt continued to chase his woman.
After deciding he'd had enough, the stranger ran over to the feuding pair, grabbed the mystery beauty by the waist, tossed her over his shoulder and ran back to roughly where he was standing before.
…in about half of a second…
By the time Inu Yasha noticed Kagome was gone, he caught the scent of the stranger and locked eyes with him.
Inu Yasha didn't know how this guy had managed to waltz in here and steal Kagome out from his nose with out even realizing the guy was there, but he really didn't like it.
Right about this time it occurred to Kagome that she was no longer being chased. Not only was she not being chased, but she was, in fact, being held over someone's shoulder. And it was not Inu Yasha. And she was now back by the filing cabinet.
This did not sit well with Kagome.
Just when she was about to start screaming, she heard the tinkling of the bell at the door yet again and felt the head of her captor snap to the source of the sound.
It must have been quite a sight:
Papers still gently falling to the ground, chairs over-turned, the two Marys huddled in together, gasping for breath but still managing to laugh, a silver haired boy standing in front of Kagome's desk, panting and looking ready to kill, and a black haired boy with a frazzled Kagome thrown over his shoulder staring at the door.
Kagome recognized her friend immediately.
"Sango-chan! Uh… its not what it looks like?"
…
…
A/N: hee hee… sorry, Kody Leigh, you'll have to wait until the next chapter to get her reactions… but what did you guys think? I hope you liked it… btw, the dreams, are all based upon real ones… o.O strange, isn't it?
And of course you guys know who the "stranger" is… and I didn't mention his entrance before because I actually just added him on a whim, to be frank. Tee hee… but all's well that ends well, right? Right.
(cricket)
…I should go now… anyway, I will hope to hear from you guys soon! Merry Christmas if I don't update before then!
-M-
ps... My beta is sick! (sad face) So... I'm just gonna go ahead and post this as is... feel free to pretend you didn't see any of the typos you find... or whatever...
pss... oh, and I'm starting to do some different POV's, in case ya'll didn't notice... lemme know if it is too confusing or whatever...