The Hattori twins began to settle into their new school life. As if to make their identity as twins cliche, as Chiyo claimed when given her timetable; Shizuka and Chiyo had been placed in the same classes. Japanese, Algebra, art and chemistry. The only time when they separated was when Chiyo had PE and Shizuka psychology.
As Summer went by, they had to conformed to their new environment. Shizuka no longer got lost every time she tried to find the girls bathroom, while Chiyo finally mastered the skill of managing to bring all her books to class without forgetting a dictionary or a calculator. But despite all this, Shizuka felt like an outsider. Unlike her doppelgänger, she had always lacked a bubbly, open personality that made socialising easy.
Shizuka used to feel forgotten in Okinawa, and it took her several years to finally gain a minuscule sense of belonging. Shortly after her fourth birthday, the whole family decided to go to the beach. It was a wonderful summer day. the ocean breeze combating the humidity to create a perfect climate and the sky a picture perfect blue. It was certainly a lovely day at first, soon the sky faded to a dismal grey and the waves grew violent, disrupting the harmony of the tropical beach. While hurrying to leave Shizuka's parents lost sight of her for a second, they didn't notice the absence of their little girl until Chiyo's snivelling grew to hysteria. In a panic, the twins father rushed towards the stormy beach despite the begging of his wife who went about calling a search party. After several hours of searching, Shizuka's father found his little baby girl curled up crying under a broken tree, tears blending with her droplets of rain streaming down her face. Wasting no time they rushed to the nearest hospital hoping no harm had to come to her, only to discover their paranoia was true, Shizuka had contracted hyperthermia.
If it weren't for Chiyo's outburst alerting her parents, and their fathers desperate acts, Shizuka may not have survived the cold and deadly conditions of the storm. For the next few months, Shizuka was sickly and constantly tired, her naturally olive skin became a sickly beige and feared going outside on even slightly cold days. She spent most of her childhood days at home, as time went by Shizuka slowly gained confidence again but continued to become increasingly attached to Chiyo. After the incident at the beach, the twins hated being separated. Shizuka relied upon Chiyo's protection, while her brunette twin felt happiness in her sisters adoration for her, fuelling pride that led her to become a self confident extrovert.
Now, Shizuka's was aware of this recently growing gap in her beloved sisters tight-nit relationship. This made the shy teen feel like the small fear filled girl once again, surrounded by the crashing of waves, the icy clawing of rain and the wind howling like a vengeful banshee warning mortals of encroaching death. Only the sounds were now generated by students as they rushed through the halls, leaving her behind.
As the timid school girl made her way from the lockers to the distant psychology classroom, the lack of Chiyo's prescence hit her hard in the form of loneliness. Would she once again shrink into a faded lavender blotch attempting to hide as a wallflower?
No, she thought. Sure no one talks to me in psychology, but I can survive... I think.
The thoughts whirling in Shizuka's head continued, echoing in her mind like her gentle footsteps in the now empty corridor. She snapped out of her daze long enough to notice her inner ramblings had slowed her pace, making her rather late for class. In a panicked dash she flew through the corridor and down the stairs, her eyes bulging In anxiety and her hair bellowing dramatically from the mad running. Clumsily she passed through the doorway with barely a second to spare, huffing with exhaustion.
I made it! She Mentally sighed in time to her physical ragged breathing.
"You're late."
The harsh words snapped the dishevelled looking girl out of her exhaustion. The last thing needed to destroy any sense of belonging gained recently, was a scene. Luck was never something possessed by the girl, and nothing feels as demoralising as the sight of twenty disinterested students faces morphing into giddy smirks of amusement at your own expense. There was nowhere to hide!
"I-I'm terribly sorry for my... Uh.." Shizuka mumbled, failing to create a coherent sentence. Quickly she opted for bowing in apology and scurried out of the teachers way, the eyes still didn't leave her sight.
Her skirt was hiked slightly at the front causing certain "perverse" eyes to I wander elsewhere. Shizuka's skin portrayed her embarrassment to onlookers, it longer blended with the dark toned walls, now it radiated shades of red. Trying to Recollecting herself, Shizuka made her way to the back of the classroom in hope of finding a place away from the eyes that pierced her confidence. Without looking she headed towards the far right corner of the room, the piercing feeling seemed completely dead in that direction.
Great job at getting noticed for once! But I doubt this will improve ANY chance of friends. It seemed as the day continued her thoughts grew in pessimism.
She weakly placed the led-like textbooks on the empty surface, and sat in the worn out chair that accompanied the desk. Growing lethargic by the second, her small frame slouched slowly onto the desk, followed by lavender hair blanketing the other half of the desks surface.
Nearing sleep, a slight bump alerted the girl of another presence next to her. A cold. Rigid, presence. For the second time today, Shizuka was once again facing disinterested eyes.
"Move." The Eerily quiet word increased the tension omitted from the owner of the emerald orbs.
Taken back by his blunt language, it took Shizuka a while to realise that not only did she seemingly ignore the silent teen sitting next to her, but she was unknowingly falling asleep on his arm! In a delayed reaction she squeaked in embarrassment and sharply jolted upright in her chair, cheeks blushing rose red. Suprisingly no one saw, they were probably too drained by the teachers dull presentation on identifying sociopaths and psychopaths.
"Sorry!"
...
No response, just a slow head turn in the opposite direction.
"I'll get out of your way.." Awkwardly, the girl set about collecting her books in her arms.
"Don't bother moving... Just don't lean on me."
The quiet yet articulate words stopped the blushing girl dead in her tracks. Despite the cold tone carried in his voice, Shizuka couldn't help but find it comforting, of not.. Accepting...
"O-Kay... thank you."
Silence ensued again, although Shizuka couldn't help but recall the first time she saw him. Pale as a ghost, plastered with a stoic expression hiding all emotions and thoughts. Shizuka knew he was considered odd and robotic by her fellow peers, yet despite that she felt increasingly curious about the silent genius. Sick of pondering on her thoughts, Shizuka took a risk.
What's the worst that could happen..?
"Excuse me?"
...
"I never caught your name.."
...
The silence disheartened her, enforced by his lack of care towards her attempts at making conversation. She sighed in defeat.
Why even bothe-
"Ulquiorra Cifer."
Her lonely thoughts were brought abruptly to a halt, by the no longer name less Ulquiorra.
Shizuka's clouded eyes shone with surprise, and the rooms cold feeling was lifted for a moment as a slight smile graced her thin lips.
I guess he is alive after all.. well slightly.
"Hi, sorry for what happened earlier, I'm having an off day" she smiled in an attempt to seem calm, inside she was bursting with curious as to how far this talk could go.
Ulquiorra refrained from speaking this time, but bothered to nod his head slightly in understanding.
"Would you mind if I sat her again... I.. Uh.." Wow, this is harder than I thought... Maybe I should speak to more people other than Chiyo more often!
The bored gaze from the emerald eyes caused Shizuak to panic, her hazel eyes darting to and form the window and Ulquiorra.
Stop making it awkward and just spit it out already!
"I don't really feel comfortable near the front... I li-like it back here so... Uh! Only if you don't mind!" The introvert within her fought every word out of her mouth, but eventually she made her proposition.
"Fine." He responded quickly in a monotone manner.
Relief filled her mind as the fear of rejection receded, replaced with a sense of accomplishment. As if nothing had happened Ulquiorra returned his attention to the teachers standard boring presentation, listening studiously and reviewing quickly in his notes the minuscule information he missed during what you could call a 'conversation' with Shizuka.
Their brief talk was over. It may have meant nothing to Ulquiorra, but he failed to realise the impact he made on the timid Shizuka. The silent, cold genius had created a glimmer of confidence and happiness for the shy girl.
Authors notes
-This is a really late update I know! I guess I overestimated how much time I would get done over the holidays, and when I got back to school I pretty much stopped writing until last week. I know it's frustrating waiting for updates (I have no patience when it come to my favourite fanfics and manga) but I am trying to fit I time for writing during my final year of high school, so study unfortunately comes first.
- I have to thank the latest chapters of Bleach for my inspiration, I am such a fangirl for Grimmjow so (SPOILERS) I was so overjoyed by his return, plus Nel and Yoruichi being in the storyline more so yay! Also I got the need to write again since I am studying this book in English called Stasiland and I love the style of the authors writing.
- I was a little short on ideas for a while but I am happy to say I have a decent plan outline for the plot from this point on and have started to prepare the next two chapters (I'm jumping between the two but I'll update whichever one is complete first). Sorry for the OC orientated chapter! there won't be many more of these so bare with me I didn't just write it for the sake of it, there will be more Ulquiorra soon. ^_~
-I will continue to use Italics for characters thoughts.
And finally thank you to Maylavender and Lhisawesome4ever for your reviews!
Lhisawesome4ever: my first review ever, ^_^ it really boosted my confidence so thank you. I am still pretty new to writing fanfiction but I hope I continue to avoid making any MarySue type OCS.
Maylavender: you have no idea how much of a relief it felt to know someone appreciated my style of writing! I hope you enjoyed with this chapter!
If you enjoyed please follow, favourite or write a review, and thanks for reading :)
