Care Package
~One Shot 2: Family~
When you fear something, do you run and hide from it to live another day, or do you try to make it so that you face that fear head on, despite the consequences? One small taicho slipped out of his room in the forth division and headed towards where his fear was. He slipped into the room, prepared to face it. He was a Gotei Thirteen taicho, so he could handle anything Hinamori Momo said.
He stepped into the room, watching as she sat on the bed, staring at the wall. He cleared his voice to get her attention and she turned her small head towards him. "What do you want?" Her voice was rather monotone, in a way... distant.
"I..." The small taicho opened his mouth and paused. Many words wanted saying, but his lips refused to move, almost as if he didn't know how to say the words that he desperately wanted too.
Momo turned back to the wall, her composure remaining. "I don't need this from you, you know?"
"You don't need..." Toshiro's voice strained from hurt. He felt like she was pushing him away.
"I don't need you coming here, sulking away," the girl responded without looking him in the face. Never before had he heard her have such a dark, pessimistic tone. The Momo he knew was always optimistic.
"Hai..." With that, he turned back and headed back to his room, a whole strain of dark, moody thoughts passing through his mind. "She didn't want to see me..." Arriving back at his room, he simply froze in the doorway. He felt a huge pain feeling his chest. He felt like he was going to break. The last thing he wanted as a Gotei thirteen taicho, was for someone to see him in a bad state of mind.
Carefully he slipped under the bed where the wooden floor cooled his warm skin and the dust attached to his fingers. He found himself reminiscing on the fact that a lot of things were his fault and they were coming back to haunt him. Kyoraku Taicho had told him before he messed up to keep his cool. Truth of the matter was he hadn't been able, proving that he was really a child.
As his chest calmed, his eyelids started to fold on themselves trying to close. His breath slowed and his mind numbed as he for once refused to think, as thinking only brought back the pain. In his dazed state, he didn't hear the two people come into the room.
"The... the brat's gone and taken off on Unohana again," came Abarai's voice. "We come to visit, and he's off trying to do paperwork."
"Maybe..." Kurosaki stated. Their voices had jarred the small taicho to consciousness and he pulled himself tight, hoping none of them would think of looking under the bed. However, quickly coming into his limited line of site he saw Ichigo's face peering at him from an angle. "Hi..."
There was a muttering sound from the other side of the bed and the small taicho suddenly felt someone grab him around the waist from behind to pull him out from under the bed. "What the hell do you think you're doing? You get irritated whenever someone calls you a kid, yet here you're acting like one."
"Renji..." Ichigo's voice suddenly turned stern.
" No! I constantly get sick and tiered of Rangiku and the other girls babying him," Renji stated, dropping the small taicho onto the bed. "And it's other people too, like Ukitake and Kyoraku Taicho, even you."
"He's right here you know and he's also a person with feelings," Kurosaki snapped.
Abarai ignored him and stuck his face right into Toshiro's. "Why the hell haven't you gone and visited Hinamori yet?" This caused Hitsugaya's eyes to water from the shock of being told off. He opened his mouth to say something, but then decided he wanted to pull away from Renji instead. The fukutaicho of the sixth division simply forced Toshiro to look at him. "She's waiting for you to go see her."
"No... she isn't," the boy stated, the words coming easily, as it was simple answer.
"You haven't even tried to go see her, so how can you know?" Renji stated, his voice firm.
"I did too!" Toshiro snapped as his head turned sharply away. A few tears trickled down his cheek, making him inwardly angry at himself for showing the soft sappy side of himself he rarely showed people.
Renji paused, his mouth dropping. Ichigo walked over and pushed him away. "What happened Toshiro?"
"I went to her room, tried saying something... but, I chocked up." The child's limbs went limp, his shame showing through on his face. "She just... didn't want me there."
"You're taking this hard because she's family aren't you?" Ichigo asked.
Renji, who's face was twisted in a scowl, spoke up. "How did you know that?"
"Rukia said that they grew up together like siblings. When we first came here, they explained to us that people formed their own family groups," the substitute soul reaper stated, placing a hand on Toshiro's shoulder. "If she cares about you, she didn't mean what she said."
"That's right," the sixth division fukutaicho stated. "I'll go talk to her and see what is going on, all right?"
"If she cares then she isn't acting like herself," came the soft reply. Two teal eyes watched as Renji disappeared.
Ichigo sat down next to the small boy. "So... why was it you chocked up? What are you so worried about?"
Hitsugaya's mouth opened then closed. A scowl passed over his face. "I may not be the eldest, but in our family I am the oldest male, the only male. It's my job to protect them. First, I couldn't protect my grandma from my own power. I almost killed her with my reiatsu. Now, it's Hinamori. I couldn't protect her from Aizen and then I stabbed her with my own zampaktuo."
The orange haired teen stared at the wall. "You are rather intimidated by your own power, aren't you?" He received an irritated affirmation, more at the fact it was true, then at the young man himself. "Let someone else be the older brother for once."
"Excuse me?" Toshiro narrowed his eyes at Ichigo, confusion twisting his face up.
"I said, let someone else be the older brother. Be one of the siblings that older the brother protects. By that, I mean for you to let me take on some of your burden," Ichigo stated firmly.
"You aren't older then me," the boy muttered.
"If I had been born in soul society, or died and come here, you wouldn't be using the fact that you have more years on me, because no one knows how long anyone's been here," Ichigo stated. "But, if I had lived here, been born here, I would be the older one, simply because I am physically older."
"Why?" Two small legs swung up and were held out as the small body stretched and finally found itself able to relax. "Why, when the person I considered my sister hasn't treated me like her sibling since she entered the academy?"
"Because,you've always been like a brother to me. That kind of bond... you can't really break it," Ichigo stated, watching a few tears trickle down the small taicho's face.
"He's right you know," came a soft voice from the doorway, causing both males to glance up.
"Hinamori..." the name tumbled out of the child's mouth.
The small female gave him a weak smile. "You don't call me Momo nee-chan anymore. I don't know why you stopped calling me that if we're still family. If you still think I'm family, then is there something you aren't telling me?"
"You didn't want me there," Toshiro stated, glad that the tears had stopped falling. Abarai though had seen him cry but stood in the doorway pretending like he didn't care at all. To the small taicho's surprise, Momo stepped forward and quickly hugged him.
"Gomenasai. I shouldn't expect you to smile and be happy when I can't even be. I never have liked seeing you cry," Momo let out a sigh. She then said something indicating that she knew full well that Toshiro had been crying. "Just because your a boy, that doesn't mean you can't cry sometimes."
"Baka! I've cried plenty of times around Rangiku! I just don't do it around you because you look like you're going to cry or going try to smother me. It was one thing when we were little, but we aren't little kids anymore." Toshiro pushed away, only to find himself hugged closer.
"That's what your problem is?" Hinamori let out a sigh and rubbed Toshiro's hair. "Shiro-chan, you'll never be to old for me to coddle or baby you! I'll do it even when your married."
Hitsugaya suddenly paled, his cheeks turning a deep red, causing both of the teenaged males to burst out laughing.
Author's note – The second one-shot. Looking for more themes. Someone asked me to do one, based on what Toshiro and Ichigo talked about in the first one shot. They talked about how they were like siblings.