Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach. All of the characters and their likenesses do not belong to me. I only claim ownership of the story line.
The story thus far: It is Christmas Eve and Hitsugaya has managed to get Matsumoto out of the office early. He has spent time thinking to himself and then decided to clear his head. Venturing out not the Seireitei he has found himself stopping at the division offices to see how each are celebrating the holiday. However when he s at the eighth division he beings to pace outside and is caught by Nano- fukutaichou and is convinced that he needs to hell Hinamori how he feels. And well he does, he goes over to the fifth division and tells her how he feels and luckily his feelings are returned. Oddly enough they wind up falling asleep in the division five office.
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When the later morning came and the sun rose on the Seireitei, there was quite. Up until when Matsumoto got to the division ten office.
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Earlier that morning she had woken up in the division six office to Kuchiki- taichou yelling at Abarai- fukutaichou to get he office cleaned up.
"Kuchiki- taichou be a little more in the sprit of the holiday," she said with a smile. Kuchiki- taichou just waved her off. "Renji, your captain is pickier than mine when it comes to the holidays."
"Are you sure? At least mine didn't kick me out of the office to go reconnect with his girl friend," he said as he spread himself out on the floor on the back room of the office.
"You don't really think that's why he kicked me out last night, do you?" She was beginning to panic.
"It's very possible. I overheard Hinamori- fukutaichou confiding in Nano- fukutaichou about him a few days ago."
Matsumoto's face went red, "and you didn't think to tell me?"
"I didn't think that you would mind. I would give anything to see my captain happy again."
She sat and thought about it for a moment. He would tell me, wouldn't he? "I have to go. When Kira- fukutaichou wakes up tell him to go home. Bye Renji," she yelled as she bolted for the door. She was on a mission to find out the truth, starting at the division ten office.
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When she got there the door was locked, but luckily she was so much taller than her captain that she was able to keep an extra key under one of the roof tiles. She reached up and grabbed the key to unlock the door. He better be in there. It's already passed the time he usually yells at me for being late. She stumbled to get the key in the door, but finally managed to get it unlocked. The click the locked made caused her to pause. She took a deep breath and turned the handle.
The lights in the office were off. Everything was exactly how she left it. He didn't clean up anything. The office is usually spotless. She stepped in slowly and cautiously. She walked over towards her desk, but there was nothing out of the ordinary, so she investigated his desk. Nothing was out of the ordinary there either, she was defiantly perplexed. The office was a mess, but everything seemed normal. If he left in the middle of the night, where did he go? She went into shock.
"He wouldn't just go, would he? I mean he didn't even say anything to me," she became very sad. "But I'm his vice-captain, he should be able to tell me these things," she began to pace around the room. Should I go to the division five office? What if he isn't there? How will I cover? But it didn't matter, she charged out of the door and over towards the division five office.
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Slowly Hinamori woke up. She rolled over and right into Hitsugaya's bear chest. Suddenly the whole night came rolling back to her. She glanced down to check herself and found that she was only in her white kimono. This had been the first night she had not spent alone since she had been released from the hospital. As the warm feelings filled her, she snuggled in closer to him.
His eyes began to open. When his vision became clearer a smile grew on his face.
"Good morning, Shiro-kun," she said with a smile.
"Good morning, did you sleep well?"
"Very well, having you by my side," but their conversation was cut short as Matsumoto- fukutaichou came bursting through the door, She was breathing heavily as if she had been running. When her eyes found Hitsugaya and Hinamori her face turned an even brighter shade of red.
There was a pause of awkward silence before Hitsugaya spoke, "Matsumoto- fukutaichou, what are you doing here so early in the morning?"
"Umm…well, you see. Yachiro- fukutaichou has called for an in-promt-to meeting for all vice-captain's." That was a total lie. "So I'm here to let Hinamori know."
"I see, that makes sense," he mumbled.
"Well now I know and I will be sure to be then, when is it?"
"Umm…" Great, now I need to think of a time, four is a bit too late, and noon seems rather soon…two it is then. "1400, division eleven office."
"Alright then," Hinamori said.
"Good, now you know and now I will be going and she bowed and quickly backed out of the office. So it's true, he did kick me out so I wouldn't know. But now I do. So what does this mean? It is against the rules; one of them would have to drop down. She stopped walking when she was far enough away from the division five office for her to be seen. What am I going to do about the meeting? I have to tell someone who won't blab… well the boys are out of the question then. And Kenpachi- taichou would kill me for interrupting Yachior –fukutaichou's Christmas morning. Kurotsuchi– taichou just scared me, so I guess that just leaves me with Nanao- fukutaichou. "She is gonna be mad at me for this."
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Author's notes: Matsumoto is going to have a hard time getting herself out of that lie. And what will Nanao think? Will she be willing to help? And what are Hitsugaya and Hinamori going to do now that Matsumoto knows?