Bleach Fan Fiction ❯ She Will Be Loved ❯ Chapter 3 ( Chapter 3 )

She Will Be Loved

 

By Tituba

 

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach or any Bleach affiliates.

 

(A/N: Wow, so many reviews! I really love all of them! Thanks to everyone, so much! More or less background and stuff in this chapter. Kindly remember it's AU, so facts from the anime/manga might be different. Also, on one note, Kaien will be in this story. But later.

Please tell me what you think; I really love all the reviews, especially since this is a different type of fic. ;)

 

 

 

 

Chapter 3

 

Rukia forced a smile onto her face and walked up towards the steps where her friends waited.

 

“Hello everyone!” She said lightly, flipping a piece of hair away from her face.

 

“Good morning Rukia,” Ishida said evenly, she smiled softly at him. His voice never seemed to change. When he was excited or sad or even terrified his voice still remained the same. “You look tired.”

 

“Oh,” Rukia said, raising a hand and rubbing her eyes jokingly. “Yeah, I had a late night last night.” She smiled back at Ishida and pretended to look horrified, “What? Do I look terrible?”

 

“No Rukia!” Keigo interrupted, placing a hand on her shoulder and laughing jovially, “You look beautiful as ever.”

 

“Thanks Keigo.” She murmured, yawning just a bit, for that she didn't even have to pretend.

 

“You seem to have lots of late nights, Rukia,” bubbled Orihime, tugging onto Ichigo's arm happily. “What keeps you up all the time? I mean, it's not like we have lots of homework.” She turned to Ichigo and giggled again, “Right Ichi?”

 

Ichi. Rukia thought disgustedly. She had always hated when Orihime called him that. She had no right.

 

Ichigo sent Rukia a small, worried, look and swallowed. Rukia simply shrugged and looked away. Ichigo knew better. She would never tell.

 

“I was just working on a little project,” she answered instead, “You know, extra credit; I need to pull up my foreign language grade just a bit.”

 

“But Rukia,” Ishida queried, “You speak English fluently and you're working on French.” He leaned his thin body against the stairs and pushed his glasses up his nose.

 

“So?” Rukia retaliated swiftly, being very careful to add a trace of teasing to her brutal tone, “Nii-sama always says that an A+ is better than an A.”

 

Keigo sighed and shook his head as he bounded past the small group to the top of the steps. “You work too hard Rukia.”

 

Rukia shrugged playfully, “Can't help it.”

 

Keigo grinned at that and suddenly leapt down four steps to land directly in front of the raven haired girl. His grin was huge as he pulled both of her hands into his and set his eyes into a classic puppy-dog pout. “Maybe you could tutor me? I really need some help with my English, my teacher says I need to figure out how to make that weird `l' sound.” He wiggled his eyes suggestively and inched his face closer to hers, puckering his lips jokingly, “And then afterwards we can practice something I learned from the French!”

 

As Rukia's hand went to his face to shove him away her eyes flickered over to Ichigo. She saw him staring at the two, his muscles were taunt and his amber eyes were fixed into a hard glare. Rukia swallowed hard and pushed Keigo away. She had to set another playful look onto her face as she shoved the over-eager boy away with an apology. She told him that she didn't tutor very well and that she normally just ended up doing to work herself. Besides, she already knew many French customs and didn't need to familiarize with them again.

 

Keigo pouted and began to whine, “But what about the `l'?”

 

Rukia tipped a finger to her mouth and smiled, “Point your tongue and put it right behind your two front teeth. That helps make the `l' sound.”

 

Keigo spent the next five minutes trying—and failing—to create the sound, instead producing some sort of twisted `r' melody.

 

Rukia laughed like she was supposed to until the bell rang, signaling the beginning of the day. The group walked together but separated near the lockers. Orihime went to hers, but not before kissing Ichigo loudly on the cheek. Rukia and Ichigo walked together to their lockers, which were side by side

 

Rukia had always thought it was beneficial to have her and Ichigo's lockers so close together. They used to always chat between classes or poke fun at the fact that she had the upper locker but refused to switch with Ichigo, who had the bottom one, or copy each others homework from the night before, things like that that kept them close. Those times, however, were before everything in their friendship crumbled into nothing more than a heap of meaningless sexual escapades and promises not to breathe a word of them in the morning.

 

“Kuchiki… Kurosaki…” Rukia murmured as they walked to their joined lockers. For once in her life Rukia wished her name was not so alphabetically close to Ichigo's.

 

They put their books away in silence. Rukia's body bent upwards to stuff her items away efficiently, Ichigo's body bent down to push his things in as well. Her ribs brushed casually against her shoulders and she shivered at the contact.

 

She hated this new found silence that rested between them like some insidious black hole, ready to suck both of them in at the mere mention of what happened to them in the dark of night, atop her silken sheets.

 

Unwillingly, her mind reverted back towards Orihime's earlier comment.

 

Ichi.

 

She had never been allowed to abrogate his name. Never. She remembered that when she tried to, back in the second grade, he had gotten so angry that he didn't speak to her for nearly an entire week. After that she never shorted his name, she hadn't even called him `Strawberry' (the literal translation) unless she wished to tease him mercilessly.

 

“Ichigo's a strawberry! A strawberry! A strawberry! A little bitty strawberry!” She sang out as she skipped around the Kurosaki's large lawn.

 

Ichigo chased after her, his orange hair flopping in the wind. “I am NOT!” He cried, running after her. She laughed at him and ran in circles around a tiny tree.

 

“Ichigo the strawberry! Little strawberry with orange hair!” She giggled at her own joke and continued prancing around the lawn. Her little yellow dress gleaming in the sun.

 

“It doesn't mean `strawberry!'” He shouted, a heavy frown on his face. “It means `one who protects!'”

 

Rukia laughed at him, a light, child's laugh that warmed the hearts of anyone who heard it. She twirled around towards him and poked him gently on the forehead. A large smile was on her face, one that proudly displayed her missing front teeth. “Don't worry, I was just teasing.” She laughed once again and bopped him on the shoulder with her palm. “Tag! You're it!” She cried, and began racing around the lawn once again.

 

The frown that had once been on Ichigo's face disappeared completely and he let out a laugh. He ran off after the tiny girl, their earlier argument completely forgotten.

 

Rukia scowled, a feeling of hatred rising in the pit of her stomach. She and Ichigo had been friends far longer than anyone else in the group. They only met Orihime at the beginning of middle school. The two main elementary schools in the Karakura district sent all of their graduating fifth graders to the same middle school then later the same high school. Orihime, Ishida, Chad, and Keigo had all gone to a different elementary school and had never even met Ichigo and Rukia until the second day of sixth grade.

 

Rukia remembered that day well. She and Ichigo had been eating lunch by themselves when the group of four decided to join them. They didn't mind at first and slowly began introductions. Orihime was by far the most boisterous. Chad was silent and strong. Keigo was whacky and excitable. Ishida was strange and attentive. Soon after that the group began meeting each day for lunch, they began talking to each other during classes, and even partnering up during projects. Ichigo and Rukia were no longer in the own little world of contentment. They had branched out and made new friends. All in all, it was good for them.

 

It was only at the beginning of high school that everything changed. Or, at least, Orihime changed. While Rukia remained as she was—pale, skinny, dark haired and with strangely colored eyes that seemed to scare off everyone who even looked at her—Orihime had blossomed into a full woman, almost miraculously. Her breasts grew at an alarming rate and soon were the largest in the school. Her body filled out with curves and dips unbeknownst to the plainer girls in the school. Her legs grew longer and her body stretched taller. Her voice changed into a sound that resembled the soft tinkling of a bell. Her hair grew long and luscious. Her skin was left unblemished and nicely tanned. Everything about her was beautiful.

 

Compared to Orihime, Rukia looked like a sickly ten-year-old instead of the strong, intelligent, quirky girl that she was. Pale skin, short stature, large, purple eyes, small breasts, authoritative voice, all of it led to a misunderstood and often overlooked girl.

 

It was during that time that Orihime was truly noticed by many of the boys in the school. Countless males attempted to woo her, take her out on dates, kiss her, and escort her to dances, all that and more. They adored her for her feminine features and ignored the fact that she was terribly dim. Not that she was stupid, no, her marks were rather average in the class. She did extremely well on written homework and other assignments but when faced with a test or quiz where she did not have a book, or her notes, in front of her she did quite poorly. The two balanced each other out leaving her an average student who celebrated a B, smiled at a C, and shrugged at a D.

 

Then, halfway through junior year, the time for querying boys and anonymous notes left in Orihime's locker was quite finished. That was the time when Ichigo asked Orihime out, that was the time when she had blathered it too the entire school. That was the time that began Rukia's daily heartbreak.

 

He had asked her out only eight months after his mother died. Two months after they had first slept together.

 

He had come to her twelve times in that two month span.

 

Rukia sighed, half in anger, half in sadness. She hated this. These seemed to be the only two emotions she ever felt anymore. Where were the days where the two of them would stroll in the park, licking ice cream cones and making jokes? Where were then endless summer nights of sunny beaches and water fights with his family? Where were the nights when they stayed up until three in the morning, talking about stupid things? Where were the afternoons where he would scoff at her drawings? Where were the stupid remarks? Where were the laughs? Where were all the things that made them… well, them?

 

Rukia sighed again, softer this time, so Ichigo couldn't hear.

 

All of those lost memories made her future plans that much easier. Come August she would be packing up to go to college, far away from Ichigo, from Orihime, from her past… from everything. She hadn't even told him yet that she would be leaving. She remembered that when they were younger they used to joke about going to the same college, living in the same dorm, convincing the officials to let them room together… all of that. Now, she hadn't even told Ichigo that she planned on going to a college all the way in Tokyo, hundreds of miles away from Karakura Town. She hadn't told him that she applied. She hadn't even told him that her letter of acceptance might be coming any day.

 

She remembered thinking fleetingly of applying to schools in the United States but had thought better of it when she realized that Tokyo meant she could be closer to Hisana and Byakuya. Tokyo meant she could be further away from Ichigo.

 

Tokyo meant sanity and safety.

 

“Thank you.”

 

Rukia raised her head and opened her strangely colored eyes to stare at Ichigo. He was turned towards his locker, his cheeks pink with something akin to embarrassment.

 

She frowned softly at him. “For what?” She knew for what.

 

Ichigo rubbed the back of his head and sighed, “For not telling… um, Ishida.”

 

Rukia's face fell. She didn't want to hear him say what she already knew. If it wasn't verbalized then the precariousness of their situation didn't exist. She didn't want to hear him tell her to keep her mouth shut. She didn't want him to be so ashamed of their meetings. After all, it was he who started them. He who continued them.

 

But she let him. Each time she let him. It was her one weakness. Each time she never protested. Never said a word.

 

Then again, it was never about what she wanted… only what he wanted.

 

Rukia's hand, as though it had a mind of its own, shifted only a little bit until her fingers brushed against his.

 

He flinched.

 

She withdrew with a wince.

 

“Ichigo… you know I'll never… I'll never tell.” She swallowed softly and coughed just a bit. The nervous feeling had returned to her stomach and she tried to force it down. She hated when she was nervous in front of him.

 

“I—I know.” He murmured softly.

 

Rukia looked down at the floor.

 

They stood like that for a few moments, her hand only a hairs breath away from his. She wanted so badly to touch his skin. To feel his warmth. It was what she desired but knew she could not have.

 

The silence between them stretched. It was not awkward in the way that silence between teenagers normally is. It was simply sad. Their breathing was quiet and unhurried as their feet shifted and their throats swallowed noiselessly.

 

The final bell to class sounded and the two of them immediately snapped out of their grim reverie. They started towards their class in the hopes of entering before the bell finished. Orihime appeared just as they rounded the corner and followed them swiftly, her hand clutched Ichigo's arm as the three teenagers threw themselves into the classroom. They panted softly as they found their seats and ignored the glare from their teacher.

 

Rukia sat in her normal spot. Orihime pecked Ichigo on the cheek before sitting in her seat, across the room from her boyfriend and his best friend. Ichigo took his normal place in front of Rukia.

 

Her eyes never strayed from him as she watched him slowly move his hand to his cheek and wipe away Orihime's kiss.