InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Shards of Koharu ❯ In Memoriam ( Chapter 5 )

Title:In Memoriam
Original Publication:7/22/05
Character: Koharu
Theme: #5 - Memories
Rating:[PG/K+]
Word Count: 395
Summary:Koharu sees a difference…

 

 

In Memoriam

 

“…and he was nice to me. Very nice! He made me so happy!” Koharu squealed.

 

A choking sound brought her from her happy tale. Blinking, she studied the strange group that stood before her. They were wearing identical shocked expressions on their faces, all of them.

 

The monk was hastening to explain. “Now wait!” he cried as one of the young women advanced upon him in a threatening manner. “I haven't laid a finger on her…yet.”

 

Amused, Koharu watched the holy man as he tried to placate the two angry young women. One of them in particular looked as if she wanted to clobber the living daylights out of the monk. Even now, the girl's hands were reaching for that huge weapon on her back, ready to bash Miroku-sama over the head.

 

It was interesting to see how much the monk had changed in just three years. Koharu knew that she had changed as well - didn't her reflection in the water show her to be a woman grown, and not the child he'd left behind? But the holy man had altered, too.

 

There were tight lines around his mouth, a trace of something painful in his eyes. When she had first met him, Miroku-sama had not been so care-worn, had he? Oh, there had still been that solemnity at the back of his soft gaze, that touch of something that told Koharu that all was not as carefree as the monk would have her believe, but he had not seemed so determined back then. His shoulders had not had that faint tension to them, as if they carried a burden too heavy for one man to shoulder.

 

Or had they? Was it possible that the holy man had not changed at all, that she was merely seeing him through different, adult eyes? She had remembered him as the handsome, smiling man who had saved her with his food and his promise to return, and she had clung to this memory throughout her dreary years as the oil-merchant's chattel.

 

For the last three years, she had carried Miroku-sama's promise within her heart. A frown briefly crossed Koharu's face as she considered the possibility that her memories had played her false. What if - she swallowed hard, pushing back the rising uncertainty within her - what if Miroku-sama was not the hero she remembered, but instead an ordinary man?