InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Beach House ❯ Some Down Time ( Chapter 5 )

The Beach House
Chapter Five: Some Down Time
By: OhJoy

~

Kagome's head was spinning. She had difficult time breathing. She reached for the bathroom counter, something, anything to hold onto. "What the FUCK? I am just a Goddamn rebound! Shit! FUCK! PISS!"

"Kagome… honey?" Concern flooded Sango's voice. "Talk to me, K-Girl. What's going on in your noggin?"

Kagome looked around to locate the voice. She couldn't shake the fog covering her brain… her heart… "I can't… I don't want to be here."

Sango enveloped her friend in a fierce hug. She began to smooth and stroke Kagome's hair in a soothing maternal manner. "Sshhh…"

A few moments passed and Kagome regained some semblance of reality. She said with a hitch in her soft voice, "I don't want to be here anymore. My head is throbbing. I need some space to think, to breathe. Can I use your cell?"

Without a word, Sango pulled her phone from her waist clip and handed it to Kagome. Kagome opened it up and dialed, "Please pick up. Please pick up. Please pick up." "Momma?… Yeah, I know… I'm sorry about the phone tag too… No, I'm not good. I don't feel well… Can you come get me?… Where are you?… Right now, please… Ok, I'm at the Brewery… Ok… Thanks, love you."

"Shit," Sango blew out her breath in a `hoo boy.' "You got it bad for him, huh?"

With a rueful wince, Kagome replied, "Shit… who'd've thought? Ah, geez, Sango. Who am I kidding? I got it bad for him -- in a big way. FUCK. I'm gonna crash at home. I need some time to think."

"Home? You don't think of the beach house as your home?" Sango was a little startled at that idea. "Are you… are you gonna move out?"

"Dunno," Kagome shrugged. "My head is throbbing. I need to get InuYasha in perspective. I'm way overreacting. This is so not me!"

She settled back into her friend's comforting embrace, still feeling a bit lost. They both jumped when the cell rang several minutes later. Sango glanced down, "It's your mom."

"Hi, Momma," Kagome said into the phone. "Really? So fast… I'll be right there."

Sango gave her one last squeeze. "Call me later…?"

Kagome managed a small smile, "Abso-fucking-lutely."

~

In the car, whatever resolve Kagome created had disintegrated immediately when she sat down. She sobbed into her mom's shoulder. As all mothers do when her child is wounded, Kagome's mom held her steadfast, cooed in her ear, "Ssshhh, my child. It's all right. Your Momma's here." Her mom stroked her hair until the sobs subsided. She let out a sigh and handed her daughter a bottle of water.

"Kagome, I don't expect you to tell me what happened that made you so upset. Just know that everything will work out, as it always does. I'm here if you need to talk." She gave her daughter another squeeze and started the engine.

Throughout the short twenty-minute drive to her family home in Pacific Palisades, Kagome just stared out the window and sighed… and sighed again.

Once home, she sank into her familiar bed that she loved so much. It took her so many years to create the small valley in the middle of the mattress that held her perfectly, comforting, soothing. She thanked all 108 Kamis that her mother didn't make good on the threat to remodel her room into a home office.

Her mind began to race at a dizzying speed. A million thoughts battling to take control.

~

Sango returned to the table. "Hey Boomerang Babe." She managed a small smile.

InuYasha eyed her and looked for Kagome. Again, thought straight to mouth action, "Where's Kagome?"

"She wasn't feeling well. She went home." She answered in a quiet voice.

"You let her walk home by herself?" InuYasha's voice was curt. He stood immediately.

"Sit down. Her mom picked her up. She's in good hands." All conversation stopped and curious glances were thrown at Sango.

"Her head was throbbing. She said she needed room to breathe." Sango hoped her friends would just let this go. Her eyes begged her friends, "Please, please buy this story. Please, Yash, just give her some space."

"Feh."

Dinner resumed and was rather uneventful. As soon as they returned home, much to Sango's discomfort, InuYasha went straight to Kagome's room. He frowned at the half-open door to the dark room. He ventured in… she wasn't there.

"SANGO!"

He stalked over to her in the middle of the kitchen; she was quietly speaking with Miroku. "Where the hell is she?"

"Huh?" She asked innocently.

"Don't fuck with me. Kagome is not here. Where the fuck is she?" InuYasha was seething. He was going through the entire scenario, replaying all the events just before he learned that Kagome went `home.'

"WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU SAY TO HER?" He bellowed.

"InuYasha," Miroku's soothing voice came to his attention. He pushed Sango behind him, "Perhaps you would like to rethink your question or your tone."

InuYasha wasn't listening. "ANSWER ME, WENCH!"

Sango took a deep breath and brushed past Miroku, gave his hand a quick squeeze. She turned to InuYasha and calmly said, "I told her that she looked like Kikyo."

The room was terribly still. Then their friends murmured various responses.

"Who's Kikyo?"

"Whoa."

"I never noticed it before."

"Eew. Freaky."

"She does."

InuYasha's head began to spin. "Did Kagome really look like Kikyo?" He slumped against the counter. "Oh, FUCK…" He looked at Sango with the biggest puppy dog eyes ever. She saw the sorrow in them. "Sango, I am so sorry for yelling."

She gave him a hug; it did not go unnoticed by anyone that InuYasha actually said "sorry."

~

"How did this happen so fast?" Kagome clutched her pillow and sighed wearily. "One moment we're dancing, the next we're kissing, then in an instant I fell in love…" She gasped and clapped a hand over her mouth as if she said it aloud. "Fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck…" She rolled over and stared at the ceiling in the dark room. She sighed for the umpteenth time and reached for her phone.

~

Sango was in the bathroom, splashing water on her face. Her heart was aching for her friend. "I hope she's ok." Her cell rang. She jumped and began frantically looking for it. "Please be Kagome. Please be Kagome." She chanted. She recognized the number on her Caller ID.

"Hey K-Girl." Sango's relief was immediate.

"Hey Boomerang Babe."

"Oh, honey. Are you ok?"

"Yeah," Kagome answered. "I feel better at home. I'll crash here for a couple of days."

"Kagome," Sango said softly. "You really don't consider our home yours, huh?"

"Mmm… not yet. Please don't be hurt by that."

"I'm not. I understand. If it makes you feel any better, InuYasha was concerned when you weren't here. I guess, he thinks of this house as your home too." Sango withheld his angry reaction; she didn't want to upset her friend any more.

"Mmm…" Kagome was trying to put to words the emotions she was feeling. "Uh, ok… um… Sango, I have no idea why I ran like that. Ever since I found out that he and Kikyo just broke up a few weeks ago, I got this knot in my stomach… like I was just a rebound chick to him. And then you said we looked alike. Shit! I feel like I'm a substitute for someone he was totally into… that he was `hot & heavy' with. Like he didn't see me for me… he saw me as her…"

"Oh, honey," she soothed. "This is something you should talk to Yash about, not me."

"No," Kagome protested. "I bet he's not even aware of what he's doing. We all know how most guys are clueless about their emotions. I just want to put this back in perspective. I couldn't've fallen so hard for him so quickly. It's not possible. Maybe it was the alcohol. Maybe I'm just lonely… shit, maybe I just need to get laid already!" They both chuckled at that. "Anyhow, I just need to sort out my feelings. It gets messy since we're roommates… and hell, we share a fucking bathroom, for fuck's sake."

"Do you wanna swap rooms?" Sango offered. She didn't know what else to say. Her heart was breaking, she didn't like knowing her friend's was too.

"Nah," Kagome answered ruefully. "That'd be too obvious. I hate looking like a weak female. I'm stronger than this. I just need a couple of days to gather my strength and put some emotional distance between me and him. I can't be wearing my heart on my sleeve, you know."

"Mmm…" Sango had no idea what else to say.

"Ok, so tell me about this cunt-bag Kikyo. What is her deal? What is she like? How did they meet? Is she seeing someone now? Is she trying to get back together with InuYasha? What has he said about her?" She drilled the questions at lightening speed.

Sango almost chuckled. Kagome was distancing herself. "Here we go in deep over analysis mode. This will give her perspective… I hope." She took a deep breath and did her best to answer as thoroughly as she could, she knew full well that Kagome deserved at least that much.

"They met through a family friend, I'm not sure who. It was kind of a set up. Yash was a big time player before her. He had a new chick each week."

She strode across her room, closed and locked her bedroom door, then did the same for her bathroom door. She flipped open her laptop and launched iTunes, selected a mellow playlist and sat on her bed, holding a pillow to her tummy. "Can't be too sure who may overhear."

She continued, "Hell, sometimes a new one a day. But he was always a good guy about it, never led anyone on or anything malicious. He always brought his flavor of the week around, almost like he wanted our opinion of her or like it was a test for her. Some we liked, some not so much. The ones we liked lasted for a while, like a week maybe. The ones who couldn't hang with us, he just never brought around again. I'm not even sure if he slept with them or not. It was like he just got bored really easily."

Kagome remembered the stories of Miroku's roommate's romantic liaisons. They had all lived in separate apartments in one complex near campus. Sango and Eri were roommates then, with Ayame and Arimi as next-door neighbors and Miroku and InuYasha were down a floor. Shippou, Satoru, Kohaku and her brother Souta were in the dorms.

Sango took a sip of water and continued, "Anyways, they were really into each other. He changed over night. Like she cast a spell over him or something. He didn't hang out with us anymore, hardly called, was never home. It was all Kikyo, all the time. Last semester, `Roku and him had a class together and Yash missed a lot. That's not him either. Yash is under a lot of pressure from his family to excel at school. They expect him to step up and run the company beside his brother after he's complete with graduate school."

"Huh…" Kagome'e wheels were spinning. "What do you think of her?"

"I had dinner with them a couple of times. She's friendly enough, but there's something… something cold… almost distant about her. Like when she smiles, it doesn't look like she means it. I can't remember ever hearing her laugh. One time he actually met all of us at a club and brought her. Eeew, all she did was sit in a corner and sip chardonnay. It's like she's a snob, but she never even interacts with you - not even superficially so she can make herself superior or whatever. She's weird. No one liked her and no one could figure out why Yash was spending all his time with her. I mean, she didn't even try to be friends with any of us."

There was a moment's pause. "So… do I really look like her? Like how?"

Sango sighed, she didn't know what to say, "Kinda… I don't know… Your faces are similar. Maybe it's the eyes, but hers are brown. Huh, maybe it's just the shape of your eyes. Her hair is much shorter than yours, it's to her shoulders, like Eri's and slick and glossy like Eri's. She's a little taller than you. She's way super pale though, I'm not sure if that girl ever actually sees the sun. That's another thing, you know how much we all love the beach and ocean and playing volleyball and shit… Well, the whole summer, Yash never once surfed."

"Huh…" Kagome was starting feel exhausted. She sighed, "Sango, thank you. I'm beat. I'm gonna go to sleep. I'll see you in a few days."

"Ok, call me tomorrow, ok?"

"Yeah, I'm gonna get a local cell number too."

The girls said their goodnights and Kagome hung up the phone. She laid in bed, staring up at the dark ceiling until finally sleep claimed her.

~

. o _O .

Ok, I need a really cool and hot nickname for InuYasha… any ideas?