The drive home was short, but felt longer than Renji knew it really was with his new injuries. By the time they did reach the modest farmhouse, his ribs were burning and tight, and the blood from his shoulder had seeped into the black t-shirt.

Orihime fussed about it, but Renji waved off her concern.

"It's okay," he insisted as he checked her bedroom upstairs when they got home. He glanced around. Nothing was out of place, no unusual smells. He thought back on Reese. There was something about the handy man that still didn't sit right with him. He looked to Orihime standing with her hands clasped before her at the nightstand. "Really," he said. He put a hand testily to his side, sending another screaming pain through him. He gritted his teeth. "No problem."

She sighed. "Okay. But I would like to try." Her voice dropped as she said it, but she tried to smile. "It would be good. If it's a minor injury, then it wouldn't set back any protocol to heal it. Right?"

He frowned despite her smile. "I guess not, but I think I'll be all right."

"Okay."

"But I'll let you know," he added as he passed her as he went to the hall. He paused, for a moment wondering how he was going to let her enroll in school where there may be dozens of Dans roaming the halls. Inside his shirt he felt a small trail of blood run down his chest. He headed out the doorway. "I'll change and we'll have dinner and pie."

"Yes! I'll change clothes and be right down."

He heard the door shut behind him to her room, Orihime already humming some American tune she'd heard on the radio. He stepped into the bathroom and closed the door. Under most circumstances he would have walked off her suggestion at healing for such a minor injury, which he was certain it was, but an excuse to have Orihime nearer than necessary was sounding good to him.

He pulled off his shirt and looked in the mirror over the sink. Hell, he thought, maybe she was right.

Staring back at him was a small slit in the skin at his shoulder that had stretched wider from use. The cut stung, but it was the spreading bruise and welt at his lower ribs that was angrier. He mumbled as he put a few fingers to the warm injury, feeling the knot forming beneath the skin.

He found a rose-colored washcloth from the linen shelf near the tub and ran it under cold water at the sink. He washed off his shoulder, which had nearly stopped bleeding, and then wiped at the tender area of his ribs.

He held the cloth there and let the cool water take some of the heat down. He heard a soft tap at the door, and glanced to it in the mirror.

"Come in," he called.

Orihime hesitated, and then opened the door a few inches. "Are you okay, Renji?"

"Yup." He grinned as she remained hidden behind the door. "Come on in, Orihime. I'm not naked."

She came in, blushing at his choice of words, and then her eyes went to the cut at his shoulder as she met him at the sink. "Oh, at least it stopped bleeding. Bandages." She opened the mirror's shelf over the sink, nearly swiping his chin with the door as she did. She pulled out a box and held it up. "Do you think these will be enough?"

"Yeah, they're –"

"Oh, not that, too," she said as her eyes went to his side. She looked to him mournfully. "Oh, Renji. That's bad."

"Nah, it's not too bad," he said, but when her fingers felt carefully around the widening blue area beneath the skin of his lower tattoos, he didn't stop her. She bit her lip, her fingertips feeling the contrast of cooler skin where he'd held the washcloth to the warmer damaged area at his swollen ribs.

She looked to him, this time her large eyes holding a different pout. "Let me try to heal you. Please, Renji?"

For a moment he wanted to say yes. After all, it was a small injury compared to what she'd healed in the past, and what he'd had in past battles. And the appeal of those large violet-gray eyes and the persuasive pout at her lips – but he shook his head. "I'm fine. Go down and grab a few plates and we'll eat."

This time her palm rested at his side. "Are you sure?" She looked to his side beneath her hand, and despite the pink wanting to overtake her cheeks, didn't move her fingers away. "It won't take much, Renji."

He shook his head. "I'm fine. I'll be right down."

"...Okay." She looked to his shoulder, and then took a few of the larger self-adhesive bandages from the box. "But let me do this."

He nodded, and turned to lean against the sink cabinet. "All right, you can do that."

She smiled, stripping off the paper to the first bandage. She peeled the tab back from the one adhesive side and looked to his shoulder. "Thanks for buying the pie."

He watched her fingers gently pull the sides of his slit skin together and hold the edges close as she taped it shut with the bandage. "You really had those guys bidding. I didn't think anyone here would know what sweet bean paste was."

She giggled and readied another bandage, and then some of the smile left her eyes. "Did you want that other pie?" The doubt seeped into her voice as she studied his eyes. "Did you want the walnut praline honey pie Ellie made?"

"Hell, no," he said as she secured the second bandage across the cut. "I was waving at you, not bidding. I didn't mean to bid on that other entry, Orihime."

She smiled more. "Okay." She took the washcloth from the sink and squeezed the water out. "Charlotte was talking to you."

He nodded. "She was passing out cookies or something."

"Oh." She dabbed at the faint red stains at his shoulder.

"To everyone."

"Oh. Okay."

He watched her lower lip as she bit it, wishing she'd say out loud what thoughts were making her so concerned.

She set the cloth in the sink, and for a movement looked at his back in the mirror, her eyes tracing the black marks across his back. She looked up at him slowly.

"You can ask me anything," he said, watching the doubt flit through her face. He took her hand, feeling her damp fingers soft in his. "Anything on your mind."

She nodded, gathering her scattered courage. "Renji, if we weren't here," she said slowly, thinking through the words she didn't want to use, "if you ... well, if you didn't have to be here, under orders," she added, not really wanting to hear one possible answer, "would you...?"

"I want to be here," he said without prompting, forgetting his injured side for the moment at the timid look in her face. "If Soul Society had sent anyone else – any guy – I wouldn't like it." Despite what he'd told Captain Unohana, he had to remind himself. "Yeah, at first I thought a woman would be better for this, for you, for this assignment." He wanted to pull her closer, but she was already flushed pink and there was something about being half-naked with her in the bathroom that he was sure already smacked in the face of accepted Society policies.

So he didn't.

He also wished he'd brought a clean shirt.

Her fingers gripped his tighter, oblivious to his thoughts. "Will you come see me?" Slight apprehension welled in her eyes, and she added hastily, "I mean, when this is all over, and I go back home, and you go back to Soul Society." She took a deep breath, eyes locked on his. "Will you visit me, Renji? Even when you don't have to?"

This time the sore ribs and lack of shirt didn't get in his way. He gathered her closer, pulling her into a tight embrace that she willingly allowed, her arms encircling him without pause.

"What the hell kind of question is that, Orihime?" he asked, feeling her smile against his chest. He kissed her hair, the fragrance soft and beckoning. She looked up, letting her chin rest at his collarbone, her hands pressed into his back.

"Yes?" she asked.

"Yes." He kissed her eye as she closed it. "If you let me, I'll visit you in Karakura Town."

She smiled wider, both eyes open now, her arms around him tightening, until she realized how content she was, and that her elbow was digging into his injured side. "Oh, I'm sorry, Renji."

She eased back some, as much as he let her, which wasn't much.

He kissed her lips quickly. "Are you hungry?"

She nodded. "I'm starved."

He straightened from leaning on the sink vanity and let her go. She stood on tiptoe to kiss him briefly, this time letting her fingers rest at his jaw for a moment.

"I'll get supper ready."

Within moments Renji had found a clean shirt and Orihime was waiting in the warm kitchen with plates and the take-out on the table. Renji felt the heat from the day hit him as he descended the staircase and looked to Orihime standing at the table. Her ponytail was a bit wilted, and the kitchen fan was doing a failing job at cooling anything down.

He nodded to the back door. "Let's eat outside. It'll be cooler. We'll come back in for pie later."

"Ooh, that's a good idea." She hurriedly grabbed the pitcher of lemonade from the refrigerator and a few glasses as Renji gathered the chicken and other take-out containers. They moved to the back porch where the sun was shaded by the house.

The grass was mowed, the small garden patch nearly weedless, and the shade on the porch was perfectly cool. The smell of the cut grass was inviting, easing Renji's guilt at yard work, and the waning garden was now home to some of the local birds picking at plants that had gone to seed.

Orihime arranged the food containers between them as Renji sat on the wooden porch that was more deck-like than simple porch, and poured them both glasses of lemonade. Dusk was coming early to their side of the road as the house was overlooked by the nearest mountain to one side, but the mosquitoes weren't yet out. From town, sounds of the last band, George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers, were belting out their most popular hits, and the voices echoed through the Hollow.

Orihime smiled to herself as Renji heaped his plate with chicken and food from the side dishes. She knew he could just be being nice in saying he'd visit her in Karakura Town – she knew he was genuinely a thoughtful person, most of the time – but she wanted to believe it was true.

Please let it be true, she thought to herself, watching him over her glass as she took a long drink of lemonade. For a moment, a cough wanted to surface in her chest, but the lemonade won out and she resisted the outburst.

"You sure you want to go to school here?" he asked, returning her attention. "You don't have to, you know."

She nodded. They had moved the food containers back and were now sitting side by side, looking out over the backyard. "I have another set of vials to go through after this set, and I don't want to fall behind in schoolwork."

He nodded. "There may be more vials after that set," he said, watching her as she tried to somewhat delicately take a bite of the chicken drumstick. He grinned at the effort.

"How many in all?" She wiped her mouth, wishing eating chicken weren't so unladylike.

"Only Captain Unohana or Urahara knows that. Maybe Captain Kurotsuchi," he said as an afterthought.

She nodded slowly.

He was about to speak again, when his severely damaged Soul Society communicator made a weak sound from his back pocket. He stood up and pulled it out. "I thought this thing was dead," he muttered, glancing at the screen.

She watched as he squinted at the device.

"Isane," he said. He carefully pressed a button, stepping away from the porch.

Orihime set her chicken down and wiped her fingers with a napkin.

For a long moment Renji glared at the device, carefully pressing buttons in hopes that the communicator would make one last contact. Finally Isane's voice weakly broke through.

He grinned in triumph and said into it, "Hello?"

Orihime turned back to her lemonade as he stepped a few more feet away, handling the fragile device with mother-like care.

Renji could barely hear Isane and moving halfway across the yard didn't help reception any. He caught a handful of words, something about school and paperwork, and a few other words.

His attention on the fragments of conversation was snapped when a thud sounded from the house. He looked back there to see Orihime standing at the porch, looking curiously at the window that was over the sink, and then to the ground below it. He made a concerted effort at following Isane's mostly missing conversation, watching first Orihime's turquoise shorts as she knelt to where the house met the ground, and then to her ponytail falling over her shoulder. In the late day, her hair shown a burnt copper color, invitingly warm, and soft, he knew.

He watched as she picked up something from the ground and then stood, looking at what was in her hand. She smiled a little, and then concern reached her eyes, and then something akin to fear.

"Renji!" she cried, staring with alarm at her hand. "Renji!"

He stuck the phone in his back pocket and rushed to her side, ready to pluck whatever it was from her.

"Take it!" she urged, holding her hand to him. Tears filled her eyes, her voice nearly a sob.

He looked to her hand. In it was a small finch, with Orihime's fingers clasped around it.

He glanced to the window over the sink inside. "It must have tried to fly through and –"

"Take it, please," she said desperately, now holding it to him closer.

He frowned at her, and then moved to take it from her. "Okay. Let go, Orihime."

"I, I... I can't!" she sobbed. She pushed her hand holding the bird to him.

The bird's beak was open, gasping, a strangled sound coming from it. Orihime's fingers were clenched fiercely around it, forcing the breath out of it.

And, to Renji's horror, tightening more.

"Let it go," he said, closing his hand around hers cautiously.

She shook her head furiously. "I can't, Renji. I can't!"

He wedged his fingers between hers around the bird and slowly took her wrist in his other hand. "It's okay," he said lowly to her, watching her face contort with panic.

"I can't let go. My hand won't open." She sniffed as the bird's beak yawned wider, a painful high-pitched screech coming from it as Orihime's hand crushed the life from it. "Ahh, no! Make it, make it stop, Renji." She sobbed, horrified now that she knew she was helpless. "Make me stop it..."

Renji pulled her back to him and braced one arm along hers, slowly pulling at her fingers with his other hand. Her fingers were vice-like around the small bird, whitening with pressure, a cracking sound coming from the bird's ribcage as its skin separated and innards were pushed out. It made final convulsion as its body began collapsing from Orihime's clutch.

"No," she sobbed, shaking her hand in Renji's grasp and he tried to loosen her fingers without hurting her. She pushed her arm from her and turned to bury her face in his shirt.

Renji lowered her hand with the bird to their side, keeping Orihime's face against his chest. He didn't understand. "Just let go," he kept telling her, but when she said she couldn't, he just said, "It's okay. It's okay, Orihime."

"I didn't mean it," she said. Her voice was muffled against him. "I can't let go..."

He looked down at the bird in her hand, in his hand. He could make her let go of it, he knew, but he'd have to break her fingers to do it. Her grip was tight, tighter than he thought she was capable of, and even she couldn't release the dying bird.

He could feel the death throes in the small, feathered object, feeling it fight for life within Orihime's death-grip. He wrapped his other arm around her snugger, speaking into her hair as she sobbed.

"It's okay. Just a bird."

"But I —"

"It doesn't matter," he said.

She nodded against him.

He waited until the bird stopped moving, and was about to speak when Orihime's hand opened and the bird dropped out. She shook her head, and he turned her to the house before she could look at it.

"But I –"

"It doesn't matter," he said quickly as they got to the kitchen sink.

"Oh, the dinner..."

"Don't worry about it." Renji took her to the bathroom sink past the living room. Shadows were growing long in the house, the evening settling in as sounds of the concert from town drifted in.

"Don't think about it," he said as he rinsed her hand in the sink. He left the light off and everything in the small room was pale shades of gray from the low light. He inspected her hand. The palm was red from her tight clutch, a few fingernails jagged from where she'd tried to release the bird, peeling at the nails with her other hand.

She sobbed again as she looked at her hand. "Why couldn't I let go, Renji?"

"It doesn't matter," he said tightly. He had thoughts on it, but wasn't about to voice any of them. He looked to her lavender tank top. He could see no difference in her normal, full bosom. Even if he had, he could blame it on the dim light.

He dried her hand off with the towel on the chrome ring at the side of the mirror. "You're okay now. Don't think about it, Orihime... Do you feel okay?"

She looked to him shakily, her hand trembling in his. "I don't know."

He pushed the few stray stands of hair from her face, hating the fear in her face. "It's okay."

"I'm a monster." She nodded, tears forming anew. "I'm a monster, Renji. Worse than –"

"No. You're not." He kissed her forehead and then led her out of the bathroom. "How about we find something on TV?"

"But –"

"Don't worry about anything right now, Orihime."

They went into the darkening living room and he switched on the TV, not caring what program was on. He sat down at the couch and pulled Orihime with him. "Just don't think for a while. I'll take care of everything, all right?"

She folded into the cushion beside him, shaking her head.

He sat back and put one arm around her shoulders, biting back the sharp pain shooting through his opposite side at the movement. "We'll get it all sorted out in the morning. Don't worry."

She let herself sink to his side, her head leaned to his chest, pulling her knees closer as she looked to the TV. On it a dressage horse show was beginning.

"Hey, kinda nice, huh?" Renji said, looking for something to take her mind off the bizarre demonstration with the bird. "Good-looking horses."

She nodded, a sudden weariness overtaking her. "I don't know why I'm so tired. Oh, Renji, I forgot to bring in the dinner stuff."

"Don't worry about it."

"But the...animals. Raccoons and other little animals will get it."

He saw her eyelashes flutter as she tried to focus on the TV. Her voice was slowing, becoming fainter. "It's all right, Orihime," he said, rubbing her arm as her fingers tightened on the t-shirt at his chest. "I'll take care of it."

She sighed, her knees know resting on his leg, her head planted below his shoulder.

After a moment Renji saw her eyes close and her breathing came rhythmically.

He hoped she couldn't hear or feel his heartbeat. Not much truly scared him, at least, not much that wasn't armed, but seeing Orihime squeeze the life out of the helpless bird shocked him. It wasn't like her and he knew it wasn't.

Not that it was difficult to snuff out a bird's life. Even Momo could do it. Anyone could do it.

But, not many women Renji knew would do it, and of the names on that last, Orihime Inoue was the last one who would do it.

It wasn't like her, and that was what scared him most.

Actually, he thought, leaning back more into the couch in the dark room as he watched the horses on TV move through their precise paces, the fact that Orihime could not stop herself from killing the bird was most frightening.

He looked to her knees bent over his thigh, and then down at the curves her hip and shirt made as she leaned against him.

It was definitely something Soul Society would expect to be in his report.