Beautiful You

Yumichika/Isane

"Hush now, quiet now..."

The words were soft as they departed from her lips, drawing in the tender curiosity of the child who had been safely tucked into her arms. Questioning eyes lifted up to make contact with her own and she felt that ever-familiar affectionate emotion well up in her chest for a moment; a dark shade of wisteria clouded around the small pupils that refused to look away from her. The corners of her lips lifted gently as she moved fingers to tug lightly on the soft blanket that wrapped around the small body in her hold. Any signs of previous distress from the infant were no longer visible and appeared to have been easily tossed away at the sound of her voice and sight of her approach.

She gave a playful sigh and studied the small face that had a few of her own traits mixed into it.

There were those dark, smokey wisteria eyes that seemed to complement the even darker shade of violet strands that were coming in; fingertips lightly brushed a few of the thin locks aside and she listened as a quiet giggle seemed to come in response. "Oh Yumiko, what am I going to do with you?"

Tiny fingers moving to wrap around a single one of hers provided an answer to her outward question.

Yumiko.

'Reason', 'beautiful', 'child.'

Even if she had lived very little up to this given point, being a week or two shy of three months, she was proving to fulfill her namesake. The early mornings and late nights reminded them all of how difficult it could be to reason with her, but it was the teasing way she would giggle at them upon waking up that made them realize how they were playing into her game. As her father would always recount, she was destined to be beautiful without a doubt. And while she liked to share a laugh or two at his expense... one couldn't disagree with his statement.

She was going to have thick, dark-violet hair like her father, who she also shared wisteria orbs with.

What the child had to inherit from her wasn't exactly noticeable right now, aside from her nose and lips at least... She just prayed the girl wouldn't take after her height-wise, or inherit some kind of nightmare gene that she possessed somehow. Maybe, at most, she'd take after her rather passive energy and follow in the steps of Division Four; if not, then Division Eleven best brace themselves for another star-struck beauty.

Even after the collective twelve months that had passed on by, she could still recall back to the nerve-wracking moment when she realized she was pregnant for the first time. It wasn't immediately noticed, but actually took close to five weeks before she even noticed something was different. She blamed the feeling of exhaustion on Division Four since they were still recovering from an epidemic of some sort passing around and had just finished back-to-back shifts of working around the clock; she just remembered thinking that maybe if she put her head into her hands and stared really hard at her desk... then everyone would think she was working hard, when in actuality she just wanted to sleep. When the nausea started to catch up to her, she told herself that the stupid illness had finally caught her. Captain Unohana advised that she take a few days off to recover even though she assured the woman she was perfectly capable of working still- and the Captain knew they needed every Division member working at this time.

Unfortunately, it had done little to phase the woman and she was sentenced to a couple of days of rest.

Looking back on it now, she was a little more grateful for the woman's urging because it started to poke holes in her theory that her exhaustion and sickness was based solely on her work. The over need for sleep and the urge to upchuck everything in her stomach had been the first two clues... and then it let to the fact that she had slept almost perfectly in the past two weeks; not once had she even been bothered by a nightmare or by cold sweats. The fourth note was that her nausea only occurred during certain parts of the day, or appeared to have been a reaction to something; Hanataro had finished cooking a few handpicked vegetables from the garden and... she almost didn't make it to the bathroom in time. The final straw was the full body ache that attacked her joints and hips, even her breasts had started to throb which was what confused her the most.

She broke down and, when the Division wasn't busy, ran a few tests on herself just to see what the her problems were.

Her problem came in the form of two pink lines.

She remembered her first reaction to it was to laugh, mainly at the absurdity of the matter... when the realization of it finally kicked in though, her emotions changed. It took a mess of counting back days and recalculating certain events before it all came down to one conclusion.

It was definitely positive.

It took her the remaining days of rest to pull herself back together and recall what had been momentarily lost; on her first shift back, things ran a bit more smoother and Captain Unohana remarked that she was glad to see how quickly she had recovered... and that she looked even better than she had before. She had to choke back the wanted confession and simply stated that a short break was really all she needed indeed.

The hour her shift ended though, she was the first one to clock out and depart.

She was an absolute mess when she called for him to meet her, which he gladly adhered to. The sight of him showcasing that grin of his for her helped to soothe her nerves a little more, at least to make them calm enough for her speak. He seemed to notice the way her hands nervously twisted in the thin material of her uniform and how she had a difficult time keeping eye contact with him; it didn't take him long to question.

The color drained away from his face when she finally answered him.

It took a few moments as words seemed to stutter briefly on his lips, syllables unable to make it past his tongue and teeth. Eventually, he forced himself to take a moment to draw in a deep breath before it eventually came out in a loud whisper.

"We don't like children..."

That was a fact she knew... often times before they would joke around with a situation like this, and they both agreed they had different faults on the topic of kids. She thought her height would make her clumsy and inattentive around children; he always just expressed that he had never seen a beautiful child before. She used to tease him that perhaps he should work on fixing that, but he always laughed and knocked the subject aside. Those were jokes and they were always followed by laughter... not this time though.

"Fate's kind of funny that way, isn't she?"

She had replied in half a response, not the least bit warming up to the topic.

He stood still a little bit longer before his hands moved to take a cautious hold of her own, his grip was loose as though he was afraid she was going to reject the motion. "We could like this one though..."

"Do you think it'll be beautiful enough for you?"

"With you as the mother, without a doubt."

There was a sense of reluctancy in the conversation but they both stepped away from it with a shared thought. In the following months, she noted that her height and body frame helped to hide it for the most part- which made it difficult to tell people of the truth since they didn't believe her. Captain Unohana showed a light sense of surprise but took the matter easily by congratulating the both of them and remarking that she'd have to have the other Division members review the procedures of childbirth- something she could've gone without hearing. The whole pregnancy continued on a bit easier than she had first expected but still had its annoyances from time to time, mainly with the nausea and the losing ability to see her own feet.

But when he occasionally bragged about the whole matter and turned into somewhat of a doting father-to-be, she figured she could get over the whole losing sight of her feet ordeal.

"Well if it isn't my favorite girl in the world."

She turned back at the remark and smiled lightly at the way he stood in the doorway for a moment before he pushed himself into the small nursery room.

"You too, Isane."

"Ah, what?" she questioned, listening to the way he seemed to chuckle at his own tease before she lifted the small child out of his range when he moved to reach for her; her extra inches in height easily gave her the advantage over him. "What was that you were saying?"

"Nothing, nothing, I promise." he offered, playing along with her as he tried to retrieve the infant she held out of his grasp. "You know you're my favorite still."

"You're going to have to try harder than that."