Author's Note:
This thing is over five years old and now I am finally into the seventies. I think it took me about two years just to get through the sixties. XD; Well, now that that bump in the road's done with…
Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last drabble: TigressfromFiore, drageneyez, Guest, lucid somnia sub sidera, RenjiRulez5986, Guest, Guest. (So many Guests, ha ha, though I love you anonymous reviewers as much as I love those signed in.)
aAlso, if you've a drabble or idea you'd like to see, just shoot it my way!
Kaleidoscope
a Bleach (© Kubo Tite) fanfiction
Theme #70
companion
Opening Song: "Cold Shoulder" - Adele
Rangiku shouldn't feel alone. She has friends. She has people who will go drinking with her when she wants to get away from work. She has people who will listen to her complain and who will seek her advice. She has people who worry about her and make sure she's alright. She even has people who are willing to try her food, which requires more courage than should be expected of a normal friend. Rangiku doesn't have family, hasn't ever really, but she has people who care about her and that's just as good.
But when she's sitting along in her office at night, without the nagging taichou and without the doting Shuuhei and without the confused Kira, alone is the only word that can describe the emptiness in the pit of her stomach.
Everything is too hectic and everyone is too frantic right now, so that it's difficult to find solace among others these days. Sometimes, when she's in a room full of people, Rangiku just feels suffocated and stranded. She tries to block out what they're saying, even if inwardly she knows they're all true. It's easier, then, to just avoid the rooms and the people and the crowds. It's easier to sit by herself and literally be alone, rather than stand in a crowd and figuratively be alone. It's easier when it's self-inflicted.
When she hears the door creak, she quickly sits up in her seat, paints a smile onto her face because that's what Rangiku does - smile. But it's not her taichou or Shuuhei or Kira; it's the companion she wants the least but needs the most.
She doesn't spit, "Get out," like she should, like her mind is telling her to. She doesn't glare at him, like instinct has been instructing her to do lately. She just watches, emotionlessly, as he sits down on the couch in her office, lounging on it like a friend would. He's grinning, as usual, but for once she doesn't have the violent urge to lean close and slap it off his face. His being here makes her feel something, and she's clinging to it.
"It feels like yer office's gotten a lot bigger since las' time I was here," he says casually. "How much did Hitsugaya yell when ya finally got this couch in here?"
Rangiku doesn't answer.
He continues on anyway. "Geez, it's cold in here. Leave it to him to keep his room temperature so low, eh?" Gin chuckles. "I'd think yer bein' here would warm up the place, though…"
It continues like this, with him talking and her not really listening but listening a the same time. Her brow is still furrowed and her arms are still crossed across her chest, but she lets him talk because she can just feel something stirring within her. Maybe it's the usual pent up anger and frustration, maybe it's the desire to just cry because Lord knows she's been wanting to do that, or maybe… it's just something else.
"Gin," she says finally, cutting him off in the middle of a sentence about how stingy Byakuya is, "why are you here?"
The question doesn't stir him the way she hoped it would. He merely cocks his head to the side, smiles rather than grins. "I thought ya needed some company. That's all."
"Why?" she asks before she can stop herself.
There's an actual pause before his next answer. "Because. Because we…" Because we're friends. Because I know you the best. Because I'll always know you the best. Because we're good for each other. Because, regardless of it all, it'll always be you and me. "… understand each other."
It's not anger or disappointment or joy that she feels. It's not empty but it's not fulfilling, and while it answers no questions she no longer feels confused. It's not what he says, but the way he says it, that draws her out of the shell she's enclosed around herself. She's suddenly talking with him into the night, about how her taichou eats all the watermelon and how Shuuhei always stutters around her and how Kira so likes Hinamori, and he's laughing and making comments and she thinks that everything may be alright.
When she wakes up the next morning, sprawled across the couch in her office, she isn't cold. She pulls the warm blanket closer around her body and closes her eyes; she can still see her companion sitting beside her.
Closing Song: "Dead in the Water" - Hawthorne Heights
I tend to write my best at 1:20 in the morning apparently, ha ha.
Again, I appreciate all your support, and my love goes out to you eternally! :D
wo ai ni,
der kapitan