Chapter 7: Bad day

"Are you even listening, Tosh?"

The white-haired captain woke up from his thoughts and looked at Tamotsu. The gang was sitting in the school café and having lunch. Okay, everyone except Toshiro, who still hadn't gotten his appetite back.

"Sorry, what did you say?" Toshiro said to him. Tamotsu rolled his eyes.

"He said that we got Mori-sensei to be our instructor. She gave us the keys to the music room, and we're gonna check it out after school." Chloe said, almost jumping on her seat. As usual, she was over-active and hyper. Well, at least she was happy.

"Yeah, that sounds great" Toshiro said, giving his friends a barely visible smile.

"Hey are you alright buddy? You haven't eaten anything." Mitsuhiko said, looking at Toshiro's plate.

"He never eats" Genma stated with his usual monotone voice. Everyone looked at him and then moved their eyes to Toshiro. Chloe tilted her head to the side and looked at the captain.

"Is there something wrong? You know you can tell us if there is" she said to him, her voice filled with worry.

"I'm alright. I'm just not hungry, that's all" the boy said and gave her a small reassuring smile. Chloe and the others gave him the look that just screamed 'who do you think you're fooling?'

"But seriously, man, you should eat. You already look like you're gonna pass out any second" Mitsuhiko said to him, while his sister nodded rapidly.

"For once brother, you have a point. And even more, we have swimming class later today. I really don't want to fish you out of the pool" she said.

"Aw, shit, that was today? I forgot all about it." Mitsuhiko cursed, and looked a bit defeated.

"Well, good thing you have a sister that did remember. You swim shorts are in my locker" she said, taking a bite of her pizza. Toshiro barely heard their conversation anymore. He was lost in his thoughts again.

'I have a bad feeling about this…' Ayumi thought before turning back to her lunch.


"I HATE SWIMMING!" Tamotsu exclaimed loudly when the boys were in the changing rooms. Toshiro, who had just gotten himself into his shorts, looked at him, baffled.

"What's wrong with swimming? I mean, would you rather be on the field doing laps?" he said as he pulled an old t-shirt over his head. No way he was going to let people see his scar.

" Well, yeah if you think that way…. But still! Water is cold and wet, I hate it! It's alright in the summer, but in gym class? I don't think so." Tamotsu whined.

"Quit yer bitchin' and get to the pool Suoh!" a loud voice boomed trough the room, making the boys wince. The school coach was a big man; way over 2 meters tall and he had a strong build. First time Toshiro saw him, he thought he was Kenpachi. No offense to the 11th division captain.

Once the boys got out of the changing rooms, the girls were already out and waiting for them. The boys sat down next to the metal fence that divided the pool area from the rest of the yard and waited for their turn to come. The coach put them to the pool in pairs and because the guy had no sense of logic there was no way to tell who's going to be your partner. Then after a while the big man yelled:

"Okay, next pair is Mitsuhiko Sakuragi and Toshiro Hitsugaya. Get yer asses over 'ere!"

The boys winced, but got up. Before Toshiro reached the starting platform, the coach stopped him.

"No clothes in the pool" he said with a tone that said. "And don't even think about back talking, just take the shirt off and get to the pool." he said. His tone didn't leave any space to argue, so Toshiro pulled the shirt over his head and tossed it to where he had been sitting a while ago. He didn't look up, but he felt his classmates' eyes on his scar as he stepped to the platform. From the corner of his eye he saw Mitsuhiko mouth 'You alright?'. He nodded to him and turned to face the pool as the coach blew his whistle. It didn't take long for the boy to reach the other end, turn around and reach the other end again. Once Mitsuhiko reached the end too he got up from the pool and started to walk towards the rest of the gang and his shirt. He felt dizzy and he wanted to sit down. But before he could get further than a few meters away from the pool, he felt someone grab his shoulder. He turned around to see the coach looking at him.

"What happened to ya, kid?" the man asked him.

"A little accident a few years back, nothing serious." he said. No need for the coach to know what he told Mrs. Nakagawa.

"Like hell kid. That scar goes right trough. What happened?" the man demanded. Toshiro could feel the rest of the class staring at him. Or rather, his scar. He was getting irritated and his head was already spinning a little.

"I told you it was an accident few years back! Nothing to worry about." he said, irritation obvious in his voice. Why does he care anyway?

"Kid, stop lying. I hate liars even more than lazy bums." coach said. He was starting to get angry.

"Well, too bad for you. You do seem to recognize liars, I'll give you that, but that doesn't mean I'll tell you what really happened" he said and turned around on his heels. Fast. A little too fast. His head, which had been spinning slightly before, made a full spin inside his skull and Toshiro's vision got blurry and faded to black. The last thing he remembered was someone yelling his name before he hit the tiled floor.


"Ugh…"

"He's waking up!"

'Who's voice is that?' Toshiro thought, opening his eyes. Everything looked blurry. He couldn't tell who was standing/sitting next to him.

"Don't move kid, ya hit yer head pretty bad" he heard someone say. That accent… coach? He blinked a few times and his vision cleared. He saw his friends looking at him, worried look all over their faces. Ignoring the coach's words, Toshiro pushed himself up from the tiles and held his head with his left hand. He felt like he was going to have a headache later. He looked around a little. The whole class was looking at him as he got up.

"Hey, didn't cha hear what I said? I told ya not to move!" the boy heard the coach say but ignored him and kept walking until he reached his abandoned shirt and pulled it on. Then he felt someone grab his shoulder again. First, he thought it was coach, but when he turned around he was face-to-face with worried looking Tamotsu.

"Come on, man, sit down and take a breath. Then we'll take you to the nurses offi…"

"Thanks, but no thanks. I've seen way too many doctors to this age already. Besides, I'm sure it's just because I didn't eat much at lunch." Toshiro told the other boy.

"Didn't eat much? Buddy, you didn't even touch your lunch!" Mitsuhiko joined the conversation.

"And how is that a problem? I'm alive, no need to worry." the white haired boy said to them, rubbing his aching head.

"Well you won't be alive for too long if you keep this up Tosh. Seriously, you look like a skeleton." Tamotsu said gesturing to the other boys overly thin arms, then continued: "Are you sure there's nothing wrong? Chloe's right, you can tell us" he said, looking at the captain, who was baffled. He hadn't expected something like that to come out of the other's mouth.

"Just tell us what happened kid!" the coach yelled. Toshiro looked at the tall man as his memories started to resurface.

Battle.

His sword gone trough Aizen.

Kurosaki yells.

Blood.

Hinamori.

Hinamoris blood.

The captains knees started to give in. His breath came out in pants. He was sweating. He didn't want to…no. He couldn't tell them. Anything. Even if he could tell them, he wouldn't. It was too much for him. Even captain Unohana said so. She had said that the white-haired captain had a serious trauma. And she also said that he wasn't ready to face it. Not yet. Toshiros knees buckled and gave in, letting the boy fall to the tiled floor. Tears started to form in his eyes, but he shook them off before anyone could see. He stared at the ground and felt someone placing a gentle hand on his shoulder. He looked up. Ayumi looked down to him and smiled warmly.

"It's obviously something you don't want to tell about, and that's fine. We all have our secrets. Take Tamo for example: he couldn't look at a spider to save his life" she said and the whole class broke out laughing. Tamotsu looked pissed at first but joined them quickly. Even Toshiro cracked a small smile. It was weird. One minute everyone was extremely worried, and the next they were all laughing. All it took was one sentence. Thanks to Ayumi, the gloomy atmosphere was all gone.

Once everyone was done laughing, Ayumi looked at the captain who had gotten up from the floor and looked at him.

"But seriously, go to the nurses' office. You're bleeding, and blood doesn't look good on white." she said to him. Toshiro touched his head; true enough there was blood on his fingers. Then, there was a loud crash and everyone turned around to see Mitsuhiko lying on the ground, pale as a ghost. He was out cold.

"Seems like my brothers cute little weakness has been revealed: he has hematophobia, in other words, he's afraid of blood." Mio explained to the baffled class while trying to get his brother to wake up. The class started to laugh again as Tamotsu took the unconscious Mitsuhiko and started to walk towards the nurses' office with Ayumi and Toshiro.


After they got out of the office, the gym class was already over and everyone else had gone home. Mitsuhiko was still pale and looked like he was going to throw up and Toshiro had a bandage around his head to cover the small injury. They walked together to their usual meeting spot, but once Toshiro was sure no-one saw him, he started running towards the Nakagawa house. Fast enough to make the usually twenty minute walk last five minutes. Well, it was late, and no-one saw him. And even if someone did, he wouldn't have been able to recognize his face with that speed. Besides, he was late for dinner. Not that he was going to eat much anyway. Once he got to the garden gate and opened it he noticed that there was a strange car in their driveway.

'Do we have guests?' he thought as he walked in to the house and to the living room.

"I'm back" he said at the door before completely walking in, only to get yelled at.

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?"

Toshiro almost jumped because of the dangerous tone Mrs. Nakagawa was using. She was pissed. No, scratch that. She was beyond angry. She continued yelling.

"You were supposed to be home an hour ago! Where were you? And why didn't you answer your phone? And WHAT ON EARTH happened to your head?" she almost screamed, pointing to the bandage around his head. Toshiro took a deep breath.

"I'm sorry for being late. I didn't answer my phone because the battery's dead. And please, don't worry about the bandage, that was just a little accident in gym class. Which is also the explanation to why I'm late, the school nurse was patching me up" he told her calmly. He saw that Mrs. Nakagawa was calming down. She took a very deep breath and sat down to the sofa next to her husband, who was smiling.

"See, I told you that he had a good reason to be late" Mr. Nakagawa said, still smiling to his wife.

"How do you know he got that from gym class? He could've been in a fight" a cold voice said. Toshiro looked at the sofa and noticed an elder man sitting there. The man looked like Mrs. Nakagawa, except the fact his eyes were cold. The look he gave to Toshiro made it obvious: this man is the head of the Nakagawa family.

"Toshiro, meet my father, Takuto Kooyama. I guess he's your grandfather now" she said smiling at the boy.

'Kooyama must be her maiden name…' Toshiro thought as he heard the elder man talk.

"I never agreed with you two adopting a child. And now I agree even less. Just look at him, he has white hair. He's obviously going to be a criminal, if he already isn't! It's written all over his face." the man spoke, and didn't even try to hide the disgust in his voice. Toshiro just stared at the man. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. Just who did he think he was? The young captain took a very deep breath before saying anything to calm himself down.

"I assure you, I'm not a criminal…." he started, but the man interrupted him rudely.

"If you're not a criminal, why are you living with my daughters' family? Why aren't you living with your own family?" Mr. Kooyama asked the boy. It was obvious that if Toshiro wouldn't answer him, he would kick him to the street. Toshiro was now overly pissed. What does this guy think he knows about him?

"It's hard to live with my family since I don't even remember what they look like." he told him, no longer hiding his irritation. The room temperature started to drop below freezing.

"See, exactly what I meant! Your parents never cared about you so they abandoned you and you became a criminal! The classic story." the elder man said loudly, ignoring his family's words of protest.

"Not really." Toshiro continued. It was already snowing outside and there was frost on the living room windows. "If you just would've let me finish, you would know that my parents died when I was just an infant. THAT is why I don't remember them or live with them. So, please, next time you start judging people at least check if there is even a chance of your 'theory' to be true" the captain said with so much venom in his voice that everyone in the room got scared. Toshiro turned around on his heels and went to his room and dropped himself to his bed.

' Well, at least tomorrow can't be as bad as today was' he thought, and fell asleep.


Me: This has got to be the longest thing I've ever written! I just hope it's not too long…

Toshiro: Weren't you supposed to be studying? Don't you still have three tests coming?

Me: Yeah… But I got an idea for this chapter so I just had to finish it.

Toshiro: Your idea was to make my life miserable. AGAIN.

Me: Not miserable, never. I just had to add a little something to spice things up. *grin*

Toshiro: I'll never see the end of this story if I keep talking to you….

Me: Well, at least stay alive for a little while so you can see what happens in the next chapter!

Toshiro: I'm not sure I want to know… Anyway, as usual, Angel DOES NOT own Bleach!

Me: Please give me reviews and tell what you think! You have no idea how much they mean to me!