[AIM Log] [Ichigo + Rukia] [ Ostara ] [Closed]

[dramabunny]

The rigours of a Kurosaki family meal were enough to overwhelm even Rukia's stomach, which had a capacity far larger than should have been possible but was more accustomed to sweets and snacks than hearty home cooking. A small army could have been satiated with the starter alone, by the time the remainders of the main course were being pushed around plates it was already quite clear that there would be no room for dessert. Not for her, anyway, although having breakfasted and lunched on chocolate earlier in the day it was with only a little remorse that she’d watched the others argue over the easter basket she had brought (having given names to all the foiled chocolate rabbits before dinner, Yuzu was understandably reluctant to allow Flopsy, Mopsy or Cottontail into her father's clutches, an act which only encouraged him in his determination to devour them head first).

Far from being the model family, there was something far more natural about the way that every seemingly mismatched one of them fitted together into one unit. Dysfunctional maybe, still they hadn't broken down yet, and there was reassurance beneath the yelling. If Ichigo never departed the house without a headache and a fresh set of bruises, she assumed at least that he never felt ignored.

She would have left, too. Different reasons, maybe. But days with the Kurosakis always felt like window glimpses into something she couldn't quite comprehend, leaving her a curious mixture of wistful and overwhelmed. As some noisy TV special came on - watching was declared to be a family tradition, though Rukia suspected Isshin made most of those up on the spot - she let herself out, settling on the top step to catch her breath.

Home remained a curious amalgamation of that-which-could-not-be-forgotten, and all that he wanted to leave behind--it’d be selfish to assume he was the only one feeling like that. Yuzu had been appreciative, Isshin in some sort of glories-of-youth uproar, and Karin made it clear that she hadn’t expected him to show, but that if he was going to stick around for some dumbass family dinner, then maybe she could be bothered to make an appearance as well. Older now, seeing Yuzu as the motherly figure confused a whole set of carefully laid images in his mind--but she seemed to pull off the whole smoothing of hairs, setting of plates with some kind of self-assured grace he couldn’t quite fathom. And (this was the real kicker), she didn’t seem to mind. Not even after he and his father had somehow upset the mashed potatoes into the string beans and sent the casserole dish catapulting toward the breakfast bar. Clearly, wonders never ceased.

He’d dropped tulips in the kitchen, three carefully mixed and burned cds in Karin’s backpack, and maybe they’d find it later when the throes of LET US TAKE PART IN AN EASTER EGG HUNT OF METAPHORIC PROPORTIONS TO THE TUNE OF THE TELEVISION descrescendo’d. Ichigo knew for a goddamn fact that Isshin hadn’t even hid any eggs. It wasn’t any real surprise when Rukia, finally, vanished (how she deflected Isshin and Yuzu’s lines of inquiry was pretty astounding), Yuzu hung an apron on a cabinet knob and shuffled through the refrigerator, and Karin loudly protested any sort of ‘probably-cliché television crap’ and stomped up to her room. Familiar. Maybe he’d talk to her later.

And so that’d left him alone with the old man, and it was funny how his personality so rapidly metamorphosed from something juvenile, larger than life, into the promise of something that could’ve been serious. And so he’d talked--classes, track, his knee, when he was going to do something different with his life, move back home, become a doctor, get married, give him grandkids, live with his sisters, invite them to the apartment... Rukia was a matter of course. Ichigo’d licked his teeth and explained in the most benign way possible (reassuring himself, maybe, probably, yeah)--but the elbow-nudging jibes didn’t come. Not right away anyway.

Ichigo somehow managed to rip open the front door with a bang and dolefully slouch out onto the stoop, hands shoved into his pockets, brow knit and jaw tight. “Fuckin’ presumptuous old man,” he muttered, quiet, and slumped down beside Rukia.

It was not the kind of statement that demanded response. Isshin was always presumptuous, ridiculous melodrama masking appropriate fatherly concern and, perhaps less common, genuine faith that Ichigo would never really sink to the wallowing lows so loudly prophesied. The guessing game as to what parental intuition prompted the latest outburst could go on all day. She leant in, the bump of her shoulder against his more a brush of fabric than anything solid, then realigned herself. Set the distance between them again.

It had been there all evening, accompanied them on the ride over and was more tangible now the distractions were shut away at their backs. While never given to adoring glances, it was strange to be uncertain how to look at him. Dropping her eyes whenever theirs met and finding he'd looked away by the time she was confident of the set of her gaze, the standard impenetrable blue that smiles never quite touched. She was watching the road now. The clinic was set in a quiet street, cars a slow and distant hum that now and then built to a roar as one came rushing past, somehow louder than all the piled up City traffic she had learned to block out.

"It would confuse me." Finally. Even her voice sounded too loud out here. "I am never sure which of his expectations he wants you to live up to, and which are supposed to inspire you to do the exact opposite." She liked her outlines cookie cutter clear, survived by knowing how to fit all the different ones set out for her, changing flavour according to taste. The original recipe was one of those trade secrets nobody quite knew and the makers had probably forgotten. Lately she was beginning to suspect it might contain nuts. Maybe she should come with a warning.

There had been a weird kinda distance. Restraint, maybe. When words and actions came faster than the mind could usually keep up with (and it was better that way, when there wasn’t so much thinking and one thing spun quick into another), that was where they usually operated. Not here, not when there hadn’t even been a half-malicious kick beneath the table. He could blame the atmosphere (where any kind of touch could be misconstrued as intent to marry), but it didn’t change the fact that this was Easter, her favorite time of the year (apparently), and they were hanging around the stoop like some kind of almost-acquaintances.

Ichigo shoved his hands into his pockets before he couldn’t figure out what to do with them (touch her?), and made a point of looking up. City glamour--pollution and flourescent light just masking the on-coming twilight. What was the word--gloaming. Yeah, that was more like it. This was the kinda thing you’d have to swallow, with the air as thick as it was. Gloaming didn’t sound like it went down easy. Huh. He made a vain attempt to shake the scowl from his face and slumped over.

“I dunno,” he replied benignly, unsure of how to proceed. No one quite knew what to make of Isshin, including his family. His moments of confident seriousness were few and far between, and generally not in the public eye. “He pisses me off, y’know? Sometimes I don’t think he gives a fuck what I do, s’long as I ain’t hurtin’ me or anyone else. Probably figures I’ll learn eventually.” He let the silence yawn and stretch after that. Isshin probably saw the dark spots better than anyone. “I just don’t know. Maybe he does want me to go into medicine.”

Although having the sign repainted to read 'Kurosaki And Son' would doubtless make Isshin's not inconsiderable chest swell further with pride, Rukia could not really see the difference between that vocation and the one Ichigo had set for himself. Both medicine and law were, in their ideal states, preventative. The idea was to catch the criminal before they struck, vaccinate early and prevent an epidemic. Both of them would, all too often, really involve working with what was left after the damage had been done. When it came to careers where failure could cost lives, Ichigo could take his pick, and the father had to know how well the son dealt with that.

Any other parent might have urged him towards a safer career, after all, the world always needed more florists.

Ichigo needed to fight. There were no easy ways. "The building is already overrun with medics, I am not sure I could handle the inevitable hypochondria." she clipped off the last syllable with a faint smile, feet skidding across the step below and bumping down to the next. Leant forward to press her fingers into the moss by the railings and retrieve something that shone gold in the last of the light. Lucky penny. Didn't know the roots of the superstition (though they were probably only a few minutes older than the joke about a ten dollar bill being luckier), just the rhyme. Find a penny, pick it up. All day long you'll have good luck And an addendum that might have been tagged on later by some hopeful opportunist. Give the penny to a friend, then your luck will never end. Hallmark card sentiment, ridiculously inane. She turned it over in the cup of her hand and then dropped it into his pocket, stopping shy of following it with her hand.

"You're all working for the greater good, and I'm still playing dress-ups." Chose her next words carefully. "How did the study group go?" Just one more place to feel out of.

Ichigo shrugged, mind not entirely fixated on the notion of careers and future occupations--they’d been more conversational. Purely speculative. He’d never be able to hold a scalpel and make an incision without recalling his mother. Flashback marring the intent to save wasn’t exactly the way he’d want to start a career. Easier to put a bullet between someone’s eyes if he had to; it was just that simple. “Yeah, Sakura’s bad enough. Heard her talkin’ about ebola or somethin’ the other day, and I thought she just had a headache.”

Hard not to smile (even if just the barest wisps of a lip curl) when she practically pressed the coin into his pocketed-palm. Something shiny--’course she’d be into it (memory of picking up bits of tinfoil, wrappers, paper clips, bottle caps). He curled his fingers around the coin as best he could with the tight pockets, even though the khakis weren’t nearly as bad as his jeans, and recalled another memory: money’s dirty. Don’t know where it’s been. Make sure to wash your hands. This was why he didn’t come home. “Wouldn’t be no greater good to work for if there wasn’t gonna be art in it, Rukia. Think we all deserve somethin’ beautiful, y’know?” Ichigo turned to meet her eyes, finally, squinting like he wasn’t quite seeing her straight.

And sighed. “Studyin’ is studyin’. I’m kinda sick of it. Real fuckin’ sick of it. It’s not so much of a party or anythin’ as it is just not-bein’ alone while you’re doin’ it.” Pad of his thumb rubbed over the embossed metal disc. “I kinda like bein’ by myself though.”

If you're so sick of studying you should complain less when I distract you from it. An eyebrow arched, but the words remained unsaid. She was saving them up, tonight, reigning in her syllables for some later onslaught. Felt too flippant, anyway, dismissive. One reason she had stayed away from the study group -- what was she supposed to do, run through a dance routine? The students with examinations to sit and long latin lists to commit to memory beforehand couldn't be expected to sympathise because she thought this one song was a little out of her range.

It was very different to their graduating year of high school, back then she had been quite confident in her abject failure and saw no point in effort expended simply to disappoint that modicum less. Now she was working, but very few people seemed to see the difference. She told herself that recognition was not the important part and wondered when she became so self-seeking.

Of course there were other reasons for not attending. She was a distraction, unable to watch anyone hunched over a book for long without finding better things they could be doing, but might have stopped by, except -- except, "I think I've treated Orihime very badly." here was where she needed the words, found herself forcing them out through a stubborn, sticky throat. It would have been so much easier if he wasn't looking, but she could not keep finding reasons to turn away. "I wondered if she was there." Because if he wanted beauty, he should have been the one looking elsewhere.

Definitely not on his let’s-talk-about-this-while-sitting-on-my-dad’s-step topic of conversation. Before he could stop himself, his eyes were already flicking to the brick, the concrete, watching fibrils of almost-grass poking through the cracks there. Ichigo wasn’t quite sure what he disliked more--that other people had clearly known about Orihime’s feelings for quite some time and hadn’t said anything, or that she’d somehow been compelled to lay them at his feet when there was really little to be done about it all. No, after the conversation he’d just had with his father, he could safely say he really didn’t want to fucking talk about it.

Ichigo tried to bend the penny in half. Failed.

“She was sick,” he explained shortly, not entirely convinced himself (despite Orihime’s theatrics, reassurances that she’d be better). “Or something. I kept pretty well to myself.” The question of what did you do? lingered on the tip of his tongue, sat, and turned stale before he could lick the back of his teeth and force the question out.

"She wasn't sick." And the list of things Rukia kept getting wrong was not getting any shorter. Both the guilt for knowing Orihime's feelings and compelling her to talk about them lay squarely at her feet. Now she intended to talk about it (he had asked, and her defences were slipping, something had to be siphoned off before the dams burst altogether). First she had to know whether he was really being blind or just deliberately stupid this time. "Illness is rarely that convenient, and do you really think Tatsuki would have invited everyone into a potentially infectious environment? If she is hurting it is only because of me."

Turning back to check the door -- slammed effectively, abused hinges set, she recalled the instruction to act normal in front of his family. However normal was supposed to act. "I didn't think I was pushing her to talk to you until she agreed and I couldn't make myself tell her to stop. While I was concerned for her feelings, my selfish priority was to know how hers affected yours. I still don't understand. But if you know a little of how she is inside, you should know that is how I am, and now I don't know what to do with the pieces of the things I have broken." Trust, friendship, any number of promises made to herself (those least important of all). Set something in motion that could never be taken back, no matter how hard they could all pretend they hadn't moved.

Hands withdrew from his pockets (penny left behind), clasping in a loose weave of fingers as he rested his elbows and forearms on his knees. If he was the nervous type, the kind prone to anxiety (and not so much exasperation), he might have been wringing his hands. Ichigo exhaled once, in a long, drawn out blow of city-air between his lips, and tilted his head sideways enough to look at her.

“I understand how ‘sick’ functions as a metaphor here, Rukia,” he returned, far more casually (calmly) than he thought it’d come out. No, he wasn’t fucking retarded, but he wouldn’t completely discount the possibility that Orihime had made herself physically ill over the whole thing. “If she’s hurtin’, you know, it might be more likely because I don’t love her.” And those words had bite, vinegar and lime poisoning the syllables. For once he could see beyond himself in the scheme of things, but if there was hurt, it likely lay with him. With the unconditional affection she’d offered. But anger--well, maybe that was something entirely different.

“What you’re tellin’ me, is that you didn’t trust me enough to know what I wanted,” came the slow drawl, halfcocked brow, “right? You think that I’d...just change my mind, huh?” Because the fact of the matter remained that he wouldn’t, and this just blurred all the other lines. Pieces? Having two friends, who were already in a fairly tight circle, start dating threw off the dynamic automatically. Putting something like this out in the open? Well.

"You are an idiot." she snapped, frown as sudden and sharp as the words (no affectionate tone to the insult, now). The jolt of her hands against his arm was less shoving him, more of an attempt to push herself away. Ended up with the determined prying of each finger from his shirt instead, having found herself clinging by accident. "She has been hurting over your lack of response to her feelings for years, that's hardly anything new." Love -- she didn't feel capable enough to use that word correctly. Whatever Orihime felt, Rukia thought it had more to do with fantasies than any real sense of what Ichigo was. Loving an idea. And she hadn't expected him to declare undying devotion the moment she opened her mouth, maybe just notice that little spark of potential. Or doubt.

"What I have done wrong is to make her admit it. I've been keeping a promise to her for months and watching her barely keep it herself, do you understand how it is to see straight through someone?" She had told Rukia she would be fine, and Rukia had not believed it for one second, but accepted it and trusted that the act would be maintained well enough. Pretence being something she knew better than most, it surprised her to find what a transparent thing it was when left in someone else's hands. To the point where she could not even pretend not to notice. "But it was not my place to push her daydreams into something real, or judge whether her idea of living was life at all. It is not even my place to imagine that you might want to know that she holds herself back from whatever she could be because of you. In the end all I wanted was for you to know. It isn't about trust, Ichigo, I wouldn't blame you. But I would have blamed myself forever if you found out too late."

Finally freeing herself, one hand knitted into her hair instead, dragging stray black bangs behind her ear as she stood up. "We are not usual, do you know that? This is not usual, it is not how other people do things. I read these scripts, watch movies, things that are supposed to be a reflection of real life, and I barely recognise it. I think maybe I should have practiced this, with other people, with anyone who didn't mean... who was not you. But that would have been the problem. Still I have to point out that we are not the standard, here." a couple of steps down from him, her voice carried back over her shoulder, eyes following the road until it was cut off by darkness and distance.

"And you could have that. She thinks you're a prince, Ichigo. She's easy to be with, isn't she? Wouldn't confuse you or drive you insane or leave you threatening to garrotte yourself with the guitar wire. She isn't demanding. Everybody says how warm and open she is, I don't think there's a single person within a five mile radius she doesn't consider a friend. How can I compare with that person? The only people who call me warm are morons, you know that."

Rukia hadn't heard Orihime profess her love to be unconditional, but knew she could say no such thing for herself. Any kind of closeness came with conditions, for her. The will to gradually work through her long list of don'ts. Don't crowd me. Don't push, I will not move at any speed but my own. Don't touch me. Don't look too close.

A firm set of rules to ensure that she remained alone. He was beginning to bend every one.

"She's angry with me because I can't give you what she can, and how can I fault her for that? I cannot even let her live vicariously, I am nothing she wants to be. She wants to live for you, I can't do that. I can't make my life about you, I am quite content so long as you are in it, and that is all. Don't feel that you have to be what you are to me, I can let you go, but I'll never forgive you if you make me lose you." There. Permission. His choices didn't have to be set by her wants, she wasn't asking him to make her happy. Rukia was far better at pretence than Orihime, she could just be the friend.

"I can't take care of you the way she keeps asking, or give her the fairytale she thinks you should have." and of course Ichigo's happiness was all that was important to Orihime. Ichigo, Tatsuki, her friends. Rukia was unsure how much she had ever fit in to that category, or just how long she had been the one thing standing in the other girl's way. "I know you have called me a princess before, Ichigo, but not any disney variety. I'm not fit for her prince."

Had he said one word, during all of that? Rukia had not looked to see if he was even trying, but glanced round now, sinking to a lower step and allowing space for some other word to slip in edgewise between hers. Looked up at him, apologetic. "It's not about trust at all. I just wanted you to know that there are other kinds of stories."

The cold sensation creeping into his loosely gathered fingers and the nauseous drop in his stomach felt strangely familiar--though this time, it was tempered with a curl of his lips, a muscle working in his jaw when he ground his teeth and knew well enough not to interrupt her. Oh, no, this was good. Here she was, outlining everything he’d managed to sum up earlier with you don’t trust me. He kept his lips sealed, head low (no immediate words leaping to his tongue)-made sure he didn’t dispute.

The silence. Ichigo measured the length of each breath as he listened, posture relaxed and wondering how the fuck, exactly, he was supposed to respond to that. No words, still. Nothing that wouldn’t damage things irreparably and catch her before she could run. There was only the rush of occasional cars, the wail of an ambulance in the distance. The TV, faint, from indoors. Orihime had said love. In this kind of light, it was hard to tell. Not when he couldn’t place his finger on whether her words were urging him to do what he wanted because she didn’t care enough or that he should do what he wanted because she wanted him happy.

He might have cried (tears of frustration) if not for the quiet center of anger behind his sternum. In the end, unsure of where or how to answer, what to reply to and what to casually file away (fucking ridiculous) for later (leave, but I won’t forgive you), he only came up with seven, one syllable words. Ichigo could have pared it down to three, but that voice wouldn’t work either. Not when it would send her running in the same direction that all the cold words he’d stored would.

“What do you want me for, then?” he remarked, tone chilled, head raising to follow after. No sarcasm. Because what was the whole fucking point? That he was supposed to be with Orihime? That he was supposed to be pissed (was) about how Rukia’d forced her hand? Forced him to consider? I never asked for normalcy. Ichigo waited for the nothing.

The default answer, simple, vague, entirely unrevealing, would have been more than a kick in the teeth. So maybe she should have used it, told him she didn't know (and not that she just didn't understand), and let him go. This being the difference she had tried to explain, letting go was something she could choose, allow. Losing him another matter entirely. That was unforgivable. Rukia had not so selfish a heart that she could not consider giving things up for their own good (he would be better off with 'Hime), factor in a little self-preservation and walking away seemed like the best option all round.

"I just want you." came the response, though. And how it had come to be that way, and why were left unsaid. She had never been able to ignore him, this boy with his stupidly bright hair and far too many buttons reading DO NOT PRESS for her to be able to resist. The quiet intensity that she could feel, all the time. That never went away even when he was yelling about nothing. He'd amused her, the way he couldn't not react even when he knew that was what she was digging for. He'd unsettled her hugely, the only one who saw a little more than the image she projected, a little too much for comfort. And he'd challenged her, wouldn't back down even when he was thoroughly beaten and one more kick might break a rib. Meeting him was startling, scalding water in a lukewarm life.

"Does there have to be a purpose? I just do." and she honestly couldn't think of much more she wanted than what he already gave. Perhaps she'd rather sleep beside him every night, or most of them. There were more reasons why she shouldn't want him -- the way he was pulling apart her walls, piece by piece. Deconstruction. In actor’s terms it was vital to break the character down to it's base elements before attempting to build the whole. He was working backwards. She shouldn't want him because he was the only one whose touch she didn't pull away from (had to force herself sometimes, not every shudder was pleasure, but therin lay the trust he wanted). Or because the way he kept on about listening made her think it might be safe to talk.

Maybe those were also the reasons she needed him. "It's frightening, sometimes. How much." She had never allowed herself so many feelings, before.

Now seemed the appropriate time to push, press hard the proverbial knife to her throat and not let go until he nicked her neck. But that seemed pretty cheap--getting answers under duress was a pretty shitty thing to do, and he knew that getting cornered only made one more apt to lash out. And so Ichigo swallowed instead, rubbing the pad of his thumb along his opposite hand (soft swathe of skin between index and thumb). Quiet, again.

The impact, here, was far different (though maybe not any more or less important) than what he’d been told a few night’s earlier. No rush of inescapable sadness, no feeling of being eternally unforgiven, helpless. Rukia’s relatively terse response was surprising in just that--it was hers, it was honest, and she’d been succinct. Maybe he was surprised at feeling so...resigned about it. Want, need, love, care, hate--all pretty euphemistic for really similar base emotional states. All the distanced each particular word was subtle nuance. If want was close to desire, at least, then he could live with that.

“...that’s a relief,” he breathed, exhaled almost, doing his best to fill the air before the silence blossomed in his chest again. Straightened his back, and tried to be flippant. “Because I guess I’d be pretty pissed if y’didn’t and I just went to the trouble of explainin’ to my dumbass father that I’m tryin’ to date you.” Date. Ugh, word choice, Kurosaki. That wasn’t what you said.

At any other time she might have accused him of trying to shut her up. It was certainly an effective way of stunning her into silence, looking up past him to the door against which Isshin was probably pressing a glass at this very moment. There had been one occasion upon which she left Ichigo's room only to find the bell of a stethoscope wedged under the door, earpieces trailing outside, and suspiciously innocent whistling carrying up the staircase. Doctors were sneaky.

And Ichigo told him? After he had asked her not to, and she had wondered at the necessity of the question, since she had neither a desire to advertise, nor wished to be bombarded with catalogues from 'petite' bridalwear specialists (a word she loathed. As though it was fine to insult someone so long as it was in a foreign language. Ces bâtards condescendents), handy notes scrawled in the margin as to which dress she might prefer.

Bare knees pressing into the edge of her step, she turned the bemused look fully back onto him. Lowered her voice, as if now it was suddenly vital that they not be overheard. "Why is it so quiet? Ichigo, if I go back in there and there are balloons... I am not going home with confetti in my hair." Perhaps they were co-ordinating a cheer, or Isshin simply was not yet done sobbing and clutching at his manly bosom. Whatever, there was always a lull before the storm. She hesitated, other implications of what he'd said that might be more important slowly seeping through the initial panic.

Byakuya knew. Save Ichigo investing in a parachute or getting some serious soundproofing work done, that had been largely unavoidable. The Kurosaki's had no reason to find anything out by accident. "What made you change your mind?" she asked, still quiet, failing to follow the question up with the inevitable 'and couldn't you have done so before I made a fool of myself?'. His family. That was some kind of reassurance.

“S’probably quiet ‘cause my Dad’s in a food coma.” Casual, eye-askance banter was a whole lot easier than trying to discuss feelings and the implications of said feelings. Any more intensity like earlier and he’d be digging himself an early grave with what could possibly fly out of his mouth. “Either that, or he asphyxiated outta joy and I’ll find his body in the living room later.” Dead in the living room. Ha ha.

Ichigo glanced up from his hands, eyes narrowing automatically to find hers. Torn between honesty or more made up garbage that’d just keep the cycle of we’re-lying-to-each-other going. She was right, sort of. Their relationship was pretty fucked up--he could’ve mentally compiled a list of why, but having themed almost-sexual encounters had to be up there.

With a scuff of his heels against the concrete stoop, he shuffled ungainly to his feet (hands tucking back into his pockets with a shove; fingers meet penny, promise of something more). “I needed to feel like shit was solid.” That telling his Dad, really telling Dad, was somehow making real all of the sum-total ridiculousity of...whatever they had. Like telling family would validate what was going on his head. For whatever it was worth.

It was a credit to Isshin that he’d gotten the message the first time.

"I did too." she returned, almost contrite. So he built on what they had while she was busy shaking it to the foundations, just to find out what was left standing. There was really no need to tell him what an idiot she felt (though he might have appreciated the turnabout). There were still reasons that she thought what had been said was important, maybe she wasn't the only one who needed the answers in order to move on, but it was never her call to make. She should have told him about her feelings, not tried to work around that in favour of Orihime's more open emotion.

Gaze following as he stood (the only person she knew who could slump upward), she gave up the attempt to keep eye contact in favour of not falling backward off her own step. Waited a moment, still somehow expecting streamers, flash photography, a last ditch attempt to fill the pages of the photo album that included more interesting bruises than first dates and dances.

The silence remained resolutely uninterrupted. She gave in. "Charming as the view of your navel is, Ichigo, would you please come down here? These steps might actually lend balance to the equation if you weren't insistent on towering. Why must you tower? You are not a monument, I have not come here to gaze up at you in admiration. I will not be buying postcards for the folks back home." hands went to her hips, chin tilted up just slightly (still not quite enough). "...And you've been too far away all day."

How the fuck did she think that practically wrecking everything was SEEING IF SHIT WAS SOLID? Christ. A lingering unease crept into his limbs, but it might’ve been the stiffness of sitting out with no coat or anything in the still kinda chilly evening air. Who knew, these days. Maybe all the running was fucking his joints. Shit happened. Clearly.

With a slow, feet-dragging deliberateness (sure, make her think it’s some kinda effort), he slipped down the rest of the stairs and glared. Down his nose. It’d been easy enough up on the top step, but even here, she was still short. Midget. Dwarf. Gnome. “Admirin’ is a whole lotta lookin’,” he explained matter-of-factly, trying to push the uncertainty, the feeling that he still didn’t know what to think from his head, “and no touchin’. Seems like a dumb idea to me anyway. Though I imagine I’d make a pretty good postcard.”

And there--he couldn’t help it. Ichigo tossed a narrowed glance over his shoulder to watch the window, check the sway of the curtains. Isshin had been business with him, but that didn’t mean that the moment the door swung open he wouldn’t do something absolutely retarded. Like offer sex tips or demand grandkids or burst into song (or any number of things). But when the curtains remained still (still enough, old man, if you wanna watch, then fuckin’ watch), he deemed it reasonably safe enough to duck his head and kiss her forehead.

Any more bending and he was gonna get a cramp in his neck.

"That was my point exactly." Although not really the part about the postcard, and not the almost chaste brush of lips to brow that made her feel oddly like his little sister (Yuzu was taller than her now). Edging forward, elbows jutting out awkward for a moment, like she had forgotten how this worked, she let her arms settle round his waist. Ducked her head to lean against him, dark crown just below the curve of his shoulder.

Not quite a prelude to an apology. She had made one to Orihime, but never specified what for because there were things she couldn't quite regret and didn't know how to make right, either. Rukia didn't make grand gestures, not in personal issues. Somehow the size of the statement lessened the thought behind it, overcompensating for a lack of sincerity. She just didn't know whether silence would be taken as lack of care. Things were so much easier when she was never wrong, with luck this week could be counted as a momentary lapse in an otherwise flawless record. "You can yell at me if you want. Honestly, I will allow you one free shout, where I will sit with my arms folded and do nothing but nod at the appropriate moments. You could perhaps indicate these with a signal, just so I can be sure."

Ichigo shook his head with a rueful sort of smirk ghosting across his lips before it disappeared again. What was the point of taking a free shout when he could go around shouting all he wanted anyway? Stupid girls. He could’ve used her as an armrest, but thought better of it (mostly) when her arms settling derailed him again. So much simple, stupid shit, and he could barely cope with it--though probably not for the same reasons she shied away from excess show-of-liking. They were on the street, for chrissake.

“Ain’t gonna shout at you,” yet, “I mean, seriously, Rukia, y’want everyone in my fuckin’ house comin’ out here to find out why I’m makin’ a ruckus?” That, he thought, would probably start up a whole lecture on domestic abuse, a fist fight (irony?), and then a bunch of ridiculous cow-towing to Rukia that would, inevitably, piss him off more. This vaguely humbled slip of a girl was sort of a nice change--for a little while. Ichigo battled down a sudden rush of furious affection (shit he shouldn’t say, shouldn’t do) and casually threw one arm around the narrow breadth of her shoulders. “Just fuckin’ kiss me before we gotta go back inside and say goodbye to those cats for real.”

He’d wanted to add and mean it in the middle of that sentence somewhere. Ichigo ducked his head and took over anyway.

Well obviously she hadn't meant now, although Ichigo was hardly a stranger to PDPRs (public displays of pointless rage), laying into her outside his own front door would hardly give the right impression. Where right was taken to mean good and not technically correct, anyway. They hadn't even agreed on an appropriate nodding signal -- she thought it would have to be something simple, like shaking his fist, so as not to spoil the flow. No, she meant it as a token, a coupon that he could cut out and keep, valid for one good spleen venting without repercussions.

And then, damn him, he came up with the better course of action again. She wasn't admitting to this one, tilting her head up and kissing back like it was her idea.

The stairs could have been put to better use, a couple of steps up and things could level out, saving the craning of necks, the way she had to grip onto his shoulders to keep him set in place. Instead she wound up with one foot twisted in sideways against the next level up, used as leverage while the toes of the other foot were practically making ballet points. Just meant she had to hold tighter. Excuses, excuses. Pressed her mouth to his like somehow she could make up for all the gaps between, distance, things unsaid. Thought maybe later she'd say a few more sorries in the same way, private.