even if i now saw you only once
by appleschan
How it begins -
i.
This face is not familiar. Individually, the features make for an interesting attribute - purple eyes, round face, thin lips, black hair.
"Heh," Ichigo shrugs, then exits the bathroom gruffly. This must be a dream because he is a girl, one who is very tiny and has unblemished skin, and who owns a nice bathroom twice the size of his home - this couldn't be real.
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ii.
Rukia, of course, has not seen a proper high-school thug. But everyone around her paints them to be bleach-haired and scary-looking, the kind that terrorizes convenience stores and wields basebats and raids kindergarten schools and steals candy. Then she wonders if there is some merit to that stereotype.
"Oh," Rukia looks away from the mirror, she has robust arms - is tall, in place of her black hair is orange hair - bleached? - and there's something dangling between her legs but she pays it no mind, after all: she is a boy and this is a strange dream.
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iii.
Rukia goes along with her dream, and apparently, she has sisters and a father.
This appears to be a consistent thing, a breakfast, with the rest of her dream's family in attendance, all at ease and lively and huddling together over miso soup and grilled tuna and rice and black tea - very traditional but they zero in on being non-traditional: the sisters - hers - are strikingly opposite and the father the most. He is very animated.
Over in her real house, breakfasts are consistent too, usually quiche or brioche and some freshly-whisked green tea or mango juice served every 7 am sharp. But too often, Rukia stares blankly at the six-piece lily flower arrangement at the center of the table and the empty chairs surrounding it. Her breakfasts are a quiet matter.
This is a quaint home, pastel yellow and tidy and modest with big windows and airy curtains. Rukia finds herself sitting on a chair in the dining room - it's not strictly a dining room, but an open section of the house.
"It's miso paste day today!" the straw-haired sister, Yuzu, declares, emerging from the kitchen and carrying a pitcher of orange juice.
"Heh," drawls the other sister, black-haired and boyish, and sitting herself on a chair opposite her, she says, "that's not true, Yuzu made that up, she wants an excuse to make miso, this old-goat here only wants greasy burgers for breakfast."
"Oh yes. I see, thank you," Rukia replies, employing her Kuchiki diplomacy and pleasantries, she has been heavily taught, of course, and her diplomacy lecture applies to almost any situation.
Both sisters turn to her, open-mouthed and incredulous and eyebrows-raised.
"I'm sorry?" Rukia says politely, blinking.
"A-are you okay, Ichi-nii-?"
"Dumbass, did you hit your head or somethin'?"
"Karin-chan! Please don't call Ichi-nii that way!"
"YO ICHIGO! YOU AREN'T PAYING ATTENTION, YOU SORRY PRODUCT OF MY LOINS-!"
-then Rukia blacks out from a punch.
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iv.
Ichigo has only seen, in his words, gourmet shit on TV.
"What the fuck is this?"
"Steak and basil quiche, brioche with hand-seeded blackcurrant jam, and mango and satsuma tangerine juice-"
"What?" asks Ichigo, seated on a modern, and very clean-cut dining room, "are you guys even Japanese?"
"Ah - yes, well, such a curious question," the butler smiles, he's definitely not Japanese, Ichigo thinks suspiciously, "Would you rather have honeyed hot cocoa or gyokuro tea instead, Miss Rukia?"
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v.
"What the," says the father, "you dropped? Dropped?! Just like that? Have I not taught you anything, my stupid son?!"
tbc randomly
movie and poem; shinkai and shikibu.