A/N: YES! I am back! I am back, and I updated! This story will probably be a four-shot after all, seeing as I had a simpler ending in my mind, but now I thought of a better, more complex one. I'm sorry if this chapter didn't live up to your expectations. This whole story sounds a bit like... A people's story you know? I generally avoid describing dates and such, but this one couldn't go without it. Side note: this song is a really good, if slightly short one. I like the line with the clouds the most for some reason. It's Trey Songz's Interlude for his album 'Passion, Pain and Pleasure'. Just look up 'Pain (Interlude)' by him and you should be good.
I don't even like the rest of his songs, but meh. Pleaaasee be nice and review.
P.S. I have an idea about a small 2-3chapter sequel of this thing. I want to hear opinions about a potential something like that and whether you would like to see it all written in this same story and marked as 'Part Two' or if you'd like it to be posted separately, like a different story.
P.P.S. For all the GinHitsu lovers out there, go read my friend Doublebend's story 'Telling Thoughts'. It's an amazing piece that needs appreciation. Thank you. :3
Iridescent
Chapter 2
…Hurts when I laugh sometimes, feels good when I cry.
Tell me when you're lookin at me, can you see the pain in my eyes.
As the stars shine deep in the night sky.
As the sun sits way above the clouds.
As the world spins, time and time again.
Look at myself, wondering where I've been…
"Momo, please, those knowing looks are really infuriating."
"You're meeting him again tonight, aren't you?"
"None of your business."
"Aww, Shiro-chan, that's so sweet! Did he kiss you yet?"
Letting out an exaggeratedly loud sigh, Toushiro spun on his heel and pointed his still unused toothbrush at his cousin the way one might do with an actual weapon.
"For the last time," the boy gritted out, glaring daggers at the girl who was leaning sideways against the bathroom's doorframe, a small brazen smile gracing her lips. "My personal life is of no interest to you!"
"That's a no then." Hinamori cooed, folding her arms in front of her chest with a complacent arch of her right brow as she watched Hitsugaya roll his eyes before turning back to the sink.
"He's just taking it slow." He muttered gruffly, squeezing an even amount of toothpaste all along the length of the brush, lips forming something that faintly resembled a pout. He half-expected his cousin to let things go at this point (seeing as there wasn't much piquancy to share yet), but instead a strange, low, and painfully familiar sound reached his ears, causing him to lift his gaze to look at Hinamori's reflection in the mirror. Still in the confines of the bathroom's doorframe, she was staring at his back lazily, shaking her head and clicking her tongue with the same disturbing smirk that Toushiro found oh-so-odious. "Fuck. What now?"
"It's only been like a week and a half and you're getting restless." She pointed out in a sing-song voice, making one of those girly, playfully miff faces that the boy hated so much. "You really like him, huh? Really, really like the 'evil stalker' you've been nagging me about, no?"
"Shut up. That is not true!" Hitsugaya instantly objected lifting his index finger to point it accusingly at Momo's reflection rather than making the effort to turn around. "I just haven't had any in a pathetically long amount of time. I'm still a teenager, I'm sexually frustrated and he isn't helping."
"Ew, Shiro-chan!"
Hitsugaya paused for a moment, a victorious smirk slowly dissipating across his face as an impressively cunning enlightenment popped in the form of an imaginary bulb in his head.
"Are you getting out of this bathroom now, or are you staying to hear the details?" he asked her sweetly and within a second the door slammed shut behind Hinamori's hysterically retrieving form.
Taking a moment to congratulate himself for a job well-done, Toushiro let out a deep breath, a content smile adorning his lips before he shoved the toothbrush in his mouth and proceeded to pretty much grate his teeth clean. He wasn't going to go and give his cousin the pleasure of admitting that she had been right, that Ichigo wasn't so bad and that, in fact, Kurosaki happened to be quite sweet and considerate most of the time (his orange-haired head not nearly as empty as the teen had expected it be)… but yeah, at least in front of himself he could concede that maybe whatever it was that the carrot-top and he were having might as well be the healthiest thing Hitsugaya had had in his life for… quite a while. It felt almost as though he was back at school, back at those times when he would go out on a date with abundantly sweating palms and a tongue tied in a tight knot, mind blank like a piece of unused paper… and , ironically, hardly any idea of what' making out' and 'sex' really meant. Right. So cute. Agreeing that it would be somewhat ridiculous to roll his eyes at himself, Toushiro suppressed the urge, cleverly deciding that he was much better off being honest with himself rather than bottling things up like an immature child. There was nothing wrong in lying to everybody else (at least in his mind there wasn't), but trying to deceive your own head was just plain ludicrous.
Not so long ago he would've laughed at the thought of feeling this way towards anyone – of examining a barely blossoming liaison in search for pointless details, an understanding that wasn't even going to give him any sort of emotional or mental satisfaction. Mulling over whys, and hows, and becauses was what girls usually did and also what Hitsugaya tended to mock them about whenever he got the chance (see: Momo)… But so what? He wasn't going to go as far as to stop making fun of his cousin about her overdramatic tendencies, but he could at least admit it to himself that there was nothing wrong in brushing your teeth and thinking about a person you just might've developed some liking towards… Some.
A little of everything was good, right…?
Eh…
Toushiro wasn't entirely sure why he and Ichigo were moving at a snail speed or why a supermodel of 26 with (probably) more sexual partners behind his back than his own age would not dare to make a drastic move by now, but he wasn't complaining. Rather, the tempo helped him feel more at ease in the carrot-top's presence, relaxed somehow that he didn't have to think about keeping up when he wasn't even sure what would be waiting for him on the other end of the racing path. Hitsugaya wasn't one of those people who'd lie through their teeth and say that sex was not important because, damn, it was fuckin' vital, but the afterglow of a pleasant escapade failed to last very long when there wasn't something more involved… Even at this very moment, without having had done anything with the carrot-top, he still felt better than he had for awhile. He was considerably less surly and uncivil as of lately, less inclined to smoke a whole packet of cigarettes before dinner and all in all, just better. Happiness hormones, or no happiness hormones, he was enjoying the change.
For the first time in more than a year, Toushiro felt… good. He actually felt, through and through, good.
Hitsugaya froze for a moment, his brows knitting into a tiny, suspicious frown as his mind was unexpectedly wiped completely clean, allowing a healthy dose of puzzlement to seep into his body. Letting his hand with the toothbrush lower, he blinked a few times, observing blankly his own expression in the mirror before him as his thoughts backpedaled to what had been running through his head so very undisturbed just a moment ago.
Wait, what?
He blinked again, nearly sputtering the commotion of white bubbles that were sizzling in his mouth as the realization tried to sink in yet again, only to withdraw twice as quickly.
…What?
Bending over the sink to rinse his mouth with a few mechanical movements, Toushiro remained that way for a couple of moments before straightening up again, this time without the froth to cover the shape that his lips had molded in. He looked a bit freaked out, that much he could tell for sure, not sarcastic, bored, not even angry… just… freaked out.
No fuckin way in hell!
Lifting a hand to run his fingers through his hair restlessly, Hitsugaya shook his head, a peculiar sort of tremors coursing through his body as he tried to get a hold of the flips his stomach had suddenly started doing. It couldn't be. It couldn't be, right? It had only been a week and a half, just one week and a half and they hadn't even done anything! He couldn't be so stupid, could he? He couldn't, he was not doing it again, he had promised himself, he-… Ugh!
Closing his eyes for a trice, Hitsugaya let his forehead fall against the cold, smooth surface of the bathroom mirror, a low shaky sigh escaping his lips as his whole body went sort of slack against the poor support that the looking glass provided.
That's it, Toushiro. You idiot. Who the hell gave you this susceptible little heart of yours with these good-for-nothing amorous disposition?
"Fuck it…" the boy whispered, feeling strangely exhausted suddenly. "Fuck it. It's not the same."
"Sooo," Ichigo drawled after Hitsugaya had closed the door behind himself and turned around, a lit cigarette bouncing jovially between his lips as he raised a pair of thin white brows at his date expectantly. "Can I finally take you to a fancy dinner?"
Letting his eyes roll with exaggerated tedium, Toushiro took a deep drag from his smoke and descended the two steps in front of his threshold before capturing the poisonous stick between his index and middle finger and snatching it away from his face, calmly exhaling the white fumes through his mouth the moment there was nothing in the way.
"Don't be ridiculous." He murmured evenly, showing absolutely no signs of a protest as the taller male draped his arm around the boy's shoulders and proceeded to usher him on the sidewalk. "Last time I was in a fancy restaurant, I asked the waitress if it was okay to smoke pot in the 'no smoking' department or if I had to move."
"And what did she say?"
Hitsugaya paused for a second, momentarily recalling how his father, the 'famous politician', had dropped his fork, too shocked to say anything as his son purposefully pulled out a joint and looked up at the baffled waitress with his sweetest smile.
"Hm. She said," Toushiro took another drag from his cigarette, altering his voice into a thinner, more high-pitched version as he imitated the girl's words. "I-I guess so, s-sir. A-an ashtray? Tch! Fucking hypocrites. As long as you look important, the world is at your fingertips, if not-… Well, go smoke pot in the playgrounds."
Ichigo let out a low chuckle, squeezing the smaller male tighter to his side as he shook his head in mock reproach.
"That really happened?"
"Yup. It was a good experiment." Glancing up at his date with the slightest bit of apprehension, he added somewhat tentatively, as though trying to apologize for something. "I never really smoked pot, I just did that to annoy my father."
The carrot-top's hand instantly started rubbing up and down Hitsugaya's clothed arm, an unspoken kind of comfort seeping in the gesture as he watched his date finish up the second half of his tobacco stick and pull out another one, deftly tucking it between his lips. "You don't get along with your parents much, huh? You don't really… talk about you family…"
"No." the boy agreed dully, frowning slightly down at the unlit end of his cigarette before pulling out a lighter and promptly fixing the issue. "My dad was a stuck-up bastard last time I saw him and my mother had no spine. Excuse me if I don't feel too proud to be their embarrassing little sprout." He felt Ichigo's fingers move up to entangle in the short strands of his hair and sighed contently, his eyes fluttering shut for a moment at the feathery feeling. "Can we not talk about it?"
"Of course. If that upsets you."
"It doesn't. My heart is made of stone." Came the immediate response and the man laughed again, urging the smaller male down a much more lively street.
"A movie then?"
"A movie it is."
There were two lines in front of the cinema: one was for an animation that had apparently just come out and another that was consisted of just a few people, seeing as the premiere of the second film had been months ago. Toushiro hadn't watched either movie, so he decided to have mercy on his date and graciously picked the less popular one, smirking a little when Ichigo ordered him not to move and went to get the tickets. Stepping away from the crowd and leaning against the wall opposite of the two ticket stalls, Hitsugaya briefly considered another cigarette before the film, but chased the thought away almost immediately. He didn't really want a smoke, it was more like he was looking for something to do with his hands and poisoning his lungs even more than he usually did for the sake of having a minor, brief occupation… well, it was dumb to say the least.
Slumping a little against the rough surface behind his back, the boy lifted his hand to rub the back of his neck lazily, his watery gaze floating aimlessly around the scene before him without really taking anything in. He could hear some annoying song playing from somewhere above his head but, surprisingly, he didn't sense the familiar sting of vexation that tended to follow such poor music choices. Instead, as his gaze fell on the familiar tuft of orange hair that was now bouncing restlessly at the end of the line, he felt relaxed. Safe somehow. Hopeful perhaps. He was yet to admit it to himself what it was about this person that had initially irritated him so much and consequently ended up drawing him towards the man, but deep inside… deeper than he was willing to look, deeper than deep, deeper than skin, blood, body, underneath so much bad memories and accusations, he knew it was lack of judgment that had touched him. The tolerance. Ichigo didn't push him or pressure him in any way, he didn't sulk, yell, demand a better treatment, no. He copied with Hitsugaya's foul temper with an easy-going attitude, laughing at the little sarcastic remarks that the boy spat out ever so often even when those were offensive or uncalled for. The carrot-top's hand on the boy's shoulder was always warm, welcoming somehow, and for that… for that Toushiro was grateful. He was never going to say it out loud, but he needed this. He had always, always needed to feel wanted, and loved, and welcomed… so much so actually, so badly, that he still remembered the dull, throbbing pain when his father had greeted him with a 'Do you necessarily have to be so loud?' rather than a question of how school had been. He recalled with startling clarity every cold, polite line that had ever left his parents' mouths, he re-lived every inmost clenching inside his chest, the frustration that had kept building up day after day until it had started spilling over the brim, leaking from his pores, gushing between every cell in his organism. He remembered how bad it had pained him at first. And how frightening it had been when suddenly, inexplicably, he had woken up one morning and realized, with some sort of sick satisfaction, that he didn't care anymore. That he didn't hurt.
Not the same way he had anyway…
He had done a lot of stupid stuff after that, all random, all seemingly without any particular reason and absolutely each and every one of them had ended badly. Shrinks would call it 'attention seeking', Toushiro put it in his 'revenge' section. Possessing the exceptional ability to learn quickly and efficiently had rendered him haughty and thick-skinned even before he had entered high school. For the better, or for the worse, the boy's educational efforts had promptly been reduced to minimum without actually affecting his straight As in any way, and so Hitsugaya, lots of free time and boredom had become more or less best friends. He had come back home after three in the morning for a year before his parents even noticed the fact, and when they did, preaching the boy about the potential of getting caught by some paparazzi had only made him more inclined to keep behaving in such way. He had said nothing, just kept his lips pressed tightly together during the dry scolding, but even back then he knew this was the beginning of a pointless, winless war. He didn't mind getting lectured when he deserved it, he really didn't, but it was the way his mother had put the focus on his dad's image rather than her son's health that had made the white-haired teen's blood boil. The next day he had shown up at school drunk like a sailorman after a night of god knew what activities, and only an immediate reaction and lots of convincing funding from his father's side had shut the authority's mouths. The moralizing after that had been just as shitty as the one before, and the bruise on Toushiro's face hadn't really hurt much till the morning, so he, once again, had failed to feel guilty or inappropriate in any way. He had been caught smoking in the early hours of the day several times afterwards, as well as spray-paining, but his cigarette addiction hadn't been so bad back then, and his dad had managed to cover things up pretty successfully whenever hooliganism was involved. Hitsugaya Senior hadn't yet become a mayor back then, but he had still had a lot of money and a lot of influence… or at least enough of both as Toushiro had often said through a bitter sort of laughter when his parent had withdrawn his hand from the teen's bruised face after the only physical contact that he would ever grace his son with. Underage clubbing had also been added to the list of mischiefs, but such escapades had been much rarer, seeing as the boy wasn't very fond of any party-ish atmosphere. Then, just around the elections, Hitsugaya had reached the pique of his adventures and before he had even had the time to realize what was happening, things had started to spit out of control.
The funny thing was that during that last incident, for once, for once getting back at his parents had not been Toushiro's aim. The boy had just wanted a glimpse of personal happiness and maybe exactly because of that audacious desire, he had paid the pricey cost of his foolishness with much more than another tenacious pursing of his lips and purple splotch or two…
Looking now at Ichigo, the boy felt understood and accepted for who he was for the first time in his life. He didn't feel pushed around for the millions of flaws that he had, didn't feel inferior, didn't feel less in any way. The carrot-top didn't want, expect, require anything from him. It was more like, the older male was just reveling in the little conversations they had, contemplating Toushiro, when the teen spoke, studying him with a sort of fascination that no one had ever expressed towards Hitsugaya before. For better, or for the worse, it was those looks that dug the furthest in the younger one's guts, that impossible to dissolve smirk that made the boy feel not only desirable, but interesting. Someone worth listening and talking to.
…And that was an unfamiliar sensation.
Relieving somehow…
Toushiro exhaled slowly through his nose, chewing thoughtfully on the inside on his bottom lip, and was just about to look down at his watch, when a familiar face caught his eye and he paled so fast and so much, that for a minute he thought he was going to collapse. Fighting down the frightening acceleration of his heartbeat, the boy made a move to duck in some less visible place, but it was too late, he had already been spotted.
"Shit…" futilely willing himself to look away from the man's face, he momentarily felt himself lapse in some gravity-devoid, blank, empty space, his brain refusing to cooperate. Then the guy made a step towards him, his brows furrowed with surprise, and Hitsugaya snapped back to reality. Gathering enough strength to stand on his weak knees, the boy pushed himself away from the wall and made a bee-line for the bathroom, head held low as he prayed to all deity that the man would be smart and back off.
No such luck.
"Toushiro?"
Fuck. Freezing on spot like an inspect, caught in a spider-web, the white-haired teen closed his eyes, weariness washing over his face before he slowly turned around, arms wrapping protectively around his body as he hunched over just a bit, refusing to meet the other one's gaze.
"Hey." Toushiro replied dully, suddenly feeling incredibly small and pathetic as the man of solid 6 feet took another step towards him, the smell of the familiar cologne that had once made him all warm and tingly on the inside, now bringing a sickening sensation to his stomach.
It took Ichigo awhile to pick exactly which seats would be the most convenient ones -without many people in front of them, but not too close to the screen, either. Then, just as he was planning to walk away from the stall, a couple of squealing girls popped out of nowhere to ask for his autograph and he had to plaster that famous smile of his on his face and sign tickets until the queue of fans melted away, leaving him in peace. When he had finally turned around, he had half-expected to see his date's gaze, drilling with excessive grumpiness in his head... but instead, he found no one.
Stepping away from the crowd, the carrot-top looked around, a small frown forming on his face as he tried to make out the familiar white mane somewhere among the bleary splotches of colours that had permeated the cinema's hall. He was blessed with no success. Standing awkwardly there with two tickets in hand, he quickly considered the possibility that Toushiro had just ditched him, before shaking the thought away completely. If anything, he could definitely trust the boy to proclaim the model's presence for unwanted (in case it truly was) without having to have to resort to such complex evacuation plans as this one… At least Ichigo really, really hoped so, because he had no idea where the small teen could've gone without even saying anything, or where-
…And then he heard Hitsugaya's voice.
He couldn't make out what the boy was saying, more like just the buzz of his intonation (which sounded strangely shaky, verging with some highly uncommon, helpless sort of urgency), but it gave him enough direction to spot the narrow corridor at end of the hall which, judging by the signs, led to the toilets. Taking no moment to consider who Toushiro could've possibly been talking to, Ichigo made his way towards the needed spot, turning the corner just in time to see some stranger try and take the Hitsugaya's hand, only to have the younger one jerk away wildly with an indignant, firm, and maybe slightly frightened 'NO!' on his lips. Freezing with surprise, the carrot-top momentarily lost any ability to move, watching instead the scene that kept unraveling before his eyes like a badly directed play.
The man that Toushiro was talking to was quite tall and quite winsome, with sharp, angular features, long libs and surprisingly sinewy arms that looked like they could crush the boy in two if they wrapped around the petite body tightly enough. Ichigo couldn't see the stranger's face well from his angle, but he was definitely at least in his late thirties, if not older, his clothes neat, simple and expensive-looking to the very last button. From where he was standing, the carrot-top wasn't exactly hidden behind anything, probably positioned precisely in Toushiro's visual range, yet he remained completely unnoticed by the pair… Something that wasn't exactly a surprise, seeing as the boy was stubbornly staring down, merely shaking his head when his conversation partner kept whispering mellifluous reassuring, bent just over the shorter one's ear. The model could tell that whatever it was that this guy was trying to achieve, it wasn't to the teen's liking, not at all – rather, Hitsugaya seemed ready to run for the hills at the first chance given, the look of a caged animal becoming gradually more and more noticeable with every passing second. What the-…? There was something oddly disturbing about the way the boy looked, something… unnatural, slightly broken even, and it made the carrot-top's insides clench as he took in more details about his supposed date's appearance. Hitsugaya's whole form had assumed a startlingly uncustomary stance, his lips pressed together in a tense, white line that literally screamed of how hard he was trying to contained his emotions, and his frown, usually so glum, and untoward, and calm, was now a knot of pure distress - vulnerability and unwillingness etched in every shallow crease in his forehead in a manner that seemed almost physically painful.
"No!" Toushiro yelped again, trying to move out of the man's reach, but ending up trapped anyway when the larger hand grasped his arm, the scene, along with the look of disgust on the boy's face, making Ichigo's insides jolt with heat as he promptly crossed the distance between himself and the pair.
"Do you mind?" the carrot-top asked smoothly, his hand sliding along the back of Hitsugaya's neck to rest there possessively. The man's hold dropped off instantly and he redirected his gaze to the model, surprise flashing across his face momentarily before being replaced by slight, if rather bitter, amusement.
"Oh." The stranger uttered dryly, eyes fixed on Ichigo. "Aren't you that guy from the posters?"
Toushiro cleared his throat, leveling the model apprehensively for a moment, before saying:
"Kurosaki's my date tonight." he uttered steadily, a tiny frosty flicker illuminating his jade orbs as he turned to the man reluctantly. "This is Sakai Takeo. Somebody I used to know."
"Cold." Sakai stated with a tight smile, his attention solely on the shortest in the group. "But then again, you always have been, haven't you, Toushiro? Unable to forgive."
Hitsugaya remained silent, his gaze riveted on the man before him with stillness that could easily fooled someone less observant, someone who couldn't feel the accelerated pulse that palpitated beneath the skin on the boy's neck.
"You'd go and do the same thing all over if you're put in an identical situation. What kind of a roguish apology is this?" the teen whispered but the other one just shook his head inexorably.
"I'm just a man. You know that. You know what would've happened-…"
"And I was and still am just a boy!" Hitsugaya cried out, much more loudly than a moment ago, a sort of bottled up frustration oozing from his words and spilling unrestrained in the open space between them "Yet I did what I had to do when it came down to it, didn't I?"
"If you're such a boy, then tell me this:" Sakai gritted out with some malevolence in his tone, dark eyes flickering to Kurosaki for a moment. "Why do you keep running after older guys, huh?"
"I think that's quite enough." Ichigo cut in, his well-practiced composure cracking along the ridges as he felt Hitsugaya go tense underneath his touch, stepping back as though he was planning to make a run for it. Frowning slightly at the action, the carrot-top looked down, meeting his date's widened, trapped looking eyes with his own, soft gaze. "I would say that's a no for the movie, hm?" he smiled reassuringly at the smaller male when he received a voiceless nod, and added. "It was not very nice meeting you, Mr. Sakai. We'll be leaving now."
"I'm so sorry." Hitsugaya whispered once they were out in the street, the words coming much more easily than he had expected as he closed his eyes for a moment, not daring to meet Ichigo's gaze. "I really, really am, and I'll understand if you want to go back home and-"
"Why would I want to go home? The night is still young. Unless you're feeling too upset, I'd like to spend a little more time with you." He paused and Toushiro looked up, disbelief swimming in his jade orbs as he met the other one's calm, slightly concerned expression with a slack jaw. "Are you? Too upset?"
"W-what? No! But I thought after-"
"Toushiro," the man said seriously, reaching to wrap an arm around Hitsugaya's waist and pull him closer so that the boy's hands, which the teen had instinctively brought before himself, were trapped between their bodies, resting securely on Ichigo's chest. "If you want to talk about it, I'd be more than happy to listen. If you don't want to, that's okay. Whatever it is that you've left behind, you've left it behind, and that's what matters. It's of no importance to me. Okay?"
"Okay." Toushiro replied weakly and the model smirked, reaching to tuck a wisp of white hair behind the boy's ear before letting go completely. Swallowing back his disappointment of the lost contact, along with a fresh lump of nerves, he added gingerly. "I want to show you something."
"They stopped building it months ago. Almost a year." Toushiro explained, grazing the tips of his fingers along the tall iron chain-link fence as he stared at the skeleton of the edifice on the other side. It was a little hard to make out what was snuggling beyond the barrier as the sun had settled down long time ago and the street lamps were providing almost no-existent illumination, but with a little imagination, one could get the idea. And Ichigo had way more than just a little imagination… "I think it was supposed to be some extravagant office building, but apparently the guy who funded it went bankrupt or something, because all of a sudden, they just left it like this."
"Why do I have the feeling that you don't really want them to pick the project up again?" the carrot-top murmured knowingly and he stepped beside the smaller male, hands in his pockets as he glanced down at his date playfully. Toushiro let a small, almost melancholic smile twist his lips as his fingers curled through the holes in the fence and he sighed, still contemplating the construction on the other side.
"Do you want to get in?"
"Get in?"
"Sure." Hitsugaya cooed, shooting the taller male a challenging smirk. "Get in. Over the fence."
Then, without waiting for an answer, and barely giving the stunned man a chance to digest the newly arrived information, Toushiro linked his fingers through the wire and began to deftly mount the barrier, chuckling a little when Ichigo's eyes went wide with shock.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" the carrot-top hissed, looking around frantically to see if someone had noticed. The street was empty. Turning back to the boy, the model momentarily reached for Hitsugaya's ankle, but quickly withdrew, fingers clenching in frustrated fists when he realized that touching the younger male could result in Toushiro falling off. "Come down? Please?"
"No." the teen countered easily, climbing the last meter before jumping over it and landing agilely on the other side. "Are you coming?"
"I don't think-"
Hitsugaya cut him off with a snort mid-sentence before placing his hands on his hips, his weight resting on his right leg as he eyed the other man pointedly.
"Don't tell me you're scared to break a nail."
"We're going to get arrested." Ichigo stated with as much authority as he could possibly muster, but the younger male just scoffed, rolling his eyes expressively.
"What's your point again?"
"Toushiro-"
"We're not going to do anything wrong, okay?" the boy insisted, looking a bit impatient now, restless. "If they catch us, we'll say we got lost because you don't know the neighbourhood."
Ichigo somehow doubted such excuse would be passable (for more reasons than one) but sighed, deciding to oblige anyway.
It took the carrot-top a little longer than Hitsugaya to surmount the awesome ordeal that was the chain-link fence. Toushiro wasn't in a hurry, so he pulled out a cigarette and lit it, watching with a great, if silent, amusement, as the taller male tried to simultaneously climb up and be aware of whether someone was in the immediate vicinity to spot him. That included a lot of turning his head from side to side, pausing, squinting, grunting, and, understandably, some snickering from the white-haired teen's side.
Once Ichigo had his feet solidly on the ground, the teen spun around on his heel and started walking away, not really bothering to look over his shoulder to see if the taller male was coming. Hitsugaya could swear he heard an exaggerated sigh behind his back, but that only made the edges of his lips curl upwards a little, as the sound was followed by hurried steps and next thing he knew, an arm had found its way around the boy's waist. For a few moments neither of them spoke, Toushiro smoking his cigarette silently as he guided them further away from the street, deeper into the foundations of the abandoned building and around the labyrinth of roofless walls until they were standing on the other side, contemplating the scene from an angle that left everything in a shower of silver moonlight.
"You can't see it, can you?" the boy murmured, leaning a little against the other male as he gazed at the unfinished edifice before him. "It's all just ruins to you."
"I can see it if you show me." The taller male noticed half-teasingly. "What do you see?"
A tiny, strangely distant smile grazed the smaller one's lips as Hitsugaya let his eyelids halfway to cover his eyes. Like a cat, stretching his elongated, spindly muscles at the threshold of an imminent slumber, he gave up a low purr and slothfully hummed at the back of his throat as his slightly glazed over irises moved along the length of the scenery.
"I see a gallery." He whispered with an almost clandestine sort of tone, surprised just a bit to hear the other man let out a tiny encouraging sound as though expecting to hear the rest of some very captivating fairy tale. Toushiro nearly smiled at the thought, daring to steal a quick glance at the taller male with the corner of his eye before settling his gaze back on the scene in front of him, this time with a very deep, nagging comprehension of the fact that there was someone next to him. For all this time, after numerous, countless visits to this site, only now did he realize he had never brought anyone here before. Not even Momo. And yet, having Ichigo with him at his little imaginary castle didn't feel strange or awkward… Not at all. Can you see what I see? Can you hear the same croon of warm earth, the stone creaking and the air clashing against harder bodies? Toushiro exhaled very slowly through his nose and lifted the nearly finished cigarette to his now chapped lips to take in one last drag before chucking it carelessly to the side with his thumb and index finger. His digits felt strangely empty when they disposed of their ill-scented accessory and so they involuntarily fumbled about in the thin air in search for their 'precious' until another hand grasped his own and the void vanished like a mirage in a hot summer day. Hitsugaya glanced obliquely at the palm, pressing against his own and felt an uncustomary tightness gather in his throat. It was all so very familiar and yet so, so different. Much like a year or so ago, he wanted to regret this and couldn't bring himself to, no matter how hard he tried. So instead, he stood there beside this near stranger and just sank in the comfort of the taller, larger, more mature body with barely surfacing avidness, neatly masked covetous craving for more: more warmth, more attention, caresses… affection. Like an old, quaint doll, left in the attic for an undefined period of time, he felt suddenly picked up, brushed off the dust, the thin, silvery spider-webs and summoned again to display his once lacerated sheen. His virtues…
His…
Toushiro swallowed thickly.
…His sins.
"Just think about it. About these walls, as ugly and useless as they look to you right now." Hitsugaya tried, his voice strangely raspy, rifting like enfeebled, aged wood despite his efforts. "White. Clean, freshly painted. Now, imagine them… covered with colors. Pictures of anything really. Large, overwhelming scenes that want to swallow you, confuse, envelop, suck you in…" he paused, self-conscious suddenly when the demurring fragment of his fantasy tried to pull away from his grasp and lips much like a shy kitten, meeting a stranger for the first time. "A labyrinth of unconventional art… Wouldn't it be amazing to lose your way in there?"
Ichigo remained silent for a few moments and Toushiro felt his lungs contract with the effort to keep his own mouth shut. It all resembled too much sharing some dirty, long-kept secret and during one short trice, the boy cursed himself in earnest for saying anything. It was, after all, his own crazy idea to develop, his own plan to plot and strive after, as impossible as he knew it was. He needed this little sparkle inside his head to light his life, put some illumination in the darkness he was so blindly wading around in, and he didn't care, couldn't allow himself to care, about what others thought… About how pathetic he would seem in any reasonable person's thoughts.
"Kyouraku mentioned something about you doing graffiti." The carrot-top noticed finally, a tad bit of humour flashing in his tone, not unkindly though. "He sounded quite impressed about what you could do, although he never gave me much information, probably assuming automatically that I already knew everything... You know, he's the manager of quite a few famous faces out there. If he says you're good, that probably means you're too talented to cast aside."
Hitsugaya's brows shot upwards in two equally sharp arches before he snorted and let out a curt, dry laughter, his muscles tensing under the clothes as a stab of painful disbelief pierced his ribs.
"What he saw was just a little more than a napkin sketch." He pursed his lips and made a move to pull his hand out of the taller male's grasp with absolute disregard to the hurt look that flashed in Ichigo's eyes. Instead, Toushiro clenched his hands into fists and trapped the emptiness within his palm the way a desperate man clutches the shadow of his last spent coin and slowly disentangled himself from the model's arms. "You don't have to talk sugary shit to have me fawning over you, Kurosaki."
"That wasn't my intention at all." The man said softly, frowning just a little when Hitsugaya finally stepped away from him and turning to face him with a hard, slightly fretful look. "Maybe it's not such an impossible ambition to follow, huh? Opening your own gallery, developing what has already been given to you and showing it off to the world, like you've been supposed to all along."
Toushiro couldn't help the small chuckle that broke from his lips as he shook his head, forcing himself to rip his gaze away from the burning chocolate eyes and rivet them on the peeling walls to his right instead.
"Do you know how much work this would need? Not only the restoration of the place itself… There'll have to be some sort of a tent over this whole place to keep it dry. People to take care of guarding and maintaining it, painters, other than me… And those are just the possible problems that I can think of right now. The easily resolved ones." he bit the edge of his bottom lip for a moment and shrugged one shoulder, an uneasy sort of mood shining in the gesture. "I dream and think about this because I'm a human being. We all need to cling to something unattainable to keep existing, but… But I don't want pink smoke to try and grasp as a life-line. I'd rather look for real rope."
With that said and done, Toushiro shoved his strangely numb hands deep in his pockets and made a move to mimic his steps back to the chain-linked fence, only to feel something grasp his arm and pull him back. He stumbled a little in the unwanted direction, too surprised to resist, but instead of landing on the slightly moist soil beneath his feet, he collapsed right in the awaiting embrace of his date.
"Kurosaki-" he started, the demur already forming icily on his tongue, but he never got to finish his sentence as a pair of soft lips landed on his own, causing him to take a sharp breath in and blink stupidly for a moment. There was no rush in the kiss though, no persistence, hunger, cruelness. Rather, it was an almost timid, unsure one, moving gently and sending a wave of warmth to course through the smaller one's frame like an alleviating antidote for his half-poisoned body.
Catching up with the gesture just a few seconds later – the time that was needed for all the uncertainty and irritation to melt away – he arched his back, wrapping his arms around the model's neck and pulling him flush against his smaller figure with audacity that he had a tough time extinguishing just yet. Quickly, almost too quickly, he tilted his head to the side and opened his mouth, inviting Ichigo in for a deeper, more intense kiss, like an impatient child, trying to swallow his long-awaited sugary treat as fast as he can before anyone had tried to take it away from him. An arm wrapped around his waist, another traveling up the small back, and the boy purred deeply in his throat, reveling in the mix of sensations. He cared not if he was rushing things, if he was too needy, too insistent… He wanted this. He had craved and needed to be kissed in such a way for a long, long time… Maybe forever, maybe an almost forever, it felt equally horrid either way. For the first time, he dared hope that maybe he had found someone right for him, someone to see beneath his biting exterior, someone to hold him like this, steal his breath away and leave him burning like a living ember rather than a true creature of flesh, and blood, and bones.
And heart.
Despite everything, Toushiro did, too, have a heart.
A heart too big for his own good.
But that he was unwilling to tell just yet.
A/N: Now PLEASE review? Next time: smut and drama. In the chapter afterwards - even more drama.
