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Artwork commission by thunderpot
“This is the last time!”
Kagome keeps staring.
She’s knows it’s rude, but… well…
“Doesn’t ‘this is the last time’ usually mean there needed to be…” She gulps. “A first time?”
The silver-haired man—demon?—with the pointed dog ears and the glowing golden eyes is wearing one of those faces that presumes he just ate something foul. But nope, it's pretty clear that this is all about her. And… something.
“This happens to be the four-hundredth sixty-ninth time!” He probably thinks he looks scary when he snarls, but the scrunchy nose and the way his ears are pinning back makes him look—cute. Kagome really wants to touch those ears… “And it’s the last! I quit! I quit! I don’t care what Dad says about ‘the good of the world’ and ‘being a guardian is an honor’, I want to get some fucking sleep sometime this century!”
Kagome wonders why he is talking about sleeping and guardians when she’s never seen this guy before.
Okay, fine. Today was weird. Who the hell could have predicted that a piano would fall at the same moment she was walking underneath it? That is cartoon shit, not real-life shit, not even ‘only-in-New-York’ shit. And if this guy, this guardian, had not grabbed her hand and pulled her backward into him, then she would be dead right now.
Kagome is almost sad, almost, because the headlines about being crushed by a piano would have been kinda funny.
“I’m skeptical that you could have possibly pulled me out from under four hundred pianos,” Kagome mocks, but that just makes the demon (crap, he’s really really handsome) start to grumble.
“Ohhh… ohhh… you think I am being melodramatic, Kagome?” Two new pieces of information: 1) her demon is indeed being melodramatic, and 2) apparently knows her name. He rifles around in his pocket and pulls out a small, black, leather-bound notebook. The pages of paper are rimmed with gold. “February 22, 2007. You were hiking with your family in upstate New York and decided that it was the smartest idea ever to climb a fucking waterfall. When the rocks were all wet and slippery.” Kagome kind of remembers this. “You nearly gave me a heart attack. I had to distract you away from your death with a cute dog.” Now the dog she remembers. It was a Shiba Inu. Unfortunately the demon does not seem to be done. He’s rustling through the notebook again. “Ah ha! And who could forget September 22, 2017! Barcelona.”
“That barely counts…” Okay okay okay Kagome definitely remembers Park Güell and too much sangria and a dumb game of truth or dare. “Wait…” She also remembers the dark-haired stranger who was speaking rapidly in Spanish as he pulled her off the ledge she was balancing on shouting ‘I’m a gymnast!’ (Miroku thought it was hilarious). “Are you Spanish?”
“Fuck no!” The demon is looking more irate, to the point that his ears have started twitching. She needs to touch them. She shouldn’t. And it’s probably best if she gets a handle on the situation before reaching to grab a stranger’s ears.
“So you’re just my stalker.” Kagome probably should be a bit more worried that she’s standing here with a demon who apparently has a ledger of all her near-death experiences and seems to believe that she’s been close to death over four hundred times… The adorable dog ears and exasperation are a powerful weapon if he is evil.
“For fuck’s sake, no!” The tips of his ears even turn pink at the insinuation (he has no right to be this cute), and he snarls when he pages through his magical near-death book again. “AH! June 21, 2020. A creepy dude stuck something in your drink and you almost drank it! That is what a stalker is, not me.”
“Oh my god, did you spill my drink on me that night?” Kagome absolutely remembers this. Because campari does not come out of fancy dresses without hefty dry-cleaning fees. “You owe me $40 for that!”
It’s abundantly clear that whatever conversation this demon thought they would be having at this moment? It is not going how he planned.
“Listen.” He pinches the bridge of his nose, which is scrunched again like he smells something disgusting. “Keeping you from dying in the stupidest ways possible is exhausting. I need a vacation, and believe it or not, I’m supposed to help out more than one single human woman so…” When he looks up his face looks strained, as if he doesn’t want to say what’s coming next. “You’ve gotta take better care of yourself, Kagome. Because this is absolutely completely the last time I will save your ass from something stupid.”
It’s starting to click into place: the time when she and Sango were hiking the Na Pali coast and she thought it was a good idea to hike one of the segments in flip flops (and a dark haired stranger somehow managed to break the strap so she had to change into her hiking boots); the time she was walking through the California wilderness and everything went dead silent and a ranger walked up and warned her of a mountain lion sighting (also dark-haired…); the time when…
“Do you wear a wig or something normally?” Kagome was starting to get a picture of the dark-haired stranger who seemed to jump out of the woodwork everywhere. Could he have always been this demon? Kagome definitely would have remembered silver hair, fangs, dog ears. “Black hair? Because if so, uh—thank you.”
“So you do have at least two neurons in that brain of yours that work,” the demon scoffs, but Kagome doesn’t miss the way he’s fighting his lips from curling into a smile. “Normally I’m disguised to look like a human. But today I just—” The frown is back. “I was so fucking sick of your near misses that I kinda… didn’t think.”
He’s turning redder, and his ears are pinned back again. Kagome doesn’t recall clearly enough what he looks like in his human disguise, but she is pretty certain that she likes this version of him better. Who knew she would have a thing for fuzzy ears (probably every anime she had ever watched, honestly).
“Can I—touch them?” Kagome knows better—she knows—but how often does a cantankerous guardian angel (well technically demon?) with furry ears come barging into her apartment to yell at her for almost getting squashed by a piano? Carpe diem, dammit!
The demon’s hands shoot up to cover his ears, and his face becomes an even darker shade of pink.
“W—why?” He’s looking flustered, but that’s been true for a while. Maybe he’s expecting her to cower or freak out? Hell, she should be freaking out probably. But he’s not scary. And now that she knows, some door in the corner of her brain has opened; she must’ve known that he’s been there standing between her and the proverbial piano forever. That, and his ears are magnificent, something he seems to be absolutely unaware of, given he’s the one currently looking freaked out.
“I just like them,” Kagome replies. She knows immediately that it is entirely the wrong answer. The man’s scowl is back, and this time it reaches his eyes.
“Fuck you.” This certainly seems like an over-reaction, but he’s not looking at her anymore and his ears are so far back they’re nearly into his hair. He looks… ashamed. Which, why?
“Holy overreaction Batman,” Kagome deadpans. He’s avoiding eye contact now, as if all the fight has gone out of him.
All over being sensitive about his ears.
“Whatever.” Something blank slides over the demon’s face, a mask falling back into place. Kagome doesn’t like this at all. He’s actually a little scary when his face is like that. She wants the exasperation back, but she doesn’t get a chance.
“W—wait!” Kagome barely catches him before he’s out the door.
“Next time you get your ass into mortal danger,” the demon scowled, “you can count me out!”
And with that, he’s gone.
“I didn’t even get your name.” Kagome closes her eyes, willing wayward ‘oi!’s in raspy voices and arms that pulled her back from the proverbial precipices. The disguised stranger who kept her from falling off cliffs and drinking poison (or roofies).
Well well well…
Everyone always did tell Kagome that she had the most uncanny luck in the world. That she had more near misses at death than most people had pedestrian injuries… and Kagome always figured they were teasing her. Her klutziness is legendary amongst her friends.
To think there had always been someone there tugging her back from the curtain.
Every thrill of her life, he was there.
And she doesn’t even know his name.
This wouldn’t do. Not at all. Kagome has always lived to seize the day. She’s not going to change because the guardian she didn’t even know she even had decided to walk out on her.
No, she is going to carpe the fucking diem even harder than before. If that means that one of these days near-death becomes…well, then so be it.
“Are you certain, Miss?” The sushi chef looks skeptical of Kagome’s resolve. He should not be skeptical of Kagome’s resolve. “Fugu is a delicate fish, and eating a whole plate alone is not strictly—”
“Thank you, but I am looking forward to this!” Kagome singsongs her reply, forceful enough that he stops talking, cheerful enough that he does not argue.
She probably should have brought a friend along on this adventure; she knows this, but—well—that would take the fun out of the adventure. Defying death with a friend doesn’t have the same ring to it as standing on the precipice herself and cackling that ‘today will not be the day!’
Skydiving had been her favorite. Strapped to a strapping stranger and thrown out of a plane over the farmland part of upstate New York (apparently, according to Bankotsu-the-hot-skydive-instructor, Kagome is a screamer). Weightless and whooshing down toward the ground, then floating elegantly while Bank-hot-su made sexy adrenaline-enhanced smalltalk. Kagome is definitely planning on defying death exactly like that again…
Bungee jumping ends too quickly, and for some reason the ground being much closer than jumping out of a plane makes it all the more terrifying.
Paragliding is amazing but too involved, because one needs a tall hill, a brisk wind, and not too many trees to really enjoy. And while Kagome’s joie de vivre loves sticking it to the grim reaper, she didn’t fancy the hospital stay that might have come from smashing into a robust oak tree.
She still doesn’t have a name.
She looks for him now, when she does the things that thrill her blood. Tries to see if the dark-haired stranger is snarling and refastening the carabiners on her parachute, or shifting the wind direction, but it seems to look for her demon is to guarantee that she will not find him.
Maybe it’s time to take all that extra vacation and turn it into a Mt. Everest summit…
“You know…” There’s a snarl just behind her ear; Kagome knows that voice! “There’s a snowball’s chance in hell that this is going to do anything…”
Kagome whips around, and comes face-to-face with a human man; it’s him. His hair might be up in a dark ponytail, but Kagome knows it’s meant to be silver. And his ears might appear to all the world human, but Kagome’s fingers twitch to rub the triangular dog ears that she knows to be hidden. And the eyes might seem warm and hazel, but Kagome knows that the golden flecks therein are the true color. The scowl is definitely the same.
“Yes, I know! I did my research and this sushi chef is the best in New—” Kagome begins the lecture, to find a finger pressing against her lips, stopping her mid-sentence.
“Farmed fugu doesn’t have toxins, Kagome.” He’s smirking now as he removes his hand, and slides into the chair at her table.
“Farmed?” Kagome looks down at the delicate petaled fish flesh, arranged in a chrysanthemum. “B—but…”
“Though it looks like Kaede really is that good in her prep work.” The human-disguised-demon looks down at the fish, smirk still plastered across his face. “So at least you can pretend that you defied death by eating it.”
“You!” Kagome’s brain finally catches up to the situation. Her demon is here? Here? To inform her that her danger-fish is not dangerous, and is farmed? And… he’s here? Now? Now? “You have some nerve—”
The finger is back over her lips again. He looks amused, which is certainly a whole lot better than the hurt that was written all over the last time he saw her.
“Skydiving, paragliding, bungee jumping, fugu eating.” He has his notebook out again, but he hasn’t opened it. “What next? Shark cage? Base jumping? Cave diving?”
“Mountaineering,” Kagome retorts, though she likes his suggestions too.
“I swear to fuck, Kagome.” He is trying to sound exasperated, but he just… isn’t. Apparently to Kagome, no part of his disguise works. “I tell you that I’m walking away—quitting—and instead of moving to some small quiet place and living a small quiet life you, what? Dial it up to 11?” He trembles, barely noticeably, but Kagome notices. “What are you trying to do, make me crazy? Test just how far you can push me to come back before—before—you really do go too far?”
This would pack a whole lot bigger punch if he wasn’t currently sitting across from her with the farmed-fugu-that-can’t-kill. But there’s not exhaustion in his eyes, there’s a flicker of something else, something in those gold flecks that runs deeper: hope.
The demon was not accusing so much as projecting.
Kagome wishes her answer was as simple as his accusation: that she has been playing roulette with death as a grand gesture designed to bring her wayward guardian back. It’s the thing of romance movies after all, and there’s even a whisper of truth in that. But the sincere answer is much more complicated.
“How is it that I have almost died over four hundred times in my life?” she starts, looking down at the not-dangerous fugu. “And despite cheating death that much, I had this list of things I wanted to try out, but was too afraid to do them?”
“Do I need to remind you of the waterfall inciden—” The demon tries to interrupt; it’s Kagome’s turn to bring her finger to his lips to silence him. His lips are full, pliant, soft.
“Then maybe you can understand,” Kagome huffs. “I climb waterfalls because I want to see what is at the top. I try to do gymnastics on tiled terraces because it makes my heart race. I like that feeling—I love that feeling.” She hasn’t removed her finger from his lips; she probably should. “I never stopped wanting to climb to the top of waterfalls, and I don’t want to be a headline for walking under a piano because I was looking at something on my phone.” Finally, she removes her hand. “I want my life to be full of waterfalls, and bad ideas in Barcelona, and fugu and jumping out of planes.”
“You’re gonna get yourself killed.” Her demon’s lips are pursed, disappointed, because this is not the answer he wanted.
“I don’t think so.” Kagome’s hand is back to the demon’s lips, though instead of an index finger, she uses her thumb. She isn’t finished with her explanation just yet. “I get to climb the waterfalls because it always felt like someone was watching over me. I… I just mistakenly thought it was my dad.” There is a blush coming to the demon’s cheeks as she rubs his lower lip, but he doesn’t pull his face away. “I might’ve never seen your face, but I always knew you were there. For the waterfall, for the piano, and even for the bungee jumping and the skydiving.”
“Well… it’s my job.” He takes her wrist in his hand, freeing his lips of her thumb, and he doesn’t let go.
As he looks at her, the flecks of hope are back. Kagome is saying exactly the right thing, which is good, because it’s also exactly the honest thing.
He’s always been there for her, on the edges of her life, guiding her away from danger so that she can climb waterfalls. He’s the exasperated ‘oi!’ and the cursing her out in Spanish. He’s the pinned back ears and the silver hair. He’s a demon. He’s her demon.
And she’s tired of him only existing in her periphery.
“What if—” Kagome can feel her heart start to beat into her throat. “What if… you came with me?” She feels sicker than she did jumping out of that plane. “What if you… and I… what if we adventured together?”
His eyes are going wide, and that rose dust blush is deepening to beetroot red.
“You want to adventure… with me?” he asks, pointing his finger at his chest as if there was another person sitting at the table but invisible that Kagome might be making this offer to. “Even though… you know what my ears look like?”
Leave it to Kagome to fall for a demon.
“Yes,” she answers.
“You—you really did want to touch ‘em, didn’t you?” The demon’s eyes are flaring yellow, as if his hope was splashing against his disguise, letting out slivers of the real him.
“I did,” Kagome says, and her eyes trail up to where they would be. She wonders if she could feel them even through his disguise.
“Fuck me, Kagome.” The demon probably should have chosen his words more carefully, because… well… there are now very joie de vivre pictures in Kagome’s brain.
“I need to know your name first!” she teases before her mouth can close. If it’s possible, the demon goes an even deeper shade of red. “But… maybe we can start with… enjoying some fugu?”
The sound that emanates from her demon is so loud that several of the diners put down their chopsticks and stare. It’s hard to look away from someone who manages to combine a boisterous belly laugh with choking on his own tongue.
“Fucking fuck, Kagome,” finally breaks from his mouth, now wide with a smile. He picks up the chopsticks with a flourish, and stuffs the first petaled piece of fish into his mouth. “And I’ll have you know that I, Inuyasha, never say no to food.”
Kagome never would stop climbing waterfalls.
Although Kagome does end up changing her mind about Mt. Everest; she summits Mt. Rainier instead. After all, it’s more fun to laugh in the face of death hand-in-hand with an exasperated loved one, especially knowing that his beautiful ears are pinned back under his disguise.
Inuyasha promised Kagome that Seattle has salmon sushi so good she’ll think she’s ascended to heaven. Though if Kagome were honest, because of her guardian demon, she’s pretty certain that she’s already there.