Rukia walked down the sidewalk, her usual gait a little slower, her violet eyes sadder than normal. She sighed in the hot noonday sun, pulling her mild yellow cotton blouse away from her chest, wishing for a little relief from the hot day.
Michael wouldn't like it. Her job at the laundromat wasn't much, brought in little income, but it was better than nothing.
And she knew they needed every bit of income if they were going to have a baby. She groaned inwardly at the painful thought of her last stillborn child. She was ready to try again. Michael was, too.
Her coral lips set at the thought of the fallout from her last ordeal. Michael hadn't handled it well. Oh, he'd been there for her -- consoled her, encouraged her.
And then went to that barmaid's bed to ease his own hurt.
Her small hands balled into fists at the memory. They hadn't been able to afford counseling, but he had agreed to go to the free sessions at the local church for a few weeks with her.
It was over, she thought. The affair was a one-time thing, he'd promised her. Things had gotten better between them. Life was normal. That's what she told herself.
A baby would make everything normal.
"Marrying childhood sweethearts is like that," one of the other women at the sessions had told her. "Marry young, and you're hurting earlier in life."
Rukia didn't consider nineteen that young to marry. She hadn't listened to her. Hadn't believed the woman. Michael was different.
She looked up as she neared their small home on the street of other modest houses. A smile spread across her face as she brushed a stray dark hair from her eyes.
"Grandpa York!" she cried, seeing the tall form sitting on the steps to their house. "I didn't know you were coming by. You didn't walk to the bus stop from the farm, I hope.'
She quickened her pace to greet him as he stood.
He smiled as she met him. "Farm's not that far from town anymore," he said, his arms folding around her. "Sidewalk right up to the porch, Rukia. Had an appointment in Chicago and thought I'd come down and see you." He kissed the top of her dark head.
She smiled, surprised by the tight hold of his arms, at the strength still left in him. She hooked an arm in his. "An extra hour trip just to see me? Come on in."
*****
She ushered him into the front door, through the small but well-kept room to the kitchen at the back of the first floor. She pulled out a chair at the table and went to the refrigerator, clicking on the fan above it.
"Doctor's appointment?" she asked, biting her lip as she opened the refrigerator and found the iced tea pitcher.
"Yes." He grunted as he leaned the cane to one side of the table. "The old ticker wants more attention now. Nothing serious, dear." His voice took on a noticeable sharpness. "How are you and Michael doing?"
"Fine."
"You are?"
"Oh, sure." She poured two glasses full of tea and set the pitcher back in the refrigerator. She placed one glass before him, and smoothed her skirt, sitting down with him and her own glass. She gave him a knowing look. "Oh, that's all past." She took a long drink of tea, not meeting his eyes. "That's all long past," she said in a meeker tone.
He nodded, watching her as he drank the tea.
"We're still trying, of course. Oh, I forgot the ice."
She hopped up and went to the freezer for the ice tray. She slipped a few cubes in each of their glasses.
"I meant, everything else, dear," he clarified.
She put the ice tray back in the freezer, tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ear as she resumed her seat. "We were both under a lot of strain --"
"That's no excuse," he said quickly, fingers tightening around his glass. "If I were twenty years younger --"
"That's all long past." She patted his hand, her smile in place. "I wish you'd have called. It's too hot to be out walking."
"Ah, it's the humidity I can do without. I wanted to talk to you when Michael's not around. If you ever need help, any kind, I want to know, Rukia." His hand caught hers, his hard fingers closing around her small, soft ones.
"Oh, Grandpa, we're fine."
He nodded, looking around the room. It was pale yellow, with orange and green curtains and towels, unassuming in a number of ways. "You'd let me know, if you needed anything? You wouldn't have to tell Michael, dear."
Rukia smiled, thoughts of losing her job to downsizing making her feel guilty and relieved at his visit, somehow both at once. "Grandpa ...yes, of course, I'd tell you."
He smiled, nodding.
*****
Aizen threw the burly man against the none too clean brick walk of the alley, pushing the man's head in burning contact with the surface. He kept the nine millimeter angled at the man's head while he frisked him. "Fourteen stones, unwashed, that makes it a felony, buddy!"
Behind him his partner of eight years, Paulson, was sorting through the plastic bag of uncut gemstones, pocketing two rubies while Aizen wasn't looking. "Hey, it's only twelve, Aizen. Can't you count, man?"
Aizen handcuffed the large man in front of him, subduing him with a shove when he tried to spit on him. "You sure, Paulson?"
He nodded, his stout form shaking in a few loose spots. "It's still a felony. Anything over ten unwashed is a felony."
Aizen pushed the cuffed man before Paulson, and took a moment to straighten his dark blue duster and flip the lapel back over his Division Five badge, sighing in the New York afternoon. "You'd think in this heat the department would find something a little lighter weight to wear."
Paulson shook his head, closing one hand around the smuggler's handcuffs. "Show pony, Sousuke. Take it up with management. Maybe they'll find you something more fashionable."
Aizen chuckled, watching Paulson push the man ahead of them as they headed out of the alley. "Like hell. You know Ichimaru wouldn't spring for anything other than Homeland blue."
"Get yourself a desk job, and then you can sit around in your briefs."
They headed out of the alley to the waiting black SUV at the corner of the street.
Paulson shook his head. "Unless you're not a briefs man."
"Go to hell, Pauly."
*****
Rukia leaned back in the white wicker rocking chair of the small upstairs bedroom early that evening, looking around at the clutter. It was a happy clutter, sometimes sad, but hopeful.
The baby crib, high chair, boxes of clothing, dresser with the lamp shaped like a hot air balloon -- it was all waiting. Still waiting.
She looked at the blue sweater on her lap, so small and soft. She smoothed the wrinkles with her fingers, memories of the small boy who'd never breathed playing through her mind. Leaning to the dresser, she pulled the baby book to her and opened it. The first page was empty. Her fingers traced the spot that was supposed to hold his first photo. She sighed. He'd have been two by now.
She looked up as Michael entered the room.
She smiled. He had a strong build from his years of work at the construction site, his ordinarily medium brown hair lightened by the long days in the sun, his eyes steel blue. Handsome, she thought, by any standards.
He smiled a bit, sighing. "Thought you might be in here." He kissed her cheek, pushing the sweater away. "You've got to stop doing this to yourself, Rukia."
She nodded. "Someday."
"We'll have another."
She glanced to the photo on the dresser of her parents and her, taken when she was eight. "They'd have loved being grandparents, Michael."
"I know." He followed her gaze, then picked up the photo, his eyes going over it for a long moment. They rested on the emerald pendant she was wearing in it.
She stood up and stepped near to him, slipping a small arm around his waist. He pulled her closer.
"Grandpa York stopped by today."
He looked to her. "How's he doing?"
She nodded, looking up at him. "Good. I'd like to see him more."
He set the photo on the dresser. "We will."
Rukia hesitated with her next words, reading the weary in his face. "They let me go at the dry cleaners today. A few others, too," she added hurriedly. "Business is slow."
He nodded, his hand sliding up her back, fingers pressing gently. "Don't worry about it. There are better jobs. Did you tell your Grandpa about it?"
"No." A cooking timer rang from downstairs. She lifted an eyebrow, relived he'd taken the news so well. "Hungry?"
"I'm starved."
*****
Dinner was half over before Michael realized Rukia had eaten little. She sat at the table with him, the kitchen well past warm, the classified section of the newspaper to one side of her plate. Her only flicker of joy had come when she spoke of her grandfather's visit. And that, he thought, looking to the photo she'd brought down from the unoccupied nursery. It was propped against the wall on the table. He nodded to it.
"Cute girl, Rukia."
She smiled, blushing a little. "I'd like to hang it up somewhere."
"Sure thing. How old were you there?"
"Eight." She pushed the newspaper aside, picking with her fork at the pork chop she'd only half eaten. "There's nothing in the paper. I'll get the metro tomorrow."
He wished she'd forget the job hunt for a few minutes. "That locket you're wearing," he said, nodding to the photo, "do you still have it?"
She shook her head, a sadness coming to her eyes. "About a month before graduation Dad said the setting was loose, and took it in to be checked. The jewelry store went out of business, and he never got it back."
"Too bad. Be a nice memory."
"Yes." She took the photo and pulled a second photo from under the first. It was of her parents' wedding, a modest ceremony, her mother in white, her father looking sharp in his black suit. "Mr. and Mrs. Robert Kuchiki. They got married after Dad got the Wisconsin-Ohio route hauling paperworks out of Cincinnati."
He nodded, sighing. "Wish they were here for you now, Rukia. You've still got Grandpa York."
She smiled.
*****
The farmhouse was dark, the only light coming from the kitchen as York sat at the table, the half finished glass of bourbon before him, the phone with its knotted cord beside it. He unfolded the small piece of worn paper, a piece he'd kept for twenty years. The folds were creased nearly to the point of tearing, and he'd always meant to copy it onto a new one, but never had.
The phone number was still readable. He wondered if it still worked.
People changed phone numbers in twenty years, he told himself. Many times. Even without government intervention.
He pulled the phone closer across the table.
*****
Ichigo sat hunkered over the small table in the hotel room, a jeweler's loupe stuck in one eye. Not a very nice hotel room, in fact, but all he could get in late day with the Mets in town for the next two games. He positioned the stone in the rubber-lined jaws of the table vice he had fixed to the table. Beside it lay an assortment of bits, a chisel, a jeweler's hammer, and a dial caliper. They were the bare necessities, but he still didn't like using them to recut, and rarely did.
He hated using the temporary setup in absence of a proper faceting machine, but Gralini hadn't been interested in perfect cuts or jewelry-quality shapes; he'd just wanted clean stones. He was working on the pink tourmaline, the second of Gralini's he'd promised to recut. It would result in not only shedding the electrostatic chemical wash applied by the jeweler, but a stone that would be clean, and while smaller, worth many times over its value as a traceable stone. In the ash tray a cigarette burned away, neglected.
His cell phone rang, but it didn't hamper his work, not after ten years in cutting stones. He reached for the phone, clicked it on.
"Yes?" His eyes went over the gemstones he had yet to resize.
"Is this Kurosaki?" an elderly man's deep voice asked.
Ichigo senses sharpened. He hadn't heard his last name spoken aloud in quite some time. "Who?"
"This is Milton York," the man said.
Ichigo put the loupe down, full attention going to the caller. The name was familiar. "This is Ichigo. Haven't heard from you in a long time. Ten years or more." And even then it had been by way of his father.
York chuckled. "Didn't think this number would get me through. Isshin gave it to me when the Federal boys got rough."
Ichigo sat back in his chair, stretching his long legs out beneath the table. "It's been altered. You're safe."
"I know the heat was on you after Isshin passed on. I never thanked him for not caving in to Federal pressure."
Ichigo shrugged and picked up the cigarette. "Client records are confidential. That was our policy, Mr. York." He took a drag on the cigarette.
"Confidentiality. Not much of that left. Didn't know if you were even still around. A lot of the old jewelling families are imprisoned."
Ichigo nodded. "Most, yes." He felt around in his shirt pocket for the pack of cigarettes, finding none. He looked to his leather jacket on the bed.
"You still handle the stones as your father did?" York asked.
"Exactly." Ichigo frowned at the jacket, then lent his full attention on the caller.
"Glad to hear it. I have a matter I'd like to settle. I want no problems for my granddaughter."
"We can arrange anything you like, Mr. York."
"Good. I have a few ducks to line up. Should my attorney need to locate you upon my death, you can still be reached at the post office box number your father used?"
Ichigo nodded. "Yes, but the name is Fields now."
"I see. I'll let you know more later. I'm sorry for your loss, son."
Ichigo looked to the pile of stones on the table. "Thanks."
The line clicked silent, and he pushed a button on the phone. He stared at it thoughtfully for a moment, and then set it on the table and mashed out the cigarette. He went to the bed, moved aside the jacket and opened the laptop beneath it. He reached into his front jean pocket and dropped three flash drives on the bed, settling beside them, sorting through them. He stuck one in the laptop's USB port and turned it on.
Milton York's purchase history popped up on the screen, displaying activity over the last thirty years.
Ichigo whistled lowly, his brown eyes going over the list. "Milton York, Musgrove, Wisconsin," he read from the screen. "Quite the collector, once upon a time..."