Dedicated to Vincent. Many know him as Vindictev. Sorry it's taken so long. Too many clashes in how I want it and how others said it should be. But it's finished know. I wanted to make it a chapter story but I didn't want to make you wait, either. So I might delve into the chapter scene at some point with anoter piece of work. So anyway, Happy Belated Birthday. Happy Valentines Day. Happy you're a wonderful friend and I love you so much. I hope you enjoy it. And to everyone else, spread the KaiRuki love. 3
"In another life, I would make you stay. So I don't have to say you were the one who got away." - Katy Perry
The station was crowded. So much so she could hear their heartbeats - the people sharing the train with her. They were all sporadic and quick, as if anticipating unwanted conversation. She wasn't one of them. She liked it here, twisted inside their paranoid thoughts and delusions of grandeur. She felt easy amongst the monotony. It was like a second home, here, pressed tight between an overly large man and a woman with darting eyes that spoke of her want to be elsewhere.
In this mass of hysteria and intrigue, she found peace. For she was the only humbled and patient being in the entire nation of people that littered this over-stuffed subway.
Large purple eyes soaked in her surroundings like sponge to water, mouth splayed in a smile that could be mistaken as mischief if anyone cared to pay attention to her. But they didn't, so it was overlooked. With that, she was perfectly fine. She was happy to go unnoticed and ignored. It suited her. Life under a microscope, forced to be something that she wasn't when eyes were fixed upon her was what dying would feel like. And most of the time, she was dying. Every strangled manner or bat of her lashes to customers that came and went from the small convenient store she worked for was more than she could take. The rope that tied tighter around her throat. One day, one more too wide smile and too cheerful greeting would be the noose in the end that took her humanity. What was left of it.
But for now, enveloped in people who had already lost theirs, she was content. Each thud of their hearts confirmed her happiness.
Thump. Thump. Thump. -bump.
She froze.
Ba-bump.
So it hadn't been a fluke in her hearing; in her accepting of the monotonous sounds and breaths of those in her environment. It was there. Growing louder. Stronger.
Ba-bump. Ba-bump. Baaaa-buuuump.
Foreign. A foreigner. Trespassing. They were infiltrating her world. How dare they. The spoils of her heaven.
Ba-bump. BA-BUMP.
She let out a soft gasp of surprise when an arm ran into her shoulders, nearly knocking her smaller form down.
"Oh boy, there I go again. I'm like a big ol' bear, always knockin' people down!"
A large palm extended towards her, offering to help her back to her feet and back to her reality of not existing. Chancing a look upwards, she stopped, hand open and hanging just over the foreign intruder's hand like a suspended charm.
A smile. It was so, so bright. "Hiya, nice to meet ya. I'm Kaien."
-This is where boy meets girl and life changes.-
It was a most profound and unnatural name. Kaien. Who would name their child such a thing? It was terrible. Too short and choppy. She didn't like it. And the way he came off, all loud and idiotic…who was this man?
He tugged her upwards and helped to brush her off, "About did a spell on you, knockin' you over so hard. Look at how damn small you are. Lucky I didn't break anything."
She blew pieces of misplaced hair from her eyes and cast him a look, almost challenging him to speak further.
He did.
"It's just so crowded in here. I hate comin' and goin' like this. Too many people fogging the place up with their heavy breathing and junk. Don't you hate it too?"
She certainly hated this.
"So…" Settling next to her with a long sigh and a shouldering to stand, he continued to invade her world. Here, where she was just her without having to be 'their' her, "Where ya headed?"
She must have taken far too long to answer because he spoke before she ever retorted, "I'm trying to get to the city's west side. I want to try out that new restaurant there. Have you heard of it? It's the ah…um…" Here he snapped his fingers over and over in an effort to remember, the noise piercing her hearing like a razor blade to skin.
Finally, after some time, he gave up, uttered some odd name, and laughed just a little, "I hope it's good."
"I'm sure it …will be."
"So, you never did say! Where are ya headed?"
Why was her destination of so much consequence to him? Couldn't he go about his life without knowing her plans for the day, the plans to further kill her humanity with another droll day of plastic smiles and false charm?
"Work," she told him flatly, hoping he would be more than satisfied with that answer.
"Ah, the ol' grind, huh? What is it you do for a living?"
"I'm in retail."
Here, for the first time since he had spoken to her, he took a pause. And it lingered. It lasted for a great while. Almost so long that it was a little unnerving. A man of such character typically wasn't silent for so long. That she did know.
"That doesn't suit you."
Peering up at him through her strand of bangs, she held her gaze with his. Who was he to simply say what she wasn't? What they all told her that she was? Who, who, who?
"I mean," He breathed, brushing his longer, unruly mane of black from his eyes in an effort to keep the conversation flowing, "-you don't strike me as that type of person. You really happy doing that sort of thing? Are you happy with your name on your tag and a smile on your face all day, even when you feel like just running away? Far away, until there's no more pavement and all there is happens to be grass and clouds so white and thick you're sure to suffocate from the sunny day?" Kaien took this moment to throw those teal eyes her direction, wrapping her inside molasses and trapping her, "Am I wrong?"
The small female heaved in a breath for guidance. Too much, too fast he had deciphered her. With only a few words that had been forcefully dragged from her chest to the open air and he had made her exact origin and being. She was tired. She was so terribly exhausted that even thinking about showering another undeserving person with her generosity was like poison slowly curdling away inside her veins.
"I….am. I just want to be myself for the rest of my life…not what 'they' deem me to be."
The towering man gave her an earnest nod and a smile that almost electrocuted her to the core, "You'll learn how to deal with that. Maybe not in this lifetime, but the next. I'm sure you'll find yourself some day."
He glanced upwards at the flashing words indicating their next stop before giving her hair a playful ruffle in spite of their newfound acquaintance, "Just remember kid," he murmured on, stepping out of the automatic doors, "Keep your heart open. You'll always find your way."
She stared after him, suddenly too cold for comfort. Too overwhelmed by the perfectly matched heartbeats still trapped inside the train. The same heartbeats that only moments before had been her sole reason for happiness. Taking a dramatic step his direction, she called out loudly over the whistle and bustle of new passengers boarding, "….Rukia!"
"Ah?"
Breathing in deep, air shuddering inside tightly constricted and nervous lungs, she shouted once more, "My name is Rukia."
Kaien tilted his head boyishly in response before throwing her a wink and a flick of his wrist in farewell, "And here I was goin' to call you midget." He snickered openly before tasting the way her name sounded, "I much prefer Rukia though."
And the doors to the subway closed.
"Do you think there's such a thing as star crossed lovers?"
"Huh?"
"Do you think there is or…is that just something that writers fill people's heads with?"
The hefty co-worker gave her a blatant expression of something akin to both boredom and unawareness, "I don't know, dude. What does it even matter?" He grumbled out, the pocks on his face taking up more of her focus than his actual response.
Rukia hefted a heavy sigh, "It doesn't. I'm just…asking."
"Got yourself a little crush there, Ru-Ru?"
"Don't call me that."
"You like it when people call you that."
No. No she didn't. She never had. But it made the customers and everyone around her so happy. She was never just Rukia. She was always Ru-Ru or 'girl'. Never herself.
At this she fell silent.
"You've been reading too many romance novels there, Ru-Ru. You know that stuff will rot your brain."
The bell rang as another customer came inside to disrupt her mental well-being once more. With a straightening of her shoulders and a locking of her jaw, she approached them with as much vigor as a child and the smile of a beauty queen, "Welcome! Anything I can help you with?"
It was weeks before she seen him again. Not that she had been looking with every step of her toes or beat of her blood. No. Not at all.
But there he was, peering up at a large sign in the middle of the city, simply content to stand and stare.
"It's you!" He beamed, teeth flashing and nearly blinding her.
She raised her hand in greeting, "You remember me."
"'Course I do," Kaien answered abruptly, as if he was offended by the mere notion of having forgotten such an important person, "You're Rukia."
Rukia. Rukia. He said it. He said the entire label from beginning to end. And with such a talent, as if it had been his mouth alone meant to harness and capture the wild creature from the very beginning of time. Long before she had ever been of consciousness and far before their unorthodox meeting in the subway. As if in some other life he had met her, owned her loyalty, and her name. It was….nice.
"That's me!"
He gave her a playful nudge of his elbow, the tattoo on his arm standing bright against his somewhat pale skin, "How could I forget someone I nearly demolished?"
She snickered, "You are a bit of an ape."
Kaien shrugged lazily, motioning down to his tall frame, "Comes with the territory, I guess. So! How was work? That's where you were going last time we spoke."
"It was…work."
"You quit yet?"
Rukia appeared quizzical, stomach rolling at the threat of such freedom but the fear of such uncertainty, "No."
"You will."
She paused, "Why do you keep saying that?"
The 'assailant' sighed as if trying to decide how to answer, "Like I said before…that's not who you are."
"You don't even know me!" She snapped, almost offended at his need to be so right over everything. He had only spoken to her once. For a mere matter of moments. That's it. How dare he know her so well. "How can you say things like you do?"
He pat his chest and gave her a twinkle from those unnatural eyes, "I just…know. It's here. Like…how to explain this…I feel it."
"Feel it?"
"Of course! The heart never lies, ya know. It knows things even you don't. Kinda like the ladies and their intuition. Just a fancy way of sayin' that they listen to their hearts. Plus…" He pointed to her large orbs, purple bright inside her small face, "In here…there's more. More than just retail."
Damn him and his way of explaining things. Did he have an answer for everything?
"How was the restaurant?" She finally asked him, tucking some hair safely behind her dainty little ear.
He gave a long, drawn out sigh and chuckled sheepishly, "Well, to tell ya the truth…I never went. Kind of got myself lost. But…" Kaien nodded to the sign looming above them, smirking, "This is it. Guess I just wasn't supposed to go until right now."
Rukia studied the place closely, stomach rumbling at the trays of dessert passing from waiter to patrons through her spot peering through the window.
"Hungry?"
"H-huh?"
He turned to her, leaning in so close that she was certain he was indeed just a little bit insane to invade someone's personal space so freely, "I asked if you're hungry. Wanna grab a bite?"
No, no, no, no, no.- "Sure."
So she joined him in dinner and listened to his various little quirks, trying to stomach each and every single one as some sort of heavy burden. But instead, he was fresh. New. He was normal. And most of all, he really seemed to enjoy her as she was. As Rukia.
The little things that he came up with, too. They were so outlandish and wrong that they couldn't help but be right. And so funny. She caught herself laughing and just genuinely smiling so much that for once, in a long time, her cheeks hurt long after they had departed.
Soon, much to her outward chagrin and inner excitement, they met frequently. The same restaurant. The same time. He was always standing there, waiting for her. For her. And he would smile that heart racing smile and greet her the same, "Hey Rukia. Long time no see."
No matter how long the time had been since their last encounter, he always missed her. In some odd way, that's what he was saying. She knew it. He just wasn't verbally telling her. But it was there in the way his eyes glinted over her features and framed her face fondly.
Months they continued on this trail until finally, after a day that proved to be the end of her retail career, she met him with soaked through lashes, tears still fresh against her irises.
"…Something's happened?"
She shook her head curtly, wiping at the evidence with the back of her arm angrily, "I quit my job."
Kaien listened to her vent for what she felt was lifetimes, all the while keeping his face peaceful and his eyes engaged. Like he was absolutely involved in everything pouring from her lips. He was listening to her. Feeling with her. Trying. Interested. He was interested….in her.
"Stop it."
He blinked as if being ripped from sort of reverie, mouth twitching just a hair, "What?"
"Stop it. Stop it right now."
"Stop…what?"
"Listening. Caring. Being here. Stop pretending like you want to hear what I have to say."
"I don't underst-"
"You've been a pain in my side since day one. Always stepping through my walls like they aren't even there. You aren't a ghost. You can't just pass through walls like that! You can't do this. You can't do this to me."
"But I'm not doin' anything."
"Yes, you are. You're actually…trying. You want to know me and not what others say I should be. Stop it."
"Does it hurt ya or something?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Because…I'm afraid."
Kaien reached across and covered her hand with his own, "We all are. It's how you handle your fear. That's what makes you."
Rukia dared a peek through her lashes, as if certain she'd turn to ash if he caught her looking at him dead on, "What about you? You don't look remotely afraid."
He chuckled coarsely, shaking his head as if in the purest of denials, "I'm damn terrified."
The first time he touched her, really touched her, they were in his apartment after having been soaked to the bone from persistent rain. The elements had conspired against them -or for them. Which of the two she couldn't be for sure.
It had been months in the making. Years in her heart.
Feather-light as if afraid she'd break at the slightest of touches, he brushed his mouth onto hers. It was sweet. Like flavored ice. Tingling and saccharine. Everything that encompassed a first kiss and then some. Behind those pillows of flesh passed sparks and fireworks. Immortality and the rush of rarity. Everything.
"'m sorry."
Blinking up at him after having stepped through mental starlight and exuberance, she cleared her throat, "For…w-what?"
Presseing his mouth against hers once more, speaking over her lips out of sheer need to feel contact, "I didn't ask for…permission."
Her small, short arms slid up around his neck in an effort for closeness, her silent response of approval. This man didn't need permission. As she had thought long before, he owned her. In some other world or way, she was his. Even if he didn't know it. She did. And that was enough.
His touches, however, were not. She wanted more; needed more. To feel him inside and out, not just look at him. Picturing his face in her mind could only do so much.
So when he slid off her clothes, piece by piece, layer by layer like she was some sort of idol, she willingly let him. And when he mimicked the process with his own attire, she watched in hooded need. All the while he kissed her, never letting her wonder if he was using her. This wasn't the same thing. This was something magical. Books and fairytales spoke of such things. Now, she had it. Here, in here grasp, moving overtop her in slow, methodic movements that heightened her arousal and her mental being.
When he covered his length inside her, she felt her air leave. Where her breath fell short, his air filled her. Where the pain overwhelmed her, his kisses eased her difficulties.
Rukia clung to him with desperate fingertips, nails slicing into his shoulders like dull knives finding use once more. And to this, he moved faster, deeper, harder, riding against her with such an urgency and fervent glide that she nearly wondered if he was going to break into a million pieces.
Murmuring his apologies for his lack of tact and refinement, he hoisted her legs higher, nearly pressing them into the pillows that supported her head and raven hair.
She keened, back arching high off the bed as she clenched around him.
Kaien openly kissed her, tongue flicking over her teeth as he pressed in higher, rubbing her insides in response, knowing all too well what such sounds and movements meant.
Not long after, she toppled from heaven and fell with a thud, eyes shooting open with white heat and completion. With a few more jerks against her and hot whispers of her name, he followed her. Not once did he stop holding her close to him, to his mouth, to his chest; to his heart.
For some time to follow, they shared such intimate moments and experiences in quiet. Eventually, one day, he reached for her hand in public and he made her his. Not long after, he asked her. It was simple. Three words spoken thickly in that odd charm of his: 'Wanna be mine?' So, she was. Naturally. She always had been. And for once in her life and his, things were as they should be.
- This is a story where fate spins and lives are ripped apart. -
It came to her in mere conversation that she overhead while walking the street. An accident. A freak accident. A car had lost control and spiraled onto the pavement, pinning a pedestrian deep underneath the red-hot pipes and hundreds of pounds of steel and metal. He had been standing in front of some restaurant. Unmoving. Waiting.
She froze, looking around with unseeing eyes at the path ahead of her. The path leading to the scene of the accident. The path leading her back to him.
He had been waiting; waiting for her.
Rukia ran as fast as her small feet would carry her, all the while his voice sounding in her head, teasing at her midget feet and obscene doe eyes. He was laughing. Why was he laughing at a time like this?
When she arrived, the scene was packing, a gurney sliding into the back of the ambulance. A body was tucked away safe on the board, sheathed in a draping, thin, white blanket. Not white. Not white. Anything but that awful color. Black wasn't the color of death, white was.
She squirmed between officials, fighting and clawing to see under the small sheet. Screaming obscenities and demanding her satisfaction given. Once they seen she was going no where, they obliged her with a small peak underneath the death tarp. One little spike of black was all she needed to know what she had known long before when the second half of her heartbeat had died away: Kaien was dead.
Dead. Like spring time and daisies in winter. Dead like night during day. Dead like fish out of water. Gone. Like yesterday and the promise of a wonderful tomorrow. Gone, gone, gone, dead. He was buried deep in the ground, a shrine erected for his memory. For their memory. A picture graced the stone, preventing her from finding solace in her visits. His freakishly wide smile predominant as she spoke to him in hushed tones and false promises that things were alright on her side of things. It was a lie. She knew and she was certain that somewhere in the next life, he knew it as well. Or did he? Would he remember her there? Was there even a next life?
A few years down the road, after fatigue and misfortune had played her long enough, her own life ended with a heart murmur. A murmur that had delved deep in her being the moment he had ceased to exist on this plane of life.
All she remembered was hearing sirens and muffled voices, and then, nothing. But then…she woke up. Again.
Her sister was there, smiling at her and keeping her company. Until one day, she was gone. And she was left alone.
Then…
The door was labeled Division Thirteen. People filled the corridors from beginning to end, and they were all talking about her. Treating her like royalty, all because of that Sixth Division captain and his nobility and name. They were branding her. She was their being and her own internal struggles meant nothing. She was something to be idolized and avoided, like some sort of plague. She hated it. She hated feigning a somber stare and witty remarks whenever eyes were upon her. It was torture.
Then, the door slammed open and a loud voice ground her into a flightless pigeon in a matter of mere seconds and ticks of her heart.
"Kaien! You can call me Cap'n Kaien, if ya like."
She stopped, something in her heart slowing. Kaien…..what a wonderful name.
"Kuchiki…Rukia."
He snorted, those ocean flavored eyes hinting at something secretive that only they knew but neither could remember, "Rukia. No need to be so formal."
And somewhere, in her head, she nodded. She liked when he said Rukia better too. Like somewhere, in some life before this one, she belonged to him. Somehow, somewhere in time.
- This is a story where boy and girl are reunited. The rest is history. -