Rukia is silent as I push through the door to my house. She was silent the whole walk home, a complete 180 from her bubbly, incorrigible self this afternoon. I keep thinking that it's something to do with the swimming incident, because that's when she got all moody and unpredictable.
But, come on-I already said I was sorry! It wasn't even really my fault, and I apologized, and still she's all-I don't know, weird. When I go to take my coat from her, she jerks away, genuine alarm in her eyes, then drops her gaze and takes off the jacket, handing it to me while looking at the floor. Shameful.
The house is eerily silent-the twins are at a sleepover and Dad went out with some friends for a drink . . . or five. He doesn't usually go out for beer or anything, but I get the feeling that he's a little thrown off with Rukia officially living in the house. Yet another human reaction that I just can't figure out.
I mean, give me a break here-I'm only fifteen! I can't deal with this drama, and I don't see why I have to.
Rukia turns on the TV, something she never does when it's just the two of us, and dinner is leftovers eaten while staring at the screen and pretending nothing's wrong. After dinner, she clears the table and then disappears into Yuzu and Karin's room, shutting the door. The message is achingly clear-she doesn't want me around.
But for God's sake, why? I haven't done anything, not that I'm aware of, and suddenly I'm mad again. It took me all afternoon to calm down and swallow my pride for long enough to go and look for Rukia, and she was okay for maybe three seconds before once again acting like-like-like she hates me.
Which can't be right.
I know we don't get along, but she can't hate me. Just this morning she was licking ice cream off my hand.
My face burns at the memory. Her actions had brought to mind other uses for her tongue-namely, kissing-and I'd been so shocked that I was thinking that about her that I'd just . . . reacted. Maybe she thought that I thought that she liked me or something and was trying to disprove that so that things wouldn't get awkward.
If that was it, a) it was overkill, and b) THINGS ARE AWKWARD!
I resist the urge to punch a wall. Punching a wall would not be helpful. Punching a wall would hurt. Punching a wall does not solve anyone's problems. Do not punch the wall.
I slam my knuckles into the wall.
Hey, I never said I listened to my own advice.
My fist breaks through the plaster like it's cardboard, and the door to the girls' room flies open as I try to wriggle my hand out of the hole.
Rukia stares at me.
I glare back, daring her to comment, and finally extract my bleeding hand from the hole. "What?" I mutter.
She opens her mouth, expression suggesting a wise comment is on its way, but then she shuts the door again, and I'm alone. There's still a door and a wall of silence between us, and now my hand hurts like the devil and there's a fricking hole in the fricking wall that Dad is going to kill me for.
Like I said, punching a wall does not solve anyone's problems. It just hurts.
I head into the bathroom for its arsenal of medical supplies. It's a little unwieldy, trying to patch up my right hand with my left.
In the middle of my sloppy treatment, the bathroom door opens and Rukia slips in. She takes the tube of ointment from me and gently but firmly guides me to the edge of the tub, where she makes me sit. She pointedly rebuffs any attempt I make to fix my own wound, carefully applying peroxide and then some kind of cream, then wrapping a flexible bandage aroun dmy knuckles.
"The paint job was ugly, anyway." she says when she's almost done, her voice soft.
"Yeah, and it was funny how the plaster just ran into my hand." I joke.
She smiles, and a million happy butterflies wake up, pattering against my rib cage. Strange. "We'll just say it was a Hollow attack."
I snort, doubting that excuse will work, and she tapes the bandage in place. "There. Done. And-Ichigo?" She's at the door already, going to be gone, one hand on the knob.
"Yeah?"
"Be more careful with yourself." Then she's gone.
And I miss her.
The whole week is more of the same-Rukia is rarely home during the day, and at night when she is, she's laughing and joking with my family, ignoring me. The only time she acknowledges my presence is when she's expected to talk to me, like to ask me to pass the salt or on game night, when it's taken for granted that we'll be a team during Monopoly, which Rukia is notoriously bad at. When we're with my family, she acts normal, but on the rare occasion that we're alone, she doesn't talk. When I try to pull her aside, she ignores me or finds an excuse to be anywhere else.
It's driving me out of my head.
Rukia is the only one I can talk to about Soul Reaper stuff, and the only one I want to talk to about most everything else-the more she avoids me, the angrier I get. Anger, frustration, irritation; these are all emotions she's stirred up in me before, but not even three months ago I would have thanked God most profusely if she'd ever stopped talking to me.
Now I miss the weird comments and the impromptu lectures; the awkward questions about earth stuff that I'd rather not explain, and the fun we used to have just hanging out.
It seems like forever ago.
Not only that, but it's summer, which means gathering at the pool or arcade every day, planning trips to the beach and to amusement parks, spending all my free time having fun with friends. Normally this is my favorite time of year, but not when Rukia's having the time of her life not with me.
I think I'm actually jealous.
I don't own Rukia; she can spend time with whoever she likes. But between her ignoring me and lavishing more attention on my friends than me, it's getting pretty freaking annoying.
But I can't be jealous-not even when Keigo wins her a stuffed panda bear in the claw machine or Chad has to lift her up to see the menu at McDonald's.
And, hang on-why is it only my guy friends that she's with?!
This is seriously too much.
But I can't. Be. Jealous. I don't own Rukia. I can't. Be. Jealous.
I can't.
Now, remember what I said about my own advice?
"Okay, I have an idea!" Keigo announces, exactly one week to the day that Rukia started to ignore me. Not that I'm counting.
"Annnddd I'm scared." Tatsuki comments, eyes glued to the pinball machine. She holds the current high score, but that never stops her from wanting to do better. She's throwing her whole body into the game, going back and forth with the flappers, while Orihime cheers her on enthusiastically. The rest of us are half-watching while lounging around the Air Hockey table. Mizuiro is explaining to Rukia the mechanics of some device in a manga series that they're both reading. Ishida is playing Frog Crossing and pretending not to be a part of the group, which he is. "Let's go to Animal Land!" Keigo goes on, as if Tatsuki hadn't spoken. "We haven't been, in, like, forever!"
"Yeah, since we were nine." This time, the sarcastic comment is from Mizuiro.
"What's Animal Land?" Rukia asks.
"It's a theme park for children." Ishida gives up on his game, which he was losing, and comes to join us. "It's just about par with your intelligence level." he adds, for the benefit of the whole group.
"I like it." Orihime protests. "Are you calling me stupid?"
I was more than happy to see the Quincy turn bright red and not reply. Very few people can put that upstart in his place-I'm glad that Orihime is one of them.
"I think it's an awful idea." I hate to agree with Ishida, but I'm not in the mood for an amusement park that wasn't fun when I was nine, let alone fifteen.
"We'll take a vote." Chad, as always the voice of logic.
The voting goes something like this: Keigo and Rukia for, Orihime for, Tatsuki for after much begging, glaring, and persuading on part of the previous three, me against, Ishida against, Mizuiro against after a lot of dour looks from previous two-and then we all look at Chad. I'm thinking we're going to tie because he's going to vote against, and then we'll have to challenge each other to an Air Hockey game or something to decide, but the big kid lets out a rare smile and says, "Sorry, guys. I'm for it."
My fate is sealed.
