Rukia scowled as she took in her image in the mirror. The shiny black shoes did look good, but they pinched her feet. The frilly stockings itched. The dress wasn't so bad, but the frilly underskirts needed to make it poof made her sweat. The top part of the dress was decent, she gave it that, but the high collar was just a fingers breadth away from choking her. Not to mention that the headdress was degrading.

All in all the maid costume served to make her as uncomfortable as the concept of a maid cafe did.

St. Diana's Academy was a very prestigious all-girls school, but during the school festival, they opened their doors to guests. Each class was supposed to have a booth for the duration of the festival. Judges, comprising of random guests or faculty members tapped by the student council, would then rank the booths they thought was the best. Each year level was given a specific type of booth to manage. Rukia's year had to do restaurants.

One of her classmates had suggested that their class do a maid cafe. To Rukia's surprise, everyone else liked the idea. They all said how glamorous and cute maid cafes were. Which brought her to her current predicament.

Rukia scowled at her reflection. Cursing the dress, the school festival, and insipid girls who grew up privileged. Honestly, most of her classmates had maids at home, how could they think that dressing up as maids could possibly be 'glamorous'?

She wasn't like all the other girls in the school. She wasn't born rich, and while the school had students on scholarships, she wasn't a scholar either. Her brother-in-law transferred her from her public school because the old biddies of the Kuchiki family were wagging their tongues again.

Rukia didn't understand why he even listened to them. They were against his marriage to her sister Hisana, but he went ahead and married her. They were also against him adopting Rukia, but he did that as well. They were against a lot of things that he did, except for this one.

"Rukia, are you done?" a voice asked and broke her thoughts.

"I'll be out in a bit," she replied.

As she took one last steeling breath, she was glad that she never told her friends about this. If Renji saw her in this outfit, she'd be teased about it for life.

"I don't see why I have to come with you," Ichigo complained as he and Renji walked into St. Diana's. "It's not like Rukia invited me."

Ichigo knew why Rukia never invited him. The whole of the previous school year they danced around each other. Ichigo knew that people were taking bets as to when they would officially get together, but it never happened. He thought that he'd get it all out this school year, but Rukia transferred out. They stayed in touch, but the issue never really came up.

"She didn't invite me either," Renji informed him. "If it wasn't for an ad I saw, I wouldn't have known that there was a school festival."

"Then why are we here?" Ichigo asked, knowing full well the consequences of catching Rukia off guard. "She might not want us here."

"Rukia's not like that," Renji reminded, misunderstanding the orange-haired boy. "Besides, she never gets to spend time with us anymore. This way she could show us around campus. Come on, it'll be like old times."

Despite his better judgement, Ichigo followed. Renji got directions to the 3-A booth, which happened to be the classroom, and they went inside the main building. Along the way, Ichigo noticed that they were getting stares, a lot of stares.

He shook his head. It could be his hair. Or Renji's hair. Or Renji's tattoos. Or Renji's unkempt appearance. Whichever it was, Ichigo knew that their mere auras screamed delinquent, even though they weren't. He was surprised that no one was stopping them and escorting them off of the school's premises.

When they reached the 3-A door, Ichigo's eyes twitched at the sign and decorations.

Maid Café

"You sure we got the right room?" he asked Renji.

"Yeah," Renji nodded. "Rukia said her class was 3-A. But this… Rukia would never agree to this."

Ichigo nodded. Rukia was one of the most outspoken people he knew. Whenever their class had an activity that Rukia thought was stupid, she'd be the first one, and the loudest one, to disagree. A Maid Café was something Rukia would definitely protest.

"Welcome Back Masters!" a girl greeted them. "Table for two?"

The girl was obviously scared. Her hands were shaking, but she plastered on a smile. She probably drew the short straw and was forced to be the one to greet them. Ichigo took pity on her and nodded. She led them inside and showed them to a table.

"Your waitress will be with you in a moment, Masters."

"Rukia!" Kiyome said in a rush, her hands waving around. "There are two really scary-looking guys who look like they're going to come in. They look like they bleach their hair! Can you be the one to wait on them?"

Rukia shook her head. Her classmates were so inept at this. She could see that they didn't really expect waiting tables to be so hard. They probably thought that a café would be fun and games, not all this hard work. Rukia couldn't really blame them, sheltered as they were.

"Help, they're over there," Ayame, another classmate, gestured. "One of them has tattoos. On his face!"

Tattoos and bleached hair. It could be any random delinquent who happened to walk into Saint Diana's, but with Rukia's luck, she knew that her worse fear of the day just came true. Still, she wouldn't be herself if she backed down.

"I'll handle it," she told her classmates. "Just make sure that you get their orders right, okay?"

The two girls nodded, but she was already ignoring them. Seeing them, Ichigo and Renji. Of course it would be them. Rukia was surprised that Orihime wasn't with them. Rukia knew that the other girl had a major crush on Ichigo, but made no moves towards him because of her. Most of the guys at their school would kill for a chance to date Orihime, and Rukia thought that Ichigo would be with her by now.

She timed her approach as Renji took a sip of water.

"Welcome back Masters," she said in her 'sweet' voice. "Are you ready to order?"

Renji choked, as she expected he would. Ichigo stared at her like he never saw her before. Rukia took some small pleasure at catching them like this. In her current outfit and painful shoes, she took what little pleasures she could get.

"We'll have two black coffees," Ichigo ordered, seeing that Renji was still coughing.

"I'll be right back Masters."

Ichigo stared at her retreating form, not believing his eyes. No way would the Rukia that they knew willingly dress up like that. The look on Renji's face told Ichigo that he thought the same.

"Here are your coffees," Rukia said as she served them their drinks.

"Rukia…" Renji began, but didn't know what else to say.

"I'm on break after this," Rukia told them. "I'll just need to clear your table and change out of this thing."

The two couldn't drink their coffees fast enough.

They waited for her outside the classroom, talking about random things. When the door opened and Rukia came out, she gestured that they follow her.

"We could play games?" she suggested. The two just nodded.

On their way to the school quadrangle, where all the game booths were set up, Rukia got stopped a couple of times by some of her schoolmates. She was polite and soft-spoken as she interacted with them, nothing like how she would usually talk with their friends.

As they approached the booths, Renji took off. He had some flimsy excuse, but from the looks he was giving Ichigo, it was evident that he wanted to give the two time alone together.

"Renji can't do subtle," Rukia observed. "He never could."

Ichigo nodded. Chuckling at how obvious Renji was.

"With all this commotion, is there somewhere we can talk privately?" Ichigo asked.

"Follow me."

And he did. They walked in silence, but Ichigo snuck glances at her. Her uniform was foreign to him. Ichigo figured that in his mind, she was always wearing their school uniform. This Rukia, this subdued and docile Rukia, was a stranger to him.

She led him to the roof, which was locked but opened with a few hairpins from Rukia's hair. Ichigo smiled. They all learned that skill one week when they were bored and Renji was going through his spy movie phase.

Once on the roof, they went to the railings and took in the view. Ichigo knew that he had to break the silence, but he was weary to do so. In this moment, they were still friends, nothing has changed yet. But he knew that if he wanted them to become something else, to become something more, he should be the one to say something.

"I thought you were supposed to be a lady," Ichigo blurted out, mentally hitting himself. It was not a smooth move to comment on things like that. He should know, Yuzu always scolded their dad for it.

"I said I was to appear as a lady befitting the Kuchiki name," Rukia replied with a haughty air. Then she snorted. "You know me Ichigo, all this suffocates me."

"Do I?" Ichigo asked, moving closer to her. "Do I really know you?"

"Better than anyone," she admitted, looking up at him.

Ichigo smiled down at her. She may be in a different school. She may act differently because of it. But deep down, she was still Rukia.

He slowly leaned in, giving her time to back away or push him away. She just smirked and went on tiptoes and gave him a peck on the lips.

"Took you long enough."

A bit late, but better late then never!

In my defense, I was on duty last Friday so I had no time to make this.

Tell me what you think?