YO y'all! I'm back with another chapter. I thought it was really sad and I nearly cried writing it but could be because me and my boyfriend broke up. I hope you like it. Review for me, k? And for those that reviewed fro the last chapter, thanks! Love ya bunches!

Warning!!! Graphic gory scenes to ensue, please avoid reading this fic if you are not of a suitable age, or do not have parent consent! You have been warned!

I do not owe either the InuYasha characters or those of YuYu Hakusho

Bitter Memories

Chapter seventeen : Being true to the Heart

The tingling sensation at the back of her mind alerted her to Hiei's presence a moment to late. Separating herself from the embrace she had longed for, she turned quickly to see the fleeing figure slip around a corner. 'Once again, I managed to send the guy I love running away from me.' The thought shocked her. 'Love?' It only took her staring after him to realize the truth in that statement. She did indeed love him, and now, somehow, at sometime, the fire apparition had stolen her heart from it's early grave leaving her passions and feelings for InuYasha buried.

At the loss of contact, InuYasha had protested in the form of a disgruntled groan, his arms tightening around her waist in hopes of returning to their previous activity. He, like her, had waited a long time to share in the passions she had elicited with in him. Finding her suddenly distant and withdraw, he tensed. 'Did I do something wrong? What just happened? I thought she felt the same way!' His mind was chaos, and was only getting further perplexed the more time she ignored his existence. An emotion he had always used to cover his hurt, confusion, and desperation overtook him.

"Kagome?!? What the hell? I have been missing you like crazy, I finally find you and you shun me after acting like you have felt the same way?" InuYasha's angry and hurt voice shattered Kagome's thought process, bringing her to realize her current position. Blushing, she noticed how exactly she had been sitting. Her legs were thrown on either side of InuYasha's lap, her arms were still locked around his neck, and her body was pressed to his chest. Sliding off his lap, she moved to the cot, her face pointed to the ground.

"InuYasha. Gods! It feels so good to say your name and have it linked to a living, breathing person again. I'm sorry about that. I did miss you, it's just I…I'm confused. There are way too many things that are just too…weird right now." Her voice had cracked, her teary, warm orbs rising to meet his incredible purple depths. He took in her tone, her eyes and her tear stained face in a single motion before settling on her eyes. All the things in her posture and voice proved her to be telling the truth, she truly was confused and was in a lot of inner turmoil over his reappearance. Sighing, InuYasha ran a hand though his dark hair while closing his eyes. In an instant his previous look disappeared, melting into a more familiar one.

Kagome sat shocked, staring at InuYasha, her mouth hanging slightly ajar. Before her very eyes his whole person changed. His dark raven hair followed his had in its change. The dark, shiny tresses faded into a gray before settling into a snowy white. His soft, sorely missed, furry ears twitched madly atop his head before settling forward focused on Kagome. As he opened his eyes the stunning, molten gold that had haunted her dreams were focused on her with the most soul-piercing gaze. All that was missing was the familiar flaming red Fire-Rat kimono.

Seeing that he was encouraging her to stop hiding from him, she reluctantly released her hold on her image, allowing it to settle back into its demon form. Now it was InuYasha's turn to watch in stunned silence. Focusing inward, Kagome closed her eyes, hiding her amazing cerulean depths from him. The air around her swirled noticeably, her power flaring and licking over her skin. Blues and pinks raced for dominance over her pale skin, before in a bright flash of pure white energy she was seated before him, demonized.

He could only gap at the grace and beauty she radiated. Her markings caught his attention and before he could stop his hand it reached forward to run a thumb over the one on her forehead. Kagome keeping her eyes shut tightly, stiffened at the unexpected contact, but remained silent. InuYasha, realizing what he had done, shrugged mentally. He no longer cared. He had his Kagome back. Bringing his lips to her forehead, he replaced his thumb with them in a feathery light kiss. Then he trailed his kisses to the single, glittering tear-shaped marking on her cheek. Another, harder kiss was pressed there. Kagome, feeling torn in two, fought for control of herself, but lost when his lips touched her cheek. Warm, stinging tears fell from her tightly clenched eyes and made their way to fall on InuYasha's lips. At first InuYasha was surprised to fell the warm, hot tears, but then he did what came naturally. He kissed first one eyelid then the other while his hands dried the fallen tears.

For several minutes silence reined in the small, private room of the school's clinic. The two demon teenagers sat locked in the embrace of one another. For one of them it was an embrace of a lover, for the other an embrace of a friend once something more. For Kagome this particular embrace had come to late, but she welcomed it anyway. As she seen it once bitten, twice shy was very much in effect for the one that ran off with her heart. All those times InuYasha had sent her home to cry over her unreciprocated love was exactly what she had foolishly done to Hiei. Now there was no hope to recover and erase the pain she had surely etched onto the fire apparition's heart. She had broken Hiei's heart, and in effect she had to break InuYasha's, only to leave her with none of her own.

InuYasha, never being one to take silence well forced himself to pull away from the warm, small body he had numerous dreams about pressed against him in this same manner. With his movement, Kagome too, pulled back and stared up into his eyes. He could see the questions, but those weren't what were plaguing him. He wasn't an idiot. Ever since he had first kissed her she had seemed unlike her self. Something was stopping her from returning his loving embraces; he could see it in her eyes. Pain under lined the questioning front, and underneath the pain was a desperation and lifelessness that he had seen too many times in Kikyou's eyes.

"Kagome? What is it?" His question seemed to bounce from every wall, echoing in both their heads over and over. 'Don't shut me out!' " Please let me in Kagome! I can see that you have been keeping everyone out. I can't stand to let you die Kagome, not even on the inside. And that's what you've done isn't it? You've committed suicide on the inside! If there are no emotions, no ties to this world than no one can hurt you can they? Is that what you tried? I've done it remember!?! You saved me, now let me save you!" Unnoticed by InuYasha he had begun to speak exactly what was on his mind. Kagome had snapped into a look of horror, her wide blue eyes locked on InuYasha's angered and depressed face. 'But some one is saving you aren't they?' His voice shook with his conviction, tears coming unbidden to his eyes, only to well and spill over the edge. Angry at himself for his weakness, InuYasha quickly scrubbed at his face, destroying any trace of his tears except the shimmering ones still held captive in his eyes. Kagome tried to swallow, but found the lump in her throat too much. A startled, choking sob escaped from inside her, her throat left raw. She refused to cry, and stubbornly fought to keep them in check, but the telltale sting at the back of her eyes told her she was losing. Then she snapped.

"You think it's easy? You had an escape InuYasha! You all did! Even my family left me behind! You all left me! What was I supposed to do? Hum? Let everyone I've ever cared about relinquish their hold on life and stand there impassively? I wasn't strong enough to join you! I survived only to be the only one to truly die! So I did the only thing I could! I gave up! So what! My heart died with you! Without a heart the body doesn't function well, Inu. Now, here I am. Finally, I start to revive my dead heart and you reappear and ask me after all I went through to let you in?!? Where the HELL WERE YOU WHEN I NEEDED YOU? WHERE WERE YOU WHEN I HAD TO BURN THE BODIES OF MY BEST FRIENDS, SON, AND YOU?!?! SO DON'T DAMN WELL GIVE ME A LUCTURE ON COPING OUT!" She had stood, her body shaking in repressed anger, fear, and pain from the last few months. Her scream stabbed him directly in the heart, each word one blow after the other. She was right. They all had managed to go to their graves and be comforted by death, forgetting their pains and sorrows of the previous life. Kagome had been left on her own, the entire world against her and no one to step in. Not to mention there was no one to help her with the demon transformation. He knew about everything that had taken place in her life up till four weeks ago. In the after life that's all he had done. Sango, Miroku, Shippo, Kouga, and himself watched over her constantly. They saw her pain, her transformation, her capture…everything, and they hadn't been there for her. No one had. The five of them finally could stand it no longer and InuYasha had demanded to be able to go to her time to help her. They had all been surprised when he was able to go; more surprising was the fact that the old InuYasha had been placed in Kagome's time. His body, demon abilities, and memories all intact. Plus, he hadn't had to be reborn as it were. He only appeared, his body slowly materializing. Instantly he had new knowledge. The know how to hide his appearance, the information needed to survive and most importantly, everyone seemed to think he had always been there. It had been so easy, too easy. He had known there was a catch. This was it. He had all the knowledge, all the memories, and all the desire to help Kagome, but now that he was actually face-to-face with her, he had no clue how to do it, and wasn't sure that he was the one to do it anymore.

Kagome stood over him, her face a mask of rage and pain. She had gone through hell and back, but unlike him, no one was there to pick up the pieces. He hesitated for an instant, and then stood up too. His height making her only reach his chest. She turned on her heel, her long hair flicking back to smack against his bare skin in a whip-like action. A direct analogy for the way her previous words had struck him. Placing a hand on her shoulder, he gently turned her back to face him. Reaching out he cupped her face in his hands, bringing her angry eyes up to meet his. Taking a deep breath, he paused before letting it out in a giant whoosh.

"I'm sorry. Your right. I made a promise to you on numerous occasions to protect you, to save you, to keep you alive. But in the end I let you down, didn't I? When you needed me the most I wasn't there. And the end result of my failure was to let you die on the inside. Had I kept my promise you might not have had to go through all that you did. Maybe things would be different. It's my entire fault. Kagome, I understand if you hate me, but I tried. I really did. We were all always watching you. We fought and argued with the people in charge of the spirit world to let us come to you, but they wouldn't let us. Finally, for whatever reason, they allowed me to come find you, but the look in your eyes says I'm too late. Whose been protecting you? Someone has stolen your heart from us, from me, haven't they?" His voice gave out, barely letting the final word slip past before his voice refused to work. During his speech, Kagome had begun to shake, tears slipping down her cheeks. Despite her best efforts InuYasha had seen past her, he always did. Her eyes had belied her true feelings, had shown that she wasn't completely dead on the inside anymore and that it was due to Hiei, not InuYasha, that she was recovering.

In the span of an hour she had destroyed two peoples' hearts and was now having to face down one of them. InuYasha had turned away from her. His shoulders shook, and her nose detected the scent of tears. She felt like her chest had been split open and iodine was being forced into the open wound only to flow through her veins. Even if her heart finally made up a decision on who it loved, she still knew InuYasha meant too much to her to not give him what he deserved, the truth. After Kikyou had shattered his heart he hadn't wanted to let anyone in. And now that he finally did, she had squashed it the same as Kikyou.

"I could never hate you. You're right though. There is someone else. He has only recently come into my life, but I can't help but love him. I'm sorry, Kami knows how sorry. When I watched you die, part of me died with you. That part of my heart was willingly given to you, and its yours and yours alone. I can't be with you InuYasha; it wouldn't be being true to my heart. But as much as I care for Hiei, I will always have a place for you, as a friend. Fate is so cruel. When my entire heart was yours alone, you couldn't give me your heart. And now, I can't give you mine, but yet I can't be with Hiei either. Please forgive me Inu. I never meant to hurt you above anyone else." Her own tears were blurring her vision, but she some how managed to fumble into InuYasha's arms. As much as he hated to hear it, as much as his heart was dying, he loved her and love didn't let go just because it was denied. Now they both sat, clutching to one another both thinking of the broken hearts and false hopes they have found in each other. Only time would heal the scars they had endured today, and neither was sure they could handle one more disappointment, but for now, despite the pain it put them in, they held on for comfort and to shelter the losses they both were dealt.

So what did you think? Was it sad like I thought? I was kinda hoping to put a few of your minds at rest and wanted to be able to start moving along this story. Alright, you know the drill. Review for me and I'll reward you with a new chapter!

Ta ta.