Disclaimer: I do not own bleach, but I hope you're up for fluff!!

Lady In Red

Colors, like features, follow the changes of the emotions. -- Pablo Picasso

Thump, thump, thump.

Isshin's fingers rhythmically tapped the dashboard, the beat to Ichigo's opinion of Hell's song. Yuzu sighed, in, out, in, out, the wind instruments. Karin grumbled under her breath, the base while Rukia sang, 1, 2, 3, as the lead singer. And Ichigo sat there, legs sprawled apart as far as they could go, arms crossed tightly against his heaving chest, scowling so hard it looked like the pressure might make his head explode.

He was the unwilling audience.

That was what happened when the Kurosaki family underwent long, grueling car rides through the middle of nowhere together in one, small old, red car that Rukia named "Lady" almost a year ago. He had asked her why the hell she named it lady, of all things, but she said,

"Because it looks like one, and it has no black dots so I can't name it lady bug, that wouldn't be right."

He replied, "Well the name seems wrong--"

To her, anything and everything she did was right. She kicked him to prove it.

So the band within "Lady" kept playing, but it wasn't honestly a band, it was more like a bunch of putrid sounds thrown together, trapped within the car and ricocheting off all of the windows. Ichigo would have used the radio to distract him, but it didn't work after an annoyed raven-haired soul reaper punched it because she didn't like the song. He told his dad the car was probably broken into and they broke the radio while trying to get it out. Rukia said it was the worst excuse of her living-dead life. He told her it might just as well be her last if she didn't shut up.

She didn't shut up.

More than anything in that moment, Ichigo wished he could have changed the song that day, but Rukia seemed to enjoy the fact that she had a band in the car. To Ichigo, this was an intense heavy-metal rock band-- which he didn't mind-- but after two hours of passing nothing but green trees, leaves, bushes… it was deafening.

Especially since Rukia tried to count everything she saw like the lines on the street, the clouds, the birds, the stop signs. Now she was counting the amount of bends in the road.

"29, 30… 31, 32..."

She reached 33 bends in the road, then the thumping, the sighing, and the grumbling stopped. There was no applause, only a couple moments of silence which Ichigo relished in, but it was short lived. There was another sound and Ichigo's hand hit the dashboard hard as he yelled,

"Shit!"

Because Rukia puked all over the backseat.

They pulled over and Karin flew out while Yuzu helped Rukia out of the car, two small and knowing hands gently helping her keep her balance. Ichigo was already out of the car and Isshin sighed, "Ichigo, come help me clean up."

Ichigo looked shocked. "Fine."

Yuzu stroked Rukia's back and Karin handed her the water bottle. Rukia, meanwhile had a disgusted grimace on her face, her eyes fixed on a distant memory. When was the last time this happened, she asked herself. Oh yes, the first time was in Rukongai with Renji… He dared her to eat some bugs he collected. She was so hungry and oblivious to what he held that she only discovered what kind of bugs they were afterwards. The only other time she remembered was the first time she stayed in the Kuchiki Mansion. She wasn't used to the tense discomfort and the food. She heard the maids whisper, "How dirty" and "What a waste".

"It's GREEEN!"

Karin stood up, punching her fist in the air, "Shut it, Ichigo!"

Rukia sighed, "I don't like Lady anymore." Yuzu nodded sympathetically, watching Karin who spilled her water bottle all over her brother. She continued to stroke Rukia's back.

Pursing her lips, Rukia looked down at her new white flats she had bought the other day. Ruined, and they did look a little green. She gave an exasperated moan, hanging her head in her hands.

"What the hell did you eat, Ru--"

That was it, in one swift motion, she yanked the white, tinted green shoe from her fuming foot and threw it at his orange head. Bull's eye. She smirked, removing the other shoe from her foot for protection. Now they were even, one to one.

He approached her, scowling and squishing the white shoe in his fist. By this time, Yuzu and Karin had fled and so did Isshin.

"Put down my shoe!" she demanded as she stood, ignoring the tumbling feeling of her stomach and the quiver through her weak knees.

"They're already ruined and they stink."

She seethed for a few moments, gritting her teeth together and wrinkling her nose as she looked at him furiously. Her bare foot began to hurt because of the rough pavement while he stood there, smirking with wet tangled hair and his shirt that idly stuck to his chest, stupidly see-through from Karin's water.

"It's not my fault," she said slowly, each word a hot flame through her mouth. She was really angry at this point, "Blame the red lady!" She panted heavily, in then out, in then out. Her shoulders elevated then relaxed, her nostrils flared.

He tightened his hold on the shoe and pricked the surface with his thumb. She looked sick, of course, and messy. Her hair played opposites, sticking out in all the wrong directions. Her blue dress was oddly discolored and it hung lower than it was supposed to, revealing a small patch of what was her

bright red, lace bra.

"Do you want your shoe or not?" He asked passively, holding it in front of him. She grabbed it, but instead of letting go, he pulled her to him and planted his mouth on her parted lips. She didn't taste as well as she usually did, he expected that much, but he didn't expect something hard—her other shoe—to collide with his head, causing him to accidentally bite down on her lip, hard.

"You IDIOT!" she yelped, flaring again.

"It was your fault!"

"My fault? My fault?" It came out as a dangerous hiss.

"You hit me with the damn shoe!"

"Because you kissed me!"

"That wasn't my fault either," he grinned.

"Then who's was it?" She was still holding her lip as it began to turn purple. Rukia was all kinds of colors today. He grinned wider and leaned in closer so he could feel her livid breath on his face.

"Blame the lady in red."

Ah, the wonders of a red bra (I guess that was Victoria's Secret all along... ;D) lol. But those wonders will probably be short lived as well... ha. The ending is so cliche, I know, but thanks for reading it anyways (XD), and I Hope you enjoyed it!

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