InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Dashed Hopes ❯ Girls' Night Out ( Chapter 15 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Inuyasha is human. Not hanyou, so he has black hair and lavender eyes (manga colors, not anime). Did that help?

Sorry for the long break between updates, here’s why. On Wednesday, February 25th at 9:10am, my cat Luther was put down. (put to sleep if you don’t know what I mean.)

The sweetie purred up until his last breath...I’m sad now.

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Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha. Plain and simple. And sad, very sad.

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Dashed Hopes

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--- Last Chapter ---

Kagome snuggled even closer to her source of warmth. Curling up into a tighter ball at Inuyasha’s chest, she had never felt so safe in all her life.

Inuyasha, not minding sleeping in the thickly padded easy chair, wrapped his arms protectively around his charge.

He’d protect her, no matter what.

He’d protect her.

--- End of Last Chapter ---

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Chapter 15: Girls’ Night Out

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“Morning Kagome!”

“Good morning, Ayame,” Kagome slowed down to wait for her red headed friend.

The two walked side by side into work. “You’re here later than usual,” Ayame pointed out.

“Yeah, I walked today.”

“You live near here? Where?”

Kagome flushed pink. “Not really. It’s kind of far, but I like to take long walks to clear my mind,” she danced around the subject.

Ayame didn’t seem to notice and just shrugged before continuing. “I was thinking about having a girls’ night out.”

Kagome nodded and they stepped onto the elevator. “Sounds like fun.”

“Oh yes, it should be. Tons!” Ayame gushed. She needed a night of fun real bad and Kagome could tell by her over excitement.

“Great!” Kagome beamed.

“Friday night, you’re coming!” The green eyed female commanded as she rushed out onto her floor with several other coworkers.

“Hey, wait!” Kagome would have liked to have been asked first. She grumbled as the doors slid shut.

“Woe is you! Partying with your friends, the horror!” The only other person in the elevator teased.

Kagome turned to glare. Deciding not to lose her temper, she turned back and tapped her foot impatiently.

“See ya, Kag!” The man yelled as he stepped out.

“Yeah! Bye, Nobunaga!” Her good nature was back. At least for a little while.

“Wait!” Called out another man as he squeezed into the closing doors. “Hey!”

Kagome just grunted in recognition.

“What crawled up your ass and died?” Inuyasha asked cheerfully not put off by her cold mood.

“Hey, boss!” Inuyasha turned to his secretary. “You should really get that cranial rectal problem checked out!” Kagome called as she stepped out onto their floor and to her desk.

Inuyasha stood stunned in the elevator while patting down his body to see if the ‘disease’ was noticeable. Then a light bulb visibly appeared above his head. “Shit! You-!”

Kagome smiled as his insult was cut short as the elevator decided it was time to move down.

“At least we know his brain DOES work!” she mumbled, amazed, as she pulled out the latest file.

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“Damn woman! I DO NOT have my head stuck up my ass!”

Sesshoumaru smirked at his brother’s ‘good morning’. “You sure?” he greeted.

Inu turned incredulously, “Damn straight!”

Sesshoumaru shook his head sadly. “Of course you’re right, as usual.”

Inu glared. “Jackass,” he muttered as he stormed out of the room.

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Kagome skipped off the elevator, happy again by noon. For one thing, she never really was a morning person, people should learn to understand that about her. For another, she and Sango would go for girls’ night out. She had decided to invite her best friend along.

Slowling to a walk, she approached Inu’s office door.

She really should apologize.

He hadn’t deserved it.

Well he didn’t entirely deserve it.

‘Wait, whose voice is that?’

Kagome found his door open and she stopped outside.

‘I should really stop doing this,’ she mused, remembering the last time she had eavesdropped outside an office door.

“Poor Inu-babe,” a skimpily dressed female cooed while sitting on a corner of his desk. “Everyone being so mean to him!” she sympathized. She then hopped off and stood behind him to rub his shoulders.

Kagome’s eyes narrowed. ‘That slut! He could do better!’ Of course then her eyes widened. ‘I don’t really care, do I? Of course I do, he’s my friend and he deserves to be happy!’ Kag mentally shrugged. ‘I’ll do it later.’ Walking off to finish her job, mind on Friday again, her movement caught Inu’s eyes.

“Hey Kag, wait up!” He leaped out of his chair and raced out the door to her. “Hey,” he said quietly.

“Huh?” Kagome answered, distracted.

‘Inu-babe’, being the egotistical, slightly dim-witted man he was, immediately wrote her distraction off as being upset and jealous. “Don’t worry about Yura. She’s just an old girlfriend. Stopped by to deliver some files. You see, that’s how we met, she works for the branch of the company in Kyoto,” Inuyasha rambled on.

“Isn’t it against rules to fraternize with an employee?” Kag wondered out loud, mind still off elsewhere.

Inuyasha shrugged, “Never really thought about it before.”

“Right.”

Inuyasha went on about more intimate details of his old relationship with Yura Tohatsu, possibly to make Kag more ‘jealous’, and was so into it that he missed the sound of the elevator doors ding shut as she she left to go do her job, leaving him there standing to himself.

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Kagome’s nose tickled.

Bad.

Real bad.

It was really sad that she couldn’t scratch it at the second.

“Inu-Inuyasha?” She called out, afraid to move too quickly. “Inuyasha, please!”

“What?” he asked sticking his head out of his office.

“Help?” Kag offered the choice to him.

Inu ran a hand through his dark hair. “Fine.” He took his sweet time strolling to his struggling secretary.

“Hurry!” Kag snapped. She could feel her sense of equilibrium become unbalanced.

Her boss reached her just as the two and a half-foot tall stack of papers came crashing forward. Poor Kag couldn’t see with them piled so high in her arms.

She breathed a sigh of relief and scratched at her itching nose. “Thanks,” she admitted as she began to gather her stuff, leaving a struggling Inuyasha with all the mutilated trees.

Inuyasha grunted as he dropped them to the floor at her feet. “What’s all this?”

“Your homework.”

“What?!”

“Have fun staying at work!” Kagome chirped as she slung her purse over a shoulder. The rest of Wednesday has passed quickly and Thursday without incident either.

Still, Kagome now loved the meaning of TGIF.

Walking to the door, Inuyasha grabbed her elbow. “No way!”

Kagome winced, remembering her first day working with him. She didn’t want to go through another argument like that again. Cautiously she turned to face her boss.

But he surprised her yet again.

In front of her was not a angry Inuyasha, but an incredibly pathetic one.

Mr. Youkai of the Inutaisho company had been reduced to a whimpering, pleading, begging puppy.

Inuyasha did not like work, and this amount scared him.

Plus, this was Kagome in front of him. He’d seen her crying, couldn’t she see him begging?

Actually, no. He didn’t like the thought of anyone seeing him beg.

But the fact that it was fake, made him feel better.

So did the fact that it worked.

Kagome crumbled at the sight of those innocent eyes. Somewhere, in the back of her mind, she knew it was all an act, but she pushed it away. “Fine, give me half.”

Before he could stick her with the harder, or extra, work, Kagome grabbed a small pile and walked out of the office.

Inuyasha smirked.

All work and no play made Inu-babe a dull boy.

‘More work for Kagome, means more fun for me.’

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Kagome flashed her license and was waved in. She was certain that the bouncer, with unbelievable rippling muscles, was more interested in her black mini skirt and tight tank top than her age, though.

After ordering a strawberry martini (shaken, not stirred) Kag searched for her friends. Long hair bushing her bare upper back, she noticed them at a solitary table and rushed over.

“Kag-chan!” Sango glomped onto her arm. “Let’s dance!”

Kagome barely had time to set down her drink before being dragged into the mass of sweating bodies.

Dimmed lights and pounding music loosened her up a little bit and she called over the beat to her friend, “After all that filling work, this is my reward!” Kag threw out her arms and twirled in emphasis.

“Exactly,” Sango yelled back, not hearing a word.

After a few more songs the two pushed and shoved their way back to the table. Panting in their seats they chatted with the other four: Ayame, Nazuna, Erika, and Raye.

“Hey Kag!”

Kagome felt a strong arm wrap around her. Twisting to the side, cloudy met ice blue. “Kouga!” she screeched throwing her arms around his neck.

Kouga chuckled, “I wouldn’t mind being greeted like this EVERY time.”

“Shouldn’t you still be in the hospital and not at a night club?” Kag pulled back, afraid to hurt the man.

“Exactly what I was thinking,” answered a cocky voice. Low and behold, Inuyasha suddenly appeared at Kouga’s elbow with a grinning Miroku at his heels.

Kouga shrugged. “Nothing can keep me down for long.”

Kag nodded towards the two new arrivals, before looking back at her friend. “You have no idea how good it is to see you feeling better!”

Kouga offered an elbow and the two bounded off for the dance floor. Inuyasha scowled.

“Sango?” Miroku didn’t wait for a reply and twirled the said female onto the floor.

“Inu-babe,” greeted a husky female voice from behind.

“Hi, Yura,” Inuyasha grunted over his shoulder.

Kagome ran over to the group. “Don’t mind me, I’m just borrowing your date.” She nodded to Inuyasha.

Inu, thinking she meant to dance with him, smirked and stepped forward.

“Thanks,” Kagome called over her shoulder as she grabbed Yura’s hand. “This is a wild song and Yura looks like a great dancer!”

The smirk slipped. “Sure,” he mumbled.

Kag flashed her pearly whites and dragged a laughing Yura behind her.

“That was great! You should have seen the look on his face! Egotistical jerk,” Yura purred as she swayed to the music.

Kagome giggled. “He deserved it! He’s always rude to me,” Kagome paused before finishing quickly, “at work.”

Yura nodded, fingering her hair.

Inuyasha scowled as he watched the two women dance. Looked like Kag had a new ally, his ex. ‘Could be worse,’ he reasoned. Yura was one of his favorite exes, they were still friends. Although Yura was a very friendly ex. Those two couldn’t damage too much of his ego.

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“And then Inu-babe dropped his towel.” Yura went on, licking her lips of excess ice cream.

“In front of all those cameras?” Kagome started to giggle uncontrollably. Sango joined in and Miroku chuckled. Unfortunately for Kaogme, she and martinis didn’t go together as well as Sango and alcohal and she began to slid off of the stool in her fit of laughter.

Inuyasha, frowning at the story, snaked an arm around her waist from the side to help support the slightly drunk female. All but him had had a bit too much to drink.

Yura smirked, “Front page news for a week. Great pictures, though.”

“Where was I? I don’t remember hearing about this.” Asked Kagome, amazed that she hadn’t heard about the event of three years ago. After some thinking, she admitted, “I was with Naraku. He probably got rid of those.”

“Of what?” Yura asked, ignoring the uneasy looks of the other three.

“The issues of the magazines and newspapers. Anything with news.”

“Naraku?”

“The love of my life,” Kagome muttered and her eyes clouded over. Whether from sadness, anger, confusion, or love, the others couldn’t tell.

“Do tell.” Inu’s scowl and tense body seemed to slip Yura's mind as she asked curiously.

Kag gave a weak smile. “Long, silky hair as black as night. Soft waves, too. Great toned, muscular body. Real strength and sculptured features. But his eyes,” Kag trailed off.

“What ‘bout the eyes?” Yura was starting to get interested, especially about the hair comments. Hair was a real important thing to her in a guy. ‘Doesn’t sound half bad.’

Kagome tilted her head in thought. Inuyasha, even with his not-so-happy mood mentally noted that the look was cute on her. “Crimson eyes. Red as blood.”

Yura licked her lips. “Not bad, Kag, not bad.”

Kagome smiled before passing out in Inu’s arms.

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Kag woke up with a rather large headache.

She frowned when she noticed she was wearing her nightgown. What happened to her party clothes? Crawling into the kitchen, she glared at the man sitting there.

Inuyasha was innocently stirring a cup of strong tea. He shoved it toward her and she noticed that his usual smirk was replaced by his usual scowl. “Sess took the kids to the zoo. Something about not wanting them to see your wrath.”

Kagome winced. “I remember the last time the boys were promised a trip to the zoo.”

Inuyasha’s scowl depended. “Kagome,” he began in a dead serious worried voice.

Kagome’s eyes flickered to the window and back to the man sitting in front of her. She must have said something when her strawberry martini loosened her tongue. “How the hell did I end up in my nightgown?” She changed the subject to something she could handle, anger.

Inuyasha was unfazed and answered, “I put you in it. Kagome,” he started again.

Kagome sat in a huff at the stool across the counter from the young lavender-eyed man. Several deep breaths later, she responded, “Yes Inuyasha?”

“The way you talked last night,” Inuyasha’s deadpan voice cracked just slightly, “It sounds like you are still completely, hopelessly in love with Naraku.”

Kagome frowned and scrunched her eyebrows together. From what she remembered, it didn’t sound like she had said enough to make that assumption. Kag seriously thought about defending the ‘love of her life,’ but decided against it. She settled for the ever articulate, “Hn.”

Inuyasha narrowed his eyes as she looked down at her folded hands in her lap. He knew the girl had problems when it came to emotions, but to be screwed up so badly to love that jackass was going too far. He desperately didn’t want her to say that she did love the man. ‘It’ll be easier to protect her,’ he settled for the best conclusion of the thought.

Kagome blinked rapidly and glanced at everything in the room; everything but the pair of lavender eyes in front of her. “Inuyasha,” she began weakly. She was thinking about telling him she didn’t know but said something completely different. “I don’t, okay? I don’t, not anymore. I-I-I just figured it out, alright?”

To her anger she found tears spring up into her eyes as the truth finally made itself known. She didn’t love Naraku, and probably never did. “I don’t! I don’t love him and I put everyone through all of this when I could have just stopped it!” Kagome leapt up, no longer sure of herself in anything, and ran out the door.

And Inuyasha just watched her run with a mixture of worry and relief for his friend. His good friend, he realized.

“Insane,” he mumbled his word for the ebony haired female.

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‘I don’t, okay? I don’t, not anymore. I-I-I just figured it out, alright? I don’t! I don’t love him and I put everyone through all of this when I could have just stopped it!’

The words kept running through her troubled mind.

“Took me long enough,” she mumbled as she shuffled onto her side in her bed. The moon’s sliver of light filtered through the screens.

‘Why did I stay with him?’ she asked herself.

Because he used to be sweet, but only for the first few months of dating. After they moved in together, he had become controlling. She cut all contact with friends and family outside of his. He picked her clothes to make sure she never wore anything too ‘revealing’. Kagome had to call in every time she went to a new place, even when doing grocery shopping.

Then he had began to beat her the year before. The first beating had been wild and the hospital visit was the worst. Every time after that, it was only bruises and cuts that could easily be covered by make-up or clothes. At work no one knew, because Kagome always stayed her cheerful self.

It was false cheerfulness, she figured, and it had been sense she met Naraku. One day, she swore, one day she’d go back to being her happy self and never be sad again. Angry was okay, but never sad.

Crawling out from under the blankets, she ran a hand through her rats’ nest of hair and adjusted her flannel pjs.

Padding through the halls she shoved open Inu’s bedroom door.

He grunted at the intrusion in his sleep. Kagome blushed at the sight of his bare chest. ‘Damn, guy! Too lazy to put on anything but the bottoms.’ Ignoring the embarrassing situation she tapped his shoulder.

He grunted again.

Kagome sat on the far edge of the bed.

“Inuyasha?”

“Yeah?” he grumbled, still having problems waking up.

“I was scared.”

That woke him up.

“I’m still scared.”

“What?” he sat up and stretched like a cat. “Nightmare? Don’t worry, we’re all around. Maybe you can take comfort in your brother or son?”

Kagome turned to him. “I’m sorry.”

“What?” now she wasn’t making any sense.

“I’m sorry I’m scared. I should be more help. I should have fixed it myself, and never have gotten anyone into this in the first place. He was so sweet at first and I couldn’t help but feel in love. When he started acting weird, I ignored it, hoping it would go back to normal and I could actually fall in love.” Kagome choked on the words as she poured out all she had finally realized during that day and night. “When it got worst, all I could do was hope it would get better, and then it got to the point where I was scared he’d hurt someone I loved if I left.” She seemed to grow frantic.

Getting back to a normal breathing level, she turned to him again to look him in the eyes.

“I’m sorry, Inuyasha, that I was too scared to do what needed to be done. Forgive me, please?”

Not waiting for an answer, she stood up and wandered out the door, shutting it quietly behind her.

Inuyasha starred stupidly at the wooden slab. ‘What the? Was that some kind of confession? What am I a priest...?’

He scowled.

‘Kagome just admitted she never loved that creep. Finally she gets it through her thick skull. But how am I supposed to forgive her? Why?’ Shaking his head he laid back down and drifted off to sleep.

Its funny how at night, every sound is magnified. Before his mind finally reached blackness, Inuyasha could swear he heard a sweet voice whisper, “Forgive me?”

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A/N: I know the chapter seemed kind of pointless in the beginning but I needed to set the stage for Kagome finally realizing how she feels toward Naraku and why she stayed with him.

Not much left for this section of the story than to put in the ending. But no worries, there should be plenty of chapters even after the Naraku deal is settled.

My summery says Kagome is building a new life, nothing about it all being about her deadbeat ex.