InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Hit and Run ❯ The Real World ( Chapter 4 )

A/N: This chapter in particular had be a bit frustrated, seeing as it didn't quite flow like I wanted it to... ah well. Such is life.

And in case you were wondering, the chapter titles are named after titles of certain songs.

Chapter 1- "Serendipity" by Weezer

Chapter 2- "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" by Guns `n Roses

Chapter 3- "Morning Glory" by Oasis

Chapter 4- "The Real World" by Matchbox 20

DISCLAIMER: Don't be stupid. You know what goes here.

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The Real World

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"Kagome!" No sooner had she opened the door, Sota had slammed into her, tackling the woman to the ground and attached himself to her legs. "Was the guy okay? Did he die? He didn't die, did he, nee-chan?"

Kagome grunted, vocally protesting the abuse her body was suffering as she picked herself up off the floor. Guess Sota's stronger than she thought. Stupid runts with their stupid bursts of sugar-induced energy. Brat.

"He's dandy," she groused, "Frickin' sunshine n' daisies."

She struggled against his clutches grumpily, trying to wrench her legs away from his tight embrace. Not that Kagome didn't love her brother; she did. She just wasn't in any mood to be bothered. She had been bothered for the majority of the day to the point where she would kill something if she were possibly bothered any more, and add just one more hindrance to her already crummy mood wasn't really helping.

"Geeze, grouch," Sota grumbled and released his sister, stepping back to give her a skeptical look. "What's with you? You were so worried earlier; I thought you'd be happy he's okay."

Hah! She should have left him pinned to the tree-- which, by the way, still stood with barely a mark as to where it clashed with the automobile. At least she wouldn't owe her neighbors for landscaping fees.

"Karma failed me-- given the situation, a guy like him should have been mangled beyond all recognition."

There was a pause as Sota groped for words. His sister was grouchy; it didn't take a genius to figure that out, but he wanted to say something to cheer her up a bit. She rarely ever came home to visit, and he did feel sort of bad for disobeying her earlier...

"But today's your birthday," he reminded her with a smile. "Maybe it's sort of like a birthday present!"

Kagome sneered.

"That's the most ass-backwards thing I've ever heard!" she spat hotly, raking a hand through her hair.

Sota's face darkened. Normally his sister was cheery and nice; she rarely ever swore or took a harsh tone with him. However, today she was being especially sour-- whatever had happened had obviously ticked her off royally. "I was only trying to help..."

Kagome heaved a defeated sigh, rubbing her temples tiredly. "I'm sorry, Sota. I didn't mean to snap at you. It's just-- that Inu-Yasha guy put me in a bad mood, that's all."

"Oh," Sota grinned. "What'd he do?"

"Um, just... things. He bugged me, that's all," she brushed off the question flippantly, heading up the stairs. The last thing she needed was to explain to her younger brother the joys of testosterone and chauvinism. "Is Momma home yet?"

"No, she called and said she'd be home in an hour or two," Sota shouted after her.

"You didn't tell her about the accident, did you?" Kagome paused on the steps, one hand gripping the railing in a subconsciously tight grip. The only thing that could have possibly made this day of living hell any worse would be to have her mother upset with her. Again.

"N-no," Kagome's brother mumbled sheepishly, almost too softly for Kagome to hear. "She'd get mad at me for not listening to you. I was scared n' didn't tell her..."

She nodded in agreement, releasing the rail from her white-knuckle grip as she breathed a sigh of relief.

With a tired, unintelligible murmur, Kagome headed for her room. Flicking on the light (and thanking God that she had painted the walls a peach-color before she moved out; they were originally white), she swung the door shut behind her and flopped gracelessly onto the bed.

Her mother-- a sweet, sentimental fool-- had left the room virtually unchanged since Kagome had graduated from high school. Pictures of her friends and family littered her walls and dresser-top, still-frames from the past that were only just beginning to fade. Her bedspread still had the same couch-like floral pattern, and her stuffed animals were tucked against the headboard.

It was peaceful to be in such familiar surroundings. Quiet and calm.

It was comforting.

It was consoling.

But it didn't change the fact that life officially sucked.

Kagome glared at the ceiling, her hands fisting in her sheets. Frustrated didn't even begin to cover the cacophony of emotions running rampant in her head. First and foremost, there was overwhelming guilt for nearly killing a guy and then insulting him in the hospital, then there was anger at his uncouth demeanor and tactless insults, and to top it all off there was annoyance for wasting her day visiting the aforementioned jackass.

She still couldn't believe he was forcing her to foot the bill for his car; it wasn't as if she ran out in front of him just to piss him off. If she had really wanted to get him mad she would have chucked a rock or some other large, heavy object at his car as he drove by instead of putting her own life on the line merely to spite him.

Come to think of it, the rock thing wasn't a bad idea... Serve him right, anyways. Of course, with her luck, she'd probably end up killing him. Then she'd feel really bad...

"Mmmrroww!" a throaty voice called from the foot of her bed, interrupting her train of thought.

"Buyo?" Rolling over half-heartedly, Kagome reached down to retrieve the portly cat. For a moment he lay languidly in her grasp, staring blankly at her as she pulled him close for a tight embrace. Then the cat, overwhelmed with joy, began to struggle to escape her grasp.

She let him go without much of a fight, huffing as the cat made a beeline for the door. Kagome rolled jerkily onto her back, lacing her fingers behind her head and tracing imaginary lines on the ceiling with her eyes. Wonderful. Even her cat was being a jerk.

'I really am pathetic...'

She sighed again, closing her eyes and drifting into a catnap. "Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me; God-turned-out-to-be-a-sadist-and-the-universe-is-trying-to-give-me-an-annu rism, happy birthday to me."

"Hold out your arm for me, please."

With a seditious grunt, Inu-Yasha grudgingly extended his right arm to the nurse, refusing to meet her sympathetic eyes. Damn it, what was with people and feeling sorry for him? The wounds could have easily been worse, and he didn't need anyone's pity.

"This'll only hurt for a second, okay?" the young nurse smiled with a sickening mixture of reassurance and apology.

Inu-Yasha growled, glaring at the wall. "Don't patronize me, wench. Like a tiny pinprick is really going to tear me up after I've been impaled by my steering wheel."

He almost grinned as she made a strangled noise of indignation, but the opportunity was lost as she plunged the needle into the crook of his elbow with the delicacy of a MAC truck.

That bitch...

The nurse watched him grimace and bite back a hiss of pain, and thus smiled triumphantly to herself. "Oh, I'm sorry, did I hurt you?"

"Jesus Christ, woman!" Inu-Yasha ground out between clenched teeth.

The nurse rolled her eyes, dabbing at the puncture wound with a gauze patch saturated with rubbing alcohol. "There, done, you big baby."

"Feh," he growled, crossing his arms over his chest. "Isn't it a violation of some law to abuse the injured or something?"

"Nope, it's perfectly legal." The nurse began gathering her tools, her ponytail falling over her shoulder in dark waves. "So I suggest you lighten up, grouch."

"I'd like to make a complaint with the matron of this wing," Inu-yasha eyed the nurse cagily. "My nurse is surly."

The woman rose, pointing to the plastic name badge fastened to a lanyard around her neck with a sarcastic sneer; the badge read 'SANGO TAJIYA'. "Here's my name, what are you going to do with it? Turn me in for bad behavior?"

"Don't tempt me, wench."

With a casual one-fingered-salute, Sango marched out of the room in a way very similar to that wench, Kogamie or something's angry exit. Immediately his already pounding headache escalated to new levels, imitating the sensation of boards being nailed to the inside of his forehead.

Damn it.

And he had done so well in blocking the interlude from his memory... He still couldn't believe that pretentious little bitch had come in after causing his accident to insult him while he was an invalid at a hospital. What kind of sick, vindictive monster was she, anyways?

Though he kind of felt sort of bad for yelling at the girl so much. She did agree to pay for the damages to his car, and she did come to make sure he was alive and all that crap, and she did have the largest brown eyes he'd ever seen... But he was angry, and she was being rather stubborn about the whole 'blame' issue, and the last thing he needed was anyone's fucking pity...

But what really rattled his already frayed nerves was that of all the women to approach him as he drifted in and out of consciousness, it had to be someone who bared a strong resemblance to his fiancé.

'God must hate me', he decided, blushing a bit as he remembered their rather... intimate first meeting. 'Fuck.'

It wasn't his fault! He was injured, for Christ sake! It hadn't meant anything, since it wasn't really her he was kissing!

Even so, he prayed feverishly that Kikyo never found out.

The two women weren't exactly a perfect match, mind you, but their delicate features were inarguably very similar-- same 'bone structure', or whatever women call it. But it was just enough to make Inu-Yasha look twice.

God must really hate him.

Of course, as far as personalities went, Kagome and Kikyo were at completely opposite ends of the spectrum. First of all, Kikyo never argued and was never stubborn. She made a point that she didn't need to be willful to be strong, and Inu-Yasha admired that. The wench, on the other hand, seemed to try her damndest to tick him off and then wouldn't shut up until she got the last word. Stupid bitch.

Secondly, Kikyo was elegant and ladylike, which meant she was soft-spoken and polite. Raised in upper-class society, Kikyo had to act like a princess, and always carried herself with a sense of dignity that was unmatched by any woman he had ever met. Kagome, however, was loud and discourteous; she let her hair hang loose and didn't make a conscious effort to glide when she walked. She was naïve and young and thought out loud whether the results were to her liking or catastrophic.

And despite all this, during their quarrels Inu-Yasha couldn't help but see Kikyo instead of Kagome, her image overlapping the wench's like a holographic overlay. Confused the hell out of him, damn it.

Speaking of which, where the hell was Kikyo? Why wasn't she here? He hated reaffirming the wench's accusations, but it was looking as if even his fiancé had ditched him...

'Oh yeah, now I remember,' Inu-Yasha thought, tentatively lifting a hand to touch the bandage around his forehead. 'She's out of town getting her folks to help with the wedding.'

Her folks... the wedding... the wedding!

Aw shit.

He fingered the bandages around his chest, feeling for the prominent stitches underneath the dressing. It hurt a bit, but thanks to 'SANGO' and her damn needle full of blessed sedatives, the pain wasn't as sharp as it was before-- kind of a dull aching instead.

Would he even be out of the hospital in time for the big day? Shit, he forgot to ask.

Well, he'd be damned if someone had to wheel him around for his own wedding.

A thought crossed him: well, if he still could get around well enough there'd be no reason to stay, right? He nodded to himself. Right. Besides, someone had to get home and feed the damn dog. Inu-Yasha figured the stupid beast had torn the apartment to slobber-saturated shreds by now without his master there to supervise.

Ah, the joys of domesticity.

Damn, what was that these ether-addict goonies said about his back and walking? Something like: 'blah blah blah, don't, blah blah, can't, blah-blah blah blah.'

"Oh well," Inu-Yasha thought aloud. "Only one way to find out."

Rubbing his palms together absently, he carefully lifted his right leg out of its sling so that he could swing both legs over the side of the bed. His bare feet hit the cool floor with a soft slap, and his ankle throbbed painfully at the contact. Grimacing, Inu-Yasha clenched the muscles in his injured foot, trying to get used to the ache. He wanted nothing more than to get out of this damn hospital, and he could take a little pain if it meant going home sooner.

With tentative, jerky movements that belied his natural grace, he slowly pushed himself up, holding his weight with his arms. Inu-Yasha hesitated momentarily, breathing deeply as he built himself up for the moment of truth.

With a final push he forced himself to his feet, baring the brunt his weight on his uninjured foot. His back ached through the numbing sedative haze, making every little movement erratic with pain and effort. The linoleum tiles were blessedly cool as he slowly limped across the room, careful not to rip the wires connecting him to the machine stationed at his bedside.

"There, that's not so bad." Inu-Yasha gritted his teeth as he made a complete circuit around the room. "It only feels like my foot's gonna fall off an' my back's gonna shatter into tiny pieces. No big deal..."

It was at that exact moment that he realized that trying to climb back onto the cot-- with all the extra bending and twisting he'd have to maneuver to pull it off-- would probably send a big enough shockwave through his body to knock him out again.

As he saw it, he had three options:

Option #1: Climb back onto the cot without assistance and cause major pain to himself.

Option #2: Freeze until someone came in. They couldn't ignore him for too long, right? ... Right...

Option #3: Throw himself on the altar of dignity and call for help.

Well, Option #3 was completely out of the question. Like he'd risk another teasing session with Sango, the nurse from hell with an armament of needles. Option #2 seemed safest, but his foot was already feeling like someone had nailed it to the floor. Waiting much longer would result in either collapsing or causing himself further injury.

His mind made up, Inu-Yasha fisted his hands in the mattress and slowly leaned forward. Immediately, pain began shooting up and down his spinal column as the bruised vertebrae bended uncomfortably.

He bit his lip to muffle the obscenities rising in his throat, using his arms to hover over the bed. Stars were beginning to dance in his vision as his head began to pound incessantly. Fuck, everything hurt!

Of course, then he lost his balance and flopped rather gracelessly onto the mattress, sending jolts of pain racking through every nerve in his system. With the muffled utterance of the word 'fuck' in the most vehement way manageable, Inu-Yasha drifted into blissful unconsciousness.

"Mom?" Kagome stumbled downstairs, still a bit groggy from her nap. "Grandpa? Sota?"

The house was unusually dark for midday-- the lights were off and blinds were drawn, creating a thick blackness that made hazardous obstacles of normal furniture. Ruefully rubbing sleep from her eyes, Kagome felt her way into the kitchen, navigating her way by memory. . .

. . . and promptly falling flat on her face after tripping over the living room sofa. Apparently her memory was a bit rustier than she had originally thought.

"Hello? Guys?" Picking herself up off the ground, Kagome continued her way to the kitchen. "Where is everyone?"

There was a rustling in the dark, catching her off guard and causing her to bristle in surprise. "Hello?"

Her hand hit the kitchen doorframe just as the lights flicked on. She let out a shriek of surprise, taken aback by the chorus of voices that hit her tired senses head-on.

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KAGOME!!!"

The room was alive with brightly colored streamers and festive balloons crowding the ceiling; Sota laughed and tossed handfuls of colorful confetti into the air, adding to the festive atmosphere. The paper pieces fluttered down and showered over her as she stared, frozen in shock. Kagome's family was huddled around the kitchen table; big, cheery smiles adorning their faces and surrounding the biggest chocolate cake she had ever seen.

"Whoa..."

She absently brushed confetti off of her head and shoulders, leaning down to take in the detail of the cake. The dark frosting was looped with white-letter words, reading 'Happy 20th Birthday, Kags!' in elegant cursive. The outer edges of the masterpiece were outlined with elegant white-frosting roses. Kagome's breath hitched in her throat as she took in the detail of each sugar petal-- it almost looked too pretty to eat.

Almost.

"Hurry up, Kagome!" Grandpa urged, inserting a large pink candle above the lettering and lighting it quickly. "Make a wish so we can eat! You know, this candle is actually a very ancient artifact originating from the Sengoku Jidai and made from a special plant, which grows only in the lower western hemisphere and..."

He would have continued for hours if Kagome's mother hadn't cut him off and motioned for him to get to the point. "... Yes, well. Unlike those cheap wax candles, THIS candle will REALLY grant the extinguisher one wish. It's true. Never distrust old folk lore."

Kagome could have cried. Here she was, undoubtedly having the words birthday of her entire life, feeling miserable and being a downright bitch to everyone, when they go and pull something like this. Simply family, being themselves the way she had always remembered. It was unbelievably sweet, and it warmed her heart to see her loved ones so happy for her.

"C'mon, 'Gome! Blow out your candle!" Sota said, trying to sneak a finger-full of frosting into his mouth.

'This is wonderful,' Kagome thought silently, 'Everything is perfect, I don't want anything more...'

With a sleepy grin she situated herself over the cake to contemplate the customary birthday wish. Not that many of her other birthday wishes had ever come true (despite Grandpa's ancient be-spelled trinkets, she never had gotten that pony), Kagome wanted to make this wish special, just in case it did.

At first she pondered material things, all of which were similarly enticing, but none seemed to fit the situation. Special times like these required equally important and serious decisions.

"Wish for a race car, Kagome!" Sota suggested, grinning happily.

"Wish for a beau," Grandpa nodded sagely. "I still can't believe you're unattached-- you'll die old and alone if you don't act soon."

Kagome blushed indignantly, opening her mouth to voice her embarrassment and annoyance. However, her mother put a comforting arm around her shoulders and kissed her temple lovingly, effectively shutting her up.

"Now, as much as I would love grandchildren..." Kagome's blush escalated through about five different shades of red. "... I think your wish should make someone happy. Maybe there's someone else you have in mind that needs a little luck."

Fatal words that sparked an idea in Kagome's mind.

With a secretive smile, the young woman gazed deeply at the lone candle, firelight flickering in her brown eyes. "I've got it."

She inhaled deep, reciting her wish in her mind and closing her eyes for effect before blowing at the tiny flame. It flickered pitifully before going out all together, and Kagome's family clapped.

"What'd you wish for?" Sota asked.

Kagome smiled knowingly, ruffling his dark hair playfully. "If I told you it won't come true."

Kagome's mother grinned proudly. "That's my girl. Now, if you would be so kind as to cut the cake, love?"

After chocolate cake had been dished out and the mood was mellow despite the gray skies outside, the family slipped into comfortable conversation. Of course, it was only when Kagome had relaxed and completely forgotten about her stressful afternoon did her mother decide to venture headfirst into the area of discussion that Kagome had been so keen on avoiding.

"By the way, Kagome," her mother started, innocently enough, "did you happen to see the Goshinboku's tree recently? There's this huge mark where all the bark's been scraped off..."

Kagome choked on her cake.

Mrs. Higurashi continued, however, without missing a beat. "... It must have happened this afternoon; it looked fine this morning. Looks almost as if a car or something had hit it. By the way, Kagome, where were you this afternoon? You disappeared for hours, dear."

Carefully forcing the forkful of rich chocolate down, Kagome gave her mother her sweetest, most apologetic smile, innocence gushing out of her widened eyes.

"Er, um, I love you...?"