Chapter: You May Be Cold But My Moves Are White Hot

Shalan's Say: TEEHEE! I took some liberties. Rukia is taller than she actually is… but still shorter than Ichigo.

&

Her head nearly touched the back of her knee as she stretched, her toe pointed directly towards the ceiling.

"That, ladies and gentlemen, is stretching!" A tall man with sleek white hair clapped his hands. "Madame Rukia, if you'd please." Rukia straightened up with the practiced grace of a well-trained ballerina.

"Maestro." She smiled and bowed to him as her hand rested in his out stretched hand. Again her head nearly touched her knee. "You are too kind."

"You are too talented. Why haven't you left us for the Royal Ballet yet?" Maestro waved his hand at the instructor and led Rukia out of the room.

As the headmaster's favorite student at Le Chateau Academie du Ballet, Rukia was allowed nearly free reign of the entire seaside school building. A beautiful stone chateau on the edge of the Mediterranean sea it glistened with threads of granite that were prominent in the stone. Possessing nearly 300 sleeping rooms all floored with a shining red mahogany wood Maestro Ludovic L'Amosse couldn't simply let it rot when he found it.

He immediately bought it and within two years he had opened the best ballet academy in France, arguably the world. His students were driven harder than US Marines. In order to become a student you must receive a specific request by the maestro himself or one of his messengers. Even then it's no guarantee as a rigorous admission performance is required. But Rukia hadn't gone through any of those. Oh no.

She had been hand picked by Maestro himself when she was five years old. Since then she had become one of the most recognized dancers in Europe. If she was dancing in a ballet there was a scramble by the upper crust to buy tickets. She was famous for her technique, her fluidity, her passion, and her beauty.

Standing at 5'7" she was long and willowy with muscles that wove around her entire body. Her long black hair hung nearly to her waist, sleek and silky. A pair of big blue eyes lined with long black lashes were set beneath delicately curved eyebrows. At the moment she wore a leotard with leggings and a pair of magenta leg warmers over her ballet slippers.

"Rukia my darling," he cupped her face in his hand. "You look tired…"

"I'm not really, in fact, I'm never tired." She smiled. Maestro simply patted her cheek. "You will join the ballet won't you?"

"Have they been asking after me?" He smiled. Her French had barely been understandable when she had first arrived. Now she was fluent in that and several others.

"Of course, aren't they always," she had danced with them several times before as a guest but she had never really wanted to join the troupe.

"I'll think about it Maestro," she shrugged. He frowned slightly and disappointment shone in his eyes for a moment. "I said I'd think about it Maestro."

"You are the best, the best that there ever was," she shrugged again.

"I am, because you trained me to be that way."

&

He stretched luxuriously as his computer booted up, he had just gotten off his graveyard shift at the hospital that he was working at. His desperate hope would be that his favorite dancer would be online. He grinned as her screen name came online.

ShaxBoy15: What time is it there?

BellaBallerina: About half past noon.

ShaxBoy15: You going to video chat today?

"Good morning, you don't sleep do you?" Rukia stretched her arms above her head as the cocky grin of her American counterpart appeared on her screen.

"Only sometimes, I think it's you that doesn't sleep!" Ichigo smiled. She was beautiful beyond all belief, "I think I saw you today."

"Really now?"

"Yeah, on a poster advertising a ballet that's coming to New York," Ichigo smiled, leaning on his pillow.

"Ah, well you might have," it was at this moment when her eyes opened wide at his next comment.

"I'm coming to Paris." She gaped at the little tiny him on her screen.

"What? When? How?"

"Obviously by airplane, I don't think people travel any other way anymore," Ichigo chuckled. "I'm arriving on the 12 of April and I'll be there for a month. It's a medical conference." She blinked. He was a doctor?

"You're a doctor?"

"Yeah, I graduated last year." He smiled congenially as if it was no feat to graduate from medical school. Rukia's eyes widened, she didn't think he looked that old.

"You're only-"

"Twenty-five," he was delighting at the bewildered look on her pretty face. Then she suddenly looked satisfied and folded her long-long legs. "I entered a six year program when I was 17. I just recently bought a practice with my best friend."

"Ah, I see…" suddenly everything she had accomplished seemed to pale in comparison. She didn't want to tell him what she had done, what she had failed to do.

"So you're a teacher right?" Ichigo tilted his head.

"Ballet teacher."

"Where'd you go to college?"

"Juliard, though I didn't get out much," she chuckled. She hadn't hardly left her dorm room or the studio at all during her four-year stay. "I feel as though I haven't even seen the United States."

"You probably haven't, I work at a small hospital in Maryland. My father and my best friend's father owned it together. We took it over recently and have been updating it to modern standards." Ichigo chuckled.

"I work…" she paused. He knew everything about her, why was it so hard to say to a doctor 'I work at a small but elite dance school' oh, because he was a doctor.

"I assumed. You have a very nice bed." He chuckled as she blushed currant-red.

"It's Sheherazad. Unique, antique and made of the finest mahogany money can buy." Her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth as he watched her curiously. There was a look on his face that read 'awestruck'.

"I- I've never met anyone that knows…" he paused to bite back a chuckle "that much about their bed…" he laughed. She attempted to look offended but cracked into a smile instead. He was funny.

"Hey, you never did tell me your name," Rukia tilted her head. Ichigo blinked. That was right. After nearly a year and a half of correspondence they had never heard the other's name. "My name's Rukia Kuchiki."

"Kurosaki. Ichigo Kurosaki."

&

She spun in a circle as she walked down the Paris street. There was a little boutique she liked to visit on Saint Germain des Pres. She paused to pick a flower for her hair and continued into the boutique. Immediately she was embraced by a loving pair of arms.

"Rukia! You've come back to see me!" Retsu Unohana was a short, comfortable woman with long black hair that was more like a mother to Rukia than her own.

"How are you doing? Have anything new in?" Rukia beamed as Retsu dragged her into the back of the shop.

"I've been pulling aside things for you since they came in." The two of them had created an agreement that if ever anything that Rukia would like came in Retsu would save one in her size. And of course, Rukia had first dibs on anything that was one of a kind.

"You've got a whole rack here!" Rukia laughed at the woman's antics.

"Indeed I do!" Retsu laughed as she ushered Rukia into a changing room.

Rukia thoroughly enjoyed her three hours with Retsu barking instructions at her about how to stand in a dress and what shirt to wear with what skirt. By the end of her purchase she didn't even look at the price, she just handed over her credit card and ran it through.

"So who is he?" Retsu leaned over the counter on her elbows as Rukia sipped a cup of tea.

"Who is who?"

"The one you're buying all these clothes for… obviously you are staying here in Paris for a while…" Retsu smiled evilly.

"Stop that smirk on your face…" Rukia smiled softly. If Nanao had been there the hell Rukia would have gotten. "His name is Dr. Ichigo Kurosaki. He's coming here on a medical conference and I wanted to meet him."

"A doctor? You roped yourself a doctor!" Retsu lifted her eyebrows. "Have you told your brother yet?"

"My brother?" Rukia looked over at Retsu, her eyes wide. "No, I haven't… but I'm having dinner with him tonight so I suppose I will…" she turned to leave. "I haven't roped him…" she mentioned in passing, as if an after thought. Retsu chuckled.

&

Ichigo hummed as he packed his suitcase, neatly folded shirts and jeans were tucked into a duffle bag while in another bag entirely his dry cleaned suits were awaiting packing. His wild orange hair was suddenly ruffled when Uryu tugged on it.

"Earth to Kurosaki, where are you man?" He stuck a wet finger in Ichigo's ear and he yelped.

"Oi! What're you doing?" He stared at the other human being in the room.

"Waking you up! I've been telling you that you have a phone call for five minutes…" Uryu tilted his head as Ichigo left the room. "What has gotten into him?" He looked over at the laptop, sitting upon its case innocently. "She lives in Paris."

"Kurosaki Ichigo, medical magician extraordinaire," a chortle came over the line. "Hallo Yuzu."

"Hiya medical magician. Dad wants you." She stated rather simply. "Something about giving you something for your trip."

"He still thinks I'm going to fall into the Atlantic doesn't he?" Ichigo smiled. His father was a bit off his rocker.

"Probably, we've been avoiding the subject." Yuzu's voice echoed her smile.

"Good, I'll see you all tonight then." Ichigo hung up as she said goodbye. He looked over his shoulder at the black haired man in the doorframe.

"So, that's why you're so excited about this trip. Not because you're going to get to meet some of the most brilliant medical minds in history but because you get to meet your stunningly beautiful counterpart face to face…" Uryu folded his arms. Ichigo smiled sheepishly.

"You're so ridiculous," he palmed his forehead. Ichigo merely stepped past him and disappeared into his bedroom. "If she turns out to be psychotic… your head not mine." Uryu shrugged.

&

She looked around the restaurant tentatively, her mind elsewhere. She wondered what his skin felt like, her eyes half lidded. She imagined running her fingers down those rippling muscles. It seemed too good to be true that he had turned out to be that good looking. She paused in her thoughts as her brother and his wife entered the restaurant.

"Rukia," Byakuya swept upon her and kissed both of her cheeks, embracing her in something close to a bear hug. "It's been too long."

"Bya, it's only been two weeks since the last time I saw you," she chuckled as Hisana kissed both of her cheeks. "Hisana." They clasped hands and examined each other for any changes in physique. "You look good."

"Thank you," Hisana smiled. They looked as though they could be twins. Though Rukia was definitely taller than her sister-in-law Hisana was also a little rounder. Where Rukia was long and willowy Hisana was short and petite.

"So Rukia, I have word that you're staying here in Paris for a while," Byakuya gazed at her across the table. His long black hair was swept away from his face, exposing his deep blue eyes. He squeezed Rukia's hand across the table and she smiled. Her brother had nearly raised her, their parents dying when Rukia was only 6 set Byakuya, at the time a young up and comer in one of the biggest corporations in the world, as her guardian. He and his wife had taken her in and from then on Rukia was theirs.

"Yes, I have an-er-friend to see…" she shot her gaze towards the ground.

"An-er-friend?" Byakuya's eyebrows lifted. "This er-friend wouldn't happen to be male would it?"

"Perhaps…" Rukia glanced back up at her brother's face, which held a bemused twinkle.

"Ah, I see then… very well… is he a good one or another one of your dancers?"

"He's… a doctor… from the US…" she braced herself for the rampage.

"From… the United States?" Byakuya instead sounded interested. "May I meet him if he stays for a while?"

"I-er-what?" Rukia blinked.

"While he's here… may I meet him?" Byakuya shrugged. "I've been hard on company from the US… it would be nice to speak with an American again."

"I guess… I'll ask him tonight when I get home." Her chest was nearly bursting. Byakuya approved.

"You do that, and Rukia…"

"Yes, Bya?"

"Don't fall for this one."