VIII. Young Bones Groan
"Where the hell is my other boot?!" Rangiku groused, limping half-shod in circles around the genkan.
Kiyone poked her head over the landing at the top of the stairs. "What's it look like?"
Rangiku held up her foot demonstratively.
"Oh. Nope. Haven't seen it."
Rangiku sighed heavily in annoyance. "Ask Isane if she borrowed them and kicked it somewhere stupid, would you?"
"Sure thing. NEE-SAN! RANGIKU-SAN SAYS YOU STOLE HER BOOT!"
"What?!" Isane's voice shrilled from the room she shared with her alleged accusor. "I haven't been anywhere near her boots!"
"That is not what I said, your sister's a brat!" Rangiku shouted back.
"Matsumoto lost a boob?" asked Iba, tramping down from the boys' dormitories. "Now that's fuckin' tragic, man."
"Boot," Rangiku snapped. "I've had my outfit for this festival picked out for two weeks and I am not going to wear anything else!"
"You're not gonna wear anything but boots?" Iba gave her a lingering, lascivious once-over. "Fine by me, but you might get cold -- which is also fine by me."
"Tetsuzaemon, sexual harassment," Aizen reprimanded as he passed, his arms full of a puffy teal parka. "Rangiku, perspective. Rin!" he called up the stairs.
"In here!" the ponytailed boy's voice sounded from the TV room.
"Jacket," said Aizen, and tossed the parka across the hall before heading up the girls' staircase. "Kiyone, if you're ready, go put on your shoes."
"Hai, Taichou!"
"That's my line!" complained Renji from the kitchen, backed up by Rikichi's "Yeah!"
On the upstairs landing of the south wing, sitting on the floor and leaning against the wall out of sight, Gin chewed his fingernails to stifle a laugh. To his left was a grayish-blue suede-and-fleece Ugg suspiciously without a partner.
Izuru looked at him. "What are you doing?" he asked, more for the sake of it than any actual ignorance.
"Shhh!" Gin hissed, waving at him to be silent before calling down to Rangiku, "What color is it?"
"Blue!" she hollered back. "Or gray. Take your pick."
"Does it lace up the front?"
"Yes!"
"An' does it have kinda sorta pinkish lil' flowery bits embroidered on the tongue?"
"Uh-huh. . ."
"Size twenty-four? With some white fluffy stuff pokin' out the top?"
"Yeah. . ."
"Ain't seen it, sorry."
"Gin, give me my fu-- my damn boot!"
Gin muffled his giggles behind his hand.
Izuru rolled his eyes, but smiled. "Just give it to her," he said.
Gin shook his head.
"Don't make me come up there!" Rangiku's voice threatened from downstairs.
"Come on," Izuru pressed. "We're gonna be late."
"Nuh-uh."
Izuru reached for the boot. Gin swiped it away and held it aloft on his right side. Izuru tried again, and Gin tossed the boot to his other hand.
"Maa, too slow!"
Izuru, now on his knees, narrowed his eyes.
"Ooh, whatcha gonna do, I-zu-ru?" Gin mocked, shaking the boot tauntingly as he would one of Haineko's catnip mice.
Izuru lunged -- feinted -- lunged again for Gin's other side. He got hold of the boot, but Gin's grip on the thing was strong -- and he had a free hand.
Izuru yelped as Gin's fingers dug into his ribs, tickling mercilessly. He flailed; they tangled, and toppled over.
"Gin! S-s-stop!" Izuru ordered, as well as he could for laughing.
"Say uncle!"
"Uncle!"
"Now say please!"
"P-please!" Tears streamed down his cheeks, and his face was beginning to ache.
Finally, Gin relented.
". . .just kidding!"
"No-- ack!"
They tumbled and rolled, and -- following a split-second of mutual astonishment and dismay -- ran out of landing and continued thus down the stairs as well, somersaulting over one another twice before equilibrium established itself, with Izuru in the unfortunate position of acting as Gin's human sled as they tobogganed down the last five steps and skidded to a bumpy stop just shy of the genkan.
For a moment, stunned silence reigned.
It passed, and Kiyone and Iba collapsed into laughter on the floor.
"What was that?" the disembodied head of Aizen demanded, peering around the wall at the top of the other staircase.
Rangiku pursed her lips at the pretzeled pair in front of her. "The sound of idiots in action."
Aizen sighed. "Are they bleeding?"
"No," she said lightly, snatching her boot out of Gin's hand, "not yet."
He nodded. "Try to keep it off the carpet."
"Of course."
Izuru struggled to regain the breath that had been knocked out of him in the fall. Gin's dead weight on top of him, convulsing with silent laughter, didn't offer much in the way of help.
"Man, that does not even look right," Renji, drawn by the commotion, assessed with humiliating accuracy.
Behind him, Rikichi shook his head in agreement. "Not even."
"What do you know about it, squirt? Go put on your shoes." Renji knuckled the younger boy's dark hair, and Rikichi sprang to comply.
At last, Gin lifted his head from where it was buried in the crook of Izuru's neck and grinned down at the dazed blond beneath him.
"You okay?" he asked.
"Off," Izuru weakly croaked.
Gin pushed himself up, then paused, hovering balanced on his hands and knees. "Uh, your leg," he said. "Kinda stuck."
Izuru turned crimson and quickly lowered his right leg, which had somehow become wrapped around the backs of the older boy's corduroy-clad thighs.
"Sorry," he mumbled.
"Don' worry about it," said Gin easily, not seeming to register the awkwardness of the moment at all. He merely leapt down the last three steps past Izuru's head and, while his kouhai was busy wishing the staircase would swallow him whole, bent down and hooked his wrists beneath Izuru's underarms and dragged the slighter boy the rest of the way down the stairs and into the genkan. "Ups-a-daisy!"
Izuru, wondering what kind of condition his back was going to be in at forty, overcame enough of his surprise to accept Gin's proffered hand, and allowed himself to be hauled once again to his feet. His embarrassment drew the line, however, when Gin dusted him off with a few rough, efficient swats to his back, his legs, and -- Izuru bit back a second yelp -- his ass.
"Okay, okay, I'm clean!"
Gin only smiled at him, shrugged, and dropped down to the floor to put on his sneakers.
"I hope everyone's used the toilet," Aizen advised, trailing Momo and Isane down the stairs. "Trust me when I say the ones at the festival are not a life experience you'll want to add to your lists."
"And if you have to use one," added Renji, "then for the love of all that is taiyaki don't get in line directly behind Iba."
"Hey, it's not my fault bean paste messes up my stomach."
"Food messes up your stomach, Iba-san," Rikichi pointed out, plugging his nose and waving at the air in front of his face.
"Why you little--" Iba swiped at the twelve-year-old, who darted quickly -- if not with very much foresight -- behind Hanatarou for protection. It was only by the grace of a literal deus ex machina that he was saved, in the form of a honking horn outside.
"That'll be Yumichika," said Renji, burrowing into an olive green hoodie. "C'mon, Iba. You know how His Imperial Majesty hates to be kept waiting."
"Tch." Iba zipped up his jacket to the neck and stomped out of the house.
Renji tugged Rikichi closer and whispered sotto voce in his ear, "Hey, how's about later on at the festival me an' Ikkaku'll hold him down so you can fart in his face?"
Rikichi snickered. They dabbed fists conspiratorially before Renji headed out the door.
Izuru hurriedly shoved his socked feet in his shoes, grabbed his jacket from the genkan closet and hastened outside, but paused when he realized that Gin wasn't, as per usual, slouching along behind him. He threw the silver-haired boy a questioning glance.
"Are you coming?"
"Nah," said Gin. "I'ma ride with Sousuke an' 'em."
"Oh." A little stone of disappointment plopped into Izuru's stomach.
Gin's grin broadened. "Don' look so sad, ne? I'll see ya there."
His cheek twitched in a wink. Izuru blushed.
"O-of course. I'm not sad. I just thought. . ." Yumi's horn honked a second time. "Right," said Izuru quickly, "I'll see you."
He jogged down to the edge of the drive and through the smaller, walk-in side gate that Renji had left open, and which Izuru closed behind him before climbing into the back of Yumi's SUV. The usual group was present, along with the surprising addition of Shuuhei, who was slumped against the window of the second row driver's side backseat, looking sour.
"Hisagi-san? What happened to your car?" Izuru asked.
"Blew a gasket," the black-eyed boy grumbled. "Won't have time to fix it until winter recess."
"Oh, wow, that's too bad. But at least you'll only have to wait a few days?"
"I would that it were longer," chirped Yumi from the driver's seat, smiling at Shuuhei through the rearview mirror. "I for one will always welcome Shuu-chan's company, for whatever the reason."
Shuuhei looked for a moment like he wanted to roll his eyes, but then perhaps realized whose vehicle he was in and thought better of it, instead giving Yumichika a brusque thanks that set the androgynous boy to beaming.
Izuru watched the house as they pulled away, watched as Aizen ushered the girls and Gin and the younger Lost Souls into the foster home's Honda van, and tried to halt an irrational influx of unease at the sight. A simple ride to a festival was not -- not, he told himself firmly -- cause for separation anxiety. He was not that pathetic, and if it hadn't been for the incident on the staircase, he imagined he could have accepted Gin's choice easily; but Izuru over-thought things, overdid things internally with just as much outlandishness as Gin did physically.
He really hadn't intended to end up so mortifyingly -- intimately -- splayed beneath the older boy. Of course he hadn't. They'd just fallen down the damned stairs, for crying out loud; he'd had no control over the positioning of his limbs at the bottom. Gin himself had been in no hurry to get up -- in fact, he'd seemed quite comfortable with employing Izuru as a mattress -- and Izuru. . .thinking back on it now, Izuru really hadn't had a problem with it, either. He'd been more stunned than pained, and Gin wasn't that heavy, and. . .and he smelled really, really good, no cologne this time, just the soap-and-silver scent of Gin. . .
Izuru hadn't moved his leg. He hadn't really wanted to move his leg, randomly positioned or otherwise. He'd. . .he'd liked it, having Gin. . .well, not even so much there -- although had the curious eyes of others not been present, and had Gin tarried in shaking laughter just a little while longer, Izuru didn't think there would have been any chance of his covering up exactly to what extent he'd enjoyed it -- but. . .close. Closer, even, than normal. Closer than grazing knees while sitting next to one another, or knocking shoulders as they walked. Closer than chilly hands ruffling his hair, or one long arm slung across his back, cold fingers biting into his upper arm. He'd liked it. He liked. . .
Oh fuck me, you don't like Fox-Face, do you?
Izuru stole a glance at Renji. The unlikely prophet was gesticulating wildly to Shuuhei, reenacting his winning blow against a member of Koutei Academy's Kendo Club in a recent match.
"Man, Matsumoto didn't even do it justice in the paper. I mean, the guy was down, out cold from one hidari-men strike! Ahh," Renji sighed, flexing ineffectually inside his sweatshirt, "sometimes it hurts to be so good!"
Possibly even better than he crowed about, thought Izuru.
Terminal velocity. Could he really have fallen for someone so fast? What did it say about him, that he'd found a smile again -- a literal, constant smile -- a mere two weeks into his mourning, and that he'd become so attached to it within a mere two months?
A movie he'd once seen had explicated that people often sought sex after funerals, sought the verification of life in the wake of death. Was that all this was, a weird, roiling concoction of his being fifteen and hormonal and grieving? Was this a crush, or a crutch?
Izuru thought about sex with Gin. He had a loose idea of what boys did with one another, and the thought had never appealed to him, in the technical sense. It seemed too. . .out there, something reserved for the back rooms of video stores -- too seedy and uncomfortable and just plain wrong, things weren't supposed to fit like that, and he'd never heard it spoken about in a positive way. He'd decided early on that the act was nothing he would ever try, and had even been reassured by his own attitude toward the subject that, despite his never having had romantic feelings for a girl -- or a boy, for that matter -- he was still roughly normal. He'd suspected he was a late bloomer, or that maybe he simply wasn't wired to be an overtly sexual person. . .but here, now, unpleasant technicalities aside, the thought of touching Gin, of kissing Gin, all cool skin and soft lips and everywhere-hands. . .the thought of wrapping his legs around pale, naked thighs and keeping them there. . .
"Kira? Oi, Kira! Snap out of it!"
"Huh?" Flushed, Izuru blinked, readjusting his eyes to reality and his heart against palpitating as a silver something else was waved tantalizingly in front of his face. He took the flask automatically, gave its contents a cautious sniff and wrinkled his nose at the yeasty smell. "What is it?"
"Pigeon Ruby," said Renji. "'s whiskey."
He grinned at Izuru's hesitation.
"Lemme guess, you've never had a drink before, have you?"
He hadn't. Neither of his parents had drunk outside of social functions. They'd disapproved of using alcohol as a vice, and aside from the occasional bottle of sake bought specifically for a dinner party or festive gathering, liquor had never been kept in the Kira household.
He wondered what else they might have disapproved of, about which he'd never get the chance to find out.
Izuru closed his eyes and took a large swig. Sour, lukewarm liquid filled his mouth, and he forced it down in one burning, choking gulp.
He saw red. His eyes watered, and the salivary glands at the back of his mouth twanged painfully, working in overdrive at the sudden assault to his tastebuds and esophagus.
"Yeah! That's the spirit!" Renji encouraged, thumping Izuru on the back as the blond coughed into the crook of his elbow.
The discomfort ebbed after a few moments, and Izuru regained control of his breathing. Again he felt that strange mixture of pride and shame, of freedom and dishonor, that had been plaguing him in spits and spurts for the past few weeks. He took a second, shorter pull from the flask, swallowed this one with much greater ease, then passed the nearly empty container back to Renji, who handed it to Iba, who downed the last of the liquid inside before returning it to Ikkaku, its surmisable owner. The bald boy refilled it from a bottle he produced from beneath his seat before tucking it away inside one of the many pockets of his army-issue flak jacket.
Izuru settled back in his seat and felt the dull, almost achy warmth of the alcohol begin to weight his limbs. He decided it suited him. When the flask was passed around a second time forty minutes later, as Yumi followed the directions of the parking officials just outside Karakura Town's Winter Fireworks Festival compound, he was glad to be the last one to receive it, and quickly polished off the remainder of the liquor inside.
Iba watched him, sniggering. "I think we have a burgeoning lush on our hands."
Shuuhei smirked. "Wait till he stands up."
That wasn't quite fair, Izuru thought. He only staggered the once while getting out of the vehicle.
Renji steadied him with a hand to his shoulder.
"C'mon, lightweight, walk it off, walk it off," the redhead smiled, leading him in the direction of the festival gates.
There were lights. Many thousands of them, and of many different colors. Some of them spun, and not solely at the behest of Izuru's slightly swirling vision. He searched the poorly-lit parking field for the Pure Souls van, but could see only row upon row of family sedans and sized-for-city-life compacts.
Noise accosted him from every angle as the group entered the compound, in the form of chattering crowds and vendors shouting to advertise their wares, rides that rocketed in circles to the pace of popular rock music and the high-pitched shrieks of small fireworks being set off at random. In the distance he could see an amateur sumo contest taking place, and across the midway, a kendo exhibition drew a sizable assemblage.
They paused a little way inside and surveyed their surroundings.
"Well, gentlemen," said Yumichika, stroking his chin contemplatively, "what's our plan of attack?"
Iba and Ikkaku looked at one another.
"Funhouse," they decided in unison.
"Tch, forget it," Yumi scoffed. "Unflattering mirrors."
Ikkaku shrugged, stuffing a black beanie onto his bald head. "Suit yourself. Hisagi? Abarai?"
Shuuhei glanced up at the mass of cargo nets, twisted tunnels and rolling rooms that loomed in the distance. He looked unaffected.
"Maybe later. I wanna hit up the games."
"A most excellent suggestion," Yumi agreed. "Abarai-kun? Kira-kun?"
Renji's stomach answered for him in the form of an obnoxious growl.
". . .yeah. That. And I think Kira could do with something to eat, too."
"Oh, no," Izuru said quickly. "I'm fine. Really."
Renji rolled his eyes. "You had what, three bites at dinner? Let's go. The taiyaki calls."
"But--"
Izuru's protest was trampled underfoot as he was tugged away towards the food stalls by the sleeve of his jacket. Ikkaku and Iba headed off in the opposite direction, and Shuuhei and Yumichika in a third.
"Abarai-kun, I'm really not--"
"Baka," Renji cut him off. "Don't you get it? You'd have been a third wheel."
"A th. . .oh. But isn't. . .isn't Hisagi-san straight?"
"Well, yeah, but Yumi ain't, and you don't cockblock your friends, no matter how hopeless their conquests." Renji's voice was tinged with painfully personal experience. "And anyway, you do need to eat more. I may as well be dragging around a balloon for how much you weigh. I can see how Fox-Face does it so easily."
Izuru's shoulders drooped somewhat at the mention of Gin. He wondered if the silver-haired boy was his own hopeless conquest, although he couldn't really picture himself being a conquistador of anything. Even so, Gin's ambiguous sexuality was a suddenly swinging pendulum of Is-he-or-isn't-he? in Izuru's mind. If he wasn't, then was that why he had chosen to ride to the festival with Aizen and the others? Had the -- now infamous, in Izuru's brain -- Staircase Incident bothered him more deeply than he'd let on?
But if he was. . .if he was, then through how different a lens would Izuru have to look upon Gin's excessively tactile nature?
He wanted to see Gin again, right now, if just to know, if just to gauge whether Gin had ridden with Aizen only because he'd wanted to ride with Rangiku, or because he actually felt the need to avoid his kouhai. Gin was clingy, but it was possible that even he had his limits. It was possible that Izuru had clung back too tightly.
"Hey, you all right?" Renji asked, frowning at him in concern as they waited in line at the taiyaki booth. "You're lookin' kinda green around the gills. Did the whiskey kick your ass that hard?"
Izuru shook his head. "No, I. . .it's nothing. It'll pass."
"Aa. Don't worry, we'll get you some of these gills and you'll perk right back up." They shuffled forward to the front of the line for fish-shaped cakes. "Three, please!"
"Skeeball?" Yumichika suggested.
Shuuhei sneered a little. "Nah. Too easy."
"Goldfish Scooping?"
"Not unless you're in the mood for sushi."
"Hmm. Perhaps later. Shooting Gallery?"
Shuuhei eyed the stall lined with pellet guns in front and metal ducks along the back wall. He looked at Yumi, inspected the effeminate boy's orange turtleneck, his fitted black leather jacket, his mascara.
"You're on."
"Tell me again why I'm here."
Shihouin Yoruichi grinned ferally in the rearview mirror. "Because everyone is here, Byakuya-bo. Because it is a celebratory community event--"
"Not our community," her dour passenger muttered, lending to his voice what dignity his body lacked at having his knees squished entirely too close to the vicinity of his ears in the cramped backseat of Yoruichi's sporty little yellow Mazda.
"--and because," she continued as if she hadn't heard him, "it'll do you good to interact with the little people."
"I do interact with the 'little people.' On a daily basis. They're called 'students.'"
"Yare yare, Kuchiki Byakuya-dono sounds dangerously close to whining, doesn't he, Kisuke?"
"Oh yes, dangerously so," Urahara sagely agreed, his striped hat doing little to shadow the amusement in his eyes.
On the scale of glares, Byakuya's present one ranked somewhere below "nuclear winter" but above "arctic."
"There's only one thing for it, you know," said the physics professor, unbuckling his seatbelt.
"Dare I ask."
"Oh, dare, dare!"
". . ."
Urahara and Yoruichi exchanged glances.
"Well," the former began, "first there's the beer. . ."
"And then the games," said Yoruichi, "once you're good and inebriated."
"Followed by the Funhouse, to compare your drunk goggles with the mirrors. . ."
". . .and the mazes, and if you come out the other side alive--"
"--we stuff you with greasy festival food--"
"--shake you up on the Breakdancer--"
"--the Kamikaze--"
"--and the Freak Out, until you spew hard enough to dislodge the stick from your ass--"
"--by which time you should be loosened up enough to enjoy the fireworks."
Nuclear winter.
"Take me home. Now."
"Aww, come on, Byakuya-bo," said Yoruichi brightly, getting out of the car. She jerked her seat forward, grabbed hold of his wrist (there was no room, alas, for him to even attempt to recoil), and yanked him unceremoniously from the car with the unapparent but still very present strength of many, many afternoons spent being paid to occupy weight rooms and gymnasiums. "You will have fun."
"Is that an order, Shihouin-sensei?" he asked icily.
"Nope. It's a threat." She linked arms with him -- firmly -- and hands with Urahara. "Now why don't you boys concentrate on showing a lady a good time?"
The two men leaned back slightly to glance at one another over Yoruichi's shoulders.
"Lady. . .?" Urahara silently mouthed.
Byakuya lifted an eyebrow skeptically.
"Oi, no dissension among the ranks! Face front. Forward march."
Urahara saluted and smiled. "Yes ma'am!"
Byakuya only sighed.
U cant come??
Scowling from where he hung by one hand and foot in the middle of one of the Funhouse cargo nets, Ikkaku hit Send on his cell phone and pocketed the device. He'd reached the top when it beeped again, letting him know he had a new text message. Irritably he flipped it open and hit Read.
No. I'm sorry. Otou-sama thinks festivals are a waste of time.
"Fuck your otou-sama!" he growled, moving onto the next net as he dialed a reply.
Thats bullshit
Halfway up again, another beep.
I'm sorry.
"Don't apologize, dumbass, it ain't your fault. . ."
Quit sayin that. U dont gotta say that 2 me, ev--
"BANZAIIIIIII!!"
Ikkaku looked up.
Later on, he would reflect that he should have used the precious half-second he had between the shout and the impact of Iba's bulk to do something more useful than forming a horrified expression on his face -- something like, say, safely restoring his cell phone to his pocket before it was knocked out of his hand and sent careening between the ropes to shatter most spectacularly against the ground some ten meters below. As it was, he could do little else but roll -- and roll, and roll, and tuck his legs in to narrowly avoid decapitating a small child, and roll some more -- until he managed to convince his fingers they were in fact grappling hooks and catch himself before he matched his phone in both location and appearance.
"Iba, fuck!" he shouted up at his chortling friend. "Aho! Now she's gonna think I'm pissed at her!"
"Who?" Iba asked, after they'd retrieved the shards of Ikkaku's phone and been escorted from the obstacle course by its furious overseer, an irate woman with one arm who nonetheless managed to be both extremely strong and excessively generous with smacks to the backs of their heads. "That Kurotsuchi chick? Shit, man, I didn't even know you got her number!"
"She just gave it to me the other day. D'you have any idea how long that took? And I can't even actually call her -- it's for 'emergency use only' or some horseshit like that, so that her fuckrag of a father can track her down if she steps one toe outta line, not that he ever lets her get that far."
"So why the hell do you bother, then?"
Ikkaku whirled, his boots stirring up red clay dust. He grabbed hold of the front of Iba's jacket.
"What did you say?"
"I said, why do you bother?" Iba repeated, unaffected by the choleric boy's menacing display, having been faced with worse, and worse plus a shinai at that. "What's so great about this girl that makes her worth all the daddy issues? I mean, yeah, she's cute, but there are cuter. Not to mention easier."
Ikkaku stared him down, pupils shrunk to pinpricks.
"I don't mean easier," Iba backpedaled, "just. . .simpler. --Not that I think she's an easy girl in spite of her situation. I mean, she might be, I dunno, maybe that's it, but. . ."
". . .I think," Ikkaku said lowly, "you need to shut the fuck up, right now, before that wagging tongue of yours gets nailed to the roof of your mouth with your teeth."
"Aah, for fuck's sake, Madarame, calm down!" Iba glared, shoving Ikkaku's hand away. "I ain't tryin' to besmirch the girl's honor or anything. I just wanna know what you see in her."
"What I see is you needin' ta mind your own goddamn business an' help me find Yumi. I gotta use his fuckin' phone."
He stalked off in the direction of the gaming booths.
"Che. Whatever, man," Iba mumbled. He retrieved a cigarette from the pack in one of his jacket pockets and lit it before following a few paces behind.
"So?" Yumichika arched an eyebrow expectantly.
"So. . .I'm humbled," Shuuhei admitted. "And you're kinda fucking scary."
Yumi sparkled, lashes fluttering. "Why thank you, Shuu-chan. I think that may be one of the kindest things you've ever said to me."
"What'll it be?" asked the vendor as he set to rights the eleven-out-of-twelve metal ducks Yumi had managed to hit (compared to Shuuhei's nine). He was a scrawny, freckled man topped by a blond faux-hawk that made Yumichika want to strongly reproof all manufacturers of cheap hair gel everywhere.
Yumi surveyed the prizes, all Sega-themed plushies of varying enormity. He pointed.
"That one."
The vendor unhooked a giant blue Sonic the Hedgehog from the roof of the stall and hefted it with some difficulty over the counter and into Yumichika's arms. Yumi thanked him and cuddled it close. Shuuhei's eyebrows raised, impressed.
"Damn, Ayasegawa. You know, if you're looking for a substitute boyfriend, they make special dolls for that sort of thing."
Yumi's smile turned coquettish. "But I'm not looking for a substitute, Shuu-chan. Or a substitute Shuu-chan, although it does rather remind me of you." He patted the plushie's spiky blue head.
Shuuhei rubbed the back of his neck and shifted his feet uncomfortably. "Yeah, well, I'm not your boyfriend, so. . ."
Yumi rolled his eyes. "Oh, don't be so paranoid. It's a festival. Unless this defensiveness stems from jealousy at my having -- to employ one of Ikkaku's more colorful idioms -- owned your ass at Shooting Gallery. . .?"
Despite himself, Shuuhei found a grin pulling at the corners of his mouth. He placed a hand on Yumi's shoulder and leaned in close to whisper in the other boy's ear, "Trust me, Ayasegawa, you own no part of my ass."
Yumichika's smile widened. He indicated a nearby stall. "Crossbow Shoot? Fair warning, Shuu-chan: I always hit my mark."
Shuuhei shrugged. "Bring it, Peacock. And prepare to eat feathers."
"Goddamn dumbass kids. I hate this fuckin' festival."
"But, Nee-chan," Shiba Ganju garbled around a mouthful of taiyaki, "if you hate it so much, then why do you volunteer to work it every year? Ain't it enough that the company sponsors it?"
"Baka!" Kuukaku snapped, slapping the fishcake out of her brother's hands. "Because at the end of the night, they let me use explosives."
She grinned. It was frightening.
Ganju gulped, and through sheer force of will kept his eyes from straying to her side, where her right arm used to hang.
Kuukaku toed at the half-eaten taiyaki on the ground. "Eh, where'd you get that, anyway?"
"Hawk," said Ganju. "He's sellin' 'em this year."
"Hawk. You mean Miyamoto."
"Um. Yeah. Him."
His sister sighed and looked to the sky, as if asking God what she had done in a past life to deserve such blood kin.
"Watch the Funhouse a minute," she ordered. "I'm gonna get somethin' to eat."
An hour later, Izuru picked at a bit of red bean paste under his thumbnail as he waited for Renji to finish showing off at Ring the Bell.
Heaving something between a bellow and a grunt, the redhead swung a large mallet up and around to strike the pivot board at the base of the game. Its indicator shot up along the scale board, but missed the bell at the top by a scant few inches.
"Damn it!" he swore.
The game's operator -- massive, bald, indifferent -- gave him a consolatory smirk.
"Tough luck, kid. We can't all be winners."
Renji glared at the man and fished another two hundred yen out of his pocket. "One more try."
Face determined, he picked up the mallet and swung again. Izuru's eyes followed the indicator up, up, up, and -- clang! chimed the bell at the top, at a resonance that made the blond's teeth rattle.
"Hell motherfuckin' yeah!" Renji whooped, punching the air in triumph and narrowly avoiding hitting a passing orange-haired teenager.
"Oi, watch it!" the boy griped.
"You watch it!" Renji barked after him. "Stick to the damn path!"
The boy flicked back a rude gesture, but kept walking.
"Che," Renji muttered. "Asshole."
"Who's an asshole?"
The two boys turned at the sound of the feminine voice behind them. Renji perked up, grinning.
"Rukia! When did you get here?"
"A few minutes ago. I took the train in with Shaolin, but she ran into Yoruichi-sama" -- the diminutive girl's voice climbed a mockingly besotted octave -- "near the Face Painting booth. Urahara-sensei and Nii-sama were with them, so I demurred."
Renji's eyes widened. "Byakuya's here?"
Rukia shrugged. "Apparently."
"Getting his face painted?" asked Izuru.
She gave him a queer look. "Ah, I doubt it."
"Hey, kid," said the game operator to Renji, "you gonna stand there yakkin' all night or are you gonna take your prize?"
Renji absently grabbed the lion plushie from the man's beefy hands, glanced at it momentarily, and then gave it to Rukia. It was a homely-looking thing of the sort found in the bargain bins of 100-Yen Store toy sections, probably not even worth the two hits Renji had swung to obtain it, but Rukia crammed it as best she could inside her purse nonetheless, then grabbed Renji by the arm and headed for the rides.
"Come on. I wanna give you whiplash on the Bumper Cars."
"Aa. . ." Renji distractedly agreed, allowing himself to be pulled along as his eyes continued to scan the festival grounds. Izuru hung back.
"Kira-kun?" Rukia called over her shoulder. "Are you coming?"
"Uh, n-no, I. . .uh, bathroom. You guys go ahead; I'll catch up with you later."
She nodded. Renji came to his senses long enough to shoot his roommate a meaningful look.
"Remember," he warned, "if you see Iba coming out, don't go in."
Izuru forced a smile. "Yeah, I got it."
He waited until they disappeared behind the Goldfish Scooping station before heading in the opposite direction, with no specific destination in mind, but a very persistent guiding purpose: find Gin.
Young bones groan
And the rocks below say:
"Throw your skinny body down, son!"
But I am going to meet the one I love
So please don't stand in my way
Because I'm going to meet the one I love. . . -- The Smiths, "Shakespeare's Sister"
A/N: Go, Izu, go! Yesss. I'm still high off of canonically assertive!Izuru & doing the dance of fresh manga.
Impromptu cliffhanger. This chapter & the next were actually supposed to be another very, very long one, but as an impatient reader myself I hate to keep people waiting, & to break it off here works, so. . .rST still to come. Everything always takes so much longer to say than you think it's going to, you know?
This is also where I showcase my obvious Americanness even moreso than usual, with a festival/fairground hybrid. Lazy, perhaps, but my brain can only take so much research in the name of a hobby that's supposed to relieve stress, & so I'm relying on ye olde trusty particle-board excuse: it's an AU. Just go with it.
Many, many thanks to my readers & reviewers. That can't ever be said enough. You flatter me to discomposure with your interest & kind words.
