A.N.: I originally wrote sometime after Shunsui announced to Tatsuki and the others that Ichigo might not return to the Human World, should he be able to defeat Ywach and become too strong to exist alongside humans. Obviously this was way before the manga ended, but. This is basically a fic I wrote when we were all still unsure about what would happen.

So. Set in a universe in which Ichigo was not able to return with his friends/loved ones to the Human World. And how this directly affected Orihime in particular.

From Orihime's Perspective.

Your apartment feels a thousand times bigger, and just as many times smaller, its corners pinched tight and its ceiling too high. You are caught between suffocation and detachment, fingers numb and chest tight. It is a few moments before you remind yourself to breathe, to shuffle forward into the kitchen and heat up a cup of tea. You force all thought from your mind and read over the letters left on your kitchen table, untouched from the last time you'd been here. You leave the cup in your sink and make your way into the bathroom, wash off all the sweat and grime and exhaustion from your skin, sink into your cold bed and squeeze your eyes shut.

You're good at this, remember? Pretending is what you do best—fitting that old mask over your face comes easy, comes natural, comes second only to breath and flow and twitch of finger.

You are asleep before you know it, but no amount of anything can stop you from dreaming.

And that's just fine. Your heart can torment itself all it wants there and no one can blame it.

So there, you are engulfed by all that you cannot have.

.x.

Things begin to fall back into place in the only way it can manage. Nobody can ignore the massive hole left behind and no one can deny how very quiet everything becomes but not a single person has the courage to dwell on it. They are as agonized as you are and you almost find comfort in this, sink yourself into the silent company Sado offers and wave off every apology Ishida can possibly toss your way.

It is only when Tatsuki takes you by the shoulders and makes you stare into her burning eyes that you realize how very different this sorrow is from the rest, how deeply it has affected you and how many cobwebs have been brushed clean from your soul.

It is only when you don't try to choke back the hurt slicing through you that you realize how much of who you once were has chipped and cracked from you like old paint.

It is only when your body is buckling into itself that it becomes clear how many of your walls have tumbled down, and for just a second you think you have become weaker, you think you have lost your armor, you think you have softened to tissue paper fit to dissolve at the first sign of rain—

But you lie in bed that night and you feel like you've never tasted the air this way before, like the world has switched its orbit and the things falling back into place were not what they used to be—not the act of forgetting and pretending and the remolding of masks, but the process of accepting and growing and moving on—and nothing is any better than it used to be but nothing is worse.

Nothing is trying to swallow you whole. Nothing is trying to steal what remains.

.x.

It still sounds so clear in your mind, it's almost like you're there again. That has to be the worst part, you think. That has to be the part that makes your throat hurt like that.

You are standing so near him you feel his warmth radiating off him like fire, like sun, like a close embrace you don't wanna break. Something between the two of you has fallen, some thin, thin curtain that at one time had been glass, had been stone, had been solid wall too thick to pierce. You are ruminating over this sensation, of feeling far too close and yearning for far more. The air between you feels electric, simmering with energy and revelations and soft-spoken promises.

Shattered completely when, with the tip of a wide-brimmed straw hat, you're all told, "He won't be coming with you."

Part of you knew this before the words were ever spoken, the same part that had locked up and stared with wide eyes and bursting heart and realized, He's far too big for this world, he's far bigger than the rest of us.

It spreads, just like frost would, over your bones and muscles and skin and wraps around your throat. This was inevitable, this was predictable, this was as natural as the realization that you had again been left so far behind you cannot even see the bottom of the mountain you'd have to climb to catch up.

You are already aware you never will, this is as concrete as the way the energy between the two of you flares and sears and twists with the ferocity of his reaction. All chemical, all burning sun, all too-big-heart and too-much-too-soon and—

"If you go back, all you know will cease to exist."

If someone asked you what you loved most about him, a million thoughts would flood your mind before you could ever grasp a single one. But in this moment, it is his maturity, his ability to just know when fighting and rebelling and refusing would not do a single thing, his ability to understand when his own personal feelings were outweighed by the well being of others.

It is his selflessness.

He turns, all fluid, all liquid, all ripple and soundless and slow. His eyes are tight and his brow pinched and he looks at everyone else before his gaze settles on you.

When you are quick to smile, something behind his eyes flinches and you know he recognizes the look.

You recognize his, too, but clasp your hands behind you when he returns the smile.

Quicker than ever before, images of what could have been—what might not have been either way—flash through your mind and you are almost overcome by them. You let the first whisper of doubt touch your ear and you lean yourself into it. If it had happened, if everything you'd dreamed had unfurled, would you both have woken up one day recalling the times that had been and regretted everything that came after? Would you have turned in bed and seen his head on your pillow and lost the fluttering in your chest? Would you have stopped loving him?

You take refuge in this thought, let it pull you into its arms as he mumbles some misplaced apology and force the urge to throw yourself in his to the very back of your mind.

"We'll come and visit you! As much as we can," you assure, coat the wobble in your voice with sugar sweetness, stifle the follow-up you wish so much to say.

Every day, it goes. I'd visit you every single day if I could.

His eyes search yours and you are aware you have stolen too much of his attention. You are not the only person in his world and you have no right to soak away all of his goodbyes. And so you drift, back toward the others, to allow them their piece. The current between you strains, holds taut, and meters away it buzzes for attention. Your heart is pounding but you will not look at him.

You have said all that you are allowed to say.

.x.

Graduation is approaching fast, and you let all thoughts of what comes after fall over your head. The thought of moving far, far away from here occurs to you once or twice, but every step in that direction suggests the act of running away and you are glad no one calls you out on this. You think of seaside, of busy cities, of quiet country, of foreign lands, of everywhere but here—you already know what you're trying to do, every street has a memory and every memory a ghost and every ghost another knot in your stomach you cannot undo.

Every time the marks are posted your eyes seek out his name and you remind yourself that this is only muscle memory.

Every time you step into class you look at the desk that was once his and you remind yourself that is only muscle memory.

Every time you close up the bakery you work at and stack all the rejected—left over—bread you take a step in the direction of his home before correcting and spinning toward yours and you remind yourself that this is only muscle memory.

Every time you laugh at a funny joke your head turns to look for him within your group of friends and you remind yourself that this is only muscle memory.

Everything you do that brings his face to mind, simple reflex. A slip of the mind.

He was so engrained in all you did, it's only natural this gnawing emptiness has formed at the base of your heart.

It's only natural you can't let go.

The worst, you think, is when you imagine how many time his sisters berated themselves over a simple glance toward the empty chair at the dinner table, his name falling from their tongues in the morning, opening the door to his cold room and finding his scent has left the sweaters they might wear to feel less alone, their brains telling them his voice had said their name and turning too quick in that direction—

A lump forms at your throat and you try not to picture how low their hearts will sink when he's not at their soccer games or play recitals or anniversaries or birthdays.

Graduation is approaching fast and you try not to imagine the chair that would've been his, the future he would have had.

.x.

"I went to see him this weekend," Tatsuki mentions, and you almost knock over the cups in your surprise.

"Oh?" you fill in politely, fold a napkin to dab away the droplets that had escaped.

"Everyone has," she continues. "Keigo, Mizuiro, and I can only go in with passes and we've used ours—they'll give us more soon, but the point is we can't go very often at all. At the most, maybe twice a year."

"That's unfortunate," you say genuinely.

She places her hand over your teacup so that you'll look at her. "You can go whenever you please."

You fidget, squirm under her hard eyes, and mumble, "I know."

"He asked about you. You don't wanna know how hurt he looked you didn't come with me."

You can already see it, and within your chest your heart twists so terribly you visibly wince. "I need time," you admit. "I know that if I see him again I won't be able to let go as easy and—I'll only end up hating myself in the end. I need time to...adjust to life...without him."

Tatsuki's eyes soften and she removes her hand. "Don't let too much time pass. He's as fragile as you are."

You don't ask what she means by this, you already know how deeply he can care for a person. You assume you fall under this, too.

"After graduation," you promise. "I won't be distracted from studying and I won't have anything to keep me from going."

.x.

Part of you thinks it would be easier if, with his absence, your abilities had gone with him. Seeing what others cannot brings memories, of the days before and after war and bloodshed and otherworldly power.

Before you know it, you are stopping to right knocked over vases of flowers, and leave small tokens at each memorial leaned against light poles. You are kneeling before translucent children and telling them of lives they can have after the fact. You are filling the job he once had, tethering yourself to the one thing you can of his and pretending your heart isn't aching because of it.

You are learning that just because it hurts doesn't mean it'll break again. You are learning there is growth in taking a small step back, that letting go is not always moving on.

You are learning that everything will be okay. You are learning that the sky is still blue and the clouds still white, and the world still round. You are learning that even the smallest acts of humility bring about the greatest pleasures.

He knew that, and in time you do, too.

.x.

You are well into your first year of college when you finally do visit him. It is winter and you cleaned your entire apartment twice in preparation of your leave. Christmas is just around the corner and you have completed a few assignments on the syllabus in advance, if only to keep yourself from making any unnecessary excuses. You wrap yourself in coat and scarf and boots and tuck your hair behind your ears.

Last week, Sado dropped by to tell you, "He misses you like crazy."

Hope rekindled within you so intensely you had to swallow to contain it. You promise, and take the time to curl your pinky around his massive one, that you will definitely go soon.

You lock up your apartment and make your way to Urahara's shop for the first time in almost a year. He silently tips his hat in your direction and his smile feels to you like an old knit sweater, a foggy memory of your life before. His shop smells like sandalwood and spices and citrus and you duck your head on your way down into the world beneath it. The portal into Seireitei opens up and on the way in he hands over a small charm and says, "For easier access."

You aren't surprised he knows you'll want to come back, just that he has the faith in you to know you'll leave in the first place.

It is cold there, too. Your hands find your pockets and your shoulders hunch and you shut your eyes for just a moment. Finding him is so easy it's like snapping a rubber band back to size, you gasp audibly and fall back a step, your mind is immediately there—recalling his warmth, his fire, his sun, his all-encompassing presence.

Your feet take you there without really thinking about it, eyes soaking in the sight of the world that had, at one time, been nothing but chunks of debris and charred earth. Now, snow blankets the ground where cobble and building did not, restored back to its magnificence and lit with a new glow that had not been there before. Better, you dare think, than it'd been before.

He is moving, slowly, along the edge of the forest. Why he's there, you don't know, but you are suddenly sprinting, trying to cover as much ground as possible. You recall a river, you recall small homes out there, you recall the calming quiet and wonder if, perhaps, he lives there.

You yearn to ask, to know if he belonged to any squad or if he'd already become captain to one. If he had taken to their ranks, or if he'd decided he wanted no more of it.

Did he still draw his sword? Did he still grin when he did it?

When you break from cobblestone to dirt road to forest, you hardly pause for a second. Your heart is pounding and your breath is short and you're wondering why you took so long to do any of this. The snow crunches under your boots and your hair slips from behind your ears and don't pay any heed to your appearance. However you look, he would look dozens of times more beautiful than you could ever hope to match.

His soul is burning you now, he's so close. The sensation is so new, and yet so secondhand, that when you slam into him, you're not entirely surprised you misjudged the distance.

His hands scramble for hold, more considerate over your well being than his own, and he stumbles, falters, tumbles down into the snow and accidentally pulls you with. A flurry of snow jumps away from you and some of it soaks into your pants, but you dig your palms into the ground on either side of him and press your ear into his chest, find his heartbeat, and feel your entire being melt in tandem. You push yourself up to look at him and his eyes find your face with wonder, lips parted and brow smooth and expression open with awe. It makes your breath catch, and when his fingers, cooled by the snow, come up to touch your cheek gently, you shiver right down to your bones.

"Inoue," he breathes, and he smiles so brilliantly a sob escapes you, shakes your shoulders and makes your eyes squint shut.

He's even more beautiful than you remember.

His palms cup your cheeks and he's still smiling, eyes warmer than any cup of tea. He wipes the tears from your eyes with his thumbs and tells you, "I'm glad you're here."

"I missed you," you choke out, fingers wrapping about his wrists. "I missed you, you don't know how different things are without you."

His eyes tighten, and you realize that he does know.

Oh, how could you have forgotten the most important part?

You love him because he loves too deeply, just like you do.

He tugs you into him, folds you into his arms, and lets you tuck your face into his throat. When his lips press warmly against your forehead, it feels as natural as breathing.

.x.

The house he lives in sits near the bank of a frozen lake, miles deep in the forest. There is a hill on the other side of the clearing where beyond there is a clear view of the poorer districts and the mountains caging them in. He tells you, with hand steadying you by the arm, that in the mornings the sun peeked over the tops of those mountains and he sometimes woke up early enough to catch it.

His new home is small, hardly big enough to breathe in, you hold yourself so tight you feel your joints ache—you're afraid you'll break what he's managed to make out for himself. The heat from the tea he brews clouds thick and heady against your skin, makes your cheeks flush and your toes curl and you are trapped by his gaze when he turns to look at you again.

"How have you been?" he asks, and smiles gentle and kind. "How are you feeling?"

When you don't answer immediately, you see him rethink his words, brow creased and head tilted and you cannot help finding this endearing. "Just fine," you say, and know he doesn't believe you.

"I haven't been, either," he confides, and this allows whatever spider-web wall hanging between you to fall, to tear, to collapse right at your feet.

That's right, you think, chest filling and spine tingling. That's right. We've been here before.

"I'm sorry," you force out, bowing your head. "I'm sorry, I don't know how to do this."

He knows what you mean. Partly because he's felt it, too, and partly because he knows you all too well. You are an open book and you're not sure how long you'd been, but the fact that he looks at you like that—no judgment or pity or any amount of disdain—tells you all you need to know.

"I miss you, too," he says.

You hardly hear the kettle shriek.

.x.

When he kisses you that night, you don't recall a younger you—day dreaming about this very moment in a dozen different ways—you don't want to make this what it isn't. He is kissing you because you're both so full of memories and hot tea and chilly wind and nostalgia that every thoughtless brush of shoulder against shoulder or foot to side of foot sends shocks, all throughout the system until you are drunk on touch alone.

Hand upon hand and then hair and then jaw and then cheek and then cupping the back of neck, his mouth timidly finding yours, all wet, all warm, all him.

Something inside of you bursts, a catalyst, and you can't stop yourself anymore. All that he gives you take almost greedily—it's hard now to tell who the bad guy is when he keeps pushing for more and you likewise keep pulling, but there's the ebb and flow of things; there is balance, there is pattern, there is the odd sense of familiarity even though you both bristle with inexperience and anxious fear—

Your teeth click his and he accidentally pulls your hair lying down, his bed is so small there's hardly any room for twist or turn, there's lots of elbows and knees and mumbled apologies and the longer you both take fumbling around one another the more you realize that this is almost exactly how you want it. His face is a brilliant red and every few seconds he retracts his hands to wipe his sweat from them and when he tentatively skims his fingers down the curve of your waist he quietly asks, "Is this okay?"

You push away the part of you that has imagined him doing this before, in your bedroom or maybe his, the part of you that clings onto the past for dear life and silently wishes nothing had ever changed.

You whisper, "Yes," and sink yourself into the realization that you cannot control fate, that you cannot rewrite the universe, that you cannot keep wallowing within your own remorse. If there's any way to have this moment, you'll take it.

Nothing about either of you has ever been orthodox.

His mouth tentatively finds yours again, and you let yourself be taken by this—this moment and all its complications.

And afterward, he lies with his head pillowed at your chest and his thumb drifts back and forth and back and forth over your arm, his breath puffs warm against your breast, and he tells you, voice rumbling like thunder against your ribs, "I wish time could stop."

You close your eyes. Oh, that hurts, too.

"I wish we could stay like this forever."

.x.

His kisses you again in the morning, hair mussed and lips softened from sleep. And then again before you leave. Each one lingers too many seconds too long, plead for you to stay, and it makes your knees weaken every time.

You're not sure what any of this means. Your skin is blotched with red marks where his mouth had been, tingling underneath all your layers of clothing. Your body recalls and misses the callouses on his fingers and palms, the shake when nervous laughter erupted from the both of you when things didn't quite work out the way you'd hoped.

You don't ask him. Every time you work up the nerve you feel it shrink and shrivel away.

Would it be silly to ask, after everything that's happened?

You decide it is, when he pulls you into him for another kiss.

"Don't stay away so long," he says. "It's cold without you."

.x.

You apartment feels too large, too small, and of course the thought occurs to you that it would feel just right if you could only share it with someone else. The extra chair at the kitchen table deserves permanent resident but you decide that's just as well.

Soon, you will become good enough to fill these spaces by yourself.

.x.