The bruises and scabs are gone, the cracked ribs have set; the scratches to his face haven't fully healed yet, but almost. He hadn't let Orihime patch him up or even told anyone what had happened. Of course, they'd eventually figured out from hearsay that he and Renji had come to blows, and he'd gotten some shit from a few people who wondered why the hell they still fought, why they couldn't get along now that there was a peace time. They didn't know that just because the war was over, didn't mean everyone's problems were solved.
Ichigo sighed, taking off his reading glasses for a second and rubbing at his eyes. They were always sore these days. He read too much and then rubbed his eyes, exacerbating the bruising around his eye orbit and making them hurt still more.
He was home in his bedroom at his desk, browsing on his laptop. He'd turned the screen brightness all the way down, and still his eyes ache and itch. He'd spent the last two weeks or so applying to colleges and doing volunteer work. His birthday was going to come soon; it was almost the full blaze of summer already.
After he and Renji had fallen out back then, he'd gone back to Karakura, and he hasn't heard much from anybody over in Seireitei. He figured that Rukia was livid that he'd just gone away like that, and that he'd get an earful from her next time he saw her. If he did. She hadn't visited last time he'd had to be in the human world. He'd left without saying anything to anyone this time.
He'd visited Urahara once or twice. He'd seen the shinigami posted in Karakura around a couple times on some rooftops. He tried not to think about the other world and avoided the subject when he was with Orihime and Uryu, when the guy wasn't busy studying for the med school entrance exams. He still didn't know what had convinced him to follow in his father's footsteps and take over the hospital as a doctor.
Chad too. Chad's taken up boxing. Only Orihime had held onto the dream she'd had, and was working in a cupcake shop, frosting sweets. She's going to go to cooking school. She wants a bakery. But Chad and Uryu, who'd been so emphatic in their promises to never, never-
Sometimes Ichigo felt like everything they'd all said they were going to do had just been a stupid lie, a dream that they'd never really believed in. All the promises they'd made had just gone away. Life just did its thing; you don't really get to decide… You can try and say you're not going to do something, and in some crazy roundabout way, end up doing it anyways.
He didn't believe in fate, but here he was back in Karakura anyways, even after he'd said otherwise not too long ago. Maybe it really wasn't in his control at all.
Ichigo huffed and scratched at the short hair at the back of his neck, then pushed his bangs up. He ought to cut those. He didn't get so many zits on his forehead anymore, so he could get a haircut if he wanted. Maybe it'd help him feel different before going to school next term. A new start with new people, forgetting everything he'd known and done, abandoning the broken parts he couldn't fix and just starting over in a new place. He can make that sandcastle after all, maybe.
Ichigo was trying his damned best to be satisfied with it all. As much as he'd tried to move on and forget about it, he found that he was still kind of sad and mopey; frustrated too. Of course he was. How could he ever be happy with a fucking sandcastle now that he'd seen his special island and been told he couldn't go there, couldn't live there?
Yeah, he was pretty ticked still. He should've cooled down by now, but he was still angry, actually.
For a while, he'd been downright sorry for himself, you know, thinking shit like he should've known this would happen. He should've known Renji wouldn't really want to date a stupid silly know-nothing kid like him. He couldn't have been a real option for Renji – the moment Renji had thought about it too much, he'd changed his mind. Of course he had. It must've been momentary madness, war-sickness, making Renji think things he didn't really mean, and then he'd later realized that those feelings weren't real, or were stupid, not worth the trouble. It made sense, you know, that he'd changed his mind. He wouldn't have wanted to be stuck with Ichigo anyway. He was a fucking sad sack. He got all… rainy.
And yeah, he could turn it around the other way too if he tried. Why the fuck would he want to be with Renji either? A guy who ran at the first sign of trouble, no loyalty at all, no… no faith in either of them… Ichigo fisted his hand in his bangs and pulled on them compulsively. That shit wasn't true at all. Renji was the bravest person he'd ever met, viciously loyal. For god's sake, he'd sworn to always have Ichigo's back until the day he died.
And he had had faith in Ichigo. No one had ever believed in him like Renji had. Right to the bitter end, Renji had been there. Not even Rukia had been with him at the end like that.
He dug the heels of his hands into his achy eye sockets, groaning, the pain bringing him out of his wallowing. This had all been stupid. Maybe he hadn't even really liked Renji like that in the first place.
Yeah! He'd probably just been excited that someone had liked him, and he'd overreacted. It had only been like a week, right? Of course Renji could cut and run – it was so soon, too soon for anything to have formed between them. It shouldn't hurt. It doesn't, it doesn't. Ichigo's doesn't even care. This was nothing. This would pass.
He'd never fucking liked Renji to begin with anyways. He'd never fallen for him or felt funny inside when he'd smiled or told him he was there, he'd always be there. That shit hadn't mattered to him, it never had. Ichigo didn't fucking care about Renji. He'd never cared.
This will pass. This will go away. Everything does, if you wait long enough.
He'd… he'd forget about this, about Renji, about how irrationally elated he'd felt each time Renji had smiled at him after that day under the trees, how his heart would jolt and jerk weakly with the smallest touch or bit of loving teasing. Those had all been normal reactions of a young inexperienced guy, happy that for the first time, someone liked him. It was a fluke, a week spent in the grips of madness. Ichigo could pry Renji back out of there.
Yeah, he could get Renji back out, just like he'd done with Rukia and everyone else during those seventeen months he'd spent as a normal human boy. Ichigo dug his nails into his scalp. He was so screwed.
' Get him back out. Yeah, that'll work.' He just sighed to himself and shut his laptop, heading downstairs for some food. He'd not eaten breakfast again.
The days passed in a seemingly slow fashion, but looking back on each week as it went by, all the days looked remarkably similar and bland. It was almost worse than when he'd lost his powers, because this time he'd made a conscious choice not to go back, to stay away, to put his badge in a sock in his closet instead of carrying it with him.
It's been three and a half weeks. He missed Seireitei, and he longed to go home – or, well, back , – but he was still hurt. He's still mad at Renji. He's hurt and mad and really lonely. He just wanted to go back. He'd wanted that to be his new life. … It was really sappy, he knew, but… him living there and being with Renji was supposed to be like his new start.
But things don't go as planned. They never go as planned. They don't turn out like you want.
He rubbed at his mouth as he often did when he was missing and hating Renji and that stupid not-kiss they'd almost had that day Renji had told him he loved him, both of them frozen against each other, so close, hesitant, as if any move could startle the other away or disrupt the seemingly magic pull they'd had to one another. It had felt right, Renji's hand gripping his. Everything they'd done had felt right.
That one small dream had turned out to be too much to ask; that simple happiness too fragile, so easily lost. Things were changing and it's time to choose a path.
He goes and buys one of Orihime's cupcakes and eats it in the shop.
. . .
A full month had rolled around and he'd almost been surprised when he finally received a hell butterfly from Rukia. Strangely, her message was professional – she must want to lay into him in person. He was told to meet her at Urahara's place. Some other people were going to be there too, but he didn't remember who else because after Renji's name had been dropped, everything else had been an unintelligible buzz.
Ichigo had decided to go.
He'd spent last night rolling around in a nervous sweat. He didn't know what he was going to say to Renji when he saw him. God, what if Renji was patronizing or pitying. He was a dick like that sometimes. Ah fuck, but it could be worse. Instead of being mean, Renji might actually try to be nice about it. What if he apologized to Ichigo or something, said sorry for hurting him? If he did that, Ichigo'll fucking lose it. He might recruit Grimmjow to help murder his ass. If they both beat him half to death, then, you know, no more pity-apologies or smug 'this-is-for-your-own-good' looks. Because two half beatings make a dead ass whole.
The worst thing was that there was this stupid tiny hope inside him that he kept trying to crush, but it kept hiding out, impervious to his efforts at eradicating it. It wasn't likely, considering both of them had bad tempers, but he still hoped that maybe, maybe they could reconcile.
When Ichigo got to Urahara's, Grimmjow was hanging around in the front yard. He gave him an uninterested look as he approached, but it was all a carefully orchestrated act. Ichigo knew Grimmjow got twitchy if he didn't swing by for too long of a time, and Ichigo's last visit had been a while ago. Sometimes Urahara would call just to get Ichigo to come over and 'pet the cat.' Luckily he didn't mean Yoruichi.
Grimmjow, as expertly nonchalant as said cat turning its nose up at food, acted as though he wasn't excited to see him, and instead rudely asked, "The fuck're you doing here?"
Ichigo didn't rise to the bait. "You know why, idiot."
Immediately dropping the act, Grimmjow grumbled, "Thought you'd never get here, slow-ass. Fuckin' assholes are drivin' me nuts in there." Ichigo smirked, shaking his head. Predictable. "'Specially that red-hair guy. Heard you two went at it," Grimmjow drawled knowingly, and damnit, Ichigo hated that he always forgot how smart Grimmjow was when he wanted to be.
"Where is everyone?" Ichigo diverted, desperately trying not to let on about the cold sweat that had broken out on his neck under the gaze of those hawkishly perceptive eyes. "I don't hear anything."
"Basement."
"Mm."
"I'm gonna' kick your ass in there later. Be ready," he warned. "You'll be a stain on the ground once I'm done."
"In your dreams," Ichigo called back absently, already having eagerly headed for Urahara's cavernous basement, where Rukia was waiting – or lying in wait, he should say, because the way she greeted him was more akin to a lion ambushing an antelope than friends meeting after a long time apart.
After the customary beating and then an extra one for leaving without saying anything, they then talked about the why, Ichigo very petulantly poking his toe along the dirty floor. He knew Renji was not far away. He'd been sparring with Kensei when he'd come in, which was right around the time they'd stopped. Ichigo knew he had a very loud and obtrusive reiatsu. He still didn't have the hang of being inconspicuous with it – at least he didn't have to go to the trouble of letting Renji know he was here. He knew. He was just pretending he didn't, lingering over there.
Rukia was still trying to wheedle a reason out of him, but Ichigo was being particularly reticent, answers short and purposefully unhelpful. She was getting impatient, little foot tapping away, and Ichigo grit his teeth and refused to show any sign of intimidation. She was a tiny little thing but she was like a wild dog – she could smell fear, he just knew it.
Finally she narrowed her eyes and a rock dropped into Ichigo's gut, because she'd obviously caught the straining motions of his eyes along his periphery, tracking Renji's movements in the distance. She totally knew. God damnit.
"Is this about the Renji thing?" Shit.
"What Renji thing?"
Rukia looked very unimpressed, and Ichigo didn't even know why he was bothering to play dumb. It was probably right on his face, and he was so tired of this stubborn act. He just wanted this dumb fight to be over. He wanted this pain and loneliness to go away. He wanted that fluttery nervous unexplored thing back, where he got a thrill just out of touching Renji's hand. He didn't know what to do, what he could've done differently to have changed Renji's mind, what he should do now to make Renji like him again, and right then he realized how much he'd missed Rukia and had needed to talk to her.
"Okay-yes," he blurted, face hot, "It's… yeah," he muttered awkwardly. "Okay? So, what do I do?"
Rukia gave him an appraising look for a moment or two, and around this time, as if Ichigo's embarrassment was some sort of dog whistle, Renji began approaching warily.
"Oh I'll tell you what to do," Rukia declared with that imperious confidence she always bossed him around with, and this time Ichigo literally didn't even fucking care. He was so lost and out of it that he didn't care if she made fun of him the entire fucking time. He just wanted this all to be over.
"Do you really want to know?"
"Rukia, for fuck's sake-"
"Uhh, hey," Renji signaled his approach, and Ichigo remembered too late that Rukia wasn't as bad at sensing spiritual pressure as he and Renji were, and her back being turned to Renji as he'd come up on them had been a deliberate strategic move to make him think she didn't know he was getting closer.
Apparently this realization had come too late for Renji too, as he seemed completely off guard as Rukia leapt in the air and took a firm grasp of their hair in each fist, using that to knock their heads together with a loud crack!
With identical yelps, they burst apart and held their skulls. "Idiots!" Rukia scolded. "Why do you both have to make everything a struggle?!"
' I don't know, Rukia. I don't fucking know,' he wanted to say.
Ichigo nursed the rising bump on his head, sulking, and waited for the inevitable tirade about how dumb they were both being. Ichigo privately agreed with her, and wasn't planning on arguing – much – and was surprised when Renji shouted right back at her in what strangely seemed like a continuation of an earlier argument.
"Damnit, Rukia!" Renji raged, bearing over her angrily, and between any other two people with a similar size difference, it would seem like an unbalanced match of power, but Rukia sure wasn't intimidated by Renji, for all the size and weight and strength advantages he had on her. He didn't even know what the fuck Renji was doing, challenging her like that; she was gonna' eat him.
"Don't you 'damnit' me! I see what's going on now. This all comes down to you, doesn't it! Admit it, it was you, fool!"
"I told you!" he shouted, aggravated, "It's outta' my control! What about the laws of nature?!"
"Hey!" Ichigo piped up, when it became clear they were fighting about him.
They both ignored him in favor of outshouting each other. "Laws of nature, my foot! Since when have either of you two cared about rules?!" She then brandished her fist at Ichigo, who panicked and scrambled back.
He held up his hands. "Hey, it wasn't me! It was Renji!" Even if he hadn't known what he was throwing Renji under the bus for, he still probably would've done so rather than face Rukia's wrath on his own. She had such bony knuckles and she was freaking vicious when she was annoyed.
"Me?! " Renji sputtered, outraged at the blatant betrayal.
Rukia waved a hand back and forth, rolling her eyes at Renji. "Believe me, I've already talked to him about chasing you home." Indeed, now that Ichigo's looking, Renji has a big bump on his cheekbone, maybe a shoeprint.
"Hey, you just hit me earlier for running home! You can't argue both sides!"
"I can so." Rukia folded her arms and looked up to Renji for a few seconds of cold staring in which Renji sweat and did his best to glare back. "Stubborn, both of you."
Renji burst, throwing his arms in the air and tearing at his hair. "So?! What am I supposed to do?! The fuck do you want me to do, Rukia?! I can't change facts of life! "
"Don't use that excuse on me. I already told you, you don't care about things like that."
"I already fucking told you, Rukia-"
"Quiet!" she snapped.
"Hey, leave her alone," Ichigo interjected, because really, this wasn't about Rukia. There's no point in Renji being mad at her when she had nothing to do with this. She hadn't been the one to wreck things, she hadn't driven them apart, she hadn't made them feel shitty like this. They had.
"All she did was try to help. It's your fault we're even having this fucked up conversation anyways." Ichigo jabbed at Renji's chest, causing him to reel his head back and stare at the spot for a second before he bared his teeth at Ichigo angrily. "You didn't have to do what you did, but you did, and look where you got us now!"
Renji, clearly aggravated beyond belief, sputtered, "You're the one who won't accept the fact that-"
"That what?" Ichigo challenged, fed up. "That we have an age difference? It didn't have to be about that, but you made it that way. You're the only one who thought it was weird."
"It's not just an age difference, Ichigo," Renji refuted, his anger becoming more stern, tamer, a simmer rather than a wild boil like Ichigo's. "You're not even a man yet, and I'm not sayin' that to be an asshole. You're seven-fucking-teen," he stressed.
Rukia slapped a hand to her eyes and groaned, heading away. "This again," Ichigo caught her muttering.
Ignoring her, Renji grit out, "A teenager. Do you know how that looks?"
That caught Ichigo off guard. Incredulously, he slowly wondered, "What do you care about how things look? Isn't that kinda' dumb?"
"Shut up!" Renji gasped in exasperation. "You don't know how hard I've worked to get where I am now. I'm not gonna' blow it all on-" Ichigo took a step back, brow furrowing. Renji huffed, clenching his eyes shut and rubbing at the bridge of his nose with the pads of his fingers. Ichigo swallowed when he saw that Renji still had just a little bruising there from their previous fight, and picked at it, just like Ichigo did with his aching eyes. Ichigo swallowed again; his throat hurt.
'I'm not gonna' blow it all on a kid like you. Not gonna' blow it on something that didn't even matter. Not gonna' blow it all on a stupid, meaningless crush. Not gonna' blow it on something that wasn't worth it, not on you.' Ichigo ended the sentence a dozen times, and took another step back.
Seeing that he was causing harm, Renji started over, his voice more controlled, gentler, but filled with that big-brotherly advice tone that Ichigo hated to hear from him. "That's not what I meant."
"What did you mean then," Ichigo grit out, his throat mangling his voice.
"I'm saying, you're young," Renji's face scrunched up then, and he half-sobbed, half-laughed, smiling wretchedly and scrubbing at his face with his palm. "You're so goddamn young, and you're a human." Ichigo didn't breathe, not believing what he was hearing as Renji went on. "Experience life, do some crazy shit. You're a teenager for god's sake. There's so many things you haven't gotten to do and see."
"You-!" Ichigo burst, holding his hands up in front of him like he was just barely holding himself back from throttling Renji. He couldn't even-! He just-! Had Renji really just-?!
"You're the one who-! You're the one who came to me and said that you-" he sputtered, frustrated beyond ability to speak without taking continuous breaths to shout at full volume, "I fucking picked you to do those things with! What is so hard to understand here?! It's you. That's what I want my crazy teenager shit to be! It's you! There, I fucking spelled it out! Questions?! What the hell do you not get?!"
"I never should have done that! What do you not get?!" Renji retorted. "God, kid, I'm not doing this to be mean."
"Then why, huh?! Why did you tell me you liked me if you weren't going to let me be with you? If that's not mean then what is it?!"
"I shouldn't have done that, Ichigo, it wasn't right! I-" He groaned and scrubbed his face violently, leaving his skin and eyes red when he threw his hands down. "I know I fucked with your head, okay? An' that was messed up. I never should've done that, I shouldn't have put that in your head, 'cause now you think it's gotta' be me, but it's not!"
"It is, I don't know why you're fighting it!"
"Maybe it seems hard now, but it'll get easier. This'll pass." He'd told himself that too when he'd been trying to manage the pain, but that had been a big fat-
"I don't want it to pass!" he practically wailed.
"You've gotta' meet people your own age, Ichigo," Renji insisted flatly, all the aggressive passion leaving his voice. He shook his head and leaned back, exhaling through his nose. Ichigo felt like tearing his hair out.
So he did – well, sort of. He balled his hands up in it and yanked on it like he did when he was nervous and frustrated. "I don't know why you're being so- so-" God, he couldn't even think of a good word. What's something Rukia would say to make Renji feel small and stupid? . . . "Bullheaded! " he finally spat.
"You're a kid, Ichigo," Renji sighed pitifully, his hand on the top of his head, "and-"
"Not much a kid," he complained, brows scrunching together, and he hated how much that had sounded like a plea, how much those words had really meant, 'like me anyways, don't stop liking me, please don't do this, it's not fair.'
"-and I'm a man!" Renji finished stubbornly. "It's not right."
"I don't understand you, Renji! Why does that bother you now? You didn't care before!" Ichigo threw a hand up and let it smack back down against his leg. He tossed his head in bewilderment, still utterly confounded by Renji's sudden and complete withdrawal from what had been the beginnings of a relationship after things had been going so well. "We were fine before," he reminded, "it didn't even cross your mind! Because nothing was wrong!"
He was getting that weird saliva in his mouth that always came before vomiting, but he kept going anyways, even though it was really hard to admit these things out loud. "Not for a second did I feel like anything we did or said was wrong, and neither did you!"
"'Cause I'm sick!" Renji pretty much flipped his bricks right there, giving an almost hysterical laugh. Ichigo raised a skeptical eyebrow as Renji pushed his bandannas up and dug his nails into his scalp. Renji licked his lip, eyes wide and distressed as he burst out with it again, "I'm sick, that's why."
"Oh come on," Ichigo griped, not doing much to stop Renji from going into full-on self-flagellation mode. He was still doing this horrible smile thing too, the type of smile that wasn't even really a smile, because smiles were supposed to be happy.
"Sick twisted pervert Renji, dogging after a kid! "
"That's not what you think," Ichigo called him out flatly, arms folded. Come on, no one thought Renji was that kind of creep, who wanted to have sex with little boys. Get real. "You don't believe that. No one believes that."
"O-hoh! You know everything, don't you!" Renji sneered, lip sticking out sourly. Ichigo put a hand to his temple, pressing his thumb in. He's getting a headache.
"I really don't know where this is coming from. It's not like anyone's even said anything." Other than Ikkaku, but well, y'know. That didn't count. They'd already fought about that one. No sense rehashing it.
"That's because they're not saying it to you ," Renji hissed, pounding his chest with his fist, "They say it to me. Don't you fucking get it, it doesn't matter how much you think you want this. It still makes me a fucking creep."
"You don't really think that, do you?" Ichigo said, "'Cause that's a lotta' shit if you do."
"A CREEP, Ichigo! In case you still didn't hear me!"
"Oh come off it."
"Just because you don't want to see it doesn't make it not true," Renji insisted. "Ichigo, you're a young guy. There's so much you haven't done. There's so many amazing things you haven't had happen to you yet – if I ruined that," his voice faltered a bit, and his expression scrunched in regret, "I won't forgive myself."
"What the fuck is your point here?! So what if I haven't done things?"
"So , you should have the chance to-"
"But I wanted it to be you, you idiot!" Ichigo stressed, "You are so fucking dumb."
"You oughta' like someone your own age."
"But I don't. I like you. What's so wrong about that?" Ichigo shook his head, confused. He deliberately met Renji's eyes then, trying his hardest to keep his voice level and calm. If Renji wasn't taking his own decision making skills seriously, getting all crazy and emotional wouldn't help make the case that he was mature enough to handle this.
"Why are you fighting this so hard?" Really, if nothing else, that's all Ichigo wanted to know.
Renji's brow furrowed, and Ichigo saw a sharp flash of shame flit across his face, so quick that it was like someone darting past hedges in a garden, and from the other side, you only saw an instant of color through the thousands of tiny gaps in the leaves before it was gone. "I don't…"
Rukia was long gone and it was just them down there together. The sudden quiet now that they weren't yelling at each other made Ichigo realize he hadn't noticed when everyone else had gone up to leave them alone to tear each other into strips.
"You don't what."
He shifted on his feet uncomfortably, looking down at his toes, shoulders heavy with guilt. "I don't like what I could do ta' you," he grit out, and that was the last straw.
Ichigo completely blew his stack at that one, whipping his arms up above his head. "What you could do ta' me?! What the fuck are you talking about?!"
"I can't live with it, Ichigo! Okay? I can't sleep with that on my heart, if I'm the person who hurts you," Renji blurted quickly, and Ichigo honest to god wanted to hit him in the face. He didn't think he'd ever been angrier in his entire fucking life. "It's not a fair playing field, for me ta' just-" He banged his hands on his forehead. "You've gotta' learn these things with someone your own age! God damnit, I won't be that guy who drags you into his sick world just because you don't know better!"
"What sick world?!"
"It'd be taking advantage, when you've never done anything, and I… It wouldn't be fair. If I hurt you-"
"Hurt-!" he burst, then huffed and started again. "Okay, one, you give yourself way too much credit to think you could take advantage of me," Ichigo stated, voice alarmingly even, so much so that he surprised even himself, because he didn't feel calm on the inside. Inside, he was an inch from the point of detonation. "In case you don't remember, I can kick your ass any day of the week. You can't beat me anymore, Renji. Those days are long over. I don't know why you think you can hurt me."
"It's different," Renji stubbornly countered.
"Don't, okay?! Just don't!" Ichigo barked. "Don't you dare talk down to me like you're afraid of breaking my poor little heart! That's a load of bullshit! Pick a different excuse!"
"Ichigo, knock it off already!" Renji paced a few steps away, shaking his head, huffing and staring off at the fake skyline. "No matter what you say or think about how strong you are, or how much you think you can take, or how much you know about the world, you're seven goddamn teen! Just seventeen!"
"So what?" he shouted at Renji's back, "So fucking what?! I'm not afraid, Renji! What are you running from?!"
Renji gave this horrible laugh and dropped his head into his hands, rubbing his face before turning back to him. He smiled sadly and Ichigo's going to hit him, he's really gonna' hit him if he says what he thinks he's going to say.
"Look Ichigo, I'm sorry. This is where it stops."
His fist is clenched. It's coiled and ready. But it doesn't move. Ichigo just let those words play again and again, and, "That's it then?"
"That's it," Renji repeated, his voice strained, tired, stretched thin. "I was outta' line ta' tell you what I did, an' I'm sorry I let you think that this could go somewhere. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I ever looked at you like that."
Ichigo shook his head for a long time, blinking, finally just staring into Renji's eyes. Renji gazed back at him sadly, and Ichigo didn't know why he was just standing there not saying anything else instead of walking away or something. Renji just looked and looked at him like he couldn't bear to stop even though he'd just apologized for ever looking at him with a lover's eye, for ever letting that wild, precious, fragile thing live, for feeling that same thing that Ichigo had for him, that Ichigo had been so happy to be able to feel. He was looking at Ichigo almost imploringly, as if begging him to change his mind, to keep arguing, to give him a reason to give in. He wanted to be talked out of it; he'd stopped this in its tracks, but wouldn't walk away from it, gazing at him with an almost obscene longing.
He didn't know why Renji was doing this, keeping Ichigo just out of reach even though they both wanted nothing more than to be together. He didn't know why Renji was making this harder than it needed to be. He always did that, come to think of it. From what he'd heard about Renji and Rukia's separation, a big part of it had been that Renji hadn't felt good enough for a long time, and had slaved to move up in the ranks and stand equal to Byakuya so that he could be worth something before he faced Rukia again. It wasn't like he couldn't have talked to her before then, and it definitely wasn't like Rukia had actually said that he wasn't good enough to show his face around her, but all the same, Renji hadn't let himself be close to her.
Why did he do that, make excuses to keep the people he cared for the most the farthest away? It was dumb as shit. What was he afraid of?
"Why the fuck do you do that, huh?"
There was no point in Renji thinking he was a pedo. It wasn't like Renji had ever done anything creepy to him. He hadn't pushed himself on him or groped him. He hasn't played mind games. He hasn't even kissed him, for god's sake. As far as Ichigo knew, there hadn't ever even been a sign that Renji wanted him like that – like that, you know? Renji had been – and Ichigo cringed to think it – a gentleman, and yet here Renji had himself completely convinced that he was touched in the head, that he was some kind of child predator. He was acting like he'd already hurt Ichigo and had to get away from him to keep him safe. He was scared of himself, hadn't trusted himself to be with Ichigo.
But that was shit. They could've kept going as they had been; things had been moving monumentally slowly. Nothing had needed to change, but Renji had jumped the gun, Renji had freaked out for no reason, he'd gotten scared before anything bad had even happened. It reminded him of a half-wild dog that scratched at a door and then hid when it opened.
"Why the hell do you do that?" Ichigo demanded again when Renji didn't respond at first.
"What the hell are you talking about?!" Renji snapped, nerves frayed to the quick, his eyes defeated and shot through with blood.
"There were other options, you know," Ichigo said slowly, eyes narrowed. "It's not like the first thing you did was grab me by the dick or push your feelings on me. You didn't have to approach the way you did. You could've done that stuff, you could've taken advantage or done all that shit you said, but you didn't – so it makes like, no fucking sense that you're talking now like you have to protect me from you," he rambled, "like you're this dirty-rotten heartless tramp an' I'm some untouched, driven snow-"
"Ichigo, you're seventeen," Renji rasped, seeming both relieved and exhausted by his unwillingness to let the subject drop, "I can't just… I mean, I'm not gonna'-"
"Just because you 'aren't gonna' doesn't mean shit. That's not the point. There were other options. Everything was perfectly fine. W-" He halted, swallowing. "I was happy. There wasn't one second that I was afraid of you, or- or whatever the fuck. It was fine. You're the one who-" Ichigo shook his head. "I dunno' what happened ta' freak you out, because I don't buy that one word from Ikkaku made you do all this, but whatever it is..."
"Ichigo-"
"My point is, I was fine. You're the one who went nuclear and decided ta' fucking run. "
"Run?!" Renji howled.
"You know what I think?" Ichigo grumbled, getting in Renji's space, voice sharp and low, "I think this is on you. You're scared about something. You got freaked out and now you're just making excuses so you can bury it and run away from it."
"What the fuck do you mean, run?!"
"I guess what Ikkaku said really did get you mad, huh. Made you think about stuff you didn't want to."
"Don't go all psycho-babble on me, Ichigo, I fucking swear-"
"It's okay, you can get pissed, I don't care." Ichigo narrowed his eyes, curling his lip. Renji leaned from foot to foot, breath hissing from his nose like an angry bull, a nerve in his cheek pinching. "You wanna' hit me? You can't fucking stand it, can you," he growled lowly, "I see right through you, Renji. You hate that." His gaze flicked from eye to affronted eye, and he didn't back down. "You're terrified a' that."
"Of course I am!" Renji snapped, and by this point, he looked crazed. He'd fucking lost it. His eyes were wild and his voice was raw and deep, pained. "Of course I'm fucking scared! I don't like what I wanna do ta' you, do you fucking understand?!" He grit his teeth and glared at Ichigo, eyes blazing with guilt, "I fucking hate what I feel when I look at you, Ichigo."
"Run away then," Ichigo spit. "You're good at it by now."
If he'd thought Renji had lost it just moments before, he'd been way off, because after that final prick in his side, Renji lunged for him. It felt like that's all they've done lately is fight, all they'd done lately is hurt each other when what they want to do is the opposite. It didn't make sense and Ichigo hates it, but he doesn't know how else to get out the frustration and the confusion, the resulting anger. He hated feeling helpless, he hated not knowing what was going on. He hates this state of inbetween he and Renji were in. Before, he had been trying his hardest not to wreck anything, but that's all he wanted to do now, was wreck this – destroy it, obliterate it.
Take it back out.
Ichigo didn't know at what point he'd left his body, but it felt like no time at all had passed between Renji's enraged roar and the clashing of their swords and the repeated bursts of sparks that resulted from the violent scraping of metal on metal. It's been a long time since they've fought against one another, and it's harder than he'd anticipated. Zangetsu doesn't seem to want to cooperate fully. Stubborn sentimental ass.
He'd gotten Renji mad at him before – hell, Renji's ticked him off a fair amount of times, but it hasn't gotten this bad since they'd literally been trying to kill each other that day so long ago when Ichigo had first come to Seireitei. Even then, Ichigo had never seen Renji this upset. Renji was really really mad. After just one strike from the bankai Ichigo was still unfamiliar with, the bones in his arms felt like they were going to splinter under the force.
He got Renji too, and he didn't have it in him to feel bad that Renji started to move slower and heave with effort under the immense pressure of his spiritual energy. Gaah, he's so mad! Fuck Renji, that asshole! He's such a dick! Why does he always have to-
Ichigo grit his teeth against the hot unwanted wave of emotion that engulfed him and instead let the furious fires blaze higher and higher.
He didn't know how long they went, because the sun never set down there, but they fought until they were exhausted, taking out their rage on each other until they could hardly stand up. Ichigo was almost getting bored at this point – he wasn't so angry anymore, more bitter, and was only keeping this up out of stubbornness and pique. Renji is not fucking winning this one. He's going to break any second now, he just knows it.
Renji, mulish to the bitter end, kept trying to land a hit on him even though he was dripping with sweat and his technique was falling apart. They stood there quivering for a moment with their swords locked together and glared into each other's eyes. Ichigo scowled, and then yelped as Renji put on a sudden burst of speed, nearly taking his ear off with an aggravated growl.
"What the fuck, man?!" Ichigo shouted, clapping a hand over his ear protectively, because goddamn it, he needed that thing. "Ahk!" he blurted in surprise, hopping back as Renji lunged for him again and again, and finally stood still, shoulders heaving.
"You know what?" Renji growled, voice hardly more than the shudder of his exhausted breath. His hair was a mess and his face was filthy with sweat and dust.
"What?" Ichigo threw up his blade just in time to block a final desperate and frustrated blow of Renji's sword. He jerked his head back away from Renji, who was in his face, teeth bared and breath seething through them like steam through the grates of a coal furnace. He still didn't think he'd ever seen Renji this furious with him, this off-the-rails out-of-control angry. He wouldn't be surprised if they never recovered from this, if they couldn't remain friends. He wouldn't be surprised if the next thing Renji said was a profession of never wanting to see his fucking face again.
He doesn't want that more than anything. Sure, he's had to leave behind everyone he's grown attached to here before, but he'd had the chance to say goodbye, he'd left them as he'd known them, they'd gone away on good terms, with fond memories. To know that the last thing they'd done and said had been so vicious, when really what he felt for Renji was this beautiful powerful thing, what he thought of when Renji's name was said was a sweet idiot, a guy who likes to play tough but is a sap at heart -
Ichigo would live, that's for sure, but he doesn't think he would ever live the same.
Unable to take it, Ichigo groaned, and with all the strength he had left, struggled to push their locked blades back, and Renji with them – but at that moment- "You win." -he lurched forward, nearly losing balance when the resistance he'd expected to meet fell completely away, Renji's sword pretty much dropping into the dirt, hanging limply from his hand. Ichigo's sword clattered to the side, almost falling out of his grip in his surprise.
"What?" Ichigo breathed, his voice slipping out of the word as it cracked and failed halfway through. He was looking at Renji's face, he knew so because the edges of his vision were red and black, but he couldn't see shit.
There might've been a pause between that word and the next moment, but if there had been, it had been so infinitesimal that Ichigo's slow human brain hadn't been able to process it. From one moment to the next, he'd been speaking, and then he's being mauled, swallowed whole, Renji's hands having seized his face and yanked. Ichigo almost can't understand what had happened because of the speed and what seemed like a complete non sequitur. One second they'd been fighting, and now- They suddenly weren't. Now Renji had his skull caged in his hands, palms molded against his cheeks and holding his head still, his mouth sealed over Ichigo's in a searing kiss.
His lips hurt from the sudden smash of their mouths coming together, where his teeth had banged the tender inside. He can't see; there's nothing there but touch and maybe the few crisp red blowaway strands that he can manage to focus on. He's still so surprised that he's feels like a computer in error state, still running but not processing anything. He knows his hands are open and empty at his sides; he can feel air touching the skin between each spread finger. It's warm, bone-meltingly warm, like sunlight on your back.
Ichigo's never been kissed before and it feels like everything.
Then Renji made this noise and his body surged against Ichigo's, his head tilting a bit more to kiss at Ichigo's slack mouth, his fingertips pressing against Ichigo's scalp where they cradled his head and dug through his hair. The conscious thought that he was being kissed finally penetrated Ichigo's cerebral cortex and his body flooded with a sort of warm chill, all his hair standing up in excitement. Renji hummed again on his next breath, and Ichigo shuddered, every tensed and strained muscle turning to putty. Ichigo's heart picked up speed, his stomach getting that tight and airy feeling, and he just relaxed into it even though Renji was holding him so tight and pressing against him so hard that he might leave a lip-print on Ichigo's face afterwards. Renji's kissing him, he's-
It broke suddenly, and their lips being yanked apart felt like being awakened by an abruptly dumped bucket of ice water. Ichigo reeled, vision blurry and unfocused, and a moment after their mouths separated, Renji's hands on his face did also, and Ichigo pretty much fell on his ass.
Oh god, he's woozy. Had he even breathed once during that whole thing? His head is spinning like crazy.
Ichigo lifted his hands to his cheeks and felt them, pressed his fingertips into them, and hardly felt anything. His face felt funny. "Hey," he heard someone say, but he just kept swimming in this warm numb fuzzy feeling. That was- That was great! "You okay, kid?"
There was a hand on his arm, tight and hot, half-lifting his arm and keeping him from flopping backwards. Ichigo's legs shake with strain; he's so exhausted. His head keeps spinning round. It made sense really. He hadn't eaten lunch yet today, or breakfast, and wow, that kiss was amazing.
"Hey. Don't scare me." Someone shook him. "Dude." Another shake, and Ichigo's head lolled forward for a minute. "Fuck."
There was a hand to his cheek, and it was so hot that Ichigo responded. His mouth felt loose, and it was hard to talk, like after a dental operation that had required novocaine. "Muh? Wha'?" he mumbled confusedly, his lips tingling, his vision finally starting to clear enough that he could make out that Renji was holding him by the shoulders and checking his pupils. Renji put his hand to his forehead as if to feel for his temperature, and his brow scrunched in worry.
"You gonna' pass out?"
"What?" Ichigo complained, voice a bit sluggish. His eyes drifted close and he lurched forward, straining a bit against the firm grip Renji had on his shoulder. He wanted to kiss him again. He was okay; it didn't matter that he felt like he couldn't stand. That's just because… that's because-
"C'mon, don't stop now," he mumbled, eyes drifting closed, hot breath coming through his lips feverishly. He'll just keep floating like this until Renji holds him that tight and secure again, anchoring him in one spot.
"..."
The hand on his forehead slips off with a tight strangled sort of noise. "God damnit."
And Ichigo was being kissed again and he felt like a string of Christmas lights being connected to the wall socket. Or maybe it's eating the whole box of chocolate even though he's not supposed to and still not feeling the least bit guilty about it – or maybe it's finding the warm spot on the bed, or floating underwater, cool behind the ears and on the eyelids and between every toe.
Or even, just maybe, it's like ripping off a bandaid and finding that it hadn't caught any of the hairs and that the scab beneath is gone.
. . .
When someone was finally sent down to check on them, they'd dragged themselves to the hot springs and, still unable to get out – or you know, hardly goddamn move, because they'd kind of overdone it earlier – had been forced to stay there and let Rukia lecture them about bounds of reason and reckless behavior. They took it as well as anyone could take that kind of berating; Rukia beat them on the heads while they sat in the water, shoulders hunched in shame. That woman sure knew how to make a guy feel stupid.
And well, maybe it had been stupid. Ichigo didn't even remember what he'd been mad for. He was just glad it was over, and maybe – just maybe – he was gloating a bit, on the inside. Renji kissed him! Renji really liked him!
"I hope you're fucking happy, Rukia, I did what you said and I feel like a total dick now."
"Why, because it worked?"
"He fucking passed out!"
"Did not," Ichigo mumbled quietly, and was largely ignored.
"I call that a success." Ichigo felt a surge of conflicting affection and annoyance for Rukia when she shot a double-thumbs up. He didn't know how he'd ever survived without that woman, as hard as her knuckles might be on a tender scalp.
"FOR WHO?!" Ichigo sighed, bubbles tickling his nose as he rolled his eyes and floated around in the deep center of the spring.
"Damnit, Rukia, ouch!" Renji cussed, swatting at her as she knocked him on the head for the who-knows-what-the-score-was time. Ichigo had given up responding to her ten minutes ago and had gotten depleted beatings for it. Renji was stupid and kept arguing with her; the poor doomed soul didn't learn.
"-Monkey-brained moron! If you'd listened to me earlier, maybe you wouldn't have had to beat each other's faces in first like that! And another thing!"
"I'm not a moron, Rukia! It was a mistake, okay?! What do you want from me?!"
"I'm endlessly astounded that you graduated the top of your class and still manage to be so monumentally stupid."
"Yeah, but I-! Rukia, you're like-! " Renji screamed, "You know what, never mind! Fine! You're right!" And the twenty minute argument was over, Rukia one, Renji zero.
Rukia didn't rub it in… much. Not other than nodding her satisfaction, which pretty much made Renji burst a vessel.
"Pff," Ichigo snorted, sinking underwater enough that his mouth was underneath, only his steam-heavy hair and his distrustful tiny-bony-fist-wary eyes peeked above the surface. Unfortunately for him, the rush of bubbles drew Rukia's attention to him. Ah shit.
He was tempted to duck under completely, but she'd have him when he came back up to breathe. He'd have to sometime.
"What do you have to smile about, Ichigo? Don't pretend you handled this any better than this fool," Rukia needled. Ichigo's eye twitched. "Moron-Two."
"Don't affiliate me with him when you're insulting me! And I'm not a moron either!"
"Pssh," Renji snickered, and Rukia lost control of that faux-serious look she used when she was trying to channel Byakuya, laughing at him too behind her hand. He hated when they ganged up on him. It reminded him of how they'd met him in Hueco Mundo with a double beating, or embarrassed him in front of his class by holding him still and kicking him in the face. Couple of jerks.
"Oh shut up." Ichigo ducked back down in humiliation, glaring at Renji and letting water fill his ears so that he didn't have to hear his dumb laughing.
Seeming appeased, Rukia's righteous tirade abated and she eagerly asked Ichigo if this meant he was coming back to Seireitei. When would he come back? Where would he stay? She's going to make a room up for him, he can help her with these green unseated members who still make the mistake of panicking in battle – What has he been up to?
Renji smiled fondly, one arm up on the edge of the bath, fingers playing on the edges of the water as he lounged lazily and watched as Rukia chattered and Ichigo responded in his usual deliberately casual and bored 'cool' tone. His other hand, suspiciously having gone AWOL was discovered when some unidentified object brushed against Ichigo's arm, giving him a momentary scare when he thought it was a fish or something – before he remembered that that was impossible, of course.
Renji didn't react other than his smile becoming a smirk and his other hand rubbing on his lips to try and kill it before Rukia noticed he was fucking around. Ichigo's eyes slid back to the side, glaring a bit to tell him to knock it off. He told Rukia yeah, he'd been practicing his kidou – he has – and he was getting better – he's not, he's really not.
The second time Renji made a swipe for him, it hit its mark and it was teasing, searching. He pinched lightly at Ichigo's hand, tickling him with one finger like he was scratching a cat, the way he had before in the Eleventh Squad's yard, the day they'd split up. Ichigo withdrew a bit, eyes involuntarily dropping from Rukia's, his chest tightening in simultaneous embarrassment and that same familiar fluttery excitement. 'Renji ,' he thought annoyedly. 'Not in front of-'
Renji curled his fingers around two of Ichigo's in an unexpectedly tender gesture, and Ichigo was weak. He fought not to drop his head into his palm. 'Damnit.'
"Where do you think you'll stay? I know the Zarak-Corps will take you long term. I think they've had a petition made, actually."
Ichigo groaned. "Don't remind me."
"He'll stay with me," Renji rumbled, his low voice practically vibrating through the water, or maybe Ichigo's brain was just tricking him into thinking so because they were fucking holding hands. "If he wants," he added after it was clear someone had pressed the pause button on Ichigo.
"Room with you again?" Ichigo finally muttered when it was clear they were both staring at him and waiting for his reaction, Rukia with a sort of perverse delight, Renji, somewhat uncertain but trying to appear confident.
"For 's'long as you want." Renji squeezed on his fingers and if Ichigo ever caught him trying to pretend in future that he wasn't the biggest softie on the planet, he'd never let Renji hear the end of that shit, because that was the dirtiest fucking lie ever concocted. "Not that you have to. Only if you wanted to, I mean."
"Trust me, he doesn't."
'He does! Well, you know, maybe he might consider.' Ichigo cleared his throat."Uh, why not?" he asked, trying his best not to let his tone betray him. Luckily his carefully honed high school skill of sounding aloof didn't fail him.
"Ichigo, you'll go nuts there in a week. Renji's lived the bachelor life for ages now, and his house shows it."
"It wasn't that bad when I saw," Ichigo mentioned, looking back to Renji, who had gone suspiciously quiet. When he saw him, he was glaring daggers at Rukia, who raised her eyebrows and singsonged that it had only looked presentable because Renji had begged her to help him clean it.
"He knew how clean you keep your room and told me that if you saw the way he lives, you'd never want to be associated with his dirty slobby ass ever again."
"I didn't say all that! And I didn't beg," Renji denied petulantly, his lip sticking out as he deliberately ignored meeting Ichigo's shit-eating grin. "Wipe that look off your face."
"He even promised to do me – how many favors was it again?"
"Rukia, I swear to god, if this water wouldn't sear your flesh off, I would drag you in here and make you eat those words."
"Small blessings."
"Rukia, dang you!"
Ichigo hid his smile under the water and let Renji's thumb trail absently against his palm. Okay, maybe he had liked Renji after all. Maybe he had felt funny inside to see Renji smile, and when he thought about those words, "If you ever can't keep going, I'll carry you on my back," maybe it did matter to him.
Maybe he had liked Renji, just a little.