Simple Like Tea

Chapter 6 - Changes & Inaction




When Reiko woke up, she realized with a start that someone was banging on the door, that they had been banging on the door for some time now. She jumped out of bed and ran barefoot to the window. Looking downstairs, she saw the twin heads of Chiyo and Senji. “Sensei!” Chiyo shouted, banging on the door again. “Reiko Sensei!”

Retrieving her house slippers Reiko raced downstairs. Something must be wrong. Chiyo and Senji wouldn’t show up this early for no reason. She opened the door, and Chiyo stopped in mid-knock, her hand suspended in the air. She looked at Reiko and her jaw dropped open. Senji looked like he had been hit with a stick in the back of the head. “What is it? Is something wrong?” Reiko asked, trying to keep herself from panicking.

“Sensei, were you… were you sleeping?” Chiyo seemed to disbelieve even as she asked.

Reiko wrinkled her brow and spun around to look at the wall clock that hung above the kitchen. Eleven-thirty! She had slept until eleven-thirty! “No way! It can’t be that late!”

“Sensei…” Senji looked genuinely concerned. Never in the two years they had been coming to work for her had they come to find her sleeping. She was always up at the crack of dawn, cleaning and fixing and preparing, and by the time they arrived for work at eleven, the shop would be open with customers served and Reiko in her nice kimono, smiling at everyone and full of instructions.

For her to have slept so late like this…

“I’m ok,” Reiko quickly smiled at the two teenagers standing in the doorway, exchanging looks and looking worried together. “I just overslept, that’s all. I had a rough night last night. Please, come in, and help me prepare to open while I get ready.” They seemed to hesitate, but her smile seemed to spur them into action. If Reiko got a grip of herself and continued as though all was normal, maybe she could make this day pass without further disaster.

When Senji and Chiyo finally came in and started to relax, Reiko gave them another encouraging smile. “We’ll help open shop, Sensei. You take your time getting ready.” Chiyo sounded more like herself now, full of eagerness and bubbling with energy.

“Thank you.” Reiko turned to go back upstairs, clutching the yukata she had fallen asleep in and gripping her hair nervously. She couldn’t remember a time when she had worn it down for anything but sleep, and it felt private somehow. She didn’t want to be seen with it that way. Hair like hers wasn’t befitting of a young lady, and she didn’t want her employees to see her as anything less than that. As she swept to the back of the kitchen, she ran her eyes over the table she and Renji had been sitting at the night before, drinking tea. The cups were still there, and she knew Senji and Chiyo would wonder who had been sitting there drinking tea with her and note how odd it was for their sensei to have left one of her precious porcelain sets out. Reiko was surprised herself, but last night had been full of surprises. Her eyes on her back as she started up the stairs made the hair on the back of her neck stand. She could hear the two whispering nervously.

As she stepped into her little apartment, she realized that the accounting ledgers were still sitting out on her desk. The shrine had not been tended to, and neither had the mess. She would have to take care of those things later, though. Now she had to be ready to open shop.

As she stepped into her bath, she wondered if the night before had been some sort of delirious dream. That beast, the way Renji was twins, the long hours into the night they sat drinking tea while he told her everything, about soul society and the Seireitei, about shinigami and hollows and Hueco Mundo. Reiko had asked lots of questions, about the court of pure souls and the thirteen protection squads, and had been impressed to learn that Renji was a lieutenant under the most famous of the thirteen captains that led the army-like organization. But Renji was self-deprecating. He had told her about a human man just barely into his twenties named Ichigo who was stronger than he was, stronger even than his captain, as if the inferiority he felt towards him was personal.

It had taken all night and even some of the early dawn. Renji had been both reluctant to tell her everything and adamant at making sure she believed him. Though it had defied everything she had taken for granted, Reiko had ended up believing him. How she managed to hold together her sanity, she wasn't sure, but her grandfather had always been insistent that she accept all things with grace, and while he wasn't exactly talking about something this big...

As Reiko put the elaborate combs in place to hold her bun, she realized with a start that she didn’t remember going to bed.

She remembered talking with Renji, and then she remembered being woken by Chiyo. She had been tired, and maybe she had fallen asleep while talking to Renji downstairs, but then how did she wake up in her bed? Had it really all been a dream? But then, what about the tea cups downstairs? She was certain there had been two.

Her mind suddenly presented her with a hazy picture of Renji standing over her bed and she blushed. Had he taken her upstairs? Put her in her bed? Had he undone her hair? The idea of any of those things being true made her want to hide her face and never reveal it again.

She picked out a navy kimono with imprints of white clouds and yellow flowers along the edges, a kimono that her o-jii-san had thought too childish, but that she had always secretly liked. She wrapped her obi around herself with the resigned thought that she would probably never see him again. Why should it bother her? He had been some kid she thought was in trouble, and she had wanted to help him. But if what he had said was true, and she reminded herself that she had already gracefully accepted it as true, he didn’t need her help. He was a capable lieutenant in some kind of after-life war epic. He was a shinigami she had seen kill a hollow. He was just someone she had made tea for and talked with all night. Someone who had been so gentle when he lifted her to her bed, she had struggled to recall it happening it all, someone who had touched her hair...

Slipping on her socks, she mentally berated herself for even thinking about it. For thinking about him. He couldn’t mean anything to her, and she couldn’t mean anything to him. He had been good company for one night, and she had enjoyed it because he had liked her tea. Nothing more. She steadied herself to face the day as she faced all the days that had come before for the past years, fixing a calm smile on her face before she descended the stairs to help Chiyo and Senji open shop.

On her grandfather’s shrine, yesterday’s tea sat cold.

**

Renji fidgeted where he stood in front of Byakuya’s desk. It wasn’t often he was called in here. In all his memories of being summoned like this, he had always known what it would be about, sometimes a failed mission but usually some inappropriate conduct Renji was guilty of due to a night of drinking with Ikkaku, Ran and the others. This time, Renji had no clue.

“It has come to my attention that you have used a Senkai gate recently,” the captain spoke suddenly, and Renji stiffened. It wasn’t really against the rules, using Senkai gates and going to the real world, not technically. Usually the shinigami didn’t go without permission from their captains, but it had been known to happen once or twice. He hadn’t been asked a question, however, and Renji was too cautious to say anything. When the silence stretched out, Byakuya spoke again. “Are the reports about Hollow activity in the real world accurate?”

“Hai.” Renji remained stiff. He knew he was walking a thin line, being as untalkative as he was, but he didn’t know what information his captain was trying to gain and didn’t want to give him more information than he absolutely had to regardless.

“You went to Karakura Town,” Byakuya’s voice was flat, but with a hint of warning behind it.

“Hai,” Renji said again, even though it hadn’t been a question. But his instinct told him that remaining silent would not have been wise.

“It is of my belief that the sixth squad has insufficient information about the nature of Karakura Town’s spiritual atmosphere. There has been more Hollow activity and more spiritually powerful people found in Karakura town than anywhere else in the real world by a factor of four. I have decided to investigate this further.”

Renji blinked at his captain. What was he up to?

“Should you choose to go to the real world again, please provide sufficiently detailed reports afterwards, especially concerning spiritually aware humans.” Byakuya paused and Renji realized he was gaping in surprise. “I trust you to keep this discreet, Abarai Fukitaichou. The twelfth squad would not be pleased to know that we are gathering information without their… supervision.”

“Hai, Kuchiki Taichou,” Renji tried to steady his face into the same blank expression Byakuya always wore, but the way that his captain studied his features for what felt like an eternity made him feel exposed.

“Dismissed,” Byakuya finally said absently, and Renji nodded, turning on his heel and walking out of the office as fast as he could while trying to make it seem like he didn’t really mind either way if he stayed or left.

What was his captain up to? This wasn’t about information gathering, Renji knew that much for a fact. The way his captain had stressed that he was interested in knowing about the spiritually aware humans made his gut clench with anxiety. Did he know about Reiko? Was he trying to see if Renji would crack and tell him under pressure?

For some reason, Renji wasn’t ready to tell anyone about Reiko. A spiritually aware human was not usually worth noting, unless they were a threat to soul society. Most had their memories modified if they came across a hollow or a shinigami, but quite a few lived out their lives without ever knowing anything about soul society, and soul society never knowing a thing about them. He hadn’t been technically violating any orders before, but if his captain explicitly stated that he wanted to be informed of the existence of any that Renji found, then he was. The thought of violating orders didn’t sit well with Renji. He wasn’t a stickler for them the way his captain was, but he didn’t deliberately defy them the way Ichigo did. He had been able to find a happy middle ground between his morals and the restrictions of his work by finding loopholes and exploiting them. The only time he had ever defied an order outright was when it concerned Rukia. So why was he willing to defy his orders now for Reiko?

Renji stopped in the middle of the halls and a scary thought occurred to him. Unseated officers walked past him quickly, eyeing him with confusion, wondering why their fukitaichou looked so stricken. But Renji didn’t notice them.

He had defied orders for Rukia because he had loved her. He was willing to bend all rules and break all laws for her. Because he loved her. But Reiko, why was he breaking any kind of rules for her?

It wasn’t until a clumsy new recruit bumped right into him when she came careening around the corner of the corridor that he snapped out of it, blinking suddenly at where he was; currently, on the floor with the rookie sprawled over him, rubbing her forehead where it had collided with his chest and murmuring to herself. “Gomenasai…” she whined when she realized who she had bumped into, then scampered to her feet and dashed in the opposite direction. He frowned at her retreating form. There was no reason to run so fast, it wasn't like he was evil incarnate or anything. He didn't like it when girls were scared of him. His mind drifted to the memory of the way Reiko had looked at him last night. Her tiny arms, when he had gripped them he had felt the muscles in her arms twitch. When he had held her, he had felt her entire body quivering in his arms. She had smelled like mint...

Renji rubbed his chest where the recruit had hit him, reminding himself not to get lost in thought in such awkward places again. It had knocked the wind out of him, but he was certain he was fine. He felt foolish, mentally berating himself for standing like an idiot in the middle of the hall like that, getting lost in his own head of all things. He would have to find that recruit and try to show her he wasn't such a scary guy. As for the scary thought that had occurred to him earlier, he dismissed it. Nothing more than a result of an overactive brain in frenzy because of Kuchiki Taichou’s suspicious behavior. Nothing more. He thought again of the feel of Reiko in his arms and quashed the thought quickly.

Renji got to his feet and brushed himself off, then walked on, careful to mind where he was going. He would go visit Reiko again tonight, when he got let off work. He’d ask her to make some more of that cinnamon tea. She had made such wondrous teas for him, exotic flavors that he never dreamt of trying. They had tickled his senses and made him feel as though he were right where he was meant to be, and all was well with the world. She soothed him with her quiet presence and her soft featured face as much as with her strange teas, he realized, and the idea of it made him smile slightly to himself.

Rukia had always riled him up, and he had ended up in shouting matches with her more often than not. He somehow couldn’t imagine yelling around Reiko, let alone yelling at her. She was much too peaceful a presence for yelling. She also felt softer than Rukia somehow, and he remembered once holding Rukia to his chest. Her body had been strong and hard, muscle and sinew he was certain. A warrior’s body. He tried to imagine Reiko holding a sword and found that he couldn’t. Remembering the way she had defended herself when he had called her simple, Renji realized she wasn’t just some weakling. But she was no warrior. She was strong inside, but outside, she was fragile and feminine. Rukia’s strength as a warrior was one of the things he loved about her. Strange that he should take comfort from the fact that Reiko would never be the same.

But why was he comparing the two? They were like night and day. Maybe that was why he found it so comforting to be around Reiko. She was nothing like Rukia. She didn’t remind him of her or make him think of her at all. When he was with Reiko, he only thought about Reiko. Thinking about Rukia hurt too much. He would be thrilled to be free of the feeling, even if for a short while.

Yes, the tea was excellent, and she freed him from thinking about Rukia. But why was he willing to defy his orders for her? He would have to ponder that when he went to see her tonight.




TBC


AN/ I could have sworn I already put this chapter up, but apparently, I didn't! Eeep! I'm such a forgetful idiot sometimes. I've gotten caught up in my classes, but the summer semester's almost over so time will become more available and I can happily empty my head again.

I can't say enough how awesome it is that the reviewers still like it, and that the hits keep going up. I'm ecstatic that there are readers who seem to support both RenjixReiko and ByakuyaxReiko. I love both Byakuya and Renji, and I think they both deserve love, although the idea of them getting love from the same person (at the same time) is kinky but not really where I'm going. Um. Yeah. Anyway!

Thanks to the lurkers! Keep reading, it's all I ask. Tune in next week!