Can't Smile, Don't Blame
You looked at your calendar and noticed what day it was. June the 17th. So that's why he asked you not to come over yesterday.
A small smile made its way to your face as you imagined what his face would like when he saw you today, anyway.
Glancing at the clock, you realized you had to hurry if you wanted to make it in time. Last year you hadn't been there for him on this day. On that June the 16th, he asked you not to come over as well.
You had immediately realized that pained look on his face and did some research, which mainly existed of asking Tatsuki about it (since she's been friends with Ichigo for so long), and you found out that his mother died.
Trying to act as normal as possible, you had tried to hide the fact that you knew about 'it', but you eventually burst and Ichigo merely laughed at you. You knew about his ability to see ghosts, and he also told you about being a Shinigami, hollows (albeit hesitantly, he probably didn't want to scare you) and that his mother was killed by one.
As you exited your house and started to walk down the street, you suddenly felt a few soft water droplets fall on your head. You looked up at the sky, noticing dark clouds coming in your direction. You contemplated returning for an umbrella, but decided not to.
At the corner of the street you stopped to buy some flowers. You decided on buying two white lilies, and with that you quickly left to go to Ichigo's house.
You knocked on the door, making sure you were knocking loud enough for them to hear while you crossed your fingers, hoping they hadn't left already. You had wanted to run, but the road had gotten slippery after it started raining.
When there wasn't any reaction, you knocked again, fearing they had already left. Just to make sure, you tried to open the door, but found it was locked, which meant they weren't there.
With a small sigh you turned around and started making your way to the graveyard. By the time you arrived there, your hair was dripping slightly. Droplets of water tickled as they slid down your cheek, where they gathered at your cheek to fall to the floor.
You saw a figure standing in front of a grave and the orange hair immediately told you who it was. A smile appeared on your face as you quietly tiptoed over to where he was. Apparently, his father and sisters were doing something else because you couldn't see them around.
Wrapping your arms around the boy, you pressed your nose into his back and took a deep breath of his air. Ichigo suddenly tensed, probably trying to guess who you were.
"Yuzu?" he asked as he turned around, only to have his eyes widen slightly in surprise as he recognized you. "[F/N]?! I told you that you didn't have to come!"
You merely pouted before sticking your tongue out at him. "That doesn't mean that I won't come! And anyway, who said I was here with you?" you asked him, while playfully pushing him aside before stepping up to the grave.
All your cheerfulness disappeared as if the rain washed it away and you placed your white lilies on a free spot. After that, you bent down on your knees, pressed your hands against your chest and began to have an inner conversation with the woman you never knew.
It was weird. You didn't know the woman, never had, yet here you were, having an imaginary conversation with her as if you had been good friends. You even had to bite your lip to stop yourself from crying. Ichigo never talked about her, but you knew how much he had loved her. Not only he had, but also Yuzu, Karin and his father.
You blinked as suddenly two strong hands grabbed you and pulled you up till you were standing steadily. As the hands let go you of you, you turned to find Ichigo rubbing the back of his head while looking the other way.
"If you stay on the floor for too long in this weather, you'll catch a cold," he mumbled as he continued to look at everything but you. Your giggle caught his attention and he dared to glance at you.
You kept on smiling at him as he tried to think of something to start a conversation and keep it running. He didn't want you to see his sad face and try to cheer him up; he had noticed that your eyes were still slightly glossed.
"Why did you come here?" was all that he could muster and you tilted your head slightly to the side.
"You didn't expect I would've let my boyfriend go to his mother's grave all by himself, did you?" you replied while nodding in the direction of the grave of Ichigo's mother. "And I had to give her my regards personally, right? Promised her I'd protect you," you grinned as you playfully ruffled Ichigo's wonderful hair. It was what had pulled your attention to him the first time you met him and somehow you felt proud about it, even though it wasn't even yours.
Ichigo smiled softly at you as he wrapped his strong arms around you, his brows still furrowed. You can't even remember how many times you had wondered how he managed to keep them like that, having tried it yourself too. Your forehead had felt heavy for a few hours after you managed to keep the angry expression for about 10 minutes.
Maybe he had frowned for so long that it just stayed in place like that, or something.
"What are you thinking about?" you would've jumped in surprise if Ichigo's arms weren't hugging you tightly at the sudden sound of his voice. It seemed that you had dozed off slightly as you were thinking about his eyebrows.
And without thinking, you replied honestly. "I was thinking about how you manage to keep looking so angry all the time,"
Ichigo blinked in surprise, slightly taken aback. After a few moments of confused frowning and innocent smiling he burst into laughter, and this time it was your turn to blink and look at him in surprise.
"Eh? Eh?! What's so funny?" you exclaimed as you thoroughly looked through the reply you had given your boyfriend a few moments ago to see if you had said something weird.
I was thinking about how you manage to keep looking so angry all the time.
You could feel your cheeks redden in embarrassment as you realized what exactly you had said. Trying to act as if you didn't care that you were blushing and that this idiot was still laughing at you, you puffed your cheeks up in a pout and abruptly pulled away from Ichigo, folding your arms as you turned your back to him.
"I'm sorry… It was just…so random… You really…are weird…" he managed to say in between laughs. You threw the boy a glare over your shoulder with a 'hmpf' before looking away again.
"Well, I'm glad I could entertain you, mister I-am-going-out-with-a-weirdo," you retorted, still pouting.
After a few moments of laughing and pouting, Ichigo calmed down and took a few steps towards you (while he was laughing, you had slowly shuffled away from him), only to find you take the same amount of steps (though noticeably smaller steps, the damn giant) away from him.
Ichigo sighed at your childishness and suddenly started to sprint after you; catching you by surprise once again (it seemed like he was doing that a lot that day). Of course he had caught up to you easily, even after you started running off yourself.
Reaching out for you, he grabbed your arm in an iron grip and planned on stopping, but the rain had made the ground slippery, causing him to slip, obviously. You let out a cry, closing your eyes tightly.
In a reflex, the evil person who had started all this falling wrapped his arms around you in a protective manner as the two of you temporarily soared through the air.
With a thud, you both landed on the floor none too softly and you allowed yourself to open your eyes only after hearing Ichigo groan.
You flushed as you noticed how close you were to him; he had somehow managed to turn you so that he was lying flat on his back. You were lying on your chest, your breasts squashed against Ichigo's chest, though he was probably still busy trying to survive the fall even though it had already ended to notice.
"You had promised her that you'd protect me, and not the other way," he snorted, making no move to stand up. It didn't look like he was going to let you go soon, either.
"Weren't you the one who had warned me that I'd get a cold if I sat on the floor too long in this weather?" you retorted playfully, completely forgetting what had caused this situation.
"You weren't flattening me back then," he muttered as he shifted into a more comfortable place.
You were about to shoot something back at him, but you were interrupted as you heard several voices coming nearby.
"Ichigoooooo!" Ichigo's father, Isshin, suddenly exclaimed, about the step on the boy (on purpose). However, he stopped when he noticed you were lying on top of him, his I-love-my-son-to-death attitude falling and his I-love-my-son's-girlfriend attitude rising.
"Ah! [F/N]~!" he yelled, waving at you with what seemed all his energy. You sweat dropped, wondering if that guy really wasn't affected by what day it was today.
"Hello," you replied with a small wave. Simple and to the point, nothing extraordinary like yelling or kicking sons in the face. Though, he didn't really seem to care that his son was lying on the ground with you on top of him.
On the other side, his sister did.
"Brother! [F/N]! Why are you two lying on the floor together?" Yuzu asked, blinking her big eyes in curiosity.
"It's obvious they slipped. And if that isn't the reason, then they were planning on doing something naughty~," you heard Karin's voice say, and you knew she was grinning widely even before she appeared from God knows where.
Yuzu let out a small sigh as Ichigo didn't react. His eyes were closed, as if he had fallen asleep. Or maybe he had died. Wait, he was still alive, was he? Just to make sure, you pressed your ear against his chest, holding back a sigh of relief when you heard it beat loud and strong.
Isshin somehow drooped slightly, his mood darkening as he noticed that his son wasn't going to react. He pouted, trying to act cute for a guy at such an un-cute age, but ended up turning around.
"Alright! Let's leave Ichigo alone, since he won't even bother to react!" he yelled, managing to pull Yuzu and Karin after him while Karin yelled that he was a pervert for not managing to keep his hands away from them and Yuzu tried to make sure that you'd make sure that Ichigo would get up so he wouldn't catch a cold.
After they left, you felt Ichigo shift under you again, catching your attention. "Are they gone?"
You laughed softly as you placed a soft kiss on Ichigo's jaw in reply. He grumbled something about horrible parents before sitting up, making sure you didn't touch the wet ground more than necessary.
The moment your lips met, Ichigo's tongue entered your mouth through your slightly parted lips, the muscle dancing with yours as you reacted to him. You had already lost the need to dare him to a tongue-battle a long time ago, knowing you'd already lose. After all, you hadn't won once.
You whined as he pulled away, panting for air. He didn't let you recover from the kiss you had shared, but immediately pushed you up before standing up himself.
"Come on, let's go and have something warm to drink,"
His hand shyly grabbed yours as he started to make way to his house.
Somehow, this was the first time that June the 17th had turned out to be a quite fun day. I wonder if I'm finally getting over mother's dead. I wonder how she'd think about it if she were here. I wonder if next year, June the 17th will be the same as this year.