Keeping Up Appearances

Back with chapter two, finally! Thank you for all the reviews, favs, and alerts you guys have sent me! I really appreciate it and wanted to get another chapter up as soon as possible! I have to thank the lovely Samurai Smee for giving me advice on how to proceed with this in the long run and for inspiring me, I totally borrowed the cat idea from her I think. Anyway, hope you enjoy this second chapter, even if it is kind of a filler chapter. Hope no one is too OOC and I am sorry if they are. This is AU after all, so certain things deviate from the original storyline.

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach or its characters. No money is made from this.


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Keeping up appearances

Chapter 2: Plan

Kisuke lived in an apartment not so far from the school campus. It was located in a better district of the city of Kanakura. He was on the sixth floor in a one bedroom flat. He had done all of the minor décor himself, from the green and white pillows on his black futon to the significant paintings of the nearby landscape in several centuries before.

His plain black briefcase full of ungraded work was set on the small black kitchen table as he began to struggle out of his jacket and tie. He couldn’t stand playing dress up one more minute. The suits and ties were just not for him. He liked t-shirts and jeans of course, but his loose robes were the favorite.

“Ah finally,” he sighed once he was down to just his underwear. He grabbed the various articles of clothing off the furniture and headed for his bedroom where he knew the favorites were waiting. The soft deep sage material slipped against his skin as he tied the straps firmly.

But what to do now?

He could grade papers and hope to put a smile on Uryu’s face or he could get the next month’s work planned out, or he could always eat something as his stomach was grumbling.

He could hear a soft mewing in the kitchen and he smiled before he called out “Hana!” There was soft padding of paws on his dark glossy hardwood floors as a small black cat came into view. “There you are Hana,” he laughed as he picked up the kitten. She was cute and combated some of his lonliness but not all of it.

“What should we do today?” he asked as he scratched behind her ear as she purred into his arm. He knew the cat probably wouldn’t answer other than a mew, but it was still something to interact with.

“Should we eat something Hana? Should we grade papers? Maybe both?” he continued through to the kitchen. He set Hana on the counter as he began to prepare some type of snack.

He had just decided to combine eating and grading while Hana watched, waiting for Kisuke to provide her with something. He smiled and hummed to himself, trying not to think of Ishida.

The kitten followed him to the futon as he set down and spread the papers all around him. She liked to play with all of the many pages, after making his work about ten times harder than it probably should have been, though if his mind wasn’t focused to begin with anything could do that.

“Hana, that’s not very nice,” he laughed as he plucked a test from her black and white paws. It would have claw marks through it again if he let her play with it much longer. She rolled over from her back to her stomach and stared at him, wild-eyed as cats do before she took off into another part of the apartment.

Kisuke twirled his pen as he munched down on lunch and read through the formulas and text he thought he had assigned to be vomited back at him on paper. His red, free ink rolling pen worked furiously against the white as he hardly glanced at names and assigned grades.

Naturally one paper of neat handwriting snatched his attention from the monotone he was working himself into. Ishida’s paper looked better than the answer key somehow, with every character written carefully in the correct spacing and parallel to every other in precise pencil.

In spite of himself, he couldn’t stop the smile that began to work its way onto his face. That was perfect Uryu. As usual, he got over ninety percent. Maybe tomorrow he would smile.

X

Uryu rested his aching head against the wall, trying not to vomit from the feeling of longing failure beginning to sink into his systems again. The words rang in his head constantly, of his almost sin.

He couldn’t believe he was beginning to slip at school, that his home life was starting to overshadow his academic needs. Kuchiki-san rarely spoke to anyone outside of class, least of all him.

Ishida guessed it was because he was the top student and had failed a couple of things. It was starting to show up in other classes too. Ukitake-sensei had called him out afterward the week before, Aizen-sensei had given him several looks, and most of the others were starting to catch on.

His father was out of the house again and he was glad. He wasn’t sure that he wouldn’t do something rash. It wasn’t that his father abused him physically, but his words and expectations were enough. Ishida had to be perfect.

He knew he was smart, but he was only human, after all. His father was trying to mold him into something to make the family name proud. But Ishida didn’t feel that was right for him. He shared more of his grandfather’s view on life than his father’s and he missed the older man extremely as he had just passed.

He wasn’t going to cry but it was bad enough, his feelings, and he could feel that something was beginning to crack.

X

“Everyone could have done better I think,” Kisuke reported as he passed back the papers; he could see that eye rolls already. He passed Uryu’s paper back to him with a smile. He turned to the rest of the students, but not without one more glance to his favorite student.

What he saw made up his mind as far as the pursuit.

Uryu was holding the paper staunchly between his hands, staring down with only his intense blue eyes moving across the paper. Kisuke followed the features of his face down to his mouth and saw what he had been waiting on; a smile.

Ishida Uryu was actually smiling.

Kisuke was sure that he was going to melt on the spot from the boy’s relieved expression. He liked it when he smiled and had only seen it a few times. Kisuke was certain that he was in love.

But how to proceed? What would be the best plan of action?

He would have to consider it later as he opened his mouth to say “Alright class, open your text books and turn to page one hundred and eighty five for experiment three.”

X

“Uryu, you’re not staying after class today?” he teased as the youth always seemed to be the last one out the door, even after tests and papers were back.

“Well you still haven’t graded all papers,” Uryu spoke plainly, pushing his glasses back up as he fixed those intense blue eyes upon Kisuke once more.

“Yes, I’m working on that,” he smiled, leaning across the desk like usual.

“I see.” Kisuke actually thought that Uryu would leave as he usually did, but he was still standing before him. “Urahara-sensei, thank you for grading some things,” he said quietly.

“Hm? Oh, no problem,” Kisuke said, waving his hand in a ‘don’t worry about it manner.’ “I figured I should take your advice.” Ishida turned his head and Kisuke couldn’t tell if it was because he was smiling or blushing, but he didn’t want to be seen whatever it was.

“Er, no trouble. Someone has to keep you on your job,” he said, now turning back, those cold eyes meeting him again.

“Well, might as well be you,” Urahara smiled wider.

“Yes, I suppose. See you on Monday then,” Uryu told him. That left Kisuke the whole weekend to plan his next move.

“Alright Monday.” He would finally be able to wear more comfortable clothing, but he was willing to sacrifice all of that just to see Uryu smile again if he could. But simple smiles were not enough and as the youth disappeared, he realized that he had forgotten to try and speak to him about his problems.

“Well, it will just have to wait until Monday,” he sighed as he began to pack his things. He headed down the now empty halls, since it was his last class of the day. He was just a little disappointed that it was the end of the week.

“Kisuke!” he heard someone yell down the hall. He turned to see Ukitake waving after him. ‘Better than Byakuya-san,’ he thought. He wasn’t sure that he could handle the stoic man that afternoon. He turned around and started towards him.

“Hey,” he smiled. Kisuke and Ukitake were very similar, Ukitake was one of the few people he could get along with.

“Would you like to get together with a few of us tonight?”

“A few being?”

“Me, Shinsui, possibly Zaraki-kun,” Ukitake told him thoughtfully. “Maybe Aizen-kun and Gin-kun too.”

“I see. Yeah, I guess I can go tonight.”

“Alright, I’ll let you know when,” Ukitake smiled as he headed off, long white hair flowing after him. Kisuke wasn’t all that fond of Zaraki, but he liked Ukitake and Shunsui enough. He wasn’t too sure about Aizen and Gin. It would be a nice change though. He wasn’t going to do anything else.

X

“So Kisuke-kun, how are your classes going?” Ukitake asked as he passed a bottle of sake around. Shunsui had brought his own as usual. Ukitake was something of a home economics teacher with his gentle personality and smiles. Due to constant illness he had to remain quiet and depend on his students to behave. He always appeared older than he actually was from his bleached hair and ill fitting suits.

Shunsui wasn’t actually ill that anyone knew about, unless Kisuke counted laziness. It was hard to tell what he actually taught since he never seemed to do much with his students, other than hit on the particularly brainy ones. The last time Kisuke had checked, he figured geography or history of some kind. He was a bit of a rule bender too, always wearing a pink and floral designed coat over his uniform and refusing to shave the stubble around his mouth and chin. It didn’t even look like he did much with his hair, always keeping the curly locks in a low ponytail and under a wide brimmed traditional hat.

“Oh well fine.” Ishida popped up when the place was mentioned.

“I hear you’re up to your old tricks of not grading papers again.”

“Well, it’s not that I’m not grading them, it’s just that I’m taking my time about it.”

“I bet your students appreciate that,” Shunsui smiled.

“Only because you do the same thing,” Ukitake mentioned.

“Well that is true,” he smiled as he pulled his hat down.

“What about you Aizen-kun?” Ukitake asked the man beside Kisuke. Compared to the other teachers there, Aizen and Gin were fairly new.

Aizen looked like the professor part right down to the wide glasses. His soft brown hair was always combed and parted neatly in place, his suit always prim and pressed. He appeared younger than the other professors as well and always wearing a gentle smile. He was in charge of some of the advance placement classes and cram school for college.

Gin, on the other hand, seemed to be an opposite. He had short bleached almost grey hair with a thin face and devious smile. His eyes were hardly open ever, and Kisuke found it strange that he could still walk around as he did. He was from a different part, speaking with a different accent that often came across as slang and rude. Kisuke didn’t want to know what he did.

Aizen started to provide a long answer and Kisuke began to drift off into another world. Uryu had been perfectly adorable when he smiled earlier, the memory making Kisuke’s heart jump somewhat as he sipped quietly on his cup of sake.

He wanted to make the boy smile, in private. But how? What could he possibly do to put a smile on his face, to make him love him? He couldn’t seem to be thinking of a way so far.

“Hey, are you okay?” Shunsui asked as he tugged on Kisuke’s sleeve from the floor of Ukitake’s home. He always seemed to be stretched out somewhere, didn’t matter.

“Hm? Oh, yeah I’m fine,” he told the other man, smiling. He figured that Shunsui would see through it anyway. He was smarter than everyone took him for. Shunsui just looked at him but did not utter a word as they turned back to the small Friday night gathering.

He socialized as best he could, not knowing much of the popular topics or celebrities that Ukitake and the others seemed to know. It was still nice to be out of his apartment for a little while, away from his constant thoughts.

But it only lasted so long, and soon, one by one they began to drift out.

“See you on Monday,” Ukitake smiled as he waved Kisuke from his home.

“Yeah Monday,” Kisuke nodded as he began to walk in the cool night air. Monday seemed to be when everything was going to occur. If he was lucky the nocturne would help his thoughts. He could hear cars in the distance and various sounds of the city as he walked, but nothing seemed to be helping.

That seemed until he was standing right out in front of his apartment building and had a revelation of how to get Uryu. He could do it, since he was going to anyway.

He would fail Uryu on purpose and force him to stay after school.

It was a cruel tactic, since he wasn’t sure what was going on with the young man, but he knew it would receive a promising reaction, as he dashed up the stairs to his apartment. Uryu would want an explanation after class and then tutoring most likely.

There would be plenty of room there to make a move or two at least. He smiled as he ran back up to Hana, who would be hungry of course.

X