NOTE: Any touchy-feely parts of the story start next chapter. The POV are just for a beginning so people can see how they actually feel. Make sense?

---

Renji's Point Of View

I sat staring at the clear moon on top of my small apartment. I had decided that, after the Soul Society incident, I wanted to remain in the living world. I wore my gigai most of the time but I shook my self out of it sometimes. And, even though I was still in the living in the real world, I was still Vice-Captain of the sixth squad. My captain said that he didn't care either way. He also mentioned, which I think he had meant to keep to himself, that I was a bit of a nuisance.

It had upset me, but as usual, I just shrugged it off as another one of his random comments. So after what seemed to be a lot, I ended up where I am. On the top of an apartment building in the real world.

Of course, there was one other reason I was here that no one else knew about. At least, I hoped no one else knew about. That one reason I ask? I was madly in love with the god damn substitute shinigami of the real world. Known to most as, Kurosaki Ichigo.

I jumped back to reality when I heard a knock at one of the apartments doors. I turned on my stomach and belly crawled to the edge and peered over it. I nearly gasped when I saw who it was. I swung over the edge and landed cat-like on the balcony of the apartment complex.

"Hitsugaya-taicho, Rangiku-san. What are you doing here?" I asked, trying hard to suppress my surprise and failing miserably. "Or, when did you get here? I didn't feel your reitsu." (no comments about spelling. It's obvious already that I can't.)

The young white haired shinigami turned around to look at me, and glared. "We're not allowed to drop by from time to time?"

The other, taller, larger, of the two slapped me on the back and said, "Konbonwa, Renji-san. O-genki desu?"

"I-I'm fine Rangiku-fukutaicho. " I coughed as the woman slapped me repeatedly on the back, causing me to choke on spit. "And of course you can...visit. It's just rather...unexpected?" I said, searching for the right word.

Matsumoto's eyes widened. "Are you doing something dirty with a human girl?"

I coughed hard again, feeling as though I was going to lose my stomach in the process. "W-what? That's absurd!"

She wriggled her eyebrows at me, clearly saying she didn't believe me. Tenth squads captain cleared his throat to get my attention. "Is now a bad time?" He asked, his voice low, and to my surprise, generally concerned.

"What? Oh, no. I was just thinking about things up on the roof-'

"I wondered where you'd come from." Matsumoto interrupted.

I had lost my train of thought and said instead, "Just, come on in. Make yourselves comfortable."

"How do afford this?" Hitsugaya asked, showing some "general" interest. I saw his eyes flit across the room, examining everything there. His eyes worked over the room, examining the couch, the low set coffee table, the kitchen, and his eyes lingered longest on my bedroom door.

I had made my way to the kitchen to make tea. While pulling out the teapot, I called out to the living room, "I have a job as a police officer. It pays well and this really isn't all that expensive. It's one of the cheaper places actually." The water had warmed up so I put it on a tray and brought it out. I set a glass in front of both of them and sat cross legged on the other side of the table.

"A police officer huh? Must be nice. You must pick up a lot of girls." Rangiku piped, here eyes wide and hopeful again.

"Yeah. I guess." Except I've got my eyes set on a whole other goal of a whole other gender. My flushed pink as I thought about it.

"What sized chest girl do you like?"

"R-Rangiku-fukutaicho!" I stammered. "That is really none of your concern."

Rangiku stopped for a minute and stared at the ceiling,before saying. "Or maybe, you're not into the girls? There's perhaps a... another male, that's caught your interest?"

"W-what?" I jumped to my feet, startled that she would think such a thing.

"Whoops," she smiled a huge quarter-moon smile, "did I say that out loud?"

Hitsugaya slapped himself in the face and let his hand slide across that. "Matsumoto! Now that's what I call absurd."

"It would be if she wasn't right," I muttered, mostly to myself. With their sharp sense of hearing, regretfully, they had heard.

"Renji-fukutaicho of sixth squad, what did you just say?" demanded the young white haired captain.

"I said, 'it would be if she wasn't right.' I am in love with some one and that some one isn't a large breasted woman like it should be." I admitted, shrugging my shoulders. "I have fallen in love with-"

"Oh let me guess! Please oh please let me guess!" The blond said, almost jumping from wall to wall.

"S-sure." I agreed.

"Is it some one we know?" She asked, her eyes wide and childish.

"Yes." I answered dully, not wanting this to turn into a game of twenty questions.

"Is he a shinigami?"

"Kind of."

Hitsugaya interrupted with, "How can it be 'kind of'? He either is or isn't."

"Shut yer trap. He's 'kind of' a shinigami. Just keep guessing."

"Is he in the human world?"

"Yes." I watched as the anticipation slowly grew across the vice-captains face. She was thoroughly enjoying this.

"Ok, if he is a shinigami, does he rank at all in the thirteen protection squads?"

Sighing, I answered, reluctantly of course, "No."

She stopped and I watched as a devilish grin crossed her face. She mouthed 'oh my god.' "Taicho, he's in love with the substitute shinigami of this town, Kurosaki Ichigo!"

His jaw dropped and he turned to stare at me. "I-is that true?" I nodded. For some reason, I got the feeling that he was holding back laughter. You could see the smile pulling at the edges of his lips. He obviously found this very amusing.

"Does he know that?" He couldn't help but to snicker a little when he opened his mouth to talk.

"Of course not! And it's of course going to be kept that way! He doesn't even know I'm in the living world and he has no need to know either." I shouted. It was irritating, having them... interrogate me like this. My face had flushed bright scarlet, making my black wave of tattoo's almost blend in with my skin.

Rangiku let out a monstrous laugh. "What are you thinking? If you want him, take him. He won't know unless you tell him."

"If I tell him and he says no, than there will be some awkwardness between us. That would be terrible." I looked at her, my face a lot less scarlet now.
"Well, if you don't tell him, he'll end up getting stolen away by some one else and then you'll have no chances of having him as your own." Rangiku gave a gentle smile. She understood how it felt to want to tell some one how you felt but you weren't sure just how to tell them. Up until the most recent incident, she'd had her eyes set on the sneaky bastard of a devil, Ichimaru Gin.

I let my self drop to floor so I could sit cross legged again. I stared at the floor, picking at the carpet. I was confused because they were so calm about all of it. With out looking up I muttered, slightly under my breath, "How come you're so calm about this? You just find out that one of the vice-captains are in love with another male and you're talking like it's nothing."

Rangiku gave me a confused look. "Shouldn't we be happy? One of our own is in love. Doesn't matter if they're in love with the same sex."

Hitsugaya, who seemed to have regained composure said, "Love is love regardless of who it is that you love." He crossed his arms across his chest and stared hard at me, as if he were trying to see some hidden meaning behind me emotions.

I shrugged, letting my eyes wonder across the room, noticing, but not really seeing, the other two people in the room. They were right and I knew it but I couldn't believe it. I looked up at them and begged, my eyes pleading, "Please don't tell any one about this. Especially not my captain."

"We can't do that. If there's an emergency, your captain needs to know you're in the real world and why you're there. Sorry Renji but rules are rules." Hitsugaya said, his voice almost apologetic. There was also a note of sarcasm and I knew that he was making that up but I was in no position to tell him what to do.

"F-fine. But can you please keep it between you three? I really don't need this getting out to every body."

"I wouldn't worry to much about it but... There's been a... rumor, going around that Yumichika and Ikakku are going at it. It's still an uncomformed report but, it's helpful. It's not that unusual for you to be the way you are. Sometimes it just happens." Matsumoto said, her voice kind; her gentle eyes caring. This was the first time I had ever seen Rangiku Matsumoto like this. She was calm, but her thoughts weren't in a present day time. They had flown off to a time when she had known love. She didn't want others to be hurt either.

"Thanks. It's getting late," Actually it was already late but, oh well. "Are you staying here or are you going back? If you're staying I'll have to get the futons and stuff out so you'll have to wait for maybe half-an-hour." I offered, hoping they weren't staying.

"No. We need to get back to Soul Society and report. The towns safe, you're crazy, which means that nothing has changed." Hitsugaya said, sarcasm showing in his voice despite his emotionless face.

I got up and sighed. "Yes yes now get out, give your report and if the captain starts laughing bash his face in will you?" I asked, shoving the two of the out the door.

Right before the door slammed shut I heard them say together, "Sure sure. Later loverboy."

---

(Soul Society: Sixth Squads Office)

Byakuya sat at his desk, working quietly on some paper work he still had left when he heard a knock at his door. With out looking up or stopping what he was doing he answered, "Come on in."

The door slid open and tenth squads captain and vice-captain walked in. "Reporting in, Tenth squads Hitsugaya-taicho."

"Reporting in, Rangiku-fukutaicho of the tenth squad."

Byakuya finally look up to see them standing in front of the doorway. "Reporting in? Why to me? I have no need to hear such reports. I'm simply a captain. Not head of Seriete."

"We thought we'd tell you something rather interesting about your... ex-lover-"

"You've no need to talk about that. All he is now is my vice-captain of the sixth squad of the thirtee-"

"He's fallen in love again." Hitsugaya interrupted. "This time, his target is Kurosaki Ichigo."

The captain stopped breathing for a couple seconds, snapping into a straighter position. Although he didn't voice it, you could clearly see the pain in his eyes and written all over his face. He was very upset that his lover could leave him for some one like that useless lump of flesh.

"Kuchiki-taicho, are you alright?" Rangiku asked.

"I-I'm fine. Has he told him yet? Renji I mean." His voice started to crack and he could feels tears pushing on his eyes.

"No. He hasn't told Kurosaki yet. Who knows if he'll even tell him." Rangiku answered, a worried look still plastered on her face. "He was really worried about it. He doesn't realize that you finally 'came-out-of-the-closet' and told us that you were his boyfriend. I 'spose you plan on keeping it that way." (Excuse the American terminology. It fit.)

Byakuya's face dropped, but when he spoke, his voice held plain authority, "Thanks for reporting. Go tell the chief commander the real report." The two nodded, and flash stepped out the door. Renji, please don't hurt Kurosaki the way you've hurt me.

(Flashback)

Renji kissed his lover on the lips, letting his eye's flit from side to side, making sure no one else was around. He pressed a little harder and then let go. He was determined to do today, what he had planned on doing so many times but couldn't bring himself to do it.

"Renji... is everything... alright?" He asked, planting kisses on his cheek every other word.

"Um, actually, I have something I need to tell you." Renji looked away, wishing that he wasn't there.

Byakuya stopped and pulled away from the red head. "What is it?"

"I-I can't do this anymore. I'm to worried about image and, well, you've got to uphold your clans name. You can't soil it by being with another man. And don't forget about your late wife. She'd be disappointed if she were here watching you."

The larger man took a step back. "So, you're saying,we're finished? We can't be together?"

"Well, we can just not intmantely. I'm sorry. Find some one else. Some that will love you forever and who doesn't care about image." Renji, with out looking back, walked out of the room, the tears falling carelessly, soundlessly, down his face.

Byakuya felt something hot and sticky against his face as he watched his now ex­-lover walk away from him. He put finger against his eyes and was surprised to find wet droplets of water against his finger. He was crying. Renji had meant so much that he was crying.

(Present Day: End Of Flashback)

Byakuya felt the tears stinging his skin again as he realized that had really lost him. That he would never his one and only true love back. Wiping away the tears, he turned back to his work, concentrating on it instead of the feeling of hate he had pent up inside.

---

With the other two gone, the house seemed eerily quiet. I still sat on the floor, staring at it as if it had the answer to a really hard test question. I still didn't wan to tell him. I didn't want there to be awkwardness between us. "God this sucks," I muttered to myself. "This sucks and love bites. It's hard to tell those you love that you love them especially if you don't know if they'll love you back or not." I flopped onto my back, my legs still crossed. It had been s shitty day and I wasn't in the mood to make it better. I had just confessed my love to the most talkative vice-captain, no, the most talkative person, ever. She was surely going to blab and then everything would be ruined. Except for then, just maybe, I could go back to Kuchiki. I could love him again. Except this time, it wouldn't have to be kept secret.

You know what? Tomorrow, I'm going to find Kurosaki and hopefully confess. I don't want him to be stolen from me. He's mine and mine alone. With that, I stood up, dusted my self and walked into my bedroom closing it behind me.

I got dressed quickly and crawled into bed. Right before drifting off, I herd myself mutter, "I love you Kurosaki Ichigo. And there's nothing you, or anyone else, can do about it." I felt my self smile, and then drift into a peaceful, dreamless sleep.

---

Ok, this is the end of chapter two. It's not turning out as great as I had hoped but I hope you're enjoying it any way.

Just to let every one know, the next chapter is most likely going to be in third person so please don't get confused. I have a reason for doing it the way I'm writing it.

NOTE: I DO NOT OWN BLEACH OR IT'S CHARACTERS. STORY NOT FOR SALE, RENT, OR REPRODUCING.

© Stacie Streck 2007-2012