A/N: Okay! So, this is... reaaaally old. I'm just getting it back from loaning it to a friend (Hey there Nai-chan) to read. Here, enjoy, or don't. Whatever. Review!

River Water

He doesn't know what made him come back. It's beautiful here, sort of, but he's never really been interested in scenery. It's probably the peace and solitude. Especially the solitude. He needs to be alone. He needs to think. He... he needs to remember. Remember a time that was simple, slow, fun. Feeling a bit overly dramatic, he looks at the river at his feet; the same river they'd played in as kids, and thinks, maybe life is kind of like this river. Slow, steady, calm... then come the rains that just make everything blurry, messy, and too fast. After that, everything's different. Maybe it's not exactly BAD, but its not the same.

He misses her, bu he won't say it. Not aloud. Abarai Renji is too proud for that. Too proud to say he wants to go back to the days of splashing in this river, of stealing food and water. He'll take back all the crappy life, if it means she's once more at his side. But then again, and he's thinking again, he doesn't want that for her. She deserves a palace with a huge warm bed, and tons of servants, and all the crappy bunnies she needs. Love means letting go, or whatever. That's what they tell him. So he does. He lets her go. He lets her leave him drowning in an empty room, screaming in a room so loud even though he's alone.

But she comes back! She does, and he's so HAPPY he wants to kiss her then and there, but he can't because she broke the rules... she broke the rules for that IDIOT who doesn't see the way she can smile, doesn't know how sad she can be, or how beautiful she looks when she laughs, or how her anger can be calmed by the tiniest bits of candy or mentions of Chappy.

Then, he has to let that guy save her, as if his EXISTENCE isn't a big enough slap in the face. As if his stupid powers' origin aren't enough of a knife twisted into his tattooed chest. Once again, he is forced to step back, and let some other man take her. But the strawberry was different. He gave her back. He threw her to him. Renji isn't letting her go again. He can't. EVER.

"Renji? What are you doing out here?" her voice startles him so much he falls into the water. He sits up, soaked, sitting in water that sloshes barely to his knees when he's standing.

"You runt! Look what you-" he stops, because the scene is all too familiar. She's standing, waist-deep in river water and holding a beautiful flower. The moon is lighting up her raven hair, and her face is creased ever-so-slightly in a smile.

"They're as beautiful as I remember." she whispers. Renji stares at her.

"Mhmm." he agrees.

Kuchiki Rukia looks at him, and her smile widens. She splashes towards him and holds out a hand to help him up. He takes it and pulls, a bit to hard as it makes her fall forward onto him. He stands, pulling her up with him and holding her close.

"R-Renji! Let go of me!" she yelps, and wiggles as she tries to escape.

He pulls her head against his chest and leans down to bury his face in her onyx hair. "No..." he whispers, "Never again." and she freezes, hands on his chest where she'd been trying to push herself away. She tilts her head back, chin tilting up so she can look him in the face.

"What?"

"I can't let you go again, Rukia." he says, staring into her dark eyes and wondering what she'll do.

"Thank you." she says, burying her face in his soaked black front.

"What?" he's shocked by her reaction.

"Thank you. Don't leave me alone again. Baka, you've done it twice now." she smiles against his chest. "And... well..." She's red as his hair now and he pulls out a grin.

"Spit it out, pipsqueak!"

"Sh-Shut up!" she hits him, and he wonders if it'll bruise. Then she grins up at him, reaches up and presses her fingers to his cheek. She's standing on her tip-toes to do so. "I... I love-"

He kisses her clumsy, and roughly, and all Renji, and she returns the gesture, wrapping her arms around his neck. Her eyes slide closed as she knows nor cares about nothing but his soft chapped lips, desperate aagainst her own. So they don't say it. They've never been people of mushy words anyways. Renji suddenly breaks the kiss, looking at Rukia with a serious face.

"Don't tell Byakuya."

Rukia kisses him again, laughing.