Author's Note: I do not own Bleach or its characters. This is AU and in honor of Shunsui and Nanao's birthdays.
Passing Summers
It took Shunsui a year of working weekends and holidays to get the rough draft done. He spent his entire vacation camped out at Jyuu's place in Matsue working on it. Then it took another entire year to turn that rough draft into something he could submit to an agent or a publisher. Shunsui loved every minute of it. He was pretty sure he had hated a number of those minutes as well, but then writing did that to him. So two summers after Lisa's funeral, Shunsui sent off multiple copies of the manuscript. Then he started working a new one.
Most of his friends thought he was a little crazy. Of course, that had been a commonly held opinion before this, so it really wasn't much of a change. And besides the constant, rather obsessive writing, Shunsui hadn't changed much. He still slacked off at work most of the time, had a fondness for bar crawls, and flirted with most women. But writing had also taken up a large part of his life as well, and he liked it better than just about anything else he'd done. Creating stories was interesting and a challenge, and it was what he wanted to do for the rest of his life.
Nanao in the meantime had thrown herself into two things: her schoolwork and books. She had always been an intelligent child, but even those who had realized it were rather blown away when she really began to apply herself. Not that she hadn't been applying herself before, but now there was a new intensity to it. Books had always been an escape for Nanao as well, but now she wasn't just reading them. Nanao had managed to get the local library to let her volunteer there, despite the fact that she was two years younger than they typically allowed. The staff had started her out with simple things like shelving books. Within a year, she could do almost every task in the library, including the ones that were typically only for paid staff. Within two years, the library staff didn't know how they had managed without her.
Shunsui had just finished the rough draft of his next novel when the news came. It was a sunny summer day when he learned that his first novel would be published. It also threw his normal schedule into chaos, and it took longer to edit that rough draft than he'd planned. Still, when the next summer rolled around, Crossing Starry Riverappeared on shelves in bookstores, and Shunsui had submitted the manuscript for his next novel to his new agent, Rangiku Matsumoto. And despite the craziness of the book tour, Shunsui managed to get started on his third novel.
Crossing Starry River, a modern story loosely based on the Tanabata myth, was the break out novel of the year. Critics and readers alike fell in love with the heroine, Hoshi, a young professional dancer and her beloved Hikaru as they struggled to make a relationship work in the face of a demanding career and controlling parents. It was a story of love conquering all, and almost everyone who read it loved it. The dedication of the book read To my own star who provided a guiding light and caused quite a stir. And everyone was looking forward to Shunsui's next book.
It was Nanao's new favorite book when she read it. She had checked it out from the library, but within a week, she had gone out and bought her own copy of the hardcover. The fourteen year old still adored fairytales, and this adaptation fixed many of the problems that she'd had with the original. She recognized Shunsui's name and felt pleased that she had actually met the author. It was also that summer that one of the librarians suggested to Nanao that she might think about a career in library science. Nanao had already been skipped a year ahead in school to provide a better challenge to her, so thinking about college and careers wasn't that surprising. By this point, Nanao was a well known feature at the library. She was the one that both parents and children went to when looking for books, and even her peers knew that if you needed a book for an assignment, you went to Nanao in order to find one that wouldn't drive you crazy. The teenager was practically running one of the library's book groups, and everyone thought it would be a good fit for her.
His next book came out a year later and received as much success and praise as his first. By this point, Shunsui had been able to quit his day job and write full time. It had been an interesting period of adjustment, but Shunsui had to admit that he liked the schedule much better. It was nice to be able to take naps whenever he wanted to and not worry about being caught working on his novel at work. And having more time in the day to work on his writing was great. It didn't stop his rather obsessive writing habits, like scribbling scene on cocktail napkins when he was out for drinks, but it did make getting manuscripts done easier.
When Chasing Stars came out, Shunsui had already submitted a third novel and was working on a fourth. While Chasing Stars was rather different than Crossing Starry River (it was a modern fantasy complete with fighter planes, curses, and true love), it met with just as much success. The tale of Kara, a brash young pilot, on a quest to rescue her love that had been stolen was a hit. Shunsui had based this novel loosely on East of the Sun, West of the Moon, and while maybe not all of his readers caught that fact, many did and were delighted. Chasing Stars publication also heralded another change. Shunsui moved out of his little apartment in Kyoto and into a slightly larger. There were two reasons for the move. One had been that he had always really needed a bigger place. The other was the fact that people (mostly fans of his books) had started showing up on his doorstep, and that was distracting him from his writing.
Nanao loved Chasing Stars almost as much as Kyoraku's first book. She would be hard pressed to choose a favorite between the two of them. This time she didn't wait. She bought the hardcover version the moment it came out. She found the dedication a little odd though. It had read To my star – thanks for the ideas to chase. He had dedicated his last book to his star (whoever or whatever that was) too. Besides adding Chasing Stars to her favorite books, the only major thing on Nanao's horizon was the fact that she was now slated to graduate from high school early. That meant that it was time to start really thinking about where she might want to go to college. Nanao was still volunteering at the library, around five days a week at this point. She would have been there more days, but she had also been convinced to join the school swim team, and that took up some of her time now. Her schedule was pretty full, but despite this, Nanao was happy.
By the time that Shunsui's third novel, Won't Let Go, was published, he was bona fide reclusive celebrity author. He was always popular and well received when he did interviews and made appearances, but for the most part he stayed out of the spotlight when not promoting a book. Won't Let Go continued his trend of bestsellers. Its release had been highly anticipated. It was yet another adapted fairytale. Shunsui liked working with them. They had so much potential, and given that one of his areas of intrest during his college career had been folklore and mythology, he had quite a bit of material he could draw on. This time around he's chosen to work with Tam Lin. It had not escaped Shunsui's notice that all three of his novels were based on the first three stories he'd chatted about with Nanao Ise that summer night when they'd met at the Tanabata festival. There was a reason that all three books were dedicated to her.
If it hadn't been for the two conversations he'd had with Nanao, Shunsui rather doubted that he would have become an author. He owed her for that. Besides, Nanao had very good taste in fairytales. He had to admit that this had been his favorite novel to write so far. It was another modern fantasy, and Shunsui had really gotten attached to the characters. It had been something of a let down when he'd finished the book. However, he'd started another project rather quickly, and that one was now awaiting approval from the publishing company. He'd just started work on the draft for his fifth novel when Won't Let Go came out, and there were rumors about interests in the movie rights for his earlier works.
The summer Won't Let Go came out, Nanao was a little stressed. It was her last year of high school, and she was busy both with the actual schoolwork and with figuring out college. She knew what she wanted to study, but she was having trouble finding the right fit of schools. It didn't help that she was making most of the arrangements on her own. Well, she had the support of her teachers and the library staff, but since her sister had died, there hadn't been much support from home. Not that there had ever been much support from anyone other than Lisa, so with her gone that rather made sense. The new book by her favorite author had been a wonderful escape, and Nanao quickly found that the heroine on this one, Emer, was one of her all time favorite characters.
When In Plain Sight came out as Shunsui's fourth book, it came at the same time as a number of changes in his life. For one thing, he moved away from Kyoto. That in part had something to do with his best friend. Jyuu had finally married Retsu in the last year, and Retsu had opened a pediatrics practice in Hiroshima. After a nearly a year of living in a different city from his closest friends, Shunsui had decided he wanted a change. Besides, Jyuu had called him with news that Retsu was pregnant, and his friend would need some one to commiserate with through the pregnancy, and someone had to spoil that kid rotten. It wasn't like there was anything vastly important tying him to Kyoto. It was just the city he'd gone to college in and where he'd lived since. Yes, his agent Rangiku Ichimaru was here, but most of their contact was through phone and email anyway.
So he'd relocated to an apartment in Hiroshima. It had put him slightly behind schedule for his new book tour, but Shunsui really didn't care much. In Plain Sight was doing fine. Like Crossing Starry River, it was a fairytale set in the modern day. Revolving around Airi, a young chef hiding from her past, and a well known young businessman, Atsushi who was starting a restaurant, it was an immediate hit. Furthermore, both Crossing Starry River and Chasing Stars would both be turned into movies in the next few years, though by different studios. Shunsui knew that next summer his fifth novel would most likely be coming out. He'd been a little later than normal with getting it submitted. All in all, life was good, even if Jyuushiro had started to tease him about finding a nice girl and settling down.
University was utterly delightful to Nanao, if a little overwhelming at times. At seventeen, she was the youngest person in all of her classes, but she didn't really care. She had a part time job working in the university library, and she was enjoying all of her classes so far. The only major drawback to her mind was the fact that she now had very little time for pleasure reading. She didn't read much anymore that wasn't for a class. But when In Plain Sight came out, Nanao made time to read that. Though she didn't know that her favorite coffee shop in Kyoto where she read most of the book was the same place where Shunsui had worked on many of his other novels.
Falling and Flight was Shunsui's fifth novel, and when it came out he was immersed in his next project already. Sort of. He was struggling a little more with this newest project than he had with his other novels. To be fair though, the newest manuscript he was working on was something new for him, and it was turning out to be a bit of a challenge. But Shunsui had been doing that more lately with his writing. Take Falling and Flight for example. Until that particular novel, Shunsui had stuck with focusing on two main characters with some supporting cast. But he'd felt that Falling and Flight needed something more, and so along with Riella and Westley (his original main characters for the story), Mira and Connor took center stage. That was probably why it was his longest book to date. This time around he'd based the story on The Wild Swans. It was fairytale that had always intrigued him. This one had turned out to be another modern fantasy despite Shunsui's intentions to write a straight modern tale.
He wasn't sure what his latest project would turn into. It had already turned out to be more complex than he'd expected, and while it was taking longer to write than normal, Shunsui rather thought it worth it. Actually getting the story down was definitely a challenge, but he liked it and his characters too much not to try. Other than that, his life these days was quite ordinary. He worked on his book. He occasions did interviews, appearances, and book tours. He babysat Kiyomi Ukitake, his goddaughter, whenever he got the chance. The filming for Crossing Starry River was finishing up (not that he was actually involved much in that), and the movie would come out within a year or so. All in all, Shunsui was content with his life.
Finding the time to curl up and read Falling and Flight proved to be difficult for Nanao. She was busy. University was still wonderful, but when she wasn't in class or studying or working on assignments, she was working. Nanao had managed to land herself in a fast track program with library science. It made things a little more hectic than normal though. She was doing some preliminary course work for the graduate program, and if she was lucky, she'd get in internship in a public library in a year or so. So Falling and Flight joined her collection of Kyoraku's books, and Nanao didn't actually get around to reading it until the summer was almost over. The wait was well worth it though. Nanao practically fell into the story. She spend an entire day reading it, skipping lunch without realizing it. It might not be her absolute favorite of Kyoraku's works, but she still loved it and to be fair, at this point her top five favorite novels had been written by Kyoraku. Figuring out the order of those top five was almost always next to impossible, and Nanao couldn't wait for his next book.
