T H A N K F U L

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Disclaimer: As much as I would love to own Inuyasha, I don't, so I'll just have to be happy with having Sesshoumaru as a love slave. . .eyes glaze over with happiness and delusiveness

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Rating: Hmm. . .I always rate my stories PG-13 and this one won't be any different. So yeah.

Summary: She hadn't seen him in years . . . why was he back? It took her forever to get over him . . . and she had a bad feeling that she still might be hopelessly addicted. Sess/Kag

Genre: Romance. Lots of stupidity from me. whistles

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. . . means emphasis

" . . . " means dialogue

' . . . ' means thoughts

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A/N: Bonjour readers! This is my Thanksgiving gift to you guys, hope you enjoy. Pretty much what this is is a frivolous romance on my part, me being in a state of. . .well, lacking the stuff. So yeah. Read on, review, and enjoy yourselves

BTW: characters a little OOC, but shrugs that's the way the cookie crumbles. Yumm. . .cookies.

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Part One : Coming Home

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Ring. Ring.

Rain pattered onto the windows, sliding down in clear sheets, blurring the objects cast in dark shadows outside.

Ring. Ring.

Kagome tottered into the living room, lazily stretching her arms above her head and heading towards the ringing pink phone sitting on the coffee table.

Picking it up, she answered cheerfully, "Moshi moshi."

A deep, masculine voice spoke back to her. "Kagome! It's me, Mr. Daidouji, may I speak with your mother?"

Kagome answered an "OK" before setting down the phone and called out for her mother to come and talk to Mr. Daidouji, their next door neighbor and old family friend. The said Ms. Higurashi walked breezily into the room, taking the phone off with table with an appreciative smile towards her daughter.

"Hello, Higurashi Akemi speaking, who is this?"

Her mother smiled at the reply from the caller, enthusiastically exchanging pleasantries into the phone. Kagome merely plopped down into the couch and pulled out a Vogue magazine, flipping through the slightly perfume scented pages.

"Of course we would love to! It's been forever since we've seen him!" continued Ms. Higurashi who sat balancing precariously on the armrest of the sofa.

"My, how Sesshoumaru must have grown by now!"

Kagome continued to stare at a picture of a pretty Vera Wang dress, the infamous spoken name slowly registering into her feeble, Jell-O like mind.

Sesshoumaru. Sesshoumaru

Oh. Holy. Sweet. Mother. Of. God.

Kagome threw the magazine across the room and quickly scrambled into a sitting position, staring with wide eyes at her mother, searching for signs that she had heard wrong and that the world was not, indeed, cruel.

"Yes, of course we would be delighted to have Sesshoumaru join us for Thanksgiving! It'll be no trouble at all!" exclaimed a perky Ms. Higurashi, her eyes glazing over into her Martha Stewart mode, china patterns and seating arrangements floating by in her mind's eye.

Kagome frantically made slashing motions with her hand at her throat, mouthing "NO NO NO!" and finally clasping her hands together in a prayer like stance, looking beseechingly at her mother.

"Oh, Kagome will be so delighted to see him! She's practically dancing right now! I've never seen her so enthusiastic!"

The ground crumbled, the sky fell, an apocalypse raged outside, and all that was left in the world was Kagome and her utterly horrified and shocked expression.

"Alright, see you tonight! Bye Katsu!"

Click.

Click-- the sound of a hung up phone, or the sound of a cocked gun held at Kagome's temple. Either way, her life was over.

With both hands securely gripped on her feather down pillow, and her head tucked nicely in its soft exterior, Kagome screamed out all of her rage.

"MMMMMFFFFFHHHHH!! AAAAUUGHMMMMMFFFFF!!"

Knock. Knock. Knock.

"MMMFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!"

Knock, Knock, Knockity-knock-knock.

"Kagome, what's the matter? It sounds like you're having a hernia!" shouted grandpa Higurashi from outside Kagome's room, his irksome knocking never ceasing but increasing with each spoken word.

With one last muffled shout of bloody murder, Kagome extracted her flushed face and yelled a confirm of good health to her grandfather, whom they should never have given an Encyclopedia of Medical Abrasions, Diseases, and Injuries to for Christmas of last year.

"Alright Kagome, make sure you tell me if you get any shooting pains in your arms or anything! That might lead to a serious heart attack, something that is increasingly becoming more known towards teens with too much stress and cholesterol!"

Kagome groaned and yelled a "Right-o gramps" to her grandfather before hearing the pitter patter of his feet walking back down the hallway and away from her room.

Rolling onto her side and off the bed, she walked to her bookshelf and extracted an old photo album emblazoned with the words "Precious Memories."

Clutching the album, she sat back down on the bed and flipped through, finally stopping on a picture of a two girls with two silver haired boys, both glaring disapprovingly at the other over Kagome's head.

"Sesshoumaru. . ." she whispered faintly to herself, looking at the said boy when he was only eleven, his arms protectively clasped around Kagome's six year old shoulders whilst Inuyasha was practically shielding Kikyou, Kagome's older cousin, from the view of the camera.

Kagome sighed, turning the page to rest instead on a picture of a much older, colder, handsome version of the same boy who used to clutch and paw at her like a precious stone, but later treated her indifferently upon being introduced into the world of older girls who knew what hanky panky meant, and did not believe that it was in fact a Kleenex.

'I was so naïve to think that he would have wanted to be with me. . .all those years of pining after him. . .only to have him ignore me and then travel abroad for college and leave me here heartbroken. . .'

"That-that PLAYER!" Kagome shouted aloud unexpectedly, frustrated and taking out her anger on an unsuspecting teddy bear.

The tiny fellow didn't have a chance, and it is said that if you strained your ears, you could hear its pitiful squeaks in the nighttime air. . .

'I'm going to have to stitch him back up later,' Kagome thought dryly to herself, closing the photo album with a decisive thump and discarding it onto the floor.

Ding. Dong.

'Who can that be at this hour?' she thought to herself, glancing at the clock and seeing it to be seven pm.

"Kagome, dear, be a sweetheart and get that for me, my hands are busy," called Ms. Higurashi from the kitchen.

Alright. Was she imagining it, or was there a feeling of ominous doom sneaking its way into her room?

Shuffle, shuffle, went the sound of her teddy bear slippers on the rug as Kagome walked towards the door, wearing nothing but a shapeless white sweater and green striped lounge pants.

Ok. . .that feeling of ominous doom? Not going away. Increasing in doom, if possible.

Her hands undid the lock and the door swung open, revealing the face of a smiling Mr. Daidouji.

RED ALERT. RED ALERT.

"Evening Mr. Daidouji, may I take your coat?" she asked pleasantly, trying to ignore the feeling that there was a wolf at the door.

"Thank you Kagome," he said, handing over his pricy wool coat and scarf, allowing Kagome to drape them on the coat hanger nearby.

Wolf. At. The. Door. Run little red riding hood, run.

"C'mon move dad, it's cold out here," complained a familiar voice, Inuyasha's.

Mr. Daidouji moved aside, only to have Inuyasha rush in and shove his red coat at Kagome, asking excitedly, "Is Kikyou here?!"

Kagome's slightly nagging feeling did not go away but instead seemed to intensify, though she hid it with a scowl as she hung up Inuyasha's coat. "Nice to see you too Inuyasha. And no, Kikyou won't be here until tomorrow. You'll just have to save the sweet nothings to whisper in her ears for later."

'Must. Not. Be. Rude. Must. Not. Be. Rude. You are a calm lake Kagster. . .a calm freaking lake.'

"Mind taking your repartee somewhere else? It is rather chilly out here and you're blocking the doorway," said smooth, silky, oh-so-come-hither voice from behind Inuyasha's lithe form.

Run little red riding hood. . .run.

Time was all relative as the next few seconds went by as if in slow motion, seeming to last an eternity as Inuyasha moved into the warm interiors of her home, leaving her standing in the doorway facing two molten gold eyes which practically radiated with amusement at her discomfort.

'Sesshoumaru. . .you're actually back, you're actually here. . .and you're still heartbreakingly handsome, you bastard.'

Not voicing her thoughts aloud, she looked at him and faced the music, as you might say, all the while plastering a fake smile onto her face and saying in a voice that was slightly too low, "Nice seeing you again Sesshoumaru. Please come in."

'It's been four years, count them, four years, and suddenly you're back? YOU TWIT! Do you realize how long it took me to get over you?!' raged the voice inside her head, screaming and urging her to slap him and shout, "Look at what you've could have had!"

". . .you could have had. . ." she said quietly, looking at him with sad eyes full of unspoken thoughts and emotions.

His brow furrowed slightly, and he pushed his body backwards to close the door.

"Pardon?" he asked, looking at her with intense eyes.

Kagome's eyes widened a bit, and she shook her head, muttering a quick "I have to go" before she scurried away to her room, ignoring her mother's raised eyebrow and Mr. Daidouji's questioning glance.

Sesshoumaru quietly put up his coat, noting with amusement that his first look at Kagome in four years was of her in Teddy slippers and green pajama bottoms.

How quaint.

A/N: That's part one darlings, review aplenty if you want me to continue! I would have finished up the whole story in one go, but it's turning out a bit longer than I expected it to be, so please just stop pulling out your hair in frustration--I'll to try to update quickly! Knowing me however, it'll take awhile. ;;

PS: Since, to my knowledge, people in Japan do not celebrate Thanksgiving, this story will be taking place in the U.S. Where in the U.S. you ask? Well, anywhere you want. I'll be making everything up so. . .yeah.

PPS: I'm listening to Faye Wong's Eyes on Me. . .love that song. Wooo! Need candy now. 'Ta lovelies!