Bet no one thought this was ever coming...sorry guys. I'll babble later, for now, try and enjoy this one.

Disclaimer: I don't own Bleach...but I wish I did.

In the weeks preceding my betrayal of Soul Society, I took to making stops at places that held some sort of meaning for me. The list was small, barely even a list at all: the Academy room where I passed my fukutaicho examination, the empty field where I'd achieved my bankai for the first time, the dirt road I first met you…

Our little shack was last on my list.

I'd unconsciously saved it for last. I knew it was going to be the hardest.

I hadn't been back there, to our sad hovel where I spent some of the best days of my long life, for years. I hadn't been back since we packed up and left it for Seireitei, the day after your hellcat had nearly eaten me.

I didn't use shunpo to get there, but rather I walked every step of the way. From the front door of my captain's quarters, through Seireitei and the upper districts of Rukongai till I reached the small desert we had called home. I still knew the paths, the little shortcuts through the dry woods and tall grasses. Some of them were worn down, others barely used. I began to get a sense of how much time had passed as I wandered down a path overgrown with brush…too much.

I reached our small home when the moon was at its peak in the sky. Evidence of abandonment was everywhere. The cloth door hung in tatters, holes littered the thatch roof, and one of the walls had nearly caved in. I don't know why, but I was glad that no one had touched our home since we left it.

I waded slowly towards the door, parting the cloth gingerly with long fingers, careful not to destroy what was left of our front door. Moonlight poured through the windows, illuminating the inside of our hut. Pots and pans still rested on the makeshift shelf you had made for us.

Dust had settled everywhere. On our pallets, the water basin, the walls…the only real sign that time had passed here. Standing in the center of the shack, I opened my eyes fully. I felt at ease there, as I always had, and did not feel the need to squint, to keep my eyes sharp. I took a deep breath, exhaling slowly as I took in the smells that still seemed to linger there. They were faint, fading…just like you and I had once we'd left this place.

My feet carried me from the center of the room towards an open hole in the wall, too one of our two windows. The curtain had long fallen down, and it lay in a heap on the floor. Slowly, I reach down, grasping the faded fabric between my fingers. It feels like it's ready to disintegrate and blow away in the breeze that is now flowing through the windows and doorway.

The feeling of it, the silken feeling of the old fabric between my fingers, reminded me of your hair, Rangiku. Soft, silky to the touch.

And I found myself, for the first time in quite some time, longing for nothing more than the feel of you quite desperately.

Your skin against mine, the soft curves of your body pressed against the hard lines of my own, the weight of your head in my hands, my fingers snaked through your hair…

My breath seemed to catch in my throat, and my eyes slowly slid closed. I could almost feel you, in the room there with me. My mind tried to recall images of our life here, but the best I could do was bits and pieces thrown haphazardly together in no specific order. Us by the river, looking no more than twelve years of age; us before we left for the academy, the way you slipped your hand into mine as we turned our backs on the only life we ever knew; nights spent hot and breathless on my sleeping pallet; days when I'd come home after leaving you for too long…they all seemed to swarm around me in my hand.

I felt like I was drowning. Drowning in the memories of you, memories that still seemed to haunt me. There is a saying in the human world that love makes time pass, and time makes love pass.

I have to say, I don't believe a word of it.

So much time has passed between the last day I held you, kissed you…and still, the feelings seem to reside somewhere deep within me, buried beneath the malice and treachery I've surrounded myself with. But despite it all, all the years, weeks, days, hours, minutes, seconds… I still love you.

Yet I'd never told you so.

I opened my eyes, my hand now clenched in a fist, crushing the old and rotting curtain till it threatened to disappear from the force of my reiatsu.

If there is one thing I regret in my twisted life, it is not the people I've wronged, innocents I've killed, souls I've tricked… it is never telling you that you were—that you still are— the most important part of my life.

I let the fabric slide from my fingers, back to it's spot on the ground, and turned back to the shack.

I wonder if you knew, Rangiku, how I felt. If you ever figured out the true extent of my feelings for you… and how much they scared me.

I was not used to someone having the power over me that you did, and that you still do. No has ever been able to cause an ache I my chest with a look, to make me feel as if I am melting with mere words, stop my sword from delivering the killing blow…no one, but you.

I was never able to form the words; they felt awkward and heavy on my tongue. I felt as if I had no right to love something so wonderful, someone so pure and beautiful as you…

You were always good at reading me, my thoughts and my facial expression, minute actions and muscle twitches. I can only hope that you could hear the unspoken words that I could not say to you.

I could feel the memories pouring back, both pleasant and gut wrenching, and I gritted my teeth, reaching out for something—anything—to pull me out of the self-induced misery.

That's when I felt it.

A small tingle that reached my nose first, then seemingly the very core of my reiatsu.

It was you.

My eyes snapped open and I looked frantically towards the door, wondering if you'd had the same idea I did, the same need to come visit the place where we'd grown up careless and, dare I say it, happy. I didn't know what you would do if you found me here, had absolutely no idea what I would say to you if you strode through the doorway.

But as the breeze blew through the door, no part of you came with it.

But I could still feel your reiatsu, somewhere nearby. My eyes traveled around the room, up and down the walls, until finally, they rested on my old sleeping pallet, and a faint silvery-amber glow rested on it.

You had been here, been on my pallet, sometime recently, for the trace of you had not vanished completely. Slowly, I walked over, towering above the pathetic heap of fabric we used to sleep on. The dust there had been disturbed, and if I looked hard enough, I thought I could see what would have been the outline of your long body. Hesitantly, I knelt and then reached out, brushing my fingers on the fabric that you had lain on.

What was left of your reiatsu touched me with such ferocity that I nearly jerked my hand back. I'm not sure what caused it, whether it was my abstinence from you for so long, or possibly the fact that you now had so much hatred for me, but the contact hurt, burned my fingers.

I stared slowly down at the outline of your body, and silently, eased myself down onto the fabric, careful not to disturb the place where your body had been. I could feel you all around me then, burning and thrilling all at once. I knew what I was doing was beyond pathetic, but it was all I had. It was as close to you as I was ever going to be again, and I was not strong enough to let it go.

Carefully, I lay my head down on the pillow, as I could see you had done, and inhaled deeply, the soft scent of you bombarding me more strongly than your reiatsu had.

And for one last night, I was able to lose myself in you.

Sorry that this took so long...summer has a way of making me not want to do anything remotely productive. But this has been niggling at me for a while, and I sat down today and cranked it out. I have to say, I liked it, despite how unlikely it is now...the 'Turn Back The Pendulum' chapters sort of destroyed my nice Gin, but...oh well.

As always, please review!

-Luin