Disclaimer: Bleach is the property of Taito Kubo and its licensers.
Author's Note: Unfortunately, I won't be able to post my other Bleach story here due to certain restrictions here, but it'll be on my livejournal (and possibly elsewhere) when I find the time to post it.

Afternoon Repose
By CalicoKitten

The bandages stick to his wounds as he unravels them from his hands, tearing open closed cuts, blood running in thick red lines to his palm and mingling with dots of red liquid already spreading on the white cloth at his fingertips. His left hand isn't as strong as his right, but he's trained himself so that he could work easily with it, if a situation arose in which his right arm became incapacitated.

He pushes the pain to the back of his mind when the remainder of the cloth refuses to move from his skin, and ignoring the ache, he rips it out in one smooth motion.

The wound reopens, stinging against the wind and bleeding against his arm.

"Looks pretty nasty," someone tells him, and he doesn't have to turn to recognize the intense spiritual power behind him, power that's faded a bit from the incident a week ago.

"It's not as bad as it looks."

He doesn't think he's fooled the other boy, but Kurosaki says nothing. Instead, he moves to sit next to him, leaning against the wall casually while keeping a surreptitious eye on his crimson hand.

White gauze is pulled carefully out of the bag at his feet, and Ishida says, with all the indifference he can muster, "What do you want, Kurosaki?"

They've avoided each other for a week after that meeting in the graveyard and the lunch incident, and he figures that since Kurosaki made the first move, he would go directly to the second.

He unwinds the gauze carefully with his left hand, in circular motions that go around and around too many times before Kurosaki finally speaks.

"You should wear archers' gloves."

Kurosaki's avoiding the question. Ishida doesn't feel the need to tell him that he prefers to fight barehanded and likes it that way. He likes the pain in his fingers when the charm on his bracelet bites into his skin because it keeps him grounded. He avoids thinking about the strange sensation of spiritual energy bleeding into him, something he still hasn't gotten used to and doesn't ever plan on getting used to.

Sometimes, in that rare moment of weakness, it makes him feel like he's lost in someone else's world.

The first time was when he met his sensei. After that, he only vaguely remembers the experiences since he'd trained to absorb and use the energy properly.

The boy next to him shifts uncomfortably, and he's reminded that Kurosaki has made him feel that way as well, the first time he'd ever fought alongside him. He felt it again last week, but it was through a haze of other energies he won't – can't – think about today.

Kurosaki is unusually silent beside him, something that's terribly uncharacteristic of the normally brash, quick-tempered young man. He's watching as Ishida dabs at the blood with a piece of gauze.

"How's Orihime?" Ishida asks.

Kurosaki shrugs, and a crease forms just between his eyebrows. "She's fine. Only got nicked in the head. Wasn't major."

"Rukia?"

"She's fine."

The crease deepens, and Kurosaki sinks his head between his knees. Ishida sometimes wonders at the extent of the debt Kurosaki thinks he owes Rukia, and he wonders if it's easier to have someone constantly with you, in battle especially. He thinks it must be easier, for Rukia instructs Kurosaki when his knowledge of being a Shinigami fails him.

It almost makes him jealous. He no longer has someone to do that for him.

He ignores this and asks for the sole purpose of driving Kurosaki away, "And Chad?"

The bloody gauze is suddenly ripped from his fingers, replaced by a hand that grabs his sharply, fingers digging into the open wounds until Kurosaki realizes the strength of his grip is causing more blood to appear.

Soft presses of clean gauze sting his skin as Kurosaki bursts, "Damn you, I didn't come here to talk about them; I came here to see how you were doing, you bastard!"

"Shut up!" Ishida snaps back, attempting to pull his hand away, but Kurosaki maintains his death grip on it and refuses to pull away. "I don't need your damn concern!"

"That's why you're bleeding all over the fucking floor!"

"It's your fault I'm bleeding all over the fucking floor!"

He hadn't meant to say that last line out loud. Kurosaki's face turns an interesting shade of red before it quickly shadows over. His fingers shake almost imperceptibly against the torn skin in his grasp, and Ishida tugs in an effort to dislodge the orange-haired boy once more.

"…"

"What?" Ishida bites out harshly, irritated at Kurosaki's soft mutter. "Say it so that I can hear it!"

"I said I'm sorry!"

Dropping the gauze in his right hand, Kurosaki grabs at the lapels of his shirt, and for a brief minute, Ishida closes his eyes to feel a fist crashing against the side of his head, or a pull that will drag him roughly towards the other boy.

Instead, a shadow falls across his face, and he opens his eyes to stare into angry blue orbs. The hands reach up instead to cup the sides of his face, trailing blood across his skin in the process.

"I'm sorry," Kurosaki repeats, sounding almost desperate.

Kurosaki doesn't seem to notice the streaks of red he leaves across Ishida's face as his left thumb moves back and forth on his face. He isn't very adept at hiding his feelings, and Ishida notices the flickers of anger, hurt, and desperation that flash through his eyes, and of something else he finds mirrored in himself.

"Don't be. I didn't mean it; it's not your fault."

Kurosaki finally realizes his hands are upon Ishida's face. He takes them away while avoiding Ishida's eyes, and using the cuff of his sleeve, quickly wipes the blood away from the corner of Ishida's mouth.

"If I hadn't been so stupid, you wouldn't have had to…"

"Shut. Up," he hisses, feeling a shudder rack through his body at the memory. The memory of Kurosaki lying facedown in a pool of his own blood. Of Rukia trying to save him, and of him trying to save the both of them. Of the unfamiliar sensations flooding his body, of seeing his friends – Orihime, Chad – fall unconscious as he lost himself in another world.

"It's my fault," Kurosaki insists. He distracts himself by unwinding more of the gauze at their feet, and Ishida thinks that if he hadn't also been using Kurosaki's spiritual energy that day, Kurosaki would be more prone to the notion of simply shaking Ishida bodily and bluntly screaming his thoughts out at him.

"No. If it's anyone's fault, it's mine."

He says the last sentence softly, but Kurosaki can have sensitive hearing when he wants to.

"Don't be an idiot. You saved us."

"I almost killed you," he snaps angrily. "I almost killed all of you."

It's the last thing he remembers about the battle – seeing his friends scattered across the ground of the graveyard before he passed out with them. He remembers waking up in a strange white room, the only color being the red seeping through his bandages onto his blankets, and he'd left before anyone had come in to check on him.

That had been a week ago.

"You didn't, moron," Kurosaki says roughly, grabbing a hold of his hand once more. Quickly and efficiently, he begins to bind the wounds, taking care in not wrapping the gauze too tightly. "We're still here."

"Not me. Not for much longer."

He didn't mean for the words to slip out of his mouth, but they did, and Kurosaki picks up on them. He gives Ishida a confused look, almost hurt in a way, and stops with his ministrations.

"What are you talking about?"

"Nothing."

"Are you moving?"

"I said, it's nothing."

"Damn it, it's not nothing! What the hell are you talking about?"

Kurosaki's aura is familiar to him in the way a scowl lights up his face and his eyes blaze with emotion. He feels frustrated eyes fix on his face in a stare, but he doesn't turn to meet it.

He gets angry in return.

"What do you think is going to happen to me after this? Just think about it! I'm a Quincy. A fucking Quincy who almost killed two Shinigamis and a bunch of humans with a goddamn fucking power he couldn't control! Do you think your Soul Society will pass this off as an accident? I bet they'll love the chance to rid the world of the last Quincy – I'll be dead before…"

He's cut off by the unfamiliar weight that crashes into him, driving the breath from his lungs even as strong arms enfold him in their embrace. His mind blanks for a second before realizing that the arms belong to Kurosaki, and it feels incredibly weird because Kurosaki doesn't ever touch him unless it's in the form of a violent gesture.

"…"

"What?" he snaps again, and he can't move because Kurosaki threatens to suffocate him with the hold he has on him.

"You fucking prick!" Kurosaki shouts, straight into his ear so that Ishida finds it hard not to flinch from its sheer volume. "You damn, stupid, fucking prick…"

He's breathing harshly, chest moving rapidly up and down, and Ishida can feel it as if he himself were inhaling large amounts of air. Kurosaki's grip on him increases, and Ishida thinks the world is tilting slightly to his left, but he's not falling.

Something wet touches the back of his ear; he realizes it's Kurosaki's mouth when the other boy's warm breath tickles his ear and Kurosaki says softly, vehemently, "I'd never let anything happen to you. Ever. Soul Society or not."

There are implications behind this assertion of his, and Ishida won't let himself think of what they are. He prefers to think that Kurosaki leaves out a few words for his benefit because he knows Kurosaki won't let anybody suffer if he's there to stop it – it's not just him Kurosaki speaks of. It's only for his benefit, he thinks, and it's for the orange-haired boy's benefit that he chooses not to tell him of the Soul Society's threats towards him the first time they'd met.

"Don't be ridiculous," are the words that come out of his mouth, and he barely has time to feel Kurosaki's muscles twitch before the other pushes him against the wall roughly, sliding in between his legs, grasping his left shoulder with one hand and slamming the other into the wall to the right of his head.

"Fuck you," Kurosaki hisses, and he slides off the glasses perched upon Ishida's nose before he realizes and places them on the ground. Kurosaki's face becomes blurry in front of him before Kurosaki says "I'm not lying" and tilts his chin up, taking advantage of his impaired vision.

Kurosaki's mouth is on his, and a hand moves up to cup the back of his neck to keep Ishida in place when the other flinches in surprise. A tongue slips between slack lips and delves into his mouth; Kurosaki kisses him harshly, mouth firmly attached to his and stroking his tongue deftly with his own, coaxing it until Ishida begins to respond.

A sudden motion brings his legs further apart as Kurosaki moves closer and presses him against the wall until there is no space left between them. His right hand slides slowly up Ishida's leg and travels under his shirt, feeling the flesh underneath, and he shifts the other so that it wraps firmly around his waist.

Teeth nip sharply at his bottom lip, and Ishida slowly responds, a nagging tingling sensation in the back of his mind. It feels like the time he first took hold of Kurosaki's sword. He's not entirely aware of the spiritual energy drawn into himself, but when they touch, he feels it clearer than ever.

It's like last week, when he could still draw spiritual energy from Kurosaki's prone form.

Something else pricks on the edge of his consciousness. Finding it hard to break away from Kurosaki and his energy, he pushes against the other boy's chest, ending the kiss and sending Kurosaki sprawling away from him.

Quickly, he puts his glasses on, and when he does, he sees a hurt expression upon Kurosaki's face.

The door to the roof flies open, and Mitsuori and Keigo appear, lunches in hand.

"There you are. Why the hell are you skipping class again?"

Kurosaki coughs into his hand and ignores them. The injuries on his hand almost make Ishida grateful that it turns their attention away from his red lips, and Tatsuya comments on it, making a poor joke about the handicraft club that earns him a hidden glare from Kurosaki.

"What are you guys doing up here, anyway? It's not even lunchtime."

Their eyes train expectantly on the orange-haired boy, who, with a glance at Ishida, starts sputtering, unable to come up with an excuse.

"He was wrapping my hand for me," Ishida says quietly, and Kurosaki's babbling stops.

He doesn't listen anymore to the conversation around him, and he ignores the sound of the rooftop door opening and closing once more. Kurosaki's footsteps are loud as he comes and kneels beside him, a hand taking his own and resuming the task of binding his wounds, and he speaks first when Kurosaki opens his mouth.

"I don't want to talk about it."

Kurosaki frowns at his words but keeps quiet, bandaging Ishida's wounds. Pulling his legs to his chest, Ishida ignores the other boy. He ignores the constant worry in his head about the Soul Society, ignores the sting in his hand, and ignores the deceptive charm hanging around his wrist. He tries to ignore the Kurosaki's presence, but he realizes he can't, and he doesn't know if it's because of Kurosaki himself, or simply the spiritual energy radiating from him.

He doesn't know, and he doesn't want to hurt him – anybody – by his lack of knowledge.

Kurosaki finishes and ties a knot in the gauze to keep it from unraveling. He holds on a bit too long, and Ishida wonders if he can feel it too, the constant pushing and pulling of something magnetic between them.

The other boy stands up, and Ishida turns his head to the side.

"We'll talk later," Kurosaki replies firmly.

He walks away from him then, and Ishida feels the pull of energy follow him, stopping at the door when Kurosaki stops. A hand around the knob, yet Kurosaki waits as if he'd suddenly felt the energy as well. He pauses for just a minute, though long enough for both of them to become aware of the pulse between them.

Kurosaki turns his head just so, catching Ishida's eyes with his own, and they share a brief, all too short glance before he closes the door behind him.

Picking the gauze up from the floor, Ishida begins to rewind it. The cloth spins around and around far too many times before he replaces it back in his schoolbag.