On the night before her
seventeenth birthday, Higurashi Kagome tasted her first champagne.
It was at the house of
an American attaché and his family. Deputy Minister Houjou and his
famous wife were among the invited guests. Only that morning the hostess
had telephoned: one couple had had to cancel. Would the Houjous' delightful
son like to join them, along with a guest? There would be other young people
there. "Foreign service brats, like me," Inuyasha informed her.
"The Americans and the British like to have dinner parties at home."
The statement, as always, was matter-of-fact, with no trace of superiority
or smugness. Privileged, intelligent, and good-looking, he was the most
completely unaffected person she'd ever met.
They were to come dressed
for school. "The Westerners love us cute little Japanese kids in our
uniforms," Inuyasha said, rolling his eyes. And so she had arrived
at the Houjous' house, bathed, brushed, and pressed, in her navy-blue uniform
with the red neckerchief and pair of black tights. There in the foyer of
Inuyasha's home she suffered her first embarrassment of the evening, when
she whispered, "I've never really met any gaijin." There
was an awkward pause, after which Mrs. Inuyasha-Houjou said, gently (for
her) but firmly, "We don't use that word for Westerners in this house,
Higurashi-san. Many people are bothered by it." Strangest and worst
of all was Houjou Inuyasha's expression of wide-eyed astonishment and—disapproval.
He quickly looked down, away from her. She bowed her head, letting her hair
hide her flaming cheeks, and muttered a flustered apology. "It's all
right," he whispered, "you're not used to this." But for
the first time since she'd returned home, she had the terrible feeling she'd
tarnished herself in his eyes.
Inside the largest modern
house she'd ever seen, she was intimidated to realize that most of the guests
were…Westerners, and that the language of the evening was to be English.
Trembling, she accepted a tumbler of iced brown liquid ("It's all right,"
Inuyasha whispered, "it's just Pepsi"—he could tell Pepsi from
Coke by scent) and stood silent, drowning in a sea of English words. The
other "young people" turned out to be a Japanese girl about a
year their senior, daughter of a diplomat, and a Western boy a year or two
younger than they were. The four teenagers stood apart from the adults,
the other three talking politely about American television programs she
hadn't seen.
Dinner was served in a
huge dining room at an impossibly long table decorated with candles and
bowls of vermilion-and-white roses. Kagome stared with alarm at her formal
place setting, innumerable pieces of gold Western flatware arranged in an
intricate pattern around her plate. Panicked, she tried to catch Inuyasha's
eye where he sat, half a table away from her ("You're not allowed to
sit next to the person you came with," he'd informed her), but his
attention was taken by the woman to his left, who seemed to be asking him
a question. Kagome closed her eyes, feeling her face redden, and suddenly
heard a quiet cough from across the table. Inuyasha's father, Mr. Houjou,
was looking at her. He glanced down at his own hands, and she saw his index
fingers touch first the outermost utensil on each side and then arc inward
across the array of goldware before he almost imperceptibly lifted the outside
fork and knife in either hand. That was it: outside to inside. Kagome sighed
with relief and followed his lead, nodding her thanks to him. As the courses
progressed he continued to prompt her silently.
For part of the meal she
carried on a stumbling conversation with the man on her left; for the rest,
a more fluent one with the man on her right, an American who taught English
at a cram school. Inuyasha had been seated next to Kanehana-san, the diplomat's
daughter, and Kagome realized it was an attempt on someone's part at matchmaking.
The girl was dressed, not in a school uniform but in a simple, flattering
cocktail dress with a string of pearls; she looked sophisticated and very
much at ease, and her English conversation, floating across the table, was
bantering and confident. At one point she switched languages to—what, French?—and
Houjou Koinu, his face a pleasant mask, switched languages with her.
All Kagome wanted was
to go home. One unfamiliar food after another was set before her, and she
picked lightly; she was eating now, and holding it down, but only small
amounts. She stared down at her own hands, their delicate bones sharply
outlined, their skimmed-milk blueness accentuated by the deep blue of her
uniform sleeves. She had a sense of being watched, and lifted her head.
Inuyasha had turned from his table partner and was silently staring at her,
his eyes narrowed. Suddenly he seemed alien to her, light-years away from
either the boy who had died in her arms on the other side or the boy who
had clumsily courted her on this one. She felt lost, cast adrift in this
strange place among people who were nothing like her. The thought occurred
to her: This is how Inuyasha's mother, the Houjou princess, must have
felt in the court of the youkai.
A waiter—Japanese, thankfully—came
by to tell her there was a choice of dessert: a flourless chocolate cake
with fresh raspberries and raspberry sauce, and a cappuccino crème
brulée. She went for the sure thing, chocolate. All evening two
men had walked up and down the table pouring wine for the adults and water
for the young people. Now corks were popped and the two men stepped forward,
each with a bottle wrapped in a towel. Their host, Mr. Harrison, a cheerful,
portly man with barcode hair, stood with the men, a bottle in his own hand,
and winked an eye toward Mr. Houjou, who bowed his head slightly. "At
such a festive table," he said, "even the young people must have
champagne. We have sweet, for the young people and ladies, and brut
for the more adventurous. Or," he added, "there is a sparkling
cider I'm told is excellent." The three started down the table, one
man pouring sweet champagne (not always for the women), the other pouring
brut (but not always for the men), and Mr. Harrison pouring cider
for one or two adults.
The young Western boy,
who had a monster name, Jason, opted for cider—"I've tasted champagne,"
he said, wrinkling his nose. Next to Inuyasha, the pretty Kanehana-san smiled
as her flute was filled with the sweet. Houjou Koinu set his hand over his
glass before the "sweet" man could pour. His eyebrows shot up
adamantly as he said, "Brut."
Mr. Harrison chuckled
and glanced over at the Houjou couple, both of whom nodded slightly. "Aha,"
said Mr. Harrison, "so the puppy already has the old dog's nose."
The pun was deliberate; Kagome realized the jovial Mr. Harrison spoke Japanese,
and was sharper than she'd guessed.
Suddenly the three stood
behind Kagome. Flustered, she covered her glass with her terribly thin hand.
"Oh," she said, panicking as she tried to summon the appropriate
English, "I must not, I have not the age of twenty. Only I have seventeen
years tomorrow."
"Tomorrow,"
repeated Mr. Harrison. "Not today."
Kagome felt her cheeks
reddening. "Today is sixteen years for me. Tomorrow seventeen baasudee."
From down the table her
hostess, Mrs. Harrison, spoke up. "Nate, is she saying tomorrow's her
seventeenth birthday?" she asked. "She must have her first taste
of champagne while she's still sixteen! Kagome, dear, you must try at least
a sip. Pour her the sweet." Kagome looked at Mr. Houjou, who managed
to express with his eyebrows that the choice was her own. Kagome glanced
down the table at the girl next to Inuyasha. The girl shot her a coldly
superior look in return, and Kagome suddenly thought of Kikyou. "The
sweet, please," Kagome murmured.
She tasted the champagne
tentatively. Sweet was not her idea of sweet. She had been expecting
something like soda pop. So, she decided, had Kanehana-san, who wrinkled
up her nose and then set her glass aside. The flourless chocolate cake,
on the other hand, was everything she had ever wanted from a dessert, and
more. Kagome ate slowly, savoring the rich chocolate on her tongue, the
dense, creamy texture, the wonderful fruity tartness of the raspberries.
She caught Inuyasha quietly observing her reaction from his place across
the table; years later, lying naked on a dormitory floor sharing bites of
cake and raspberry interspersed with long, sugary kisses, she would realize
he had been making mental notes. Now, on the night before her seventeenth
birthday, she ventured a little more champagne, enjoying it more combined
with taste of the chocolate.
As she ate and drank,
she fell into a kind of reverie. Inuyasha had ordered the other dessert,
the cappuccino crème brulée, which looked like a sort
of crusted-over brown puddle on the plate. His tablemate had ordered the
same thing, and after picking at the edges she set down her spoon, looking
enviously at Kagome's chocolate. Serves you right, Kagome thought,
for trying to impress my boyfriend. Inuyasha turned to see what Kagome
was looking at, and his eyes widened with pleasure. "Aren't you going
to eat that?" he asked in Japanese. The girl shook her head with a
little frown. "I'll take it," he said, grabbing her plate and
moving it to his own territory. No longer alien, he suddenly seemed like
the perfect amalgamation of the Inuyasha she had known on the other side
and the Houjou boy she had known on this one, disarmingly innocuous and
stunningly ill-mannered at the same time.
The girl drew herself
up. "Do you want my champagne, too?" she asked.
He shook his head, his
full attention on the crème brulée. "Huh-uh,"
he said. "I hate that sweet crap. But thanks," he remembered to
add, favoring her with a glance.
The girl bristled. With
a flash of insight, Kagome wondered what Inuyasha's last morning with Kikyou
had been like, as Naraku's castle fell and the remaining companions struggled
to plot a strategy without their strongest member. How had he and Kikyou
become separated? Had a few hours of quality time with her beloved been
enough to make Kikyou storm off alone?
Suddenly Kagome perceived
that the girl she was watching was a miko. As the revelation sank
in, she realized with dismay that the filters she had been working so hard
to rebuild for the past few weeks were dissolving, floating away on a tide
of champagne and chocolate. Waves of youki were crashing in—so many
of the people in this room were at least part youkai, or whatever
corresponded to youkai in their native lands. Inuyasha's observation
about the foreign service was accurate. Kagome closed her eyes and tried
to focus, desperate to bring her perception under control. Now that she
wasn't starving, the paranoia was mercifully gone—she had hit poor Houjou-kun!—but
the combined auras buzzed in her head.
Mr. Harrison—almost pure
youkai, he and his wife—was saying something in his friendly
voice, and she realized the others were standing. One of her seatmates,
the American (no youki, he was pure one-hundred-percent mortal human)
was trying to help her out of her chair. To her alarm, she found her legs
were too rubbery to let her stand. He pulled on her hand. She looked up
at him and shook her head, helplessly. He looked across the table just as
helplessly toward their hosts.
Youki closing in
as the adults gathered around her. Mrs. Inuyasha-Houjou's voice saying,
"Kagome has been gravely ill with a severe form of mononucleosis. It
took them months to identify it." Tsk-tsking from the Harrisons;
they had served prime rib, youkai needed a lot of red meat—expensive
in Japan!—or iron supplements. "On the mend now, though?" said
Mr. Harrison, and Kagome remembered Inuyasha teaching her that phrase, that
it meant she was getting well. Right now she didn't feel well.
Then she felt Inuyasha
standing behind her. She opened her eyes and swiveled toward him; he took
her hands in his. "Kagome," he said.
She completed the incantation.
"Inuyasha."
Immediately she began
to feel strength pouring from his hands into hers. Could he feel it, too?
His face was serious, concerned, his eyes reflecting the gold of the candlelight.
"Can you stand?" he asked.
"I think so,"
she replied. He pulled her lightly to her feet, his familiar aura lifting
her, sustaining her.
"The adults are going
into the living room for coffee," he said. "They have something
for us in the TV room."
She nodded, letting him
lead her. "Looking a little better now," said Mr. Harrison approvingly.
"Getting some color back."
The "TV room"
was small and cozy, with cans of tea and soda pop set out in a bowl of ice.
Kagome was settled into the corner of a fat, comfortable sofa with a cold
can of sweet green tea.
"Woo!" said
Jason, the Western boy, "Nintendo!"
"Cool!" said
Koinu. The two immediately plopped down before the large television screen,
controllers in hand, soda pop at easy reach, and immersed themselves in
some form of Mortal Kombat.
Kanehana-san sat in a
chair away from the others, looking bored. She's waiting to slip away
and meet her dead-soul catchers, Kagome thought. She set down the tea
and curled into a little ball on the couch, while the boys cheered and blood
spurted across the TV screen. She began to doze.
In the background, Kanehana-san's
voice was saying in Japanese, "What's wrong with her?"
She could tell by Koinu's
voice that he wasn't looking away from the screen. "What's wrong
with her?" he replied. "Nothing's wrong with her. She's
been sick. Shit!" he added.
"Ha!" said Jason.
"I heard she was
dating some kind of motorcycle gangster, and he died mysteriously,"
she said.
"He wasn't a motorcycle
gangster, he was just a tough guy. And he didn't die mysteriously. He got
killed in a fight," said Koinu. "I know all about it."
"Oh," said Kanehana-san.
"Then I guess your little friend isn't a miko."
"She's still a virgin,
if that's what you mean. You're a miko, right? You smell like a miko.
Gotcha!"
"Crap," said
Jason. "What does a miko smell like?"
"Like a virgin,"
said Koinu.
Jason snickered, and Kanehana-san
made a disgusted little noise. The boys turned their full attention to the
game. Then Kagome must have slept, because the next thing she knew she was
opening her eyes to see Inuyasha standing over her whispering, "Kagome,
are you awake?" Kagome blinked and looked around. The television was
dark, the others gone from the room.
"I think so,"
she said.
He grinned at her. "It's
after midnight. Happy birthday. Here's your birthday kiss." He leaned
forward and kissed her quickly on the mouth, then stepped back to pull her
to her feet.
The adults were standing
waiting in the foyer, and she was greeted (and embarrassed) by more birthday
kisses from the Harrisons and one or two other guests. She had forgotten
Koinu's warning that Westerners went around kissing everybody in public
all the time.
The midnight air was chilly
and refreshing on her face. "Ugh," she said. "After midnight,
and we still have to get up for school in the morning." Two years ago,
minus about seven hours, she had been pulled down the well, and her life
had changed forever.
One year ago, almost to
the minute, she had awakened to find Inuyasha the hanyou kneeling
by her sleeping bag by the dying campfire as the others slept through the
last night of the quest. One year ago, in a shower of moonlight and starlight,
he had whispered, "Kagome, are you awake?" and they had spoken
their goodbyes. She had wept; they had both pretended to sleep. And then,
in the light of false dawn, she had watched with silent tears as he stood
and walked away, without looking back, to keep his early-morning rendezvous,
more than fifty years late. Later that day, a couple of hours after noon,
he had breathed his last in her arms.
She turned to look at
Inuyasha. This time the night was overcast and chill, but the paved walk
to the street in front of the Harrisons' house was light enough to make
out his face, the hair glowing copper against his forehead. How long ago
had it been for him? Eighteen years? Before I was a baby, he would
say, trying to explain. His face was solemn, and he reached out and took
her hand. They walked that way to his parents' car, schoolboy and schoolgirl
hand-in-hand in the Tokyo night, nearly half a millennium separating them
from the hanyou who slowly walked away from one weeping miko
and into the arms of another.
