Disclaimer: No, I don't own it.
Renji was in a foul mood.
Not that it was anything unusual. Since childhood he had been of the pissy persuasion. But today, of all days, she needed him not to be.
No such luck.
"So that carrot-topped hothead fucked up last night, did he?"
She wasn't about to answer.
"Rangiku checked in with me this morning. Says Orihime put in quite a night taking care of you after she healed Hitsugaya-taichou. How did it happen?"
"He caught me off guard."
"They caught us all off guard. But there were two of you. You should have had a better chance."
She shifted on her haunches and studied her bento, the one that Yuzu took such care to make. Yuzu, Ichigo's little sister who needed him. Her stomach lurched. She didn't want to think about it, let alone talk about it. "He caught me off guard."
"You'll do better next time." He leaned close to her. No, not to her. To her lunch. "Gonna eat that?"
"You can have it."
He smirked a little and then proceeded to inhale the bento. "They're tough," he said between bites, spewing specks of rice onto his shirt. "But we can take them. We just need to keep our eyes open."
As he continued on in this vein, she gazed up at the sky and tuned him out.
Promise me you'll end it if he takes me.
There were remarkably few clouds and the sun was like liquid.
You did all you could, and that's more than anyone else.
Her lips were tingling.
All you could do.
She'd had so much practice pushing things out of her mind. Of course Ichigo's lips on hers were plenty of fodder for temporary amnesia. How long would she have sat on that precious event? And why was it precious? Was it because she felt they were living on borrowed time? If that was the case, didn't it mean in her heart of hearts she'd decided? And shit, Renji, were you raised in a barn?
She dug in her bag. Yuzu was nothing short of a professional. Rukia pulled out the carefully folded napkin and handed it to Renji.
She made the mistake of catching his eyes.
"Are you okay?" he asked, the concern naked on his face. "You're still hurting from last night, aren't you."
She shrugged. "He caught me off guard."