Coffee Flavored Angel (Bleach Fanfic)

Dark with a Dash of Cinnamon

 Getting the call from the college regarding the fact Toshiro hadn't shown up for class left an unpleasant feeling in Gin's chest. Rangiku always called the school when their child ended up to sick to go to class, and they weren't to call under said situation. Toshiro started hanging out at Nanao's place a lot during the last school year, and Gin blamed Ichigo. The orange haired teen, now college student, was the one person the man knew Toshiro hung out with, so anything bad had to be blamed on the boy.

Nanao of course denied the fact the fifteen year old was at her place, but a call to Rangiku due to having no other ideas of where to look for their son revealed Toshiro really was at the coffee shop. To make matters worse he'd been their all day, and his ex-girlfriend's best friend felt the need to lie to him. He walked out of the exhibition and ignored the person trying to lecture him about getting his priorities straight due to his position within the family.

He arrived at the shop and smelled the strong smell of coffee and remembered the time he'd come here with Rangiku. Kyoraku and Ukitake still ran the shop, and for a brief while Gin was able to work at the place to escape the problems he was trying to escape. Eventually though they caught up with him. The familiar feeling though didn't do anything to relax the panicked feeling in his chest, and the feeling became worse as he watched a situation unfold between his son and a girl around Toshiro's age.

The next thing he knew Ichigo was stopping him from back slapping the girl, and then he was cleaning up the coffee mess while Nanao and Ichigo watched from a distance. Gin's pale eyes took notice of the dark haired female that his ex-girlfriend's best friend employed. The need to take care of Toshiro superseded everything else. The table was clean, and he ordered the drink he and Rangiku bonded over. "Not as if that would really help matters."

The sketchpad still lay on the floor as his son sat their staring at the now dry table. Somehow the boy had managed to sit down on his own, and despite Gin's best efforts the corner still reeked of spilled coffee. He opened the book, and found Toshiro to have quite the natural gift for drawing. He then noticed every single picture in the sketchpad was of the girl behind the counter. He let out a sigh as he came to the last picture. "Creepy."

Gin looked up in time to see Toshiro visibly flinch at the comment, and the girl slam down the two cups of coffee. "You're an absolute jerk. The fact you don't like Toshiro drawing during his free time doesn't give you the right to treat him like trash."

The sketchpad lowered to the silver haired man's lap as he looked at the girl. He then looked back at his son who wasn't paying any attention at this point to what was going on visably. One bone thin hand held the sketchpad up as he flinched his head away so he wouldn't have to look her in the eye when she found out his son was stalking her. "Take a look."

Toshiro's head jerked up in a panic, and Gin found himself having to grab the coffees so they wouldn't spill over the table again. "No! Why did..."

"I can't." The girl moved to give the sketchpad back to Toshiro.

Gin's hand shot up to prevent her from doing so. "Don't. You need to take a look at his drawings before you say I was wrong for saying what I did."

The girl looked at the two rather reluctantly before taking the time to open up the sketchpad. Her eyes widened slightly when she looked at the first picture while Toshiro looked out the window nervously. The fifteen year old still worried his bottom lip when he knew he'd done something wrong like he did when he was a toddler. "I don't see what's creepy about his drawings. You're actually pretty good."

"I don't need you to lie to me Karin." Toshiro rested his chin in the palm of his hand, and refused to look her in the eye. "You heard that girl who was in here with her friends a few minutes ago. She quite clearly stated the pictures I drew were ugly."