satoko ayakura | 綾倉 聡子 (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thewisechild) wrote2025-02-05 12:14 pm
thewisechild) wrote2025-02-05 12:14 pm
Entry tags:
fic: well-wishes (bleach x-over)
WELL-WISHES
?
Every week, her mother visits at the same time, shown to the Kuchiki house’s serene tearoom where Satoko, likewise every week, sits waiting for her, the ceremony only beginning in the moment her mother, bowing slightly, enters the space. Satoko gestures at the seat opposite her, then starts by offering her guest a newly procured chestnut cream sweet from the kitchen in the style of the season that they both eat in silence, neatly and without spilling. After this, Satoko moves on to cleansing the utensils, working in silence, feeling her mother’s alert gaze on her body, following every of her moves. It's what they call scrutiny, isn’t that so?
The water takes a long time to boil.
Once it does, however, Satoko adds two scoopfuls of matcha powder to both their cups, then pours hot water over the first, the one for her mother, the honoured guest, whisking it briskly for half a minute until it foams and thickens. Her mother doesn’t reach for her serving until Satoko actively holds it out, they both know these rituals to death. What else did she learn as a child, except the preparation to become an adult woman?
Then, she makes a cup for herself as well. Not until Satoko has sat back on her heels, back straight and chin slightly raised, fingers folded around the ceramic bowl, does the talking begin. It’s supposed to be light and unproblematic, no difficult topics.
Her mother opens, “are you well, Satoko?”
Satoko knows it’s not a show of concern for her as much as it means, are you with child? Not, are you happy? Not, does it please you when you wake up in the middle of the night next to him, his hair in your face, his presence heavy next to you, does it make your heart soar? No.
Are you pregnant?
Like most women who aren’t virgins anymore and of a certain standing, and most likely all other women, too, she tracks her bleeding, keeps it under close surveillance, should it tell her something everyone, Byakuya-sama’s family, her own family, the surrounding society, is anxious to know. Although it has never been spoken plainly, this clause, Satoko has seen other noble marriages end on lesser grounds than the woman not being able to produce a child.
It was part of the arrangement. She should bring a Kuchiki heir.
It’s not as painfully desperate an awareness anymore. Not because she doesn’t want Byakuya-sama’s child, children, family, no one should mistake how much she does, but because they’re creating something else first and whatever order these things take, it is good enough for her. She takes it one day at a time. She feels too much joy not to, after all.
She is too greedy not to indulge as she best can.
And because she is happy, because it pleases her to wake up next to Byakuya-sama in the morning, much too early to her liking, but she sees him off even so, of course, what Satoko replies, before taking the first sip of her tea, one of three, is:
“I won’t ask for anything more, Mother.”
Not, I couldn’t, because most likely she could ask for anything and Byakuya-sama would do what he could to give it to her, that is how secure he has made her feel in this household, but I won’t. He has already given her all this and everything that is bestowed upon her besides is in addition, it is extra.
It isn’t that she doesn’t want it. It’s that she doesn’t want him to give more than what he holds between his hands. Satoko simply trusts that in time, his hands will take up more and more, won’t they, and she can be patient for him.
His hands are worth waiting for.
Her mother proceeds to talk about the weather. It has been an unusually mild autumn so far, it bodes for a harsh winter, you know? Except, Satoko isn’t sure she knows. Perhaps it’ll be a different kind of seasonal change this year.
Who can say, it might just get even better.
The water takes a long time to boil.
Once it does, however, Satoko adds two scoopfuls of matcha powder to both their cups, then pours hot water over the first, the one for her mother, the honoured guest, whisking it briskly for half a minute until it foams and thickens. Her mother doesn’t reach for her serving until Satoko actively holds it out, they both know these rituals to death. What else did she learn as a child, except the preparation to become an adult woman?
Then, she makes a cup for herself as well. Not until Satoko has sat back on her heels, back straight and chin slightly raised, fingers folded around the ceramic bowl, does the talking begin. It’s supposed to be light and unproblematic, no difficult topics.
Her mother opens, “are you well, Satoko?”
Satoko knows it’s not a show of concern for her as much as it means, are you with child? Not, are you happy? Not, does it please you when you wake up in the middle of the night next to him, his hair in your face, his presence heavy next to you, does it make your heart soar? No.
Are you pregnant?
Like most women who aren’t virgins anymore and of a certain standing, and most likely all other women, too, she tracks her bleeding, keeps it under close surveillance, should it tell her something everyone, Byakuya-sama’s family, her own family, the surrounding society, is anxious to know. Although it has never been spoken plainly, this clause, Satoko has seen other noble marriages end on lesser grounds than the woman not being able to produce a child.
It was part of the arrangement. She should bring a Kuchiki heir.
It’s not as painfully desperate an awareness anymore. Not because she doesn’t want Byakuya-sama’s child, children, family, no one should mistake how much she does, but because they’re creating something else first and whatever order these things take, it is good enough for her. She takes it one day at a time. She feels too much joy not to, after all.
She is too greedy not to indulge as she best can.
And because she is happy, because it pleases her to wake up next to Byakuya-sama in the morning, much too early to her liking, but she sees him off even so, of course, what Satoko replies, before taking the first sip of her tea, one of three, is:
“I won’t ask for anything more, Mother.”
Not, I couldn’t, because most likely she could ask for anything and Byakuya-sama would do what he could to give it to her, that is how secure he has made her feel in this household, but I won’t. He has already given her all this and everything that is bestowed upon her besides is in addition, it is extra.
It isn’t that she doesn’t want it. It’s that she doesn’t want him to give more than what he holds between his hands. Satoko simply trusts that in time, his hands will take up more and more, won’t they, and she can be patient for him.
His hands are worth waiting for.
Her mother proceeds to talk about the weather. It has been an unusually mild autumn so far, it bodes for a harsh winter, you know? Except, Satoko isn’t sure she knows. Perhaps it’ll be a different kind of seasonal change this year.
Who can say, it might just get even better.