InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Boyfriend ❯ Learning ( Chapter 23 )

Disclaimer: InuYasha, Kagome and anyone else you saw in the manga or anime does not belong to me. Yukio does. If I saw so much as a shiny penny for this story, you think I'd be writing fanfiction still? Okay, I would… Damn other authors and their more interesting universes…

 

Genre: Angst, Romance
Rating: M
Codes: Inu/Kag
Feedback: Keeps my muse talking and the stories coming! Do tell. But if you have a flame, use it for something more productive, like setting your clothes on fire.

 

 

The Boyfriend
Chapter 23

 

Kagome opened her eyes, blinking away the remains of a dream she couldn't remember and looked for what had caused her to wake. Eri nodded her head at the front of the classroom and Kagome sat up, her English book's page tearing slightly as she rose, since it was stuck to her cheek. Blushing, she pressed the page flat and looked at the teacher, who was glaring at her.

 

“Did I interrupt a good dream, Higurashi?” the teacher asked and Kagome blushed harder.

 

“No, Sensei,” she answered. “Where did you ask me to read from?”

 

“Page one-twenty-one, please,” he said with a sigh. Kagome flipped to the correct page and started reading. She tripped over several words and found one entire sentence incomprehensible, but she knew that she had still improved a lot since she had resumed school. “Thank you, Higurashi,” the teacher said and she sat down and smiled at Eri who was grinning at her.

 

As soon as the class was over and they had bowed for the teacher, Yuka walked over to where they were sitting and smiled at Kagome.

 

“You did great, especially for someone who's been asleep for most of the class!” Yuka said, laughing slightly.

 

“Yeah, I had plenty of time to study while Tama was eating… every two freaking hours. And when I had to change her diapers. And when she just couldn't sleep and just laid there crying, I read to her from my English book,” Kagome added with her own chuckle. “I had InuYasha hold the book for me,” Kagome added absently. “I didn't think I'd actually absorbed any of it.”

 

“Your boyfriend's living with you?” Eri asked and Kagome bit her lip as she realized her slipup. They had finally met him a few days before Tama came home and said they thought he was really cool, if he seemed like a bad boy type. His hair and eyes made them decide he must be half-foreign.

 

“Is he sleeping in your room?” Yuka added.

 

“Are you sleeping together?” Eri jumped on.

 

“Yes, yes and not how you mean. He sleeps on the floor,” Kagome said.

 

“And he helps you take care of Tama?” Yuka asked.

 

“Is he going to adopt her? Oh! Are you getting married?” Eri leaned in closely and Yuka joined her.

 

“We… we've talked about it,” Kagome said slowly. “He did ask me… to marry him,” Kagome admitted.

 

“Did you say yes?” Both girls asked at once. Kagome blushed and nodded and they both fell back: Eri into her chair and Yuka took a step back from the desk. “Why didn't you tell us?” Yuka demanded while Eri asked, “When are you going to do it?”

 

“I haven't even told my mom yet,” Kagome said.

 

“So he's your fiancé now, not your boyfriend,” Eri pointed out.

 

“Well, yeah, but…” Kagome started.

 

“What kind of ceremony do you think you'll have?” Yuka interrupted.

 

“Well, I suppose I've always imagined a western ceremony, but I think he'll want traditional…” Kagome stopped and wondered what InuYasha had in mind. She imagined him in a tuxedo and grinned. Absently, she wondered if he would wear his fire rat kimono to the wedding. `Well, red is a lucky color,' she thought.

 

“Well, at least you won't have to worry about what shrine,” Eri said, smiling.

 

“You'll invite us to the Kekkon Hiroen, right?” Yuka prodded.

 

“Of course,” Kagome said. “But I don't think it will be until I finish school.”

 

“That's best,” Eri agreed. “Do you think you'll go to university?”

 

“If I can survive high school!” Kagome said, smiling. The chime sounded and Yuka walked back to her seat to prepare for the next class. Kagome laid her head back down and barely opened her eyes in time to stand for the next teacher. As she took her seat again, she groaned and realized that she was going to have to get Tama on a schedule as soon as possible or have InuYasha take on all of the nightly responsibilities. There was no point in her coming to class if she wasn't going to be awake for most of it.

 

Somehow, she got through the day and woke up during cleaning time. She absently swept a pile of dust out into the hall to leave whoever was responsible for the hall cleaning most of the work while Eri chatted at her as she cleaned the windows. Yuka was taking out the trashcans and Kagome suspected she was dragging her feet on the way back to class. Her suspicions were confirmed when Yuka reappeared in the classroom ten seconds before the final chime of the day. Yuka and Eri went to their clubs after saying good-bye to Kagome, but she had to go straight home, so she went to her shoe locker and changed to her street shoes, almost alone in the room.

 

When she stepped out of the building, InuYasha was waiting for her, Tama strapped to his back. Kagome smiled and walked over to him and set her backpack down so he could transfer Tama over to her. He picked her bag up and slung it across his shoulder.

 

“How was your day?” he asked.

 

“It would have been better if I had been able to stay awake through more of it,” Kagome answered, followed by a huge yawn.

 

“Do you want me to stay up with Tama tonight?” InuYasha asked.

 

“Yes, please,” Kagome answered. “I wonder if Mama developed those pictures today,” Kagome continued absently.

 

“Yeah, she did,” InuYasha said. “I went with her.”

 

“Really?” Kagome looked over at him. “You stayed here all day?”

 

“Yeah. I figure… if Tama can't go through the well, I have to stay here. So I need to learn about your time. Your mom took me around with her and explained a lot of things to me.”

 

“Like what?” Kagome asked.

 

“Yen, for one,” InuYasha said and pulled a handful of yen out of his pocket. “What it's worth and everything. And what that camera thing was and how it works. She told me about your school system and showed me how to change diapers and talked about some other things.”

 

“Did she know anything about making you a legal citizen?” Kagome asked, blatantly ignoring a lascivious stare shot at her by a businessman walking by. He looked at InuYasha, who shot him a glare that made him face forward and speed up his step.

 

“Your grandfather did,” InuYasha answered. “He said that he had some friends he could talk to that could make me a fake birth certificate, but that I would need to take a surname.”

 

“Did your father have one?” Kagome asked. “I mean, wasn't he nobility?”

 

“Yeah, he was, but he didn't. Youkai don't have surnames, even lords.”

 

“What about your mother? She looked like a princess.”

 

“I don't know,” InuYasha said. “Everyone called her Izayoi. I guess I could ask Myoga, but I don't think she had one, either. But I was thinking either Taji or Inoue.”

 

“'Silver and yellow' or `above the well?'” Kagome said. “They both suit you.”

 

“Yeah, but Inoue suits us both and if you marry me, it will be your name as well.”

 

“Inoue Kagome?” Kagome made a face. “They rhyme. Taji Kagome? Makes me sound like a basket.” InuYasha gave a short laugh.

 

“Is Taji Tama better?” he asked.

 

“Inoue Tama… Jewel above the well,” Kagome said. “I kinda like that.”

 

“Although Inoue InuYasha sounds weird,” InuYasha said. “But anything-InuYasha sounds strange to me.”

 

“Taji InuYasha does work better,” Kagome agreed. “I think Taji works best for you. It's not very common, though and Inoue is. How did you pick, anyway?”

 

“From a list your mom showed me on a computer,” InuYasha answered. Kagome did a double take.

 

“A computer?”

 

“Yeah, it's like a television, only…”

 

“I know what a computer is!” Kagome exclaimed, laughing. “I didn't know that you did.”

 

“Your mom taught me while we were out today.”

 

“Wow, you learned a lot, huh?” Kagome said, impressed. InuYasha had always ignored her when she told him about things like that and she was a little jealous that her mother had got him to listen and learn so much in just one day.

 

“I told you, I need to learn about your time if I'm going to live here. She said these are things that people have to know.”

 

“You were just never interested when I would tell you about this stuff,” Kagome said with a slight pout in her voice.

 

“I didn't think I would ever need to know it,” InuYasha explained. “What good would it do me, knowing that people made it to the moon hundreds of years after my time? If they lived there, that would have been different. But just going there and finding out it's nothing more than a big rock—that's boring.”

 

“I suppose if you look at it that way, rather than looking at it like people will probably live there one day,” Kagome said.

 

“Maybe, but who knows when that will be and if we'll live to see it?”

 

“Spoilsport,” Kagome muttered. “I still think it's great.”

 

“Keh,” InuYasha stepped onto the bus and grabbed a hand bar behind Kagome. They were quiet for the entire ride, except when Tama started crying and Kagome had to spend five minutes trying to get her to stop. An older woman offered Kagome her seat until the baby fell quiet and could be put back in her sling. Then Kagome gave her back the seat and resumed standing. InuYasha surprised Kagome by paying his own fare after she swiped her bus card as they were getting off. She couldn't help but marvel at how well he was learning. She began to really believe he could fit in and they could be a family.

 

 

 

To be continued…

 

Sorry about the length between updates. I've encountered a huge writer's block called gestation. I'm afraid that all my creative energies are currently focused on creating life. Hopefully, I'll get back into the swing of things in a while. In the meantime, the updates will be a bit slow to stretch out what I have written already. I won't abandon the story, though, so just stick around. It may take a while to come, but there will be an ending, barring my death or the death of my computer. Or blindness… couldn't type if I was blind… Okay, so barring any unforeseen disasters. Count on it. I finish what I start.

 

Japanese lesson for today: Kekkon Hiroen is a Japanese wedding reception. Non-family doesn't go to the marriage ceremony itself, which is small and sometimes has two ceremonies—a traditional Shinto ceremony with only the immediate family members followed by a change of costume and a western ceremony with more people present, including non-family in some cases. Not all Japanese weddings are like this, but this is the average currently. Afterwards, they go to the Kekkon Hiroen (after another change of costume). If you're invited to the reception, you're expected to bring a gift of money (the amount depends on your relationship to the couple) with the average being thirty-thousand yen, which is about two-hundred and fifty dollars. The weddings are very expensive and these monetary gifts basically pay for it. I can say that would have been nice for my own wedding! We had to pay for everything ourselves!