Orihime dreamed that night of fields of flowers and tall trees she didn't remember ever seeing. She was with her brother, wandering the sunny summer meadow, smiling at the beautiful day. The sun was warm on her shoulders, her face, and she was happier than she had been in a very long time.
But as she turned to where she knew her brother was catching up with her in the field, it wasn't Sora behind her.
"Hurry," she urged him.
It was that moment that Orihime woke up from what had been a pleasant dream. Pleasant, she thought, rubbing her face with her hands as she sat up in the big bed in her Las Noches' room, until she'd seen the face of her companion.
How Aizen had gotten into her dreams without making them nightmares was beyond her. It shouldn't have been possible.
But there he was, catching up with her in the field, smiling at her with what she could only call a genuine smile. And she had smiled back, as if expecting him to be there, not finding him out of place at all. And more oddly, he was in his shinigami robes.
She rubbed her face vigorously with her hands in the darkened room. All the hints he told her, the small seeds planted into her thoughts that they had a past together – they were taking hold, rooting, sprouting and growing into bigger things. That's what it was, she told herself.
She threw back the bedclothes and stood. Yes, he was – at times – unlike the monster that had waged war on her and her friends, but he was still the same man.
She didn't want to sort through the dream. Instead she quickly dressed in the pale pink kimono with the white edged sleeves and yellow and rose-colored stitched flowers. She paused as she finished tying the sash. It was a new one and one end was embroidered with a small brown and red hummingbird. She pulled it closer to see it better. The stitching was fine and even, the bird hovering over a carnation pink flower. She found herself smiling. Someone had gotten the hummingbird right at Las Noches.
A knock at the door to the hall got her attention and she opened it to see her attendants.
The taller one bowed. "You are awake," she said. "Would you like tea now?"
Orihime looked to the shorter one. "Is it late?"
The two attendants both blinked. "Why, yes," they said in unison.
"You were tired, so Aizen-sama told us to let you sleep today," the shorter one added.
"Oh, I'm sorry," Orihime said, looking down the hall to see if anyone else had noticed her late start to the day. "Is Aizen-sama angry with me?"
They both shook their heads. "No."
She sighed. "Yes, tea is fine."
"Would you like a meal now?" the taller one asked, predicting the shorter was about to.
"Oh, yes, please." Orihime nodded, her stomach beginning to wake up now.
It was actually much later than Orihime thought it would be. It was difficult to tell how the days transpired in Las Noches, with the bright spot in the sky shading over in milky tones, with no real semblance of late and early. Orihime ate her rice and vegetables alone in her room and then went for a short walk in the corridors of the wing she knew she was allowed to wander.
Actually, Grimmjow had helped her set those parameters. She didn't want to get lost again. She saw brief glimpses of Ulquiorra, who only gave her a spare look before moving on, and a few of the lower ranked servile Arrancar moving among the halls. She didn't even quite know where she going, just out to get a bit of exercise. She finally ended up back at her room, and was at once both glad to find it, but still a little bored. She didn't want to think.
She went first to her room, and then to the common room beside it. If the laboratory indeed wanted to create a hummingbird, she thought, maybe she could help them visualize one. The room was dimly lit, a deeper shade of green on the walls, and Orihime looked again to the far wall, still expecting a balcony or window to be there. She looked around, hoping to find something, anything, to use to sketch a hummingbird. If she could use the one on her sash as a guide, maybe she could help the lab render something less dragonfly-looking in their next prototype.
She sighed, finding nothing of use in the room. She was about to find one of the attendants to make her request, but then she noticed something unusual.
The door to the opposite wall from her room, across the small common room, was ajar. Orihime stared at it for a moment. She'd always known it was a door, but never seen it open.
She stepped to it quietly, holding her hair back as she leaned to peek inside. It was only open a few inches, and inside the light was a little brighter, warmly inviting. She nearly gasped, her fingers covering her mouth as she got a better look.
Aizen knelt at a low table against the wall inside, his back to her. He was working at something Orihime couldn't see on the table, his head bowed over it.
She blinked quickly, and then looked around the room. The walls were a pewter-blue color, trimmed with brown frames, and the rice-paper divider beyond the low table didn't quite hide the large bed dressed in tan and white sheets. She could smell water from further inside – bath water, she realized – and on the table before Aizen a large tea pot was steaming.
She watched him lean over the table, her eyes moving across his shoulders as he moved, imagining the broad muscles that were beneath the brown kimono he wore. His hair fell just to the nape of the collar, kept now in a slightly less neatly combed style than when she'd seen him during the War.
She bit her lower, trying to cancel her thoughts, hoping to ease away before he could see her.
"You may come in, Orihime," Aizen said as she held her breath. He turned to see her, smiling at her. He extended one arm. "Come. Tell me what I'm doing wrong here."
Orihime hesitated, knowing her choices weren't really hers. "I didn't, didn't know you were in here."
She slowly crossed the room to where he knelt at the table. He was dressed in the brown kimono, the front of it mostly open and belted loosely at his waist by the obi.
He pulled a cushion closer to him at his side. "Sit down."
She carefully knelt beside him, crooking her legs to her side, away from him. "You... This is your room?"
He smiled wider, chuckling. "Yes. This is my room. I was hoping you'd find it quicker." His fingers pushed a few strands of hair from her face so he could see her large, startled eyes better. "Did you sleep well?"
She nodded. "I didn't know you were so close," she said without thinking. "Oh, I meant... I mean –"
"I think that's exactly what you meant, Orihime." His attention went to the table. On it was a sheet of parchment beside several bottles of ink and a stylus. The parchment was blank. "I've not kept up with my writing," he said, sighing, watching her look to the blank sheet. "I think the desire is gone. I once enjoyed writing."
"Oh, perhaps it will come back to you," she said, looking at the bottles of ink, some colored, by the stylus.
"In the meantime," he said, taking the sash end that was on her bent knee, "maybe you can find some inspiration for our laboratory." His fingers found the hummingbird on the tie. "Can you draw, Orihime?"
She shook her head, although that was exactly what she had planned to attempt.
He smiled, fingering the sash. "Maybe a little?"
Her gaze dropped to the sash end. "Do you think...?" she stopped, shoving the remnants of the dream as far away as possible. If she was going to ask anyone, it was not going to be him, she decided. But then who?
"Think what, Orihime?"
He turned to her, letting the sash drop to instead take her hand on her leg. She looked down to his fingers tenderly grasping hers. For some reason, there was no recoil, no automatic impulse to pull her hand away. In fact, she realized, his fingers felt natural on hers. Her eyes rose to his, seeing something in their brown depths that she was certain hadn't been there before.
Ever.
Never had he looked at her as he did now, she thought; or, maybe it was the first time she remembered it. She closed her eyes, sighing. "Do you think dreams can be past memories?" She looked to him slowly, hoping she wasn't nearing something she wasn't supposed to touch. "It is possible? Sousuke."
He smiled, this time in a different manner she'd ever seen. Something beckoning, irresistible in his face, calming and natural; something intangible that Orihime didn't have the capacity to clarify.
"I believe it's possible, yes," he said. "Dreams can be made up of things we fear, that we push off so we don't think about them." He let the fingers of his other hand touch just below her chin, silently admiring the spark that leapt to her eyes. "Or things we wish for, or can't remember in our waking hours."
She nodded slightly, watching his lips as he leaned to her, feeling his fingers slide to the back of her neck beneath her hair. She wasn't aware that he pulled her so close, only feeling his arm around her, holding her tight to his chest, and his lips firmly on hers. She kissed him back, unpracticed and quickly, slipping her hand from his to put against his shoulder.
She eased back, looking to him with wide eyes, shocked at her own reaction. She shook her head, but his arm at her back braced tighter. "I don't... I'm not..."
He remained near, the scent of her hair welling memories in his little-used past. "You're here now, Orihime," he said lowly, kissing the corner of her mouth. "We've been here before."
She wanted to tell him that he was mistaken, that it wasn't her, but his lips moved to hers fully again, and she didn't care if it had been her with him before or not. She kissed him back, feeling the flutter inside her answering his hands drawing up her back. She moved her knee to settle closer, letting both arms go around his waist, his warm lips hard on hers, drawing out a different compliance.
Her arms tightened instinctively, her breath quickening as he pulled her nearly onto his lap. It was only the third knock at the hall door that broke their collective concentration.
Aizen let her ease back a bit, watching her eyes, a smoky amethyst overcoming the hazel in them as she remained close, her heart pounding against his chest.
Someone cleared their throat from the other side of the door. Another knock sounded.
He let her sit back, studying her face as Orihime felt the blush slip over her cheeks and to her throat. He smiled and bent, kissing her neck softly, a slow warm trail of light touches that ended at her lips. She wasn't sure when her eyes had closed, but when she opened them, he was close again.
"I hate to leave you at this moment," he said, letting one hand move to the back of her neck, fingers moving into her hair. "But I have a few issues at the laboratory."
"Now?" she asked. She flinched emotionally.
He grinned, reading the expectancy in her face. "This is not something I can let wait."
Her arms lowered behind his back, still around him. "You can't?"
For a moment something different crossed his face; little came between Aizen and matters in the laboratory, and it was a very long time since anything had tempted that schedule.
"Okay," she said, leaning back some, realizing she was still very close, and waiting. She took a deep breath in the confines of his arms. She couldn't wade through the odd and contrasting emotions vying with everything she knew about Sousuke Aizen. She also knew she didn't want him to leave.
She sat back as he let her move. For a moment he looked to each of her eyes, reading what he thought was behind them.
Then he stood up and bent to lift her face to him. He kissed her on the lips, quickly, and then nodded to the paper.
She looked to it, staring blankly at the blank parchment.
"I hate to leave at this moment, Orihime," he said.
She watched him move to the other side of the rice-paper divider. He reappeared a moment later in his usual white and gray clothes.
"You're free to stay here, but I won't be back for a long while." He gestured to the divider. "You can sleep, if you get tired."
"Oh! Oh, I... I'm..." Orihime looked to the divider as her words stalled, as did most of her thoughts. She looked back to him. "Thank you. Sousuke."
He smiled, and then went out the door where the knocking had come, into the hall. Orihime didn't see who had summoned him.
She turned back to the low table, her heart still racing. She didn't believe in memories within dreams, or lost memories from other lives, she told herself.
But she could not deny that her body seemed to have memories, and a will, that she did not recall.
Author's Note:The next chapter will be rated M.
