_a/n: 2 INSPIRATION SONGS—the title of this fic comes from james bay's "when we were on fire" ; the lyrics within this fic are ben howard's "keep your head up" (which I would recommend a listening to because it may fuck you over as it had me when thinking of ichiruki...sigh)

take me back to where it was before
(when we were on fire)

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.

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i spent my time, watching
the spaces that have grown between us

He can't expect everything to be the same. Not with the time, the experiences, the worlds in between them, bridges fallen and gaps (holes) that are now present in his heart. She steps back (away.) Ichigo watches her slowly retreat from him, while Inoue tends to the wounds that paint his arms. Rukia can only smile, small and soft and in bittersweet resignation as she does. Someone else will fill the holes she has left.

Her time is up.

Their time is up.

and i cut my mind on second best

Ichigo, numb and lost from the outcome of this war, turns to the woman beside him. Inoue Orihime is bruised and battered and so-widely smiling. He wonders how she has it in herself to be so cheerful after everything that has happened—everything he has done.

And—as if she had read his mind, her large eyes, glimmering with a wet surface, meets his curious gaze. "...I'm so happy Kurosaki-kun's alive."

In turn, he lets a smile grace his features. Maybe all he needed was a reminder. Maybe Inoue will be the one to give that to him.

He watches her move from wound to wound, meticulous fingers slowly grazing the expanse of discolored skin.

If Ichigo were to look up for a single moment, he would see Rukia's retreating form get further and further away, smaller and smaller until she is out of sight.

He doesn't.

oh the scars that come with the greenness

They were on fire once, but that has long been put out.

She doesn't let herself cry.

She is Kuchiki Rukia, after all. She is a soldier, a warrior, a fighter. It ends how it begins: with she, a shinigami and he, a boy.

She doesn't have the time to rekindle an old flame.

She has lived lifetimes, and she refuses to steal the only one he has.

So: she lets the time pass. She lets the distance grow. She lets them change.

In the end, Rukia lets them burn out.

She leaves his heart and takes hers back.

Foolish girl, you knew what was coming.

and i try my best to embrace the darkness
in which i swim

It rains the night he returns to Karakura. He can only wince, furrow his brows in the crippling irony.

Ichigo is different—changed, inevitably so, but in some way, he feels that he can't shake the feeling that pieces of him have gone missing, as if he's been stripped and stolen from.

Still, he goes on.

keep your head up

Trudging forward is easier now than it had been. Perhaps because he is grown, through pain and through wonder. He knows how to get back up.

(Kuchiki Rukia had taught him that.)

And the rain will stop, eventually, with or without her.

keep your heart strong

She is preoccupied. She thrusts herself into her work, spars with Renji in moments in between, and never steps foot into the place of sanctuary she had once created a world away from her.

That would be selfish of her, and she is anything but. And Renji—he's always been taken by her.

For Rukia, it is not as cold anymore.

It begins to hurt less and less as the days turn to weeks, months, years.

Before Ichigo realizes, he is a few years older. The numbness of the battlefield dissipates, the longing of his younger days lessening without his notice. He doesn't feel as heavy.

"I'm glad Kurosaki-kun's starting to look like his old self, again," Inoue observes quietly. She's been here all along; throughout every lost phase, her heart unwavering.

He's glad, too.

'cause i'll always remember you the same

In the rare occasions where he lets his mind wander, he thinks of her.

It is odd, residing in the same place everything had started in. When he turns to his left, he remembers a woman stepping foot atop his desk, retiring simpler days in his closet, making a home of his family. There had been bickers and banters, snide remarks, smirk after smirk, and firefirefire. This had been a time where he had first felt a sense of determination burning in his gut that she would reignite effortlessly. He has a memory of her standing above his mother's grave, a large moon casting over the two of them. Her eyes were one of the brightest he'd ever seen that night, paralleling the moments she'd met his own seconds before her execution, or when she had stood at the windowsill of his classroom, or when she'd slide her zanpakutō into his very being for the second time.

He doesn't miss her, he would retort, if anybody were to ask. It would almost sound rehearsed. Ichigo is happy. He is.

It is only impossible to devoid himself of reminiscing, that's all.

Sometimes his mind even goes as far enough to think that a third time would be quite the charm.

(He sets fire to that thought before it seeps further into the crevices of his mind and settles itself.)

eyes like wild flowers within demons of change

The modern human habits stick with her, burdensome and embarrassingly so. What's worse is that she doesn't even notice. Sometimes she simply wants to watch films and in a theater, and eat things like popcorn and cotton candy and hot dogs (which aren't actually dogs, to her surprise and relief.) When she's forced to take a break (god forbid they just let her work) she finds herself craving an espresso of all things, remembering a time Ichigo had handed her the remainder of his white chocolate peppermint mocha. The rich flavor reminds her of something they celebrated—Christmas, which she believes is to be soon. She remembers so vividly because it had been her favorite.

"Didn't know you liked plants," Renji's brow raises at the miniature tree perched on her desk. He walks in on her hanging paper bunnies (that Yuzu had taught her to make) to it.

"It's for the holidays," she flushes, toying with the spiky branches.

He sends a questioning look in her direction. "A human thing," he clarifies.

She nods. It is silly, but it would be a lie to say small, silly and humane commodities didn't bring joy to her. And although her life has changed, there are some things that never will.

She isn't sure if she should be ashamed, or if she should discipline herself to not engage in these festive thoughts—that this was wrong and unprofessional. It's as if Renji senses her befuddled confliction, because he reaches to touch one of the hand-made ornaments with a delicate finger.

"Maybe you could teach me a thing or two," he offers, watching her as she fiddles her pen through the tree in amusement. "About being human."

Her eyes flicker to his instantaneously, all vivacious and luminescent, and too captivating for his own good.

(For a split second, he thanks Kurosaki—)

"Yeah," and he watches her lips curve at the corners.

(—for the existing brightness of her eyes and the smile that always seems to follow shortly afterward.)

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_a/n: i'm debating on whether or not this is actually finished. when i ended this, i thought it was finished. but when i reread it.. it didn't feel finished. feel like i'm lacking a little closure..what do you think?