InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The 500 Year Engagement ❯ The 500 Year Engagement - Back To School ( Chapter 1 )

The 500-Year Engagement - Back To School

By Majicman55

 

Disclaimer: The characters from “InuYasha” are not mine; they are the intellectual property of Rumiko Takahashi, Shogakukan, Yomiuri TV, Sunrise, and Viz. I do not benefit financially from these writings. I just like to play with the characters.

 

Kagome smiled as she put on her sÄ“rÄ-fuku before heading downstairs. “Nope. Don't look a day over sixteen,” she thought as she took a last glance in the mirror. She felt a pleasant pulse where her neck met her shoulder and glanced out her window towards the Goshinboku where she knew InuYasha waited. “Be patient.”

 

“Feh,” came her answer.

 

It never ceased to amaze her that she and InuYasha had developed so close a relationship that each could actually tell what the other was feeling…and, if they were very close, thinking. And there were other effects, too.

 

When her hanyou stroked a certain spot at the base of his neck, she felt it, too. “Cut it out!” she thought. “Now's not the time!” InuYasha knew it was mock anger, but he did stop.

 

He didn't feel like angering Kagome to the point that she'd plant him face first into the shrine grounds. Not that she did that often these days, but he knew what she was doing now was important to her.

 

She still wanted to graduate and make her family proud.

 

So he backed off.

 

“Breakfast is ready!” Mama Higurashi called up the steps.

 

“Coming, Mama!” she answered, as she put on her penny loafers and proceded downstairs.

 

 

******************

 

 

When she got to the kitchen, Kagome found her brother and ji-chan already sitting.

 

Her grandfather put his newspaper down as Mama Higurashi placed the food on the table. “Oh, good morning, Kagome. I didn't hear you come in last night.”

 

“Is InuYasha here?” Sota was practically bouncing in his chair. “Is he here, Sis?”

 

“Yes. He's outside, in Goshinboku.”

 

Sota began to get up, but Mama Higurashi put her hand on his shoulder. “Finish your breakfast, young man. You have to leave for school in 15 minutes.”

 

“Awww, but Mommmm!”

 

“No buts,” Mama Higurashi said. “You can see him after school.” Mama turned to Kagome. “You'll be here that long, won't you?”

 

“Hai, Mama. I guess you could say that.”

 

“Is anything wrong, dear?”

 

“Nothing, Mama.” Deep in thought, Kagome ate breakfast. “What do I tell them?” She continued to ponder her problem as she ate her breakfast. It was so vexing! She had imagined this time after time, but now that she was actually here…

 

“Kagome?”

 

“Huh?”

 

“It's time to leave, dear.”

 

“Oh.” Kagome stood up and put her dishes in the sink. “At least I don't have to tell them NOW.” She grabbed her book bag by the door, tapped the toe of her one shoe by the threshold for luck, and proceeded down the shrine steps to the street…

 

…where she ran into Eri, Ayumi and Yuka.

 

“Kagome!”

 

As nice as it was to see her friends, she wasn't sure she was ready. She turned away quickly so the girls wouldn't see her wince, and then turned back. “Hi, guys!”

 

“Kagome! You're going to school today?” asked Eri.

 

“Uh-huh.” She smiled sweetly. “Isn't it obvious?”

 

“That's great, Kagome!” said Ayumi. “How long has it been?”

 

“You don't want to know,” thought Kagome. “Oh, too long…but I have some good news. The doctors think I'll be okay now.”

 

“Really?” squealed Yuka. “Does that mean we're all going to be together again?”

 

“I…I guess so.” She told the girls about how the doctors had finally declared her problems pretty much over…and how she could go back to school full time now.

 

The three girls surrounded Kagome, touching her as if they wanted to make sure she wasn't insubstantial…that it was all real.

 

“That's great, Kagome!”

 

“Wonderful!”

 

They walked a little longer, until…

 

“Are you coming to the dance this weekend?”

 

“Huh?”

 

By this time, the girls had reached the school and the first bell to report to homeroom was ringing.

 

“Don't worry, Kagome! We'll find you a date!”

 

“Yeah! We'll talk to Hojo for you!”

 

“It's in the bag, Kagome!”

 

“No! Wait!” Kagome watched the girls dash in the front door ahead of her and get lost in the crowd of students rushing to their lockers and then to their rooms.

 

She stood just outside the school with InuYasha's growling in her head. Her hanyou was nearby, alright; not that she hadn't expected him to trail her to school. “Now, if only I can keep him from eviscerating poor Hojo.” She shrugged and went inside.

 

 

******************

 

 

It was sort of like coming back to a school for a reunion. Fortunately, in Kagome's case, the school hadn't been remodeled or rebuilt in the meantime. Everything was where she remembered it. Her locker even still had Shippo's drawings taped to the inside of the door. She remembered thinking that if anyone ever looked at them, they'd put them down as the product of a teenage girl's overactive imagination.

 

She sighed when she looked at the picture of Miroku and Sango. “Such good friends. Why did they have to disappear like that, and so soon after defeating Naraku.” She ran her fingers over the drawing and felt her tears beginning to well up. “I miss you, my friends.” She sighed as the bell sounded and she had to close her locker and rush to first period.

 

“It's nice to see you in class again, Kagome, but try to be on time.”

 

“Gomen, sensei.”

 

“Take your seat.”

 

“Hai.”

 

A few minutes later, Kagome was smiling. For once math class wasn't difficult. It was fortunate that she had found time to study over the years and had even enrolled herself in school during the Meiji era. The irony was that it was just after some joker in the Japanese school system had decided to model school uniforms after European-style naval uniforms…so she found herself wearing a sailor suit again.

 

But at least the skirts were longer.

 

She had graduated with honors. And even though they approached math somewhat differently in the present time, she found that it was not difficult to make the leap. In fact, if anything, she understood the subject better for having learned it the old way.

 

At one point, she was called up to the blackboard to solve a problem. As she worked, she heard her classmates startng to mumble. When she sat down again, she found the teacher looking at her strangely.

 

“Kagome?”

 

“Hai, sensei.”

 

“Where did you learn to do the problem that way?”

 

Kagome gulped. She realized she had done it the way they did back in the 20's. “I had a tutor, sensei…because of being sick all the time.”

 

“Really.”

 

“A very old and very traditional gentleman. A friend of my ji-chan's.”

 

“I see.”

 

Fortunately, the bell rang.

 

 

******************

 

 

Kagome sat outside the school, eating her lunch. She was feeling good about avoiding any serious problems when…

 

“Kagome!”

 

She looked up. “Oh no.”

 

Ayumi was in the lead, with Eri and Yuka each holding one of Hojo's arms and dragging him along in trail. “Look who we found for you.”

 

The two girls released poor Hojo, who straightened himself out and bowed slightly to Kagome. “Higurashi.”

 

Kagome acknowledged the young man. “Hojo.” Immediately she winced and bent forward with her face buried in her hands.

 

“Are you alright, Kagome? You're not sick again, are you?”

 

Kagome remained bent over where she sat, but raised one hand slightly and waved to her friends. “No, no. I'm okay. The doctors said I might get migraine-like symptoms for a while before I was completely cured.” She returned to holding her face in both her hands. “I sound like ji-chan.”

 

Hojo and Kagome's three friends watched as the miko remained bent over, her face in her hands, shoulders shaking as what sounded like sobs escaped her. “Shall I take you to the school nurse, Kagome?”

 

“No, thank you, Hojo. I just need to rest quietly for a few minutes. It's what they said to do.” She raised her hand briefly, just enough to wave for them to leave and give her some quiet.

 

“If you say so.”

 

Once she was pretty sure that her friends had left, she peeked through her fingers to make sure. What sounded like sobs turned into laughter, although she quickly brought herself back under control.

 

InuYasha had been far enough away so that she couldn't tell exactly what he was thinking, so her mind had interpreted his thoughts with a mental image. Kagome had seen a very naked Hojo hanging upside-down from a branch…a broadly smiling InuYasha standing beside him, as if posing for a picture, his Tetsusaiga in one hand, Hojo's…

 

She started giggling.

 

…testicles…in the other.

 

Finally collecting herself, Kagome stood up and started walking back into the school. Just before going through the door, she paused. “Osuwari.” She heard a crash somewhere above her and towards the back of the building. She could feel that InuYasha was surprised and upset. Satisfied, she continued into the school.

 

 

******************

 

 

Chaos.

 

Utter and complete chaos.

 

“It's a bomb!” shouted one student.

 

“Terrorists!” shouted another.

 

Finally, after a minute of furious rushing about her by wide-eyed classmates, the public address system came on. “Attention, students! Attention, students!” Everyone quieted down. After all, there didn't seem to be smoke pouring through the halls. “You may have heard a loud crash on the roof. The principal has inspected a large hole in the roof. We can only guess what happened…perhaps a chunk of ice off a passing airliner…or even a meteorite…but, whatever it was, it severed several electrical cables for the school and will take at least a day to repair.

 

“Accordingly, school will be dismissed early today, with buses arriving in twenty minutes. Please maintain order.”

 

A cheer went up from the student body at the unexpected holiday.

 

“Be assured that there will be school tomorrow.”

 

There was brief groaning, but then everyone smiled at having the rest of the day off and proceeded to their lockers.

 

Kagome, who still felt the presence of InuYasha in the distance, also felt a little sheepish about what she had done. “Oh well. There's nothing I can do about it now. Just try to be more careful.”She got her books and walked out of the school.

 

“Higurashi!”

 

“Oh no.”

 

“Is your headache better?”

 

Kagome looked at Hojo, but the image of the poor boy hanging upside-down by a rope with a happy hanyou standing beside him, holding his cut off…

 

No, she mustn't think of that.

 

“You must be feeling better. You're smiling again.”

 

“Uh, yeah. I guess so.”

 

“So, how about it?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“You will go to the dance with me? Great!”

 

“I'm definitely feeling…huh?” All of a sudden she could feel InuYasha getting closer…fast. “Osuwari!”

 

The young man looked around. “What did you say?” Then there was a crash. “Did you hear something?” He looked up and around, worriedly. “More stuff falling from the sky?”

 

Kagome looked past Hojo. A small dust cloud was rising from the direction of a nearby park. “I didn't hear anything.”

 

Hojo looked relieved, got on his bike and started to pedal off. “I'll pick you up at seven and we'll stop for something to eat, first!”

 

Kagome realized that the boy thought they still had a date. “Hojo!”

 

“See you at seven!”

 

She watched dejectedly as the young man pedaled off into the distance. This time the image in her head was of a naked Hojo hanging upside-down from a tree branch…with InuYasha stomping gleefully on what the hanyou had cut off the poor boy.

 

She didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

 

 

******************

 

 

Kagome had wandered around downtown Tokyo for hours after getting out of school early. Finally, she couldn't put it off any longer.

 

“I'm home.”

 

“Hi, Sis. Is InuYasha with you?” Sota recoiled at the look he got from his sister.

 

“You would bring up his name!”

 

Sota watched as his sister stormed through the house and proceded out the back door and onto the shrine grounds. “I guess they're fighting again.”

 

Kagome sat down below Goshinboku. This place always brought her peace…and she needed peace. All of a sudden she felt InuYasha's rapid approach. Closer…closer. “Osuwari.”

 

<CRASH>

 

At least this time she had been careful so that he didn't crash through her mother's roof. She looked at the hanyou at her feet as dislodged twigs and leaves fluttered down on him.

 

Finally he managed to raise his head. “Bitc…”

 

“Osuwari!”

 

<CRASH>

 

“A few more moments of peace.” After a moment, she looked up to check on InuYasha and discovered her family peering anxiously out the back door. They looked a little…afraid.

 

“What did ya do that for?” yelled the angry hanyou.

 

Without looking at him, she answered,“You wanted to hurt him.”

 

“I wanted to…”

 

“I know what you wanted to do.” Kagome was blushing. “The image was pretty graphic.” She couldn't help it. She started to giggle.

 

InuYasha sat up and slid over beside the miko. Deciding he was out of danger of being sat again, he lost his anger and smiled. “I guess I do fly off the handle…when it comes to you.”

 

Kagome leaned towards InuYasha and kissed him. The hanyou leaned forward and deepened the kiss.

 

Back inside the house, Kagome's ji-chan stared, agape.

 

Sota watched his sister and his idol for a moment, and then looked up at his mother, confused. “Mama? What just happened?”

 

 

 

 

A/N: I hope you liked the first chapter!

 

As always, please read and review. Thanks! Oh, and again, more reviews = more inspiration for new chapters. lol