Work Text:
“You must be mistaken.”
“Children can have such overactive imaginations.”
“Have you taken her to see someone about this?”
Kagome had heard them all. Each challenge to her mental state, each dismissal of her claims. Each… each denial of her dreams. But Kagome knew what she saw.
The man in her dreams, the one that smiled and beckoned her toward him, to find him. Her soulmate.
But she’d never encountered anyone with silver hair or dog ears. Who had fangs that pressed against his full lips, whose eyes glittered like molten amber. Beautiful.
And Kagome didn’t want to see anyone else in her dreams. She didn’t want to go to the seer meant to ‘correct’ the vision of her soulmate, because to her, he was everything she could ever want. She liked the way lights danced over his hair and skin, reflecting a soft warmth that she knew was from his soul. She loved the way his ears would twitch and vibrate the moment they found each other in their dreams. Their voices never worked in the ether, but still, from their gazes alone, she knew that he felt about her the way she felt about him.
Perfect. Desiring no one else.
“What are you drawing?” The annoyingly chipper voice of her annoyingly chipper classmate interrupted Kagome’s meditation.
Artwork that inspired this by the birthday girl thornedraven!
“Oh, nothing, Hōjō…” Kagome lied, realizing that right there on the page, her soulmate stared serenely back up at her. But she was so tired of talking to people about him that it was just easier this way. “My Dungeons and Dragons character.”
Kagome had realized that calling him a ‘character’ stopped the questions, and often dissuaded the questioner from continuing to press. It was the perfect disguise: wrapping oneself in nerdiness to keep people away.
“Oh… he’s pretty neat! Do you—do you have a group you play with?” Hōjō was… the first that Kagome’s D&D excuse hadn’t been able to scare away. “I—I’d be happy to join you…”
“Uh, thanks for the invitation, Hōjō, but… we’re not looking for any more members at the moment.” Kagome couldn’t believe she’d just needed to further the lie, but Hōjō had always been persistent, and… a bit daft.
“Oh, next time then!” Hōjō waved and wandered on his way, unphased by the rejection.
Not likely, Kagome thought. Hōjō had been giving her weird little gifts and trying to flirt with her for the entirety of that year. He was trying to court her; Kagome knew that, and she wondered why. Surely he didn’t think that she was his soulmate, because Hōjō most certainly wasn’t hers.
“Meeting soulmates is rare. Very few soulmated people ever actually find them. And not everyone is soulmated!”
Kagome wondered if that was only the reassurance because she’d loudly proclaimed her soulmate had silver hair and dog ears. As a way to tell her ‘hey, it’s just a dream!’
But it wasn’t. Her hands understood how desperate she was to know him, with his air of relaxation and kind smile. And no one could convince her that he wasn’t really her soulmate, or that she shouldn’t wait for him. Because Kagome would rather be alone in her waking and with him in her dreams than offer herself to another.
She looked back down at her notebook, followed the lines of his mane to his shoulders, then trailed back up to his eyes. To the smile that her hands remembered from her dreams.
Don’t cry Kagome, she whispered to herself. You know who your soulmate is. He wants to find you as desperately as you want to find him.
She had to believe. Because not believing was so much worse.
And she’d already given in to pretending for the sake of others.
When the bell finally rang and Kagome was free, she packed up her books, taking care to fold her special doodle into the pages of her math book (her least favorite subject) and she headed home.
“Higurashi, wait up?” The annoyingly upbeat voice had Kagome frowning before he even caught up with her.
“Hi, Hōjō.” Kagome kept her voice light and forced the smile back onto her face. God, was he going to walk her all the way home?
“There’s this new ice cream shop that opened that I am interested in trying.” Hōjō looked hopefully at Kagome. “They have all sorts of flavors—healthy too!”
“Um, I wanted to get started on my homework.” Kagome tried to look truly apologetic for this. It seemed like there was no limit to how many times she could say no to Hōjō; he just didn’t get it. But maybe… “Oh! I know Yuka was talking about going to try it.” If she could distract him… “She always talks about how desperately she wishes to be asked. And how—shy she is about the boy she likes.”
Hōjō’s eyes were growing wide. Was he buying it? Sure, Yuka did want to go to that ice cream shop, but Kagome’s friends seemed so excited about Hōjō liking her, about helping her “get over” the fact that she never dreamed of her soulmate, that Kagome was pretty sure that Yuka had never entertained the possibility of Hōjō for herself. But, Kagome was good at pretending now; why not pretend just a little more?
“The… the boy she likes?” Hōjō’s face took on some confusion, and perhaps even… dare she hope, interest?
“Yeah!” Kagome leaned into the lie. “She won’t tell me who it is, but… I just always thought, what with the way she looks at you that you… didn’t know!” (Yuka did on occasion stare at Hōjō. He was pretty popular, and not bad looking, just… well he would never be for Kagome. Because he was not Kagome’s soulmate.) “Yuka’s not like me, you know. I—I’m… I think I can only imagine ever being with my soulmate.” At least that part of Kagome’s lie was true. “Yuka, well, she hasn’t so much as mentioned soulmates to me.”
“Ah, a soul-sexual huh?” Hōjō looked piteously at Kagome (she was used to it). “I… I hadn’t really thought about soulmates either! They’re so rare, so why not meet someone else special, you know?”
Time for Kagome to close the deal.
“Yeah, poor Yuka. I’ve told her that I’m—uh—soul-sexual before.” She looked sadly into Hōjō’s eyes. “But, I think she doesn’t believe me. It makes her afraid of her feelings.” Kagome grabbed Hōjō’s hand dramatically. “But, Hōjō! We all deserve to be happy, right? So… well, not to be Cupid or anything…” (She was absolutely being Cupid), “but if you were to ask her, I think she’d be so excited.” Only one more lie to go. Kagome pulled Hōjō’s hand tighter to her, then looked earnestly into his eyes. “Sorry… sorry I can’t be your ice cream shop girl—I… I guess I’ll just be cursed to wait.”
Hōjō pulled Kagome in for a… hug. This was not how she thought this would go.
“Oh, Kagome, thank you.” Hōjō’s voice carried more emotion than she’d ever heard in all the times he’d hijacked her attention. “I really do hope you find your soulmate. And—uh—thanks for the heads up about Yuka.”
With that, Hōjō bounced away from her and Kagome got to be alone again. She adjusted her backpack and continued her walk to her house, feeling somehow lighter than before. In part because Hōjō finally listened. And in part because he didn’t question her love for her soulmate.
What she did not know was that there were two violet-gray eyes watching her, intently following the conversation she had been having.
“I found you,” he whispered, before turning around and disappearing back into the shadow that was one shade too dark.
Kagome smiled as she walked into her house. She wondered if she’d done a good deed today. Getting Hōjō off her back was quite the relief, and honestly? Yuka did look at him (Kagome thought). A lot (Kagome hoped). And maybe it was just Kagome, but Yuka’s looks sure looked like pining (Kagome prayed). Two birds with one stone, right?
“Hi Mama, I’m home!” Kagome always tried to sound chipper when she came home, but today she was actually feeling it.
“Did you have a good day, sweetie?” Mama asked, poking her head out of the kitchen.
“Not bad,” Kagome said truthfully. “Just lots and lots of work I need to do.”
“The amount of homework they make kids do these days is scandalous!” Mama lamented, but took Kagome at her word. “Maybe this weekend we could go to the spa, just us girls.”
“S—sure,” Kagome answered. Her mom really was trying. But Kagome still had not forgiven her for suggesting that she was not dreaming of her soulmate (because he had silver hair and dog ears).
“Great!” Mama emerged completely from the kitchen. “We haven’t done anything like that in a really long time.”
Kagome smiled serenely, and nodded. She couldn’t be mad at Mama forever. And there would come a day when Kagome could set off to find her soulmate. Dog ears and all. And each night, when she closed her eyes, she would get to see him, dog ears and all.
The evening was uneventful after that. Kagome had learned how to smile and chitchat, about school, about friends, even about Hōjō. Just enough to avoid the questions about dreams or soulmates.
Had she heard back yet from the universities that she applied to? (Not yet.)
Was she still struggling with math? (She was.)
Did she have any plans with her friends the following week? (Perhaps that ice cream shop?)
Just enough to keep engaged, just enough to keep the topic from turning back to her soulmate, who she’d so stupidly refused to lie about when they’d pressed. Now, she let them believe she didn’t think about him anymore. Even as she was certain they knew, the armistice never did fall away.
“Time for homework!” Kagome declared as she brought her empty plate into the kitchen. “See ya!”
Kagome bounded up the stairs and threw her math book on her desk. The assignment for the next day was tricky, because it was trigonometry. And Kagome hated trigonometry. She opened the book with a grin (the first time ever that that had happened). Because there he was, her soulmate, on that piece of paper staring back at her, with that gentle smile that she always saw in her dreams.
Before she knew it, she’d solved all the math problems for tomorrow, and was ready to start her reading.
“Hey, how do you feel about the magical realism theme that runs through Beloved?” Kagome asked her paper soulmate. “Ironic that I am studying the interweaving of reality and fantasy in a novel when, well, I’ve convinced myself that my soulmate has silver hair and dog ears.”
Kagome picked up Beloved and flipped it open to where she left her bookmark. As she read, she took notes, all the while stealing glances at the dog-eared man that her hands drew of their own accord.
Finally, when her eyelids were heavy and the words all blended together, Kagome realized it was time to go to bed, and (hopefully) to dream. She brushed her teeth and changed into her pajamas. She was about to turn off her lamp when she froze, and ambled back over to her desk.
“You should stay out of sight for a while,” Kagome whispered to her doodle, and slid it back into her math book.
That night, as Kagome drifted off to sleep, there he was. His golden eyes lit up his gold-dusted skin, and his silver mane glowed like moonlight. And for the first time since she’d started dreaming about him, his smile was not serene, it was jubilant.
When Kagome woke in the morning, something in the air felt different, brighter. As if something big was going to happen that day.
Kagome always did like Fridays, so maybe that was it. She sang in the shower that morning (she rarely did that), and made the effort to wear her hair down, and even dressed up, choosing a green pleated skirt and a white cropped sweater. She finished the look with some dark tights and suede boots.
And as she waved goodbye to Mama and set off for school, something compelled Kagome to take a different route, one where she could walk through a park. One where Hōjō might not be waiting for her (although she was fairly convinced that her playing Cupid had finally succeeded where her saying no had failed…). It was one of those walks that she saved for special occasions. The pond was open, though there were no water lilies just yet, and the path was also lined with jonquils and daffodils, which had started their bloom. It was beautiful.
She zoned out as she walked past the rose garden and toward the bridge that passed over the pond, her feet moving with the same independent fervor that her hands had yesterday, as if they knew where they were headed before she knew she was supposed to be walking. When her mind finally caught up, she looked to see her destination, a forest green wooden bench sitting next to a weeping willow on the far side of the pond: secluded and serene.
Kagome knew this place, because once in a while, on cool spring mornings, she liked to sit on the bench with her travel mug of coffee and just take in the sounds and smells of the morning. It was in an unpopulated part of the park, and always afforded her the quiet peace she needed to take on her day. It was where she often psyched herself up during those first tortuous weeks of school, after she’d revealed that her soulmate had silver hair and dog ears, to face her classmates and their mockery. At the cusp of spring, the gentle whisking of the willow’s newly sprouted leaves was her chosen song of nature, soothing her as she prepared for the day.
On this particular morning though, even as her feet had driven her to that space, she would not be alone. Sitting on the bench on that particular Friday morning was a man.
He had long black hair, which streamed down to his back, and a wide smile splashed across his full lips. His eyes were violet-gray, and sparkling in the morning sun. And… Kagome knew him.
“It’s you!” She took off at a run, needing to get to him as quickly as she could. But before she closed the final distance, she stopped. “Is… is it?”
Everything about him screamed soulmate, but that didn’t make sense. Her soulmate had amber eyes and silver hair and dog ears. This man, with the identical face, was missing all of those things. The very things that had brought Kagome so much grief!
“It’s me.” He didn’t move, looking as apprehensive as Kagome was. “I dream of you every night, and every morning I search for you. Because… well, because the way you look at me as if I’m the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen—it’s…”
“B—but, you’re… you’re not…” Kagome stuttered, still looking at the man who was her soulmate but not quite.
“Not myself?” he offered, then pawed at the necklace around his neck. A necklace that…
Kagome grabbed her math book and pulled out the picture she’d drawn, and there it was, around his neck, the beaded necklace with intermittent fangs. Which, on the human man in front of her, gleamed purple and white.
“There’s a whole lotta world you don’t know about,” he said. “A world that… well, a world that soulmated you to a half-demon.” Pink appeared across the bridge of his nose, as if he was worried that somehow that revelation would change Kagome’s mind. “To… me.”
She needed to see. Needed confirmation that this was not just some uncanny coincidence of the universe, to prove to her that she was as crazy as people had all said she was. Because, even as the man who sat before her eyes was her soulmate and human, the soulmate in her dreams and by the man’s words was not human.
“Please,” Kagome said, taking a single step closer. “Show me.” One more step, so she was nearly within an arm’s reach of him. “I need to see.”
“You—you’re not scared?” the man asked, concern flashing across his face. “Of… of what I am?”
“No,” Kagome answered, “I could never be afraid of my soulmate.”
The man nodded, then with a quiet crack, something arced from his fingers into the necklace, and it was as if a veil was lifted.
His black hair glowed silver, his skin took on the slightest pearlescent golden hue, his eyes sparked from violet-gray to amber and his ears—the ears Kagome had come to love so much in her dreams—appeared on the top of his head. And when he bit his lip, obviously worried about the magic show he’d just put on, she saw that mischievous little fang poking out.
Her soulmate had found her, and he had silver hair and dog ears!
Kagome launched herself into his arms, trying to hold back the tears that threatened to come, but entirely failing.
“No one believed me. That you were real. That you were my soulmate…” Kagome whimpered. “But… I knew you were real. I—I knew.”
“And… you’re really not afraid? That I’m part demon?” the man rasped, his nose buried in Kagome’s hair.
She didn’t know what she could possibly say. He was here. Every person who told her that she was imagining things, every downcast look of pity, every person who scoffed at the idea that she could have a dog-eared soulmate had been wrong. No, her soulmate was here, and not only that, he was about to open her world to all the things she always wondered about. All the dreams they told her to forget were keyholes she peeped through to the hidden world, and her soulmate was there to open the door.
“Not even the tiniest bit,” Kagome said, trying to steady her rapid breathing, trying to stop the tears from streaming down her cheeks. “You’re real. And you found me.”
“I’d never stop looking,” the man said, then he turned his golden gaze back to Kagome. “So… will—will you be with me?”
“Yes.” Kagome had almost gotten her tears under control, but… the earnestness in his request cut her so deeply that they returned with a vengeance. “Yes, of course I will. Uh—” The next realization sent her crashing back down to earth, and helped her swallow her tears back away. “Wh—what’s your name?”
“It’s Inuyasha,” her soulmate—Inuyasha—declared, still holding her in his arms.
“I’m Kagome,” Kagome giggled, and ran her free hand over Inuyasha’s cheek.
“Kagome…” Inuyasha said, his smile as jubilant as the one she’d seen in her dream. “What a beautiful name.”
“So is Inuyasha,” Kagome sighed; she liked the way ‘Inuyasha’ sounded when she said it too.
“I—I’m sorry it took so long to find you, Kagome,” Inuyasha whispered into her ear.
“I would have waited for you,” Kagome replied, letting her hand wander to the top of Inuyasha’s head to stroke his ear; the fur was downy-soft. “I would have waited for you forever.”
“You don’t have to anymore,” Inuyasha said, leaning his head into the touch of her hand. “We have our whole lives, starting now.”
Inuyasha sparked his disguise once more, returning to the human form Kagome now knew hid his beautiful eyes and ears and hair. And Kagome sat down with him on the bench, enjoying the spring morning. He threw his arm back around her, the jubilant smile he’d worn in his dream the night before.
“So, do you want to hear about demons and half-demons? Can—can I tell you about my family, Kagome?” Inuyasha asked, his eyes alight with the golden fire beneath the disguise’s veil.
“Yes, Inuyasha.” Kagome loved saying his name. “I want to hear.. everything.”
As Inuyasha began to speak of the time when demons went into hiding and how yoki could turn on and off their charms, Kagome couldn’t help but muse that although Inuyasha’s human form was handsome, she preferred the soulmate underneath: the soulmate who’d been so masterfully captured in yesterday’s doodle.
Amazing collaboration birthday artwork by mickisketch!