InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Odds n Ends: General Audience ❯ Wish For Me (Kohaku/Kag) ( Chapter 11 )

Disclaimer: The characters of InuYasha are not mine, they are property of Rumiko Takahashi, Shogakukan, Yomiuri TV, Sunrise, and Viz. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

 

Genre: Romance

Characters: Kohaku/Kagome

Type: Oneshot

Rated: PG13 for darker stuff

 

=#= Wish for Me =#=

 

He sat, watching the amber glints of firelight dance off of Kagome's ebony hair. Between his fingers the strands were like water and silk; a sinuous slither of sensual delight against his skin. With the back of his index finger, he traced a delicate trail down the hairline of her forehead, across her temple, down to the shapely line of her jaw.

It was selfish of him to treasure her like this, without her knowing or consent, but he could not seem to help himself. She'd fallen asleep on his shoulder and he'd moved her head to his lap so she could rest better. Even after all this time, her easy trust in him still had the ability to catch him off guard.

He was no longer Naraku's puppet; his life was no longer tied to the last Shikon shard. The others, including his sister, trusted him implicitly now…but Kagome had been the only one to trust him then, to believe in him then.

She'd been the one who taught him to believe in himself.

Kagome's faith in her friends, her belief that all would work out in the end, was something he'd seen as blind naivety. Had he not believed the same before he slaughtered his family and turned on his sister? Had he not still expected some divine absolution to save him even as he committed sin after sin for the evil hanyou? With the naïve serenity of youth, he'd never expected anything bad to ever befall him. His good life, his good family had been something he'd taken for granted.

Perhaps such a privileged, sheltered life had made him soft. Maybe, had his life been a harsh struggle from the start, he would have had the inner strength to resist the temptation of Naraku's forgetfulness. Privately, in an opinion he kept solely to himself, Kohaku suspected that it simply was a matter of who he was and what he was not. Surrounded by the goodness of his family, he'd flourished and loved his life. Confronted with the anguish and despair of his family's deaths, he run into Naraku's waiting arms because he hoped in his most inner heart that the evil hanyou would do what he could not: end his life. His will to survive was too strong to let him take his own life, but his grief was too much to live with, so he let Naraku take control of everything.

Including the fate of his sister.

He owed much to Inuyasha, to Miroku and Kagome and Kirara for giving Sango something to live for. At that time, he'd not only failed his dead but his living family as well. He'd let the events of his life shape him, mold him without fighting back—so that the goodness of his family soaked into his skin like sunshine and Naraku's evil slithered into his soul like icy, choking darkness. He'd seen no way to break free; had felt trapped by both his past and present. He'd never hoped for any kind of future.

Until Kagome changed him.

Unlike him, she'd never lost sight of her dreams for the future. Regardless of her circumstances, her goodness shone from within. Her belief that everything would be alright was backed by a willingness to fight for what she believed in. Her strength came from an unshakable faith in herself and those around her. Her friends.

And without any hint of doubt or hesitation, she'd included him in her circle, drawn him like a moth is drawn to flame. Her simplistic acceptance had both awed him beyond belief and terrified him down to the core of his tainted soul.

What if he let her down?

For the first time since his abduction by Naraku, he'd cared for someone other than himself. His love for Sango was tied to the dark sin of killing his family—and thus was walled away behind an inner chasm so deep and cold he dared not cross it.

Inevitably, his affection for Kagome bloomed into something more akin to worship. The fact that she loved another—another who had yet to treat her like he should—begin to bite deeper and deeper into his heart as he witnessed their daily interactions. Knowing the depths of Kagome's loyalty and forgiveness, he almost despaired of even beginning to impress his feelings for her on Kagome.

But, for the first time in his life, he found something he was willing to fight for.

Long years followed. Many times his determination wavered as Naraku proved harder to eliminate than any of them ever thought. Amid the blood and brutality, the bright sound of Kagome's laughter pulled him forward and bolstered his spirits. From afar, he watched as Inuyasha and Kagome grew closer and closer…and yet never took that final step.

He continued to hope.

Gradually, with a kind of grim patience he never knew he possessed, he came to accept that Inuyasha would always hold a part of her heart. He came to understand that more than just their feelings held those two together. Destiny and the force of the Shikon no Tama bound them to each other. Until the jewel's fate was resolved, neither Kagome's nor Inuyasha's lives would move forward beyond its twisted, invisible embrace.

He thought to never see any result to his furtive love—but it proved that fate was liquid and changeable; as affected by the whimsical nature of choice as a summer squall is by the direction of the wind.

Naraku's ultimate solution to grasping the completed Shikon no Tama was to deliver it—and him—into Kagome's hands. Poised in the shadows, holding them both in the palm of his cruel, knowing hand, Naraku forced Kagome to complete the jewel.

Hopelessly in love with her, resigned to his fate as an undead puppet whose life depended on the shard in his back, he surrendered himself to her in hope that with the last shard she would be able to escape alive.

Instead she made a wish.

For him.

She gave him back his life—and took his heart for good. Anything left within him that opposed or resented the love he had for her vanished that day. He ceased to question his right to love her, whether he was worthy of her and simply loved her.

All the things he'd never dared to do before, he dared to do after. A new, quiet sort of confidence in his own feelings permeated through his being as he did all the small, considerate, overlooked things that he'd wanted to do for her for so long. He didn't do them to win her love, he did them for her.

He never said how he felt out loud, but he knew she knew by the way her perceptive dark eyes watched him sometimes. The others, including Inuyasha, knew what he'd thought he'd kept hidden and so were unsurprised when he began to treat Kagome differently. One after another, they came to him with words of encouragement, of concern, of caution and warning. A few surprised him—Sango expressed the fiercest reservations and Miroku gave him the gentlest encouragements.

Inuyasha found him alone and they sat in tense silence for the longest time before the hanyou spoke.

“In all my long life, Kohaku, I never expected to love anyone. In many ways, Kikyou will always be first in my heart because she was the first I loved. Kagome…is everything I could have wished Kikyou to be and yet…it is Kikyou I love that way and not Kagome. Kagome is and will always be my best friend, a part of me I never knew I was missing, but I don't desire her body as I desired Kikyou's.

“Be good to her, Kohaku. She trusts you; more than she ever trusted me. I hurt her too many times for her to be completely open with me and I regret that. I wish, in hindsight, I had figured out my true feelings earlier and told her so.”

With that said, Inuyasha stood and left.

And suddenly, Kohaku's hope bloomed anew. Looking back, it seemed that the moment he realized he loved her was so long ago. Sometimes he still questioned the unusual tenacity he showed in clinging to his feelings for her. Yet, one by one, he watched the obstacles fall between him and her until he couldn't help but think that it was meant to be.

Because of her wish.

He knew not to press her, to crowd her with demands. Like a silent, suffering shadow, he walked the dark road through heartbreak with her. Like a soft and gentle sunrise, he let her bask in the security of his love as her heart healed.

It was enough for him to be able to see her smile again.

His own unselfishness surprised him; he whose own self preoccupation had led him to embrace Naraku's twisted offer. Yet now…he needed her. He needed her to smile, to laugh and to be happy. He wanted to share those things with her, ached inside until the longing kept him up at night, so that he prowled restlessly through the night.

Perhaps he was selfish after all.

He wished she would look to him for support, for companionship. He wished she would look to him for more than those things that were a part of friendship.

He wished for her.

A strange sense of inevitability settled over him, a pressing awareness that once again something had shifted in his life to bring about change. When he looked down at Kagome in his lap, he was unsurprised to see her eyes open and staring up into his. Dark and mysterious, with the flickering light of the fire catching in them like sparks, her eyes seemed to take in everything he'd been thinking up until that moment.

Her slow, intimate smile had a warmth all its own that filled him with heat.

The weight of her fingers cupping the nape of his neck was like a heady illusion, something he'd experienced once in a dream. Obedient to the silent command of her touch, he let her pull his head down so that his breath mingled with hers. Without thought, without doubt, without protest, he let her butterfly her lips over his and trembled in response. Against her mouth, his lips shaped her name like a prayer, a benediction for this waking surrealism to never end.

“Kohaku,” she whispered; and the murmur of her voice wrapped about his senses like spider silk.

Entrapped, enchanted by the spell of her kiss, he could do nothing but seek another taste of what had always been forbidden to him before. His lips closed over hers so that the firmness of his embraced the softness of hers. With a tentative suckle and a clever twist of his tongue, he opened her mouth to his exploration. Like a man dying of thirst he drank deep and greedily of her kiss, teasing her tongue into a sinuous, gliding dance that enflamed his lust and made his body go hard.

“Kagome,” he gasped against her mouth as he broke the kiss for air, “I love you, Kagome.”

“I know,” she returned gently, her fingers tracing the contour of his face and cheek as her dark eyes glowed softly with affection and approval.

“You do?” he asked, his cheeks starting to pinken as reality began to catch up with him.

“I love you too, Kohaku,” she responded, her slightly swollen and reddened lips curving into a pleased smile.

“You do?!” he exclaimed, the light flush of his face deepening to a cherry red as he realized exactly what was happening and with whom. “But that's impossible!”

Kagome's smile turned rueful. “Nothing's impossible if you wish for it hard enough, Kohaku.”

Her dark eyes were thoughtful as she studied his face. “Didn't you ever think I'd love you?” she asked after a moment.

“No,” he replied honestly, catching hold of her fingers as they dropped from his chin. Too embarrassed to meet her gaze directly, he satisfied himself with watching their hands as he threaded his weapon roughened fingers through her long, slender ones.

“I've been hoping that you'd say something Kohaku, but I understand now why you didn't. Actually, I fell asleep waiting for you to make the first move,” she admitted quietly, her gaze falling to rest on where their fingers were joined.

Looking up, even in the faltering light of the fire, he noticed the hint of a blush darkening her cheeks too. Somehow, that eased his own awkwardness, enough so that a mixture of amusement and affection mellowed out his mood. Giving her what he hoped was an encouraging smile, he dared to reach out and lift her chin so that she met his eyes.

“Would you like me to `make a move on you'?” he took a risk to inquire.

With a kind of heady satisfaction, he watched as her blush deepened. But, despite her obvious embarrassment, her gaze remained almost startlingly straightforward.

“Please?” she half pleaded, half demanded, her dark eyes hopeful and hungry all at once.

Speechless with the sudden thickness of his throat, he managed to lean over and press his lips to hers in a continuation of their kiss. Immediately she threaded her fingers into his hair, dislodging the tie as she sat up and became the aggressor. With confident ravishment, she took hold of his head and angled the kiss in her favor so that she could tangle her tongue with his. Helpless to do anything but let her have her way, he did his best to respond to each of her impatient advances.

At last they broke apart, her chest heaving as much as his as they both panted with their exertion and the heat of their passion.

“Kohaku…” she started, the hesitation in her voice in direct contrast with the decisive aggression of her actions.

“Yes?” he replied, his voice a bit breathless.

“I wish…” she started, her face going hot with color.

“Yes?” he prompted her, reading her unspoken request from her expression like an open book.

“I mean,” she stalled, her manor one of shyness, “It's just you and me so…”

Catching his look of pointed interest, she found the courage to continue.

“Can we…are you…do you want to…um…” she tried to vocalize her thoughts.

“What do you wish for?” Kohaku inquired softly, with poised anticipation.

“You,” she replied simply, her face a complex puzzle of want, hope, self consciousness, fascination and impatience.

“Do you know what I wish for?” he asked her, spinning out the moment of realizing his dreams a little longer.

“Me?” she guessed with a tentative, impish smile.

“Yep,” he confirmed with growing satisfaction. “Do you know what else I've wished for?”

She shook her head, waiting for him to enlighten her with impatient curiosity. Without further delay he showed her, and her response was everything he'd hoped it would be.

 

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