Author's note: I do not own Bleach or its characters.
A Thankful Heart
Momo bit her lip as she looked down at the neatly wrapped present in her hands. She had bought it for Toushiro a few weeks ago. It wasn't much, but she wanted to give him something. It was both a thank you gift and a Christmas gift. Orihime had told her that in Japan Christmas was a romantic holiday. And Rangiku had been encouraging Momo to be a bit more obvious about her interest in her childhood friend.
So she had spent a few days scouring the markets for the right sort of gift. Momo had finally settled on a rather lovely shogi set. She knew that Toushiro liked to play the game even if it wasn't one of her favorites. It had been easy to purchase it and wrap the gift nicely. It was another matter to actually give it to Toushiro. This was actually the third time she had walked over to the Tenth Division in order to give him the gift. The first two times, she had chickened out before she actually reached his office.
And Momo was seriously considering chickening out again.
"Hey, Momo." Toushiro's voice rang out.
She froze, panicking. Toushiro jogged the rest of the way towards her.
"I've been looking for you. Here." He held out a small package wrapped in pink paper.
Now she really had a problem. Momo couldn't accept his gift without giving him hers. Carefully, Momo extended her own package. Toushiro blinked but grabbed it with one hand and deposited his gift for her in her now empty hands.
"It's a Christmas gift," he explained. "I wanted to get you something."
"Thanks, Shiro," she just knew she was blushing.
"Go on and open it."
Momo carefully pulled open the clumsily wrapped package. Inside the paper she found a pair of hair combs with a design of peach blossoms carved on them. They were beautiful.
"Thank you." Without thinking, Momo leaned over and kissed his cheek; then she realized just what she'd done and blushed. To distract Toushiro, she added, "You can open yours now."
Toushiro carefully and methodically unwrapped his gift. Momo was gratified to see his eyes light up when he realized what it was.
"This is great! Thanks, Momo." He was grinning.
She smiled back. "You're welcome."
They stood there smiling at one another for a moment. Then it started to snow. Toushiro laughed and grabbed her hand.
"Come on. Matsumoto's been making hot chocolate, and there's probably some left."
Momo just laughed and followed him, thankful that she had finally managed to give him his gift. Rangiku had been right. It really wasn't that bad.