A bright winter's morning. A man and a woman walking hand in hand beneath the plum blossoms, harbingers of the spring.
Byakuya held her hand tightly. It had been a long winter and Hisana welcomed the return of warmer weather. Ever since the fire, which seemed to her a lifetime ago, she would wake, on cold mornings, with a tightness in her chest and a cough that had grown worse over these past few months. It usually wore off as the day progressed and, on milder mornings, like this one, she could almost forget the scars of her old life. All but one.
Byakuya had stopped at the entrance to a shrine partially hidden amongst the trees. She had almost walked on but hesitated at his tug on her hand:
"This belongs to my family. My mother was buried here."
She stood obediently, repectfully. Even in these things she was deceiving him. She didn't want to be here. "Hisana, can I ask you something?" he said suddenly.
"Of course."
"Are you happy?"
"Of course I am happy!"
"And yet, sometimes" – he searched for words – "Sometimes it's as if you're far away, Hisana."
"I'm sorry. I think, sometimes, I'm so happy that I'm ashamed."
"Of what?"
"Byakuya, I'm not unique; I'm not special. But you brought me here. I can't help but think there were others like me in Rukongai, and they will never come here and they will never know this."
"No," he said with certainty: "There are no others like you."
"But there are, Byakuya-sama. There are others more deserving." He put his arm around her waist and pulled her to his side:
"Are you asking me to rescue every stray cat? I told you before: I am selfish. I chose you." He stood a while longer, staring at the shrine, then said: "There was a law against our marriage. My grandfather appealed to the Central Forty-six and they agreed to make an exception in our case."
She stared:
"I didn't know he did that for us."
"Without him, they might have prevented us; even punished us."
"But he didn't want me to be any part of this family. What made him change his mind?"
Byakuya glanced down at her. She thought she saw traces of a smile on his lips, but she couldn't be sure:
"I told him that unless I married you then I would never marry anyone. He's very keen on my marrying you see." They began walking again: "Some traditions die harder than others. One is that the bloodline continues and that, for him at least, is more important than the woman I choose as my wife."
"The bloodline? You're" – Hisana's steps faltered – "Are you talking about children?"
"He's been afraid, ever since my father died, that the family line would end with me." Now he was smiling, right up until the moment when he caught a glimpse of her expression. She dropped her head, letting hair fall across her face. "Hisana?"
"You surprised me; that's all," she said breathily.
"I just thought" – he broke off as she extricated herself from his arms and began to walk away from him: sharp, jagged steps. "Hisana!"
There were certain levels of deception she could not stomach and one of them was to play at being a family. She could imagine it: the two of them together in a summertime garden. A paradise idyll. A baby in her arms. The empty house growing full again with promises for the future. But the child was the little girl from eighty years ago, and the fine linen blankets Hisana was holding were rags. She could still feel the baby squirming and crying in her arms. Her cheeks were suddenly wet. "Hisana!" he cried: "Whatever I've said" -
"No, you've said nothing unkind." She turned back. She could steel her features, but she couldn't hide the tears, though she tried to pretend they meant nothing: "Let's go home now."
"Why are you crying?"
"You made me happy." He stared hard at her:
"No, I didn't."
"It's fine. Really."
"Why are you lying to me?"
The smile fell away from her features and she stood there, feeling strangely naked. His eyes bore into her; a thousand and one questions. His frown was cold, but, as tears began to gather and sting her cheeks again, he reached forward suddenly and drew her into a tight embrace.
That was so much worse. If he could simply have been angry, she might have forgiven him, but to offer her comfort and acceptance when, with her every breath, she lied; that was more than she could stand.
She broke down.
How long they stood there, she didn't know, and she hoped that nobody passed them because it would not do to be seen so. She had hooked her fingers into the collar of his kimono and was holding on so tight that her knuckles were white. Her head hung against his chest:
"I can't marry you, Byakuya-sama."
She said it so softly that he had to ask her to repeat herself, and, when she did, she felt him stiffen. Loosing her fingers from his robe was one of the hardest things she'd ever had to do. She looked up into his face and, just once, was glad that she couldn't see what he was thinking: "I'm so sorry. I can't."
A sudden gust of wind raked through the plum blossoms causing them to cascade like snow. As they fell between the man and the woman who had walked hand in hand to this spot, the couple broke apart and she ran from him. Her footfalls were soft, her passage light, leaving no prints on the ancient path.