Title: If Only for a Little While
Author: Fact Vs Fiction
Rating: T
Pairing: Rukia x Urahara
Warnings: Vaguely AU, because I didn't end the battle the way canon dictates.
Disclaimer: I don't own BLEACH it, and all its characters belong to Kubo-sensei.
A/N: My entry for round one of the bleach romances fanfiction contest take two! Enjoy!
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If only for a little while
Rukia didn't bother looking up at the presence of someone else on the war torn cliff, continuing to stare off into space, lost in thought. She didn't bat a lid when he sat down beside her either. He could sit where ever he liked after all, it was a free society... As of a few days ago anyway.
That brought with it another torrent of thoughts to deal with and her eyes glazed over with sadness.
Out of the corner of her eye she saw the blonde man glance at her sadly before pulling his knees up and leaning on them in much the same way she was. They sat in silence for almost twenty minutes, both lost in thought.
"I'm sorry." Said the blonde quietly.
"Don't." Said Rukia looking at him for the first time. "Aizen was going to do this anyway, but right now it's far too easy to blame you, so please, don't give me the excuse Urahara-san." She finished in a whisper.
He nodded sadly.
"He was doing it anyway." She murmured, more to herself than him.
Kisuke wanted to believe her just as much as she wanted to believe herself right then, but the scientist found it an almost impossible task.
He couldn't quite work out why he'd chosen to go to Rukia Kuchiki of all people. Of everyone she had the most to blame him for, and rightfully so. He'd used her body as a glorified incubator for the experiment that Aizen eventually used to try and take out the shinigami without her knowledge or consent. He'd violated her, whether anyone else saw it as that serious or not. She'd lost so many people over his stupid experiment... She'd nearly been executed over it herself.
And now she sat there and told him it was okay? That made him vaguely angry.
Now he realised why he'd gone to Kuchiki. He'd wanted to be shouted at. He wanted her to scream, and shout and curse him, wanted her to feed that guilt. He really wished she would right then... He idly thought about provoking her but decided against it. Whether he felt it or not she was affording him a kindness he didn't deserve. Instead he asked the obvious question.
"Where's Ichigo?"
"At the party with Orihime." She said simply.
"Are they?"
"Yep."
"Are you-?"
"I'm perfectly fine, Urahara-san."
He didn't quite believe that for a second, but he let it slide.
"And Ishida?"
"He's at the party too. Chad is looking after him. He's been pretty drunk all day."
Urahara nodded. He opened his mouth to ask about Renji but snapped it closed again.
She nodded to herself, pursing her lips as she rocked just slightly.
"Renji... Renji is in the fourth division. The morgue." She said quietly.
"I heard. You were childhood friends... I'm sorry."
"Where's Yoruichi?" She changed the subject. She already knew the answer.
"She's in the fourth. Soifon is dead... They were close... And your brother..."
"He's on the way to the morgue too." Said Rukia, running a shaky hand through her hair.
"Yeah." He said quietly. "She knew him as a kid. Why are you out here, Kuchiki-san?"
"I either go to the party or go back to the fourth." She shrugged. "I don't understand how they celebrate.."
"There isn't an officer above fifth seat there tonight Kuchiki-san..."
"But Ichigo and the others..."
He smiled tightly.
"It's different." He said simply. "They lost Renji." He said gently. "A comrade, and that's terrible, but they haven't lost what you have."
She nodded with a bitter smile.
"You know I don't even know my name anymore?" She admitted with a half laugh half sob. "Yeah, the Kuchiki's, they're going to kick me out as soon as Nii-sama dies." She nodded to herself again. "The woman at the orphanage named me Rukia before I got old enough to run away and it stuck... But when I first met Renji I had no family name. Neither did he... One night we all lay awake by the campfire and decided to pick a name, because we were a family. You know?" She glanced his way. "For years I was Abarai Rukia, I was happy like that. Me and the gang, we were all Abarai's. Then people started dying."
"Well then it's rather obvious, isn't it Abarai-san? You're an Abarai."
"What's a family name without a family?" She whispered. Something in him ached for her right then.
"A tribute, a memorial. A history, Rukia-san. It's a history. It's your history, and Renji's history, and the history of all your friends that didn't make it as far as Seireitei."
"I've never been this alone before." She whispered. "Even when Renji and I didn't talk during those years... I had Kaien-fukutaichou, and nii-sama's presence, and Momo-chan and taichou... Everybody who's ever been close to me is dead, even taichou is touch and go."
"You'll be okay, Rukia-san."
"Will I?" She snorted.
"Yes, because you're stronger than all this. You aren't a street rat anymore, you aren't an underappreciated shinigami. You're a powerful woman with the means to make your own way. It hurts, I know it hurts, but this won't kill you."
"Will it kill you?"
"It feels as if it will right now." He admitted quietly. "I feel like it might be best to let it, but that would be taking the easy way out."
He was surprised when her fingers wrapped around his but squeezed back thankfully nonetheless.
"I respect that." She said softly.
He rubbed the back of her hand absently as he held it in his. Her hands surprised him. She'd always hit him as so small and delicate. Her hands were small but her fingers were surprisingly long and strong. Calluses and scars made the skin rough. For the first time he appreciated that this was a woman who had survived one of the worst districts of Rukongai.
"Why aren't you with Yoruichi, Urahara-san?"
"She blames me."
Rukia squeezed his hand tightly. He sighed exhaustedly, scratching his hair with his free hand, and only then did she realise that his hat was missing.
"I blame me too." He said tiredly. "She has every right to be angry."
"Why did you come to me?"
"I wanted you to shout at me." He admitted with the ghost of a smile. "Everyone else speaks behind my back... I figured you, of all people in this world, had the right to shout at me... And instead you make me feel marginally better."
"I do?" She asked. The hope in her voice was so potent as she turned violet eyes on him...
He nodded. It was the truth.
"Are you really okay about Ichigo and Orihime?"
"I guess I did entertain stupid fleeting romantic notions sometimes." She admitted. "But they were just that, stupid and fleeting. Any relationship of ours would belong in a badly written romance novel. I'm happy for them, I hope they last."
Kisuke nodded, still playing with her hand.
She glanced up at him, and unused to his unshielded gaze she found herself looking into grey eyes.
There was a softness to his eyes, one she'd neither expected nor noticed there before, a certain measure of insecurity... She'd heard before, that Urahara had been a very nervous man as captain of the twelfth. As a woman who'd met him she'd laughed outright at the idea but now she wasn't so sure.
The eyes were the window to the soul, perhaps why he always hid them. That insecurity coupled with the bangs falling into his eyes gave him something of a puppy-like appearance now she looked properly, almost as if if you petted him he'd wag a tail...
Something changed in his eyes, an understanding and he nodded. She really shouldn't be doing this, she hadn't done this since her time on the streets, but old habits died hard, particularly in times of stress. She needed to forget and so did he and he offered and asked for the ultimate form of comfort. He could make her forget, if only for a little while...
She closed the gap between them then, bringing their lips together. Her hand slipped from his in favour of burying in his blonde locks , tugging just slightly as they tasted for the first time. His lips were chapped, and two days stubble scratched her skin but his kiss was warm and inviting, comforting, and tinged with that same sense of desperation that she felt. He needed this as much as she did. He deepened the kiss until it almost bruised, his hands running up and down her sides and she returned it until her lungs screamed for air.
They both breathed harshly in the silence of the deserted battlefield when they finally broke for air. Grey met blue as they caught their breath.
"Are you sure?" His eyes revealed his desperation but he still felt the need to ask, to warn her. "I have a tendency to ruin the lives of people who come anywhere near me."
"Are you?" She countered. "People who come near me have a tendency to die."
"As long as we're all clear then." He murmured before catching her lips again, far more passionately this time. They fell back on the hard rubble, a jumble of tangled limbs, messy hands, soft sighs,
And they forgot,
If only for a little while.
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A/N: And there you go! Review!