Author's Note: Thanks for the reviews of chapter one!

Absence

Chapter Two

They had been relieved to see him when he stepped out of the well that final time. Blinking, squinting against the blaze of light, with the leading edge of their bright smiles fading as they looked behind him for the familiar figure they all wanted to see. Confusion, that first hard spurt of disbelief, harsh and accusing in the laden pause that followed.

"Inuyasha…" Sango was the first to speak. Her eyes darted from his face to the empty well behind him, and she voiced the question he knew they all wanted to ask. "Where's Kagome-chan?"

He couldn't meet their eyes, but he couldn't look away. How could he face them when he couldn't even face himself? How could he reconcile what he'd done with what he felt, how he knew they felt? How could he justify his actions when his heart screamed at him through the pain and tears that he'd just made the biggest mistake of his life?

He'd let her go. Hearing her family's worried exclamations, seeing her cling to her mother like that, smelling her tears…he'd known what he'd had to do. Selfishness, pride, fear, need, desire…At that moment, nothing meant as much as her happiness did. And she'd be happy there. With her family that loved her, her friends that needed her.

So he'd made the choice that was no choice at all. He'd let her go.

His voice was rough, hoarse from all the shouting he'd done in the meidou. "Kagome is safe."

Shippou leapt up into Sango's arms so he could glare accusingly into Inuyasha's face. His voice was shrill. "You left her behind, didn't you? You left her! Why would you do that? How could you, Inuyasha?" He'd known the decision was final, and irrevocable, and threw himself at Sango with a wail. "I hate Inuyasha!"

The words, so familiar, nonetheless sent barbs through Inuyasha's heart. It wasn't the fact that he was hated that hurt so much as the knowledge of why he deserved that hate. They'd relied on him, they'd trusted him, and he had failed them.

His throat snapped shut, but Inuyasha tried. He took a shaky step forward, lifted one hand as if to touch Shippou's head. He stopped short, let his hand fall back to his side. "I'm sorry." His voice was raw to his own ears. "Shippou…I'm sorry."

"I hate you." The statement, muffled against Sango's chest, was watery, but no less vehement for the tears that choked his words.

Inuyasha lifted his eyes to Sango's. Hers, too, were filled with tears, with recrimination. "I know. It's okay."

"Why?" Sango's voice was low, but she couldn't mask the pain as she stared at her one-time enemy and longtime friend as she echoed Shippou's question. "Inuyasha, why would you do that? Why would you leave her and come back alone?"

He couldn't fight back the tears, and as the first one slipped down his cheek, Inuyasha looked away. Shame and guilt battled in his broken heart. There were so many things, reasons, feelings. He'd done the only thing he could have, and he'd made the right choice. He clung to that as his only truth in the rest of the slippery world.

But all he could say was "I'm sorry." Over and over again, as if repetition would make the words come true. As if words could soothe the grief and dull the pain and ease the separation. As if words were enough.

Miroku spoke up for the first time. His eyes were steady on Inuyasha's face as he put a gentle arm around Sango's shoulders, but his words were directed to Shippou as much as to Sango herself. "Inuyasha misses Kagome-sama just as much as we do. More, even. You'll come to understand that that's why he's hurting…and that's why he chose to come back alone."

For once, Inuyasha was grateful for his friend's perception and calm, astute observations. "Come on, Sango." Miroku guided Sango away with a final, steady glance at Inuyasha over his shoulder. "Let's go tell Kaede-sama there will be the three of us for dinner tonight."

Alone, Inuyasha stood and watched their departing figures. Miroku's parting statement was warning enough—he wouldn't be welcome at the village, not tonight. Wounds were still fresh, and his presence around their fire would only make all the more poignant Kagome's absence. Still, he couldn't shake the vulnerability he felt at Miroku laying bare his emotions in front of the others—friends and traveling companions though they were.

He couldn't turn around. His shattered heart cried out at the thought of the barren well behind him, and he knew he wasn't ready to face it yet. Instead, he launched himself into the treetops and set his legs to running, bounding from bough to bough through the depths of the evening forest. The sun was setting in the west, staining the sky crimson and orange as it emblazoned a path behind the distant mountains. Gold-bellied clouds slowly flared into shadow as night fell, and still Inuyasha ran.

Wind sluiced through his hair, streaming like water past his face. Scents flowed past, sounds drifted on the breeze, but they meant as little to him as if he possessed his dull human senses. He could no more decipher the woven threads of scent than he could read Kagome's textbooks. He could no more pinpoint the source of sounds that flooded his ears than he could ride that wheeled iron cart of hers he'd once tied into knots.

He could no more stop thinking about her, remembering her, than he could forestall the next beat of his heart.

Sunrise found him perched in 'his' tree on the edge of the village, a silent sentinel watching over the slumbering village. His clothes were torn and dirty, his hair mussed, and his leg muscles screamed from the punishment of the night before. But he couldn't sleep, couldn't force his mind to silence long enough to find a moment's rest.

He couldn't stop remembering. He couldn't stop the hurt.

"Inuyasha."

He hadn't noticed the monk standing below him, in the exact spot Kagome used to stand when she called up to him—laughing, teasing, annoyed. Inuyasha…Come down here!

"Inuyasha." Miroku repeated the hanyou's name, his voice smooth and even. "If you could fetch a bucket of water from the river, Kaede-sama will be starting breakfast preparations shortly."

Inuyasha couldn't find it in himself to care. It took too much effort to respond in kind. "Get the water yourself, monk."

The jingle of the staff Miroku habitually cared was annoyed. "Stir your lazy stumps, Inuyasha. You're not the only one who has to live with the consequences of your decision to let Kagome-sama go, wherever it is she went. Are you going to forsake us, too?"

His head lolled on his neck. It felt too heavy to hold up on his own. "Shut up." Inuyasha thought, vaguely, there was a time he would have added something to the demand—a threat, an insult. An attempt at slicing the human in half with his sword. "I told you, she's safe." He hadn't forsaken her. Miroku's words didn't instill any seeds of doubt in his heart. He'd done the right thing, the only thing. It was the least he could do for her, after all she'd done for him.

He had enough time to reach out and grab the bucket that came flying before it smacked him in the face. But he didn't have the energy to drum up irritation at the unexpected attack. Miroku was already walking away. "Fetch the water, Inuyasha."

Even as he scowled—okay, so he did have enough energy to be irritated—Inuyasha dropped out of the tree, wincing as abused legs protested the landing. He limped off to the river to fill the bucket and bring it back, though part of him, the part that hadn't gone cold and numb when he'd found himself alone at the bottom of the well, dreaded the coming confrontation with Sango and Shippou. Kaede, Kohaku. Myouga. Kirara. Everyone.

Kaede looked up when Inuyasha entered her hut. It was crowded with the number of people who had spent the night, and Inuyasha avoided looking towards the sleeping figures still tucked under blankets on the far side of the single room house. "Welcome back," Kaede said simply. Her words touched something inside Inuyasha. Had anyone ever said those words, those simple words, to him? He shook his head as he set the bucket down beside her, moved away. Her words touched the part of him that still ached, and her words, meant to soothe, instead made him bleed.

He didn't eat, but he sat with his back against the wall as the rest of the company woke, rubbing sleep from red-rimmed eyes, and slowly gathered around the warmth of the fire. Shippou stubbornly refused to look in his direction, but Sango, at least, managed a faint, if half-hearted, smile towards him, even if she wouldn't look him in the face. Kirara didn't seem similarly inhibited, and trotted over to mew and paw at his knee until he petted her. Grateful for even that small semblance of acceptance.

Kohaku tried to offer him some food. "There's more than enough if you're hungry," he attempted as the silence in the room stretched taut enough to pluck in harmonizing chords. "Kaede-sama's miso soup is delicious."

Inuyasha shook his head mutely, refusing to lift his gaze, even for this boy who probably understood best of all the pain of living the repercussions of one's actions. Pretending to be possessed until he could exact his revenge on Naraku…Inuyasha couldn't imagine his pain, but he could, now, commiserate.

And while he appreciated the boy's attempts at inclusion, nothing could fill the void inside. He had the feeling that anything he dared ingest would merely end up over the floorboards in a matter of minutes. He wasn't just hollowed out inside, he'd been torn to shreds.

Miroku shattered the silence by slapping his hands on his thighs and standing up. "Kohaku. Inuyasha. There's work to be done. The village isn't going to repair itself, you know." He moved to the door, paused at the hanging mat to glance back at the others. "Well?"

Kohaku stood with a glance at his sister. "I'd like to help." He hesitated, then bent to pick up his sickle, coiling the long chain through his hands. "I can chop wood to use for fixing the fences." The fields outside the town had been destroyed, and the small number of herd animals had scattered without the fences that had once penned them in.

There was another pause, and then Inuyasha unfolded himself from the wall and brushed past Miroku. "It's my damn fault anyway, so I guess I'd better help."

"It is your fault." Shippou still wouldn't look at him, but Inuyasha stopped to glance back at the small kitsune. Face pointed at the ground, Shippou clenched his hands into fists. "It is your fault, but I don't hate you. I just miss Kagome so much!" The sobs broke out of him, and he threw himself at Sango to bury his face in her chest. The taijiya cuddled him close, stroking his head and murmuring to him. Much the way Kagome had done when consoling the kitsune boy.

Inuyasha turned away. There was nothing he could do for Shippou's grief. There was little enough he could do for his own.