A/N: The second of two prompts from my LJ friend; this one was "saving a life". Same circumstances as "Wrongness" apply.


If this was what being somebody's wife was like, Orihime liked it and disliked it in turns. It was fun to let herself into somebody else's home and make dinner. The downside was that he seldom came home before ten, and she'd have to hurriedly wake up from the odd position she'd been sleeping against the countertop in and stuff everything back in the microwave. She enjoyed doing household chores with a purpose, tying on an apron, tugging her hair back, and pretending she was a long-lost princess turned washerwoman or a spy from America disguised as a maid. Sorting the recycling for Ishida-san often made her cry, though, to see all the bottles of alcohol waiting to be placed outside. With each one she put out, she hoped it would be remade as something happier- just like she prayed every day that Ishida-kun's soul would find her way back to her, even if she didn't deserve to see him again.

She smiled and laughed and studied extra-hard in hopes of bringing Ishida-san some comfort, and thus by some secret emotional back-route, herself as well. She bought him tea and left chocolate under his office door, anything to replace the liquor and cigarettes that both kept him alive and slowly killed him. At first, she hardly noticed the decline in brown glass bottles, but when she went to take the recycling out and saw that there were none to be found, she began to cry nonetheless, and ran into the house to hug Ishida-san, much to his obvious surprise.