Love's Unvarying Law
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She is such an idiot, she thinks.
Her lithe figure is a blur of quick movements as she shunpoed across town at break neck speed, darting past streetlights and leaping off rooftops under the cover of the night.
She snatches a quick glance at her soul pager. She's down to the last five minutes of the day and she pushes past her exhaustion, desperate to make it back in time.
Rukia has been looking forward to this so much. They both have. She went so far as to get an official pass from the Soutaichou, stayed past her normal working hours for a whole week to clear her schedule ahead to make sure that this day will go absolutely perfect.
Their first anniversary together as an official couple and they were going to celebrate it together- just the two of them in the tiny apartment, dinner, wine and she definitely isn't opposed to something more than platonic cuddling later.
How foolish she was to not realize that no plans for the future can survive the machinations of the Kuchiki Elders. A sudden missive and summons from the old coots unravels all her carefully laid plans. They're stubborn enough that even Nii-sama running full interference on her behalf couldn't change their minds.
So she sat through the four agonizing hours of formal dinner with a pained smile and anxiety prickling, waiting for this very moment to make her exit through the private Kuchiki Senkaimon to go back home, to make it back in time to Ichigo.
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When the key finally slots itself in properly and the door to the apartment swings open, her hair is windswept and her cheeks pink from the dash across town. The expensive hand-painted kimono with all of its heavy silken embroidered layers is weighing her down almost as impressively as the guilt on her soul.
She takes the first step in and shuts the door behind her.
Ichigo.
Her heart leaps to her throat as she closes the distance between them.
In the darkly lit room, the lone red candle is flickering weakly- dinner for two laid out with wine by the side that has long since grown cold and there is fear that grips at her. Fear because Ichigo is refusing to meet her gaze.
Her hands fist and bundle at her kimono. Her mind is a tangled yarn of sorry and let me make it up to you, please.
She wants him to say something- scream at her if it would make him feel better just not this silent treatment, anything but this.
As seconds stretch into minutes and possibly even longer, her blood turns to ice. This is on her- she didn't even have the time to text him to let him know about the sudden change in plans before she was whisked away by her helpful maids and helped into the heavy garment.
The lump in her throat is stuck and she is powerless against the panic. Because this is how relationships end she thinks, the stage is now set so let the curtains fall. Love is a tragedy in-the-making. Maybe someday they'll sing of hers; shroud her in layers of mourning grey and silvery ash for she is made ruined by its touch and now she reaps what she sows.
In Love's unvarying law it is dictated that there is one who shall weep and the other who shall stray.
Who is she to argue against it?
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After what seems to be an eternity of aching silence and heavy stares, he makes the first move.
Ichigo heaves a sigh- still not meeting her eyes, makes his way to stand before her with his hand outstretched and Rukia palms the warmth of the house keys held within her grasp for the final time before she hands it over and—
"Idiot!"
His presence crashes over her- as familiar as ever as his hand closes around her wrists and tugs her towards him. She is in his arms and held so tightly that she is finding it more than a little harder to breathe.
"Don't do that ever again! I was so worried. Did you know how many voicemails and missed calls I left you?"
It surprises her enough that she loses her grip on her emotions. And once they started, the cascade of waterworks would not be stemmed until he is sliding his fingers through what remains of her previously immaculate coiffure, pulling out hairpins and tasting the salt in her tears.
"I-I'm so sorr-y!"
"Shut up!"
And then the only thing she is coherent of is the pull of his embrace and the expanse of sun-kissed skin burning under her fingertips. She tilts her head up, catching his lips and winds her arms around his neck- focused on the sound of his breathing and the thrum of his heart, she lets herself settle.
She looks into Ichigo's eyes and she is smiling through her tears. Realization comes in two parts- the first, he isn't mad; the second, be it the unvarying law or Murphy's Law, it doesn't matter- they are above it.
He is in favour of staying over straying and even if anything that can go wrong does go wrong, he'll be there waiting for her. He keeps the light on for her for as long as she needs him to.
Her heart is full. She is home.
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"Tadaima."
"Okaeri."
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Prompt: I love you
I'm just gonna leave this here. The phrase 'Love's unvarying law' is taken from Dorothy Parker's poem Surprise.