Ichigo wasn't a pervert. It was an odd statement to begin a story with, but it was true. He never joined Keigo and Chizuru on their 'expeditions,' and swore vehemently that he never would. He had never even seen a naked girl, save for those long gone years when he had helped his mother dress his baby sisters. But to get back on subject; he was in no way, shape, or form perverted.
However, when a completely nude woman comes out of nowhere and you are a straight male—or Chizuru—then you are going to stare. You are going to stare a lot. You are probably going to pay attention to certain body parts that you really shouldn't be paying that much obvious attention to, especially if, like Ichigo, you've never seen them before. And if you don't have any warning, then you're just going to stare more.
And that's why Ichigo, despite not being a pervert, was gaping at the equally shocked, stark naked, dripping wet young woman that had just walked out of the forest.
He stared at her. She stared at him.
Neither of them spoke. Neither of them breathed. For one long moment, even the cows that Ichigo was stuck babysitting stopped mooing.
The moment ended with a nearly audible click as what was going on finally registered in both of their minds. The girl shrieked and darted behind a tree. The orange haired cowherd yelped and belatedly covered his eyes. He tried to scramble backwards, forgot that he had been leaning against a tree before this whole mess started, and promptly hit the back of his head on the rough bark.
Forgetting that he wasn't alone, he started using several words that would have caused Yuzu to try and wash his mouth out with soap. As he took his hands away from his eyes to rub his new bump, the girl poked her head out of her hiding place. "Are you alright, Pervert-san?"
"I didn't—I wasn't—" Overwhelmed by his predicament, mind had lost control over his mouth, which apparently had no clue what to do with its newfound freedom. The other teen, looking concerned, took a step towards him, revealing—he quickly clapped his hands back over his eyes. "I'm not!"
"Not what, Pervert-san?" She took another step.
"A pervert!" Ichigo shouted, squeezing his eyes shut to keep from looking through the inevitable gaps in his fingers. "I'm not a pervert! So—please—go back behind the tree—PLEASE!"
"Oh, sorry!" The girl quickly dashed back behind her impromptu shelter, and the strawberry sighed in relief.
"Thanks."
"No problem… um…" She frowned thoughtfully, although he couldn't see her. "…Not-Pervert-san?"
"It's Ichigo," he told her, relieved that she had accepted his denial of perversion. Tatsuki, he knew, would have broken every bone in his body, twice. "Kurosaki Ichigo."
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Kurosaki-kun." Despite the circumstances, her words had a ring of sincerity to them. "My name is Inoue Orihime."
"The pleasure is mine, Inoue." Only after the words had left his mouth did he realize how, put into a different context, they might sound. He scrambled for a cover-up. Distraction, damnit, distraction!
"Um… where are you from?" Incredibly lame, but incredibly safe. "This is a pretty small village, and I've never seen you around before."
Although, come to think of it, Tatsuki had made a few snide comments over the years about him never being able to remember people…
"I live pretty far away." Orihime informed him, apparently not noticing his panic. He gave a mental sigh of relief.
"Are you here visiting relatives?" Other than him, he couldn't think of anyone with hair as bright as hers, and he was positive that none of the girls had her… assets. "Or something like that?"
"Iie." The girl shook her head, although all he could see was the ends of her hair whipping from one side of the tree to the other. "We wanted to take a bath."
"You…" Ichigo blinked. Nose, if you start bleeding, you'll regret the day you were attached to my face. "…Wanted to take a bath."
"Hai!" She nodded.
"And you couldn't bathe back where you live?" He asked, raising an eyebrow skeptically. "Wherever that is?"
"Well, we could have." She admitted. "But Yachiru-neechan was bored, and Rangiku-neechan says that the Milky Way is too cold."
"So you're with your sisters?" He smiled slightly, thinking about Karin and Yuzu. "It's sounds as though…"
The orange-haired cowherd trailed off, frowning slightly. There was something about her last sentence that he was missing; he could feel it. Something important.
It took nearly a full minute of awkward silence for realization to pull a Tatsuki and punch him in the face.
He blinked. "Did you say the Milky Way?"
"Hai!" She gave another cheerful nod.
"As in… the Milky Way?" Ichigo asked carefully. "The one in the sky?"
"That's the one!" She replied.
"I've never heard of an actual river named that." He commented.
"Yes you have." Orihime informed him. "After all, you were just asking me about it."
"What are you talking about?" His head was starting to hurt from trying to understand this strange girl. "The only Milky Way that I know about is the one in the sky!"
"That's it, that's the Milky Way I was talking about!"
"…"
"…"
"…"
"…Kurosaki-kun?" The very, very strange girl called out in a tentative voice, poking her head back out from behind her tree. "Did your tongue disappear?"
"…Um… What?"
"Rangiku-neechan says that sometimes humans tongues randomly vanish into thin air, just like all of Kuchiki-dono's big fish and Kira-dono's sake!" (1)
"Riiight…" Ichigo said, slowly blinking at her. "Where did you say you were from again.
She told him.
He lifted one hand to cover of his eyes, and dug the index finger of the other into his ear. "Can you repeat that?"
She did. He started on the other ear, looking slightly perturbed, and asked her to say it one more time. After she had done so—now looking somewhat confused—he sighed.
"I'm sorry," the cowherd said, "I think there's something wrong with my ears. It sounded like you said you were from Heaven."
"Well, it's good to know that the sound warping weasels aren't nearby." She commented. "Because that's what I said."
The silence lasted a lot longer that time.