Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach

A/N: If you haven't read "Wasting Your Time" yet, I highly suggest you to check it out first. It ties in very well with this story and this one works out as a sort of side-story/sequel. Enjoy!

Edited 01/11/2012

Already Taken

One would say that having the appearance of a bishōnen (pretty boy) was lucky. Kiyomori Nakamura would say it was a curse. Even if it did give him instant popularity with the girls in his class, it also made him the very target of the bullies in his school.

Kiyomori was a shy boy. He hated violence and would rather give in to the enemy's demands than fight them. There were plenty of reasons why he would give in, but the number one answer he came up with was because he was weak. And even when he had gone through some intense training, improving his physique and thus making him even more desirable amongst the female crowd, he still refused to fight only this time making the excuse that he didn't want to hurt them. This was a noble act and all but a complete lie. Truthfully, the boy was gutless.

One day, weeks after moving from Okinawa to Karakura, the boy was being bullied yet again. And like before, he did nothing but hope that it would end without a bloody nose in his immediate future. To his surprise, however, fate did him a favour and offered him Karin Kurosaki, a girl who if bitten wasn't afraid to bite back.

He was astounded by her strength and bravery, but most of all by her selflessness. No person, girl or boy, ever stopped to help him in the past because they never really cared about him. He was a stranger, so they found no point in endangering themselves for him. And yet this girl, someone whom he had never met before in his life, saved him. It was then that he knew that this girl was the one for him.

Five years later, however, the seventeen year old boy did nothing to get her attention and their relationship had not gone past best friends. It was frustrating to see her so close and yet so far away from him. Why oh why was he still so damn gutless?!

He shook his head at the thought and decided to make his move. Even at the risk of ruining their friendship, he had to find out how she felt about him. Maybe it was like one of those teen romance movies where both the girl and the guy liked each other but were too stubborn to say a thing until the other did.

'It's now or never,' he thought and got up.

To his dismay, however, the teacher, Higurashi-sensei, barged in with his briefcase and told the whole class to sit down and be quiet.

Kiyomori sighed and sat in his seat.

"Class, we have a new student. Hitsugaya-kun, please come in."

At the sheer mention of his name, Kiyomori could see Karin's face light up. Why, he had no idea, but he hoped it wasn't someone she knew or at least someone she was romantically involved with.

When he turned to face the new student, almost all of the girls in the room screeched about how hot he looked.

The boy in question winced at the loud noise. "Name's Tōshirō Hitsugaya. Don't touch me, don't look at me, and don't talk to me. Do that and the school year will pass by quickly."

The girls screeched again, each saying how they were looking forward to dating this bad-ass.

Kiyomori merely shook his head in annoyance.

"Settle down girls!" the teacher yelled. "Now Hitsugaya-kun, please take a seat behind Nakamura-kun. Nakamura-kun, raise your hand so you can show Hitsugaya-kun where you are."

Complying with the teacher's wishes, Kiyomori raised his arm and Tōshirō made his way towards the seat.

Ω

'This is ridiculous,' thought Kiyomori as he watched the white-haired boy's fanclub increase with each passing second. Why couldn't they all shut the hell up?! Their incessant screeching was making his ears bleed.

As if reading his mind, the loud sound of fists hitting a desk silenced the room. Everyone turned to its source and found Karin Kurosaki boiling with anger.

"Will you just give it up already?" she yelled. "Clearly the guy has no interest in any of you! So would you all do us a favour and leave him alone so the rest of us can study? Higurashi-sensei might have given us a free study period, but it doesn't mean you can gawk and squeal at the new guy all day. Get a life!"

"Instead of yelling at us, why don't you? Go…I don't know…play soccer or something?" responded a girl. "We all know your life revolves around that black and white ball anyway. So do us the favour and leave."

Kiyomiri shook his head. Was this girl trying to get a bloody nose in her near future?

To his surprise, however, Karin simply got out of her chair and made her way outside the classroom. "Oh sure, kick the only sane person out," she called out right before she left. "Just don't come crying to me when he finally starts talking back."

By lunchtime, Karin was back in class. Kiyomori wanted to talk to her, wondering why she let that girl talk to her the way she did until he saw her laughing. He looked at the direction she was staring at and noted the change in Hitsugaya's reaction. Earlier he did nothing to the fangirls, but now he looked downright irritated. Just what the hell was going on?

Before any of his questions could be answered, he felt the temperature in the room drop and looked around only to spot the tomboy he knew and loved standing on her desk. Curious, he waited to see what she would do next, thinking that she would probably shout at the top of her lungs until she opened her mouth and began to sing and dance.

Wait a minute… Was he seeing things? The Karin Kurosaki was singing and dancing?! Was the world coming to an end?

Kiyomori pinched himself, thinking he was just in some very vivid dream. To his surprise, it was real. His one true love was dancing fluidly and singing like an angel. Things just couldn't get any better!

He followed her every move with his eyes, listening to her heavenly voice, and eventually followed her when she left the class. Even if he was seeing this with his own eyes, he just couldn't believe it. Was this really his Karin?

When the song reached its end and Karin made her way out of the crowd, Kiyomori felt like he just had to tell her how much he loved her. She was even better than he could have hoped for, and he knew how the other guys were going to chase after her now. So it really was now or never.

Unfortunately, when he followed her to the roof of the school, he spotted something he'd never think of seeing. His one true love was making out with none other than Tōshirō Hitsugaya, the new kid. How this happened, he wasn't sure. But he knew that his heart was breaking into a million pieces.

'Damn it,' he inwardly cursed, 'I knew I should have said something before I lost her.'