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Meeting Ichigo's eyes again, Orihime finally fully accepted his arms being around her, as she rested her head on his shoulder. "You can't keep things from me anymore. We're a team."

"I know," Ichigo said, as they pulled apart again to look at each other. "I love you, and I am so grateful to have you… I'm not going to take you for granted again."

Finally a smile appeared on Orihime's face, as he had reached up to caress her cheek. "I know… I love you too."

The next morning, October 22nd

The sound of crying lifting into the air was what Orihime woke up to. As she was sitting up, Ichigo reached over to rest a hand on her arm to stop her.

"I can go get her, you can just go back to sleep."

"Thanks, but I kind of miss this," Orihime said, as she got out of bed to leave their room. Once in the nursery, she scooped Mina up out of her crib and moved over to the rocking chair. Adjusting so she could begin to nurse Mina, she slowly began to rock the chair back and forth, and let her head rest back on the chair. Despite her tiredness taking most of her attention, she felt happy at this moment. I missed doing this… Feeling at home with my family.

It wasn't until after Mina finished nursing, that Orihime adjusted so she could cradle Mina to her chest after burping her. Enjoying feeling so close to her daughter. After a moment her eyes moved to the doorway when Ichigo appeared, then Bingo who trotted into the room to lay on the rug in front of Mina's crib.

"I just let Bingo out, and it was sprinkling outside," Ichigo said, motioning to Bingo, who was currently rubbing his face all on the rug.

Orihime smiled after Bingo sneezed. "I missed this."

"It finally feels back to normal," Ichigo said, yawning as he watched Mina. "She's back to sleep already? This past week she was awake at five in the morning, and would stay up for hours."

"It's probably the rain," Orihime said, glancing to the window where all she could hear was the sound of the rain. The sun hadn't yet made an appearance yet. Her focus went back down to Mina and smiled. "I wish it would be that easy for me to go back to sleep."

Ichigo hummed lowly and smiled when Orihime met his eyes again. "Maybe we could give it a shot though? The rains supposed to clear up some time in a couple of hours, then Rin, Raya, and Kei are coming over for lunch. We could use a couple more hours of sleep."

"Okay." Orihime agreed after a moment. Getting up slowly, she crossed the room and rested Mina down in her crib without waking her up. Catching Bingo's attention, she got him to follow her out of the room, and they returned back to her and Ichigo's bedroom. Bingo took a running jump onto the bed and laid down at his usual spot at the end.

Ichigo grinned at Bingo. "He's getting much better at jumping up here."

"I'm noticing that. He's growing up on us," Orihime agreed, smiling as she got back into bed with Ichigo, and moved so she could rest her head on his chest. After a moment of silence, she sighed. "This is nice."

Ichigo, who had been lightly running his fingers through her hair, hummed lowly. "It is. I missed morning's like these."

Orihime moved her head so she could kiss him, then rested her head back down and closed her eyes. The sound of the rain lightly tapping on the roof was what helped soothe her back to sleep.

That afternoon

Starting to load the dishes from lunch into the dishwasher, Orihime's eyes moved to look through the windows in the kitchen that gave her a view of the back porch. Ichigo was back there, along with Kei, Raya, and Bingo. Since it was no longer raining, Ichigo had filled up the kiddie pool, and Raya and Bingo were currently playing in it. The sun had come out and it was an unusually hot day for October, so they thought it'd be nice.

"I have to apologize once again for not telling you about Aizen." Rin said, appearing from the dining room with the rest of the dishes from lunch.

"It's fine Rin," Orihime said, offering her a smile. "It's not like I didn't know he was alive-"

"No, no," Rin interrupted, waving her hand. "I should have told you. I was just being protective, but that was not my place."

Smiling at that, Orihime shrugged. "From now on, let's just be honest with each other," she said, reaching over to rest her free hand on Rin's. "We're family, right? Honesty is policy."

"Yeah," Rin agreed, just as Mina's cry was heard through the baby monitor. She clapped her hands together and turned. "I'll go get her."

Putting the last of the dishes in the dishwasher, Orihime moved to the back door and stood in the doorway. Her eyes going to Raya and Bingo in the pool. "Having fun Raya?"

"Of course I am!" Raya exclaimed, giggling as Bingo jumped back in and out of the pool again.

"Was that Mina crying?" Ichigo asked, his eyes meeting Orihime's.

"Yeah, but Rin went to go get her," Orihime replied, then her eyes moved to Kei. "So are you enjoying your new job at the fire station?"

Kei nodded, as he sat down in one of the chairs at the patio table. "Ichigo and I were just talking about that actually… Yes, I'm enjoying it. It's nice to be closer to home. It only takes me twenty minutes to get to work now instead of almost an hour."

"Well that's more time you get to sleep in the morning," Orihime said, smiling as her attention went back to Raya. "Do you want a popsicle?"

"Yes!" Raya exclaimed, standing up in the pool.

"Wait, don't get out," Kei said, at her about to get out of the pool. "We'll bring the popsicle to you."

Orihime went inside and returned back out with a blue popsicle for Raya who had sat back down in the pool to more calmly enjoying the cool treat. She moved back inside when she noticed Rin had come back downstairs with Mina now.

"She just needed to be changed."

"She'll probably need to be fed soon too," Orihime said, smiling at the way Rin held Mina and the look of happiness on her face. "So, if I'm being too forward, you don't have to answer… But have you thought about having any more kids?"

"No," Rin replied immediately, but she stopped for a moment and hummed. "Maybe."

Orihime laughed at Rin's words and raised an eyebrow. "That confident, huh?"

Rin snuggled Mina a little closer to her, as she sat down on one of the chairs at the bar. "I mean I just forgot how it is when they are this tiny."

"Have you and Kei talked about it?"

"We have… I think we're both on the same page that our main focus right now is our wedding. Raya's got a busy schedule with preschool half the day and running around the other half. I still manage the Somi people who live in Karakura, and I really think it's important for Kei to settle into his job," Rin said, smiling down at Mina. "But every time I hold this little lady; it makes me want to forget all that other stuff…Bingo apparently had jumped back into the pool and slid around a little. Orihime smiled as Bingo happily barked and shook out his wet fur. "And Bingo of course."

The next day, 23rd of October

"That was such a beautiful ceremony." Orihime gushed, taking a glass of champagne off the tray the waiter offered her.

"It really was." Rukia agreed, also taking a couple glasses from the tray, and handing one over to Renji.

"What's really beautiful," Akira started, finishing her most recent glass of bourbon. "Is the open bar."

While the others laughed, Tatsuki just held up her gin and tonic. "That's the truth."

Ichigo raised an eyebrow in Tatsuki and Akira's direction. "I thought you two hit your wedding quota for the year."

Orihime noticed that led to both Tatsuki and Akira looking in her direction. "What?"

"Do you tell him everything we talk about?" Tatsuki countered.

Orihime shrugged after a moment. "Not everything."

"It's okay dear," Akira reached over and patted the back of Orihime's hand. "We know you can help it because you two are in a relationship now."

"We're actually engaged." Ichigo pointed out, rolling his eyes at how that made both Tatsuki and Akira laugh. Even Rukia and Renji joined in.

"Anyway," Akira started after the laughter stopped. "I will not be attending any more weddings this year, as Orihime has already told you; I have hit my wedding quota this year."

Tatsuki nodded in agreement with Akira, then her eyes moved back to Orihime and Ichigo. "So don't all of a sudden decide to get married-"

"Next August," Orihime said, her eyes going down to Mina who was asleep in her carrier. "We've got too much on our plate right now to try and get married this year."

Tatsuki focus went to Rukia now. "Don't you get any ideas either."

That made Renji nearly spit out his drink from where he had been silently trying to stay out of the conversation.

Rukia started laughing and nudged his shoulder. "Relax," she told him, then looked back to Tatsuki. "We just started dating."

"Like four months ago," Akira pointed out, as she waved her hand. "Some people get married after knowing each other for like five seconds."

"That definitely is not us," Tatsuki said, motioning between herself and Akira, then she finished her gin and tonic. "Okay, let's go back to the bar."

"Yes!" Akira exclaimed, clapping her hands together, as she pushed her chair back.

Ichigo smirked in Tatsuki and Akira's direction, as they both got up. "What is that? The fourth trip since the ceremony ended?"

"College changes people Ichigo," Tatsuki replied, waving off his smirk. "We're a lot more fun now."

As Tatsuki and Akira walked in the direction of the bar, Rukia whistled lowly. "Hopefully neither of them drove here."

Orihime smiled at that. "If they did, we'll just let them come over to our house and stay the night- oh Mai, the ceremony was beautiful!"

At Orihime's attention changing to Mai, who showed up at the table with Hikari, Rukia nodded. "It was, and your dress is perfect."

"Thank you." Mai said, smiling ear-to-ear as she glanced at Hikari.

"So," Ichigo started, his hand going to rest on the back of Orihime's chair. "You two are going out to the islands. What's it called? That small one next to Silvermist. Light Hollow, right?"

Mai nodded, as she grabbed a champagne flute from the waiter going by. "Yeah, it's perfect for honeymoons. It's pretty secluded and not as touristy. We wanted a relaxing honeymoon."

"When do you two need to be at the airport?" Orihime asked.

Hikari looked down at his watch, then rubbed the back of his neck. "In about an hour."

Renji chuckled at that. "You two are pushing it pretty close aren't you?"

Mai laughed, as she and Hikari shared another look. "We're both pretty good at procrastinating… But speaking of having to leave soon. Where is Emi? The last time I saw her, she was with Karin, and I have no idea where they are."

Orihime motioned over to where Karin was dancing with both Raya and Emi, and Toshiro was currently taking pictures of them. "Karin's been keeping the kids busy practically the whole day."

"I'm going to go grab Emi real quick," Mai said, turning to walk away.

Hikari's attention moved to Orihime and Ichigo. "My parents will be in town for the next couple days and are going to watch Emi for us. But, we really appreciate you two watching her the rest of the time we'll be gone."

"Oh it's no problem," Orihime said, offering Mai a smile. "You've watched Mina for us plenty of times."

"I'm honestly surprised you two aren't going for the upgrade and getting my sister, Karin, to babysit for you," Ichigo added with a grin.

Hikari shrugged and smirked back at Ichigo. "Well as tempting as it is, Mai and I don't want to ask too much of Karin with how busy she is right now."

Mai reappeared with Emi on her hip, and her eyes meeting Hikari's. "Are you ready to go? We have to go find your parents."

Hikari nodded, and reached over to accept Emi who was busy trying to take the flowers out of her mom's hair. His eyes moved to Orihime and Ichigo again. "We'll be back on the 29th. You have my parents number."

"Yes, yes. Now go and enjoy your honeymoon." Orihime said, laughing as she motioned for them to go.

A few days later

Grabbing some boxes of pasta of the shelf, Ichigo's eyes went back to the grocery cart, as Emi was now standing up in the cart. "No, no. Emi sit back down."

"I want help." Was all Emi said, as she reached over to the shelf.

"I know you want to help Emi, but you've got to sit down-" Ichigo quickly set the pasta boxes in the car, and reached over to keep Emi from taking anything off the shelf.

"Got Bingo's dog food," Orihime's voice was heard first, as she walked around Ichigo to put Bingo's dog food on the bottom of the cart. Seeing Ichigo's struggle to keep Emi from reaching for the food on the shelf, she smiled, and reached in the diaper bag she had with her. "Emi do you want a snack?"

"Yes!" Emi exclaimed, losing interest in the shelves of food, as she turned to face Orihime.

"Sit back down please," Orihime said, waiting for the toddler to sit down, then she handed her a plastic bag full of animal crackers. "Here you go."

Watching Orihime handle that so smoothly had Ichigo sighing. "Geez, I need to get better at this."

Orihime smiled at him, as she grabbed a bag of rice from the shelves. "Well you have at least another two years before Mina gets to this age, so you have time to practice."

"More like I need to just walk around with little bags of snacks all the time."

"It works most of the time," Orihime replied, as they started walking down the aisle. She motioned to Mina, who was busy sucking on her pacifier. "You did great keeping Mina calm."

"That's pretty easy. All I have to do is put her pacifier back in after she spits it out," Ichigo said, as they stopped on the next aisle over. His eyes glancing to Mina and to Emi. "We should probably hurry up though. I have a feeling this whole calm thing is going to end up with a meltdown or two if they don't get their naps soon."

"Definitely," Orihime agreed, reaching for their list to see what else they needed. "Let's do this."

A half hour later

Pulling into the driveway, Ichigo hit the garage opener button, as they drove slowly down the long drive. It wasn't until they were stopped in the garage that he turned the car off, and turned to look over his shoulder at where both Mina and Emi were asleep in their car seats.

"I think we should get the girls out first," Orihime said, also looking back at the girls. "However, I feel like if we move them, they might wake up again."

"We can do this." Ichigo nodded to reassure Orihime, then they both got out of the car. He got Emi out, as she was on his side of the car. After waiting for Orihime to get Mina, they both walked up the stairs to the main level of the house. It wasn't until they had laid both Emi and Mina down in their cribs in Mina's nursery, that he shared a smile with Orihime.

"Success." Orihime whispered after they tip-toed out of the nursery, and back down the main floor.

"That was very lucky," Ichigo said, as he went over to the laundry room where they currently had Bingo's crate at. They had potty trained him for the most part, and rarely used the crate anymore when they left the house. However, when they were gone for longer periods of time, they would put him in the crate. "Hopefully Bingo won't wake them up."

As soon as Ichigo was in the laundry room, Bingo stood up, and his tail started thumping against the crate. When Ichigo let him out, he ran straight out of the laundry room, and to the back door. Orihime opened it up for him to go out, then she and Ichigo went back downstairs to the garage to grab the groceries from the car and close the garage door.

A few trips later, they had all the groceries upstairs and were putting them away. Orihime took a break from unpacking the groceries to let Bingo back inside, and she gave him a little attention. Her eyes moved to Ichigo when she heard him chuckle. "What?"

"I was just thinking that so far from yesterday and today, that we've done a pretty good job having two kids in the house," Ichigo replied, then he smirked in Bingo's direction. "Well, two kids and one puppy."

"I guess we have." Orihime agreed, going back to finish up putting some groceries in the pantry.

Ichigo waited until Orihime returned from the pantry, as he leaned against the counter. "Have you thought about having any more kids?"

"That's kind of funny," Orihime said, moving to sit on one of the bar stools, after grabbing a glass of water. "I was talking about that with Rin a few days ago… Rin said that she and Kei had considered it, but they want to get settled and married before they decide on anything."

"What did you say?" Ichigo asked curiously.

Shrugging her shoulders, Orihime leaned on the back of the chair a little. "I mean I don't know. I feel like we're both happy with how things are now with Mina and Bingo."

"That's true… I guess sometimes I think about how amazing Mina is, and it'd be nice to have another kid sometime."

"I feel that too," Orihime said, then she laughed. "However, then I usually think about what it took to get Mina here, and I still think it's a little too soon for me to want to go through that again."

Ichigo laughed along with her. "Maybe we can revisit the idea in a few years. After we're married, and maybe when Mina's starting preschool. Plus Bingo might calm down in a few years, and won't be so high strung."

Orihime glanced down to the floor where Bingo was currently chasing his tail around in circles, then he got distracted with a few toys on the ground. "Something tells me that he's going to be a lot of work for many years to come," she said, then she got off the chair and knelt down to pet him and grab one of his toys. "But that's okay because we love him very much."

Here Ichigo just says he's a pretty special dog at Bingo's distraction again.

A few days later, October 31st

Going into Mina's nursery, Orihime set the laundry basket on top of the dresser and went through the process of putting away Mina's clothes. She usually went through three to four outfits a day, as there was always some sort of mess on them. There was a lot to put away. Once she finished with that task, she walked out of the nursery just as Ichigo was walking in with Mina wrapped in her little towel with baby hippos on it.

"The bath was a success," Ichigo said, as he moved over to the changing table to put a diaper and a onesie on Mina. "She only cried for a minute before I could get the water to the right temperature."

"The laundry is mostly done," Orihime said. "I think we have one more load that has to get done, and I'm going to go grab those and put them in the dryer now. I- Uh Bingo!"

Hearing Orihime's exclamation, Ichigo turned to look over his shoulder to see Bingo trotting happily into the nursery and wagging his tail. He smirked as Orihime re-appeared back in the doorway. "He's still tiny enough to trip over every once in a while."

"I have a feeling even when he gets bigger, I will still trip over him. Because he just wants to be everywhere that I am, and stop in front of me in the hall," Orihime replied, smiling down at Bingo, then brought her eyes to Ichigo again, who was about to put on Mina's onesie. "Will you put her in her costume first?"

Ichigo glanced back at Orihime again. "Do you think that's a good idea? It's still pretty early."

"Only for a few minutes. I want to see how it looks on her." Orihime said, walking back out of the room to go finish up the laundry. Bingo following her downstairs, and once in the laundry room, he stopped outside to drink some water from his bowl. After moving the clothes from the washer to the dryer, she eyed Bingo with a big smile on her face.

A few minutes later Ichigo came downstairs with Mina, and met Orihime by the back door where she was waiting for Bingo to come in. "Here she is."

Orihime turned, and smiled immediately and smiled in her little cat costume. "Oh my gosh, it's perfect! She is so cute."

"I have to agree this is pretty cute," Ichigo said, smiling as Orihime had got out her phone to take some pictures. His eyes went downward when Bingo came running inside. His eyebrow raised at the sight of their puppy in a skeleton costume. "I knew you got him a costume… I just didn't know it was matching mine."

Orihime smiled back at Ichigo. "Well technically our costumes are the same as pajamas. So we're not really dressing up that much. Besides I thought it would be perfect, because I'll be matching Mina. You'll be matching-"

"Our dog," Ichigo interrupted, before he laughed. "I have to say, we need to remember to thank Karin for suggesting this idea. Because I'm not really one to dress up in costumes, and this is a perfect solution. Wearing Halloween themed pajamas basically."

"I know, we need to do this every year," Orihime agreed, taking another picture of Mina. "We need to go ahead and get her out of that costume before she spits up on it or worse."

"You don't have to tell me twice." Ichigo said, watching her take her last few pictures of Mina.

Finishing up with the pictures, Orihime sighed. "This is going to be so different."

"What is?"

"All the holidays… We're going to be able to focus on her now, instead of just us. We used to be planning to spend the night out with our friends. Our priorities are so different now," Orihime replied, then she chuckled. "You know that Karin is getting Toshiro to go to a Halloween party with her tonight."

"That used to be us, once upon a time." Ichigo replied as they both moved to go back upstairs. Bingo hurrying so he could go ahead of them.

Orihime flipped the light back on in Mina's nursery and stood in the doorway as Ichigo went to go change Mina into a normal onesie. "Honestly, it's kind of funny. I don't think either of them really wants to go. Karin just wants to see some of her friends for a couple of hours… All of our friends are out on their college campuses for parties and fun."

"Well not all of them," Ichigo pointed out. "Mai and Hikari, then Rin and Kei… oh yeah, I guess that's the only ones that aren't going out partying at college tonight. Well, some of the shinigami won't be."

"Those won't be the ones that are in the Soul Society right? Because those don't count." Orihime said, reaching over for Mina after Ichigo finished changing her into her onesie.

Ichigo hummed lowly. "I guess that's true… Rukia and Renji are going to meet up with Akira and Tatsuki apparently."

Orihime smiled at the thought. "Honestly I'm not that disappointed that we're not going to a party. I mean if we're not counting the party at Rin's house that is meant for kids 4 and under."

"I don't think that's in the same category as the same type of party that our friends are going tonight," Ichigo replied, smiling as that made Orihime laugh. "I'm kind of glad that we're just going over to Rin's for a couple hours, then over to my dad's to watch Halloween movies for the rest of the night."

Orihime's eyes went down to where Mina was falling asleep on her chest, and they fell into silence for a moment. After a moment, she sighed and smiled. "Yeah, there's not where else I'd rather be tonight than spending it with our baby girl."

A/N: Orihime and Ichigo are finally back to normal, and things seem to be alright in their life. Also Mai and Hikari's wedding was briefly mentioned, but I really enjoyed writing the grocery store scene with Emi. What was your favorite scene?

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