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“Shunsui…is this you?”
“Hmm?” Shunsui tipped his head back to look at his fiancé.
“This picture,” Nanao repeated, before she walked back to him, a small frame in hand.
Shunsui took one look at the photo before a grin split his lips at the very old photo that Nanao had found.
“I mean; I know it’s you. I’ve just never seen any photographs of you and captain Ukitake so…young.”
Shunsui quirked an eyebrow, “Are you calling me old Nanao-chan?”
She rolled her eyes, “I’m not answering that.”
He placed the photo on the table and leaned closer to her, “My maturity is one of the things that attracted you to me though, isn’t it Nanao-chan?” His voice dipped suggestively towards the end of his sentence.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she snapped.
Ukitake returned just as Shunsui’s laughter died down, if he’d heard anything of their conversation, he was too polite to let it show. Nanao had always thought that Ukitake had an excellent poker face, most likely the product of years of having to cover up for Shunsui, something she could sympathize with all too well.
“What’s this?” Ukitake asked as he set the tea down.
“My beautiful fiancé has found a photograph of yours from our last year at the Academy,” Shunsui responded. Nanao knew better than to try and get Shunsui to address her properly, and it wasn’t as if Ukitake wasn’t used to it.
She loved him for it regardless.
“Oh?” Ukitake murmured as he took the photograph from Shunsui’s hand. A soft smile spread across his lips and his eyes seemed to lose focus as long neglected memories came back to the front of his mind.
“This was taken a month before our graduation,” Ukitake said. “One of our classmates had been to the Living World, and it was right around the time when polaroid cameras were popular.”
Shunsui chuckled, “I remember now. He took photos of everyone, he even tried to take one of Yama-jii…that camera didn’t last long.”
Ukitake laughed, “He was so broken hearted.”
Nanao smiled as she listened to them. Although she’d agreed to marry him, there was still an incredible amount she didn’t know about Shunsui, the depth of his relationship with Ukitake was just one of those aspects. She’d watched their interactions since she’d become a member of the Gotei 13, sometimes it was as if they were extensions of each other. Which was strange to her because they were very different people.
Picking up the photograph again, she studied the two young men pictured there. They almost looked foreign, there was an innocence and youth in their features that had been stripped away long ago.
“Admiring me in my youth, Nanao-chan?” Shunsui teased.
She smirked, “Absolutely not. I just don’t see many pictures of you with short hair and sparse facial hair.”
“Are my long hair and beard things you love about me, my precious Nanao-chan?”
He barely managed to avoid being hit with the frame.
Ukitake laughed, drawing both Shunsui and Nanao out of their momentary lover’s spat.
“You two are good for each other. It’s a good thing you finally came to your senses, Kyōraku. “
Shunsui’s eyebrows hit his hairline, “Me?! I’ve professed my love for my Nanao-chan for years!”
Nanao smiled at the knowing look Ukitake gave her. She didn’t doubt that Shunsui understood exactly what Ukitake was implying, but there was no way he’d abandon the light-hearted atmosphere of the night to speak about something so serious.
“You know, Nanao-chan,” Shunsui stated, changing the subject. “Ukitake was quite the lady’s man himself during his years at the Academy.”
Ukitake made a sound of protest, shaking his head vehemently. “Don’t even go there, Kyōraku. I was no such thing.”
“Nonsense Ukitake! I remember quite a trail of broken hearts, but none of them compared to Hoshino-san. That was her name right? Ukitake?”
Shunsui’s head tossed back in laughter as Ukitake murmured something about dishes and excused himself from the table. Nanao laughed along with her fiancé, but only because she knew that Ukitake would get his revenge in some form or another, and that would be a spectacle in and of itself.
She stole one final glance down at the photograph on the table. It was true that the boys in the photo were long gone, but she’d become quite fond of the men that had replaced them.