Chapter 49: Have I Been Bothering You?

"Rukia?"

A soft call jolted Rukia out of her reverie. She turned her head to find Momo's face just inches away.

"Huh? I'm fine. What were you saying?"

Rukia hastily tilted her head back, offering an awkward smile.

Sitting in the park near the teaching building, the two of them were cooling off on the stone steps beneath the cherry blossom trees. Before them, students in white uniforms drifted by in scattered streams.

Momo Hinamori tilted her head in confusion. Looking at Rukia, she said, "You've been acting strange all day. You were spacing out during class, and your mind keeps wandering whenever I talk to you."

"Really? Maybe I'm just not feeling well."

Rukia scrambled for a makeshift excuse.

"Come to think of it, you do look a bit pale." Momo reached out, gently stroking Rukia's cheek, then glanced up at the blazing sun.

She picked up the water bottle beside her, unscrewed the cap, dipped her finger inside, and then touched it to Rukia's cheek.

"Feeling better?"

The coolness on Momo's fingertip made Rukia's eyelashes flutter. The cicadas in the surrounding trees suddenly sounded grating. Rukia stared at the bright, sunny smile on Momo's face, feeling as though a shard of a blade were stuck in her throat.

The events of last night began to replay in her mind. She felt like a plus trapped in the Dangai.

"Ah, much better," Rukia forced a smile.

"Are you still not used to living with the Kuchiki family? Why don't you talk to them and see if you can move back into the Spiritual Arts Academy? We could share a dorm then."

"No need. I'm actually doing quite well over there." Rukia gently shook her head.

Momo didn't push the matter. She looked away, casting her gaze toward the path carpeted with fine, fragmented petals.

"Yesterday, when Kira, Renji, and I were chatting, we talked about our choices for the Gotei 13 divisions after graduation. Rukia, do you know where Renji wants to go?"

Rukia thought about it seriously. "I actually haven't asked him."

Momo smiled with a pursed lip. "He said he wants to join the Eleventh Division. It certainly suits his temper and style."

Rukia couldn't help smiling either. "When you put it like that, it really does."

"But if Renji goes to the Eleventh Division, what about you?" Momo asked abruptly.

The smile on Rukia's face froze. "What do you mean?"

"You're definitely going to the Sixth Division, right? But if Abarai goes to the Eleventh Division, won't the two of you have very few chances to see each other in the future?"

When Momo tilted her head, the silver bell on her hair ornament chimed—the one they had chosen together in the Rukongai just a few days ago, though it now caught the sunlight with a cold gleam.

In truth, Momo always looked after her. Momo had a brighter personality than she did, got along better with everyone in the student council, and had helped her out of many tight spots. For instance, the deliberate harassment from certain upperclassmen was always smoothed over by Momo.

Momo was truly wonderful, wonderful in every way. Her goodness made her deserving of all the beautiful things in this world.

However, there were always exceptions.

"Momo, since Renji wants to go to the Eleventh Division, as his friends, we naturally ought to offer our blessings and support. It would be worse if we let something that doesn't even truly exist become a burden."

A whole cherry blossom petal happened to land on the back of Rukia's hand. She picked it up with her other hand and unconsciously crushed it between her palms, the sap seeping along her palm lines into the callus at the base of her thumb.

Momo smiled and said, "I'm not like you. What kind of relationship do you two even have?"

Rukia suddenly let out a soft laugh as well.

"What you said is true. Renji and I really have never talked about division preferences. I'll properly ask him about it later."

Her voice was calm and natural, just as natural as the President had been when he said those words last night.

That calmness made her voice sound clearer and stronger.

Rukia suddenly thought of many unrelated things: quietly smoothing out the wrinkles on the Student Council President's uniform in the office while he took a nap, and the searing heat on her face when the President patted her head...

Her bright eyes were tranquil, yet they inexplicably made Momo, who was watching her, feel a tightness in her chest.

Momo continued, "Maybe the chances for the two of us to meet will decrease too. You'll be in the Sixth Division, while I want to go to the Fourth. Just thinking about it feels rather uncomfortable."

"Why don't you come to the Sixth Division too?"

"Me?"

Momo first smiled, then replied in a very casual tone: "No way."

She caught a glimpse of the pink mixture of crushed petals and sap on Rukia's hand. It was an eye-piercing red that made her feel uneasy.

Evening.

Failing to find the letter in the student council office, Rukia sat alone in the President's chair, her fingertips unconsciously tracing the documents on the desk. The afterglow of the setting sun filtered through the glass, casting a shadow across her slightly furrowed brow and reflecting a surging tide of troubled thoughts.

Actually, entering the Kuchiki family had brought at least one good thing.

Since she no longer lived at school, once afternoon classes ended, the time was entirely her own, and no one would come looking for her at that hour.

Thus, no one knew she was currently in the student council office.

"Rukia?" Shin pushed the door open, holding a stack of freshly organized documents.

"President!"

Rukia sprang to her feet, involuntarily becoming stiff and constrained.

"Is something the matter?"

"No..."

Shin laughed in spite of himself. "If nothing's the matter, why haven't you left?"

"...There is something."

Shin walked over, poured two cups of water, and pressed one of them against her cheek. The warm touch startled her into looking up in a hurry, crashing straight into his smiling eyes.

"Go ahead."

Silence.

What was she supposed to say...

Rukia held the cup with both hands, struck dumb once more as ripples formed layer upon layer in the water.

In the courtyard outside the window, the figures of students were scattered about. Shin stood straight, one hand resting on the edge of the desk, the other holding a water cup. His gaze toward the window was calm and serene, half of his shoulder catching the very last rays of the day's afterglow, while the outline of his other side was already sinking into the indigo twilight.

"President."

She spoke suddenly, her voice so soft it seemed ready to melt into the sunset, "If... I mean if, someone didn't dare touch something important simply because they were too afraid of losing it, would they be very foolish?"

"Who knows?"

Shin chuckled lightly. "I'm hardly an expert at counseling people."

What kind of answer was that? Or perhaps he didn't want to answer at all.

Lowering her gaze, Rukia drank the water glumly.

Shin looked at her and suddenly asked, "Rukia, am I making things difficult for you?"

Instinctively, Rukia wanted to deny it. In the past, if she had heard the President say something like that, she definitely would have denied it, but not this time.

Because the President *was* indeed making things difficult for her; she had tossed and turned all night because of him.

After such things had happened, Shin acted completely like an outsider, as if none of it had anything to do with him.

In contrast, Rukia felt as though countless jars had been smashed inside her heart, spilling out a chaotic mess of emotions that she still hadn't sorted out.

The President...

He was truly exasperating!

Her lowered eyelashes trembled slightly. Suddenly, a vast shadow loomed over her—Shin had stepped right in front of her.

The President's slender fingers gently grazed her cheek, a gesture far more ambiguous than any before.

Rukia's breathing quickened. Then she thought, *Whatever*. Since words like that had already been spoken, what did it matter? Yet even as she thought this, Shin's fingertips began to lightly stroke her lips, setting her heart fluttering wildly.

Because when she lifted her eyes, she ran straight into Shin's gaze.

*No, this is wrong!*

She screamed madly in her heart, but her entire body remained frozen. She was terrified—afraid that Shin might suddenly do something she was even less prepared to face.

*He's not going to kiss me, is he?*

Her mind went blank as the thought flashed through her head.

Just then, however, she heard Shin's gentle voice once more: "Rukia, did I do something wrong?"

"..."

"Perhaps I should demand something of you, and then you wouldn't be in such turmoil, right?"

"Then why didn't you do that?" Rukia asked, finding courage from somewhere unknown.

"Because I didn't want to," Shin said.

Rukia didn't understand. "Why?"

"No particular reason. I didn't want to, that's all."

Shin didn't lean in to kiss her as she had half-expected; instead, he withdrew his hand. Rukia let out a sigh of relief, realizing she didn't know whether she would have dodged away if he actually had.

"So Rukia, you don't have to do things you don't want to do either."

Rukia sat in a daze for a long time.

At last, she arrived at a conclusion in her heart.

*Does he just not want to force me?*

Rukia lowered her head to look at the water in her hands. The liquid sloshed back and forth, carrying the faint, unformed melancholy unique to twilight.