They would lay side by side each night in the tiny rundown shack where they lived together, clutching at the single blanket they owned, and clinging to one another. And as they grew older and matured, they began to make love each night in that tiny shack, and later still in Rans room in Seireitei; where officially only Ran lived, but where Gin still slept each night. But no words were ever exchanged, they both felt it was not needed. The change in their relationship had flowed naturally, and it felt perfectly normal to do so, almost a feeling of 'well of course we became lovers, what else could we possibly do'. Because she loved him, and he loved her, but there was no need for words, no confessions were exchanged, that wasn't their way. They just knew, so the words were never spoken.
Looking back now, Ran wept bitterly. "I should have told him I loved him, every day, every minute. Then maybe he would know that he was my whole world, and he wouldn't have left me." She fell to the cold floor, tears running down her face. Her body curled into a tight ball around the bottle of sake that was increasingly becoming her constant nightly companion, used to fill the void left by her former one. She always used to worry when he would go off and leave her, which he was prone to do from time to time. She would sit around, waiting and worrying about whether he would return, hating not knowing. But now, looking back, she found that painful worrying to be so much preferable to the feeling of truly knowing that he wouldn't return. "Gin!" She cried out between sobs.
Deep in the heart of Los Nochos Gin jerked his head around, his hand unwillingly going to his heart, his eyes opening briefly and his smile faltering. "Ran" he whispered to the empty room, his voice pained, his eyes staring off at someone who wasn't there. His moment of weakness was short, before he instantly brought his face back to its usual expression. He sighed, but no further words crossed his lips. After all he had never been able to find the words before and now it was long past the time when words could change anything.
There were no words to fix everything, to bring them back to the beloved times when every minute was spent together, and every night they clung to one another for warmth and comfort. At that time words truly weren't needed, they had understood one another perfectly, loved one another completely. But time is cruel, while the love they had stayed strong, understanding had fled. It hadn't seemed to matter at first. They blindly believed that as long as there was love it would work itself out somehow. But the gap continued to grow, and now even with all the love in the world they couldn't make it work. They had never exchanged words about their relationship, blindly assuming that their feelings alone would be felt and therefore their intentions understood. Gin wondered if it would have mattered. If they had said the words, sworn vows of love to one anther, would it have changed anything. Or would the words not really have mattered, perhaps the problem wasn't really that they had never said the words. The real problem was that there weren't really any words, that could change who they were, or where they were. Even words of love couldn't bridge the differences between them. Even if she had told him she loved him, she would still be herself, unable to follow him into the dark, unable to come with him here. And even if he had told her he loved her, he couldn't have continued to live in the light with her, he couldn't have stayed by her side. So perhaps it was better to say no words at all.