Good At Life

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Summary: Sometimes he didn't know when to leave things alone. Sometimes you have to pick at the scar in order to discover what's beneath.

The state of drunkenness was the ultimate goal of the drinker. He had come to that conclusion long ago and he was one to know. Kyouraku Shunsui was well acquainted with the effects of alcohol both on himself and those he partied with most often. He enjoyed it himself, the stumbling gait, the slurred speech, and the lowered judgment. Ever since his academy days, the late nights, the fumbled sparring matches, the sweaty nights with strange women. Life had been a party and for a great number of years that party train had kept on rolling.

Not that he was the same now as then, he thought lazily. Drunkenness was no longer the same as it had been in his younger years. No longer did he wake up in unfamiliar places with unfamiliar women. Usually he ended up in his Captain quarters with fairly familiar women… and then Nanao would burst in the door, rip open his curtains, and very rudely reacquaint him with reality.

Ah, Nanao-chan: the cause of his stirring introspection.

He'd been thinking of her since the previous evening. A celebration for one thing or another ultimately led to the consumption of alcohol. The office-party, as it was, had been an optimal affair. She had declined coming.

He could've made her. He could've required her presence; it would have taken little more than an official order on his part. Despite that knowledge, he'd released her. With his full consent, she'd slipped away after office hours ended and retreated to her home where, ultimately, she would indulge in a dinner, a silly novel, and bed.

There was one thing he knew with absolute certainty.

Ise Nanao did not drink.

It was a quality he'd thought at first odd. Nearly all shinigami in the academy drank. It was an official pastime of the students. Certainly, not all had his tolerance, but then he hadn't his own tolerance back in the academy days.

She never struck him as a woman to hold her liquor though… It had all been rather honest fun. A curiosity he wanted sated. Some things, he never learned, were best left alone. So, he'd poked and prodded her until, eventually, he got his way. They'd spent the night together at a bar, a quiet nondescript place away from the others. Some dingy little place in one of the outlying districts that she had chosen. He didn't question what she may have been doing in such a run-down neighborhood at the time. He'd agreed to the place; it had been the only way he could cajole her into going and he'd wanted it.

It had been a thing of great fun. The fantasy of having Nanao with him at a bar, her hair loosened, her judgment dimmed… he'd salivated over it. He'd expected laughs and pranks and…fun.

It had been hot that night. Summer had set in. He recalled vividly how the sweat had made his uniform slick to his back and chest. She'd been in the same condition as they stepped into the bar, squirming against her own clothes. Inside was even warmer than out and it was dim. Little unscented candles were on the tables. Together, both donned in their black shinigami uniforms had sneaked into a back corner amongst the quiet murmur of conversation. None of the patrons had spared them a glance.

Anonymity amongst strangers.

With barely concealed excitement, he'd ordered their first bottle. She drank daintily. She reminded him of a schoolmarm with the way she spoke and walked and drank.

A lightweight.

The classification had assailed him before even her third glass. He, admittedly, drank most of the first bottle. The night wore, the first bottle fell. More to his consumption than hers, but she was loosing. He saw it. It was like a piece of paper curling around its edges when exposed to flame.

The way she held her cup changed. The delicate fingers curled around the cup were no longer tight. The small sips were becoming mouthfuls. What at first had been complaints about the flavor had begrudgingly become an acceptable taste.

The single word answers were becoming lengthy. Details he couldn't pry from her despite his greatest efforts were now released with increasingly easy questions. Her life before academy, her habits, her likes, her dislikes, her men

Each tale of a former paramour made his stomach turn a bit more. Names he'd never heard before were paraded before him, each one leaving a chink in precious Nanao-chan's armor. People she would never see again who had changed her irrevocably. His fun was vanishing in front of him.

Ise Nanao was falling apart.

The seventh glass brought a flush to her cheeks. A precarious tipsiness overcame her normally steady hands. More than once her glass sloshed and the liquid spilled. Her freely given responses to his queries were becoming harsh. She was responding with defensiveness. Rudeness touched her tongue and her better manners got away from her as curses he'd always thought beneath her assailed him from her direction.

The distinction of her ninth glass was marked by the appearance of their waitress. The thin woman with the seductive smile had been eyeing him all night and in his usual manner, he'd flirted wildly. Nanao had watched him with little comment at first, but gradually her views had become more open. Nanao's confidence evaporated. He'd always thought her so secure, so competent, so good at life…

"So what are you doing later?"

An absent comment by the unfortunate waitress. The cold unaffected veneer disappeared. Quicker than he anticipated, Nanao had the collar of the waitress' uniform and before he could interfere she had struck the woman's face to the table.

Nanao's ninth glass got them kicked out of the bar. Sitting in the street, he remembered the blood. The cold rage in Nanao's eyes… the broken nose of the waitress… the blood… watching Nanao fall in the street… watching her cry against the building.

The hurt she held deep down, hidden away… Too many things he'd never known. Her fears, her inadequacies, her desperation…

An encompassing, hulking feeling overcame him as they left that night. A desire to protect, to watch, to hold, to soothe away all the little cracks he'd never known were there…

He'd ended up carrying her home. With her face curled against his chest, she sobbed, she apologized. Her personal quarters, open to him for the first time revealed nothing startling as they returned to the Division barracks. He unfolded her futon and tucked her in.

He didn't see her again until late the next afternoon. There were rings beneath her eyes and she was ashen. She claimed ignorance of the previous evening's actions after he asked. The downcast direction of her eyes and the delicate bloom of shame on her cheeks told the lie. He didn't push and she didn't argue.

Never again did he push her to drink. So earlier, when Matsumoto had come in and tried to convince her, he'd done what that prickly instinct had told him. He defended her, curling one heavy arm down over her narrow shoulders as Matsumoto watched.

"My precious Nanao-chan has been working extra hard lately. She deserves the night off."

There had been no effective argument for Matsumoto to offer and moments later they had been alone again. When he made to move, to withdraw the arm over her shoulders that had crushed her tiny frame up to his side, she surprised him.

Nanao moved fastest when he wasn't expecting it. Her hand came up, her tiny fingers curling in the fabric at his wrist. Turning just slightly, she pressed her cheek to his chest, her eyelashes fanned down. For a long moment, neither said anything. No one had to. They both knew the reason she wouldn't be attending.

Again, he was moved to defend her, to protect the pride of this wounded lady. This tiny slip of female roused feelings in him that hadn't been so powerful since his days in his youth. Her fingers fell from his wrist and she was gone, her quiet footsteps retreating down the hallway.

No one ever said drunkenness was beautiful.