Fanfiction: Mount

… tomorrow and today, beside you all the way…
- Bread, If

She is lying within the comforts of her soft comfortable bed, her arms to herself, her husband’s, around her torso, staring at the white ceiling of her large bedroom. She is waiting for blissful, ignorant sleep to rob her of her conscience, rob her of her heart, and rob her of her passion, into the realm of dreams.

She waits.

Just like him, waiting patiently outside her house. Clad in his ever black robes, coolly wielding the large blade as though he was born with it. Perhaps he was, as he had told her his history (or rather, his father’s). He seemed a little apprehensive then, perhaps fearing her outright ridicule of such a peculiar story, but then, as she told him, she has seen more peculiar things. After all, Orihime is her best friend.

The grandfather’s clock chimes one a.m. The whole town is probably asleep, aside from two people. One of them is waiting for sleep, but can’t sleep, the other, staving off sleep, but yet ever so vigilant. She slips out of her husband’s reach, out of bed and stands by the window, careful not to reveal her presence to him outside.

She found out about his nightly activities when she heard Orihime complaining about him never being home. Already his daily activities as Captain of the Fifth Division was ever so draining, yet he still disappears into the night, Orihime complained. She was suspicious so she stayed up late one night, and carefully watched him assume his what-would-be favorite spot. By the large oak tree they once shared their dreams. By the large oak tree where she saw him cry for the first and last time. By the large oak tree she said goodbye to him.

She knows the reason why he guards her ever so zealously. She knows how his enemies know about his Achilles heel. She knows how they would use it against him, just to weaken him. She wants to tell him that she can protect herself, that she is not a damsel in distress. She wants to scold him for letting his wife worry. She wants to tell him to protect his wife instead, and that the past was the past and she doesn’t love him anymore.

She wants to tell him all that, but can’t. Because like him, she is still in love; and the past is still in the present for the both of them.

And so, she continues watching him from within and him, from without. And still, their love grows.

MOUNT noun:
1. to increase in amount, total or intensity
2. to place on guard