Shallow Depth of Field

Byakuya Kuchiki stood on the rooftop of Seireitei Memorial attempting simply to be. It was the small interval of time where it wasn't quite dark and it wasn't quite light and all you could hear were the echos of the night before.

This was Hisana's favorite time of the day. She said it was as if the city was unfolding, showing you new things and beginnings. She said that if she could capture that moment and keep it with her forever, she would.

Byakuya lifted up the camera that hung against his neck and snapped a picture of the fleeting horizon.

He lowered the camera, and before he turned to go back inside, he looked up to the sky and thought, 'I wonder what the city will show me today.'

xXx

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

A plump middle aged man, who had the audacity to insult Ichigo with an expression of boredom, put down his clipboard and stood with hands on the nursing station.

"I do not kid, Kurosaki-san. Let me explain-"

"No, let me explain to you," Ichigo said, pointing a finger at the droopy eyed nurse, his last bit of patience clenched between his molars. "My wife is being transferred here as we speak. Do you know what we've gone through to get a room here? I sold our house! You can't just send us home. We were promised a room, and I'm not leaving until we get one."

If Rhea could speak for herself, Ichigo knew she'd agree with his indignation. They were both similar in that way, fiercely protective, walking Roman candles just waiting to be sparked.

The only difference was that she knew when to trade out spitfire for a big smile and a bit of flattery, and by the end of the week, she'd be best friends with the owner of the hospital, inquiring about their mothers kidney problem. She was like that, a strategically evil genius with an ever expanding heart.

Ichigo ran a hand through his hair and let out a composing sigh. "Look, my wife is in a coma, and I brought her here because this is one of the best hospitals in the country. I uprooted our whole life. There has to be somewhere."

The nurse gave Ichigo an unimpressed look that said he had heard all the sad stories as he sipped lazily from a Seireitei Memorial coffee cup.

"Look, Kurosaki-san. Whoever entered you into our system made a mistake. They placed you in a single occupant room not realizing it was marked as private."

"But there is space in the room, right?"

"Well, technically, yes, but-"

"Then what's the problem!?"

The nurse sighed, tapping the side of his coffee cup. "The problem is that Kuchiki-Sensei, the owner of this hospital, pays for that private room. We'll refund you-"

"That won't be necessary."

Ichigo swung around to see a man leaning elegantly crossed armed against the door frame of the room opposite the nurses station. His face was heavy with indifference and he reeked of old money and propriety, and Ichigo couldn't help but to dislike him. Him and his mulberry colored cashmere sweater and tailored slacks and handsome face that probably acted as a Skeleton key, never meeting a door he couldn't open.

The nurse stood up immediately, his posture taunting as if he were balancing books on his head.

"Are you sure, Kuchiki-Sensei?"

"Yes. It was our oversightl, and I would rather avoid any unnecessary conflict. Besides." He paused, and Ichigo saw something move in those eyes, like the way dust might move when disturbing a book that hasn't been opened in years. "It is not as if Hisana needs the privacy."

The nurse's lips coiled as he gave a curt node. "I'll have the orderly's bring in another bed."

Ichigo felt as if steam was still rising from his skin, some residual anger left over from the sudden resolution of this conflict. He cleared his throat and tried to remember what Rhea would say about gratitude and mending bridges instead of burning them and such.

"Thanks," Ichigo said simply, and those million dollar features, so apathetic as if to say no tragedy in the world was worth stiffening for, hardened in his direction.

"Don't thank me. I only did it because that's what Hisana would've wanted," he said before turning back into the room.

Ichigo would've been mad if the statement wasn't so damn relatable.

Thank god for wives, they make us better people.

xXx

The room looked more like an upscale condominium than a place for the sick and ailing. There were wall to wall bamboo flooring and mahogany dressers. Beside each bed were fabric lounges, a coffee table, and a wall hung plasma seemed to go to great lengths to make you forget you were in a hospital, even placing sensored air fresheners around the room to mask the smell of antiseptic.

Ichigo unpacked all of Rhea's belongings. After placing her clothes away in a dresser, he pulled out a picture from his suitcase and smiled down at it for a moment.

In it was Rhea tip toeing around in their kitchen with Karin and Yuzu. She had been teaching them a traditional Greek dance.

The girls loved Rhea and she loved them, and he almost felt bad for leaving Karakura like he did, but they knew that being a husband had always been a full time job for him. He'd visit Rhea before work and typically stayed with her for most of the night, doing things that the very understaffed Karakura Memorial didn't always get time to do, like brushing her hair and helping her shave. The girls and his dad or his friends often wanted him to come over for dinner or to go see a movie, and sometimes he did, because he knew they were worried, but it always just made him feel worse than anything else. He would think things like, 'Rhea should be here', and 'If she can't be here than I shouldn't be either.'

After so many times of declining their invitations, they stopped asking and instead would come to the hospital. Yuzu, the saint that she was, would do Rhea's nails and talk about her life in animated detail, and Ichigo couldn't properly convey how much he needed that, because he knew his family's opposing opinions even if they didn't speak on them much. He knew they thought he was breathing too much hospital air. He knew they thought he had entered into the semi comatose sleep with his wife, and maybe he had, but that's what marriage was, till death do us part, in sickness and in health. There was no where else he should or could be.

Ichigo placed the picture on a bedside table and sat down in a lounging chair. In hopes of quelling the anxiousness of waiting for Rhea, he looked around the room with a greater scrutiny. Although, the only thing that offered a distraction were thoughts about the petite woman in the bed parallel the one Rhea would be staying in.

He wondered what circumstances had brought her to this place, wearing an IV like a ball and chain. It wasn't him being nosey as some much as it was the doctor in him and just the law of proximity. Ichigo always had this habit of diagnosing the people around him. However, all he could tell was that she was sleeping, and that was probably all he had the right to know anyway.

Ichigo's attention went to a framed photograph of a Tokyo skyline hung above her bed. His eyes were swept across the page by the interesting vantage point and use of color, but were brought back by the sound of someone walking through the door.

It was the owner and that face that looked as if it had never seen the sun light, unblemished by scars or emotions. He looked to Ichigo and said, "Hello," and Ichigo could tell that it was only because of the strictest of well to do upbringings that he was even able to manage that pleasantry.

"Yo," Ichigo said, watching the man as he walked over to Hisana's bed with a picture frame held protectively up to his chest. He placed it glass side up on the night stand, took the framed skyline from the wall, sat it down, and put the new one up. It was the same skyline, but somehow it looked completely different.

Byakuya glanced at it with a tilted head before stepping back and turning to his wife. He looked as if he was caressing a strand of her hair, and Ichigo almost wished he could see his face. He had a hard time imaging those sharp edges dulling for anyone.

Ichigo realized that, for no particular reason, he had been watching the man, making him look down with bashfully furrowed brows.

"Your wife will be arriving soon."

Ichigo looked up to see Byakuya looking not at him but at the picture he had just taken off the wall. He scowled, a typical expression of confusion. He could hear Rhea's laughter followed by a, 'You don't have to look so mad just because you don't know what's going on.'

"How do you know?"

"I inquired."

"You asked?"

Byakuya took a step forward, finally looking up with blinking eyes. "Yes," he said as if it was a perfectly reasonable action with no needed explanation. Ichigo didn't see it like that, but considering he was only here because of this man's whims, he dredged up some gratitude from the most pleasant parts of himself.

"Oh, well thanks for letting me know."

He nodded shortly and stepped forward again, as if using just his presence alone to tell Ichigo their conversation wasn't over.

Ichigo stood too if only because he wouldn't let Kuchiki see him with his chin down. Rich men like these were sharks, they could smell your empty pockets, labeled you as weak, something Ichigo wasn't.

"I did not formally Introduce myself. I am Kuchiki Byakuya."

"Kurosaki Ichigo. My wife's Kurosaki Rhea."

"And Kurosaki Rhea sufferers from a vigil coma, yes?"

Ichigo, unable to stop himself, snorted. "Did you inquire on that too?"

Byakuya perked a brow, giving a look that Ichigo could only interpret as 'You ungracious proletariat scum.'

"That would've been unnecessary, considering you were yelling your wife's prognosis right outside of the room."

"Oh-" Ichigo dipped his head. "Sorry about that," he mumbled.

"How long has your wife been in this state?" he asked, ignoring Ichigo's weightless apology.

"...Uh, three years."

Byakuya's nose crinkled. "And you sold your home to come here? Why?"

Ichigo scowled. "You're the owner of this hospital. You should know its the best in the country."

"Yes, but people do not wake up from three year comas, not typically."

Byakuya looked confused, almost innocently so, and Ichigo could see that his rudeness was probably less the fault of himself and more of his upbringing. Still, Ichigo found himself less than sympathetic of this fact.

"This hospital has some of the best diagnosticians in the country and the most cutting edge medical research, including a study on semi comatose states."

"I am well aware-"

"Then you should know, Byakuya, why me and Rhea came here. It's probably the same reason your wife is here."

"That is true, but this hospital is well within my means. I did not have to uproot my life for such an infinitesimal chance."

Ichigo's pressed his knuckled hand into his leg, practically feeling Rhea's hovering over it, telling him to think, to breathe.

"Yeah, well," he spat, "not all of us were born into wealthy families. Some of us have to give up everything for the people we love."

Byakuya's eyes widened marginally as if he hadn't been expecting that. "I see," was all he said as he turned to leave. He stopped at the door, hand on frame, and not turning around, he said, "Your wife's state, it will get easier over time… if you allow it. Oh," he looked over his shoulder at Ichigo, "It is Kuchiki-san, not Byakuya," he said before leaving Ichigo standing there, thoughtfully looking at the gaunt bedridden woman.

'Easier… Is that what it is?'

xXx

As soon as Ichigo walked through the door his hair was being preened by the finicky hands of Yumichika. He tried to crouch away and swat but his hands were preoccupied with suitcases, and thus he stood there and took the mother henning.

"Some people would just help me with my luggage," Ichigo muttered, sulking under that nimble touch.

"And some people should know better than to come to my house with an unruly mop on their head." He kneaded a strand of Ichigo's hair and tutted. "I will drench you in leave in conditioner later," he warned, relieving Ichigo of one of his bag.

Ichigo snorted as he walked through the arch way. "Ikkaku's lucky he's bald."

"Do not mention that brutes name," Yumichika said, whipping around from the corn of which he placed Ichigo's bag. He raised his hands up to his head and slowly lowered them, wiggling each finger as if he was pantomiming rain fall. "It will ruin the aura."

"Did you two break up… again?"

"I broke up with him."

"What is this? Like, the fourth time?"

"The fifth," he corrected, "and the last."

Ichigo snorted again. "Sure," he muttered, dodging Yumichika's withered glare to instead look around the meticulously decorated, stylized living room. It was just what he'd expect from his old high school friend turned interior designer.

Yumichika saunter into the kitchen, asking, "Would you like a beverage? Tea, coffee, beer?"

Ichigo sat down his bag and followed. "Coffee would be good." Yumichika pulled out a mug and Ichigo watched with a simper. "Look, Yumichika, thanks for letting me stay here until I get settled. I promise-"

"Oh, no, no, no," Yumichika said, waving the coffee mug back and forth. "The last thing I want to hear is this self deprecating, humbled hero speech. Although, I'm sure you worked very hard on it. Pride is good, but you should never feel shamed for accepting the offer of help from a friend." He started filling the mug, saying, "Just keep your clothes off the floor and pretend to like the coffee, despite the fact that it's god awful, and you can stay here as long as you neee."

Yumichika sat the mug down in front of Ichigo with such a matter of fact grin that Ichigo couldn't help but to parrot it.

"I think I can manage that. I'll be at the hospital most of the time anyway."

"Seireitei Memorial, right?" Ichigo nodded. "Hm," Yumichika hummed, impressed, "That place is high class."

"It better be." Ichigo rubbed a hand over his reddened eyes and smiled in a sort've helpless attempt to hide his exasperation. "I sold everything we owned to get Rhea a room there."

"I've heard it's like a country club for the sick." He winked. "Try not to scare the nobility."

Ichigo snorted. "It's hard when they ask for it. If it wasn't for Rhea, I would've punched the owner of the hospital."

"The owner?"

"Kuchiki Byakuya," Ichigo scowled, unsure if his face was pinching because of the stale coffee or the sharpness of the man's name. "Some socially inept ass hole who's whole world revolves around him in his bank account." Ichigo thought back to their wives mutual condition and how Byakuya had agreed to let them share a room, and then he thought that, maybe he was the one being the ass hole. He just felt raw, like an open wound ready to hiss at the tiniest brush. He was too lethargic to even remember exactly why he was upset. "Our wives share a room."

"Someone sounds a little bitter."

"I'm not bitter." He scowled. Okay, maybe he was a little bitter. "I just don't know how to act around people with that much money. It's like I can feel him thinking he's better than me."

"Oh that's easy," Yumichika said, lashes fluttering as he mimicked a voice that Ichigo assumed to be aristocratic. "You talk about the stock market and the recent economic crisis and what million yen suit you'll be wearing to the next benefit charity and so on and so forth."

Ichigo chuckled shallowly, and there was something hollow in it. "No thanks. I actually like myself. I'll just ignore him."

"That seems like a sound alternative. Don't fret, it'll cause frown lines. You'll endure," Yumichika picked up his mug in a toast like gesture and said, "For Rhea."

Ichigo mimicked him, smirking. "For Rhea."

After making his place in Yumichika's guest room and showering, Ichigo headed back to the hospital, happy that in was within a reasonable walking distance. He took that opportunity to familiarize himself with the area as he strolled up the sparsely populated metatropolis sidewalk.

There were several restaurants and bars, but it was a photo gallery tucked between a floral shop and a book store that had Ichigo stopping in a more curious observation.

The door had a brass seaweed figure windchime and the glass was adorned with Kanji, reading: Senbonzakura Gallery. Ichigo looked through sweeping glass panels. The lights were dimmed, but bright enough to see some of the photos near the front.

They were skylines, similar to the one Byakuya hung above Hisana's bed.

Ichigo squinted and leaned forward, letting his obscured gaze linger before continuing towards the hospital.

'Maybe he bought them from that gallery.'