AN: Whoa, here I am. And thanks for the reviews! Lol, well, I really didn't know how big the impact would be on my reviewers when I said I was a guy. Hehe, well, yeah I am a guy, my real name is Cyrus, and I am a high-school student in his last year. There we go. All the personal details I care to give out. Oh yeah, and I'm Filipino as well. Now, back to the chapter…Say hip-hip and hooray, RenjixTatsuki fans. Here they come :P

Disclaimer: I do not own Bleach (even though much thanks goes to that person who asked me if I actually did own the anime XD)

A Summer Job: Rehabilitation (Part I)

Renji wandered down the long marble hallways, noting to himself the expensive designs that littered the walls. From what he had seen of the house, which was just the room he was in, and the hallway outside his room, he had found out that it was big. Not as in, 'wow, you've got a big house', big, but big as in, 'DUDE! This is a freakin' MANSION!' kind of big.

Just a few minutes before, he had been lying in the bed, wondering what he would do, now that he was awake. Even though he was awake, he still felt…rather weak. No, not rather weak, but very weak. It was like someone had sucked out the spiritual energy in him, but there was still a tiny ebb left. Shrugging the depressing thoughts away – that he actually hadn't recovered properly - he approximated that he had slept for; about another 4 hours, from the last time he had woken up; and a quick glance at the large grandfather clock confirmed his estimation; it was about 11:30AM. No wonder he was feeling a bit peckish. But, other than the fruit that resided on the wooden table next to his bed, there was nothing else. He didn't want to go out of the room to meet, that girl, but instead he had decided that the fruit on the table had to do. Upon further inspection, he was appalled to find that the fruits were made out of plastic. Further inspection meaning, taking a large bite, then spitting out the bits of apple plastic, leaving him with no choice, but to go see Tatsuki.

He continued walking down the long elegant hallways, wondering why he was so…worried about meeting the girl again. There was something about her that he had failed to notice under her veil when he had gone to her school. Upon attending Ichigo's school, he once had quietly observed the spiky-haired girl out of interest. She wasn't much different to other girls, however, she was rather tomboyish, and excelled in martial arts. The latter he found much more exciting. He grinned to himself as he remembered learning about her and her obsession with martial arts.

He had only been going to the school for 2 weeks, so he didn't really know his way around. He had accidentally walked in on a guy bullying another boy, smaller than him. He had wondered what he should do; help the smaller guy? He didn't have enough time to make the choice, because the bigger guy had been knocked over by a girl; none other than Arisawa Tatsuki. Renji had blinked, not believing his eyes. That girl, had just executed a perfect flying kick that knocked the…much larger guy…out. She was definitely different to other girls in that aspect. That was the first, and last encounter (so he had thought) of Arisawa Tatsuki. They never talked, only acknowledged that the other lived, as most classmates did. Nothing really special – only Renji was a bit interested (though he wouldn't admit it to himself) that she was exceptionally good at martial arts, even for a human.

That was all. That should have been all. Until he had met her now. Again. Nothing really special, basically all he had to do was recover, thank Tatsuki for her help, give her an explanation in exchange for her help, then zip on back to Soul Society. He wasn't that big headed that he couldn't admit to himself that he was still in need of healing. Just thinking about it made the weakness in his body jolt, making him painfully aware that there was still something wrong with his body.

That damn poison.

That damn poison indeed. It would slow his healing process; he wasn't fazed by what the large arrancar had threatened him with. Death. Death that was promised after a slow poison could always, always, be fixed. He added the second 'always' to reassure himself. The question was who would fix it.

He continued walking down the long halls aimlessly, when suddenly one of the many doors that lined the hallways opened. If Renji hadn't been so lost in his thoughts, he would have dodged the fast approaching door quite easily. However, still deep in his musings, he just stupidly looked at the fast approaching wood, wondering what the hell it was doing. His question was answered quite speedily, as he lay on the ground, blood spurting from his nose.

"Oh. Abarai."

The spiky haired girl that he had been musing about now looked disdainfully over him, almost wrinkling her small nose in disgust. She was wearing familiar baggy pants, with a regular white t-shirt. Renji looked up from his position on the floor, slightly shocked and dazed.

She changed her look to a slightly apologetic one, as she figured out why he was lying down.

"Sorry about that," she said as she helped him up.

"Uh…" he mumbled, rubbing his nose.

She gave him a weird look. "Are you sure you should be out of bed?"

"I'm hungry," he told her flatly, never one for many words. She had noticed this during the time she had seen him at the school. Once the teacher had asked him if he had done his homework; whilst others in the class 'beat around the bush' making up spectacular excuses – Keigo's was the best; he had spun the classic tale of his dog eating his homework; he had even held up the remains of his, 'supposed' homework. However, under further inspection, it looked suspiciously like the English notes they had taken just the period before – Renji just told the teacher that he hadn't done the stupid homework. Sure, both he and Keigo received detention, but at least it came to Renji's desk faster.

"Well, why are you in front of my room then?"

Renji growled. So did his stomach. "How the hell was I supposed to know that it was your room?"

She sighed. Blunt as usual. "Ok, ok, I'll show you to the kitchen. Anyway," she added, as they started down the hallway, "It's about lunch time."

"Hn." He was really hungry. And he was feeling weak. No time to argue. If this is where food was, then this is where he was going to go.

As they entered the spacious dining area, Renji noted, and not for the first time, that there seemed to be nobody else in the humungous house. He would have to ask her about it later. For now, all he needed was to quench his growling stomach. Speaking of which, it just growled again.

Tatsuki turned around, looking at him accusingly. "I swear, no wonder you can wake up."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You have your own alarm clock inside your stomach," she told him, as she walked into the cooking area of the kitchen, which was massive, like the rest of the house.

"Shut-up."

"Do you want food?"

Renji shut-up.

He looked at the traditional Japanese meal in front of him. He dug in after saying the correct words. Wow. Tatsuki actually turned out to be a good cook. She would definitely make a good wife, he thought absentmindedly to himself.

THE HELL!

He almost choked on his rice. Tatsuki looked up in mild surprise.

"Abarai," she stated nonchalantly. "Get over it. It's food."

Stupid woman. It wasn't the food. Seeing that he said nothing, even after he had stopped choking, she continued.

"If you really want, you can eat Inoue's cooking…" she trailed off, but Renji could swear he could see an evil glint in her eyes. He furiously gave her a negative answer with his arms, because his mouth was still full.

Her small mouth quirked a little as she resumed her meal. Renji just busied himself with the meal, trying to ignore the heat that was uncomfortably creeping across his face.

The hell did I think that crap for?

He didn't trust himself to look at her again, and just busied himself with his food.

The food had been cleared away, and they sat at the smaller dining table. Renji sat there with his arms crossed over his body, while Tatsuki leaned on the table, her face resting in her palms. An awkward silence followed. Finally Tatsuki spoke up.

"So…" she paused. "Are you going to explain?"

The red head sighed audibly. "Ok. Well…" he stopped, searching for the correct words.

Tatsuki said nothing.

"Ok, where do I start?"

It was Tatsuki's turn to sigh. "Well, you could start by telling me exactly what that thing was that you were fighting."

The way she said the word, 'exactly', made him feel like she had some tingling of what the arrancar's really were.

"Ok, since I don't know how much you know about these things, as you call them, I'll start from the beginning."

She nodded.

"Basically…no wait," he paused. "Do you know what I am?"

Tatsuki frowned. Was this a trick question? She knew he wasn't an ordinary human being, but the only thing she could really compare him to was…

"Something like…Ichigo?" She faltered, unsure. All she was sure about was that she had seen her childhood friend dressed in a similar way to Abarai Renji. And he was hefting a huge-ass sword.

Renji nodded at the girl in front of him. "Yeah…you could say that. We are…" he paused for emphasis. "We are Shinigami."

He expected her to crack up laughing, or to look at him with big oogly eyes, or something that was different to what she just did.

She just sat there, almost as if she expected that answer. She didn't say anything, just motioned for him to keep on going.

"Well, yeah, the idea may seem stupid to you, but we are Shinigami. Now, there are these bad souls," he said, skipping the part about how the 'good' souls go to Soul Society, "They are called hollows."

Tatsuki nodded in her palms, slowly digesting the information. Renji studied her for a moment. A small face, framed by her hands, her hair that seemed to go off into numerous tangents, deep eyes, and a small nose. She wasn't the epitome of beauty, that was for sure, but she wasn't exactly ugly as well. She was…well…sort of cute, he decided, before his brain could make any drastic changes to his wayward thoughts. Luckily her voice snapped him out those exact same 'wayward' thoughts.

"So the thing you were fighting last night…that was a hollow?"

"No." Straight to the point as usual.

"Well?" she said expectantly.

"That thing I was fighting last night, that was called an arrancar. It is a hollow that has tried to take off its mask, to seek shinigami powers."

Again, the girl in front of him nodded, as if this was nothing new. He wondered this thought aloud.

The girl in front of him grinned slightly and said, "I've known that there were these 'other' beings for quite sometime now. Well, maybe only recently." She stopped, weighing the guy in front of her known as shinigami. "But I have seen an arrancar, as you call it. There was this time, when this thing just sort of…sucked out some energy out of me…and I could hardly breathe." She stopped, breathing in deeply.

Renji nodded to himself. That was right, the girl had survived an attack by the arrancars before the actual fights.

"And…I had seen Ichigo in the same type of uniform as you."

Renji nodded again to himself. That was plausible as well. Her spiritual energy (he could already feel it) was growing slowly, so that meant at some point in her life, she had been able to see Ichigo as his shinigami form, but had probably not said anything about it.

"Did you wonder why you could see him, when nobody else could?"

"Yeah. But...me and Ichigo have grown apart these last few years, so I didn't really question him about it."

"Hn."

An awkward silence followed, neither party saying much. Well, he had told her the basics of the situation hadn't he? He guessed that was probably enough. Right now though, he felt like he would fall asleep; he felt so weak. Even though he had just eaten, he had realised that his spiritual energy was still low, and he needed some time to recover. He stood up, his chair raking back across the polished wooden floor.

"Well…" he said, "I hope I explained it all right. I'll just -..."

He never finished his sentence, for he had tried to take a step during his talk, and had abruptly fainted on the wooden floor. An instant knock out.

He cracked open an eyelid, waiting for his eye to get used to his surroundings. In the dark, he could hardly see the shapes of the room, but at least he knew where he was.

Shit.

He sat up awkwardly, rubbing his head. How did it get so dark, so quickly? And why was he in bed? He was feeling fine, wasn't he? A sharp pain that thudded in his shoulder reminded him that he wasn't fine at all.

He looked down past his shoulder, and saw Tatsuki; the front of her body lying on the bed, while her lower body was still attached to a chair. It looked as if she was looking after him, and had fallen asleep on the job. Judging by the look on her face, she was worried. For the first time in a while, Renji couldn't help but smile at the fact that someone was actually worried about him.

AN: Ok, ok, there we go. It's a teeny bit late, and yeah. Needing sleep pretty badly. Anyway, this chapter is good for all you RenjixTatsuki lovers. However, their relationship is probably the hardest to work on, considering they hardly know each other and yeah. But I guess that's what makes it a lot more interesting, right? Please review! I need inspiration, and also I need your comments, questions, suggestions, etc. CYA!