AN: Ideas sprouting left and right, but I'm currently studying abroad in Morocco and I'm kept busy enough that I don't really get much time to sit and write. Thanks for the reviews on the first chapter everyone!

I do not own these characters. All creative genius belongs to Tite Kubo

Floating

She sat at the edge of the pool as her classmates tried not to drown.

Or at least that's what it seemed they were doing. They had insisted that she join, but this was just another human activity she didn't quite understand. After all, Rukia had passed over too young to learn while alive and such things had never had a part in her years in Rukongai or in her shinigami life afterwards. And now, stuck somewhere in between in her borrowed form, it still didn't come easily to her. Her small feet trailed in the strange-smelling water (Inoue had called it chlorine?) as the boys splashed playfully at girls who shrieked in feigned resistance. The water sparkled cheerfully in the sunlight, the definition of inviting but Rukia sat and watched.

Inoue broke from the group and swam over, bright hair slick and gleaming. Leaning over the edge she beamed up at her, slightly out of breath, "Kuchiki-san, won't you join us? It's so pleasant in the water!"

Rukia shook her head lightly, "It's nice out here, too."

Tugging teasingly at one of the feet dipped in the pool, Inoue started to try again. "Oh, please join..."

Her invitation trailed off as a lean shadow fell over the two girls. Rukia looked over her shoulder, blinking up at the figure outlined by brightness. Ichigo squinted down at them, dressed in swim trunks and a towel hooked by two fingers and thrown over his shoulder. Rukia noted that even he appeared affected by the day's activities, brow mostly smoothed of frowns and posture more relaxed.

"Yo," he greeted.

Orihime spoke first, one hand raised in welcome. "Kurosaki-kun! I was just trying to convince Kuchiki-san to swim with us."

Ichigo raised an eyebrow in question towards Rukia and she shrugged in response. After a few moments punctuated by Orihime's hopeful eyes and Ichigo's curious gaze she sighed and admitted shamelessly, "I don't know how."

Orihime made a noise of comprehension and exclaimed, "Please, I would love to teach you! It really is not very hard at all."

"Well, I-" Rukia started to protest but Ichigo cut her off with a smirk that came off as, and probably was, a challenge.

"You scared, Rukia?"

A muscle near her temple twitched and Rukia turned a glare on Ichigo. "I am not afraid, you fool. Not knowing how to do something is not the equivalent of being afraid of it, idiot."

"Well, someone's offering to take care of the 'not knowing how' ain't they?," Ichigo retorted. When Rukia's only response was to treat him to a sharper glare, he lifted and dropped a shoulder before turning away. "Suit yourself."

He didn't make it two feet before Inoue's cry of surprise had him looking back around just in time to see Rukia's slim form breaking the glittering surface, elegant even in her inexperience. It took him about five long, tense seconds before he realized she wasn't coming back up. In those same five seconds Rukia was vacillating between chastising herself for being so rash and trying to will her limbs into action. It might have been inappropriate to say her classmates had been drowning, but she was certainly showing them how it should be done.

She didn't have much time to panic in the eerily calm underwater before a muted splash reached her waterlogged ears, followed by blurred sunlight filtering through orange hair and warm arms pulling her up, up until she broke through gasping and sputtering and trying to blink the water from her disoriented eyes.

"You little idiot!" Ichigo shouted through heavy breathing, the harshness of his voice at odds with the concern in his glower and the way he moved to keep her afloat. "What the hell was that?"

Coughing, Rukia braced her hands against his shoulders to glare right back, "W-What? You're the one who challenged me!"

Mouth dropping open in disbelief Ichigo practically growled, "Challenge? I meant you should learn, not throw yourself in and prove you can sink like a rock!"

Rukia started to counter but suddenly the sun was too bright, the worried exclamations around her too loud and Ichigo was much, much too close. She was abruptly aware that she was pressed against the heat of his body by the arm around her waist while his free limbs worked to keep them at the surface. For a moment he froze and as they bobbed precariously in the pool Rukia knew he'd realized too. Eyes wide, she jerked and moved to put distance between them because Rukia was not one for such closeness, and surely neither was Ichigo but there he was tightening his hold.

"Hey! Stop flailing!" He warned sharply before taking in the discomfort coloring Rukia's face. Blinking he tried again, more gently this time. "What're you scared for dimwit, I'm not gonna let you drown."

Ichigo's rough assurance and his unrelenting proximity made her fidget once more before she forced herself to relax against him. "I'm not afraid," she insisted once more.

And it was true, although both of them know they might drown in more than just water.