Ishida nervously fixed his bright blue tie for the thousandth time. A New Year would start soon. He'd get to see old high school... er, "acquaintances". He'd get to see the beautiful Inoue Orihime... Indulging in a small smile at the thought, he rang the doorbell to the decent sized apartment of Orihime's.

The door quickly opened to reveal....

Kurosaki?

Any sort of happiness kind of died on the spot and his face deadpanned. Raising a dark eyebrow, Ishida simply said, "Hey idiot," and he walked past the substitute shinigami into the clean apartment. "Where's everyone?"

Kurosaki gave a glare to the back of the Quincy's head but didn't say any remark. He closed the door and rubbed the back of his head. "Everyone's on the roof. Manger let us have our party up there."

Ishida quietly noticed Ichigo looked more... mature. He was wearing a burgundy colored sweater with a gray undersweater and a white shirt beneath that, with dark gray pants. He also had a gray scarf... Orihime's touch.

Ishida already hated him, and it had only been 30 seconds. But, as Ishida noticed, his hair was as messy as ever. Heh.

For an awkward moment, Kurosaki and the black-haired Quincy had a sort of stand off... However, the ever tactful Shinigami coughed and asked gruffly, "The entrance to the roof is over here."

Ishida gave a brief nod and replied "Ladies first," with a smirk.

Scowling, Kurosaki opened the sliding door leading to the balcony and climbed the ladder to the roof.

Following his lead, Ishida climbed up the ladder but slipped a bit at first. When he climbed up, he noticed a certain orange-haired person give him a look that clearly said, "Heh. I win."

"Ishida-kun~!"

A tackle-hug greeted Ishida, along with the vision of caramel-colored hair. "I'm so glad you made it! Come on, let's go say hi to everybody!" Quickly grabbing his arm, she dragged him off.

After 10 minutes of small talk with familiar faces, Orihime went off to play hostess.

Apparantly, everyone dressed up for this little party. Good thing I wanted to look nice. Ishida thought.

"Ishida!" a rough male voice called. "Over here!"

Ishida turned to see Abarai Renji, with a drink in hand. "Abarai, good to see you." He said, with a nod to acknowledge him.

"How ya been?" the red-head asked, take a few swigs from his drink in between sentecnces. "In fact, where ya been?

Ishida gave a small smile. "I got a job that moves around a lot. And I've been good, you?"

"Been awright." Renji said with a small yawn.

The red-head sipped more of his drink. "Want some?" He offered, "Drinks are over... there, I believe," he added with a point to a black and white cooler in the corner.

"Thanks," Ishida said with a grin. "Appreciate it."

"Everyone~!! Attention please!"

Tapping her glass, Orihime stood up on a table to make sure everybody could hear her. "I've got an announcement to make!"

Conversations were hushed, glasses were put down and all attention focused on the bubbly woman.

Giving a happy smile, she began almost shyly. "Well, I know you guys have heard some stuff about me and my personal affairs lately..."

Confused, Ishida turned to Renji. Huh?

Rukia, clad in a beautiful bright blue wrap dress (which, Ishida noticed, Renji took to very well), she explained in a whisper. "Rumor is, she and Ichigo are getting engaged."

Perhaps he was looking too deeply into her tone and face, but she looked no happier than Ishida was at this news. Ishida sipped a bit from his drink--

"...Well, I gathered you all here on this happy New Year's Eve to tell you: ME AND KUROSAKI-KUN ARE ENGAGED!"

--"Pssttt!!!"

Ishida coughed, choking partially on the alcohol and the news. Hissing lowly to Renji and Rukia he asked, "What?! Since when??"

Renji gave Ishida one long, odd stare. After struggling to find his voice, the redhead sputtered, "Are you kiddin me? You had no idea?"

Elbowing Renji in the ribs (which, by the way, was all she could reach, as Renji pointed, deserving him a kick in the shin), Rukia said a bit sweeter, "You mean you didn't know they were living together?"

Ishida shook his head.

"Dating?"

Again, a head shake.

"Did you know anything??" Rukia cried, out wondering how Ishida, of all people, could not notice their behavior. It was so....couple-y.

Ishida gave both his shinigami friends a glare and sipped his drink with more relish. "Well, excuse me if I've been 100 miles away," Ishida said unhappily. And today I was going to tell her... But that doesn't seem to be happening. At all.

Renji shook his head disbelievingly. "Damn, Quincy, you missed out on a lot."

"Yeah, I noticed." Though he tried to keep his voice even, a bit of sarcasim leaked though. Couldn't blame him, though. "This is just grand."

Sighing, Rukia replied that she would be right back to congradulate her friend. She added to the crowd surrounding the couple-to-be.

Loosening his tie, Ishida said a simple, "I have to go," and left. Not that anyone would notice. Climbing down with a deflated attitude, he jumped down from the last step.

He grabbed his navy blue jacket and threw it over his shoulder. Moments of his time with Orihime flashed through his mind. It was never gonna happen anyway. He told himself as a way of comfort. Shaking his head, he opened the door to leave.

"Ishida-kun~? Why are you leaving?"

Startled (I didn't even hear her), Ishida looked up. A nervous grin fixsated itself on his face. "H-Hey, Inoue-san. I, uh, have to go back to work eaarly in the morning. I'm a hard worker!" He said with a small laugh.

She looked worried. "You don't want to stay?"

"No, no. It's just--"

"Are you happy for me?" Her tone held hope in it, that he would approve.

"O-Of course!"

Ishida felt his throat tighten. A single thought filled his brain: Am I really?