A/n: So this is a drabble, a bit of crack and it's really short but I hope you find it amusing! It got taken down from because I rated it K+ and I suppose they wanted it rated T. Gah, so troublesome. I don't think I'll be posting there again anytime soon! Anyway enjoy!
I do not own Bleach.
Just Children
It seemed disrespectful to him that shinigami that had been under his tutelage for over a hundred years made to hide certain aspects of their lives from him as if they would go by completely overlooked. Yamamoto-soutaichou was a skilled and experienced fighter, a righteous but kind leader and an example to all shinigami that served Seiretei and swore their loyalty to it. He also was extremely perceptive, especially where interpersonal relationships within Seireitei were concerned. He could understand younger shinigami in their early years in the academy trying to slip by without being noticed but he had thought that the members of the Gotei 13 would not be so foolish as to behave in a similar fashion. The lengths of discretion they went to so not to make the nature of same-sex relationships with subordinates from their own division or among the same rank clear were abysmal at best. This sort of affair was not forbidden in Seireitei and the soutaicho could not remember ever having stated otherwise, so long as they understood that duty came first.
As preposterous as the idea of them playing him for a fool and thinking that it was actually working seemed, it could not even compare to the betrayal and disappointment he felt as he settled for dinner on this peaceful summer evening. Every last Sunday of every month, it had been established since their academy days that Ukitake Jyuushirou and Kyouraku Shunsui would join him. Not only were they his oldest pupils, they were also the first he had ever appointed in the position of captain and the ones that he held closest to his heart. Something about them reminded him of his youth and he had felt a connection to them akin to that of a father and his children from the day he had first come across them.
As Kyouraku and Ukitake settled on the dinner table, one across the other next to him, he decided to let the evening play out before he confronted them with what he knew was going on between them. Minutes into a light and very vague conversation which had habitually started with Shunsui complimenting the very expensive wine, Yamamoto Genryusai was able to notice things that had perhaps been happening right under his nose all these years but were evident to his critical eye today, maybe because he was no longer a stranger to their affair. There was a glint in Shunsui's droopy eyes, a gentle grin on his lips as he propped his elbow on the table and rested the side of his face on his closed fist while he listened to Ukitake talk, nothing else existed but the white-haired man before him. Yamamoto had never seen Kyoraku so engrossed, not with women or while watching the cherry blossoms fall. Leave it to Seireitei's most renowned philanderer to fall for a man whose soul was pure and incorruptible, head so far over heels there was no sabotaging it.
At least Jyuushirou was more adept at pretending, he only locked eyes with Shinsui every once in a while though nothing could hide the gentle flush that brightened those cheeks. Yamamoto Genryusai mentally berated himself because if he really thought about it he could see how Kyoraku would be drawn to someone like Jyuushirou and it had nothing to do with his looks (well, maybe initially) and everything to do with his kindness and his virtuosity. Yamamoto Genryuusai had hoped that Jyuushirou would find someone that was...well not Kyoraku, his days as a scoundrel still fresh but then the elder thought of those endless nights Kyouraku spent by his sickbed, never getting as much as a minute of shuteye while he lay unconscious, nerves eating away at him and the soutaicho supposed that he could make do.
He sighs to himself as Ukitake continues to talk and Shunsui continues to watch him with the same amiable expression, wondering if in the future they had meant to tell him about them at all. He decides to give them the benefit of the doubt on that one, only because it was all parents ever did when they knew secrets that they were supposed to pretend they didn't.
Really, for all the claims they made about being adults, they still were just children.
End. Drabbles. Short, I know...