InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Rock Candy ❯ The Recording Studio ( Chapter 1 )

A/N: Thanks for all the reviews! Please, keep them coming. A single encouraging review really gives me the push I need to keep writing. I honestly thought that the prologue might not draw any attention, so I was a bit worried I'd have no reviews and I'd be a complete bomb, so I was so glad when I received my first review just a few minutes after I posted the fic. Anyways, hopefully you'll enjoy this chapter. It'll get to the main storyline either at the end of this chapter or the beginning of the next chapter. We'll just see what pops into my head…hehehe…

 

Chapter One: Recording Studio

 

 

The idea grew brighter and wider as Kagome thought about it, like coming to the bright entrance from inside a dark cave.

 

`Yes!' she thought enthusiastically, `Miroku's loaded! He'll have the money…and he'll probably give me something to do to make up for it. Yeah…Miroku will help…'

 

She continued whispering words of hope and assurance to herself while unhooking her bike from her small iron fence and carrying it down the steps of the shrine. She got on and began to ride to Miroku's vacation home.

 

The memories of when Kikyo and Kagome would their bikes to that very lake that was overlooked by Miroku's holiday retreat came back to her.

 

When they were younger, in middle school, before a house was even built near the lake, Kagome and Kikyo would ride their tiny flowery bikes to the lake with their swimsuits under their summer clothes.

 

Kagome could still recall the large splashes and semi-large waves she made in the water and the poised and silent dives her sister executed.

 

“It was always like that…” Kagome spoke to the wind that blew through her ebony tresses, “I was always the loud, obnoxious, stubborn one and she was always soft, sweet, and patient child,”

 

Kagome frowned and tossed the idea out of her head, trying to focus on the man who would help her escape her dreadful situation.

 

When Kagome finished her train of thought, as if on cue, she finally reached the blue-green lake that held the reflection the feathery clouds and the glare of the warm sun.

 

Kagome got off her bike and walked it to a tree so it could lean on its trunk. Then Kagome cautiously walked up the few wooden steps and onto the clean plank porch.

 

She hesitantly rang his doorbell.

 

Then she waited for a few moments.

 

Then for a few minutes.

 

“What the hell?” Kagome said in a confused and enraged voice.

 

She rang the doorbell again.

 

No response.

 

Kagome violently thrusted her index finger to the small white button.

 

Still no response.

 

Kagome willfully banged her fist on the thick, oak door. Once she set her head to something and wanted it desperately, there was no stopping her.

 

“Hey!” Kagome yelled, hoping for her voice to carry through the door and into Miroku's ears.

 

She saw a movement from inside the house.

 

“Hey!” she repeated, “I know you're in there!”

 

Kagome then heard a muffled low voice, then a muffled high pitched voice.

 

“Eh?” Kagome thought, going on her tip toes, trying to see through the tiny window at the top center of the door.

 

While Kagome was leaning on the door, it suddenly opened and she found herself collapsing onto the bare chest of a man.

 

She then opened her eyes and was met by Miroku's bare chest.

 

“Eep!” She screeched out in horror before recoiling and standing up strait.

 

Miroku sighed and looked at the horrified girl, “What do you want?” he asked, a tad annoyed and a tad amused.

 

“Well…um…” Kagome struggled to bring back the words she thought up to say but had suddenly forgotten, “Well…I…need some money…and…”

 

“Hey, honey,” A female voice from within the house inquired, “Who's that?”

 

Kagome blushed scarlet as she saw the woman. She was a platinum blond in her bra and underwear. `So that was the high-pitched voice…' Kagome thought to herself. Then she actually took a look at Miroku. His jet-black hair, usually in a neat ponytail, was sprawled across his shoulders and his pants barely clung to his hips due to the fact that his belt wasn't even buckled.

 

Kagome analyzed the situation and when what they were doing finally dawned on her she turned ghost white, `Eeeewwwww!' she thought to herself in disgust.

 

“Is something wrong?” Miroku asked.

 

“Um…I'll go now…” Kagome said with a sudden change of heart.

 

She turned around to leave but Miroku's voice stopped her.

 

“Hold on, Kags,” he tried to run…er…walk after her while holding his pants to keep them from falling.

 

“What?” she said, trying to get it over with so that she could leave and pretend nothing happened.

 

“You need money?” he asked the obvious.

 

She nodded, “Yeah,” she said sheepishly.

 

Miroku sighed, “Bad timing,” He rolled his eyes.

 

Kagome looked back at the half naked women leaning against the doorframe, watching them and she nervously added, “Uh…yeah…”

 

Kagome attempted to leave again but once again Miroku stopped her, “I can get you easy money. There is this club in the area and I'm good friends with the owner. He constantly needs performers and one of his usuals got in a sky-diving accident and will be in the hospital for weeks,”

 

Kagome turned to face Miroku, interested in his news.

 

Miroku was satisfied at her interest, “The performer was a real pretty girl with an even prettier voice,” Miroku started getting lost in thought, “Oh, she was so beautiful…her tiny waist…big brea…”

 

Kagome blushed (again!) and waved her arms in the air, as if trying to destroy Miroku's thought bubble, “Enough!”

 

Miroku came back to reality, “Oh, right. Anyways…I told him that I found his replacement. And I was just waiting for you to come!”

 

“How'd you know I'd come?” Kagome asked with an arched eyebrow.

Miroku grinned, “Intuition,”

 

Kagome's eyes averted to the women leaning on the doorframe, now looking at her nails, “Eh…” Kagome supposed, “Maybe I should leave you be…”

 

Miroku looked over his shoulder, “Oh, right!” He then directed his attention once again to Kagome, “Well…meet me here tomorrow at noon. We'll talk then,”

 

Kagome nodded then added with a slight grin, “Pleasure before work, huh Miroku?”

 

Miroku smiled menacingly, “Why not?” then Miroku added, “Oh, another thing,”

 

“Hm?”

 

“You need your parent's permission,”

 

“Oh…”

 

Then he went back to his pretty, half naked blond and they both disappeared inside the house.

 

“What a way to start things,” Kagome thought, still trying to recover from barging into Miroku when he was shagging some blond chick he probably didn't even know.

 

~*~*~*~(T^T)~*~*~*~

 

Kagome carried her bike up the shrine steps and hooked it back to the black iron picket fence.

 

`Crap…' Kagome thought worriedly, `What will mom say about this? Will she let me go?'

 

She opened the door to her house and tried to quietly sneak up her staircase.

 

“Kagome!” an angry voice yelled.

 

`Dammit…' Kagome silently cursed before putting on an innocent smile and nervous laugh, “Oh, hi, mom. Boy, I'm tired I guess I'll just go up stairs and…”

 

“Not so fast, young lady!” Mrs. Higurashi said in an urgent tone, “Where have you been? It's a school day and you haven't come back until nighttime!”

 

“But it's a Friday, Ma,”

 

“And why exactly were you out until nighttime this weekday?”

 

“Well…I was hanging out with Eri, Yuka, and Arimi….”

 

“Yes, you usually do that but you always come back before sundown! Please don't tell me you were with a boy, because…”

 

“Well…I kinda was, but…”

 

“WHAT?!”

 

“You see, I was about to go home but…”

 

“I cannot believe you were with a boy. Oh my goodness! Have you no shame? I mean…”

 

“But, mom, I saw…”

 

“I don't care how cute you thought he was or how nice you thought he was. Oh, they'll do that. They'll promise to stay with you forever. Then they get you pregnant with twins and then leave! Just like that…”

 

“But, mom, it wasn't like that, I….”

 

“Then you're left raising these stressful little things and living in a shrine with your father and…”

 

“MOM, I SAW MIROKU!”

 

Mrs. Higurashi's expression instantly changed, “Oh my, wasn't he the man who made Kikyo a star?” she said in excitement.

 

Kagome cringed at the name, “Yeah, he said he wanted me to…”

 

“To be a star?” Kagome's mom's voice held bliss and anticipation.

 

“Well…uh…yeah, sure….and I just need your permission to…”

 

Mrs. Higurashi ignored her daughter, “Be a star? Just like Kikyo?” she smiled a sad and empty, full of longing smile, “Yes…just like my little Kikyo…”

 

Kagome looked the floor, trying to escape the sorrow in her mother's smile.

 

“That's magnificent!” Mrs. Higurashi's eyes lit up with joy.

 

“Yeah,” Kagome muttered to the ground, “magnificent…”

 

As Mrs. Higurashi rambled on about the wonderful things that Kagome will experience, Kagome said softly, “I'm gonna go up now,” and her mother didn't even notice when Kagome left. Mrs. Higurashi was just talking to the walls on her house.

 

Kagome went inside her room and shut the door behind her. Then she leaned her back against her door and slid down to a crouching position where she buried her head in her arms resting on her knees pulled up to her chest.

 

“Just like Kikyo,” Kagome whispered to her room, “She's just happy because she sees this as a way to have a piece of Kikyo back. She's replacing me with Kikyo, just as she always did; even now that Kikyo's not here!”

 

Kagome crawled into her bed and began to sob.

 

That night she cried herself to sleep.

 

~*~*~*~(-.-)~*~*~*~

 

Kagome woke up to the rays of the sun taunting Kagome's eyelids to open. She sleepily stretched, yawned and rubbed her eyes.

 

She leaped out of her blankets and opened her closet.

 

“What to wear…what to wear…” Kagome pondered, “Today is the day I'm going too see Miroku, so I have to impress him and show him I have what it takes to be a sta-”

 

Kagome stopped herself and sat back down on her bed, “No…I'm probably not going to be a star. I'm never going to be like Kikyo…I'm just doing this to pay Kouga back…and to get my guitar back…”

 

Kagome continued to speculate inside her head, “He'll probably want me to make a demo CD…” Kagome nervously bit her lip, “…what if…?” She threw the thoughts of stardom and fame out of her head for the umpteenth time that week, “No…I'm totally not going to be a star! Haha…all I need are some gigs at clubs to sing for money…yeah…”

 

Kagome frowned as she got up and searched for something to wear in her closet.

 

Kagome decided to slip on a black, sleeveless shirt that showed her midriff. On the shirt was a tree and then its branch with a heart hanging from a rope on the branch. Underneath the hanging heart said in large lettering “The Used” and in smaller lettering, beneath it said, “In Love And Death” (to see the original version go to my profile).

 

Then Kagome got into a pair of jeans that hugged onto her hips but got baggy as it descended to her ankles.

 

To finish off her look, she put on fishnet gloves, a “Music = Life” rubber wristband, and pulled her hair up, holding them with two black plastic chopsticks.

 

When she finished applying very lightly colored lip gloss she looked at herself in the mirror.

 

“Do I look okay?” she questioned her outfit.

 

“Come on, Kagome! It's 11:45, we should get going!” she heard her mother call.

 

Kagome shrugged off how she looked and headed downstairs, “But it only takes five or ten minutes to get there by car,”

 

“Yes, but it's good to be early,” Mrs. Higurashi said with content and a smile.

 

Kagome slipped on her black converse and jumped into her mom's car.

 

As they got on the road, Kagome pulled out her Blue Weezer CD and played “Say It Ain't So” in the built in CD player in the car. She wanted to play some hard rock like System of a Down, but the last time she popped in B.Y.O.B by System of a Down in the player while her mom was driving, her mother nearly had a heart attack and almost crashed into a tree. Pretty funny actually…besides the almost dying part.

 

As soon as the song “Only in Dreams” ended they arrived at Miroku's vacation spot. They both got out of the car and rang Miroku's doorbell. He greeted them and welcomed them into his house.

 

He smiled, “Well hello Mrs. Higurashi and Kagome!”

 

He showed Kagome and her mother his recording studio and he explained to Kagome's mother that Kagome would be singing there and that to promote Kagome's image that she would sing in local gigs.

 

Kagome's mother amiably agreed to signing the contract that bound Kagome to Miroku's record company: Sengoku Jedai.

 

Kagome's mother smiled when Miroku was finished talking to her about the perks and she waved and said, “Okay, well, I've got to go now,” Then she turned to Kagome, “Just call home when your done with Miroku, okay dear?”

 

Then she was out the door.

 

As soon as she left Kagome turned to Miroku with a scowl, “Hey! Recording? I'm just in this for the gigs for the immediate money!”

 

Miroku waved his hand up and down, “Yeah, yeah. But I wanna work on a demo CD for you. The gigs are promotional,”

 

“What the hell?” Kagome said in defiance, “I don't wanna make a demo CD!”

 

Miroku smiled devilishly, “But your mom signed a contract,” he said, waving the document in her face.

 

“What?!” Kagome wasn't paying attention during the time Miroku and her mother were talking.

 

She sighed, “My mom has just made me a deal with the devil…”

 

Miroku pretended to frown, “Aw, Kagome, do you really hate me that much?”

 

Kagome coldly replied, “Yes,” Then she walked inside the isolation/vocal booth and found the headphones then put them on. Then she got in front of the microphone.

 

Miroku, who had just stepped into the control room, was a bit surprised, “Wow, you're already an expert. I usually have to tell my clients what to do…”

 

Kagome said in an irksome tone, “Yeah, yeah…just play some music already,”

 

Miroku nodded. Then he got in front of his microphone and said into it, “Kagome, can you hear me?”

 

Kagome heard from inside her earphones and looked through the glass wall, to Miroku, and nodded.

 

Miroku nodded in reply and asked, “So, Kagome. What song do you sing best?”

 

Kagome thought for a while and decided, “My Immortal by Evanescence,”

 

Miroku jokingly sounded disappointed, “Aw, now don't tell me you're into the pop scene, Kags,”

 

Kagome almost pouted, “I am not! I know that band is seriously exposed and a lot of posers like them, but they're songs are cool, okay? Gosh…”

 

Miroku smiled, “I'm just kidding you, Kags,” then he searched for the song on his computer and played it.

 

“Can you hear it?” Miroku asked into the microphone.

 

Kagome heard the sound of the piano, marking the beginning of the song. She nodded at Miroku and got a nod in reply.

 

“I'm so tired of being here

Suppressed by all my childish fears,” Kagome sang in a calm voice.

“And if you have to leave
I wish that you would just leave

`Cause your presence still lingers here

And it won't leave me alone

 

These wounds won't seem to heal

This pain is just too real

There's just too much that time cannot erase”

 

When Kagome was softly singing that last sentence, Miroku paused the song and Kagome looked up curiously.

 

Miroku said into the microphone, “Come on, Kags. I know your voice, it's powerful and spiritual,” Then he sighed, “Your trying to sing like Kikyo. Kikyo was soft, sweet, and quiet,”

 

Kagome gasped against her will. Miroku was right. She was trying to be like Kikyo.

 

Miroku went on, “You are Kagome. Not Kikyo. So sing like Kagome,”

 

Kagome nodded and as Miroku played it where she left off, Kagome sang in a thunderous voice,

 

“When you cried I wiped away all of your tears

When you scream I fight away all of your fears

And I held your hand through all of these years

But you still have

All of me,”

 

Miroku smiled, “Ata girl,”

 

Kagome closed her eyes and listened to the melody consume her. It was true, that the band was pop-ish. Kagome never liked popular bands. The reason she liked this song was…because it reminded her of her sister and how she felt about her.

 

“You used to captivate me

By your resonating life,”

 

Kagome thought about how she admired Kikyo and her life.

 

“Now I'm bound

By the life you left behind,”

 

Kagome thought about how Kikyo had taken a part of Kagome as she left consciousness.

 

“Your face it haunts

My once pleasant dreams,”

 

Kagome remembered all the haunting dreams of the accident and of old memories.

 

“Your voice it chased away

All the sanity in me,”

 

Kagome thought about how the accident had taken Kagome's old self and locked it away in an unreachable corner in her heart.

 

Kagome sang the chorus with the same awe-filling vocals and she finished up the ending, thinking about Kikyo more then ever,

 

“I've tried so hard to tell myself you're gone

But though you're still with me

I've been all along,”

 

When Kagome had finished she was crying and Miroku had gone inside the isolation room and gave her a box of tissues.

 

When she saw finished with the waterworks she sat in Miroku's lounge/living room and Miroku had heated up some tea for them both.

 

He set Kagome's cup on her side of the table and walked to the other side of the table with his tea and taking a sip, he bluntly said, “You really put your emotions into your song,”

 

Kagome sipped her tea and nodded in thanks.

 

Miroku glanced at Kagome's clothes and actually became aware of her style, “Hmm…emo?”

 

Kagome, once again, bobbed her head in reply.

 

Miroku nodded to himself, “That explains a lot…”

 

Then the ring of a doorbell echoed through the house.

 

Miroku brightly smiled, “Ah! So she's finally arrived!”

 

Kagome had a curios look on her face as Miroku had opened the door and merrily greeted whoever was there. Kagome could not see the visitor because there was a wall blocking her view. All she could see was Miroku.

 

Miroku had gone inside the room Kagome was in and joyfully grinned, “Kagome, look who we have here!”

 

Kagome's eyes went wide as she saw the guest and she nearly screamed,

 

“OH MY GOD!!!!”