Inspired by lovesrainscent's a href=".net/s/5850582/1/A_Brief_History_of_Orochimaru"A Brief History of Orochimaru/a
Contemplating Renji - A twenty truths fic
1 - When Renji met Rukia for the first time, it wasn't love at first sight. He was hungry, and she was small enough to get away unseen. When she shared her candy with the other kids, she stole his heart.
2 - Renji always thought of himself as self-sufficient. Rukia actually IS.
3 - To this day he cannot understand how he got into the advanced class.
4 - The first tattoos he got were his eyebrows. He hadn't needed to shave them, they'd been blown off...again.
5 - The rest of the tattoos really were badges of honor, at least to him. Every single line inked into his skin reminds him of good times as well as bad. His only regret? That he had been drunk off his ass when he agreed to have his scalp tattooed.
6 - Ishida says he hates Shinigami. That's ok with Renji. Sometimes, he hates Shinigami, too.
7 - When the Kuchiki family showed up at the academy, everyone had been shocked. The head of the family was there, in all his noble finery. Even the scarf the man wore cost more than he'd see in the next 20 years. When he was summoned to the auditorium, he was more nervous than if there had been a hollow in his dorm room. When he saw no one else except Rukia, he was confused. He blames that confusion for the biggest mistake of his lifetime. He told her that she didn't need him. He forgot that he needed her.
8 - Jealousy is an emotion Renji knows well. How long had it taken for him to rise high enough to even speak to her? How long had he watched his captain with envy burning in his heart? When she cried over the human Ichigo, he was consumed by it. When that same human told him his intentions behind invading the Soul Society, he was burned once again. Even after everything, every time he sees that boy looking at her that way, he wants to kill him. But, he's the most jealous over one thing. Being Rukia's friend. That's why he lets his emotions storm and rage, and does nothing to ease the pain. Because nothing would hurt more than loosing her friendship.
9 - Saito is the gentlest man Renji has ever met. He doesn't ever want to train with him again. Ever.
10 - He'd been trying to appease his captain. The man was cold and harder than Renji could believe. He thought that if he scared Rukia enough, she'd just come back home. He hadn't known about Ichigo. The boy who changes everything just by not having the sense a mule has. Hindsight being 20/20, he can see now that he and Ichigo have a lot in common.
11 - Achieving Bankai is still one of his proudest moments. Achieving it to rebel against everything he'd been taught to hold dear is another matter entirely.
12 - Matsumoto is just a friend. He's never once taken advantage of that friendship. With that said, they're 100% real.
13 - It takes forever to get his hair to stay like that. When he was younger, infrequent bathing had been helpful in keeping his hair gravity defying. When he joined the academy, he'd been introduced to hairspray. Now, he uses hollow infestations as an excuse to buy styling wax. He has a box of it in his barracks. Just in case.
14 - He sometimes wonders what Orihime is hiding under all that silliness. At other times he's forcibly reminded that the girl cannot hide anything. It doesn't matter, he supposes, she's too precious to let anything bad happen to her. When she was kidnapped, he'd been just as angry as Ichigo.
14 - Ichigo's got more of just about everything, but that doesn't bother Renji much. He's still Ichigo's friend. Moreover, he could whip him in a fight if he really wanted to.
15 - Renji isn't sure what frightens him more. Is it that this time he won't be able to save everyone? Or if he does manage to live through it all, will he have to be a taicho?
16 - When he'd been asked to join the men's association, he was excited. He'd been reading the quarterly ever since he'd found one on academy grounds. When he realized that the women's association had better everything and they weren't relegated to the bathroom outside Unit 12, he'd asked Yachiru-chan if he could have honorary membership. She said no.
17 - Urahara is a stingy bastard! Renji hates sweeping, mopping, doing dishes, and raking leaves. Secretly, he also thinks that the man has given him a defective gigai. Renji wishes he had enough fortitude to stay with Orihime. And Matsumoto. And Hitsa…scratch that. Dishes aren't that bad.
18 - Renji isn't stunned when he realized the Espada called Szayel thinks he's a good looking man.
19 - Renji isn't red all the way down. It is his natural hair color though.
20 - Renji wants to be a dad someday. He doesn't think it'll be with Rukia. This both saddens and heartens him. He thinks it means that he'd be ok if his friend was happy, and he could be happy even without her. It really means he's growing up.