Pairing: Grimmjow Jaegerjaquez x Ichigo Kurosaki
Music: I'm Yours, by The Script
Word count: ~ 2,400
Rating: M
Prompt 9: Connections
"Five months, Grimm," Ichigo crossed his arms and leaned against the doorframe, scowling at the man in front of him. "It's been five months. What could you possibly want now?"
Grimmjow shifted uncomfortably, eyes flickering to the side and then back. He rubbed at the back of his neck with one hand, a nervous gesture that sent a pang of familiarity through Ichigo's heart. He fixed his scowl more firmly in place and shut out all thoughts of sapphire eyes and summer-sky hair, loud, full laughter and sharp white grins full of darting humor. That wasn't his anymore.
They weren't a they anymore.
Grimm finally looked up from his meticulous study of the doormat and met Ichigo's eyes, the blue hesitant and a bit wary. It almost broke Ichigo's heart to see that look on his normally confident face, but he was saved from doing anything—and making a fool of himself—when Grimmjow said quietly, "I wanna take you back, Ichi."
He was, Ichigo thought, quite justified in slamming the door in Grimmjow's face.
As he turned the lock with petty glee, his roommate glanced up from the couch, raising an eyebrow at him. "Problems, Berry-tan?" he drawled.
Ichigo waved away his concern, ignoring the pounding on the door. "Fuck off, Shuuhei."
The scarred brunet snorted, shrugged, and went back to killing zombies. "Geez, what bit you in the ass?"
"Nothing," Ichigo practically snarled, stalking towards the kitchen and the curry he could already smell starting to burn. He didn't look back at the door, and the knocking faded after a few moments.
"Hm. You know, that might be your problem." Shuuhei risked a glance up at him and grinned. "You really need to get laid, Berry-tan." Without seeming to put out any effort, he ducked the saucepot that came flying at his head, missed by a hair, and clanged into the wall, then rolled dejectedly to his feet. He just rolled his eyes and sighed. "That wasn't dinner, was it? It's still your turn to cook, even if you ruin something while you're having your temper tantrum."
He wasn't quite so lucky with avoiding the next shot, and the wooden spoon cracked into the back of his skull, forcing out a sharp yelp. In the kitchen, Ichigo smirked in satisfaction and re-crossed his arms, glaring at the wounded look Shuuhei shot him.
"And that—" Ichigo jerked his head at the closed door, answering the silent question that still hung between them "—would be the reason why I haven't. Any questions?"
"Ohhh." Shuuhei grimaced, looking back at the TV screen only to see that his character had died. He dropped the controller with a sigh and looked at Ichigo again. "Bad breakup?"
"You have no idea." Ichigo sighed and rolled his shoulders to ease the tension in them, uncertainty already beginning to claw at his gut. "He was the one who left me, and now he says he wants to take me back? Bastard!" He spun on his heel and stalked back to the stove, adjusting the heat and fiddling uselessly with the pot. "And what the hell did I ever do to give him the impression that I wanted him back?"
Shuuhei watched him, head cocked to one side. "So that was the jerk-ass you were ranting about while I was in England? The contractor guy?"
Ichigo rolled his eyes at Shuuhei's juvenile name-calling and jerked his head in a brief nod, busying himself with cleaning up. "Yeah. Grimmjow. Bastard. He just up and kicked me out of the apartment, told me an ex of his was coming back into the neighborhood and he wanted to see if things would work out between them again."
"Ahh," Shuuhei said with an air of great enlightenment. "Hence why you showed up out of the blue the day I got back and asked to crash on the couch."
"Like you can't afford it, you rich moron," Ichigo scoffed. "And I pay you rent, too! And do the chores!"
"Only half of them," Shuuhei defended, wandering over to the breakfast bar. "And it's not like you can't afford it, either, Mr. 'I'm-a-Computer-Programmer-For-a-Top-IT-Company.' And you could have just gotten your own place."
The redhead cast him a faux-besotted glance and fluttered his lashes. "Oh, Shu," he cooed in a breathy falsetto, "but then I wouldn't be able to see your captivating face each day. I'd die!"
They managed to remain straight-faced for all of seven seconds before bursting into snickers. Ichigo dropped the pot of curry and a pair of bowls and spoons onto the table, and they dug in, the ex's visit pushed down until they could safely ignore it.
The atmosphere lightened, and Ichigo pretended that he couldn't feel regret and sorrow and longing all roiling in his stomach. Shuuhei pretended that he didn't notice the fact that Ichigo only picked at his food, because he was a friend, and that was what friends did.
"You're a moron."
Grimmjow winced at the first words out of his sister's mouth. Now he was wishing that she hadn't come along for moral support—or, since she had come, that she had at least waited down in the lobby. Instead, she leaned against the wall near the elevators, arms crossed over her sizable rack, sea-green hair up in a style that looked messy and simple and probably took hours to replicate. Her briefcase dangled from a crooked finger, the color complementing her neat cream business suit, one ridiculously high-heeled shoe tapping impatiently against the carpet. Grimmjow called them her fuck-me shoes and said they made her look like a stripper playing dress-up as a lawyer—or he had once. After that, she had nearly beaten his ass unconscious, and he had never mentioned it again, even if that was how he referred to them in his mind.
"But, Nel—" he started.
She cut him off with a raised hand. "Stop. I don't want to hear it. God, Grimm, you kicked him out, and now you expect him to go all gooey-eyed over 'I wanna take you back'? How stupid can you get? Gah!" She turned and smacked the call button for the elevator with a lot more force than necessary. "I hate men! I hate you! Why am I doing this again, when it's your own fault you guys broke up?"
Had his heart—and his life, because Nelliel was fucking scary—not been on the line, Grimmjow would have rolled his eyes. His sister, the lesbian. Not that he really cared, seeing as he was about as straight as a circle himself, but Nelliel managed to be a busty, walking, man-hating cliché sometimes. The only bigger one was her girlfriend, the tiny, tomboyish hard-ass Soi Fong.
"I choked," he admitted instead, because if this was going to work, he had to have Nel's help—or at least her sympathy. "Just…lost everything I was gonna say."
She arched one elegant eyebrow, as though asking if this was supposed to come as a surprise. "And I told you, did I not, that a head-on confrontation was probably the second-worst idea you'd ever had?"
"And the first?" Grimmjow muttered, not because he was really curious, but because some masochistic streak he'd been unaware of wanted to know where this whole thing fell on his list of fuck-ups. There were a lot of them.
That damning eyebrow went even higher. "Why, breaking up with Ichigo in the first place, of course."
Grimm winced. Even for her, she was being really damn fucking blunt tonight.
"Which," she continued before he could say anything in his own defense, "is why you are going to march right back down the hall, knock on the door like a normal person instead of a caveman trying to knock it down, and when Ichigo answers, you will apologize the way you should have the day you kicked him and tell him that you were too much of a damn sniveling coward to admit to how you felt. Understood?"
He was gaping. He knew it, too. After several blank moments, though, he was able to re-hinge his jaw and splutter, "What? But didn't you just say—?"
Again, Nel cut him off, her smile terrifyingly sweet. "As I said, your biggest mistake was letting him go. All others pale in comparison. Now march, mister."
When his sister got that gleam in her eye, come hell or high water, the world would bow to her wishes.
Grimmjow marched.
The apartment door felt ridiculously intimidating, as did the thought of seeing Ichigo's narrowed eyes and dark frown, just barely covering the gaping wound that Grimm just knew he had made. Ichigo had crashed into his life like a freighter on fire, upending his bachelor-play-boy lifestyle and showing him just how good two people could be together. Grimmjow had never known someone so stubborn, fearless, fierce, beautiful, and breathtaking. During their time together—and even now, he couldn't believe that it was only seven months, out of his entire life: it felt like a thousand times more, as though there was never a time before Ichigo literally tumbled into his lap while he was waiting for his coffee—during the seven months they were a they, Grimmjow had fallen hard. It was a first for him. He liked sex, liked pretty boys hanging off his arm, liked being the one to sweep a prospective fuck off his feet and leave him reeling.
But with Ichigo, it didn't work like that. The redhead had his own mind, and a hellfire temper whenever anyone tried to change it. Ichigo didn't get swept off his feet. He scoffed at Grimmjow's smoothest attempts, laughed at his pick-ups, and ignored his advances. And then, just when Grimmjow thought all was lost, he turned it around and asked Grimmjow out to dinner.
Even now, Grimmjow smiled at the memory, shaking his head. Ichigo was a maddening, infuriating spitfire, contrary to the point of ridiculousness, and Grimmjow had gone tumbling head-over-heels within a month. Before that, he'd been the first to turn tail and run whenever a partner said those dreaded three words, but then he'd become an insecure bastard, all but panicking because Ichigo had never mentioned, even in passing, that what they had was going to be a long-term thing.
And so Grimmjow had done what he did best.
He'd run, tail tucked between his legs and pride in tatters, kicking Ichigo out with some lie he could only half-remember and retreating to lick his wounds in peace.
But the connection between them was too strong to deny, and Grimmjow was tired of suffering every day without Ichigo by his side. So, steeling himself, he lifted a hand and rapped smartly on the door.
The dishes were done, the kitchen was spotless, and Shuuhei had retreated to his room with a book that was probably hiding his latest porn mag. He was a pervert like that—but really, what other kind of person would tattoo their favorite sexual position on their cheek? Sure, he claimed it was the jersey number of his soccer idol, but Ichigo knew him well enough to know that was only a convenient excuse.
Still, the book and/or magazine would keep him occupied for the rest of the night, so Ichigo was on his own.
With a sigh, he flopped down on the couch, dropping an arm over his eyes. On his own with thoughts of Grimmjow. Wonderful. The only one he'd never gotten over, here and in the flesh and more gorgeous than ever.
It wasn't fair.
He had dated a lot, before Grimmjow. But he'd never, never been serious about anyone, until the stupidly handsome, eternally aggravating blue-haired wonder caught him just in time to prevent him from diving headfirst into the tiles in a local coffee shop. That had changed everything.
He had, stupidly and irreversibly, fallen in love with Grimmjow, and now he could never go back.
Even after being kicked out, on the very day that he had decided to tell Grimmjow exactly how much he meant to Ichigo, that feeling—that connection—still remained. He loved Grimmjow, and he quite possibly always would.
"You're a brooding idiot!" Shuuhei suddenly called from the depths of his room. "I can tell from in here that you're moping! Go after him already! Beat him up, demand an explanation, kiss it better, and get laid! Please! I'm begging you!"
Ichigo opened his mouth to tell him to fuck off—the usual response to one of Shuuhei's not-so-brilliant ideas, which had gotten them into more than one tight spot over the years—but then paused, the suggestion taking root before he could dismiss it out of hand.
Maybe…maybe it would actually work.
A firm knock sounded at the door, just this side of hurried, and Ichigo glanced at first it, then Shuuhei's room in surprise. Then, with a small smile that hovered between nervousness and anticipation, he got up to answer it.
"Grimm," he said as he pulled it open.
"Ichigo," Grimmjow answered, "can we talk?"
After one more moment of internal struggle, Ichigo gave in and threw the door open wide.
"Sure," he said with a brief nod. "Come on in."
The door closed behind them with a soft click, and in the hall, Nel smiled to herself, sauntering off down the hall even as her phone beeped, indicating that a text had been sent.
Shuuhei flipped open his phone and smiled at the message there.
Mission accomplished. Thanks for the help! :D
"My pleasure, ma'am," he murmured, sprawling over his bed and grinning up at the ceiling. "'Bout time he got laid, anyway."