Author's Note: This is a drabble story, probably going to be written here or there if you feel the need for it to continue. There's a complex pattern to the writing style but I won't bore you with details. Just know that the length of each chapter is exactly as I want it to be - which translates to "it's never too short." As well, each break signifies as change in character POV.

Title Information: The title taken from a local band at my university, that finally got a CD out, although this song wasn't on it. It's called The Weatherman Song, and it's about how no matter what happens, true love will never change, not for anything. Sometimes you just have to get through the storm.

Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha. I do not profit from this story.

So Now We'll Let the Rain Fall

Chapter One: Never

Just because you were best friends with somebody, didn't mean you never had the urge to kill them before. Inuyasha Taisho was one of those best friends, because lord love her, he was trouble with a capital "T".

Kagome Higurashi shook her head at the silver-haired teenager, taking in the fuzzy ears at the top and deep golden eyes she could never gaze away from. He was beautiful, in a broken sort of way she guessed. He was the dangerous kid, the bad boy that broke all the rules.

There was absolutely no reason for her to love him. She did though, and it made things all the more difficult. Kagome would chalk it up to being a typical teenager, and falling in love with a boy was like falling in love with a pair of sparkly shoes – the instant draw to them, the need to have them, to always have them and then… Well you moved on. There were a lot of things about life that were like that.

Inuyasha turned his head, eyes focusing on her like he just knew she had been staring. The small smirk that came to his lips was like watching the sun peek from the clouds. Kagome knew she was horribly stupid with a side of idiotic, but she blamed teenage romance novels like Twilight to put those foolhardy notions in her head. Love was never, ever that simple.

"So what do you think?" he asked, tilting his head, ears trained on her and at attention.

Kagome pursed her lips. "You're serious about this?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" he countered, frowning. "Kagome I need…you know."

Help. Of course he did. Stealing from a store and then getting sentenced with only community service hours was a blessing.

But she would help, like always. "Yes."

Just because you were best friends with somebody, didn't mean you wanted them to stay friends. Kagome Higurashi was one of those best friends, because if anyone deserved something better than what he offered, it was her.

Inuyasha Taisho couldn't help but let the relief wash over him. "Yes?" he asked, almost scared. He didn't let it show in his voice because he couldn't let that happen. He could never let his guard down.

Being a foster kid did things to you. It wasn't like that for everybody, he knew that. Some kids managed to achieve a better life. Other kids managed to stay floating along the water's surface, balanced, neither swimming nor sinking. And then there were kids, like him, that tended to have an anchor chained to their ankle to help drag them down. He stole from a convenience store – of course he did – because the old man was drunk and abusive, his wife hiding up in the bedroom and Inuyasha didn't feel like being a punching bag, didn't feel like waiting until two a.m. when the drunken bastard was out cold to sneak down and get food from the cupboards.

He stole food. Well, he tried to steal food. It was unfortunate that a cop was dropping in around the same time as his getaway. It didn't help that the entire tiny town of Landrace thought he was the kid from hell, with the screwed up past and behavioural problems no one could fix without medication. It didn't help that he had one, maybe three, friends that would vouch for him when the rest would turn their backs.

But Kagome was different – beautiful, caring, soft. Everything he wanted and nothing he'd ever let himself have.

"What are friends for?" she murmured, smiling. Inuyasha wished she'd never stop.

What were friends for? The thought rang in her head a little. None of what she was doing was for friendship reasons solely. No, part of it was because she was drawn to Inuyasha, like a moth to a flame. It was destructive and utterly beautiful.

"You know I'll try and I'm sure Kaede will be willing but you have to promise me that whatever hours you get are the hours you work," Kagome warned, taking a moment to be serious with him, to make sure he understood the full weight of this. "It doesn't matter if I'm there or not. Just…promise me you'll finish these hours and be done with it?"

She watched his face, always impassive, always guarded except for the glimmer in his eyes. He was thinking, calculating like the smart individual that he was. No one really knew how smart Inuyasha could be, not when he was a half-breed and automatically thrown into the waste category. Kagome could also see a small simmer of anger, of something he was hiding that she always wanted to see.

Inuyasha didn't let his emotions show much in the public view. Kagome had learned to deal with it, to take what she could get when they were hidden away from the outside world, when they were in their own world.

"Who do you think I am?" he asked, oddly calm and stoic. "I pleaded guilty and I'm going to complete my hours. What more do you want me to do? I can't rewind anything Kagome." Inuyasha was too quiet, too dangerous.

Kagome bit her lower lip. "You know I didn't mean it that way."

"Yeah, like you didn't mean to forget to pick me up after the sentencing."

It was a low blow and Kagome felt the air leave her lungs. It wasn't true – far from it. She never forgot, not for one second. Her mother demanding that she didn't see that no good boy had prevented her from getting the car keys and leaving. Inuyasha had been all she could think about then. She couldn't get to him, couldn't protect him from the world that didn't understand.

"Momma," she pleaded, deciding whether getting down on her knees would help. "You don't–"

Ms. Higurashi, widowed and tired, had shaken her head. "He's trouble." The words were short and not entirely incorrect.

Kagome wished the rain would stop falling outside.

The moment the words were out of his mouth, Inuyasha felt like an idiot. He knew that Kagome's mother didn't like him. It wasn't like he could blame her. He was a foster kid living in a bad home that did little more than provide shelter and the occasional meal. A month ago he had a job that ended the moment his charges were laid down. It was unfair, how the world worked, but Inuyasha supposed that was just the anchor dragging him down some more.

He wanted to apologize, to open his mouth and tell Kagome that he was sorry. The last thing he needed was to destroy the only relationship he had. But her words still rang in his head, words that didn't sound certain of where his priorities lay. And Inuyasha knew what he wanted out of life, what he needed. Virtually every dollar from work went into a savings account, so that in a year's time he could get his own place when he was officially eighteen and independent.

Kagome couldn't question his priorities – he knew them up, down and sideways.

Shaking his head, he stood up from the bench they sat at after school and started to walk away, feeling heavier with each step. Ten steps in and he had to stop, turn around, and look at her.

The raven-haired beauty was like some sort of guardian angel, always there, always watching. She hadn't moved from the bench, lip still curled under the pressure of her teeth. It was the picture of innocence and sin wrapped into one.

"Are you coming or what?" Inuyasha yelled, crossing his arms and trying not to pin his ears to his head from all the whispers of his peers. No one seemed to get his relationship with Kagome. Everyone liked Kagome, thought she was sweet with a bright future.

Inuyasha didn't even understand what she saw in him.

When Kagome finally realized what he meant, she smiled and stood up, grabbing her backpack and flying down to meet him. He rolled his eyes fondly, stuffing his hands into his jean pockets so he wouldn't do something stupid – like hug her. "I have to be at the shelter by five," she said, "but I promised Mom I'd be home."

Inuyasha smirked then, knowing what she was getting at. He played along anyways. "Is that right?"

"My bedroom window's still open."

Before Inuyasha came along, Kagome had been what some would call popular, others would call privileged. She lived in a good home, with a caring mother, annoying younger brother and a funny grandfather that told stories of back in the day. She knew a lot of people in the school, mostly because she'd never been one to not talk to a stranger or make friends. Sometimes people just needed a little help. Sometimes people were just a little lost.

The day Inuyasha walked into her high school, Kagome didn't think. All she did was act.

"Hi, I'm Kagome," she introduced, holding out her hand.

Inuyasha, wearing a black leather jacket and well-worn jeans scowled at her. "I'm sorry, do I care?"

She smiled at him, shrugging. "I don't know, do you? Anyways, if you ever need help I'll be around. It was nice to meet you." Kagome had to admit that his answer had stung, maybe a little. Rarely was anyone ever rude in Landrace, mostly because everyone knew everyone. This boy though was new, rougher around the edges.

That had been two years ago. Now they were in their second last year of high school. In that time they got to know each other very well. Inuyasha had been in her English class and since he couldn't string a sentence together that wasn't sarcastic or offensive, the teacher had paired him up with her because she offered. It had been a rocky relationship at first, but when Kagome had helped him cram for the final, he was more grateful to her than ever before.

Kagome thought back, realizing that even before then she loved Inuyasha. It would be impossible, but she imagined it was around the time she first introduced herself.

"Hi Momma, I'm home!" Kagome shouted, slipping out of her shoes and into the kitchen. Her mother was reading a magazine, humming something cheerful when she walked in.

"How was school?" Ms. Higurashi asked, smiling kindly. "Did anything exciting happen?"

Rolling her eyes, Kagome just grabbed a bowl, pouring herself some cereal and grabbing a big glass of milk. "Nothing exciting ever happens at school Mom."

Ms. Higurashi sighed, eyeing the food. "I don't know how you eat so much and stay so skinny. It's beyond me," she murmured, gently teasing. "And I don't understand why you refuse to put milk in your cereal when it's not for breakfast."

"Because if I put milk in it, then it's a breakfast food," Kagome pointed out. "If I have just the cereal, then it's a snack."

Her mother just shook her head, laughing lightly. "I won't question it. Are you going to do your homework?"

Kagome nodded. "I have tons of it today, so I'll be a while. I have to be at the shelter by five so I'll be late for dinner." With that, she kissed her mother's cheek. Her mom may not agree with her choice of friends, but she was still her mother.

"You're so good Kagome."

Inuyasha was practically asleep when Kagome came back into the room. He didn't bother opening his eyes but his ears twitched feebly in her direction. "Did you bring the food?"

"What kind of person do you think I am?" Kagome responded, placing the cereal and milk down on the nightstand and crawling into bed with him. "Now eat while I do homework. It won't take me that long, so give me my twenty minutes and then we can do whatever."

Snorting a little, Inuyasha rolled over and cracked a lazy eye open. "Fruit Loops?" he asked, smirking. "You're such a child."

"Souta finished the Coco Puffs for breakfast," Kagome said in lieu of an answer.

Inuyasha didn't particularly mind. Food was food was food, and he never took this generous part of Kagome for granted. He never asked for it, never questioned her about it. He tried to, a long time ago when Kagome first found out what little he ate on a regular basis. The resulting fight had been terrible, with Kagome in tears and him cutting his palms from his own nails digging in. The only time now that he mentioned it was when he heard her coming up the stairs, when he could hear the difference in her footsteps that meant she was being careful with whatever she was holding – like a glass full of milk.

He remained silent like he was told, only the sound of crunching food disturbing the quiet. Kagome flew through her homework like it was a breeze, hardly stopping to question herself on anything. Inuyasha always found that remarkable about her. He did his homework at the foster house, using it as an excuse to hide in his room away from the family he had yet to escape from.

When Kagome was finished, he was already attempting to nap on the bed, his leg solid against her hip. "Are you sleeping?" she asked quietly, her heavy textbook making a thud as it closed.

"As if," he murmured, opening his eyes and staring at the ceiling. He had far too much on his mind to go to sleep. For one, all of the community service hours he had to do. The judge had gone easy on him, giving him only forty hours to complete by a certain date. While some people could gobble those up in mere weeks, Inuyasha knew he'd have a harder time.

Not many people trusted a bad boy half-demon like him. It made him want to runaway every day.

Until he saw Kagome's smile and thought, rather stupidly, maybe one more.

But he knew Kagome, and he trusted that she'd help him get something at the animal shelter at the edge of town. An older woman named Kaede ran it, barely getting by with the lack of funds but somehow managing to keep it all going year after year. Kagome had volunteered there since she was old enough to, and a peer from their school named Sango – one of his maybe friends – volunteered there as well.

"Don't think about it." The whispered words were light, audible enough for his ears and Inuyasha waited as she shifted around on the bed until she was lying on her side beside him. "I can see the wheels in your head turning. It's never a good sign."

"Shut up wench. I can think whenever I want."

"Which is even scarier," she pointed out, giggling.

Inuyasha wanted to roll his eyes at her, but found her annoying giggles too endearing for that. "I'm not sure how I put up with you."

"I don't know how you do either," Kagome admitted, shaking her head sadly.

Inuyasha tilted his head, face inches away from hers. It's the other way around, he thought. He could kiss her. If he slid over another inch, his lips would brush hers.

Kagome didn't move, just smiled in that muted sort of way she did.

Inuyasha looked away.

I thoroughly enjoyed writing this. Even with the mainly cliché storyline, I hope to...do more for it. Give it a greater purpose maybe? Hmm.

Shall I continue?

Feedback is love, as per usual.