Hello my lovelies! I would like to make an announcement! As of this chapter, Music to my Heart has reached 10 chapters and more than 50 review! I'm so excited argh! Gosh, 50! Sounds pretty big to little old me. Heh.
As such, I would like to thank all my wonderful reviewers: Rin Sessys Girl, RAHbooks, Couriosity, Ulquihime7980, Nypsy, Smylealong, Crono, Blue87, Relya Schiffer, Lilarin, Kanakokiriha, BlackButterfly9, EnternalFireWithin007, ART9807, Aralorn, Paeonin, Vampiress saya101, ART9807, Layalatania, and Kiwi4life.
A very big and special thanks to all my regular reviewers that are awesome enough to review every single chapter: Smylealong, Rin Sessys Girl, RAHbooks, Nypsy, and Lilarin. (And a great thank you to RAHbooks who gave me that 50th review. Here: have a virtual free cookie!) I've been missing a lot of your reviews especially your interesting comments so I hope you will all take this opportunity as the 10th chapter and 50th review to leave your opinions and ever beautiful thoughts.
Another bit of exciting news: I have written a full chapter by chapter plan for this story. It did take me 2 hours and a lot of tea to do, BUT I did it! Yaayness!
So without further ado, on with the story!
Thank you to my Beta Smylealong you should all check out her UlquiHime stories, they're amazing! (links on my profile page)
Ulquiorra lay on his bed, hands behind his head, staring up at the harsh light on the ceiling and listening to the sounds of rain pattering against the window pane as he tried to understand what he had seen. Maybe he hadn't really seen it; it could have been his imagination, however feeble it was. He was so sure it was her, but then the rain had been very heavy, it could have been a trick of the light. He grumbled to himself and rolled over onto his stomach, feeling the soft blue quilt press into his eyes and obscure his vision. He took a deep breath and revisited the scenario in his head:
He got into his black car, threw the soaking umbrella into the backseat, started the engine and reversed out of the space. He pulled out of the car-park and drove past the library and the bus shelter, expecting to see Orihime, but seeing no one. The windscreen wipers were waving furiously to push away the blinding rain, making it impossible to see more than 50 metres in front of him. The lights were on full beam and the street lamps were glowing down onto the pavement, the heavy downpour obscuring them as well. He turned a corner and drove down a small backstreet when he passed a figure, hunched over in the downpour. From the reflection of the fluorescent street lamp just above, he could see bright, flaming hair, glowing in the rainy gloom, over the distinctive yellow of the school jumper.
There was only one other person he knew with hair that shade, and that was Ichigo Kurosaki. And as much as he tried to convince himself that it must have been him, there was no way that figure had been as tall and lean. Besides, Ichigo didn't huddle, he strutted, no matter what the weather, rain, hail or shine. Perhaps there was someone else with that hair, but as much as he tried racking his brains, he could not for the life of him think of anyone else in the 9th grade or above that had orange hair. Only those in high school were allowed in the library, and very few had been in there at the time they had, So why would there have been someone walking from that direction, wearing a school uniform, hunched over in the rain, and looking thoroughly miserable? He tried to convince himself that it could not possibly be her, but there was no other explanation for it. That wretched, cold, wet, depressed, and utterly alone figure, was Orihime Inoue.
There could be many explanations for it of course: Tatsuki may not have been able to pick her up, her phone could have run out of battery, her brother wasn't picking up his own phone, no one else was in a position to take her home. So many scenarios, and yet, what worried him the most was not the fact that he had seen her walking home through the pouring rain in a flimsy school uniform for God-only-knew-how-far. But that she had looked so desolate and abandoned, and that he, Ulquiorra Cifer, who knew that feeling like it was his closest friend, had not even pulled over to see if it was her, and to offer her a lift.
Why? Why had he been so utterly selfish? Of course it was completely natural; she hadn't wanted him to take her home. It might not have even been that woman. But if it had indeed been her, she would be embarrassed to see him. Her brother may not be that enthusiastic about a strange man driving her home. Maybe she liked walking home in the pouring rain late at night. She might have thought he was going to assault her, for crying out loud! All these excuses were prying their way into his mind in an attempt to blind him from the truth. But what was the truth? Was he afraid of what would happen if somehow Aizen found out about him taking her home?
No. He knew what it was. It was the thought of seeing – no matter how small a glimpse – her personal life that terrified him. He hated to associate himself with people too closely for fear of what he would get them into. The reason he distanced himself from Nnoitra and Szayel. Grimmjow had gotten dragged into it whether he liked it or not, and he refused to let the same thing happen to her. It was not as if he had feelings for the woman, he didn't, but he had his humanity. And it was the one thing that kept him from running away and leaving Loly and Cirucci to Aizen's wrath. The one thing that stopped him from trying to fit in with everyone else, for getting involved with his class like everyone else. He had strategic walls built up around him that let no one in. No matter how much people like Grimmjow – or that annoying bastard of a teacher, Mr Kuchiki, or the stupid school counsellor, Mr Zommari, or Aizen, or Loly, or Cirucci, or a girl with hair that blazed like the sun and eyes that shined like stars – tried, they couldn't break them down. They were there, and they were there to stay, and the only thing that could cause the tops of them to crumble, was the piano. The only thing that could cause the walls to fall down and pull him out of his sodden shit of a life for just a few minutes. And he was not going to let that change, not now, not ever. Oh dear God what if she had gotten raped? NO! There was no use thinking like that! She was fine, he knew it.
He heaved himself up, his face feeling squashed from the pressure he had placed on it, his stomach feeling flatter as well. He rubbed his eyes, the bright bedroom light creating dots that swam in his vision. Suddenly there was a loud rumble of thunder that sounded fairly close. He rolled off the bed and walked over to the window where he could just see the tumbling clouds over the cold ocean, the rain sleeting down in front of the pane, creating streak marks. A bright strip of lightning suddenly spiked down into the sea, creating florid patterns in the sky. When had a storm come? Oh well, what did it matter? It didn't. In fact, he liked storms. They created a sense of peace to his troubled mind; the way the sky sorted itself out with a few loud rumbles and some flashing of light. It was like a child having a tantrum, just to get the angst out of its system. Something he wished he could do without anyone hitting him.
He pulled the curtains shut and began to stumble drunkenly towards the door, kicking off his shoes with an awkward hopping motion as he did so. He reached his arm out and fumbled the wall next to the door until the found the familiar switch which he pushed down. The darkness instantly relaxed his eyes and he rubbed them again to ease them back into the state of darkness.
He staggered back to the bed, cursing loudly as he tripped over his sneakers and crashed his knee into the sharp point of the wooden corner of the bed frame. Wincing, he hopped around the shoes and stumbled into the dresser as another rumble of thunder rolled above him followed by the lightning that filtered through the curtains. With another curse he pulled off his jumper and unbuttoned his shirt, not feeling bothered enough to get into his pyjamas; he decided he could just sleep with his trackies and socks on.
Throwing the pieces of clothing next to where he thought his sneakers were, he fell onto the bed, feeling exhausted from all his thinking. Another crash of thunder jolted him as the house shook in response. Just before his mind sank into oblivion, he saw a blinding flash of blue light illuminate his room, throwing everything into a harsh reality and reminding him just how shit his life was.
Orihime sat in the rickety cupboard in the kitchen, her back pressed painfully into the hard wooden edge of a broom and the sharp corner of the vacuum cleaner pushing into her ribcage. Her knees were pulled up to her chest, her face pressed into them with her hands over her ears. She flinched as another loud crashing of thunder rumbled through the house. She could actually feel the cupboard shake with it. She hunched over further, humming the happiest song she could think of. She had moved on from Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to My Favourite Things from The Sound of Music, one of her favourite musicals. She hummed it louder as she saw the bright blue flash of light break through the cracks of the cupboard, lighting up her whole situation vividly for a bare moment and causing her to jump back into the broom.
"Girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes," she sang, dropping the humming as it clearly wasn't working. "Snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes. Silver-white winters that melt into spring, these are a few of my favourite things," she continued as loudly as she could as another explosion of thunder shook the house. "When the-when the-…oh dammit!" she cursed as she forgot the rest of the words. She quickly began to sing the first song that popped into her mind, "If you want to view paradise, simply look around and view it-" she broke off as she opened her eyes and looked around the filthy cupboard, a hollow chuckle escaping from her lips as she realised just how ridiculous that line sounded.
She screamed as thunder roared above her. She put her hands to her ears quickly and continued the song as fast as she could, trying to block out the sounds she knew she was soon to hear.
"If you wanna view paradise-if-if you wanna view-wanna view paradise," she stumbled, her voice no longer following a rhythm as she tried to stop the thunder and lightning.
It was too late; the thunder was starting to drift away from the house, leaving the loud rumbles. But they weren't just rumbling from the sky anymore, they were sluggish, heavy footsteps, making their way drunkenly towards her refuge. Closer and closer. Thump…Thump…Thump…
"No," she groaned, desperately trying to remember the song. The words just wouldn't come. She knew it had something to do with imagination, but what? Her own imagination was getting away from her. Thump..Thump.. What was she going to do? They were almost at the door now. Thump. Thump. Her heart was mixing with the footsteps. Thump thump. Thump thump.
There was a thunderous crash from above.
"NO!" she cried louder, pushing her hands into her ears, but it was too late.
THUMP! She was six again, hiding in a broom cupboard, hearing the ominous thumps stop just outside the door, there was a deafening rumble of thunder. She curled into a ball and looked at the door, silver eyes wide, the stars gone from them to be replaced by a widening black hole. The door swung open, and at that moment, a blinding flash of white lightning appeared to reveal a shadowed figure staring down at her.
She screamed and fell into the vacuum cleaner next to her, jolting her from her vision. She lay there, trying to silence her heavy breathing, too scared to move or make a sound.
She had no idea how long she stayed like that for, but soon the thunder was all but gone, a low rumble sounding in the distance with the occasional flash of lightning seeping through the cracks in the door. She pushed herself up as quietly as she could, feeling her breathing escalate as she listened for a noise. There was nothing. She breathed a sigh of relief and began to heave herself up.
Suddenly she heard a louder roll of thunder that strongly resembled a pounding footstep outside her door. Her resolve deserted her and she crumpled to the floor of the cupboard again. She pressed her shaking form against the vacuum, where she stayed for the rest of the night, too scared of every little noise that sounded through the house, and too tired to fall asleep.
I'm sorry for this chapter being so short. I would have liked a longer one for the 10th, but it just didn't fit in :(
Thank you again to my reviewers as well as my favers and alerters, please keep them coming!
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