Road to Redemption

Chapter 15: Christmas

A/N: Hello everyone! Sorry I took a bit, this chapter has a fight scene and those take me forever to make. Anyway I want to let you all know that if you don't see me updating in a while is cuz there's an alert that Tropical Storm Beryl will be passing near Puerto Rico and given that we're still recovering from Hurrcaine Maria this could mean power, internet and other things might get faulty again. I apologize in advance as I do not know how long it'll take for everything to be fixed if the storm does wreck havoc. Thanks for reading and I hope you like the chapter.

©Bleach and its characters don't belong to me. they belong to Tite Kubo and Shounen Jump. Only Shizuka belongs to me.

Chapter 15: Christmas

The woman was in an excellent mood today. He didn't think much of it until he saw the date on the calendar. 'December 25th' So it was Christmas today. He'd heard about the celebration and it looked simple enough. However, the meaning of it seemed to vary from country to country. Western countries considered it a religious holiday, while Eastern countries celebrated it just for fun rather than tradition.

He didn't have any ties to the celebration, but he had bought small gifts for his acquaintances.

While the woman silently prayed in front of her brother's picture he calmly retreated to his room and took out her gift along with the others.

The puppy followed him to his room. Ulquiorra put his finger over his lips, Hoping the puppy would stay silent. "Here, this is for you." He put a dog toy on the floor, it was a bit of yarn rope. Kukkapuro seemed to love it, and barked in appreciation.

"You're welcome. Now let's go see Orihime." The two of them walked downstairs as she had finished her prayers.

Ulquiorra handed her a small rectangular box "Merry Christmas woman."

She looked surprised and even blushed a little. "Thank you, Ulquiorra. I'm really flattered you got me a gift." She opened the small box and smiled brightly.

Inside it, there was a silver-colored choker with a tiny chain necklace attached to it, the necklace had a teal charm in the shape of a hibiscus flower with a black number four inside.

"This is beautiful! Where did you get it?"

"I went to our usual shop and bought the choker and the chain for the necklace, the charm was costume made by Jeanne. She had apprenticed as a jeweler when she was human and volunteered to put the piece together."

She was close to crying and hugged him tightly. "Thank you so much, Ulquiorra. This is the cutest present ever! Oh, wait a second let me get your gift."

This time it was his turn to be surprised. Orihime left the room and came back with a green box and a squeaky toy. She left the toy on the floor for Kukkapuro to pick up. The puppy once again barked in gratitude and took his new toys to the couch.

"Here's your present. I hope you like it."

Ulquiorra opened the box to find a book inside. It was dark green and didn't have a title when he opened the book he was surprised by what he saw. The book was not filled with words, but rather pictures, usually of the times he and the woman were resting at home. There was one of them on their first day at the bakery, another of them dancing at the club, he was even surprised to see there was one of them in Hueco Mundo.

Among the pages there were also drawings, he assumed they were made by the woman. While the drawings weren't of professional quality they looked realistic enough that he could tell what she wanted to show. There was a drawing of him in his release form, another as a chibi with a speech bubble that read 'woman', and another one of them dressed as astronauts in a red planet with a weird creature, but his favorite was the last one he saw.