.
No vacancy
.
Ichigo learns that his neighbor's name is Rukia.
She's an artist with an assignment on body art, debuting a gallery showing of her own in a week at the studio she also acts as a curator in. At least that's what the flyer the kid around the corner, handing them out, had said.
The paper is glossy and features one of the models Ichigo remembers seeing, the one she'd dragged into the elevator and out the door almost two weeks ago. The address for the show is listed to the corner of the art district where the hipster restaurants bisect where the Friday markets are usually held, and he shoves the flyer into his pocket as he goes.
He thinks that it's impressive, given that it's been about a month since she's moved in, and presumably gotten the job, but he doesn't know anything about the art scene any more than he knows what colors you need to mix to get green.
(Yellow and blue, apparently.
Once the question had come up, he'd been so irritated with himself he'd opened up Google, to his determent, and fallen into an unnecessary research spiral.
He, also, now has a stance on the Anish Kapoor vs Stuart Semple debate.
And no matter how much Tatsuki had raged about it, Ichigo didn't regret the two hours he spent snickering at tumblr posts.)
Anyway.
It explains why he finds a lone arm in the hallway – abandoned and unattached to a body.
Rolling his eyes, he stoops to pick it up, and just as he straightens, he finds 3D peeking at him suspiciously in the crack of her door.
With a lazy smirk, he lifts the hand in a mock salute and walks on to the sound of her indignant huff, the rattle of her door chain and the sound of her already hissing into her phone, "He's a criminal, Urahara, you need to do something!"
He's halfway to a good mood already.
He's practically whistling which is probably why Kon appears, rubbing himself all over Ichigo's legs as he walks down the hall, and Ichigo doesn't even try to step on him.
Using the extra hand he's picked up, he knocks on the door to 3A, and finds himself unsurprised to hear music thumping just beyond it.
If it weren't for his bid to refocus his attention by taunting Grimmjow for thirty minutes in the ring, he'd probably be doing what she was: working.
They had similar schedules after all.
After realizing she was an artist, it made sense; twilight hours and early mornings are for creatives and insomniacs.
Besides, the music provides a good cover for all his pacing and mutterings about gruesome deaths, and the out-loud musings he makes over his questionable knowledge of the history of cults.
And if on relistening to the audios he makes, he can hear her diverse playlists in the undertow and it takes him more firmly back into the mindset he'd been in when he'd recorded, that's his business.
And if there's no repeat of the Cookie Incident since Rukia had dragged him to her place, all the better.
(Screw it anyway, he was ahead of Tatsuki's schedule now and he could afford to waste a few hours catching up on art drama he didn't even know existed.)
Though, now that he's thinking about it, his kitchen is empty.
He'd used the last of the eggs in the aforementioned Cookie Incident, and while he's hit his groove in the last week in terms of word count, he could hit another roadblock any day now, and if he does, he'll need ingredients.
Even with his black eye finally healed and his ankle no longer swollen, Tatsuki's explicit and violent instructions forbidding Ichigo's boxing during the lulls until the deadline has resulted in no other outlet for his frustrations, and god knows what he'll do if he can't at least bake the stress away.
(And if he considers, even for a second, going over to Rukia's to annoy her, he pretends it's only a fleeting thought, and that he dismisses it immediately.)
Unfortunately, he can't go shopping until he can get rid of the arm.
Where the hell is she? He thinks with a huff when he's still standing outside her door with no reply.
"Oi," he calls, banging against the wood with his fist, he follows up with, "I know you're home, Midget."
That, satisfyingly enough, is when he hears the chain of her door rattle as its removed before it's thrown open.
He recoils before he realizes he's doing it.
"God, who died?"
"My sanity," she informs in a deadpan, making a valiant attempt to glare at him through eyes swollen with lack of sleep, and ringed with bruises, dark hair hanging limp and frazzled over her pale face. "What do you want, Kurosaki?"
He waves the arm at her which waves too, and she sighs – in relief or exhaustion, he can't tell – before she's reaching for it, her hand dropping like a stone at the added weight before she drags it inside, knuckles dragging on the floor.
The door slams in his face before he can say anything more.
Kon meows piteously beside him before scratching at the door with another yowl.
Furrowing his brow, Ichigo considers knocking again, but clearly – clearly, she doesn't want to be bothered.
By the time he reaches his own door, his good mood is gone.
Going grocery shopping doesn't help.
He has to go to the one two blocks away because they're closed, and not only is the other grocery store the one he tends to avoid – Inoue at the deli counter is a little too interested in Ichigo's day – the store itself has changed its layout since the last time he was there. Granted, that was at least six months ago, but now he can't find anything.
He's scowling at what was once the cereal aisle – because his kitchen cupboards are literally empty of anything that isn't flour and sugar – and considering if he could get away with living off just that out of spite.
"As thrilling as your grocery saga is," Karin drawls, "why did you call me, exactly?"
"Tatsuki is at a meeting. Chad's at the studio. Grimmjow's knocking Renji out."
"Ah," his sister exhales, "and you don't have any other friends."
She doesn't say it like a question so he doesn't do her the honor of replying beyond an eye roll.
"Tatsuki says you kicked your writer's block in the balls."
"For now," he grumbles, working his way through the tinned can aisle and wondering aloud what possessed anyone to put an entire burger in one.
"Always the pessimist."
"I'm realistic, it's different."
"Well I liked you better when you were kicking it in the balls, you were much more cheerful," she informs with a sigh, and Ichigo spares the thought that she's probably still in the office – lawyers have no concept of quitting time when they have a case to win, or so she says. "But you don't even have writer's block right now," Karin recalls, "so, what gives?"
"Nothing, just – this grocery store has gotten even more inconvenient than usual."
She hums in what would be a consoling way if he didn't know her as well as he does.
Not for the first time, he curses Uryuu; if it weren't for date night Ichigo would've called Yuzu instead, she's much more forgiving of his shitty attitude.
"I'm just wondering you know," she trails in feigned curiosity, "what changed? Oh! I know!"
He grumbles mutinously under his breath; knowing exactly where this is going because –
"Could it be your new neighbor?"
"Stop talking to Tatsuki."
"But nii-chan," she teases, and Ichigo definitely should have interrupted Yuzu's date for this.
"We're friends." Ish? Ichigo hasn't brushed up on his social protocols since high school so he isn't exactly sure what the etiquette is for the neighbor you talking shit with, and get caught doing questionable activities with, and whether or not it actually makes you friends.
"Ah, but you're never friends with your neighbors," Karin reminds, and he can practically see her eyebrows wiggle. "What; is she too busy to hang out today?"
"She's got a deadline, and she looks like hell."
"So…either you're worried about her or annoyed that you don't get a monopoly on her time or both, which means -"
Again, a mutinous grumble, and then, "I don't know why I talk to you."
"Because you love me, and you know I'm right."
"I'm hanging up now."
"You do that," she hums, "say hi to Rukia-chan for me."
"Wait, how the hell did you -" He's cut off by the dial tone, and stares at the screen of his phone in belief. God, girls could be such stalkers.
He almost jumps when Inoue's voice comes up from behind him to ask if he needs help, expression hopeful, and no-no, he's good.
When he gets back to his building, Kon is still sitting outside Rukia's door, looking appropriately put out.
Ichigo lingers with his keys, and grocery bags in hand; makes a 'psst' noise at the cat, and tilts his head at his door in silent invitation. Kon looks begrudgingly at Rukia's door one last time before following Ichigo into his loft.
He finishes unpacking his groceries and putting out some cat food when he notices the time and wonders how long it's been since Rukia had taken a break.
It isn't that he's worried.
At least that's what he tells himself.
He knows what it's like to be on a deadline and that it usually isn't good.
No immediate excuse comes to mind for why he's checking on her with Kon at his feet and a tray of homemade ramen in hand.
Though any explanations he tries to grasp doesn't seem to matter when her door opens, and she looks like she's on the verge of crying.
Intelligibly, he greets her with, "Uh…" and she answers with a sniff, a harsh rub of her face with the sleeve of her sweater, and a shudder of an exhale while Kon winds himself around her legs and meows.
"Dinner?" he finally manages, and though she sniffs again, she chuckles weakly, and lets him in.
The paint fumes fill the space, the music pounding along the wall in accompaniment to the headache he can feel creeping along the inside of his skull; Ichigo doesn't know how she's been working like this.
He doesn't shut the door.
Rukia crosses her arms and manages a somewhat choked, "Thanks," before leading him towards the kitchen.
"Owed you for last time," he gets out.
"No, you don't."
"Shut up and eat your noodles."
She huffs out a laugh that seems to surprise even her as she ducks her head, cheeks warming from the steam coming off the bowl.
"You okay?" he ventures to ask.
A tiny shrug is her answer, admitting, "Just stressed out."
Ichigo nods his understanding. He knows what it's like – his own deadline is approaching like a freight train, and he can feel the tiny spikes of adrenaline hitting him at the oddest times. He's glad for the surge in creativity a week ago, it's saved him the fate Rukia's clearly in. Though telling her so seems unnecessary, she seems well aware of what being behind schedule feels like. With nothing else to add to the conversation, he doesn't say anything, but Rukia doesn't seem to mind.
She adds, "It's my first show."
And he doesn't say he knows because that's creepy, so he just nods again.
"My brother…my brother might come."
Ichigo isn't sure what his face is doing so his eyes don't leave his bowl. "Is he supportive?"
"He is," Rukia hurries to say, "the rest of my family…isn't. But he is…so…so I'm nervous." He doesn't have to contribute to the conversation for it to move along, Rukia tells him in bits and pieces about leaving home, about how her parents still haven't noticed she's gone, about how she didn't want to get into the family business so that's why she's here and why she needs this to go well, and how she wants to make her brother proud because he's the only one who's opinion she actually cares about and –
Her exhale is shaky when she finishes; her bowl is empty.
He doesn't know how she managed to talk and eat at the same time, but he silently takes her bowl and his, and turns for the sink – full of dishes. Some of the cupboard doors are ajar, empty. And the little pot plants scattered everywhere look a little wilted.
Ichigo starts in on the dishes.
Quietly, Rukia tells him, "You don't have to."
His back to her, he replies, "I know."
A/n: So, if you aren't following me on tumblr – the rating for this fic will go up. I don't know when but it will because I've mentally replayed this fic in my head and stuff happens.
As usual, thank you for your comments, if you'd like a reply, as always, I do so on the ao3 version.
Otherwise, feel free to leave me mail on tumblr at everything-withered.