I'm not exactly sure where this came from. But it was begging to come out. And so I let it.

This is my very first one-shot. I hope I did it justice. There's just so much to say. It's hard to say it all with so few words. It's pretty hard to put into words period. But I tried.

Enjoy.

"That Love is all there is,
Is all we know of Love."

Emily Dickinson

Words Were Not Adequate

Hitsugaya stared down at his fukutaichou long and hard as he leaned idly against the door frame to his personal living quarters. Hyourinmaru pressed against his back, pushed rather uncomfortably against his spine by the edges of the wall, but he ignored it. Ignored both the sword and the humming of the dragon within. There was only one thing occupying his mind at the moment, and it was enough to erase all else from existence.

Snuggled in his futon in his room under his blanket was a splayed-out Matsumoto, one slender hand firmly attached to a nearly empty bottle of sake. Another six bottles lay in disarray around her. Her shihakushou was still cradling her well-formed body, though it appeared to be slipping down one of her shoulders gradually, most likely from excess tossing around in her sleep. Her maple golden brows furrowed and unfurrowed in her alcohol-induced slumber, voluptuous lips contorted into a biting frown.

Tense, then sad. Tense, then sad.

The young taichou could easily make out the glistening tears that were unwillingly blossoming from her tightly shut eyes, one considerably large drop still clutching her full-bodied eyelashes as if its release would mean her very destruction. And, in a way, Hitsugaya knew it would. Just as every other drop that had fallen from those pale orbs had meant the same.

"G … Gin," he barely heard her whisper above the sound of his own measured breathing. "Why…? Gin…"

The name brought a number of emotions crawling to the forefront of his mind. Strange emotions that for all his extensive vocabulary he could not quite describe in words. But, for all the emotions that he could feel, he knew that one in particular was dangerously lacking.

He felt no anger. He could not feel anger. Not with this women laying before him, poring her petrified heart out to an empty bottle.

After everything that had happened, after everything they had gone through together as taichou and fukutaichou, he should feel anger. He should be angry at the man who had done so much to topple his world, Matsumoto's world, Hinamori's world. He should be angry that Ichimaru had betrayed them all.

After all, that was what he felt when he thought of what Aizen had done to Hinamori. Every time he stood in that room, silently looking down at her comatose, frail body, he felt a number of emotions. He felt sad. He felt guilty. He felt weary. He felt angry.

He should feel angry now.

But he was not.

His only concern was with the woman before him. And despite Hyourinmaru's soft thrums asking for at least some sort of reaction, he remained still, staring at her sordid form.

And sordid it was. Maimed. Scarred. Degraded. Wretched.

She lay before him a defeated woman, a side to herself that she never revealed in public. It was a side she kept behind bars, locked, the key safely buried deeper and deeper with every bottle of liquor she gulped greedily down. Tonight though, she had not run off, leaving paperwork unfinished, to gallivant her troubles away with Abarai or Izuru. She had come, probably already fairly drunk, into his room and collapsed on his futon. She had come to a deserted island among a raging sea of business and activity, a place she knew she would not be disturbed, in order to cry away each and every wrongdoing that had been committed toward her and each and every wrongdoing she herself had committed.

This was wrong. This was sad. This was utter bliss.

He hated each and every tear that broke away from her resolve. And yet he loved them for all that they held in their short-lived but meaningful existence.

"Taichou…" came the whisper once again. "Taichou… I'm sorry…"

A stirring fluttered within his stomach as those language-defying emotions and thoughts and feelings processed his fukutaichou's words at their most open and most vulnerable. He understood in a way he was strangely sure that only he could. He, her taichou. He, her companion. He, her…

Her what?

Yet again his vocabulary eluded him.

What was he to her? What was she to him?

Was there a word to express the way he couldn't help but grin when she snored as she slept upon the couch in his office? The way he blushed fervently whenever she hugged him tightly to her breasts? The way he scowled whenever he had to drag her back to his office and force her under penalty of becoming a shinigami popsicle to finally finish off her last few unfinished mission reports for the week? The way he looked into her eyes, and she into his, and they both knew instantly what needed to be done and how to go about doing it? The way he felt right at this moment, staring at her drunken mass, utterly pathetic and helpless for all its visual splendor?

Did it really need a word?

Finally, he felt his back lift from the doorway as he slowly, mechanically walked across the room. He picked up each bottle, one by one, forcing the last one from her tightly clenched fingers, and lined them up next to the trash can in the far corner of the room. He then turned back toward his futon and sat down next to her, gently pulling her robes back into place and the blanket back up over her shoulders. Leaning in, inch by inch bringing him closer to her still troubled face, he threaded his fingers through a stray locke of golden hair in order to remove it from her eyes.

"Matsumoto…" he whispered into her ear, knowing full well that she could not hear him. He watched as she pouted slightly, shifting her position. "You, of all people, have nothing to apologize for."

His lips met her forehead gently, softly, the smallest of gestures to release the greatest of emotions. As he lifted his head once more, his hand idly caressed her moist cheeks, wiping away the tears and all that they carried within them.

He thought of all the pranks she had played over the years. All of the times she had procrastinated on her share of the paperwork. All of the times she had made a snide joke about his height or his strictness. All of the times she had gotten herself so undeniably drunk that someone had had to call him over to escort her back to her room.

A small smile flickered across his features before he leaned back, looking up to the dark and unforgiving night sky he knew was there beyond the stark white ceiling.

"You may just be the only one who doesn't."

End