Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach. It is the property of Tite Kubo; I merely borrow the characters for my own amusement.

--

Lays the Road

Byakuya Kuchiki was a man who had never known want. The name of Kuchiki is tantamount to privilege in the Seireitei and all who carry the name are indeed privileged. He certainly had everything any one person could ever want in a lifetime and after.

Power. Wealth. Fame. Adoration of the masses.

Of anything a person could ever desire, Byakuya, the Kuchiki heir, possessed.

No. Byakuya Kuchiki had never known want.

--

The best part of Rukongai is considered as the slums to those who lived within the pristine walls of the Kuchiki compound and yet their heir begins to travel there frequently, for minutes, then hours at a time. There is much speculation, but no one knows for sure why.

Byakuya prefers it that way. His motives aren’t particularly honorable, or approvable in any case.

There is a derisive saying amongst the snootiest of the Seireitei.

Not even the blooms of weeds would bud in the filth of the Rukongai.

And yet Byakuya believes – in the fashion of tawdry ballads – that he has found the most beautiful flower of all, wavering within the compost of society, nearly smothered but not crushed. He is grateful for that.

--

When he first talked to her, he faintly recalls his lips moving, but though he strains now, he cannot for the life of him remember what words had formed between them, but only her voice, quiet, sliding fluidly through the air in the muted chime of a velvet-muffled bell.

Like the cry of a doe, like the frantic beating of the hummingbird she entranced him.

And in the same way, he couldn’t tear his eyes away, had to force himself to bow, and wish her good day, and continue along his path, back towards civilization.

It took every nerve he had to not look back, but the drooping gesture of her farewell tickled at the muscles of his shoulders, tensing them until his bones creaked in protest.

--

When he announces his intentions before the Kuchiki council of elders, the room of ancients explodes in a flurry of activity that surely amounted to more than they had shifted themselves in over three centuries. Or so he tells himself.

(He isn’t feeling too charitable towards them – much the way a child grows angry when denied a particular toy – so perhaps his petulance on this one day could be excused, somewhat.)

Several had the gall to throw at him words such as honor, or duty, or tradition. All he had to say to their shriveled lordships was a calm reminder as to who indeed was the inheritor of the Main Branch bloodline.

This quiets them rather quickly, as each contemplates the possibility that he, Byakuya Kuchiki, golden child of their noble family, would scorn his duty to spite them, and if they would not allow him to marry the peasant wench from the Rukongai, he would choose not to marry at all.

They discuss several alternatives with him, each attempting to force him to see reason, to no avail. Byakuya Kuchiki was a man who had never known want—

This is solely because he always got what he wanted. There was nothing to want.

--

Hisana is a quiet girl, demure in a way that noble-born women never became even after decades of practice. She was beautiful too, an aura that hadn’t been in any way diminished by the squalor of the Rukongai. What Byakuya likes best about her—her skin is pale – and soft – like freshly fallen snow.

Many maids – even members of the family – whisper, when they think that no one hears, that their new lady is just as cold and distant as ice. (So too do their manners chill as they wait upon her, as if they were her betters…)

Byakuya sees this, and his wrath flares, hotter than his indifferent, aloof manner had allowed ever before, and whenever his anger threatens to spill over, he feels her hand, supple, cool on his arm, and he will turn to meet her smile, closed, secretive and directed only at him. She will shake her head and pat the cushions beside her, and he will accede to her wishes once again.

Her hand is always so cold. Always so—so very cold.

--

Anyone will find it ironic, that Byakuya was considered for a while – still considered – the most eligible bachelor in the Seireitei, and the woman he chose to love then did not love him back.

Hisana was his world. But she did not love him.

Far from popular expectations, Hisana was not cold. She could not live in his household, be supported by his tender feelings and not give him anything in return. But she did not love him.

She was grateful for his money, for his status, for his protection, and she was grateful for his gentleness towards her that words could not express, that soft touches and regretful glances barely did.

But she did not love him.

And of all the things that he could not control, this one—this one will sting – rip, tear, shred – most of all.

--

When he first saw her, he stopped immediately in the hallway, and without his notice, his hand rose to clench the fabric of his neck-cloth, certain that his heart had stopped, that he was developing some manner of human disease – a heart-attack, an apoplexy, a seizure, perhaps – or even that he was experiencing the delirium of a particularly terrifying nightmare.

He blinks once, twice, and still the image remains, the manifestation of his deceased wife, a living, breathing figure that stands not ten feet from him—he is certain his lungs have seized.

He has never so fully lost control of himself before. Soon – in the near future – he will take himself firmly in hand, and sternly forbid himself to lose faculty of his senses in such a way ever again.

But for right now, he stares, like some ill-bred idiot, until his companion has to reach out and take his sleeve, even inquire as to his health.

And still she is burned onto his eyes, those features that will not fade no matter how many times he blinks. There is moisture on his eyelid, but that is merely the mist outside, born of a sunny afternoon.

--

He tangles with the council again, the second time in the same century, and over the same person—nearly. He knows – with his mind – that the girl was only Hisana’s little sister, but he looks at her and still he sees his wife, too soon taken from him, too little time taken.

He hears her plea as but only a whisper, lacking what little energy she’d ever had, and he remembers that he once promised.

The girl is like Hisana, with the same hair, the same skin (that same pale, milky skin—is it as soft?). There the resemblance ends. Where Hisana was reserved, the girl is exuberant, a little loud, a little bold, and (almost) utterly fearless. Where Hisana treated others with a polite, deferent respect, the girl acts as their equal, drawing smiles and affection where Hisana had only elicited pleasant facades and murmurs behind drawing doors not-quite-closed.

And where Hisana saved her (limited) warmth for him, that bright, inviting quirk of the lips fades from the girl’s features as if his very presence depressed her spirits. The girl is clearly not Hisana but try as he might, her name will not leave his lips.

A part of him fears that if he were able to speak the name of the girl instead of Hisana’s, she will – both of them will – disappear from his life forever.

--

He sees the girl walking the halls of his home – their home, now – and even from afar, and her features are fair, and that if he concentrates, he can make out the slight differences between the girl and Hisana.

Hisana was beautiful, a woman. Byakuya sees the girl smile, so eager to please, and he cannot deny that the girl is adorable, pretty even, yet he continues to push her away.

He tells himself – over and over – that he is doing her a favor, that she wouldn’t want his affections for her sister spilling over onto her. He remains distant from her, misses those hopeful-disappointed-hopeful shifts—

The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and Byakuya has supplied the bricks.

(He doesn’t see as she turns away from him – finished with her attempts to obtain an approving glance from nii-sama – but he sees her back as she’s turned, to walk away from him, far away from him.)

--

The day is beautiful when he stands here, in this lavishly decorated lawn, and all around him is a sea of smiles, and waves of laughter, resounding laughter. Byakuya says nothing, wears an expression like he is anywhere else – a meeting, a battle, a cemetery – and stands here, stiffly.

The girl looks up him, looks up to nii-sama half-hopefully, half in resignation and starts to turn away again. And slowly, as if on rusty clockwork, as if he has to force each grueling inch of movement from his arm, Byakuya places a trembling hand atop her head.

Rukia.

He remembers seeing her leave that day with tears in her eyes, and that bright, inviting, elated smile is for him, only for him.

Rukia. Rukia, Rukia, Rukia.

He has been calling her name for years, with each despairing beat of his frigid-rigid heart. And as expected, here she is, moving like Hisana, disappearing from his life—maybe forever, probably forever.

--

Something – born of long centuries of training and decorum perhaps – scolded at him, hissed that he was being nothing but a brainless sheep, following whichever way her hand beckoned. He’d ignored that voice.

Now he wonders if those tinny protests were nothing more than the logic of his better sense—common sense. Byakuya wonders if the commoner woman – women – had never entered his life, if he would be this wreck of a man today.

Hisana is gone, Rukia is going. Byakuya remains—

He doesn’t know. He will never know.

--

People move on – will always move on – and he continues, lays the road upon which he walks.