10001 Nightmares Party

[Fic] shooting stars (Bleach)

Summary:

It never occurred to Ichigo that maybe he was spending a little too much time at the Urahara Shoten. That maybe he was a bit too invested in the lives of the people living there. That maybe he was getting too comfortable with Kisuke. But honestly, even if it had, it wouldn't have changed anything. (UraIchi Week 2020 Day 5 — Accidental Dating)

Notes:

May 29th, 2020 - Day 5: Relationship Ridiculousness

Soulmates AU | Idiots in Love | Courtship AU
Domesticity | A Moment of Peace | Touch
Fake Relationship AU | Accidental Dating

Work Text:

(The kiss was soft. Ichigo closed his eyes and felt the warmth on his lips. He breathed in through his nose and his hands gripped Kisuke's hair and hip. Slowly, the kiss turned even softer and chaster, until they were just standing still. Leaning back, Ichigo scowled at Kisuke, "You almost made me drop my cup."

"I caught it," Kisuke murmured back. Kisuke pressed his face into Ichigo's neck and breathed out. The gust of air made Ichigo shiver and he let out a quiet breath of laughter. 

"Next time, give me a warning," Ichigo mumbled back.

"Oh, so there'll be a next time?" Kisuke pressed his lips to Ichigo's neck and bit down gently. Ichigo smiled, and didn't answer.

There was no need to.)

The sound of soft music filled the air. Ichigo blinked when he stepped through the door to the Shoten, a furrow to his brow as he looked around curiously. There was nobody in the front half of the store, and Ichigo softly moved through, surprised to find that he recognized the music. A song his mother had loved, one that she had played on repeat so many times that he could still hum along. When he reached the door to the rest of the house, he toed off his shoes and switched to the indoor ones he had left behind a while ago. He couldn't remember when, but it didn't matter.

Slowly he moved toward the source of the music. He stepped lightly on the floorboards, his finger trailing along the walls as nostalgia gripped him. He could almost see his mother dancing, twirling around in front of him, a happy smile on her face.

Blinking, he twisted around the corner, stepping into the light of the kitchen.

"Ichigo-kun!" Kisuke smiled up at him and rose from his seat by the table. "What do you think?" he asked, pointing to the... thing on the table.

Ururu smiled cautiously at Ichigo from the other side, a spoon in her hands half-way up to her mouth. Ichigo smiled back at her and stepped forward, settling himself down next to Kisuke by the table. "It looks poisonous."

"Wha—? How could you, after I put in all that effort to make it from scratch, just to celebrate your birthday?!" Kisuke dramatically swiped away fake tears from his cheeks and sniffled exaggeratedly.

Ichigo shrugged and gripped the cake-knife. He carefully took a piece of the cake, figuring that it couldn't possibly be any worse than Inoue's creations. They hadn't killed him yet, so he doubted this would. Besides, Kisuke wouldn't serve it to the kids if it weren't safe.

He put his plate with his piece of cake down in front of him on the table and picked up a spoon. Sniffing it, he took a bite and ate it, heedless of the funny faces Ururu was making at him.

It wasn't as bad as he had feared.

He hummed, "Good." 

Then he ate another piece and ignored Kisuke wailing next to him about not letting him prepare enough. Ichigo let it go in one ear and out the other, grateful that he didn't have to spend his first birthday since losing his powers alone. It was bad enough on a normal day, his father exhaustingly focused on not mentioning anything having to do with shinigami and tiptoeing around him. Karin, running off to train at every chance and his friends all leaving him behind. 

With the spoon in his mouth, he watched as Kisuke rose to his feet and barreled out of the kitchen. He looked, confused, at Ururu and she simply stared guilelessly back at him. Rising an eyebrow, Ichigo pulled out the spoon and drank a deep gulp of tea, grimacing at the sticky taste it left in his mouth.

"Did he make this?" Ichigo asked Ururu.

She shyly nodded. 

Ichigo took another sip of tea, needing something to wash the dry cake down his throat with. "Where are the others? I didn't see them coming in," he remarked and looked around the kitchen again, as if they would magically appear.

"There's a Hollow," Ururu squeaked out and sank back in her seat, trying to make herself smaller.

Ichigo looked down at the table and carefully put the plate and spoon down. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, ignoring the voice at the back of his mind that insisted he was being left behind. Battling Hollows had nothing to do with him now, now that he had no powers to do so with. But he couldn't' shake the feeling if only someone tried, he could be useful. He had fought so many of them, so many powerful ones, surely that knowledge would be useful to somebody. 

But nobody had ever asked.

He opened his eyes again and did his best to smile kindly at Ururu, even though he thought it probably went badly, and said, "I hope they're safe." 

He could hear the sound of Kisuke's footsteps coming back toward the kitchen. Ichigo sat up straight and picked up the cake again, cutting a careful piece with his spoon and shoving it back into his mouth just as Kisuke rounded the corner into the kitchen. Kisuke stood still for a moment, his eyes drifting over the whole room, before he focused on Ichigo and skipped over, sitting down right next to him and holding out a gift-wrapped present.

"Here!" Kisuke waved it in front of Ichigo's face and Ichigo popped the spoon out of his mouth.

He grabbed the gift and murmured, "Thank you."

Then he put it down on the table and sipped his tea again. 

Ichigo ignored the way that Kisuke almost immediately started to pout and sulk, his body slumping down next to Ichigo and leaning over to get a piece of cake for himself. He ignored the way that Ururu stared at them, as if there was some great puzzle she was trying to solve. He ignored the warmth and the touch that he had found himself getting increasingly used to since the disaster that was that last fight against Aizen. 

Instead he finished eating his cake and not until after he had drunk the last of the tea did he finally pick up the present again. He turned it over in his hands, shaking it softly to see if he could hear any loose bits.

It was small, about the size of his palm, the square box hard in his grip. The bright neon pink wrapping paper and the golden bow sitting on the top of the box were both crooked and scratched, obviously not wrapped by a store employee. Ichigo turned it over again in his grip and pretended as if Kisuke wasn't staring at him in anticipation of his reaction. He gently took off the bow that had simply been glued to the paper and put it down on the table, careful not to damage it. Then he started unwrapping the box.

When he finally managed to untangle the four layers of paper the box was entangled in, Ichigo was left with a simple, classy black box about the hight of an inch. He pulled the lid off and stared down at the gift.

It was a necklace. A simple silver chain, with no additions of any kind. 

Carefully, Ichigo pulled it out and held it up in the air in front of him. It wasn't very long, he doubted that it would hang very far. It was thin, the chain hardly weighing anything at all. Ichigo moved it over in his hands until his fingers touched upon the clasp, and then he pulled it open. He knew how these things worked, his sisters had never gone to their father with issues like this.

Pulling the chain around his neck, he clasped it back together behind his head.

"Thank you," he said and smiled at Kisuke.

("Did you know?" Kisuke asked one evening. Ichigo looked over at him, the stars and the moon shining down on them where they sat on the porch, their legs dangling over the edge.

"Know what?" 

"That you would lose your powers."

Ichigo looked back up at the sky, the stars twinkling back at him. He took a deep breath, the scent of fresh air surrounding him, before he looked back at Kisuke. Kisuke, who's hat shadowed his face so that Ichigo couldn't see his eyes. Kisuke, who had a harsh grip on his fan in his lap. Kisuke, whose body was angled away from Ichigo.

"...It doesn't matter.")

His friends never talked to him anymore. They were too busy, they had Hollows to fight. They had people to protect. He understood, but it itched at him, that he was one of those people who depended on their protection. It hurt, that they could leave him behind so easily. His family never spoke about anything that had happened and after the third time his father ran away yelling "lalalala!" when he tried to broach the subject, Ichigo stopped talking about it too.

The only one who was still there, who hadn't walked away from him, was Kisuke and to a lesser extent, the other's at the Urahara Shoten. But it was Kisuke that Ichigo spent time with, when the absence of his powers and zanpakutou and even his Hollow was just too much.

It was Kisuke that Ichigo went to, when he couldn't sleep because of his nightmares.

When he felt like he couldn't breathe.

When he was unable to focus on anything.

It was Kisuke who was there for him, when Ichigo needed someone to lean on.

Therefore, when Kisuke wanted to go to the cinema and watch a shitty Hollywood movie that even from the trailer wasn't very good... Ichigo went with him. Kisuke paid for the tickets and Ichigo took care of the snacks, and then they entered the theater together. The lights were still on when they entered so they quickly found their seats and settled down in the middle of the room.

The lights dimmed not long after they sat down and Ichigo scooted around in his seat until he sat comfortably. He had a bucket of popcorn in his right hand and a coke in the other. By his left side sat Kisuke who was busy crunching on his own popcorn. As the lights dimmed even further again, the large screen (projector?) turned on and commercials started running. While they waited for the actual movie to start, Ichigo fished out his phone and made sure his sisters knew where he was in case they needed him.

They wouldn't, but it made him feel better.

His hand squeezed around the phone before he slowly relaxed it again and carefully turned it off. He put it back in his pocket and leaned back on his chair again.

"Problem?" Kisuke asked, only to immediately start sucking on his own straw.

Ichigo frowned. "No..."

Ichigo popped a popcorn into his mouth and bit down on it, hearing it crunch loudly. His eyes stayed on the front of the room as the logos of the movie's makers appeared on screen and he forced his mind to focus on it. It was fine. His sisters were growing up, this was a good thing. They would be able to protect themselves.

That was all he wanted. For them to be safe.

The movie started and the title flashed on screen. Ichigo resolved that he was being petty and he should feel happy for them. He wasn't going to think about it anymore. 

"Oooh, I love this director," Kisuke mumbled around his straw, and when Ichigo glanced over, he saw his eyes were big with delight. His hat was on his lap instead of on his hat and Ichigo couldn't stop himself from taking another look. It was such a rare thing to see. It was almost a shock and Ichigo's eyes strayed over Kisuke's face, from his floppy hair to his straight nose to his lips down to his stubble.

Ichigo's eyes stayed there a moment too long before the loud sound of someone talking made him shift his attention to the screen again. The camera was focused on a crying dark-haired woman and Ichigo wondered what had happened to lead up to that point.

Belatedly, he answered Kisuke, "I've never seen anything by this director before."

"Mou, Ichigo-kun, that's just sad."

He could feel the warmth of Kisuke's body against his arm as Kisuke leaned closer to him and pressed their arms together. Ichigo pretended as if he didn't notice, as if he didn't know why Kisuke would do that — Kisuke played at being touchy-feely, but he never actually got close to anyone. Ichigo guessed that it must be an attempt to comfort him, just like going to the theater was.

But that didn't meant that Ichigo was going to deny the comfort and ease that Kisuke brought with him every time that they met. When he wasn't getting paid to participate in club's, Ichigo  spent most of his time at the Shoten, content to just be in Kisuke's presence.

They rarely did anything more complicated than playing cards together — going to the cinema was an anomaly — but it was that simplicity that Ichigo craved so much. 

After everything that had gone down with Aizen, everything that had happened both before and after, he needed to do normal things. More importantly, he needed to do normal things with a person that didn't flat out deny that those abnormal things had happened and was a reality. Kisuke left him alone when Ichigo came over, and they only talked about it when Ichigo brought it up, but they did talk about. And slowly, as more time passed and he got more used to Kisuke's presence, they had started to talk about it more. About Ulquiorra and Starrk and Grimmjow.

Kisuke listened. And Ichigo was self-aware to realize that he needed that.

Somebody who listened to him.

On the screen, someone ran desperately after a car. Ichigo was once again lost on how they reached this point, but he paid attention anyway. By his side, Kisuke let out a muffled laugh when the car chaser fell down. Ichigo's lips twitched into a small smile and he pressed his arm back slightly at Kisuke's. 

("Have you ever wished upon a shooting star?" Kisuke asked out of the blue. They were playing a round of Go Fish in the early morning. Ichigo had woken up an hour ago from nightmares, unable to go back to sleep, and he had been joined shortly thereafter by Kisuke. He didn't know if this meant that Kisuke had woken up in order to keep him company of if Kisuke had already been awake, but regardless, he appreciated the company.

The sun had just risen over the horizon, they had seen it reach in through the kitchen window, and the silence of the new morning was calming. Ichigo pretended like he didn't notice the way that Kisuke periodically looked over him, as if to make sure he was okay and wasn't about to have a breakdown.

Ichigo had already had his breakdown.

"Yeah," he answered. "Why?"

"Nothing. Just wondered." Kisuke responded. Then he grinned cheekily at Ichigo and said, "Sixes?"

"...Here.")

It was a beautiful day for a picnic. The sun was shining, birds were chirping and the grass was green. Ururu and Jinta were both delighted to be out of the store, running around the park like it was going to disappear any minute now. Tessai sat stoically on the picnic blanket next to the basket half-full of food, reading a romance novel. Kisuke was in the middle of playing a game on his phone while Ichigo sat back with his back against a tree, resting with his eyes closed.

He could hear Tessai turn the pages of his book, the laughter of children, the sound of Kisuke swearing as his character died in the game yet again. Ichigo kept his eyes shut, the warmth of the sunlight unmistakeable on his skin. A leaf fell on his hand and he curled it around it, his fingers gently feeling along the edges of it. When he opened his eyes again, he saw the half-crushed red leaf in his palm. He frowned and let it go. It drifted gently with the wind, curling around in the air and settling on a root of the tree he was leaning against. Ichigo sighed and directed his gaze to Kisuke, watching his hands frantically moving over the phone.

"Almost, almost, almost, almost—" Kisuke kept repeating. "I've almost got—I'm dead."

Kisuke put the phone down on his lap and looked down on it, a pout on his lips he would probably deny till his death. Ichigo couldn't quite contain his amusement and he turned his face away so that Kisuke wouldn't see him laughing at him. Ichigo would never hear the end of it.

Ururu ran after Jinta with a broom after his football hit her in the head, and Jinta was running away screaming. The other people at the park either looked at them as if they were an eyesore for disturbing the peace, or indulgently because they were kids. Ichigo watched them run around the playground, across the sandbox and over a collection of rocks. He titled his head back so the sunlight drifted over his face, closing his eyes. The shadow of the tree moved over the ground as the sun rose higher.

Heeling the warmth of it on his skin, he listened to the sound of Kisuke moving. He felt Kisuke settle down next to him on his right side, leaning against the wide trunk of the tree next to him. Ichigo opened his eyes and saw Kisuke leaning back his head, his hat sitting over half his face, shadowing it. 

After thinking it over for a scant few seconds, Ichigo scooted over the ground, until he was sitting right next to Kisuke. Their sides were touching and the contact of another person—moreover, a person that he liked—made something hot burn in his stomach. He shifted until he leaned his whole weight on Kisuke instead of the tree, and felt an answering arm weave over his shoulders and hug him tightly. Ichigo felt Kisuke breathing under him, an action that was simulated by the gigai. Nonetheless, it was comforting.

Kisuke was here with him.

Kisuke was alive. 

It didn't shame him to admit that a lot of his nightmares consisted of things that hadn't happened. Fear superimposed on his memories, the sight of Kisuke or his sisters disintegrating like Ulquiorra had. Aizen managing what he had promised, Ichigo failing to save anyone at all. He knew it wasn't true, but in his dreams, it felt so real. And the loss of his zanpakuto, of his Hollow, didn't help. When he woke in the night from a nightmare, he always felt so alone.

But right now, Kisuke was right next to him. Right now, he wasn't alone.

Ichigo fell asleep like that.

By the time that he awoke, the sun was on its way down. Ichigo blinked up and rustled Kisuke as he slowly sat up. Kisuke removed his arms around him and helped Ichigo sit up. Cracking his neck, aching stretched his body, finding it stiff and uncomfortable. When he looked up at the sky, he saw that dark clouds had started to move. It was only a matter of time before a storm came.

Ichigo climbed to his feet and Kisuke rose as well. Together they started walking in the direction of the Shoten. "Where is everyone?" Ichigo asked when he saw no sign of their presence.

"They went back almost two hours ago," Kisuke answered.

Ichigo scowled. They exited the park and walked along the sidewalks towards the Shoten. With the clouds covering the sky, the sun was impossible to see. Nonetheless, it was warm out, the middle of  summer. They stepped leisurely over the road to the other side of the street, turning a corner for a shortcut with less people.

Kisuke walked at a slow pace, and Ichigo slowed down to match it. Glancing over, he saw that Kisuke was staring at him, and he abruptly turned his head away. He scowled on reflex.

"What are you looking at?" he asked.

"You," Kisuke answered easily. He smiled a small, gentle smile at Ichigo and Ichgio quirked his lips slightly in response. This too, was a reflex at this point.

When they got back to the Shoten, Ururu was outside sweeping. Ichigo smiled at her when they passed, Kisuke leading the way inside. Stepping out of his shoes, he followed Kisuke inside. The familiar scent of the Shot an made him involuntarily relax, so used was he to it.

Kisuke waved him in further and like always, Ichigo followed.

(It was raining. Ichigo was sitting by the river, a flower held loosely in his hand. He tilted his head back and got a face full of water as a reward. By his side, Kisuke shifted and finally offered, "...You could leave the country. If you need to get away."

"No," Ichigo snapped. "I'm not leaving my sisters."

I'm not leaving you, went unsaid.

He felt Kisuke's hand curl around his own, the one not holding a flower. Ichigo squeezed it, the warmth a stark contrast to the cold of the rainwater.)

Notes:

It's been so long since I've watched Bleach, I have no idea what I'm doing characterization wise. Are they all horribly OOC? I don't know. I tagged OOC just in case.

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#Fandom: Bleach #Post Type: Fic #Rating: Teen #Status: Complete #Tag: Angst #Tag: Fluff #WC: 1000-5000