Yu Yu Hakusho Fan Fiction / InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Her Spirit ❯ Family. ( Chapter 5 )

.x.

Souta laughed quietly as he ran down the stairs to greet his sister. He could smell breakfast, her breakfast, and she always made sure to make a little extra for him. God he loved her.

His steps slowed and a frown creased the usually smooth planes of his face as he entered the downstairs hall. He could feel the oppressive aura- the awkward tenseness of two strangers facing each other.

He peeked around the corner to spot Kagome and he almost smiled. His mother's boyfriend was also in the kitchen, seated at the table with their mother. Mother was happily talking to her boyfriend - the Yukio - as both he and Kagome glanced warily at each other.

Souta sighed. Yukio wasn't the perfect man, but Mother was lonely, and she needed a man around the house, to remind her that she was a woman and desirable. `Go figure that the guy she lands is the herald of Kagome coming home.'

The relations going on in the kitchen were strained at best, and Souta couldn't really blame anyone for it. Mother had been lonely and the shrine had needed a male to support her like their father used to. Grandpa was easily won over with tales and legends…all bound up in an ancient scroll.

Souta was uneasy around the man. To him he represented the family's acceptance of Father's death and Kagome's coma. It was a blatant statement of moving on, creating another family where there was no Father- and there was no sister.

And even if Souta never really knew his father…`I will never move away from my sister.'

Souta entered the room and cheerily greeted those assembled. Ignoring the tension, as he was slowly easing it away anyway, he kissed his sister on the cheek and grabbed the plate out of her hands before sitting down.

Kagome laughed at him ruffling his hair fondly and calling him `Squirt'. It wasn't his fault that his childhood nickname stuck even though he had to slightly stoop over his sister to give her a good morning greeting.

Yukio gave him an unreadable expression before turning to their mother briefly and resuming his breakfast.

Kagome was laughing and preparing her miso and tofu as she sat down; she had this odd talent for multitasking when it came to food. Souta watched her with a grin and he could almost see his mother slip a smile out at her daughter before Yukio cleared his throat.

Souta had just been wiping his mouth and preparing to leave the table. “What do you have to say?”

Souta and Kagome looked at each other in confusion before turning quizzical faces to the imposing man. “Pardon me?”

Yukio raised an eyebrow and looked towards their mother amusedly. “Thank your mother and Kagome.”

Kagome blushed heatedly with her anger. Souta could always tell, if she was angry the blush went around her neck before making its way up to her cheeks, and if she was embarrassed it started out as a little flush on her cheekbones before extending to her temples. “I need no thanks, as I know he is grateful.” She gave Yukio an odd glance. “I don't believe we are used to each other yet Yukio-san. As the time comes, you'll understand that my brother and I appreciate each other very much, so much that we don't need the petty words people insist on using.”

Souta was stock-still staring at his sister in shock and wonder. If she could always talk that eloquently then he'd be sure to listen forever! Her words worked their way into his brain and he suddenly realized what she had said. He paled and glanced at the adults, Yukio looked pole-axed and mother looked suitably stunned.

Kagome continued. “I don't feel as you have the right to judge us as you barely know us, and I will not let you reprimand my brother with such little information. My brother is thankful and he excused himself. I am thankful to my mother for providing for us as well as my brother is grateful.” She looked straight into Yukio's stunned face. “You, on the other hand, are not providing for us right now, and have no right to judge my family…”

Mother made a choking sound and Kagome stopped her tirade. She looked oddly ashamed as she lowered her head and excused herself before making her way up the stairs and presumably to her room.

Souta cleared his throat self-consciously. “Thanks mother, if you'll excuse me.” He put his dishes in the sink as he was leaving his mothers soft voice rose up from her seat.

“Would you stay in your room, for a while, Hun?”

Souta nodded his head resignedly and trudged wearily up to his room. He passed his sister's room only pausing shortly in debate before he heard the adult's voices making their way into the living room and his Mother walking up the old stairs.

Sadly he hung his head and made his way into his room. `I keep on saying she needs something familiar, but what is familiar?' He closed the door part-way, with any luck he would be able to tell when his mom left so he could see his sister. `She comes home to an older family; everyone has changed and aged…so has she.' He heard his mother walk to his sister's room and her bedroom door close. `I want her to be somewhere familiar- so she can recover - but even her own form is unfamiliar and strange to her.' Souta sighed and picked up the kitten emerging from under his western bed. `She is a stranger to herself and this family, Mother and Grandpa never visited her, and they are strangers as well.' The kitten purred under his working fingers, curling up into his arms much like he would do in his sister's. `They just got settled in to a life without her and now she's back- a stranger to them. Where will she be familiar? Did I do the wrong thing? I can't have! She loved sitting out in the garden or near her window, telling us stories and listening to us talk after the sun set.'

His thoughts drifted away from him, to times when the family was laughing and smiling. When his sister would smile and life would dance in her eyes. He almost had interwoven the two states in his mind; a happy smiling full family with the brimming emotions of the old and comforting presence of the other- then he heard his mother walk down the creaking stairs.

A muffled noise of discomfort or sadness reached his ears, and guilt started to wind its way into his soul. It worked its way through his mind and thoughts before slamming into his heart.

So he put Bouyo down, quietly padded over to the door, and checked to see if his mother had truly gone downstairs. She had, and he sighed in melancholy before making his way to his sister's door.

Walking in he didn't find his sister crying, instead he found her meditating on the floor; any previous evidence of her tears had drifted away to rest upon memories, but he could still see the moisture clinging to her lashes. `Stranger to her own body….'

“Onee-chan?” Souta asked tentatively as he gradually opened the door wider. Her head turned to look straight at him and a smile blossomed on her face. He couldn't take it.

He ran the rest of the way in, throwing himself onto her folded legs and wrapping his arms around her neck. “I'm sorry!” He sobbed into her shoulder. “I wanted you back so much that I ignored the fact that no one knew each other anymore! You just walked right back in to a stranger's house. I'm sorry! I tried to keep it the same but it didn't work! I-”

Her finger pressed against his lips. Absently he noticed that her fingers smelled like coconuts and wondered where the scent came from. She smiled at him, brushing his hair out of his face at the same time she soothed the guilt from his soul.

“Otouto no baka. As long as you are happy that I'm here, I would spend the rest of my days walking as a stranger.”

Souta was gradually starting to feel the slack muscles of his face move, getting over his shock. He could see the gentle smile at her lips, and the dancing love in her eyes. `Yes. This was my sister. Always thinking about another's comfort before own…. I love you for that, as much as I know you'll hurt yourself with it.'

“Onee-chan…do you want to be back?”

“Silly, you are here, and my adventure isn't over now that I'm here. I have two things I'll never let go of: my brother and my love. Besides,” she shifted into a more comfortable position leaning against her bed, “I have too many good stories to tell them to just anyone.”

Souta grinned, settling his tense form onto his sister's and listening to her heart beat. `Stories from my sister, I can live with that. If it's what makes her feel like she belongs.'

So he listened to her voice start out in a whisper, gradually coloring with emotion and suspense and joy. He relaxed against her mothering form and took refuge from the storms inside his mind. For once, he wasn't the genius Higurashi who knew the answer to every question, he wasn't the small boy who was easily picked on or shunned, he was her brother- and that made up for it all.

As she wasn't the odd teenage priestess of the Higurashi shrine and she wasn't the stranger in her dreams or in her house, she was his sister- and he wouldn't let her forget it.

So he listened, like he always would. “…he was a fox-child as far as the miko could tell. His feet were paws, and his ears were pointed, and a bushy cream tail waved back and forth in his irritation. Eyes of jade green would peer out from under his auburn bangs in a good sulk and he pouted at his capturer before going on…”

.x.

Outside the cockeyed door an old hunched man listened. His silvered ponytail slid across the cotton of his haori as he turned his head to look down the stairs to where he knew his daughter was talking with Yukio. Faintly he could hear their conversation, and it blended with the story that slithered out of his granddaughter's room.

He sighed. He hadn't known what to say to his granddaughter, she had walked in, and she had felt different, she had been different. Higurashi-san paused as he listened more intently to his granddaughter; she always could weave the best of stories.

But he couldn't shake off this feeling.

Sure, people thought he was the old crazy man of the Sunset shrine who looked up illnesses to pass his time away…but he knew. And he knew the old miko and houshi knew how to counter any illness they encountered; they could protect the spirituality of their assigned villages and drive away the dangerous demons of the wild. So he saved his powers, accumulating them as time passed and they grew with his wisdom.

He felt it coming.

He scowled. Kagome always wove tales of faraway places and foreign cultures. If she always did this, without reading his scrolls of these alien beings, how would she know so many facts about the youkai?

He shook his head lightly as he made his way into his cluttered and dusty study taking a quick second to glance around in pride at his collections before making his way to one particular scroll.

He knew exactly which one it was- A fairly old scroll, of purely Japanese origin. It would be slightly dusted with motes, and the paper would crinkle with age and unroll with care. He could practically smell it…

The elder Higurashi started, and grinned sheepishly into the empty room and dust. He could smell it because he was holding it. Smiling self-depreciatively at his absent wits, he unrolled one of his treasures and blew away the gathered dust. `Ah, yes. Ancient and barely known.' He grinned and let his mind drift away into training days and ancient procedures, his lovely wife and …well, let's not go there. `This scroll has a legend…. A powerful being, the ultimate meditation! I do believe that Kagome has heralded…'

The incoherent mumblings of a hunched figure drifted into the hall of the house, joining the murmuring cacophony of voices from its other occupants.

The house of Higurashi was once again united.

.x.

The house settled in for the night, making sure the inhabitants were safely where they should be. Or in the case of a certain pair of siblings - safely where they felt safe - in each others presence. The floorboards creaked and the wind whispered its lullaby with the curtains and wind chimes. Night had come to the serene shrine, and the sunset - the shrines namesake - winked at the establishment before gathering her colorful skirts and dancing away from the moon.

No one would disturb the grounds on this night, and all nature would know this. Higurashi was once again able to protect its charges, but tonight…tonight they needed the time to rest and accept the changes that were being wrought upon them.

So the goshinboku swayed with the lullaby and the grasses danced with the dreams. The clear patch of new grass sprouting where once stood the proud well-house monument to the demon-slaying ancestry of the Higurashi house giggled and squirmed in its excitement, prophecies.

.x.

Kurama greeted the morning with a yawn and a bleary blink, silently wondering what had possessed him to arrange his bed to face the morning sun. Sighing he ran his fingers through his hair, and almost snarled when he encountered a fairly tedious knot.

Youko almost snickered in the back of his awareness, and smoothed out the flares from their souls. `Calm down red, today we meet her family.'

Kurama shook his head and sent feelings of his frustration and unease through the bond they shared. They both wanted to solve the little puzzle they had been presented with, but Kurama was the more human counterpart of Youko, and they had stayed up long into the night puzzling over the few pieces they had. It made for one very tired redheaded fox.

So he slipped out of his warm bed onto the cool floor and shivered with the onslaught to his senses. He hated cold floors.

He went about his daily morning rituals, and eventually found his way to the kitchen and his tea. Tea…he loved tea- so nice and warm and enveloping. Tea was his pick-me-up, and if he didn't have it he was sure he'd snap at people all day.

Idiots…

Kurama groggily raised his head at Youko's whisper and smiled softly. Blowing across the surface of his tea he took his first sip- the best one there was with the initial blast of flavor on your tongue and warmth down your throat - and sighed into the still morning air.

`What are you on about now Youko?'

`The humans think we are infallible in our emotions. They are idiots.'

`Why are you in a bad mood this morning?' Youko didn't need to sleep.

Youko huffed and slowly cracked his neck. `I may not need sleep as you do but I was thinking while you rested kit. That takes a lot of energy.' Kurama smiled at the youko, gathering his keys and wallet to head out the door.

He breathed in deeply as they passed the park, briefly feeling sorrow over the amount of pollution that had destroyed the once fresh air of nature. Coughing a bit behind a raised hand he picked up his pace to meet the rest of his team mates at Yusuke's house. It would be enjoyable to see their reactions to the energetic and perplexing family.

He lifted his head and raised his hand in silent affirmation of his friend's calls and walked sedately up to them. There was a general silence as they basked in the familiarity of each other's presence before Yusuke nodded his head in the general direction of the Higurashi shrine and they walked calmly in the silent formation that they had developed through years of team work. Watch everyone's backs.

Youko smirked from his viewing place and absently caressed the souls in the one body they shared. `We make one hell of a team…'

.x.

Souta watched his sister, as he was prone to do and had been doing for the last five years. But now she was resting. It made a world of a difference in her body-language. His sister was at home here, he could tell even as he carried his doubts and insecurities.

The strain of pain was not present around her mouth, and her eyes, what he had imagined to be dull with the melancholy from isolation in the hospital, were relaxed and bright with joy. Her lips were smiling in her sleep, and he could see the gentle curve of her eyes that told him she was truly happy.

Not like the lax expression she had usually worn at the hospital; this was a very refreshing change. Souta smiled as his sister pulled him closer to her from in her sleep. `Scratch that, this is wonderful.' He snuggled deeper into her embrace and sighed as he closed his eyes.

He could stay there until she awoke.

.x.

A concerned mother opened her daughter's door to ask about the whereabouts of her son, she hadn't seen him since dinnertime. The door slid open noiselessly, and she stepped onto the soft carpeting of her daughter's room to turn and glance at her bed.

She paused.

There was her little angel…angels. Kagome was back now, she had to get used to another change in the house. It had been so hard to get used to the empty silence that had surrounded the home when she had been injured, and then they had taken her to the actual Reikai hospital she had felt the emptiness oppress her soul.

Kagome had always been a rather quiet girl, so the silence shouldn't have affected her, but there was something about the quality of the silence. She had been gone for so long, and she had needed to move on. To lose a child was one thing, but to keep hoping, and hoping, and hoping….

She would have broken down.

But now she watched them.

It was so - weird - watching them. They acted like she had never left, but she had left. She had left, and now everything was different.

But they were so comfortable together. Both were facing the wall near her bed, and Souta was curled between it and his sister. Kagome was wrapped loosely around her little brother, holding him as he slept and soothing him as he dreamed.

She sighed as she remembered the night. She hadn't heard her son call out from the usual nightmares that plagued his sleep, and she hadn't had to listen in shame as he wept himself back into his slumber. He wouldn't accept her comfort anymore, saying that his nightmare would be reality until his sister returned.

Ms. Higurashi sighed heavily as she turned her head. Her kids had always had a bond; it had been pretty alarming at first. Like when Souta had been four and a half, he had wandered around to the old shrine grounds, the one were the good miko Kikyou had her ashes buried years ago in the sengoku jidai. That area of the old shrine was decrepit and overgrown with plants and wild trees…

A then Mrs. Higurashi called out to her son, screaming his name over and over and over. He wasn't answering and panic was slowly gripping her heart and seizing her rational thought.

Her husband was trying to sooth her, cooing soft words. They didn't help. His tone was frantic as her actions were, belying his outward calm and exposing his inner turmoil.

A soft call of `mommy' caused her to look at her eldest, the young baby girl that always was quiet, never crying never throwing a tantrum and never wailing. She had her big blue-brown eyes looking up at her parents in shock and fear, and tears were trailing down her cheeks.

`Oh hunny,' she heard her husband say as he embraced their child.

`Mommy, where's Souta?' Kagome asked it shakily. Truly she wondered where her brother could go on the grounds her father knew like the back of his hands.

`He's okay…'

`No he's not!' Kagome screamed and started wailing into the night air. Her fists beat her father's torso as she wailed incoherencies and her brother's name.

Their nerves had already been worn down, and now watching their daughter howl about with her son still missing, Higurashi snapped. She had a rough day and it was already night, when the wolves and wild animals of their lands would come out and hunt. So she snapped and yelled at her daughter.

Her daughter; the peaceful, tractable, usually sweet and gentle Kagome, looked at her. She stopped wailing. She stood alone, apart from her parents who were holding each other now that the eerie calm settled around them, and looked straight up into their faces.

`Just go to your room honey, Souta will be fine he's probably just playing hide and seek with Bouyo again. You know how he is.' Her husband soothed the distraught child.

She continued to look up at her parents, and then she turned her body to leave. It was quiet around the house, no small animals were out or up yet and the usual sounds of the houses sleeping inhabitants was nonexistent.

So the padding of her child's feet echoed into the night, as she did exactly what her mother had told her to do. She was a very tractable child after all.

Shutup, be quiet….GO to your room, obey….

It was in the early hours of the next day that the older Higurashis finally went to bed, and it was late in the morn of that day that they woke up to find their daughter gone.

They searched frantically, even calling upon the neighbors to help. They didn't find them.

When they returned to the house, they saw them. Little Kagome was holding her brother up as she leaned against the sacred tree. With a start Higurashi-san realized that they had locked the door when they began their search never believing that the kids would find their own way.

She had felt an odd detachment, as if this wasn't really happening…

Kagome looked up at the approaching adults, `I told you he wasn't okay.' Her gaze softened as she faced her brother closed eyes and stroked the hair off his forehead. `He was scared.'

Many times after that she had witnessed the strange ability her children had for finding each other and her daughter's peculiar knack for knowing exactly when her brother needed her.

It was uncanny, and Souta had missed his sister greatly when she had left for those years, it had hit them all hard. But they had given up and moved on, he had not. Higurashi-san sighed, maybe they should have believed him, they were the ones that shared the bond and it was most likely that he felt her life as strong as it should be.

She shook her head and left the room, quietly closing the door behind her to walk down the hall and start the breakfast.

.x.

Souta listened to his mother leave and grinned as she did so. He hadn't always been able to fool her into believing he was asleep, and if she had found him awake he would have had to move back to his room or help with a chore.

He turned himself to face his sister and watched her face. Her breathing was even, her muscles were relaxed and she was home.

He watched her for a few minutes with what he knew to be a stupid grin on his face before he sighed happily.

“You could say good morning.” Her soft voice caused him to yelp.

“You're awake!”

Her eyes still closed she laughed her laugh and hugged him. They opened to reveal the sleepy affection that would clear into the intelligent fondness she would reveal everyday, now that she was home. “Of course I am, or I wouldn't be talking to you.”

Souta laughed as he came out of his stupor and hugged her in return.

Life was looking good.